Belichick’s ‘Legacy,' a Texas NBA Gauntlet, Boston’s 3 Party, Ja’s Big Season, and Week 6 NFL Picks With Kirk Goldsberry, Chris Vernon, and Joe House

22:25And De 'Aaron Fox has never been a very good three-point shooter. So I think it's fair to say the biggest question mark overall on the offense is De 'Aaron Fox and three-point shooting. Will they be, what would they rank last year in offense? I had to hear my notes. I think they were 20, no, 19th in offense. They need to be better than that to make the playoffs.

22:47Bill Simmons:Yeah, and Wemby missed, what, the last two and a half months? Yeah, again, that happened, I think, when you were in town in Austin. Those were the first games he missed in February. And so, yeah, he didn't play February, March, and April. Fando has an unbelievable prop for Wemby, by the way. Tell me. Will Wemby average 25 points, 12-plus rebounds, 4-plus assists, and lead the league in blocks this season? which are four things that sound realistic to me. And yeah, I hate to judge the preseason. 25, 12, 4, plus 750, it's year three. Plus 750 are the odds for that. I was trying to think which one I'd be the most worried about.

23:31Bill Simmons:And I think it's the 12 plus rebounds. Yeah, that's fair, but there's nobody else on the team that rebounds. And that's another weakness is if Harrison Barnes is your four, there's a lot of rebounds to be collected. I genuinely think Cornette's going to play real minutes for this team. Cornette's good. He's not a starter, but if he's like your seventh man and he's playing 20 to 25, they just didn't have anyone like that last year. And they can play him with Wemby, which I think they know. That's why they overpaid for him. How do you tell Spurs fans what to expect with the Luke Cornette experience?

24:04Bill Simmons:He's just every once in a while, he looks like he's like the 23rd best player in the league. You just have to know that. You don't know when it's coming. It could be any game. You'll watch him on the right night and you'll be like, this guy should be making$30 million a year. What a steal that we have him. And then there'll be another game where you didn't realize he played. I loved him though. I thought he was such a good bench guy and the Celts are obviously going to really miss him. But the Spurs were smart. They used their cap space proactively. I don't know why they didn't get Yavasele. I keep mentioning that.

24:36Bill Simmons:But another fun prop for Wemby, by the way, is will he average more blocks than assists next season? Well, that's what I was going to say. So blocks would be like five? I would say four or five blocks. And if you're watching these Spurs preseason games against one Chinese team in the Miami Heat last night, you're going to notice that Victor is making a lot more passes. And part of that is every point guard on the roster is missing the preseason, or at least the first part of the preseason. So they're running offense through him. But, you know, when he gets two cent out of him, he makes the right play.

25:11He is a sort of typical European big man in that sense. So I think he can get to five or six assists, but we might be seeing a little bit of a red herring in the preseason. I have these two stats from the GM survey about Wemby that I think should get Spurs fans excited. If you were starting a franchise today and could sign any NBA player in the NBA, who would it be? Victor Wembenyama received 83 % of the votes from the GMs.

25:38Bill Simmons:By the way, who are the 17 % that had another pick? Well, Jokic got at least one. Jokic is 30. And then SGA got three or four. So again, that is a huge sign. Maybe not this year. Maybe we're two years away from being two years away, but that's a great sign that people around the league who build basketball teams are pointing at the guy in San Antonio and being like, that's the best guy to start a team with. Wemby to record a quadruple double this season, which I'm not sure has ever happened. 18 to one. I think he could do that. Wemby to do a five by five in any game this year, which means at least five points in the five categories.

26:21Bill Simmons:That's plus 340. I feel like he's going to do that in like November. I would bet all these Wemby things. The question for me is how many games is he going to play? Forget the stats. Can we just keep him on the floor? Can we keep them on the floor for 70 games? That's what they're over under, which we're going to cover in more detail next week on this pod. But 44 and a half, which I thought was right. That's like right around the right number. We forgot they have Olenek too now. I know. A bunch of former Celtics stretchy bigs in the Spurs ecosystem. All right, so what was your big Dallas question other than the obvious of when the hell is Kyrie coming back?

26:55Well, I can't wait to talk to you about Cooper Flag.

26:58Bill Simmons:Yeah. The one question that has been the number one question for any Anthony Davis team over the last 15 years since you and I have known each other is what? Can this guy stay right? I mean, if he's right, if he's healthy, they're going to be good. And I think that's sort of a boring one. So let's lean in to the second one, which is, is Cooper flag going to be great right away? Let's let's fucking go. I'm so ready for this. I'm so ready. Yeah. Let's take a break and then come back and really hit this. This episode is brought to you by Uber Eats. Every football season, the same thing happens. The game somehow makes everybody really hungry.

27:39Bill Simmons:Quarterback scrambles, clearly a sign for breakfast burritos. Yeah. Turnovers suddenly dessert at 2 p.m. Doesn't sound so crazy. Wing formations. Well, those can only mean buffalo wings, as if they're ever not in play. Even the goalposts start looking suspiciously like french fries. It's almost like football is sending the message to eat more food. Yeah, the good news, Uber Eats makes those cravings easy to satisfy with game day deals all season long. From wings and pizza to chips, drinks, and even last minute grocery runs. Don't sleep on those. You'll find savings on all your favorites delivered straight to your door.

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28:19Bill Simmons:All right, so Kurt Goldsberry asked me before the break, is Cooper Flag ready to be great right away? And I'm not doing all my basketball stuff next week. I don't want to step on any take, any opinion, any over-under prediction, anything. But I'm going to do it just for this because I can't believe their over-under is 41 and a half. And I think, so last year they were 39 and 43, but they had the Luka trade halfway in January, whenever it was. And Davis played a game and got hurt, completely messed up year. And they bring in D-Low, at least for first half of the season. Kyrie hopefully comes in.

28:59Bill Simmons:I don't see any scenario. 41 and a half means basically 42 and 40. It means they're going to have a winning season. I don't see any scenario where Dallas is 500 or under this season. They're going to be too fucking good defensively. And the reason is because Cooper Flagg, who's an overcompetitive psycho, who you would have known that if you watched that Duke or followed him in high school or anything, he's a maniac. And they're going to have him with Davis, with Lively, with Gafford, with PJ Washington. This team's going to be such a bitch to try to score against, get offense against. Just they're going to win 43 games just on defense.

29:36Bill Simmons:So I'm in. I'm in on a bunch of Dallas stuff, but that one was the one that jumped out. And to answer your question again, I think he's going to be good right away. I think he's going to be genuinely, noticeably impactful. And it's going to be every game because of the way he's wired. Yeah. And I did that big feature with him for the ringer right before the draft, which I got to meet him and spend time with his people up in Maine. And it was thrilling for me. But I also, you know, fell in love with the subject and I love this guy. And I'm a believer now to the first preseason look only sort of solidified my my stance that he is going to be impactful right away.

30:18when we were asked to do the Ringer 100 rankings. I had a really tough time figuring out where to put him. I ended up putting him at 31, Bill, because I think he's going to be really good right away. And again, you can roast me all you want, but this dude is going to be a two-way force. I had him 34. Oh, see? What a great...

30:39Bill Simmons:By the way, I initially had him, I sent it to House and one other friend I have for a list, and I had him in the 20s. And both of them had an intervention. They were like, he's never played a game. You can't put him in the 20s. You can't put him against real guys. I'm like, I don't know, man. This is going to be one of the most additive guys that has come into the league this century. Everything he does helps the team win. I'll tell you the stat that Joe House needs to hear, which is Cooper Flagg was the youngest or second youngest player in all of college basketball last year. And he won the Naismith trophy.

31:16He was 17. His twin brother is just starting at the University of Maine this fall. He's a baby, and he was the best player in college hoops. He's a freak. It's actually not a big enough story.

31:27Bill Simmons:I don't think this is like a fucking prodigy coming in here. He's turning 19 in December. My only fear with him is I just want them to use him correctly and not try to do this thing where they're trying to teach him how to be a point forward. And some of the stuff we saw, Durant's first year in Seattle, they're like, you're a two guard. And all of a sudden they were using him as a two guard. That was stupid. Giannis had that stretch, which I think ultimately long-term helped him. But short-term was really ugly to watch when Jason Kidd was trying to make him a point guard. And with Flagg, I just like ease him into it.

32:04Bill Simmons:This is not who the offense should be running around. All these young guards are going to be diving at his legs and trying to steal the ball from him. Just, you know, it took Tatum until year six to be a point forward, you know, or year five. He'll make the right plays. And that's what I think. His summer league debut sort of captured that too. Like he's not making his shots, but he's still the best player on the court because he's making every other play. He doesn't care. I mean, it's a cliche. He doesn't care about his own points. He cares about winning, as you alluded to earlier. He's the most competitive prospect.

32:36He's the most additive prospect.

32:38Bill Simmons:I can't think of another one in the last 15 years. Davis is probably the closest. Like what Davis was in Kentucky, which is like, oh yeah, you can put that anywhere and figure out how to make it work. The thing about Flagg, I really do think he can play the three with them. I do think they could play Davis with the center and then have him at the three. And his ability, he's going to be like what Tatum was like last year for the Celtics. We're just able to guard every position on the court. He's going to be able to guard guards. He's going to be able to guard small forwards. And there's going to be teams that come in to play Dallas that are just going to be like, what the hell?

33:16Bill Simmons:What we can't get in. We can't get a shot within 15 feet of the basket. And every time we think we have something, somebody switches onto a guy. That's why I feel like the D 'Lo Kyrie thing. I don't even really care because ultimately they're going to have so much size and length and switchability and just all things that we know works in the NBA. Yeah, I'm with you on the over-unders. It's fascinating to me that their number is lower than the San Antonio number. Because I just compare those teams. That seems backwards to me. Because I think that the Mavericks do have a signature thing, which is one of the best frontcourts, if not the best frontcourt in the NBA.

33:55Because I love Lively. Gafford is great. Then you have AD, Cooper Flagg, PJ Washington. Washington, I think this is just a deeper, more physical athletic team than people realize. And I think they have a chip on their shoulder, too. They weren't happy with how last year went down. They're looking at this year as a chance to reframe the conversation.

34:18Bill Simmons:I didn't realize you were going to agree with me on this. I thought we were going to argue about it. I'm like a 10 out of 10 bullish on them this season. Like, I looked at the odds. They're 27 to 1 to win the West. And I'm not saying they're going to win the West. But Golden State is 16-1. And the Lakers are 10-1. And the Clippers are 10-1. And Houston with Dovan Vliet is 10-1. And I just think if Kyrie is back and able to give them something, combined with what they're getting from Flag, which is basically we both think he's going to be one of the best 35 guys in the league. You're just putting that in there.

