PMS 2.0 1400 - Miami Head Coach Mario Cristobal, Scott Hanson, JJ Watt, Darius Butler, & AJ Hawk

13:36He retained a bunch of guys on that roster. So you have the pieces, and now it's on you as a coach. B.A. talked about it yesterday. Like, coaches lose more games than they actually win. So now the effort, the energy, the intensity, the attention, the details, those are the things that Kalen DeBoer, which he's always done, has to be great at, but now at the highest level. So, like I said, I got faith in him to turn around. Hopefully it was just a one-off. We'll see.

13:58Pat McAfee:We like Kalen DeBoer. Yeah. We do. That's why watching that game the other night was like, he's going to get crushed. He's very nice to us. He's been very nice to us. Exactly. No, no, no. If we start doing that, he's a nice guy. That nice guy shit.

14:14Darius Butler:He is, though. I was just saying, no, it's a general. He's a nice guy. And he wins. He does win. He wins. I personally think as we're talking about it, should have thought in his head like, hey, Bear Bryant and Washington would be cool. But, yeah, I guess going to Alabama. because you mentioned it, you know, you got to go to Bama to be in the conversation for a national championship. Like, now you don't because there's 12 teams and it might suck. Like, at the end of the year, you might say, like, well, Notre Dame didn't play anyone. Well, Washington or one of these teams, Pac-12, you know, they didn't play anyone, but they're in the conversation because they made it.

14:44Darius Butler:So, like, is it worth the –

14:45Pat McAfee:Well, when you're starting with 12 and you're counting down to one. Exactly. You know, if you get into dance, that's really all that matters.

14:51Darius Butler:More teams and a lot more fun.

14:52Pat McAfee:Yeah, well, it's supposed to be, but that first round was not a lot done by the bad teams. that's a good point that was pretty big yeah but that's the thing about it is that more schools get a shot to shot yeah and boom you know when you when you put it that way you can't help but this is the right way to crown a cfp national champion but when you're watching some of those games it's like uh it feels like we're just got more more blowouts yeah it's game shite and boy we got a lot of off time for the higher seeds. Did they get rusty? They just had a month off. Yeah. Congratulations. You did the best out of everybody.

15:29Pat McAfee:Well, that's the quarterfinals New Year 6. Yeah. You know?

15:35Darius Butler:Rotating bases. Should help. So cold.

15:40Pat McAfee:That was a great song. It was. Okay, let's talk a little bit NFL before Coach Cristobal joins us. Travis Hunter is listed as a starting wide receiver, and then I believe he's second string left corner or something like that. So the mindset here is he's majoring in wide receiver and he's getting a minor in cornerback. And we probably assume that this is the right way to go about doing this. Once again, this is not a normal situation for anybody to handle, let alone brand-new head coach, brand-new GM in a city and a program and organization that's trying to make a huge jump here. Huge jump. Stoner, who's the general manager, actually came out the day after drafting Travis Hunter and saying, the game of football is supposed to be tested.

16:21Pat McAfee:The boundaries are supposed to be touched. You're supposed to try to change the game. That is football. That is Travis Hunter. I gave a full speech about how, holy shit, football was once like this. Now it's completely different because Travis Hunter is here. Now we're getting a chance to see how they're going to unroll it. What are your thoughts on this, D. Butch? What does this say to you whenever it's a major and wide receiver, kind of a minor and cornerback at this moment? Kind of expected on this level. And Stoner and Liam Cohen are dealing with something that nobody's really dealt with before at this level.

16:51You made the big trade to draft him at number two. He dealt with a little injury preseason with the shoulder, so I don't know how that affected or impacted their plans going forward. But you start with a major and wide receiver. It's a lot more moving parts on the offensive side of the ball between the ears when it comes to game planning, adjustments, and all those things. Being on the same page with Trevor Lawrence and all those things on the offensive side of the ball than there are on the defensive side of the ball. If you're looking at the schedule here, these different weeks, you see the different weapons.

17:17When you come across these different teams where you have matchup problems on the defensive side of the ball, if you are the Jacksonville Jaguars, that's when I think they'll implement that chess piece. Travis Hunter, maybe it's a cat defense. Hey, we're going to play this third down red area. Hey, you got that cat. You got Jamar Chase this week on these critical situations. You got Nico Collins. You have whoever that opposing number one threat is, and you put your best cover guy on him. That may be just 15, 16 snaps that game. But we'll see. I can't wait to see how it actually unfolds. He's a great, great player.

17:48We know who he is, not only physically, but between the years, what he showed in college football to be able to kind of attain all that information and be in the right places. And we talk about loafing. This guy rarely loafed. I never really saw him loaf on the college level. We know how tough it is to play on the National Football League physically, week in and week out. So that's the number one thing to watch out for. But I'm excited to see this Travis Hunter experience and see it start majoring on offense, minoring on defense. I think that's the right way to start it out.

18:15Pat McAfee:I like the thoughts and everything you laid out. We're not saying that's definitely what they're thinking. We are just saying this is a possible mindset for them. Like whenever they face a team, I think it's 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 10, 11, whatever it is. Yeah, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 10, 11. Got it. Okay. And so all those weeks, they have a plethora of weapons on the other side. So why not add in one of the greatest athletes? You're just saying this could be the mindset that the Jacksonville Jaguars are having. This could be just because of how tough it is. And I'm coming kind of from personal experience.

18:44I played both ways in college my senior year. So there were certain matchups where we went to – we're playing Virginia, we're playing Rutgers or West Virginia. Hey, you got a 15-play script on offense. So I'll go and practice with the offense seven on seven, practice with the offense in red area. And I knew my plays. I knew my position. But I majored on the defensive side of the ball. But I knew exactly what situations I was going to be going into on the offensive side of the ball. So I think that's a great way to start it out, you know, on this next level, which, like I said, nobody – we haven't really seen anybody do it yet.

19:14Pat McAfee:And if he's able to do it full-time on both sides, that, baby. That would be great. That would be insane. High American. That would be unbelievable. That would be so much fun to watch. We can't wait to follow his journey in a tough AFC South. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, tough AFC South. Because of Gills. Yeah. Obviously, Houston's got a lot to say in that conversation. Sure. For good reason. They've won it a few times. Mm-hmm. Tennessee, they've got a guy. They've got a guy. Generation. New stadium coming. And then, obviously, we've got Trevor Lawrence in a new Adidas commercial with a guy who's going to be playing both ways.

19:44Pat McAfee:It feels like vibes are high down there. Stoner feels great. Liam Cohen is beloved. I mean, they got it for the next couple. Building a new stadium, I think. Yeah. I don't know how they're going to – do they put three pools in there? I don't know. Probably have to. AFC South stack. Nobody wants to come dance with them. 100-yard pool. Oh, my God. Somebody swim. Yeah, everyone's got a pool. Down the length of the field. With Travis Hunter running in a touchdown. Yeah. All right, ladies and gentlemen, joining us now is a guy who had to watch the end of that conversation, and we do apologize to him for that.

20:09Pat McAfee:He is the head coach of the undefeated Miami Hurricanes football team. Ladies and gentlemen, Mario Cristobal. Coach, what do you think about putting a 100-yard pool so we can swim down the side as your boys Carson Beck's throwing a deep ball to Tony down there? What do you think about that, Coach? Pretty good? We're going to want this pool again? 100 yards, right down the sideline. Right down the sideline. Sounds like your kind of stadium, man. I don't know if I can make that happen. Well, you're walking on top of the pool. Yeah, like you're on top of the pool and you've got people swimming underneath.

20:44Pat McAfee:nonetheless coach congratulations okay cam ward comes in last year you guys become a viral sensation with how the games go obviously massive plays happening magical run throughout the entire season we have a miami fan with us and he was obviously each week living and dying with you guys as i assume you were now you have to reload you lose the number one pick in the draft cam ward why carson beck the guy for you guys this year and what has he shown since getting there that makes you believe like, yeah, we might have lost an incredible leader and an incredible quarterback, but we were able to find another guy that will be able to do that for us?

21:19Well, you know, he was at Georgia while Monken was over there. He was now with the Ravens. And, you know, Monken and our offensive coordinator, Shannon Dawson, they're really tight. You know, he's an air raid disciple. But, you know, Monken successfully blended, right, the power run game, the RPO, the air raid with an unbelievable run game, really diverse. And we felt that we could do the same thing with Shannon Dawson. And just discussing Carson and watching him on tape, he had all the tools, man. And when he had good protection, he lit it up really well in 23. Last year they got beat up a little bit.

21:51It wasn't maybe the same system. It just fit us. And the guy is, he's a great human being. Like, he's a legitimate dude. Like, people love being around him. He gets after it. Relentless worker. And he just fits.

22:02Pat McAfee:And you got wide receivers making catches like that. I mean, absolutely absurd catch there by CJ. Obviously, Tony went crazy. Are we thinking about maybe putting Bain on offense? Are we thinking about maybe getting for the ball a little bit? We'll see how Heisman voting goes down the stretch, man. If we need to, we might do that. But you saw him with the ball in his hands. He's been playing football since he's been knee-high, and he does it all, man. And if you have a chance, watch him and watch Mesut, our other defensive end, against Notre Dame's tackle and see what a great job they did controlling the line of scrimmage.

22:34Pat McAfee:Yeah, we watched. We saw it. Yeah, that was the thing I think I noticed with these college teams now that I've been baptized kind of into the world through college game day. It's like you've got to be big and you've got to be fast. You have to be big and fast. Now, granted, everything else in between the years have to have that as well, but the body types of college ball are at the highest level. You've got to be big and fast. They talk about you being like a relentless recruiter. What are you looking for for guys that you're trying to make hurricanes, and what do they mean by saying that you are a recruiter 25 hours?

23:04Pat McAfee:because we're wasting now seemingly seven, eight minutes of you potential recruiting time by the way they describe it. You're killing me. You're killing me. Hopefully this will help, too. No, I mean. I'm recruiting right now, actually. Always. Yeah, I got it. I got it. I played here on some badass team. I was a nobody, but the guys I played with, they were like legitimate real deal dudes, hall of famers, gold jacket type guys. And I learned quickly, like, I like playing with those guys because you know what? They're going to stop on Saturdays. They're going to kick ass and take over games. And I came back to Miami as the J in 98, 97, 98, when they were coming off of, you know, some really bad years and trying to put it together and going, man, that does not look like Miami.

23:41And then guys like Chuck Pagano, right? He was a DB coach here. Greg Sciano, Butch Davis, Larry Coker, a lot of guys that were, you know, showing me, hey, this is a way we got to build this team. We got to recruit really good players. I'm like, yeah, because those guys aren't very good. So we hit a slew of home runs, man, in a very short amount of time and flipped the program, and I just became – I've always been a big believer in the right kind of people and in football the right kind of people that are legitimate, like elite competitors.

24:10Pat McAfee:I think Florida and South Florida, more specific, getting good at college football again, is great for college football as a whole. But, boy, Florida was looking dry for a while. A lot of flights out of town. South Florida native D-Bud has a question for you. Too many. South Florida kid grew up a Hurricane fan. I obviously went to UConn, so a Husky for life. But how important is it, and Pat talked about your recruiting, recruiting South Florida specifically and keeping those guys down there, looking up and down to Ross, see a lot of South Florida boys, and then looking on the sideline with all those legends, Michael Irvin, Ray Lewis, Willis McGahee, Andre Johnson, Edge, a lot of South Florida guys themselves.

24:45So how important is that for you, Coach? Man, I was about to plug those guys in the game. They're about to kick off to us. I'm like, all right, let's get Devin Hester in there, see what he can do too, right? No, it's always been important. I was away for a long time. I've been away for 20-plus years before finally leaving Oregon and coming back this way. And from afar, you would see a lot of misses, a lot of local misses, and then some national misses because Miami is made up from a national aspect as well, the big bodies up in the Northeast, the Midwest, and sometimes even the West Coast. But to get guys like Reuben Bain, think about it.

25:21Reuben Bain is part of our first full class. So he's a true junior now, right? And like all the fruits of all that hard work, all the labor, man, it's paying off. So yeah, when those guys are there, it makes a difference. When I came to school here and why I came to Miami was because I always saw those dudes coming back to the games. If we were playing in a big time game before our coach would come over and rip our ass, we had Michael Irvin, Jerome Brown, may he rest in peace, Winston Moss, Melvin Bratt, and all these guys right in your face, right in your grill, making sure you hold up the standard.

25:52So it's always been a natural thing, and it's good to see that coming back.

25:55Pat McAfee:It's been talked about for years and years, though. It's just a year, the U's back, the U's back, the U's back, the U's back. Last year, felt it. The whole world experienced it. You know, you go out to Cal for game day there, the Miami fans traveled out there, like a lot of them. And it was like they were feeling as if we're all the way back. And now after beating Notre Dame early, you got some games here early, brother. Like Boston College, obviously a big one for, you know, them and for the ACC here. as a whole. USF, Florida, Florida State. Then Brahms, Louisville. You got Pitt after Thanksgiving up there.

26:30Pat McAfee:So, I mean, you're going to have some cold games. It feels like you have a – Bethune.

26:33Darius Butler:Bethune-Cook.

26:34Pat McAfee:Oh, sorry, not BC. I'm so sorry. Bethune-Cookman. That's 100 % on me. That was Coach – I was wondering what the hell you were talking about.

26:41Darius Butler:Ed Reed. Coach Reed. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. For us. Yeah, about 10 minutes. We'll be talking about South Florida. Those athletes. Coach, how important. I know it's one game at a time, but you look at that schedule, you see Florida State, you play, you see Florida State, you see Florida there. All you guys are in the top 15. I know it's early right now. But even surrounding that, how much do you hear about that with all these Florida teams kind of being back at their standard, what it used to be? Well, think about it. Today was probably maybe yesterday was the toughest day because for the first time in a while, Miami is now learning how to handle success again.