34:51Bill Simmons:And somebody that's going to Swiss Army knife everything they're doing. OKC Endeavor I have up there. And I have Minnesota-Houston 3A-3B. And then after that, I don't see any reason why they couldn't be as good or better than any of those other teams. Yeah, I went through the West myself. OKC and Denver, we agree, are on a separate plane. OKC probably above Denver. And then there's a clump. And there was a clump last year. And Houston was at the top of the clump, but just barely. And I think that's still the case. It's Minnesota, the Clippers, the Warriors, the Lakers. You have to put them there.

35:23The Rockets. but I like the Mavs. Again, they have a robust set of players. Depth is one of the most important things in the current NBA, and they're deep. And D 'Lo, by the way, who's never been my favorite player, but is in another contract year situation, I think he has an option next season. He's going to want to prove maybe to the Mavericks or maybe to the rest of the league that he's worth a bigger deal than the one-year$6.5 million deal or whatever they're paying him on. with that option. So I think, look, you know, you know who D 'Lo is?

36:00Bill Simmons:He's your buddy that comes to visit. And it's really great when he's only there for one day. And by day six, you're like, I'm ready for him to leave. That's D 'Lo. D 'Lo would be great for the one day, which in this case will be two months of his first season with the Mavericks. And they're going to, they'll go through all the stages of D 'Lo, right? They're going to be like, wow, what a steal. My God, D 'Lo at 35 tonight. He's amazing. They're not going to have to worry about the playoff version of him because Kyrie will be back by then. And he's got Jason Kidd too. And I think Jason Kidd deserves a mention too, right, Bill?

36:32It's like, okay, can he get through to D-Low? Maybe not, but he's played with AD before. I don't know if anyone's getting through D-Low at this point. That's fair. And I do think, but there's a chance Kyrie comes back in February or March and they have one of the deepest teams in the West if the health gods bless them this year.

36:53Bill Simmons:So they are over the first apron, under the second apron. We didn't even mention Clay Thompson, dude. Sure. I didn't have him. No, he's a nice rotation guy. But when I think about their defensive apex with the five guys, I don't have him out there. But yeah, I think Dallas is going to be really good. I'm really excited about it. I can't wait for Flag. I think they're going to be a potential must-watch. And, uh, I had one more thing on this. So if you had to, would you rank Dallas ahead of San Antonio right now? A hundred percent. And that's no shade against my friends in San Antonio. I I'm worried about the deer and Fox thing.

37:37Um, the hamstring, you can tell him he's going to miss a week or two, but you know, like a younger Chris Paul, once the hamstring starts going, that's his, that's his thing. He needs speed. He needs those muscles to be going at full speed to play the Deere and Fox game. So yeah, I think there's less question marks in the Dallas rotation than there are in the San Antonio rotation.

38:00Bill Simmons:You know what's funny? San Antonio at 44 and a half. I could totally see them being really good this year because just Wemby just becomes awesome. Of all the MVP guys, because MVP is going to come down to the same four guys it always comes down to, but Wemby is like the wild card at 12 to 1. It's like, yeah, we might be one weekend of the season that might be three to one because he just had 49 points and 12 blocks against somebody. I think from a fun standpoint, I probably have Houston third. But what about if I asked you, you could be any of these three teams for the rest of the decade? You'd pick San Antonio, correct?

38:45I would pick San Antonio. And it's not for the current year or even maybe the next year. Uh, but the same reason those GMs are saying that it's cause I got the alien at the center of my roster under cost control. I think he's making 13 % of the cap and another group to watch are my old friends in the San Antonio front office. They have a really high stakes moment here, Bill, to surround Victor Weminyama with a talented enough group to do what he's capable of doing, uh, and not end up in like a LeBron in the first Cleveland administration, uh, era.

39:19Bill Simmons:Well, you know where that guy kind of hosed? they played that DeJounte Murray trade perfectly. They had those Hawks picks. And yet the Hawks are now going to be good. So you have like, oh yeah, someday we'll have the Hawks picks. And it's like, oh, that's not going to really help you because the Hawks are probably going to be a four seed. Well, let me give some love to, there's a poetic thing behind what you just said is my guy Ansi Sala, the new GM of the Hawks, is a protege of R.C. Buford. And he learned. And just like Sam Presti, you learn in San Antonio. and then you start becoming a problem for San Antonio.

39:54But yeah, you're exactly right with those Hawks.

39:56Bill Simmons:So the GM survey you mentioned, John Schumann, shout out to him. Always enjoy all his stuff during the year on NBA.com, especially the Monday Power Poll, I think is a must read. So they asked the last question in the GM survey was, what rule, parentheses, regarding play schedule, draft lottery, playoff format, roster construction, etc. et cetera, most needs to change. And they said number one at 26 % was roster construction. And some of the things mentioned were apron rules too harsh, add a cap discount for own drafted players. Mentioned that multiple times on this podcast. Allow trading partial salaries and make all minimum contracts the same.

40:43Bill Simmons:We all agree that the apron rules are so stupid that I actually think Adam Silver needs to pop some chest hair and maybe reopen this and be like, we kind of fucked this up. Is there a way to fix this before next season? Because this is too prohibitive. This is stupid. He won't, but he should. Allow trading partial salaries almost broke my brain. Yeah. So I guess that means I can trade somebody, but only 15 million of him, like somebody's making 30 million. I trade 15 million. I'll still carry my cap and you have to carry the 15 million on yours. Baseball has trades like this. Basketball doesn't.

41:25Bill Simmons:I thought it was a pretty good idea. I was kind of mad I never thought of it. Right? Yeah, it's just a general reaction to front offices are having a hard time right now. And we can't build out teams the way we want to with this rule. Because I've written earlier this summer, this is a hard cap. The second apron is a hard cap. What do we have, one team over it right now? It's always been a hard cap. Right. And it hasn't been good for players. And it's really harsh on general managers who are trying to build teams. But the trading partial salaries, they would have to amend the CBA on my understanding.

42:02And it's just like, that's not going to happen. No.

42:06Bill Simmons:Nothing that would actually be logical can happen. The second thing was draft schedule. They said back to one day or only lottery on day one or do it after free agency. That got 19%. And then game flow, which would have been the other one I did. Continuous, fast review, hockey-style subs, no live ball timeouts. I was talking to Zach this week. And the game flow thing is the number one thing because we were talking about how much we've enjoyed baseball the last couple of years since the changes. And especially playoff baseball has been great. And with the NBA, if they figure out how to change the last three minutes to a way that's actually fun to watch, I think it would have the same impact that it had with baseball where people look at each other and go, wow, this is way better.

42:50Bill Simmons:I'm glad they did this. The NBA hasn't tried to do anything like that for us in a long time. And, um, you know, I, I just, I don't know why they won't fix it. Yeah. I think there was a Celtics Cavs game last year around December or January or something where the last few minutes took 27 minutes or something. And that was the game that put me over the edge. And then another thing is like, you spend the summer watching Eurobasket or whatever, and you see an alternative where the last two minutes take four minutes of real time. And you're just left being like, this is, what are we doing? I do think that's really unfortunate.

43:28It's something that they should, if I voted on this, that would be one I would have voted for because it's something that I think the commissioner could change and make the product in the Theo Epstein sense a lot more attractive to us consumers.

43:45Bill Simmons:I'd also make halftime three more minutes. Longer. And I'd get rid of a timeout in the second half. In that GM survey, what team has the most promising young core? OKC got 50 percent. San Antonio got 27 percent. The next two teams were tied at 10%. Houston, I would have guessed. Detroit surprised me. Yeah. No, it's only 10%, but I would not have had them on the list. And I don't know, 10 % seemed tied. Did that surprise you or no? People like the Thompson twins are, everybody's high on the Thompson twins right now. Everyone's high on us, yeah. Yeah. And then I think Jalen Duren, who just, If you go see the NBA in person, this guy leaps off the floor.

44:33Old school. Old school, big guy, and then obviously Cade and Ivy. So I could see it. They are very good. They have a very good young core. I think Trajan Langdon has completely, in the same way Emei reinvented the Rockets really quickly, Trajan deserves some credit for getting this Detroit situation right real fast. I have some questions.

44:59Bill Simmons:Which team's level of success this season is toughest to predict? So Philly was number one with 47%. So they almost had half of the votes. And then there's like seven teams tied at 7 % per second. I was shocked that Philly won because I actually don't think Philly season is that tough to predict. Because we all know how it's going to go. What's tough to predict? Yeah, if a million things go right, that might be good. To me, it's Indiana. I would have said Indiana. That would have been my answer for this. I don't know what to expect from them. I know they lost Halliburton, but I'm also not going to pour dirt on them yet.

45:37I could make the case for Philly, Bill. Okay. I know you love to roast Joel Embiid and Paul George and our old friend Daryl for these contracts, but there is a world where Joel plays 60 games or 55 games and Paul George plays 70. Is this an AI world? And Vijay Edgecombe, by the way, some very exciting early highlights from Vijay. He's a guard. Tyrese Maxey. He's a guard. I do think they're very hard to predict because ultimately I side with you. I would not wager a lot of confidence with Joel Embiid's availability. And without him, their MVP, it is pretty easy to predict where they're going to land.

46:20But it's clearly the league is hedging on Joel Embiid playing somewhere around 56 games.

46:29Bill Simmons:What makes anyone think that that's going to happen? I don't mean a dick, but it's gotten to the point if he plays 60 games. I think that would be genuinely shocking at this point. What are the odds? What if there's over under in your head if you're setting it for how many games Joel Embiid would play? You hear that fan duel? We need an over-under for Joel Embiid games played. And then here's the other one. Paul George, whose 2020s look like this. 48 games, 54, 31, 56, 74, 41. The basketball reference, when you have that hard drop when you're later in your career, you know, mid-30s, 15th season, 16th season, and you have the hard stat drop, it ain't coming back.

47:17Bill Simmons:Just point me to the guy who's like, oh, remember that amazing comeback season that guy had at age 37? Going to go back to Bernard King. Yeah, but Bernard King didn't play. He came back and he still had the stats, but it wasn't like he didn't. Because I remember in the 2000s, I was writing about this for like three straight years with Jermaine O 'Neal, where there was this three-year stretch where people were still treating Jermaine O 'Neal like he was a 24-10 guy and that guy was gone. They're like, oh, they got Jermaine O 'Neal, you know, important center. It's like he's not Jermaine O 'Neal anymore.

47:48Bill Simmons:I don't personally think Paul George is Paul George anymore. And this to give you credit, I've been reading you for 20 years now, whatever, 25 years. But you've been talking about age curves before they were common. And one of my favorite sites on the Internet, shout out to Darko, the NBA stats app. They have these aging curves that are really, really strong for publicly available. And if you look at Joel and Paul George's career trajectory, you'll see exactly what you just outlined. Yeah. Very troubling declines in their 30s. Not unusual, by the way. NBA players rarely make it to 36, 37 in one piece and playing is better.

48:30There's no. And LeBron has deformed our expectations in this regard. He doesn't count. Yeah, he's over at the side. He doesn't count. And Kevin even, I mean, playing this well at age 37. So some of these guys are distracting us from a more common rank and file reality of aging. And Paul George is definitely on that typical downturn.

48:50Bill Simmons:Yeah, like a good example is Karl Malone, who was always in the 27 and 10 kind of range. and then by that last Utah year he was down to a 20-8 guy and then the Lakers signed him and then he dropped down to 13-8 after that but usually when you're at a certain point in your estate, we even saw Chris Paul Chris Paul was always like a 20-10, 19-11 type guy and then it dipped down to that 15 - and whatever, anyway I don't think Paul George is going to be a 20-6 with 40 % I could talk about Philly all day on that there was one more thing on that GM poll that I was excited about but now I just couldn't find it which team has the best home court advantage Denver was 43 % OKC was 43 % and nobody else the Knicks were 7 % third and that was the one where I was like they've nailed it with this Denver's got the altitude OKC is the loudest fucking fans you've ever heard and those are clearly the two best now So South Beach is undefeated, as they say.

49:59But I agree. I mean, the hardest place I had to go with the Spurs was OKC. That was, that's insane. Like in terms of the crowd impact, it is definitely OKC. Elevation and then the cultural impacts in Miami, I think, are hard to beat. But I do think that they nailed that one.

50:20Bill Simmons:Yeah. So I asked you to give me a trend that you're excited about heading into the 25-26 season. We have now reached the point in the podcast where you're going to unveil the trend. Excited about, I don't know, but one of the craziest stats that's come out last year was that for the first time in NBA history, more rebounds are coming from missed three-point shots than missed two-point shots. In other words, the quintessential rebound now, if you're teaching a young player to get rebounds, you're teaching them how to rebound three point shots, which is crazy. So you're teaching them like a corner three, move to the other side of the basket.

50:58Yeah.

50:58Bill Simmons:It's going to bounce toward the baseline, be near the baseline. You can grab it. Yeah. So I think the art of rebounding, we've gone from a Moses Malone reality. If you picture Moses, probably the greatest rebounder of my youth growing up, watching those Sixers teams at the end of his career. but he wasn't getting a lot of missed threes in his diet. It was all six footers that bounced off and he was pushing around another giant person. But there's a paradigm shift, Bill, that rebounding itself is now about getting longer rebounds. And people like Giannis are perfectly built for this task. You're more athletic, you're rangier, you have these arms, Victor Wambanyama is going to be great at this.

51:44So speed and length. Speed and length. And it's not as much as about strength as it used to be. I think strength is very important. But I would say speed and length have entered the chat in terms of being a complete rebounder. Where missed corner threes, missed 30-footers. That's a different art form than what we grew up with grabbing missed eight-footers. and the data back it up. Again, for the first time in NBA history, more rebounds are coming off threes than twos. Jesus. And it's going to continue to increase. So, yeah, it's just interesting. If you're teaching young players to get rebounds in college basketball, you're teaching them to rebound missed threes, which is crazy.

52:31Bill Simmons:This was my dramatic Lazarus-like return in the early 2010s to pick up basketball with Dave Jacoby playing at USC for a couple years. Yeah, I remember. It was twos and ones. Yes. But then that's what I thought it was going to be. But at USA, it was just ones. But then people would just shoot threes anyway. And I was always fascinated. This is right as the three-point influence was starting. And people are just jacking up threes. And it was just the experience of rebounding threes and trying to figure out where they're going. It would always be like the same four or five spots. And I wonder if this is like a math efficiency that these coaches are secretly trying.

53:11Bill Simmons:There's a heat chart map with clusters of they shoot here. Because it was always top of the key, could go anywhere. But if somebody was top of the key to the right, it was either bouncing back to them or was bouncing off the back of the rim and going almost toward the baseline. So you kind of knew where to go. Yeah, we did that. I remember I did two pieces at Grantland that are relevant to this. One was where rebounds go. So we mapped out 100 ,000 rebounds and based on where the shot was and statistically a lot more rebounds on corner threes go to the weak side. Top of the key, as you alluded to, a little harder to predict.

53:44Generally, the physics is going to take it to the other side. But one of the most secretly viral pieces, and I think Jacoby helped with this a little bit at Grantland, was I wrote about the tyranny of ones and twos in pickup basketball because it was a perverse incentive for terrible shooters to shoot more and more threes. It was the worst thing that ever happened. And people either loved this piece or hated it, but it got, I don't know how we counted it back in those days. I remember those shares or whatever, but it was like people. And I was like, we should be playing twos and threes and pickups bill.

54:18And no kidding.

54:19Bill Simmons:And instead of playing 11, play it at 21 and we've saw or play it at 18 or whatever we want to get to. Yeah. Cause we're making, we're incentivizing terrible shooters to shoot more and more threes. The other trend I had, which was darker, was just, and I wanted to get your take on this. The return of cocaine? How dark are we getting? What's dark about that? But, no, I was just saying, with the LeBron news, the trend, and I want to shout out Tom Haberstroh for finding this last year, and I think it's going to continue this year, is just the sheer amount of missed games from the league's best players.

54:56And I know that's a darker trend, but I was going to, what are your thoughts on this? Do you think we're going to continue to see more and more guys, De 'Aaron Fox missing the opening of the season, obviously Fred Van Fleet. Are we going to see more and more of these injuries taken away from the greatness of the regular season?

55:16Bill Simmons:I just think I've said this a million times. I think basketball is too hard to play now. It doesn't. The way, how hard it is to play compared to what the schedule is, is not compatible. And eventually we'll realize this, but we just haven't gotten to that point yet. I think college football is hitting this point right now with the amount of games they have on the schedule. I don't think it's sustainable for people in 18, 19, 20, 21. They're going to be playing 14, 15 playoff games or 15 games. Like that's insane. But I think with the basketball, I just think it's too much running. I don't think it's a coincidence that we've had these injuries to younger guys like Tatum and Halliburton that we'd never had before.

55:55Bill Simmons:I think it's too much stress on, on people's legs. Yeah. I think the interactions, people don't talk about that. You've still talked about it for a while now, but the interaction between the style that we're playing, pace and space, the 82 games that we're playing. And the workouts are the other piece. because that's not part of the games, but the workouts these guys do to quote-unquote get in awesome shape. Yeah. I don't know. Nobody worked out harder than Tatum and his Achilles fucking, you know, snapped. Yeah, it's an interesting thing. And I know we talked a lot about the schedule last year, but maybe we'll look more into this.

56:31But I do think that's something the league needs to really look at seriously is the availability of these top players. They don't care.

56:40Bill Simmons:They could have addressed it and they just don't give a shit. Can I give you my trend? Yeah, dude. This is good. I haven't unveiled this yet. Oh, I love it. I feel like this steps a little on the preview pods next week, but I just feel like somebody's going to say this before we do the pod and I just have to get it out there. I think the Celtics are going to be absolutely deranged this year on offense. Like, I think they might have, they averaged 48 threes a game last year. I think they're going to average like 55 threes a game. I think they're going to have games where they shoot 70. I think the pace that they're going to play with is going to be genuinely shocking to people.

57:21Bill Simmons:And it's almost like when whatever that Paul Westhead Denver Nuggets team, when they were just like, we're going to run and gun, but they had no system or style to anything they were doing. I think the Celtics actually have a system and I think they're going to play faster because they don't have Tatum. And this is the one caveat with Tatum that he did, you know, he was particular. He did slow the ball off sometimes. He did take his time. Nobody's going to be taking their time anymore. This team is going to be like, it's going to be like the run and shoot offense of the NFL. They're just going to be spreading the floor with five receivers and fucking throwing it and keeping the other defense on the field.

57:57Bill Simmons:And I don't think people understand how crazy it's going to be. I think it's going to be insane. Do you know how many threes they shot in their preseason game this week against the Grizzlies?

58:11Bill Simmons:probably it was, I think it was over 50, right? Like 55. So, and that was with the scrubs. So who's taken more shots for your team this year than, than they did last year. So here's one, here's one for you, Kirk Goldsberry. Here's a little future. I'll give to my, to my, my longtime listeners on FanDuel. Pritchard is 25 to one to hit the most threes this year. 25 to one. White's 18-1. Pritchard finished fifth last year, and he's going to play more, and he's going to have the ball more, and I think he could lead the league in threes. But I think if Simon's, if they keep him, Derek White, Jalen is going to be like, I mean, go all the overs for him if you like betting overs.

58:57Bill Simmons:Is Jalen on the 30 points a game list? No, he shouldn't. Yeah, he is. Seven to one, the average 30 points a game. It's four more points a game than he averaged last year. He's going to have way more shots with a faster pace. But I just think they're going to be jacking threes. And I think they're not tanking. Missoula's a maniac. And they're going to be like, we're going to try to system this. And Tatum's not going to be denied. He's coming back. I mean, it quote unquote was breaking news today. Anyone who follows the team or knows anything about it, like this has been brewing for two months. He's coming back.

59:29Bill Simmons:They're not going to be able to stop it. No, that's, and I was just going to say, Pritchard, Sam Houser's going to play more, shoot more. Couser's going to shoot a shitload of them. Yeah. I could see this. Shireman, wait till you see. And also all the centers they have, like Luka Garza, they're all going to be firing up threes, all of them. And I would guess Joe Mazzula's philosophy is this. Without Jason Tatum, we have to do everything we can to optimize our offensive efficiency, guys. We have to do everything we can. We can win with math. We can win with threes and pace. What's his math quote?

1:00:04That's exactly right. And so he can lean into that. And if you look at his trajectory in three-point rate, which has already broken the record to last year's team broke the record for three-point rate in NBA history, I think that's a good take. And I think it'll be Pritchard, Sam House, Derek White might shoot 10 a night. And I know that sounds crazy, but he might shoot 10 a night because Tatum, I think, was shooting 10 or 12 a game, wasn't he? Nine a game? But yeah, those shots are gone, so somebody else is going to do it. And some of the guys getting... getting those minutes and those shots are three-point assassins.

1:00:40I wish they were men.

1:00:42Bill Simmons:Well, there was one game. I can't find it. There was one game last year where Tatum didn't play and they played fast. Because one of the things with me and why, why I can't count out Indiana and Boston this year is coaches who are really competitive, who have systems and are used to playing without their stars. The Celtics played multiple games without Tatum last year intentionally, and they would play differently when they didn't have them. And Indiana would do the same. And I just think they're going to try to win more than people think. I think their over-under is maybe 42.5, something like that.

1:01:19But it's one of my favorite things, right? It's like when you have a great coach or a great team and somebody rests, like when Tim Duncan rested, teams would be like, oh, this is going to be easy. No, it's not. They're still going to beat you. And I do think Rick Carlisle and Joe Mazzulla deserve that level of respect. And these teams, nobody thought Indiana was going to be good last year.