27:19so we had to be all over their butts about look when everybody tries to kick kiss the crack of your butt on the way to class and tell you how great you are and you see all this stuff you gotta stay clear of that and get you over here so we could be all over your butts and push you and grind on you so you could focus on what gave us this opportunity to begin with you know so it's all learning process but i mean for us like you mentioned it's with you and cookman right now you know it's tomorrow's practice we got to get after it like today of Francis Mauno against Ruben Bain in a one-on-one. It looks like Jurassic Park.

27:49That's the way Miami should look, right? Yes. So that's our focus, man, just like right here, right now, not get ahead of anything, not skip steps, man. We got a lot of work to do, but we're doing it, and we're making a ton of progress.

28:00Pat McAfee:You talk about Jurassic Park.

28:02Darius Butler:AP Tonus, pleasure for you. Yeah, Coach, obviously we know you are a trenches guy. You were born and raised in the trenches, and you talk about Bain and Francis going up against each other in practice. Everyone said preseason you guys have a top five O-line, D-line, And you talked about marrying the air raid with a power running game. And we talk about all the time in the NFL how the Eagles just won the Super Bowl. It feels like we're coming back to having to play defense and run the football. Are you seeing that in college football as well? Because, I mean, last year, all final four teams, they played incredible defense and they ran the football.

28:34Darius Butler:So are you seeing that as well in college? I think so. I think everything is morphing and evolving and blending. I mean, you think about it. I was at Alabama with Coach Saban when it was almost like a boa, man. We like you kick your butt up front and just strangle you on defense and win 17-3. But you have to start scoring points, right? And then the spread and tempo. Remember, as Coach Saban used to call us, Al-Qaeda, because we would like go faster practice. So it just kept going from people start saying, you know what? If we could just combine that almost like that basketball, like spacing mentality in the passing game and blend it in with the right type of play, action, protection, concepts, great screen games, a power running game, and varied temples, right?

29:18Like a good pitcher mixes up your pitches all the time. If you could make that a reality, then you're going to have something special. And we've become that. And last year, for us, that was a generational offense, and we feel like we can be even better here in the coming years.

29:30Pat McAfee:Enemy of the state, Coach Saban is calling you at practice. These guys are enemies of the state here. All the Taliban is what he did. That's coaching. What are you trying to do here? What are you trying to do here? Carson Beck had a handshake with a DB, I think. You feel like your team's tight? I feel like that is the X factor that really separates the great teams from the good teams. I think your teams have to like each other. I think they have to hang out with each other. I think they have to want to fight with each other. I think that is a huge piece. Do you feel that in your locker room? Because it looked like it from watching the game.

30:08Yeah, it feels like that. Your biggest concern is when you're getting all this talent, are you getting independent contracts, are you getting legitimate dudes that want to win while pursuing their goals, their dreams? We do a good job just doing a lot of stuff together. We're lucky. We're in Miami. We're in the middle of Coral Gables, and then we're at Prime 112 in Smith & Walensky. Then we want to get the team together. We'll go on a speedboat and go to the beach for a little while, but then be back here in this private setting.

30:34Pat McAfee:Recruiting. We're recruiting right now. We're recruiting. We've got palm trees everywhere. We're on speedboats. We got good sun here. More players. Anyways, but without a doubt, I think it showed. It showed. I don't think it's hard to win games like that unless you're tight and you're slugging it out for each other. And that was a muddy, bloody game up front. I mean, that was like rock 'em, sock 'em robots for four quarters. And I think our guys just found a way to just dig a little bit deeper. It was a great game. We appreciate you guys doing that for us, especially opening week. I think you're both teams A-OK going forward.

31:05Pat McAfee:Now your team in this modern era, especially more players, more players, you're going to need assistance. Connor has a question for you.

31:12Darius Butler:Yeah, Coach, you're a 10 out of 10 recruiter. Obviously, you were the recruiting coordinator at Alabama, and now it's changed a lot with NIL. I believe just Jeff Bezos was in the building in a suite at your game, and also Dana White now has a daughter going to Miami. Have you reached out yet for maybe half a billion, maybe one billion? Jeff Bezos, I think, pisses that in the morning. For maybe a couple more players. We're talking about all these great Florida schools. You know, a couple extra dollars might help. Well, you know, soon I think our next lineup will have The Rock and Pat McAfee. And we'll go from there.

31:49We'll line them all up, man. Hit them up for some dough.

31:51Pat McAfee:Whoa, whoa, whoa. I'm already giving enough money to West Virginia. You need to call Dwayne Johnson. He just got a 15-minute standing ovation for his acting role in The Smashing Machine. It's like I think he's about to crack into it. They're talking Oscars. Oh, yeah. Hey, The Rock somehow. Papatouille. Yep. Zola Energy Drink. TKO Chairman. Yep. Production Company. Seven buck, the final boss. What'd you say, Coach? He was my teammate here in Miami. What a stud, dude. What was he like at college? Incredible work ethic, I assume? You guys all saw that from a very young age? He's the guy that walked in like doing 315 for 20 on the bench press.

32:29You know, just kind of like a walking bicep. just a monster, monster physique. But really quiet, really reserved, and a great player. A great, great player. We were loaded, man. Even back then, great players had to take their, you know, wait their turn and whatnot. But he was always a great teammate, great player.

32:44Pat McAfee:Yeah, he gave back to you guys right in there at Dwayne Johnson locker room or something. I think he ties back to his times at the U for a lot of things and a lot of inspiration for what he does. A great success story, especially if U's all the way back. We can't wait to watch you. Bethune-Cookman this weekend. Then we got the Florida lineup. Don't look ahead, Coach, but USF, Florida, Florida State. Everybody's good. First time all Florida teams have been ranked, right? Top 15 for a long time. I think it was 2006. Yeah, 2006. And it's early. It's early. It's early. One week. Let's keep it going.

33:17Pat McAfee:Don't be taking those kisses to the ass crap. We don't need any smooches on the butt. We need to get back to work. Coach, we appreciate the hell out of you, and thank you for stopping by. Appreciate you, guys. Thanks for having me. Ladies and gentlemen, Coach Mario Cristobal. Wait, wait, wait. Coach, Coach, Coach. Coach, you still there? I'm still here. You speak Spanish? Is that what I remember? Pablo Antonio perfectamente bien. Que tu quieres? Si. All right. Ciao. Grazie. All right. I have a good one, ladies and gentlemen. Coach Mario Cristobal. That was a little Italian for you. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

33:48Pat McAfee:Okay. All right. Sweet. Makes it in there. So I guess Coach Saban. Coach Saban used to have Mario Cristobal if there was like a recruit or a coach or an area he was trying to get to where, you know, Spanish speaking, it was like, Coach Crispo, I need you to come. Please, need you to come. Need you here, Coach. Need you here. I guess it's just fluid. Down in Miami, that's probably an incredible thing to have. What a beast. You guys like him down there? Love him. Gumpy, let's talk about it. What were your thoughts on Mario Crispo? Because I remember a couple years ago, remember you guys had the lead.

34:16Pat McAfee:Hand the ball off. Fumble happens. Goes back the other way. We all feel obligated to say, that can't happen. Coach. Obviously, hang on to the damn ball obviously hang on to the ball but that can't happen feel like he got judged harshly because oh yeah and i'm just saying that strictly from how we even had to feel had to talk about everybody had to talk about it what he's done since then is really turned the entire program around number one overall pick in cam ward obviously perfect marriage and it feels like carson's the exact same way and he's recruiting 25 hours a day they're saying gumpy you got to be excited as a u

34:48Darius Butler:fan yeah it's awesome because i used to watch him a lot when i lived on the west coast when he was coaching Oregon, and I liked him there. But this Corey Weatherman guy, the new D.C. they got, you see his passion and the fire he has on the sidelines. That was the problem last year. Cam Ward knew the defense couldn't get a stop. If you didn't score on one possession, there was a good chance you were going to lose that game.

35:08Pat McAfee:Congrats to Miami being back. And congrats to all of us getting a chance to see Michael Irvin and Ray. I forgot to ask him what's Michael Irvin's title. You got to have some title. I think he's leader of the pack. He's the The minister of culture is McConaughey. Leader of the pack might be Michael Irvin. Minister maybe of.

35:29Darius Butler:Drake was technically like Toronto Raptors ambassador. Granted, that was a pro team.

35:36Pat McAfee:Yeah, because I asked McConaughey's title. I said, what are you, like chief of culture or something? He said, I'm not an executive. Minister of culture. Legend. Of course.

35:47Darius Butler:Did you see his golf swing by any chance?

35:48Pat McAfee:Oh, my God. Yeah. He's McConaughey. So smooth. Of course. Somebody said, you need to act like a golfer. And he was like, all right, let me watch this. Yeah, no problem. I got it. What do I got to do? These hands got to get real loose up here, right? It looks like it. And I'm just trying to pinch that thing, right? He's awesome. Yeah. Everything about him, his vibe, whenever he walks, it looks like he's floating. And his hair is just always so perfectly prim.

36:09Darius Butler:I looked it up. He has another title. He is a minister of culture, but he's also the professor of practice at the university. Is that Michael? No, that would be. Oh, yeah.

36:18Pat McAfee:We're just trying to build for Irvin's. Sure. Professor. Trying to build for them. We have some great news coming out of Pittsburgh. Cam Hayward's going to play football this year.

36:29Darius Butler:Wow. For the Steelers? For the Pittsburgh Steelers. I never would have guessed that.

36:33Pat McAfee:Yeah, the hold-in, I guess, is not going to be an issue. Mike Tomlin says this. I'm certainly expecting Cam to play. Cam doesn't play a lot of his team development over the last several years. My job is to get him in and out of the throw. And I've done my job. And so there are no reservations about his participation or his readiness. I'm sure he's chopping it a bit. Okay, holding over. He's playing football for the Pittsburgh Steelers, what Coach Tomlin is saying, expecting. That's a big deal. Obviously, last year was all pro. Now he was seeking a little bit more money because they redid his contract last year, take away money, I assume, from this year.

37:12Pat McAfee:So now he's at a lower level. And all anybody was saying is, okay, Cam, come on, come on. That's basically the way everybody had treated this. We thought maybe he'd get a little bit more money before the season. Doesn't seem like that's going to be the case. And now Cam Hayward's playing for a fully stacked Pittsburgh Steelers team.

37:27Darius Butler:Yeah, it's huge, especially week one against the Jets, who are going to have a good running game. And Derek Harmon, who they drafted in the first round out of Oregon, is going to be banged up for the first couple weeks. So that's huge. Obviously, need came in the middle. I mean, he's been the best player on the Steelers defense for a long time with T.J. Watt. Tomlin, did I hear him call practice, team development? He goes, Cam doesn't participate a lot in team development. He just called him practice.

37:49Pat McAfee:Yeah, and then he said, it's my job to get him in and out of Latrobe. I did that. Or St. Vincent, whatever he said. Yeah, it was a great way to word things, which is Mike Tomlin football to a tee there. So basically, we're all getting a little bit overzealous about this holding. Cam probably not practicing those days anyways. What year is this for him?

38:07Darius Butler:15, 16?

38:08Pat McAfee:15, 16. 17, 18. In the middle of a defensive line. Take it on bodies. So much worse. Captain obviously voted Aaron Rodgers, T.J. Watt, and?

38:19Darius Butler:Miles Gilbert. Dog. Yes. Absolutely. Oh, okay. Well, I guess if I'm a Steelers rookie, I know how to get my paycheck. I guess I'll just hold out like Cam Hayward, and I'll be a captain. Oh, Aaron Rodgers? He's up there? He didn't work very hard in this offseason. What do you mean he didn't work very hard? You don't know that. That's what people are saying. Did he just say? He said Aaron didn't work hard in this offseason.

38:39Pat McAfee:You see that ball coming in?

38:40Darius Butler:You think he just woke up doing that? Oh, well, Aaron wakes up doing that, yes. Every day, actually, I do think he does wake up and does that. Yeah, exactly. That's because he's working. How many quarterbacks were playing with those squirty guns on stage this offseason while everybody else was working? He's working on his aim. Yeah, yeah. Well, he ain't shooting in football.

38:58Pat McAfee:You asked where you're wrong, my friend, because he throws that thing like he's pulling a bow in. Throwing darts, exactly. I'm sorry, you've never seen the longest yard.

39:04Darius Butler:If he was throwing water balloons or maybe some sort of water contraption instead of a squirt gun, I'd feel a little better. I'm just saying two of those four captains for the Pittsburgh Steelers are essentially, oh, excuse me, three. I forgot TJ Watts up there. He held out, too.

39:17Pat McAfee:Hey, look, if you want to be a captain for the Steelers.

39:20Darius Butler:I don't like what Conor said. You just got to hold down.

39:22Pat McAfee:I just want to let everybody know, I did not know Conor was going to take it down. Me neither. Tell us all. Yeah, I mean, Conor got real excited, I think, whenever his brain started piecing that whole thing together. He could attack Pittsburgh a little bit, but that's how Pittsburgh knows. People from Boston are going to react.

39:33Darius Butler:If he doesn't realize that it rains in Pittsburgh and you got to play with a wet ball, and that's what Aaron was doing with squirt guns. He was just squirting his balls down so he could participate in practice. As long as he was squirting his own balls. I just want to make sure he was on his own.

39:48Pat McAfee:He certainly was because he needed to get good grip on that thing. But with all that being said, Cam Hayward in year whatever, Aaron in year 423. TJ Watt's still there. It feels like now is the time where they're all going to walk in and play the ball. Chris Boswell, kicker. Is that still a thing going on?