1:01:39Bill Simmons:So I think that's not going to like it is my dad, because he he already thought they shot too many threes anyway. I don't think he has any idea what's going to happen this year. Like Jalen Brown just jacking up threes with 19 seconds left in the shot clock. Because that's what's going to happen. Yeah. This is who they're going to be for 50 games. They'll break the record. My bold prediction is they'll break the record for most threes in a game this year. That would be mine. What is that record? I'm going to guess it's 75. I don't know. I'm looking it up. Well, they set the record last year for threes attempted.

1:02:13Bill Simmons:It was almost, I'm going to say it was almost 4 ,000, something like that. Yeah. They tied the record with 29 made and attempted at 63. 63. Yeah. Yeah. That's a big number in Boston for the Celtics history. They will so easily break that. Like, mark that down. Yeah, I think that's right. Definitely shoot more than 63 threes in one of the games this year. Yeah, that's right. And I think Pritchard could have a game where he shoots like 23s. Where does he land this year? Do you think he's going to score 20 points a game? Well, the points have to come from somewhere, right? I agree. Tatum's leaving 28 points for everybody else.

1:02:58Bill Simmons:And they're going to have to divvy up some of them. And they don't, like Simons will step in on some of them, assuming he's on the team for a while. So maybe that's 16, 17 of them. Pritchard's an extra four to five. Jalen's an extra three to four wait I just don't I don't know if it's in him to just gun and shoot you know maybe it'll be a little more but then you know then it comes down to like a like a Hauser situation I think Hauser's gonna play 30 minutes a game like I don't know they're gonna be weird to play if you're just like you're doing an NBA schedule and it's like we're going here we're in Toronto then we play the Knicks and we have Philly and then it's like, oh, we're playing that weird Boston team.

1:03:42Bill Simmons:Get ready. Put your sneakers on. Yeah, that's what it's going to be. I think that's right. And I think Peyton is going to be good. But I told Zach on his podcast, I think Derek White does have it in him to be a three-point every other. Yeah, he's a very, very smart player and he'll know what they need to win games. And you're exactly right. With Tatum out, he is the most qualified guy to take that step forward. Him and Peyton Pritchard, I expect to be bigger. volume scorers. I agree. Kurt Goldsberry, great to see you. What do you got? It's just a stress ball that's for basketball. No big deal.

1:04:16Oh, I got an article on The Ringer tomorrow. The seven charts that define the quarter century in the NBA. So check that out. Oh, yeah.

1:04:23Bill Simmons:Sounds great. Great to see you. Thanks for coming on. Thank you, Bill. This episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra. We're in the heart of the FIFA World Cup 26. Every play matters here. FIFA World Cup 26. For you, the stakes are just this high. Michelob Ultra, the official beer sponsor of the FIFA World Cup 26. It's giving you a chance to win$1 million worth of tickets and prizes. Michelob Ultra, from the pitch to the poor, superior is worth playing for. Enter now at MichelobUltra.com superioraccess FIFA World Cup 26. Michelob Ultra, FIFA World Cup 26, superior access. No purchase necessary.

1:05:05Bill Simmons:Open a U.S. Residence 21 Plus begins on December 1st, 2025, ends on July 31st, 2026, multiple entry periods. Visit www.mickelobalture.com slash superior access slash FIFA World Cup 26 for free entry, entry deadlines, prizes, and details. This episode is brought to you by Netflix. The T-Mobile Home Run Derby is right around the corner. Might be one of the best showcases of pure power in all sports. Baseball's biggest sluggers, along with some legendary announcers. Pujols, Rizzo, Bonds, Sabathia, Al Duncan. Yeah, Hunter Pence, Matt Faskersian, a whole bunch of people. And it's the one night where you don't swing to make contact, you swing to make history.

1:05:49Bill Simmons:I'm interested to see what Bond says about this actually. Anyway, it is all live from Citizens Bank Park in Philly. Watch the T-Mobile Home Run Derby live on Netflix this Monday, July 13th at 8 p.m. Eastern, 5 p.m. Pacific. This episode is brought to you by TikTok. Did you know you can use TikTok to connect even more with the sports you love? It's not just highlights, it's everything around the game, including the sports community. Find breakdowns of classic basketball plays, deep dives on baseball stats, even videos on how athletes train and recover. There are people teaching strategy, sports, history, even ways to improve your jump shot.

1:06:24Bill Simmons:It's kind of like the biggest locker room ever, and everyone's sharing what they know on TikTok. All right, recording later afternoon Pacific time. Joe House here, as always, to do our really sad Ringer 107. We're going to try to turn around this week. We brought in some help. I'm not sad. We're going to have a threesome this week, House. Married couples sometimes need to spice it up. Oh, boy. Oh, no. Our friend Chris Vernon to spice it up with us. But I do want to tell you. Shilling style. So you weren't here when I had Kurt Goldsbrand. We talked basketball. I did my whole thing about how I thought the Celtics were going to be deranged in a good way on offense, and people don't realize they're actually going to be pretty fun and better than people think.

1:06:59Bill Simmons:And I talked to my dad who watched the game and my dad goes, you know who I loved? And I thought he was going to say like, I don't know, Peyton Pritchard or whatever. He's like, Hugo Gonzalez. He's going to be really good right away. And I'm like, basketball season is here. My dad has adopted the 13th man on the team as, as allegedly going to help us. But Verno, you saw the game. I agree with your father. Oh yeah. I'm in on Hugo. You're in. Oh, yeah. Ball came off the rim. You know, at that point, your animal instinct comes in, right? There's some guys that fade away, and there's some guys that hold on to it, and there's some guys that start ripping the ball away.

1:07:41They just got this extra level of aggression. That was Gonzalez. Also got a ball on the break and hammered it, hammered it on a breakaway. And I was like, okay, Hugo Gonzalez, your team is going to stink, but Hugo Gonzalez is going to be fun.

1:07:58Bill Simmons:We're going to shoot 60 plus threes a game, and it's going to be awesome. And Jason Tatum's coming back. He said it today. Last night was an absolute abomination before the eyes of God and man. It was 60 fouls and 76 free throws in a preseason game. I mean, it's unwatchable. It's totally unwatchable. What's the referee agenda this year? What are they trying to crack down on? Could you even tell? No, I could not tell. 60 effing fouls. What are we talking about? It was, yeah, I know. Right? Because a couple of years ago. Like, what are we, what point are we making? It was, it was terrible. It was terrible to watch.

1:08:37No, you just need, like, you got a big guy you can find. You ain't got no big guys.

1:08:44Bill Simmons:My dad and I mentioned that before I hung up on him to do this part of the podcast. We're like, I'm excited to watch the team. We don't have anyone who can rebound. A crucial part of basketball. I mean, you can't run out, you know, Tillman and Garza. And like, I mean, it's just, I mean, again, when the other teams have like, you know, when you're playing on a Tuesday night and you're going up against, you know, Alper and Shingun and Steven Adams, like you might not, you might not touch the ball. It's, it's all, these are all very fair points. And I'm still going over for the Celtics and you know, I'm going over.

1:09:18Hey, I listened to your, I listened to your pod last week. I don't hate the Jalen Brown, like, tops in the league in scoring. I mean, who else is going to score? Seriously, I went and looked it up tonight. He's averaged 27 a game in games without Tatum. And that's when they had other, like, real players on the team. Who is he worried about passing to on that team? Maybe Derek?

1:09:49Bill Simmons:I said to Goldsberry, one of my favorite FanDuel bets. I don't think I've given this to Joe House either. House, you should make this bet live on the show. House just checked out. Book's open. The book's open. Hold on. I'm opening it up. Peyton Pritchard for most threes this season. 25 to 1. 25 to 1. Peyton Pritchard most threes. Guess where he finished last year for threes? Fifth. Peyton Pritchard. They're all going to be divvying up Tatum's shots and points. It's like dad didn't come home for dinner and you get extra food. I will say I thought it was cool Tatum was here He was with the team And like was over at The University of Memphis and he visited with Penny Hardaway and Yeah he was bopping around And I mean like I always Think there's something to that right like he could be Away he could be just staying at all like why is He traveling to preseason games He's been I think he's been in the facility Every day since he got hurt Yeah so House and I are doing over-unders next week.

1:10:48Bill Simmons:I don't want to step on that, but we do have Chris Vernon here, Mr. Memphis. Fandle gave Memphis the all-time FU over-under total of 40 and a half house. That's a, you could go 500 and get a W with this. They went 48 and 34 last year, but you have some injuries even before the season starts, but what do we expect from the Grizz? I think that they will be, they're going over that. That's appalling. Come on. Is it? Look, again, you can always do the, and you can do this with every team, if so-and-so is healthy, but I mean, they had Morant for 50 games last year. And look at what their record was.

1:11:32Bill Simmons:Can you walk us through the injuries? Walk us through the injuries for this year. Okay, Jackson will be back. He'll be fine. But when does he come back? Oh, within the first week of the season. He might be back before, I mean, he might be back for opening night, but I mean, he'll be back. I would be stunned if Jaren Jackson Jr. misses more than four games. I don't think he'll even miss four. How about Edie? Probably December, I'd guess. That means January. They're just going to be super careful with that because it was a foot surgery. But I mean, he was at the game last night and he's walking around without a boot.

1:12:05Bill Simmons:How's Memphis Grizzlies to make the playoffs? Plus 154.

1:12:13oof i don't know i mean i'm look at the roster i think that's a no for me too they're minus 210

1:12:19Bill Simmons:for a no i think it's a no for me verno make the case when they have when they have had john morant and jaron jackson jr they've always won over 60 of their games last year they were the two seed until the last month of the season when they totally collapsed. The two previous years, when they were both healthy, they were the two seed both of those years. And then, of course, they had the season from hell where the whole team got hurt. And then they got the lottery pick. And then they move into this year. And again, when John Morant plays, they win. When Jaron Jackson plays, they win. So if you want to hedge and bet against them playing, but they have been good enough to even win despite John Moran only playing 50 games last year.

1:13:09Bill Simmons:And Jaron Jackson plays, they win, unless it's Team USA. Oh, stop. Stop. Come on. That was just for house. I did enjoy it. I got a pleased house every once in a while. I did enjoy it. So is it fair to say this is your starting five, Verna? Jaron Jackson. Santi? No. I don't think so. I think at the very beginning of the season, possibly. Let's go backwards. Jaren Jackson and Ja, who were the other three people starting for the Grizzlies? Caldwell Pope. Maybe Wells. If it's not Wells, I'd imagine the 10th pick, Cedric Howard. And then... Cedric Howard starting? No, no, no, no, no. It'll be Wells at the beginning.

1:13:55Okay. That's what I think. I think it'll be Wells at the beginning. And then Coward eventually. that's what I'd guess.

1:14:01Bill Simmons:And Ty Jerome is sixth man? Correct. And then it'll be Eadie but in the absence of Eadie it'll be Landell at the beginning of the season. It'll be Jock Landell who's just going to set screens and be a poor man Steven Adams. And you still have Pippen. Correct. Unless you trade him to the Rockets for like one of those Nets picks or something. Try to hijack him. I don't. I suppose anything is possible that you could try to change. And then they need one of these guys. They're not getting a Nets pick for Pippen, by the way. They need one of these guys that was pretty good two years ago. Gigi Jackson or Vince Williams to pop.