40:03Darius Butler:He'll be out there kicking too, I assume. I assume he says. I believe we would have heard so. You should have been captain. I think Slay's in his 13th year, right? 14th. Yeah, he's an OG. So many vets on that team.

40:14Pat McAfee:Yeah, they're going for it. Ramsey, yeah. Yenzers, I think, by and large. Grizzled team. Guaranteed Super Bowl. Yeah. Grizzled? Grizzled vets. Some people have been saying a little long in the tooth. No other leaders are long in the tooth and want money. That's what I've heard. I will tell you this. I think there's Yenzers that are very worried about how this is all going to work.

40:37Darius Butler:I wouldn't call them yinzers then.

40:39Pat McAfee:I think there's a lot of, oh, real nice. We got all the toys, huh? We got everything that's supposed to be. We're supposed to win the Super Bowl. It feels like you're listening to one person. Yeah, I think he represents a lot of people, though. I don't think so. Not my people.

40:50Darius Butler:I want all the teams up here to go to the Super Bowl or to go to the playoffs, especially the D-Bus team. Thank you. By far, the team that goes 9-8, that's the most entertaining, would be the Steelers. If the Steelers go 9-8, it will be comedy. Watching. That place will explode. Yeah, just imagining like a 7-2 start and then a 9-8 finish.

41:11Pat McAfee:You know what it kind of feels like? When Kenny Pickett was slicing and dicing that preseason. Do you remember that? Yeah, Atlanta. Oh, my God.

41:19Darius Butler:He thinks that would be – I was born in 98. Yeah, we know. I was raised in 98. We know you were. Come on, Pete.

41:26Pat McAfee:But we're saying there hasn't been a lot of like really ridiculous expectations out of the Pittsburgh Steelers fans, I think for a bit.

41:34Darius Butler:Not since 2017.

41:35Pat McAfee:I think there hasn't been. This one and the Kenny Pickett preseason one feel like the biggest. Like the Kenny Pickett preseason one was that two or three years ago?

41:42Darius Butler:I think we all knew that was a joke, though. So this year, I mean, imagine how excited they were when Kenny Pickett was 7-7 in the preseason. You got fucking Aaron Rodgers now. Things have changed a little bit.

41:52Pat McAfee:Here we go. Steelers, here we go. Pittsburgh's going to the Super Bowl. Here we go. If they don't fire everyone. Here we go. We're moving on. Nope. Get your shit. Nope. Here we go.

42:13Darius Butler:Everyone just got extensions. And by the way, if I remember correctly, that guy from Pittsburgh that you keep listening to wanted Aaron to play in the preseason too? Yes, he did. Okay.

42:22Pat McAfee:He said, I want to see two, three snaps in that Pittsburgh Steelers uniform. Don't we think you should take a couple snaps so we can see it?

42:30Darius Butler:You tell that guy to come see me next time. He actually is coming today. Oh, good.

42:36Darius Butler:I just hope the con artist is conning the other teams and not his own city. Whoa! Whoa! That's what I hope. That's what I hope. It's going to be a fun year, isn't it? It's going to be a long one.

42:48Pat McAfee:Joining us now, ladies and gentlemen, is Amanda's going to be spending a lot of time with us. Okay? He's going to be in all of our lives. And we're excited for that. We still have no idea how he does it. His bladder control is one that they should tell stories about. his ability to navigate throughout an entire league's actions and storylines is second to none his contract was up i think he had more leverage than anybody in the history of on-air talent i hope he utilized it even if he didn't we're thankful he's back the host of the red zone channel ladies and gentlemen scott hans how you doing brother gentlemen welcome to our humble abode i asked to do this interview from the red zone studio this is the first ever interview i've done from the actual red zone studio you welcome us into your place all the time so if you want a tour we can do that or we can just talk how the steelers can get to the super bowl starting on on sunday in the early window of nfl red zone well we will certainly talk about that again when with somebody that isn't you uh what we can do is see your studio yeah i had no idea we had potential access thank you for allowing us to be the first red zone studio interview okay so it's a massive green screen all right and we're standing behind that podium the entire time is that what we're doing yeah now i know you're gonna make fun of me because like look over here right here let me go Go full screen on this or no?

44:14Step back.

44:15Pat McAfee:Here we go. It's up and down. Got it. Yeah, that's a stand-in. It looks like the COVID used. It looks like the COVID used. This is not some ego play by me. You know this, Pat. The crew uses this to balance the green screen here like a Marvel movie and whatnot. The desk is real. The host's enthusiasm is real. And most importantly, the touchdowns are real. But the background is completely fake. okay so how many hours are you in there what time does day start so i'm in los angeles this is right next to inglewood uh right next to sofi stadium in inglewood california literally 300 300 feet this way is sofi stadium i i like to be the first one in the studio i get in at little after 5 a.m on sunday kickoff is 10 a.m pacific on sunday so five hours of ramping up i have a little i eat my I eat my food.

45:09I eat my breakfast at the desk right here. Okay, I know you want to know this. No, there's no toilet back here or anything like that. Scroll down. Scroll down. Scroll down. There's no Gatorade jug back there. Just like I stand right here. There's a little hose there. Is there a hose in there? Was that a wire? What was that wire?

45:27Darius Butler:Sort of catheter. What was it?

45:30Pat McAfee:Yeah. Okay. Okay. Here. You really want to get into it? Yeah, go down. Go down a little bit down. What is that, Don? Oh, what is that, Don? That's a little catheter there? It does sort of look like a tube, but that's some kind of electrical cord.

45:49So anyway, looking into the camera here, here's what you guys will find fun. Because I only stand here for the first 90 seconds of the show. As soon as we go to the Octobox, when the kickoffs are all beginning, I come around here and I stand right here and watch this wall of monitors. They've got a camera light up here for the Pat McAfee show today. That's not usually here, but we have every game on. All these big monitors go into quadrants. I'll put all eight games on over here. I've got a massive monitor that's tapped into the scoreboards of every stadium in the NFL. and I got all the scores live with the clock exactly synchronized to the game clock.

46:35So the action could be a little two seconds off, but that is the game clock. Down here, I've got what you got at home. We call it our program monitor that I know what you're watching at any given moment. And then I can say, all right, we just had, you know, whatever. The Patriots did just this, the Cowboys, the Eagles, whatever. Let's get it over here. But, yeah, we rock and roll. My right-hand men, my version of Boston Connor, Ty Schmidt, Tone Diggs, They sit right here, Tim Galanians, Brian Larravee. They have their laptops popped open to give me any type of stat, fact, player identification, and we rock and roll for seven hours with no commercial breaks.

47:10Pat McAfee:So you got two spots. That's awesome. Thank you for the tour there, by the way. That's fantastic stuff. Thank you for showing us how the sausage is made. And that sausage, by the way, is a must for any NFL fan every single Sunday. You've become just an institution in of yourself on one of the quad boxes for everybody's YouTube TV run. You got two spotters there. Who's deciding, like, are you cutting to these games in real time? Who are you talking to? Is there a truck? Is there a room? How many people are in there? I assume that's chaos. Yeah, control room. It is. It is. Controlled chaos, but chaos indeed.

47:42The control room is right above us over here, and it has about 15 to 20 people in it at any given time. Our producers, our coordinating producers, Alan Flowers and Andy Gregg, our line producers, Todd Mossberg and Brian Nettles, they're in my ear constantly saying, all right, we're on the Falcons game right now. It's third and eight from midfield. If they go incomplete, they're going to bring out the punt team. So let's go to Green Bay. But keep in mind, Seattle's coming out of the two-minute warning timeout and they're first and goal from the six. So if they come out of commercial break, let's go to Seattle.

48:16Otherwise, go to Lambeau Field. However, if the Falcons get this first down, we'll stay with this drive. Yes. So it's like calling plays in my ear, like a coach to quarterback communication system. And then I get to the line of scrimmage and execute whatever the football demands.

48:32Pat McAfee:The people that I've met that come to mind that could potentially pull off what you're doing, Michael Cole, period. That's it. I think what you're doing is like very difficult and you make it look very easy. And that's why I hope whenever we saw your contract was up, it was like, oh buddy, now is a good time to be Scott Hanson. So we want to say congratulations. to you and also thank you for getting that done because you're a massive piece of our nfl season brother massive piece of the entire thing oh pat i appreciate it fellas i appreciate it i've been on the show like once or twice before and i say this every time it is a massive responsibility i mean i love doing what i do and i hope the enthusiasm comes across your televisions i love football i love serving the audience but it's a massive responsibility when everyone in the sports broadcasting industry who's not working on an NFL Sunday is most likely watching Red Zone to get the 10 ,000-foot view.

49:28Players tell me all the time when they're not playing on Sunday, they're watching Red Zone. Coaches tell me when they're not playing on Sunday, they're watching Red Zone. So it's a heck of a responsibility, and I try and respect the game, respect the players, respect the coaches, and honor our audience who joins us, millions of them, for every single Sunday that make Red Zone their ritual and their routine. So I appreciate you, boys. I'm going to give everything I got here. Season 17 kicking off on Sunday. Let's go.

49:59Pat McAfee:You've earned it all, Scott. We appreciate you. On that note, D-Bun has a question for you. Just mentioned season 17. How many, I guess, weeks or years did it take you to get actually comfortable with all of that chaos that you just mentioned that goes on behind the scenes that now you're going into a game, assuming you're going in pretty comfortable every Sunday afternoon. Well, Sunday morning for you now. Yeah, so D-Buck, good to see you, sir. Happy New Year to you. Happy New Year. Football. Football. Before – let's go. Let's go. Before I was the host of Red Zone, I was a roving reporter. So I used to go to Lucas Oil Stadium and cover the Colts game, right?

50:40And I would do some pregame reports, and then during the game, I would sit up in the press box with all the rest of the talking heads and just watch the game, log stuff. But I'd be the guy up in the press box that would have my laptop open. And as Peyton Manning was doing something on the field at Lucas Oil Stadium, I'd be elbowing, you know, the guy and the gal next to me on media row saying, yeah, yeah, yeah. I know Peyton's doing this, but Tony Romo just hit Terrell Owens on a 50 yard touchdown in Dallas. And oh, oh, oh, Adrian Peterson's got 100 yards at the half in Minnesota. So I have always wanted to get the overarching view of the NFL, even when I had a live game going on in front of me.

51:20So to answer your question specifically, I was not entirely comfortable, but reasonably comfortable because I always want to watch more than one thing at a time. My brain is wired that way. And I love multitasking and just saying, oh, man, I want to tell this person about this going on. I know you're watching this, but check out this right here. And that's what red zone is for seven straight hours. It's the NFL doing something and then me tapping America on the shoulder saying, hey, hey, hey, look at this in Dallas, in Houston, in Detroit, whatever.

51:53Pat McAfee:Yeah, and the only people you really attacked were normally punters. Yeah, yeah. No, wrong. It's all super positive. Everything's positive, which is why I like you. Touchdowns, good things happening. Boom, boom, boom. I shouted you out. When a dude bangs a 70-yarder, I shouted you out on these. That's a kicker, and I do appreciate that. Punters only appear on the Red Zone channel when one's going to the house. I meant a 70-yard punt. That's what I'm talking about. Okay, I like you doing that. Ask the fellas. They know that I have before. I've said, for the brand, man. I saw it. Okay, the first 10 years of a murder scene of the punters, though.

52:28Pat McAfee:We're talking very recent history here. First 10 years. If we see a punt, we know why. The only time a punter would go on the Red Zone channel is because it's going the other way. So I hated the Red Zone Channel. As somebody that was, you know, playing at the time, I'm like, Red Zone Channel, everybody loves it, huh? It's great. Yeah. Only time I'm getting on there is somebody running right by my ass. But now that I am just a sports watcher and no longer a punter, it might be the greatest invention that any sport has ever had, like whenever it comes to a media thing. Like college football is going to try to do it.

53:01Pat McAfee:I hope. I think there's always been a challenge. Are you guys going to do it again? Last year you dabbled in it. Are you guys going to try college? There was so many commercials. We were still doing the commercials of the regular. You know what I mean? Like you got the 30-second ad thing is still a thing, I guess, with that. You would have to sell that as an LRAP digital. Like you guys. NFL football. Oh, boy, here it comes. Yeah. What is it? How many hours of full commercial football? Pat said commercial free. I heard you say it. What did you say? Can you give us a preview of what it's going to sound like on Sunday there?

53:35I'm going to close my eyes. Oh, man. Before I do it, can I just say one thing? When it comes, I'm the host of the show. What if I said no? What if I would have said no right there? You said, can I say one thing? I'd run through the stop signs.

53:52The business folks handle the business. Of course. And I have no say over different elements that could or could not be in the show. And so I'll just tell you right now. Now, when you see me come on the air here, we're going to hit the Octobox. We've got eight games in the early window, taking you around all the different cities. And then when we get into it, ladies and gentlemen, it's been more than 250 days since the first full NFL Sunday. But we are back. And seven hours of red zone football starts now. Wow. Well said. I realize that might be a slight change to some of you, but that's what the catchphrase will be going forward.

54:37Pat McAfee:We all understand what the NFL is. We all understand what the NFL is. As soon as we heard it's in 50 million homes and everybody's watching it, we knew immediately that there was going to be commercials dropped in there. Now, they already started doing commercials with the LRAPs. They already started sliding those in. You guys were saying commercial-free football, and I saw a fucking Lowe's ad on my screen as you were doing that. I'm like, we're certainly getting money from commercial stuff, though. Bang! Shout out. That's exactly what it would do. And then now actual commercials. Are you going to maybe go to the bathroom now?

55:09Pat McAfee:If there is like a little. No. No, no bathroom. You still stand in solidarity.

55:13Darius Butler:Can't feel it's married to it. 17 years.

55:15Pat McAfee:But I don't think anybody's upset about the commercials. I mean, it's an easy thing to kind of tweet about and post about. But I don't think anybody's turning it off because of commercials. And the NFL knows that. Yes. And it's like, yeah, we can certainly. I'll tell you this. We've had meetings all offseason. We had our rehearsal. We had our dress rehearsal in week three of the preseason. And we are not going to sacrifice any great football for any of the business side of things, right? The business folks are going to handle the business, and we play the hand that's dealt us. But we will not miss a touchdown.

55:51We will not say, oh, okay, this is first and goal from the five. but let's, you know, sell some pizza or pick up trucks. Time to do it, yeah. Yeah, unless it's a random truck. You pick and choose your spots like anything.

56:05Pat McAfee:Well, if the business people are content-creating people, that's when you're in a good spot. I assume over at the NFL you guys have it figured out. We can't wait for Sunday. And you just saying that right there, 250-plus days, getting right into seven hours of red zone football. I mean, we got the GBs over here, brother. We got the goosebumps. We appreciate the hell out of you. Have a great season. You're the man. Back, guys. Great to see you. Thanks. Have a great year. Ladies and gentlemen, that is the Red Zone channel. Scott Hanson. Yeah, Scott. Scottie. Tour was cool. Tour was sweet. Yeah. Got two guys, two spotters down here.

56:38Pat McAfee:Got some people in truck. Yep. We got these TVs here. Every stadium scoreboard is big for him. Yeah, clutch. Because he can just go in there and say, hey, it is. Ba-ba-ba. Ba-ba-ba. And it's like we're on TV. It's 30 seconds off. He's like, I don't know where I'm going now.

56:49Darius Butler:That's why I'm right there. Would love to meet his other guys.

56:52Pat McAfee:Maybe we get a chance to get over there someday. I would like to shake these other guys.

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57:54Darius Butler:to a bike ride. This summer, find more on Facebook.

58:02Pat McAfee:Football is majestic and the NFL kicks off its season tomorrow night in Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love, the city of the reigning defending world champion Philadelphia Eagles as they play host to the NFC East rival, the Dallas Cowboys. Now, how will the game go? We shall see. How will the night go? Should be epic. And will Jerry Jones speak before, during, and after this game? Absolutely. It is going to be a kickoff to the NFL that we will celebrate in magnificent fashion. And then Friday night, we got the Chiefs and Chargers. Saturday, full college football slate of kick-ass games. And then Sunday, we got seven hours of red zone football coming right up as the Indianapolis Colts host the Miami Dolphins here in Indianapolis, which we will certainly be maybe boots on the ground there.

58:49Pat McAfee:I think we'll probably be boots on the ground there. And then Sunday night football, Ravens, Bills, are you kidding me? We get Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson on Sunday night. Yes, please. Going to be waiting all day. That is just a few sleep. You will be waiting all day. Yes, you will. New version of that song's going to hit like... Yeah, always. Like crack. So hard. I mean, going to hit... Huge. I mean, it's all coming. Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, he's just a few sleeps away. Yeah. And tomorrow, we're forgetting his Sunday Night Football, kind of. Yeah, so we're getting a kickoff of Tariqo Collinsworth and Carrie Underwood's probably new version.

59:25Pat McAfee:Oh, yeah. Exactly. Yeah, we're probably getting that tomorrow night. Waiting all day for a Thursday night. Oh, my God. We've been waiting all off. Yeah, true. For this whole night. Sirianni doesn't know it's Banner Night. You believe him? Absolutely not. That's his gimmick. I respect that he said, we're not even thinking about that. And then asked the question about it. Didn't even know that. Yeah, we just keep him moving. He has to sell that gimmick and live that gimmick to the team. But also, he understands that they will boo his ass if they don't play great early. I think he wants to defend.

59:56Pat McAfee:I think he likes his team. I think you should if you're the Philadelphia Eagles. And Saquon Barkley's back. Landon Dickerson, offensive lineman who was injured during training camp, was full participant in practice today. So that's good news. He was drinking beers on the field with the Cleveland Browns, offensive lineman during training camp practice. That was an indicator to me that he's probably going to be back. I don't think you're just going out publicly having some beers while you're rehabbing an injury that you're not going to be back for. A wild move if you did. That was just kind of my reading the human thing.

1:00:27Pat McAfee:Like, he's having beers. He thinks he's coming back. If he's back, that's a huge deal, obviously, for an offensive line that was number one in the league last year. Are they going to be able to do the same thing they were able to do last year, which is rush more often than they pass, and they dominated the offensive line basically in every single game? I can't wait for this season to start. Then Friday you've got Patrick Mahomes, Justin Herbert, and then we're right into it. Let's go. We've made it. Happy NFL Eve to you. Thank you for allowing us to do this for a living. That's Darius J. Butler.

1:00:52Pat McAfee:Yes, sir. That's one half of the hammer. God. Cowboys AP tone. And then the toxic table is here at Boston Conner and at Ty Schmidt. Joining us live from an attic in Ohio is a college football national champion, a Super Bowl champion, a Ryder Cup winner, and a father of 10. Ladies and gentlemen, A.J. Hawker. Hawker, how you doing, brother? Good to see you, man. Hey, I'm doing great. Cristobal was very impressive to me, no joke.

1:01:16Darius Butler:I've seen him in interviews and talk, but he just, that dude has a presence about him. I was very impressed.

1:01:20Pat McAfee:I like him. So we didn't even get in the, I guess he was going to be a Secret Service agent.

1:01:24Darius Butler:Yeah, as the story goes, yeah, he was ready to do it. It was like a two-year process. Got offered a job, and then the morning he was supposed to leave to go to do his training in Quantico or wherever. He said, you know what? I don't really want to do this anymore. I'm going to be a football coach.

1:01:38Pat McAfee:I guess he rolls jujitsu. I guess he does jujitsu. He's fluent in Spanish. He played football at the U, obviously. He feels like the perfect guy to maybe lead the Hurricanes all the way back. D-Butch, you're down there. Yep. Do a lot of people feel the same way AJ feels about him and the team? Yeah, it's buzzing. You saw the attendance at Hard Rock Stadium last week in shitty weather, but it's definitely a buzz down there. Football is different. College football is different when the U is good, when the Florida teams are good. But when you watch the University of Miami play football, it's like a certain attitude, a certain swagger that you expect to see.

1:02:10And Cam Ward leading that ship, fell short at the end, didn't make a playoff run, but now we've got Carson Beck and he's hit the ground running. And Gump mentioned earlier that defense, and that defense is flying around, can actually get stops. That'll be exciting. But Mario got the town abuzz right now for sure.

1:02:25Pat McAfee:Yeah, I love to hear that. And how far is the stadium from campus? 21 miles. You're going to have to win.

1:02:32Darius Butler:Do any students go to games?

1:02:35Pat McAfee:They did this past one. It was packed. It looked awesome.

1:02:37Darius Butler:I know. Well, you know, kickoff big game. I'm saying like the middle of the road games. This week. Bassoon Cook. That's a commitment, though.

1:02:44Pat McAfee:If you're a college kid, you drive 21 miles. 21 miles in Miami.

1:02:47Darius Butler:Yeah, it's an hour and a half.

1:02:49Pat McAfee:That's three hours. Everybody says LA's traffic is slow. At least LA has like multiple lanes. True. Miami, I always feel like I'm on a really small road with nowhere to go. And there's a lot of people around me doing the same exact thing. That's how I always feel like when I'm in Miami traffic. Wherever you get to, awesome. It's like it's worth it. Yeah. The traffic is better going from Coral Gables north to Miami Gardens as opposed to coming from like Fort Lauderdale or anywhere going south. Because when you go into Miami, it kind of gets bottlenecked. Yes, big time. Yeah, it becomes like five highways merging no matter what time of the day it is.

1:03:27So it does flow better, but I'm sure going back is a shit show. But it's definitely a commitment either way to go 21 miles. You assume having some beverages and things like that, it's a commitment.

1:03:38Pat McAfee:Yeah. Hey, those hills of North Carolina commitment too to drive through.

1:03:41Darius Butler:Yep.

1:03:41Pat McAfee:We were driving over there. It's a lot of. A little bit of a hike.

1:03:45Darius Butler:Not a lot of places are like here where it's just flat and you've got a big circle that takes you wherever you want.

1:03:50Pat McAfee:Gotta love it. It is very flat out here. It is very nice. Speaking of, you know, things that are very nice, it'd be cool to have a job I don't have to do and I get paid for. Yeah. So that would be really cool, wouldn't it? We've heard about these no-show jobs in the sports world through colleges. Like back in the day, I believe there was a quarterback whenever D-Butt and I were in college. He at UConn, I was at West Virginia. I think we've mentioned this. In the summer, a guy was working at a car dealership. He never went there, but he was making a shit ton of money, like a lot of money. And obviously the NCAA somehow snooped it out.

1:04:27Pat McAfee:It became a big story. And it was at that moment we all started thinking, like, holy hell, that's a genius idea. We got to find a place. Like, we didn't even – the people I was talking with, which was a lot of members of the team, hadn't even thought of that potentially being a thing. So I think for us, it was a little bit of an eye-opener of what people might be doing. But also, it was a little intriguing thought like, oh, that's a good idea. Like, that is a good way to kind of sneak in the back door around rules a little bit. The NCAA isn't saying this around rules, but that's not a bad. Now we're hearing about it in a huge way.

1:04:58Pat McAfee:Pablo Torre, investigative sports journalist, who has done a lot of great work. Yeah. I mean, he is like fully committed to this. And I think it's going to be good for the sports world and even the whole world. because I think he was digging into a tree company first and then kind of unfolded all of this. If I have the investigative process proper, he was looking into this tree-growing company that isn't real, I guess is what they're saying. What? And then Ballmer was allegedly, this is all via Pablo Torres investigative journalism. So we are not saying we created this. This is Pablo Torres doing this.

1:05:35Pat McAfee:It's a lot of money and a lot of huge names. And also the league. This has massive implications, I think, everything that Pablo Torre said. I looked at his tweet where he put the video out from his podcast, had 12 million views on it. Okay, this is going to be a big ordeal. I assume the NBA is already trying to look into all this. I wonder how prevalent this is around the NBA and in professional sports as a whole as an owner is sneaking or circumventing the salary cap by providing funds through another company. How long has this been going on? Who all does this? Obviously, we heard about it from the college ranks.

1:06:05Pat McAfee:Have professional teams been doing this with their biggest stars? If they have, how long has it been taking place since, like, the beginning of time? I wonder all those things, just learning about this. But allegedly, Kawhi was getting paid a lot of money through a tree seeding company. Good company idea. Very kind of them. Not making the world better? So, I think they were saying they were. Allegedly. But who knows about actually. Because oxygen comes through those trees. Exactly. It does. They regenerate oxygen, which we all need oxygen.

1:06:38Darius Butler:I love oxygen.

1:06:39Pat McAfee:Yeah, I do too because there's osmosis in there where molecules do their thing and then they do-si-do and then all of a sudden we got... You're breathing. Yeah, we're breathing. Here we are. We need those. But being able to just say, yeah, yeah, this is what his salary is. And then on the other thing, got a couple advertising moves. Nobody knows. Here's 28 million bucks. That's an interesting dynamic.

1:07:01Darius Butler:Yeah. Very. And if what Pablo Torre is saying is true, then you don't stop at basketball. You just think of every big star deal that you have heard of over the past five to ten years in your head. Like, immediately I go, and again, this is strictly based off what Pablo Torre is reporting. If it's true, then this is where I go. Like, okay, Joe Burrow, Lamar Jackson, these guys who are getting a ton of money, and I don't think it's happening with the NFL. But people will naturally, because of a story like this, would assume, oh, if the NFL is scripted, you don't think the NFL is going to be paying guys in advertising deals that are worked into contracts?

1:07:42Darius Butler:Yeah. You shouldn't say it, but we're on the same thing. We're probably thinking the same thing. A lot of hometown discounts up there when they went on their circle runs. Bingo. Legedly. Oh, whoa, whoa. I mean, if this is what Pablo Torre is reporting, you just start to think. The mind starts to think. Payment crypto. Why are we paying in crypto? You can't trace it, can you? You can't figure it out. Why are we doing all these LLCs? There's a couple athletes that were actually invested in crypto pretty big that might have thought they were going to get arrested by the FBI. Again, something that might come back up.

1:08:14Darius Butler:Hey, wait. Was this deal that Pablo Torre is reporting about with the company like this? Is this something that a crypto could do? Because then you think of some of the stars that were playing at the time that were invested in some of those things.

1:08:26Pat McAfee:I mean, it's hard. You can't help but just think. You can't.

1:08:29Darius Butler:And it's all based on Pablo Torre saying this.

1:08:31Pat McAfee:Pablo Torre, by the way, we'd like to say, I appreciate his. He's going to find out. He's going to get to the bottom. There's a lot of bang. He's getting a lot of shins. Oh, yeah. Like from very, very powerful people. And he's just like, yep, that's what I thought. Yep. That's what just kind of doing this. I'm going to keep digging. Insane. This one's gigantic. Huge. I mean, this is implication. The tree company went out of business.

1:08:56Darius Butler:The tree company had to file bankruptcy. Is that why he figured it out? because then their creditor was Kawhi's LLC or whatever? What was it? Yeah, I don't know.

1:09:04Pat McAfee:How do you get the books? How do you get through it? How do you find out? And how is it not? I assume it's an actual investigation now, you know, that's been cracked open. And it's, you know, for us as sports fans, you want to think to yourself like, ah, this is business. Let's just talk about the teams. Because if they were able to do it, you'd assume other teams have done it. You know, like that's just how I naturally think. It's like if they're doing, if Ballmer's doing this, he happens to have a lot of money. Like a lot, a lot, a lot, a lot. Yeah, or that could be the other part. Maybe it is something.