1:14:42They need one of them to be able to go. And then off the bench, they're going to have, we mentioned, Santi Aldama, Scottie Pippen Jr., Ty Jerome. They got good players. House, this was not a compelling case.

1:14:55Bill Simmons:You don't seem compelled at all. If you want to sell me on 41 wins for this team, and that's an over, right? 41 is over. Yeah, 41's over. Then I think I can work my way there. But this team... It's all dependent on whether or not you... What your level of belief in Morant is. And my level is obviously going to be greater than y 'all's. That's true. I think when he plays, he is a superstar that makes everybody better. I can't believe what I watched from this team defensively last year at the end of the season. I just can't believe it. Well, the coach got fired, House. Congratulations. He deserved it.

1:15:35Bill Simmons:I mean... So, John Moran now, 26 years old, House. Yeah. This is right around when it's got to happen or it's not going to happen. It's got to happen. It's got to happen. He's got to play. Set the over-under for number of games that John Moran's going to play, and then I'll tell you how many games they're going to win. Tell me how many games he's going to play. All right, so let's say he gets... Let's say he gets to the number. Let's say he gets to 65. That'd be almost a career high. That's true. It would be. Literally, that'd be a career high. He played 67. It's his career high. Yep. I mean, I don't know.

1:16:11And he's gotten beat up for it. Look, I mean, there's a lot of guys that have gotten beat up for their injuries. And then, like, I mean, you know, it's interesting the way it plays out. It's also when you get injured. if you're not able to finish out seasons like he didn't last year when he got clipped in the Oklahoma City series. And so because, you know, they do these rankings, and you see on the rankings, like, you never bring up that Chet Holmgren doesn't play, do you? Never. Chet Holmgren's averaged, what, 30 games a year, and it's three years in the NBA? So I'm in the playoffs for four straight rounds.

1:16:43That's what I'm saying. It's all dependent on when you get hurt.

1:16:47Bill Simmons:House, do you think John Morant career games combined with Zion Williamson career games added together is more than Joel Embiid's career games? Yes. You think yes? Those two, yeah, because they're still both young and Joel Embiid has one year left. What do you think, Verno? Joel Embiid career games versus... Up to this point? Yeah, right now. Oh, I misunderstood. I thought you were saying career-wise. No, no, no. Okay, I misunderstood. Yeah, career-wise. Zion's career games plus Jha's career games versus Embiid's career games. What number is higher? I mean, Embiid, he's been in the league so much longer.

1:17:29Right. I agree. So it'll have to be Embiid. The answer is

1:17:33Bill Simmons:Zion plus Jha Morant together. Wow. Yeah. That's incredible. Embiid's played 452 games. In how many years? Zion has played 214 in 11 years. Zion's at 214. And John Morant is at a zesty 307. 523 combined. 67, 63, 57, 61, 9, and 50. I'm going to say this is the year. Listen, the reason I get upset about the Morant stuff, Morant has led and carried a team to the playoffs. To winning stuff. Don't talk about him like you talk about Zion, like you talk about LaMelo, Like you talk about all these other guys that haven't done nothing. He has scored when he scored, whatever, 49 points at a playoff game.

1:18:23Like he went head to head. He knocked out Golden State on their home floor out of the playoffs. Steph Curry, Draymond Green, the year before they won the title, it is the long forgotten moment that they played in the play-in and he went heads up with them and won on their home floor. When he has been healthy, he has been able to perform at a level that very, very, very few guys in the NBA can match. And again, if you want to bet against this health, I cannot convince you otherwise. I think it's fair. Obviously, it's fair.

1:18:58Bill Simmons:House, that was spoken like a man who has a lot of John Morant memorabilia in his son's room. I should turn this camera around. Oh, my God. This game room's got too much. It's better for the league if John Morant's healthy. So I'm rooting for it. I'm never not rooting for John Morant. John Morant, Zion, and LaMelo. The season's more fun if all those guys can just fucking play for six straight months. Yes. Like, especially LaMelo. I don't know if we've ever really even seen it for six straight months. At least with Ja, we've seen it. With Zion, we saw it for half a year once. We need it badly, too.

1:19:34They come out with these lists and none of the top five guys are even American. That's, there you go. That's exactly right. I need some of these American guys to stay healthy and pop and become superstars.

1:19:44Bill Simmons:Well, thank God for 18-year-old Cooper Flagg. Yeah. He's here to save the nation. Oh, God. He's here to guard five positions on a 55-win Dallas Mavericks team. Oh, my God. What? My word. That I just. Now I'm just talking crazy. No. But I do think they are going to be a playoff team. You do? I do. I do. And I don't know. Hey, who did they play in the play-in last year? They got murdered by Memphis. Oh. Yeah. That's right. The one I don't understand and I think has the biggest variance all over the place is Golden State. I don't know how variance that is. Well, Pelton's projection system had them for 57 wins, which he admittedly was like, I don't know what to make of this.

1:20:32I mean, they got awesome players. They're old. I got it. But I mean, if you go from the time that they acquired Butler to the day that Curry got hurt, they were 31-11. I mean, 31-11.

1:20:54Bill Simmons:I'm going to be rooting for them even more than usual because they have my guy Al Horford, beloved Celtic. So I'm not saying that they're going to win 30 or 40 games. I think that, you know, look, every game mattered to them at the end of the season because they were just trying to scrap a claw into the playoffs. And they're probably a vet team that'll probably take nights off. But, I mean, they have showed, you know, between those three, there's not some kind of, unless it shows up this year, they haven't had, like, a big letdown in talent. Like, I mean, Curry, Draymond, and Butler all still perform at a very, very high level despite their age.

1:21:35Bill Simmons:House, what's your dream Giannis trade location? You even told me this. Oh, wow. You can send them anywhere. Where would you send them? Denver. I would love to see. That can't happen. Realistic. Which is like basically the three Texas teams, the Knicks. I don't know. I can't really say without having a perspective on who has to go to the Bucs in exchange. Who would he be playing with? I thought the most exciting one, the more and more I thought about it, was if San Antonio just said, fuck it. Just the thought of him and Wemby on the same team would be just so weird to watch those two guys together.

1:22:16Who can San Antonio send to Milwaukee that Milwaukee would take?

1:22:20Bill Simmons:They have all those picks, plus they have young guys. I mean, there's a trade they can put together. They have a bunch of assets. And Fox is the big contract? Maybe Fox is the big contract. Fox already hurt. I was making a face. I don't like it. Bruno, what are you most excited about for the season? Because we're less than two weeks away now. What's your number one non-Memphis thing? The rookie class. Unbelievable. Like, have you guys, I don't know. Again, it's all football, football, football right now. but obviously in the interest of getting ready for the mismatch with me and Jacoby I have been paying attention in a ridiculous way to this preseason in a way that I would not normally and so I've been trying to catch up on all the games watch the highlights whatever um last year was such a colossal dud right Alex Sarr, Reese Ache, the third pick Reed Shepard didn't even play I mean, it just stunk.

1:23:19Yeah. And this year. Oh, my God. I mean, in between the Ace Bailey highlights last night. I mean, freakish. You have he had 25 and he looks like friggin Durant out there. I mean, it's unbelievable. I can't believe how he moves for a 610 guy. So you've got him. You've got Cooper flag. You've got the Yakachunas, the kid from Miami, had like 10 assists in their game. That's my favorite pick. Good assist, too. Good assist. And I mean, just up and down. Coward, Hugo Gonzalez. I saw both of them, you know, last night.

1:24:00Bill Simmons:How about Dylan Harper buried in the San Antonio bench, probably playing 15 minutes a game. I just think up and down, especially after we got, you know, it is so much. You got to mention House's new guy No, it's fine He was going to say it They haven't played any preseason games yet Just talk for two seconds They haven't played any Just give him a look Trey Johnson's going to knock down shots I'm a little upset about the Wizards So you know, House has delivered it to me before I've got friends with the Wizards They have The most unbelievable bobbleheads That's what they do. Like, if your team's going to stink, you might as well have good bobbleheads, right?

1:24:47That's what I've always thought, right? Because then people want to come to your games like cool bobbleheads. In fact, look, I'll show you an example. Look at this. This is from the Wizards last year. There you go. That's a push a T bobblehead. They had Francis TFO. They had all kinds of cool ones, right? So I go look at their promotional schedule this year. I'm like, I cannot. One of the things I really look forward to is Washington Wizards bobbleheads. They have the Kyle Kuzma in the pink sweater. You have that. Yeah, I did. Because I brought it to you. Yep. Unbelievable ones. They have one frigging bobblehead night this year.

1:25:26Oh, they cut back. Cut the budget. Kishon George. Kishon. Whatever. Who cares? and it's like a thousand Hawaiian shirt nights of different colleges and then a SpongeBob SquarePants jersey, which is admittedly awesome. I'll give you one of those. They're one of the teams that does great bobbleheads. I feel like they've abandoned me.

1:25:57Bill Simmons:What happened? Are they saving money? What's going on? Definitely not. I don't have a good explanation. They ran out of people. Nobody's going to come to the player. I'll be at the games. I'll be there. Oh, hey. You know what you got to get me this year? A pair of Bob Carrington pajamas. That's one of the nights. Okay, done. Bob Carrington pajamas? That's a night? Bob Carrington pajamas are at least as good as a bobblehead. I'm carrying in pajama night. That's pretty good. Sounds like X-rated. Oh, no, no, no, no. That was a different era. That was the Gilbert Arenas era. That's a real thing. But anyways, yeah, I was really upset with the Wizards.

1:26:44But yeah, super excited to watch Trey Johnson. How are you with the seven stages of Trey Johnson?

1:26:50Bill Simmons:We're still in the happy honeymoon phase? Well, I was skeptical. I wanted the big kid from Duke. I wanted like a rim protector for the young defense. but you know, all the indications are that, you know, he's the hardest worker. He's the first one in the gym and the last one out. He's been there for, you know, getting up thousands of shots. They have to like, you know, turn out the lights to drive them out of there. That should be a website where every team lists who first one in the gym, last one to leave is for the team. I just stuff. I'd want to know. Good information. So, yeah. So he's the first one to get to the gym on the wizards.

1:27:27So they say that's what the stories are.

1:27:32Bill Simmons:I think he's going to score lots of points. Me too. I agree with that. I don't know if your team's going to win games, but I think he's going to win 22. It's an over for me this year. Oh, my God. 22 games. That's more appalling than my over. No, it's not. They wouldn't run around 19 or 20 last year. We're only asking to win two or three more. You had Jordan Poole. House enjoyed Jordan Poole. Is that a good thing? House wished him his best when he left. I sure did. CJ McCollum and Chris Middleton are on this team for at least the first two months. House, what's your number one thing you're most excited about this season?

1:28:08Bill Simmons:Non-Wizards related. Do you have that? Oh, yeah, for sure. No joke. All BS aside, it's Denver. It's seeing Denver, it's seeing the Joker finally with the thing that everybody's been begging Denver to do. They finally figured it out. They finally put somebody in charge. Kroenke stepped up like, okay, I'll be the the guy we're not going to keep having the coach in the front office you know uh fighting over the direction of the team and now they have a full compliment so we're just knocking on wood for good health over the course of the season for denver because that should be an awesome fucking basketball team in the west with a with a west that is an awesome fucking western conference so let's go i agree i agree they could have very easily like tried to just keep it going right Like, oh, we lost in game seven and Aaron Gordon got hurt and this happened.

1:28:59Instead, they remade it. They remade the team. They didn't even spend that much money. They're still like under the aprons and stuff.

1:29:06Bill Simmons:They still have a little room to do even more. But we see this every year. Teams just stick with it and then they make excuses for why they lost. Instead of saying, okay, we need to go a different route in order to get where we want to go. It's not good enough. And they looked at it and said it's not good enough. So I give them credit. it. This is what you're supposed to do when you've got a generational player. Yes, exactly. Denver was my number one, closely followed by number two, the Celtics just rolling out five white guys. Five white guys just unabashedly just jacking up threes. People are going to think they're at a YMCA.

1:29:44Bill Simmons:I thought I was in an NBA game. I'm watching five white guys jacking up threes. What happened? I don't think it worked in 2025. Probably not. We're going to take a quick break and then we're going to do Ringer 107, the real reason we brought Verna one. 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.

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1:31:02Bill Simmons:This episode is brought to you by PayPal. On the court, the pitch, the track, even the pool, professional athletes show extraordinary physical flexibility. For us normal people, we've got PayPal's flexible monthly payment plans. Pay nothing at checkout, then enjoy a flexible monthly payment plan that works for you with no sign up or late fees. and it's available millions of stores. Pay monthly with PayPal. Subject to approval, pay monthly consumer loans made by WebBank. Available through PayPal Inc. NMLS 910457. Learn more at paypal.com slash pay monthly. All right, Verno. Yep. House and I are 10 and 15 in this Ringer 107 contest.

1:31:42Bill Simmons:Let's think so. In seven of those picks, we thought we had the game. we blew a lead and the other team won on our fourth quarter come from behind drive. We have not had that happen for us yet this season, but we're seven times it's happened the other way. Most recently, week five, Jags 31, Kansas City 28. We had the Chiefs. That game was 14-0 with the Chiefs about to score again. Bucks 38, Seahawks 35, and then Broncos 18, Eagles 17. This all started in week one when we had the Ravens and I texted house. All right, we're going to go our way to 3-2 or 4-1, whatever. And then that apocalypse happened.

1:32:22Bill Simmons:And we just had to change our juju, so we invited you on. You're more of a degenerate gambler than I think either of us are. At least equal. He's an equal degenerate. You're at least a kindred spirit. So we're going to walk through some picks. I asked you to bring a pick. I'm going to rip through... Well, first of all, the games we're staying away from, unless you guys view him in the object. The London game, I'm not doing that again. Broncos, Jets. Just no more 9.30 a.m. PT, I'm out. I just can't. Can't win them? It's my game. Oh, that's your game. Alright. We'll come back to it. I guess we'll come back to it.

1:32:59Bill Simmons:Love it. You have to. You have to come back to it. The Ravens kitchen sink versus the Rams game. I don't want either way. I'm out. Stay away. Totally fine. Line's too high. Dolphins, Chargers. the Chargers can't block anymore they've lost their offensive line and seem like they're cratering and then the Dolphins if they lose this game Mike Medano is going to get fired I would just rather stay away I don't know what's going to happen in that game Titans Raiders stay away Packers minus 14 and a half against the Bengals stay away I had a couple maybes I'm willing to be talked out of any of these Seahawks plus one and a half at Jacksonville.

1:33:42Bill Simmons:Jacksonville coming off the biggest win they've had all decade. And the reason it was, I kind of was leaning Seahawks, but the defense, I don't know who's playing for Seattle. Did you have this one marked as? I considered strongly trying to make the case for Seattle. Yeah, can't get that. The secondary thing, because indeed, it's right to be skeptical of Jacksonville, the history of Trevor Lawrence and his Jacksonville Jaguars team. tells us, don't let them get too full of themselves. Right. They line you up to then kick you in the nuts. There's some good stats for Seattle where they're fifth on the pass.

1:34:23Bill Simmons:Jacksonville's defense is 27th against the pass. They're third on the run. Seattle's defense is fifth again. I'm just staying away. Bruno, you agree that stay away, correct? Yes. Okay. Niners, Bucs. Now this is Mac Jones. Niners plus three over the Bucs. That just feels like bucks or nothing. There's no way I'd touch the 49ers with all those injuries. Also feels like it's a classic. Whoever has the ball with three minutes left is, I don't want any part of it. Tampa have with no real wins this year, they've lost once and they've had four games that could have gone either way. They still haven't like had a convincing win staying away all the way around.

1:35:04Bill Simmons:Bears, Washington house. Bears plus four and a half. It's the Hail Mary game rematch. There's some good stats in the Washington favor. Did you have this marked? I didn't have it marked, but if you had come in prepared to make the case, I have lots of good Washington angles to support it. I certainly would not endorse Chicago and the points, even though they're coming off of a bye. I don't care. I don't think they're very good. I don't think their defense is very good. And Caleb's wearing a knee brace. The thing that is underrated about Washington, they have a pass rush. They are in, if you look at the numbers inside the trenches, they're good at stopping the run, and they are putting pressure on.

1:35:52They had five sacks. Now, you can say whatever you want about the Chargers and all the injuries to the offensive line. They were at home. They knew about the injuries. They couldn't do anything about the Washington pass rush. Nobody's saying, oh, coming into this season, let's look at the Washington pass rush, right?

1:36:11Bill Simmons:Hmm. Well, you also are first running the ball. Chicago's 31st. Bill. Yeah. That's him. No. It's Bill. That's the guy. Bill. Bill. Bill. The guy that went crazy when Tom Brady interviewed him after the game. He started, he almost started crying after the game. He was so excited to talk to Tom Brady. Who can blame him? So handsome, Tom Brady. This is a maybe that almost became impossible for me. And I'm happy to be talked into it as one of the five picks. The Cleveland Browns, plus five and a half in Pittsburgh. No chance. No chance. Dylan Gabriel? Well, that's why I marked down right underneath it.

1:36:56Bill Simmons:Rookie QB on the road. Three question marks. That's why not to do it. It's a never happened in history spot for the Browns. It's their third straight road game. They're coming back off of an international game. They did not take a break. And the Steelers are coming off their bye. This has never happened before in the history of the league. And so the play to me, if you want to have anything to do with this game, just play Pittsburgh on the money line. It's a money line play. Okay, it's fine. You don't have to. I'm tired of losing money on Pittsburgh, marking that out. All right, we'll go to the Prodbills.

1:37:34Bill Simmons:So make your London game case, Verna. Let's hear it. All right. So here's my case. Number one, I think the Broncos are going to kill the Jets. All right. The line is what? Seven, seven and a half? Six and a half. We settled at six and a half. Wow. Oh, God. I mean, that's... Neutral field, London. A gift. An absolute gift. Look, I am a Cowboys fan. So I settled in and watched the entire game last week. That Jets team is the worst team in the league. You go look at the score. There's some competition. That game was 30-3. My team can't sack anybody, and they were on field's ass the entire game. Denver is going to maul him.

1:38:24Denver is a fantastic team that has tricked people by this record. They should be 4-1, and people would think about them differently. He talked me out of it.

1:38:36Bill Simmons:Made us take the fucking Eagles. They got the leverage thing against the Colts, which is the worst call of the entire NFL season. It is true. The leverage caught the end. So that's four and one. The kid or the guy missed the kick right before that. So that would be four and one. And look at their loss. It's not a bad, like the two losses are like super close losses. Herbert made two crazy, awesome throws to beat them. I think the Broncos are better than their record shows, and I think the Jets are absolutely abominable. And I'm just going to give you – I know you want to stay away from international games.

1:39:14In international games, if you just blindfolded, took heavy favorites in these games, a lot of the games, they don't feature a heavy favorite, right? It'll be like the Jaguars versus somebody, and it's a four. in all of the games, there's been 15 times that an international game has posted a line six or above. The favorite has covered that line. It's 12 and three. So if they post it where somebody is supposed to win by a touchdown, I mean, 12 out of the 15 times that has happened. So when I know those are the numbers and that typically the big favorites do perform extremely well in the international games and I already thought on the front end oh my god look I have a realistic approach to what my team is Dallas they're not they're okay they're fine their offense is good their defense stinks their defense looked like a freaking doomsday against this Jets team they can't block anybody you don't even know the guys that were getting sacks my son is looking them up on Wikipedia.

1:40:25Like, where did he come from? Like, and so I, I already had it in my mind. Oh God. Like I think Denver is way better than Dallas. So I think they are going to maul them, maul them. And so this one is this to me, this is an easy one, which I know is a famous last words in the NFL. Well, I just think, I think the Jets are horrendous. Like, truly horrendous.

1:40:54Bill Simmons:Well, we have, Denver's got like a top four running attack. Jets are like 27th against the run. There's all these good offensive protection stats for the Denver offensive line, and the Jets can't rush the passer. House, this is where you mentioned that the longer a team stays winless, the stupider it is to bet against them. Yeah, and part of the thing that concerns me, here are the concerns. The Jets have zero forced turnovers. They have no interceptions and no recovered fumbles. They do. London games always have turnovers. The other thing that scares me is that big of a number when the total is low.

1:41:36The total is 43 and a half. You need to win by a touchdown in a game that's not expecting many points. I don't have any problem with the idea of Denver winning the football game. but the Jets keep beating themselves by beating themselves. They don't force any turnovers. They commit a shit ton of penalties. They are undisciplined. They make bad mistakes on special teams. But the penalties in the special teams things, if they get it right one week, somehow, if you look at the success rates for the Jets, they are a top 10 team by the success measurement on both sides of the ball. I know that comes with like,

1:42:18Bill Simmons:they're doing their best work when they're down 20 in the last hour of the game. No, it's two things. Their first two drives of every game have been outstanding. They have a script for the first two drives, the Jets. And then to your point, which is very astute, at the end of games, they just rack up all this efficiency because they're not looking great. Well, Verno, you watch that game. Like when Hall fumbled, all of a sudden the game was over. The game was over. All of a sudden, the Cowboys had scored a bunch of points. And then it was like, oh, I can take this off the multi-view. And keep in mind, let me just give a little point of reference here.

1:42:56Dallas had four offensive linemen out. Four. Right. There's only five on the offensive line. Four of them were out. It didn't even matter. Their best player is CeeDee Lamb. He was out. Maybe their second best weapon is Kevante Turpin. He was out.