1:09:31I mean, what's the point of being the richest owner in team sports if you can't do some shit that everybody else isn't doing?

1:09:36Pat McAfee:Yeah, like that. I'll slide you to 28. So we talk about this with the Denver Broncos about how there's no salary cap on the coach's salaries. So, like, they have a definite advantage over the teams that don't have as much cash because they can pay Sean Payton, Vance. Who's their special teams coordinator over there? Oh, no. I assume he's really good. And if I know him, I apologize for forgetting it to you. It's not Bones. Oh, no, Bones went to Tennessee.

1:10:01Darius Butler:Yeah. It is. We do know. Who is it? It's Riz. It's Darren Rizzi. Oh, okay. We apologize. First year there, though. Yeah, exactly.

1:10:09Pat McAfee:It's his first year there, but they can pay. He's the guy that created the new kickoff rule. He was one tasked with the entire thing. Very good at his job. But they have the advantage of being able to overpay the coaches. So anything anybody else offers, they're able to do that. I didn't even think the advantage to overpay the players. Like, yeah, your salary will definitely do the whole, you broke the record. Yeah, okay, we'll do that whole thing. See, also, I'm not saying Denver's doing this, but I'm just saying this would be something that the richest owners in all the leagues would be able to take advantage of.

1:10:37Pat McAfee:And all these people are so uber competitive. They're definitely thinking about ways to take advantage of others. There's no way that Balmer's the only owner that's doing this. No way. I mean, maybe, maybe. No way. But there's no way.

1:10:49Darius Butler:Especially in Cali. Just think about how many pro teams are in Cali and then the taxes in Cali. Like, hey, sure, it's paying the house for the taxes, but. Well, you've got to combat the taxes almost. This is also going to be the college football model, by the way, when the whole revenue sharing comes in. The players are getting their salary, and then they're getting only NIL on the side. Yeah, this is going to be the whole model for that.

1:11:10Pat McAfee:But the NIL things have to be get paid by the commission.

1:11:13Darius Butler:That's why, yeah.

1:11:14Pat McAfee:AJ, is this what Ohio State's been doing? Is this how you guys have been able to have such good teams for so long?

1:11:19Darius Butler:What was your job?

1:11:20Pat McAfee:I did not believe. What was your job you didn't show up at? Were you making sandwiches?

1:11:25Darius Butler:Okay, so let's say Kawhi showed up a couple times. You know the old guy he worked for.

1:11:28Pat McAfee:Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. He put a bottle. He ate a bottle. He got a few years ago. R.I.P. Terry. Rest in peace, Terry. Taught you a lot of good life lessons. But Ohio State's been doing this no-show job thing for a long time? Nope. How do we know everybody isn't doing it? I mean, it's hard not to think about that. I'm naive. I've been naive to it. I don't think – I didn't think it was that rampant. I really don't. I still don't. Well, I didn't either until I read this, and then you immediately just go, why I mentioned that. And it's in the contract, too, according to Pablo Torre. As soon as he's done with the team, it's done.

1:12:02Which you would obviously expect. But if he retires, if he's traded, deal's done.

1:12:06Darius Butler:And the names. We're talking about Kawhi Leonard, of course, big name. But some of the names on there are much bigger than Kawhi Leonard. And that's why you really start to wonder and you go down that rabbit hole. How's all this? A-list. Yeah, according to Pablo Torre. According to Pablo Torre.

1:12:21Pat McAfee:Pablo Torres, investigative journalist. All right, Pablo. Sit in that pocket, brother. I'm telling you, those are some big names. Into the whole political world. Pablo want to get in there? I think Pablo wants to get into whatever needs to be getting into. I think from what we are gathering. He's got that little rabbit hole right there.

1:12:40Darius Butler:I mean, when you do this kind of stuff and you take it on the shins like that, it's like, okay, well, there's something there. Like, people would just dismiss this and be like, all right, whatever. But if people start attacking me, it's like, okay, well, maybe I'll keep digging a little bit. Good luck, Pablo. Good luck, Pablo. That's a wild life to live. Wild.

1:12:56Pat McAfee:Better you than us, Pablo. But we appreciate what you're doing, Pablo. I'm not going anywhere by myself if I'm doing that. But as I read that, amen. Amen. As I read that, all I thought to myself is like what Connor was saying. He was just like, if they're doing this, did he think of this idea? I don't think he thought of this idea.

1:13:14Darius Butler:The first thing I thought of, Micah Parsons, I was like, I wonder if the Packers gave him like 5 ,000 acres of dairy land or something. Dairy Farm.

1:13:21Pat McAfee:You get half the tickets to this sled tubing mountain.

1:13:28Darius Butler:We'll have a mica tube. I mean, Green Bay, especially more than any other team, they have landed investments and they don't have an owner. So you're assuming any of those landed investments would be easy. Every deal now. Can't do that. You can't do that. This whole room is slots at the Anata Casino. Those profits go to you now. See, we can't think like that. We're going to call this the Parsons parlay up here.

1:13:53Pat McAfee:It's going to be beautiful. It's going to be beautiful, Micah. Pablo Torre getting to the bottom. Joining us now is a man who probably has thoughts on this fight, I guess. This is very much in his world. And what's he doing? Yeah, great question. Why is he not doing this? Certainly better win the Premier League this year. Exactly. Hey, JJ, we got some negotiating tactics we'd like to drop on your head that maybe you could utilize to get a Leo Messi maybe. Ladies and gentlemen, the owner of Burnley and the owner of Espanol in La Liga.

1:14:24Darius Butler:Currently ranked fifth in La Liga.

1:14:26Pat McAfee:He's a future NFL Hall of Famer. He's calling games this season for CBS. He's going to be great. Ladies and gentlemen, JJ Watt. He's going to be great. I knew it was CBS. I am fired up to be back. I'm excited to be here. You're an owner of a new soccer team, JJ. Are you cheating? Is it considered cheating? Do you know the rules? Are you allowed to do the Steve Ballmer thing? Are you allowed to funnel, allegedly, allegedly via Pablo Torres investigative journalism, are you allowed to just create shell companies to potentially funnel money to people to circumvent whatever salary cap there is for your teams?

1:15:09Pat McAfee:Hypothetically, if this was happening via Pablo Torres investigative journalism with Steve Ballmer, Our immediate thoughts is every owner should be doing this. Do you have the companies in Spain that are willing to help Espanol maybe put some money through the back door? Are you thinking about this? No, Transfer Window just closed two days ago, so we are good to go. All business is done. Everything is good. There is no more movement on our end. All is well. What is the food over there in Spain? Beans and mash. Maia. Paella. Mallorca. Paella. So far Play my orca next Monday Tough side Watch out for the pirate now Pirate can put them in What's our team?

1:15:53Pat McAfee:We're the Espanol Pericos Parakeets Oh, the parakeets Yeah Okay You better watch out We got a cauldron of chaos RCDE Stadium Places A cauldron of chaos With the parakeets Let's go, Keats Okay, yeah What do we do? Do we fly, parakeets Fly What's the chant? What do we say? We got a great one that I just learned. Obviously, I'm still learning some of the new ones. I believe it's in the morning we drink coffee, in the afternoon we drink rum, and at night we are Magico Espanol. I like that. You have to sing it in Spanish. You can't sing it in English. In the morning, oh, we drink coffee. Morning, oh.

1:16:34Pat McAfee:But anyway, I went over there. First match, unbelievable. We're playing Atletico Madrid. Massive match opener. our first pitch there, my first time in Barcelona, down 1-0, come back, 2-1 win. Let's go on bananas. Just crazy. Did I see you tweeting about a ref got you guys at one time, right? There was an offside, maybe a goal call back? That was Burnley. That was with Burnley, and yes, it was absolute shite. It was shite. It was shite. I got to watch myself a little bit here, but questionable at best and have yet to hear an acceptable reasoning. So hold on. I'd love to hear that. Are you putting pressure on this?

1:17:16Pat McAfee:And is there like a British guy that's in charge of calling back and being like, hello, Mr. Walt? Yes. Is there like a full, do you have a British accent that you are going, do you pick up a British accent? I don't use a British accent, but we don't take this bullshit anymore. We're not like a little team at the bottom of the table. I'm just going to take this. Yeah. We are going to speak up about it. I'm going to tweet about it. They're going to hear about it. We'll get a letter back saying, yes, we screwed up. We're sorry. Nothing's going to change, but we're not taking the shit laying down anymore.

1:17:44Pissing me off.

1:17:44Pat McAfee:I like that. Hey, Burnley, up the clerk.

1:17:46Darius Butler:Get on the horn. Tell Howard Webb you want a conversation, JJ. Who's Howard Webb now? He's the head of the VAR. I'd like to have a lot of conversations. I'd like to have a lot of conversations. Send the dudes, brother. You want to get their attention? Tom. Tom. Tom. Tom. Tom. Tom. Look at that head of lettuce.

1:18:00Pat McAfee:Yeah, it looks good.

1:18:01Darius Butler:Look at that head of lettuce. Thanks for following the program.

1:18:04Pat McAfee:Yeah, he's been growing in for a little bit. Big offseason. You got bought another team. Yeah, that's fair. That's fair. And their chance sucks. No, it doesn't. That's fantastic. You suck. In the morning we drink coffee.

1:18:16Darius Butler:In the afternoon we drink rum. In the night. You just worry about Pablo Torre taking a look in your team over there. All right? That's fine. That's why it's ancient from, yeah, exactly.

1:18:26Pat McAfee:2000 to 2020. Go on. Hey, now I will say this. that move by Balmer, allegedly, via Pablo Torre's investigative journalism.

1:18:38Darius Butler:Get that out there.

1:18:40Pat McAfee:Allegedly. Put that out there, please. That's what he's doing. By the owner, I assume Steve Balmer's going, so what? And then he's probably saying through somebody else, we didn't talk about when blah, blah, blah. This is just a part of the whole thing. I feel like a naive doofus living in this world. and being in this world so often that i didn't just think that this was how this goes you know now that i know this though every single deal that's done every single move that's made it's gonna be hard not to be like and what are the local what is there any businesses yeah what other it's hard not to just think like that now jj legitimately i don't well i mean like now that you say that it's actually pretty interesting i think aj was kind of pointing to this before like what at what level of involvement did he have to do to justify being paid for it because It was like in an endorsement, you show up, you film a commercial or something, and you get paid, obviously, money for that.

1:19:34But that's okay. So, like, if he showed up for 10 days out of the year, but his endorsement rate is$2.8 million per day, and he showed up for 10 days, that comes out to$28 million. So, like, at what point is it against the rules? At what point is it?

1:19:51Pat McAfee:He might have a$20 million daily rate in the offseason. Might have a$20 million daily rate in the offseason. Two days he went out there and tapped on some trees. These ones look good. These ones look good. He's playing a few of them. He don't like doing it. Yeah, probably one shovel at least. Yeah. There's got to be a picture of him planting a tree somewhere that justifies it. That's all you need, one picture. Hard hat, shovel. Hey, I'll do it. Boom. They put it on billboards. How much value? You know how many eyeballs see that? Individual eyeballs on that billboard, the value of it? Yeah, that's why I think this NIL thing is going to be a problem.

1:20:19Pat McAfee:They got this commission that's supposed to approve things. It's like if you turn one down, they can easily just say, who says? So they can't pay me$250 ,000 for one commercial? why because other people aren't able to do it well i found a company that's willing to do it like how could you ever say no to that i don't know how you can turn down anything in america in a capitalist society that we live in i don't know how you can say no to any deal that is being offered to you via money honestly i don't understand how they're going to be able to say that no i don't i don't get how they i don't i don't understand how they're going to wrangle that in in college and how they're going to do do it all unless you literally take the whole system put it on a salary cap system and you have a reporting and everything it's that's a very very tough system to reel in.

1:20:59Pat McAfee:And then each school can just get, you know, a tree. According to Pablo's race, a tree. Alright, let's move to football. TJ's a captain for the Pittsburgh Steelers. Congrats to the Watt family. Cam Hayward, Mike Tomlin says he has no reservations about thinking about whether or not Cam Hayward's going to play. Aaron Rodgers obviously leading the boys. Kid LaRue on the special team side as captain there. All vibes seemingly high with the Pittsburgh Steelers. I feel like training camp was a good one for them. Feels like everybody has expectations that they're going to go on a run this year. What are your thoughts as we near kickoff of this NFL season for your brothers Pittsburgh Steelers?

1:21:39I'm really looking forward to seeing how this team performs. I think there's a lot of anticipation because you have Aaron Rodgers, you have DK Metcalf. You want to see what this offense looks like, what Arthur Smith can do. How's that going to match up? Is Aaron Rodgers going to be under center a bunch, running the play action game and the run game that Arthur Smith-like so they're gonna shift it more towards that shotgun drop back game um really excited to see that we literally don't know besides the little practice clips that we have and then that defense I mean you got Jalen Ramsey back there you have TJ obviously you I mean who knows but you assume Cam's gonna be out there on game day so we'll it's a really really strong defense when you look at it and I'm really I think it's the offense that's the most exciting to see what that looks like because we really don't know yet.

1:22:28Pat McAfee:Yeah, DK Metcalf and John are just getting dropped in there. It's pretty wild. Fryer-Muth is about to have the biggest year of his career, we all think. Jalen Warren just signed a deal, I think. So whenever you think about that offense and all the pieces that they have, the only question is, will they be able to block and move any bodies? We shall see. Four captains for the Pittsburgh Steelers. Go ahead, D-Butt. Yeah, I assume you were a longtime – actually, I know you were a longtime captain in Houston, Arizona. What's like the sweet spot for you, now that you're an owner, for a team captain?

1:22:55I mean, some teams I see you got seven, eight guys. Other teams, I think the Bills maybe only have two, if I'm not mistaken. What's the sweet spot for you when it comes to team captains? Yeah, it's a great question. And, I mean, I personally like the one offense, one defense, one special teams. I understand where it started to get a little. You know, you have guys that it's like, well, that guy's definitely a captain, but we already have one who's a for sure captain. So it gets tricky. I mean, you see some of these tweets where it's like, these are our captains for this year. And you're like, wait a second, is that your roster?

1:23:29Or is that the captains list? So it gets, I think I saw literally like 10 on one team. And you're like, okay, 46 guys play on game day. I'm not a mathematician, but that's like 20 % of your roster. A lot of leadership.

1:23:43Darius Butler:A lot of leaders. A lot of leaders.

1:23:44Pat McAfee:A lot of leaders. Yeah. But I like three. I like offense, defense, special teams. I don't know what you guys have experienced. What do you like? Yeah, we, you know, when it got sent into the group, I think it was the Titans who had seven of them or something like that. Eagles also. Another team had eight or whatever. And it's like the old adage about if you have two quarterbacks, you have no quarterbacks. I think if you have eight captains, do you have any captains? Like, you know, like that is the – but I think they're also trying to promote people to become leaders. And the team has a mission here with the C that they're giving out.

1:24:15Pat McAfee:I think it was the Raiders who had Max Crosby and Geno Smith. and then aj cole yeah who's the punter it's like that's the right like gino we assume from everything we know he's going to be the guy on the offensive side max crosby on the defensive side and aj is the best punter in the league at the moment so he should be the guy it's like when you have that i grew up i grew up in a hockey atmosphere i played hockey all growing up and like in hockey that c and that a on the jersey means a massive massive amount like there is such a heavy weight that comes with that and responsibility and I think that's so cool and I do think when you have 10 12 guys it takes some of that weight away but also the thing I've noticed is there's some of these teams that don't put C's on the jerseys which is fine I mean you can do whatever you want but I always think back to hockey and like that moment when you press the C on the captain's jersey for the first time that's such a special moment I think that's a really cool thing for guys.

1:25:13And so when I see the teams that don't do it, I just, for those guys, I'm like, dang, they missed out on a pretty cool moment there.

1:25:18Pat McAfee:Shout out to Sidney Crosby, by the way, for the city of Pittsburgh for so long. I'm having that C on his chest. Shout out to Barky. Yeah, shout out to the C's on the boys' chest. And the apples, you know, a couple of apples. I saw you guys are getting a nice new soccer stadium down there, aren't you? Really nice. Yeah, absolutely. Riverhounds are putting like a second level on that. It's going to be sick. Hey, the Hallmark Stadium down there? Yeah, it's going to be great for Connors. It's already very nice. They're making it bigger? Yes, they're bigger. Oh, this is good. Riverhounds. By the way.

1:25:48It looks nice.

1:25:50Pat McAfee:Espanol and Burnley. Put your little all-star team together. It'll be J.J. Watts teams versus Pittsburgh Riverhounds. Pink slips. Down in that stadium. Yeah, for pink slips. Let the Riverhounds potentially own Espanol and Burnley. Have Tyler playing if he wants to keep the team.

1:26:05Darius Butler:Yeah.

1:26:05Pat McAfee:Take on the Riverhounds, on the river, and there's going to be problems, I assume. especially with a bigger stadium. I didn't know they were adding to that. Yeah, it looks really nice. They're doing some nice things.

1:26:16Darius Butler:It may put Starlake out of business because they're going to do a lot of concerts there. No one wants to drive all the way.

1:26:21Pat McAfee:Starlake is a long drive for everybody in the East Hills, I will say that. So shout out to the Riverhounds making some magic happen. Okay, speaking of magic, Jerry Jones is filled with it. Absolutely. Wheeling, dealing, literally since he was just a wee little lad. One oil rig that cost him$800 ,000 generated$100 million in wealth, which is what he bought the Dallas Cowboys with. And now he's known for one move, and that is trading away his megastar. Go ahead, A.J. Hawk. Yeah, Jay, let's say you're the D coordinator

1:26:50Darius Butler:for the Green Bay Packers here, the first four games of the season. How do you use Micah Parsons? How much do you play him? And also, how much do you move this guy around? It's a beautiful thing about being a defensive lineman. You really don't need to know that much. You don't need to be that smart. You don't need to learn a whole lot of plays or terminology because we have basically two jobs. One is set the edge, stop the run. And two is get the quarterback. And you're going to tell me where to line up. And my job is to go get him. And so it doesn't take that long to onboard a new guy when it comes to a pass rusher, especially one of the talent level of Micah Parsons.

1:27:31So I'm using him to the fullest as long as he feels good, which, I mean, We've read about his back. We've seen about his back. But I saw that clip from practice the other day where he's absolutely smoking the blocking sled. And as a guy who's had epidurals in my back and who's had back surgery, I know that you're not looking that explosive, knocking that sled all the way back. Did you have him in season, Jage? Yeah. Yeah, I had an epidural in mid-season one time. It was a really shitty situation. How was it? Did it help a lot? I was squatting on Monday. my Monday ritual was to squat 405 for three sets of five every Monday.

1:28:06And I was on my way up. I wasn't even at 405. I was at 275. And I got to the third rep. Back. Boom. Gone. Disc. Out. Follow the floor. Literally crawled on my hands and knees to the training room. It was, I could not stand up. I went in. They were like, yeah, you're in a really, really bad spot. The next morning, I had to go and get an epidural in my back. basically kind of helps take that disc, put it back in for the moment, and played the rest of the season. And that was truly one of the most insane situations I've ever been a part of. When was this?

1:28:42Pat McAfee:When was this? What time of year? It was like week four or five. Oh, my God. Yeah. 275 takes him out. Mentally, you feel so weak because it was 275. Did you squat anymore that year? No, no. I changed, obviously, everything. Thank goodness. It's one of those things where you look back on it later. You know how – let me be candid here. You look back on it and you're like, man, I probably should have asked a few more questions. I probably should have done a little more research. But you know how it is, man. When you're in it and, A, you're getting paid a lot of money, B, you got all these fans, C, you got your teammates, you're in the middle of the season and you're like, I don't care, man.

1:29:26Get me to Sunday. I don't care. Just get me back on that practice field. Get me out on the field. So, yeah, even just telling that story, it does sound pretty dumb.

1:29:36Pat McAfee:Outrageous, yeah. 405 every Monday. Worked out, though. Day after game, I need to be going through a 405 on my back, on my spine. I need to do it. It did work out, Jake. You'll be the first ballot Hall of Famer. It did work out. You being a psycho machine certainly ended up as a good thing for your football career. But I do appreciate the fact that. Those up-and-durals, they can do some pretty good stuff. They can do some pretty good stuff. How big is that needle, right? That needle is gigantic, right? This is the craziest part about it. So I go in for the epidural. They take me back. You know, they put the stuff in and the anesthesia and everything.

1:30:09I go back. I come out, and they're like, hey, how'd it go? And I was like, I don't know. What do you mean? They're like, yo, you were telling us all sorts of stuff back there. And I was like, what do you mean I was telling you stuff? I was under anesthesia. And they're like, no, we had to give you the stuff that you don't feel it, but you're still awake because you have to tell us where the pain is. And I was like, wait a second. I was up back there? You're blacked out back there. And they were like, yeah, you were talking to us the whole time. I had no idea what the hell.

1:30:37Pat McAfee:Real loose lips back there. Yeah. Real loose lips back there. I would love to hear that. Man. Sorry about Bill O 'Brien.

1:30:44Darius Butler:Yeah, our coach sucks. I'm going to bite this guy. Wait, JJ, you said that people don't look like that hitting sleds after getting epidural. Are you saying that this whole back thing is made up? No, I'm saying you're not doing that if your back doesn't feel good. He feels good enough. If you're bending in that way with your back arching and lifting that thing, you're feeling decent. Your back is not at a point where you might not play, at least in my opinion. I may have to eat these words, but that's a tough movement on your back right there to lift that sled up in the arch position. He looks explosive.

1:31:19He looks strong. He looks pretty damn good.

1:31:22Pat McAfee:I can't wait to watch him. and everything he's saying out of Green Bay is like, so folks on the ball are so happy to be there. Once again, we are very much in a honeymoon phase of$47 million a year. We are still potentially hovering around like he was at that house when he learned how much money he's getting guaranteed. Yeah, and it might be more. What do you mean? If Pablo Torre is telling us, now that's the first deal I'm doing. You think you need more than 47, dude? He got six per year hiring the next person. Yeah, but not enough money. You think you need more than that? So too much money ain't enough money, I believe.

1:31:53Pat McAfee:is what a poet once said, Wheezy F. Baby. The inner tubes that they ride down there.

1:32:00Darius Butler:Yeah, Noah's Ark. Wisconsin Dells.

1:32:03Pat McAfee:Yeah, outside of Green Bay. The Kalahari. Yeah, they could be giving Mike a half the ticket sales throughout the entire football season. We don't know. We have no idea now. That is part of the whole thing. We don't know. But what we do know, he earned it. Congratulations. And he's saying all the right things up there. And Green Bay Packers fans are steadfast on World War II Super Bowl. Yeah. This is an amazing time. We love the NFL. Now, there's a Steeler fan in here, obviously, that's excited for you getting to call the game this weekend. Go ahead, Tom.

1:32:29Darius Butler:Yeah, JJ, obviously there's a lot of first-time head coaches this year, Kellen Moore, Shoddy, Liam Cohen, and Aaron Glenn. You call Aaron Glenn's game this weekend. Have you got a chance to talk to him at all? Because he's been a little testy with the media so far. I didn't know if that was going to carry over to those pregame meetings with you guys. And which of those coaches do you think is going to be best this year? Yeah. Yeah, I actually did the Jets-Eagles preseason game, so I did go and talk to him and sit down with him. He's great. He's great with us. I think the thing about him and what he's trying to set and maybe some of the stuff you're seeing in the media is he is trying to make a no-nonsense, all football.

1:33:08We are the New York Jets. We are going to be tough, disciplined, physical, aggressive. He wants to kind of change that entire culture, and he's taking it to every single aspect, whether it's the preseason games and not having guys do interviews on the sidelines, even if they're not playing, to how he handles the media and the stuff that he gives. He is trying to set a precedent for his team. And listen, whether they're good or not, he said it the other day, what he wants and what he's going to judge this season by is if Jets fans are proud of the team that they're watching every week. And last year, they were number one in pre-stamp penalties.

1:33:43They were number one in drops. They were number one in missed tackles. Like these are a lot of undisciplined things and he's trying to come in and correct that first. Obviously, that will help translate to wins. Does that mean they're going to be unbelievable world biggers this year? Who knows? Somebody goes worse the first every year. But I think that he is building a culture there that those guys are bought into.

1:34:03Pat McAfee:How quickly will it take effect, you know? And will he be given enough time to maybe have it all take effect? We shall see. There's some Jets news that Schefter has tweeted. guard Elijah Veritaker suffered a season-ending torn tricep before it even gets started here. He's getting a second opinion to confirm the injury and see if the surgery is necessary. Okay, so Jets fans obviously go, of course. Of course, that's kind of how it all goes. Go ahead. He tore his killers before, too.

1:34:28Darius Butler:He's been out for a long time. That really sucks. Yeah, Jets. He's a very good player. Just named captain this week. He was really excited about being a captain. Great player. I believe it's the last year of his contract. He's up for an extension after this year. Such tough timing from that standpoint. Really tough.

1:34:44Pat McAfee:That sucks. I mean, you go all the way back to what? Justin Fields' first day he got carted off. Yeah. A toe or something like that. It's like Jets fans just can never be excited. Yeah. Snake bit. There's always something that's going to pop in. Oh, we're actually – everything's good. He's saying everything real hard-nosed. Our captain guard now is out for season. We haven't even started a season. Yeah, he's out. Jeez. That foreplay thing with Aaron. Man. What a bummer.

1:35:10Darius Butler:Even thinking about it. It's still like – that was a sad, sad time. September 11th. He's just being a fan of the team so jacked up. Like, we got him.

1:35:19Pat McAfee:We got him. This is awesome. The shot of the American flag running out there with that place going crazy. Just a fan of the NFL, period. I wasn't even a Jets fan, but just to see, okay, they got Aaron, they got defense, flag, everything, and then just boom. And if you ask a Jets fan, they go, of course. What are you talking about? And it's like that's crazy that that is their kind of mindset, but maybe Aaron Glenn's the one that's able to flip it all.

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1:37:19Pat McAfee:There's a lot of new faces in different places. Go ahead, Conman.

1:37:22Darius Butler:Yeah, JJ, new coordinators for the Eagles and Lions. Last time this happened with the Eagles on offense, they had that kind of lull year almost before going back and winning the Super Bowl, and then Lions lose DC and OC, but most importantly, Ben Johnson with the OC. Are you worried about them at all? It feels like every year one of these teams that is typically at the top of the league ends up dropping off a little. Do you think it's either a thumb? Do you have your eyes on another team that you're kind of curious about at all? Listen, I think it's easy to sit there and say, like, oh, we have no worries.

1:37:57We've got the same guys. We've got the same scheme. It's just a different guy calling the plays, or it's just a different guy. But it is hard. It's hard to change coordinators no matter who it is, especially one on both offense and defense. It's a new guy. It's a new voice in front of the room every single day delivering messages his way. Could be better. Could be worse. But also just getting that continuity with what the guys like, how they feel and everything. So there's definitely no guarantee that it's going to be successful. And there could certainly be a rocky point to get over, get past.