1:43:17Bill Simmons:And Michael Parsons was out because they fucking traded him. And they were up 30-3. That is crazy. Let me ask this. Come on. Let me ask this. I have no respect for that. House, one more thing on this. Go ahead. Fields 0-26 when the other team scores 21 points. Can the Broncos just get the 21 points? Because we could also money line parlay them with somebody else. Yeah, so I am willing to play Denver on the money line. And what do you think about the fact that the look ahead line, the line this summer was six and a half. And we're saying that this game right now, having seen, you know, five weeks of football is also just right there at six and a half.

1:43:55Bill Simmons:There's two things to that. One is, as Verno pointed out so eloquently, Denver is still underrated. It's a three and two team that should be like four and a half and a half if you're going to redo the record. And then the Jets, these dumb metrics make it seem like they're better than they are. I think the Jets are also terrible. I like that pick, Verna. We're going to add it to the pile. I mean, if I talk to you into getting a London game, because look, that way you're either like super happy by the time the other games come. How's it going to be together on Sunday? We can watch this pick be terrible together.

1:44:26So I happen to be in Arizona on Sunday when the game started. I mean, I don't know how you – this is unbelievable. I woke up because of my body clock. I woke up at 625 and five minutes later, the freaking football game started. I was like, people watch football at 630 out here. This is crazy.

1:44:48Bill Simmons:I put it on. I woke up and put it on in my bedroom. And I was like, I thought I would get away with watching the first quarter. And my wife was like, get that off. To wake up, go downstairs. Oh, you're talking about the TV. Yeah.

1:45:08Bill Simmons:House, what's your favorite pick this week? Hold on. Let me look real quick. One that we didn't mention. Chiefs. Chiefs. Okay. Going back to the Chiefs. Going back to the Chiefs. House, I changed our tactics this week. I didn't text you any picks. True story. You did not. And I kept the... There was five that I liked. The top one on the list was Chiefs minus two and a half against the Lions. Great. This is like a miracle. Look at us. This line. First of all, Vernor. Are the Chiefs really going to go two and four? Would the league ever let that happen in a million years? No. Casey Jags wasn't the dumbest loss of the season, but it was in the top three.

1:45:49Bill Simmons:What an insane loss. The guy fell down. The guy fell down on the game-winning touchdown. Mahomes threw a 99-yard pick six on a throw that, I don't know, five QBs in the league would be stupid enough to make. He got completely rope-a-dope by the Jags linebacker. I'm going to make a prediction, guys. I think KC will be 6-3 heading into Week 11 at Denver. I don't think they lose again. I will say, I mean, Detroit has done nothing wrong since that first game. All right, but they beat counter. I got it. They beat Chicago. They beat the Zombie Ravens. They beat Cleveland, a team that immediately traded the quarterback who started the game, to the next team they beat Cincy, who traded for the shitty quarterback that started the Cleveland game.

1:46:35Bill Simmons:So those are their four wins. I got it. But that at Ravens was, come on, that's a great one. It was impressive. They had a good defensive game plan. They had a nice spy on Lamar, and it was very effective. And the Ravens defense is terrible. Lions have a bunch of OL and DB injuries. And then the Lions... It's the secondary. That's the part that makes it appealing to me. The secondary is in bad, bad, bad, bad shape. And it's also, it's like Mahomes, I mean, good. a field goal. Right. Do you know what that against the spread record is? I'll tell you if you don't know. At home? No, just in general.

1:47:08What is it? Mahomes at less than a field goal, 19-3 against the spread. Wow. Oh my god.

1:47:16Bill Simmons:The Lions have this game this week and then Tampa the next week. Then they go Minnie and Washington and Philly. We're going to find out if the Lions are actually what's going on with them. Alright, so I like the Chiefs. The next one I like, ironically, because Verno already half made the case about how bad the Cowboys were and the Jets lost to them. So that means they must be really, really bad. I don't think the Cowboys are very good, even though I think the quarterback's been good this year. Panthers plus three. Oh, come on. Panthers plus three. Panthers? Panthers plus three against Dallas. Chris Vernon.

1:47:51Bill Simmons:Panthers frisky at home. Oh, stop. For almost the last year. It's a, what's his name? Rico Dowdle revenge? I didn't even think of that. It could be a little bit of a doubt on revenge. He had 200 yards last week, I saw. Last five home games last year for Carolina, they went two and three, but they covered four of them, including against Casey and Tampa. They're two and O'd home this year. It's going to be 75 degrees and balmy in Carolina. Dallas, like they have to play with the air conditioning on and they're stupid dumb. There's some fun Cowboys-Panthers history, Verno, that's not favorable to the Cowboys.

1:48:28Bill Simmons:And Dallas' defense is awful, and you have a shitload of injuries all over the place, including on your offensive line. I just like the spot for Carolina. I like the plus three. I think it's a field goal game. I think they could win. I bet it's a shootout. I like that. I think it could be. I bet it's a shootout. And, I mean, whose offensive repertoire do you like better? So, I mean, these are the kind of games the Cowboys are going to play in, same way they did against the Giants, same way they did. You know, I mean, they can't stop anybody. Again, that's why the Jets are so horrible. that it's the only team that could they could stop somehow so uh i think if if you believe in carolina i mean i think what's a i think the over under is yeah it's i mean it's almost 50 for god's sakes so you're just going back and forth cowboys offense is unbelievable their defense is terrible that leads to these fun you know super high scoring games and you might be right like i I mean, it might be 38, you know, might be 38, 35 somebody.

1:49:30But I'd imagine it turns into a shootout. That's what I'd guess.

1:49:34Bill Simmons:So it was when we lines locked at, when we sent these out this morning, it was plus three. And now it's minus two and a half, but we get it at plus three house. What's your take? Let's hear it. Yeah, I mean, Carolina hasn't lost at home. you know their offense with Canales he simplified things for Bryce Young and we're starting to see him move out of the pocket and feel comfortable and he's you know if you want to be real glass half full about it with Carolina you'd say he's seeing the field better Jalen Coker might come back fully cross the zone but you guys say this like oh they haven't lost at home but I mean they played Atlanta and Miami Miami is a real football team.

1:50:24Yeah. Miami is not.

1:50:25Bill Simmons:Your team beat them by 30, Bill. I know, but here's the thing about that game. They played really well, the Panthers, for the first quarter. No, listen. For the first quarter and a half of that game, they kind of controlled the game. And we were like, what's going on? And then touchdown kick return, and the wheels kind of came off. They fell apart. But I don't know. I watched that Atlanta game. They killed House and I in week three. That was our worst pick of the year. They just, you know, dominate Atlanta. I thought they were pretty good last week. So that's one. Falcons, we mentioned them. Falcons plus four and a half against Buffalo.

1:51:03Bill Simmons:This is our last week to bet against Buffalo before they get the suspended defensive line guys back in Ed Oliver. They're 28th against the Rush. The Falcons, there's some really good defensive metrics. You just talked about Atlanta burning you. And it's in Atlanta. And it's in Atlanta. You can only bet Atlanta at home. You should not bet Atlanta on the road. Not allowed to bet Atlanta on the road. I don't think you can bet Atlanta at all. Why? What are your thoughts? Come on, there's better choices than Atlanta. There's really not. It's pretty weak, weak. I like Atlanta. I like this spot for them.

1:51:38You guys brought me on because you lose. Come on, I'm trying to talk you out of this stuff. We already gave you a pick. I mean, you want to know why you lose? Can you pick the fucking Falcons and pick the Panthers? And then you go to bed at night. They're like, oh, my God, I can't believe we lost. We had the Falcons and the Panthers. We took the Chiefs. We took the three-time champion Chiefs. I got it. Just stick with the good teams. These teams stink. Carolina and Atlanta. The problem is, who are the good teams? You tell me who the good teams are. The problem is, who are the good teams? Yeah, because Chiefs were a good team, and then Jacksonville went down the field.

1:52:16Bill Simmons:We crossed off Seahawks, Jags, Niners, Bucks. The Bills are good. In Washington. The Broncos are good. The Chargers are good. We're taking the Broncos. The Chiefs are good. We took two of those teams. All right. And then, obviously, yeah. I'll say this, especially after watching the Bills pretty carefully and having been involved in a couple of their games from a gambling standpoint. They have not played a good start to finish game yet. I don't think they have like a killer weapon other than Cook, who the Patriots took out. We'll see if the Falcons can take him out. But I don't know. The Pats were able to move the ball up and down on them.

1:52:54Bill Simmons:And it was a Sunday night spot with a young QB and Ramondre with another murderous fumble in that game. And they kind of hung around, hung around. And then when they really needed to, they moved the ball on them. And I just think the Falcons are going to be able to do it at home. All right. I have it marked down. How else do you agree? Falcons plus four and a half? Yeah, it's one of my favorite ones. So, you know, take that. Last one. It's Monday Night Football, and you're going to bet Michael Penix over Josh Allen. Okay. I mean, that's just the number. Is that a FanDuel alert? Do they remind us that we're about to do that?

1:53:31Bill Simmons:Look what you did. Get the buzzer. Oh, trust me. This text, when you guys are down 14-0, five minutes into the game, I cannot wait to fire this off. Michael Penix, you did it. Last one is Pat Saints. A possible on paper trap game for the Pats at minus three and a half. Oh, don't pour about this. The Saints are pitiful. Well, here's Kamara. What? I don't think it's Spencer Rattler. Look at their against the spread record. They've only gotten blown out in one game. Verna, they do hang around. That's why that hook is tough. Here's the thing. the Saints against Buffalo they ran for 34 for 189 and against the Giants 34 for 88 but they were able to kind of control the game against Seattle they were 27 rushes for 79 yards I think that's what the Pats are going to do though I don't think they're going to be running on the Pats the Pats run defense has been excellent like they're fourth with rushing yards but every team has tried to test them and nobody's been able to run on them which means Spencer Rattler is going to have to beat them and I just don't think he will it is in New Orleans the most important thing for New England is Gonzalez who they kind of held out of they were a little easy with him in practice hey how much do Patriots fans travel a lot I don't know for a regular season game I will tell you this and I don't know how big the brand got nationally but my producer here, Roser, went down.

1:55:12He's a 49er fan. He went down to that 49er Saints game earlier this year. He said it was 80-20 49er fans in New Orleans. I think we'll get some. And so I just wonder how many Patriots fans will be in there because, I mean, they're filling out a stadium up with road fans. I don't know. It used to be you play in New Orleans and it was like, you know, obviously a very serious home field advantage and that's just not so anymore.

1:55:39Bill Simmons:Well, you can make it a weekend too. So, House and I lost a bet last week because we did a parlay that included the Eagles money line. And what we should have done is made the Eagles money line Eagles plus one and a half because under the rules of Ringer 107, you can do a parlay up to minus 120. House, we can do Pats plus one and a half for this with the Colts money line. Fine. And that is minus S120, and that could be our parlay this week. I want to say out loud, I'm also perfectly fine with just laying it with the Colts. Can we do this? Can we do this? Well, this could be our last pick if you want to do it.