1:38:29But I look at that whole NFC North. Like you mentioned the Lions. The NFC North between the Vikings, Packers, and Lions last year had an unbelievable year. Is that conference going to be able to repeat that type of dominance at that level? And are the Bears, can Ben Johnson get them up in that conversation? That's a really, really, I can't wait for Green Bay Detroit week one. That's incredible.

1:38:49Pat McAfee:I'm very excited for you to call games now because you have to do meetings with all these teams. So when you're talking about them, you know, you can't be, you know. Oh, yeah. You can't be, because you're going to be walking in the room where it happens, brother. whenever you're commentating these games, you know. Oh, yeah. That's an interesting thing with game day. Like, for instance, Bubba Cunningham, athletic director of North Carolina. Whenever he was the chair of the March Madness Committee and whenever North Carolina gets in and West Virginia is the first team in the history of March Madness to be left out of the tournament who have like five, six different criterias checked or whatever, I guess I said some really mean things to Bubba and about Bubba.

1:39:28Pat McAfee:Kind of deserved it. And everything like that. I completely forgot about this thing. So do you go into that meeting and ignore it completely? Or do you like, hey, man, I was a little messed up, but we'll get through it. I had no idea it happened. Don't even know. I completely forgot it happened. He came up to Pat. I completely forgot. I went into that place skipping. Michael Lombardi's the GM, friend of the program. Basically, I'm walking into that place like we own the building. Oh, yeah. We are. I mean, literally, Bill Belichick and Michael Lombardi are running this place. This is our fucking house.

1:39:55Pat McAfee:It's great to be here. Literally, very comfortable. Sit down, have a good time. Boys get their passes, kind of mingle around, have a blast. Place was beautiful. Security people, Pat, welcome home. You know, the whole thing. Like, very, everybody very kind. And I'm sitting there, and I'm just going through whatever the show is about to be. Kind of a couple different conversations in the production room, which is normally just, like, one of the halls' classrooms that we rent out for game day, basically. And Bubba Cunningham walks in. There's a little bit of emotion whenever he walks in. Some people, like, tighten up a little bit.

1:40:21Pat McAfee:I'm like, that must be somebody. And he was talking to Pete Thamel. And they go, this is Bubba Cunningham. And I'd heard his name. And I'm like, Bubba, how you doing? I'm Pat. that's a fucking great name or whatever you know he's like classic that whole thing and uh somebody says it's the athletic director here i'm like oh congrats man feels like it's gonna be electric out there today and then i sit back down but he he as he was walking to me before that uh conversation there he said public enemy number one i believe is what you said or something like that i didn't even and the interaction was pretty stiff so then i sat down and then as he walked away uh that was when i was like oh my god and i looked at him and i said you fucked us that's what i said he was on he was and he said yeah i was like oh you're the yes basketball oh i'm sorry yeah i probably said some stuff he goes yeah you did or whatever i'm like that's on me should have put him in but that's as 100 on me i do think yeah we should have made it i did do a little bit of a battle but i did apologize and he said you know if you did know exactly how it went i don't think i'm the enemy here and i was like whoa whoa whoa don't be giving me any more new enemies i don't any more new enemies here.

1:41:24Pat McAfee:But that's something you're going to have to experience. Yeah, but as long as you're saying something that you can go back and be like, no, I believe we should have been in. You're not having to defend yourself. If I say something on here about a team and I actually believe it, and then I have to go and talk to the guys face-to-face and they're like, why'd you say that? I can say, well, at the time, I thought that your running game was trash. That's why I said it. That's so big. You got it. Standing on business. Standing on ball. That's right, Pat. Gotta do it, Pat. I'm just telling you, there's going to be awkward There's going to be awkward encounters.

1:41:58Pat McAfee:No, no, you're good. I'm just saying there's going to be a lot of awkward encounters. Go ahead, AJ.

1:42:01Darius Butler:No, I'm saying, like, Dano, what if you go, you count 21 loaves for a team and you go into a production meeting and they're like, hey, I'm going to show you there's only seven. Are you going to sit there and argue with these coaches back and forth

1:42:10Pat McAfee:and the players? Yeah, what are you going to do? Bicker? Are you going to defend your stance, your take? I mean, in a situation like that, if you can turn on the tape and show them, I'd be like, I mean, guys, if you want to sit down and go through it, let's do it. Go through it. I mean, yeah, I'll show you all 21. It's going to be embarrassing for you. That's his dream.

1:42:26Darius Butler:That's Dano's dream. What do you hear? What do you just sit at the end of the table and keep his mouth shut? I don't know. Dano's no stand-up business.

1:42:34Pat McAfee:I'm excited for you to commentate. Jeez, that's a lot of people in the back not thinking that Dano's SOB back there. What are you excited about for commentating? Legit, you did the Christmas one, right? Yeah. I'm really, really enjoying this because, A, during the week, my prep is very similar to like when I was playing. I'm breaking down film. I'm looking at the matchups and all the different stuff, so I'm really enjoying that aspect of it. And then the actual game, you get the adrenaline from being in the stadium, from not knowing what's going to happen next, from feeling the crowd and the emotion and the big moments and trying to make sure that you're properly articulating what's happening and teaching fans about the game but not overdoing it and trying to watch it from a fan's perspective as well.

1:43:22I really, really enjoy this, and I have the best partner in Ian Eagle. He's so good, and we have such a great team at CBS. For me, it scratches that itch on a much deeper level because I'm talking football every Sunday on a deeper level.

1:43:37Pat McAfee:Hell, yeah, and you're going to be traveling a lot. Have you prepared for that? Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's obviously the most difficult part, hands down, is when I have to say goodbye to my wife and sons every week. And you can give me some advice on that. I would appreciate it because I don't see any easy way. Yeah, you just take the vitamins, brother. We've already talked about the mode of transportation, what it should be. Okay, I've already given you that whole thing. Check that box. We don't need to be feeling every single gust of wind. Emotion? No, no. We don't need to be feeling every gust of wind either.

1:44:09Pat McAfee:Yeah, you know, like Matt Barry the other night said. I think you were on a small bird the other day. I saw you post, but it looked like a small bird. Nope, that ain't ever happening. I'll tell you, we are getting to 40. I'm only getting on planes that get to 40 ,000 feet, brother. That's where you need to get to. The storms are all happening below that, okay? If it's happening up at 40 ,000 feet, the whole world's feeling this. So that is the, I am scared of flying. So with what I do, there's a lot of traveling involved. And I am not like the greatest flyer. It is always a full on. Need you here.

1:44:40Pat McAfee:Come on. It's every single flight. It is like that. So, yeah, I think I've given enough advice in that whole thing. You're allowed to ask for this. You know, I wish Coach Corso would have asked. You know what I mean? Like, I wish we would. What happened there, man? What happened there? That's literally what he does. Oh, old school. Yeah, that's literally what he does. Like, I think, like, if you were to ask him, this would not be even a conversation. I think I've offered up in the past for different games, and it's just kind of been like, hey, literally don't worry about it. Too much money. What are we talking about?

1:45:08Pat McAfee:Like, that is literally how he, like, kind of views it all. But I'm happy Southwest. You guys nailed that. Everything about it was perfect. It was so cool. You guys crushed it. It had to be awesome being there, just seeing the spectacle. And then him nailing every single pick. I mean, his team's winning. Like, that was so cool. It was really a perfect sendoff, I think, personally. And Southwest in the airport giving him a round of applause for how many years he's been through those airports. It's like that was even perfect. You know, it was like everything about it was just so monumental. and as we're riding his coattails out in front of 107 ,000 people or whatever it was there, and you see the band layout, it's like, I hope you know, Coach, you did good, brother.

1:45:50Pat McAfee:This doesn't happen just for anybody, you know? And I think his last pick was his best, too, in the last couple years. I mean, he absolutely nailed the entire thing. If he would have had another Houston moment with the band and the entire thing, that would have been one of the most legendary heel moves of all time, but instead he gets it right with the Ohio State Buckeyes. Yeah, it was cool to be a part of. I was lucky to be there. They did a great job, though. The people that set that up, the producers of game day, all the ideas. As soon as they were out, I was hearing them. I'm like, genius.

1:46:23Pat McAfee:That's genius. Tux. He's wearing a tux. Nobody knew that. I think he showed up just like that on Saturday morning. Genius. Yeah, I don't know if anybody knew he was doing that. Yeah, it was perfect, man. College football's crushing it right now.

1:46:33Darius Butler:It literally is. Jage, do you know, because last time you were on the program, and I've seen a couple photos hair was looking magnificent do you know how you're gonna wear it yet I need opinions right now because it's been a hot topic in my household in my chat with my friends I got a haircut scheduled tomorrow morning I gotta decide is it staying long or is it going back short you had a fantastic I don't know where the photo is but you had a middle part either at an Espanol game or a Berkey game

1:47:09Pat McAfee:And you have really strong hair. You should not get rid of your hair. It's very strong hair, I think, personally. Now, does that make you sure? I'm just trying to figure out how to style it. That's my issue. Because on game day, I'm at the stadium for like six hours. So it's got to stay strong throughout the whole game. And you're wearing a headset. It's just the shorter is so much less maintenance. But I enjoy it long. I've never, ever had it this long, ever. So it's really uncharted waters here. You can go kind of a mid-range jumper, though, right? You don't have to go too small because you've got good hair there.

1:47:40Pat McAfee:And I think this is a barber you know, I assume? Yeah. Yeah, it's a barber I know. I like Conor's flow. I want to flip out the back. I like the flip. I'm not long enough to do the flip out the back yet. Yeah, but he had to do a lot of hat times to get to this time, you know, and you're not going to be able to do that.

1:47:55Darius Butler:Yeah, it's a summer of hats, really. You could slick it back like Barry Melrose. Legend. Not gold anywhere. Doesn't get enough credit. I agree. Agreed. Agreed.

1:48:05Pat McAfee:for the sport of hockey um you know are you gonna have the headset um but you're gonna have a quaff in front probably whatever the hell this is in front of this so you should think of that you know yeah like wwe headset goes yeah here we don't do the uh pop star mic that you got on game day yes yeah what do you have on wwe you have a headset headset fully which you like better I like this right here. I like ears. I don't like the thing going over my head or over my ears. I like individual ears. You know, I don't like feeling like I'm building cauliflower ear while I'm watching and doing the show.

1:48:43Pat McAfee:You know what I mean? I like it beat up, so I like this. You guys headset old school, huh? Old school, yep. Kirk Herbstreet would say that you should wear the mic thing on the, if you're standing to Ian's right on your left side of your face for when you look at him and talk to him, you see whole face as opposed to microphone covering. It is a good tip. Face. It is a good tip. You did a good job. I didn't even know they made righty and lefty versions of that. Every one of them could be. You can flip that thing right around. Every one of them. Yep. Wow. That was a defensive line in Monterey. No, no, because there is the ones that are just specifically and some of them stop.

1:49:22Darius Butler:When you flip it, some of them do stop like here. Thank you. Thank you, guys. This is good teamwork right here.

1:49:27Pat McAfee:Yeah, but we will assume the ones you use will be able to go left or right here. You'll be able to do that entire thing. I'm excited to hear you call a game, brother. Legit, we know you love it. There's a couple storylines this season that are going to be different than any before. Now, there's a guy that's majoring in one thing, minoring in another. D-Bot has a question for you. Travis Hunter. He'll be majoring, at least early on, in wide receiver, minoring on the defensive side of the ball. It's rare air. You were one of the few that was able to do it in the National Football League. What was that week like prepping to play some tight end, you know, in the red area coming up weeks?

1:50:01How was the practice like? Did it change? And how do you think Travis Hunter is going to handle this at least early on? Yeah, I mean, just like everybody else, man, I'm so excited to see what this looks like because I did it as a goal line tight end. So I would go down there on Friday and I would practice my two plays for literally just two plays at the end of practice on Friday with the whole offense. And that's fine. It added an extra five minutes to my day where I would have been drinking water on the sidelines instead of practicing those two plays. But him, like, what's his package going to be when we say he minors his corner?

1:50:39Is that going to be, you know, a third down package? Is it going to be only in the red zone? Or is it going to be quarter by quarter? Like, I can't wait to see. And none of us know what that's going to look like. And people have said it. I think it might have been Devontae Adams. I don't remember who said it. Like, it's crazy. I don't know how you could do it. Truthfully, from a pure fatigue standpoint, I do not know how you could do it. I forced, I always call it the greatest three minutes in my football career, forced a fumble, picked it up, ran it, went off to the sideline for one play, and then went in on offense the next play and scored a touchdown.

1:51:12Probably the most tired I have ever been on a football field. Like, I don't know how you could possibly go run some routes at receiver, catch some balls, go over to the sideline, take a sip of water, and then go back out and try and cover the best receivers in the NFL. Like, that's incredible, man. I know we give him a ton of respect and we give him a ton of credit, but if he truly pulls this off, I have utmost respect.

1:51:36Pat McAfee:Well, he celebrates touchdowns and stuff too, just like you, you know, because you, you know, scoop that fumble or whatever you did, run it back, go to the sideline, come back in, play tight end, score a touchdown. For the fumble or interception, had to celebrate because the place was going crazy. So we got whipping JJ. and watch me, JJ. Yeah, we saw that. Turn down for what? Then you go back out there. Oh, no. Now we score a touchdown. Guess what happens again? Hell yeah, brother. It's supposed to be fun. I see the Eagles now, which I respect the hell out of, and maybe it's the reason they win Super Bowls, and I didn't.

1:52:13Fair enough to them. Fair play. But when they're like, we don't talk about our Super Bowl. We don't want it. We don't smile with our rings. I'm like, geez, guys. Well, what's the point? Like, at some point, we got to be happy we did it. Like, holy shit.