1:56:19Don't rub this in-house. We can't. What do you mean? I mean, this has been the death of me. Me and House, in the interest of full disclosure, me and House are in a league together, a skins league, where we have to pick teams' wins and losses. So we have six teams. one of our great picks for this season was Colts losses and it has been the bane of my existence watching this team every week

1:56:44Bill Simmons:they're like legitimately good out there they should be 5-0 or could be 5-0 they're gonna battle out Jacksonville for the freaking division it worked out yeah they should have lost yeah you're right they should have lost so 4-1 is the red record you're right well the Cardinals who had the worst loss of the year and then their coach got fined for pushing his player on the sidelines. P.S. Me and House have Cardinals wins. Yeah, think about that. That's why I said as soon as you mentioned this game, I'm like, House, this is going to beat us both ways. So then Kyler Murray's might be a little bit hurt, maybe.

1:57:25Bill Simmons:This line seems a little high to me because it's a little bit of a desperation game for Arizona coming off that awful loss to Tennessee. But I like the idea of Colts' money line with the Pats plus one and a half. How did the Cardinals respond to their coach punching one of their teammates? It seemed like a punch. It was like a hard shove borderline. You know. We said on the Wednesday gambling show that they need a tent on the sidelines for the coaches to take the players. The ass-whipping tent. Beat them up. You have the blue tent for injuries. What color should the ass whipping tent be? Like a dark purple?

1:58:04Yeah, the purple tent. The purple like a bruise. I gotta tell you guys, this was kind of interesting. This past week, I told you I was in Arizona, so we were in Phoenix, and the last time I had been in Phoenix, it was sun stuff everywhere. Everywhere. This is after they had gotten Durant, right? And it was like Durant and Booker and Beal and just like omnipresent sun stuff everywhere. I did like this time when I went, there were Cardinals things everywhere. I thought it was so strange. I know it's football season, but again, I was there during football season the last time. Like, and people like walking around were wearing like Cardinal stuff.

1:58:43And like, you would go into stores and it was like Kyler Murray jerseys and Marvin Harrison Jr. jerseys and James Conner jerseys and whoever. It was just very odd. Like I always have this keen awareness of when I go to these different cities, like, you know, how, how long does it take before I know that you've got a big time basketball team? And the answer was two seconds. And I just wonder, like, I mean, I guess Booker's the only thing left and whatever with, with that, with that son's team, but it is crazy. It's so crazy how much that has switched. And it's so crazy that he has turned out to be what he has been.

1:59:19I thought he was great on your pod. Like when he first got that job, You remember you had him on? He was really good. And I was like, man, this guy seems like the kind of owner you'd want. He's been terrible.

1:59:31Bill Simmons:And then he did 29 terrible things. And he hired their GM who was a guy that I covered when Memphis played South Florida in the American. He got fired from Georgia Tech in South Florida. He's a college basketball coach. And he's now the GM of the Suns. It's all so strange. So for Ringer 107, let me test drive this. We do KC minus two and a half, Panthers plus three. Oh, God. Broncos minus six and a half, Falcons plus four and a half, and then a little parlay of Colts money line with Pats plus one and a half. How does that sound in the vicinity for you? Or is there somebody else we're missing? No, I think it's in the vicinity.

2:00:15I mean, I really think that the Steelers are going to take care of business against the Browns.

2:00:23Bill Simmons:I can't do it because I'm too afraid of that Browns defense against a team. Did you see that stat, Aaron Rodgers? Let's confirm what we talked about where he's got the least amount of distance of every pass. It's like he averages four yards of distance per passes. That's not an indictment. That's the game plan. That's how they beat Minnesota. But the Browns have a good defense. so Minnesota allegedly did as well they couldn't put any pressure on him they couldn't put any pressure on him it was supposed to be the Minnesota Blitz that flustered Pittsburgh abroad and it flustered nobody I like that Judkins he did his thing So, Verna, are you good with that five?

2:01:08Bill Simmons:No. What do you want to replace? You want to take out the Falcons and put the Steelers against the Browns? He doesn't want the Panthers in there. I'm telling you right now. He does not want the Falcons. Or the Falcons. On either of those teams. Those teams stink. Listen, we gave you a pick. You should be happy you got to pick a ringer with a seven pick. I'm in. Look, my whole reputation rides on the Broncos.

2:01:35Bill Simmons:You get to come back again if you do it. And then, hey, I promise you, bring me back next week and I'll pick against the Jets. I'm riding this thing. They are awful. Today's Ringer 107 is brought to you by FanDuel, and here's what we're doing for week six. We're 10 and 15 for the year. You know what, House? I'm okay with the – I just think we've had incredible bad luck. there's seven games where a team blew it near the end and it went to the other thing. We should at least go like two and five in those, not oh and seven. Didn't we just discuss this when we gave the nuggets credit for acknowledging, you know what?

2:02:18It's not bad luck. We've got to change things up.

2:02:22Bill Simmons:I like our process betting on bad teams. There's only so many games to bet on last week. We lost on the chiefs and the Eagles. Are those bad teams? Well, the Broncos are good. Are the Seahawks a bad team? We picked them, too, and they lost. It was Bo Nix on the road, Bruno. I got you, but the Broncos are good. We're up 17-3 with the alleged awesome running attack. No. Week six picks. Chiefs minus two and a half over the Lions. Come on, Kansas City. Really, you're going to go two and four heading into week seven? Just take care of business. Lions are banged up on the O-line and the D-backs. Panthers plus three over Vernos Cowboys.

2:03:04Bill Simmons:You tried to get us not to do this. Ten minutes before you tried to get us not to do this, you talked about how bad the Dallas Cowboys were and how many injuries they've had. Panthers at home, hot, humid. Broncos minus six and a half against the Jets in London. This is Vernos pick. By the way, it's so unfair because, yes, I was talking about how my team's not that good, but I wasn't sitting there telling you the Panthers are. Panthers are terrible, too. Your team beat that team by 30, Bill. That happened. I don't care if you say they controlled the game for the first 10 minutes. They stink. Panthers plus three.

2:03:41Bill Simmons:Broncos minus six and a half in London. We're going back to the overseas house. We're 0-2 in the overseas. We're going to wake up Sunday morning and wait to, Bruno, if we wake up. When I tell you my ringer's off, you have no idea. Falcons Falcons plus four and a half At home against Buffalo Verno tried to throw his body in front of this How's that I like betting the Falcons at home We'll never bet on them on the road again But at home Kind of like it And then last but not least A little parlay Colts money line against Arizona Maybe not with Kylo Murray With the Patriots Moved to plus one and a half In New Orleans Room for like The stupidest loss ever but maybe they lose by one.

2:04:26Bill Simmons:We have a little room. That is minus 120 on FanDuel. And those are going to be... I'll tell you this. They said that Murray didn't practice yesterday, right? Isn't that right? Then it could... You got to watch out, Bill. Could be Jacoby Brissett revenge game. I watched Jacoby last year. We're fine. Today's Ringer 107 brought to you by FanDuel. Odds subject to change. Verna. We're fine. We're fine. The mismatch with you and Dave Jacoby twice a week on the Ringer podcast network. Joe house. We can find you on the Ringer gambling show. We can find you on fairway. Rolling. And we'll find you next week.

2:05:09Bill Simmons:Cause we're doing over unders next week. We are doing that thing. We heard Zach Glow saying he's going to be on there. Is that right? Yeah. Then we're going to lose Zach Glow next week. Let's go. Did you win or lose money on golf this year?

2:05:27I mean, lost. I mean, I think if you probably check my account, it's probably a lot. I probably lost. I don't know if I hit any of the big tournaments. I think I caught a couple of the after day two, Scotty Scheffler got good odds. Like, you know what I mean? I got on that streak where it was like he opened up at plus 150 for the tournament. And it was a lot like Tiger back in the day. And then by the time you're going into moving day, you could catch him at plus 400. And so I won some of those.

2:06:04Bill Simmons:Do you know House won over$150 ,000 on Europe in the Ryder Cup? That's not true. All numbers approximate? I wouldn't be sitting here. He told me. I text him. This is how you know we're bad. I text him something about it. It had to do with this Skins League that we're in together. Yeah. And oh, no, no. I take that back. I text him about the Ryder Cup. And I was like, oh, my God, what a disaster. OK. About what it was. Right. And he has to feel that way. No, no. He texts back about our Skins League. And it was like, yeah, we should have never taken the Cardinals or whoever we have in the thing. And I was like, I'm talking about the Ryder Cup.

2:06:51But he's like, I bet on Europe. I was like, you communist. What are we doing? Just making money. What are we doing? Just making money, buddy. Just out here to make money.

2:07:02Bill Simmons:That's all. Listen, how should I bet on the Argentina in the 2004 Olympics was our greatest one? No regrets. Yeah. We were so mad at the roster Team USA put together that we put a giant 10-1 Argentina bet on and cashed it in. Yes, sir. And it was beautiful. It was great. You guys were wearing baby blue for Argentina. It was fine. Unbelievable. The real problem with the Ryder Cup, which I think we discussed on both of our pods, is that Europe had most of the golfers that I like. You really got to work on that. Can we get some more fun American golfers, please? A lot of American golf fans preferred the Euro personalities to the U.S.

2:07:46personalities. I mean, all due respect to the Henley family and the English family, but like Harris English and Russell Henley, not putting butts in seats. Let's just put it that way. Not putting butts in seats. I mean, when they were listing off, you know, because they got the auto qualifiers. I was watching the golf channel right before that week that it was about to get going. And they were like, and here's the, you know, captain's pick. So basically like the bench for Europe. And they're like, John Rahm, Victor Hovland. I'm like, oh my God, what is going on here? It was just a Matt Fitzpatrick.

2:08:21I was like, bro, it's all major winners. That's right. Crazy.

2:08:25Bill Simmons:Verna, great to see you. Good luck with the Grizzlies season. House, I'll see you in LA this weekend. Thanks for coming on, fellas. Yep. All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Kurt Goldsberry. Thanks to House and Verno as well. Thanks to Gahal and Eduardo as always. I'm going to be off all weekend until Sunday night with the cuz talking about week six NFL. And then four podcasts next week because we have a bunch of NBA stuff planned plus NFL. This is my favorite time of year. So enjoy the weekend. I will see you on Sunday.

2:09:11Bill Simmons:Must be 21 plus and present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in DC, Kentucky, or Wyoming. Gambling problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER. Visit rg-help.com. Call 888-79-7777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut or mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit gamblinghelplinema.org. Or call 800-327-5050 for 24-7 support in Massachusetts or call 877-8HOPE-NY or text HOPE-NY in New York. For adults with Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis symptoms, every choice matters. Tremphaya offers self-injection or intravenous infusion from the start.

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