1:52:26Pat McAfee:Yeah, Tom Brady was like, I want to see the quarterback celebrate with everybody. But what I'm saying for this, implying in this, is that's exhausting, too. Yep. I mean, that's a lot. That's full time. You know, and the hype and the adrenaline and everything rolling. Jacked up. And then you got to sit down for a kickoff. And now you're still on camera, though, in the stadium. Okay? So do something. Don't just sit there and look like an asshole. You know? So we're going to look at it. Place goes crazy. then a commercial runs of you on the Jumbotron. I'm JJ Watt here. They're ciphering money through this car dealership to pay me for my deal here in Houston.

1:53:02Pat McAfee:You need to buy a car there. So then they show you again, and you're like, yeah, buy a car there. You're dead tired at this point. Kickoff happens. Touchback. We got a TV timeout, obviously. All right. You jog on the field. Now, bang, you're right back in it. That would be very exhausting. I could see how that would be. times and that's mentally too like i consider myself a decently smart guy offensive play calls are absurd like absurd and i had to know what i had to know one offensive play call for the game and i went in that huddle and fitz was he said the play call and i literally looked which this is the craziest part i only had one play so why was i even asking him what to do because it's the only play i had but i said fitz what do i do make sure i lined up behind him at fullback motion and went and caught it.

1:53:46Pat McAfee:I love everything about what Travis Hunter could potentially do here. In theory, iconic. Be insane. Like JJ said, a lot more moving parts on offense. Defense, especially as a corner, I mean, it's quarters, it's cover three, it's on cover two, like you only got probably four things that you're actually going to do, so knowing it isn't that hard. Playing it is super tough, but I can't wait to see him actually do and how much of it he actually does, but They moved mountains to get them, and Stoner seems pretty jacked up, so we'll see them out there. They're going to change football, says Stoner, the day after they draft him.

1:54:19Pat McAfee:A couple quick notes out of college ball that we need to talk about. I think Tennessee has moved to Adidas from Nike, and Penn State has moved from Nike to Adidas. So, I love that. Never going to win anything. I do appreciate Adidas making a play, though. Feels like they're coming back into the game.

1:54:38Darius Butler:Is Wisco in Adidas school still, too? Currently under armor. Currently under armor. Miami, though. We just talked tomorrow. They got Adidas. Adidas is making a big-time play. I feel like everybody just kind of rotates around every, like, five, ten years. Does that feel like it?

1:54:52Pat McAfee:We looked up what the deals were worth. Much smaller than we could have imagined. I was shocked. Yeah, it's very – I don't know if the schools suck at negotiating or –

1:55:03Darius Butler:Well, Nike sponsors just the biggest athletes from every school. Well, they're probably like, what are you going to wear, Russell? Instead of the entire – Yeah. Yeah, like at some point there's not many options.

1:55:14Pat McAfee:Well, at Penn State, they're going to be Adidas options. They get a lot of money for it. And at South Carolina, they're going to be there. They wear the same one all the time. The South Carolina deal, interesting. Yeah. They're with Nike. Should be fun. We'll continue. Be a friend. Tell a friend something nice. It might change their life. JJ, that a baby. See that right there at the zero. We're buying time. The Adidas move, I don't like. Is Nike getting out? What's going on? I think Adidas is just making a push. I don't think Nike is trying to get out of it. Listen, I got some shell tops. Sure.

1:55:40Pat McAfee:Okay. I'm not going to act like I don't like Adidas. Go Stan Smith.

1:55:45Darius Butler:We all know the best cleats.

1:55:48Pat McAfee:Yes. Under Armour's AJ. We're all on the same page. I wear Air Force Ones basically every day of my life. I mean, there is, you know, it's just. Or Jordans.

1:55:58Darius Butler:And it's not right, but if I see if, you know, I'm watching a game on Saturday and one team's wearing Adidas and one team's wearing Nike, I ain't never fucking picking the team wearing Adidas ever. and that's not fair that's not fair but it's just the way it is

1:56:15Pat McAfee:that's pretty real

1:56:16Darius Butler:and now teams with Jordan too and recruits see that too that's the biggest thing

1:56:21Pat McAfee:they got Travis Hunter they've done a good job with younger kids

1:56:25Darius Butler:younger generation definitely wears more Adidas

1:56:27Pat McAfee:I think Adidas is trying to crack the market a little bit I think they're trying to get in there personally they got Texas Tech with the Mahomes Mahomes There we go. Yeah. You got a bunch of guys. Leo Messi, right? Yeah. Sure. Oh, yeah. Obviously massive in the soccer. They got a huge talent. Aaron Rodgers. Yeah. I forgot Aaron's a big team Adidas guy. He's going to be a Super Bowl champion, too.

1:56:56Darius Butler:He already is. Yeah, already is. Another time. And the only one that matters in Pittsburgh. No, no, no. I love Green Bay. Green Bay's my NFC brother.

1:57:07Pat McAfee:What are they doing to get those deals? That was a good high five. We missed it. That was a very clean high five. That was one of the greatest high fives I've seen. They both went back for it. Both aggressively meeting. Both sitting down. Both kind of locked in place. The pureness of the hand to the hand there. You saw it too. Yeah, it was perfect. Because they really went for it. Perfect. We're on the same page. That's tough with the cock back. If you knock it all the way back, get those to line up.

1:57:37Darius Butler:A couple old school teams used to build through the draft, but now we're making moves. Well said. Watch out. Spending money. Are you guys going side to side? So you're right-handed. I don't know if now's the time. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no.

1:57:49Pat McAfee:Hold on. I'll wait for the camera.

1:57:50Darius Butler:We're just kind of showing you what happened. I don't think we should. Don't do it. No, no, no. No, no, no. Do not. No, you can't. No, no. Don't let it back. Let it back.

1:58:00Pat McAfee:Holy shit. Pretty good. Pretty fucking good. I'm down here. That was really good. Holy shit. I don't know if you guys should do that again.

1:58:09Darius Butler:Super Bowl preview? Could be. Maybe. I kind of felt something right there. We felt it. We all felt it.

1:58:16Pat McAfee:We'll see. Colts are going to have something to say about that.

1:58:18Darius Butler:Yeah, they are. What's everybody quiet about? I think Colts are going to win the South. I'll say it. Kings. Kings of the South. Boom. Sweet potato pie. And we'll smack you in the mouth. Dimes. We're running wild. Yeah, we can do it. Two Super Bowls by 2030. Five.

1:58:41Pat McAfee:Yeah, we can add it a little bit. I know the Texans are scared. We know it. They're not saying it, but we understand the vibes down there. And Houston is, oh, no, the Colts got Danny Dimes. We know that. We understand that. Houston, we are not necessarily thrilled that they are in our division right now. They got a banger week one, though. Yeah, I mean, they're going to have problems all season. Rams, Texans. Matthew Stafford, brand new. Camonte. That's going to be a good one. I've got the Titans week two, so I'll get some AFC South action week two. I'll see what Cam Ward's about. I'm really looking forward to that.

1:59:21I cannot believe how little hype and discussion Cam Ward gets. It's the craziest thing for a number one overall quarterback pick. Very much looking forward to watching him play week two against the Rams.

1:59:33Pat McAfee:All right, JJ. Hey, we got a couple people here that won raffles at charity events here. This one, I believe, was for MS, where we raffled off a chance to be live in the Thunderdome to watch the show and the program. We don't do this often, so we're probably terrible hosts if I had to go. Sure, definitely. Yeah, it's probably nowhere near what they thought it was going to be or anywhere. Just threw them D-bone. Yeah, we had D-bone give them a tour of the place. We tried our best. We did. Water's the whole thing. Food, snacks. Good chairs. Good chairs. We took photos. We got basic human necessities.

2:00:08Nice.

2:00:08Pat McAfee:Boom. Took photos. Did a tour. D-Bone gave a tour. This is where I eat snacks. This is where our friend Mitt lives. He's just fucking hanging out. Showing the locker room? Yep. Saw everything. Yeah, we did the tour. We did the thing. We tried our best because this is for a great cause. And obviously, these people overpaid for this. But it was for a good cause, so we're very thankful. There's Carly, Ted, Owen, and Claire. Okay, Owen is a 13-year-old, and he's tall, I believe, for his age. He is 13 staring at my temple. Bottom of your earlobe. Yeah, like my temple, like right here. He's very tall, athletic.

2:00:46Pat McAfee:He's from Indiana, so he definitely has a shot. Of course. So I think on the way out here, we were wondering, Owen, will you try to shoot a hope to win 30 people$500 that are watching the show? Will you do that? All right, Owen. Let's do it. Come on, boys. Let's go. Come on, Owen. Now's your time. Now's the time, Owen. Owen, here's the deal. JJ, can you hear what we're saying through those speakers? Yeah, okay. No, you can't. All right, JJ, speak loud. Will you give Owen a little bit of a motivational message here as he tries to make a shot for 30 people to win$500? All right, Owen. Here we go.

2:01:23There are 30 random strangers on the internet. You've never met him. You never will meet him. They'll never thank you in person. But this is extremely, extremely important to them. So I want you to step up to that line. Pretend it's you in the middle of that gym like Hoosiers and drain that ball right through the net. Let's go.

2:01:43Pat McAfee:Here we go. Whatever you want to do, Owen. If you want it to be a free throw, you want it to be an NBA 3, whatever shot you want to take, if you make it, 30 people will win$500. Now, Owen's been sitting over there. Yeah, he's cold. Like an absolute gentleman. Okay, just sitting, hanging out with Claire, his mom, I do believe. Sweet boy. There was not enough of introductions. I do apologize. Could be older sister, too. Okay, got mom. Got it. He's with mom, Claire. He has been nothing but a gentleman over there.

2:02:09Darius Butler:Yeah, he is.

2:02:10Pat McAfee:Not a peep. Sweet boy. Good boy. Good boy. Good boy. Sweet boy. Raise the good one. Ted and Carly also. Nothing but positive vibes here. Uh-huh. This has been incredible. We should think about doing this more often, maybe. Yeah. Your microphone's off. Yeah, your microphone is definitely off.

2:02:25Darius Butler:Hello? You are back.

2:02:29Pat McAfee:All right, Owen. 30 people,$500. All you got to do is make a shot. You pick from wherever you want to go, and we appreciate you in advance for being an awesome lad. Is this the Owen? No, you did not call into the show a couple years ago, right, Owen? No. That guy's long gone, don't you? He did not appreciate Boston Conner. He's going to go with an NBA. I like it. I like it. This is very far for a 13-year-old. I think anybody walks into our office, everybody walks into our office and they try to huck a three, and they have no idea it's an NBA three, and it's always short and it's always an air ball.

2:03:02Pat McAfee:Dale Jeremiah, I'm talking to you. Yeah, and also AQ Shipwitz. You can just go through basically anybody that isn't a professional basketball player that comes in here. Oh, and NBA three, 30 people,$500. Good luck, pal. Hair looks phenomenal. Yep. oh oh oh

2:03:26yes let's go wow that's awesome oh my god wow

2:03:38Darius Butler:he just got an offer yes dude some college coaches calling in coach debris

2:03:44Pat McAfee:all right all you gotta do is repost this video So say something nice to somebody and put the easiest way to pay you. And you might be one of random. Lee selected 30 people to win$500 because Owen just stepped – might have had his foot on the line. No, no, no. It doesn't matter. He's allowed to shoot from wherever the hell he wants. In his league, in the league he'll be playing. And next year, in the next 10 years, that is good. Splash, Owen, unbelievable stuff. Wow. Owen, Claire, Ted, Carly, thank you for coming in here and enjoying the day. Thank you for donating to a great cause. and we apologize that this all was.

2:04:21Pat McAfee:Sorry. Yeah, we do apologize for that. JJ, that was awesome. My day is made. That was the coolest. That was unbelievable. Fuck you.

2:04:30Darius Butler:Never a doubt. Never a doubt. Confident. Just stepped up to the line. He was so confident. Oh. Dude, Owen, have you started school yet, Owen?

2:04:40Pat McAfee:Owen, have you started school yet? Have you started school? Yeah, he skips school for this. Tomorrow's going to be a good day. Tomorrow's going to be a good day. Hey, you walk into that cafeteria, brother. Yeah. There's 30 people that are never going to say thank you like JJ told you, but just know you made their lives infinitely better. And you made us.

2:05:02Darius Butler:Needed that. I'm hopping out of here today. Yeah, me too.

2:05:05Pat McAfee:All right, be a friend, tell a friend something nice. It might change your life. We're in this thing together. Shout out to you, Owen. Team on me. Wow. Shout out to the chat, too. I'll be in there tomorrow. There it is. Team on three. One, two, three. Team. Goodbye.

2:05:20Darius Butler:You know when you're locked in, focused, and fearless. Welcome to the WNBA. Your vision narrows. You can't look away. Every assist, every stop, every logo three. From beyond the logo! Every did-you-see-that-moment? You bet! What records are going to be broken this season? All of it, right here. Lock in. It's the WNBA on ESPN. All season long. In a sunny Californian suburb, one family's home is unusually quiet. When detectives walked into that house, they said that it was like time just stood still. It's 2010 and the McStay family is nowhere to be found. Inside the home, no clear answer where the family could have gone.

2:06:08Darius Butler:Husband, wife and two children all gone, like poof, disappeared. The search for the McStays quickly captures the nation. But for years, the search for answers only brings more questions. Who's ever heard of an entire family going missing? A family of four doesn't just drop off the face of the earth with no contact. Is this a family on the run? Or is the truth far more sinister? From ABC Audio in 2020, this is What Happened to the Mixed Days. Coming August 11th, wherever you get your podcasts. Or subscribe to 2020 True Crime Plus on Apple Podcasts for ad-free episodes, early access to new episodes, and so much more.