Hour 1: NCAA Tournament, MLB Opening Day, Cleveland Browns proposal

0:00Get in the game with the college-branded Venmo Debit Card. Wreck your team with every tap and earn up to 5 % cash back with Venmo Stash, a new rewards program from Venmo. No monthly fee, no minimum balance. Just school pride and spending power. Get in the game and sign up for the Venmo Debit Card at Venmo.com slash college card. The Venmo MasterCard is issued by the Bancorp Bank N.A. Select schools available. Venmo Stash terms and exclusions apply at Venmo.me slash stash terms. Max$100 cash back per month. 5 a.m. I'm up with a crisp Celsius energy drink. Running 12 miles today. Grab a green juice, quick change, and head to work.

0:37Meetings, workshops. One more Celsius, no slowing down. Working late, but obviously still meeting the girls for a little dancing. Celsius. Live, fit, go. Grab a cold, refreshing Celsius at your local retailer or locate now at Celsius.com. This is the Rich Eisen Show. Hey, everybody. Can't get enough of the Rich Eisen Show? You're in luck. You can find us everywhere. Watch us weekdays on Disney Plus from noon to 3 Eastern. Miss the show? We've got a podcast so you can listen anytime. But here's the best part. Our YouTube channel. Subscribe at youtube.com slash Rich Eisen Show and you'll never miss a moment.

1:21Now, on with the show. Nebraska only had four defenders on the floor. This is the Rich Eisen Show. Smith puts it up. No! The throw! It's gone! From the Rich Eisen Show studio in Los Angeles. And Will Smith has gone deep. Today's guests, Basketball Hall of Famer Chris Webber, MLB Network Analyst Kevin Millar, plus your phone calls, latest news, and more. And now, it's Rich Eisen.

1:55Rich Eisen:Everybody, welcome to this edition of the Rich Eisen Show here on this busy Friday. We've got ourselves 12 teams left in the men's NCAA tournament, trying to get it down to the rest of the Elite Eight by the end of the night, and I think they'll be successful. That's just breaking news. We've got ourselves Major League Baseball opening day now for most teams. The rest of the teams that have yet to play over the first two days play later on today. We've got Kevin Millar on the program, or Chris, how do you pronounce his name, please? Millar. He's joining us from Major League Baseball's network in our number three of this program.

2:35Rich Eisen:C-Web, Chris Weber, about what happened last night, what was going to happen tonight in the NCAA tournament for the men. He's going to join us on this program. You should as well. 844-204-RICH, number to dial, Disney +, ESPN, the app. Listening to us on ESPN Radio or SiriusXM, Channel 80, For those who listen to our podcast, you can call. We just won't answer. Probably when you listen to us, which you can do whenever you want. All three hours available, however you get your podcast. What's up there, Chris Brockman? What's going on, man? It's going to be one of these today. It is indeed. I love it.

3:08Rich Eisen:Good to see you, Jason. How are you? What's up, Rich? I'm great. Good to see you, TJ Jefferson. The candle is lit. What's going on? 1-0. That's what's going on for these Metropolitan fans. Ah, yes. The Mets survived in advance. Survived. That's the phrase of the day. I don't know that that's how I would. All right. The headline of the Thursday of Sweet 16 action here on this Friday. Here's the headline. The Big Ten is dominant, but Arizona is the wagon. That is basically the way things look. As the South region is set in Houston, Texas, to be won by a Big Ten team. And that's because both Iowa and Illinois won last night.

3:52Rich Eisen:And we saw Purdue make it a third Big Ten team in the Sweet 16 to win in the Elite Eight. But Arizona just absolutely destroyed Arkansas last night. Absolutely smoked Arkansas. Handing coach John Calipari, who I mentioned the other day when it was the 30th anniversary of my first ever SportsCenter, talking about how I was there in that 1996 SportsCenter studio doing highlights, most likely, of Rick Pitino's Kentucky Wildcats on that round of 32 Saturday. the Kentucky Wildcats wanted to win the championship in 1996 and the new coach at UMass, John Calipari in 1996 took UMass to the final four with Marcus Camby and my sports center line being I'm Camby, dammit I am Camby, dammit so that's how long John Calipari's been at it it's the worst loss he's ever suffered in the NCAA tournament wherever he has been, 21 point loss and you could see John Calipari last night exhorting his team to do something and they couldn't do very much because Arizona became the first team in NCAA tournament history to have not one but six players scoring at least 14 points in a game they shot 64 64 percent from the field jeez 37 of 58 we always do the math for you that's 64 that's the highest field goal percentage by any team in the sweet 16 or later since Villanova in the 2016 final four somehow someway shot 71 against Oklahoma how you gonna lose that game so John Calipari did not mince any words when he hit the podium after that Arizona wagon of a win.

5:51Arizona is really good. And if they shoot the ball that way and do the things they did today, wow. You know, I told my team after, proud of them, what they did this year. And I don't want them to look at one game and take away from what they've all accomplished. But that was a hard one, you know, and they got us from right at the beginning. We kind of kept it a little close, but they're good. Really good team. He almost looks dumbfounded. He's just kind of like, yeah.

6:31Rich Eisen:I think he just, I think he was missing a really, in that statement, really, really, really good. uh tommy lloyd uh taking this arizona team through the first three games of this tournament for themselves in dominant fashion was asked if there's anything he's done differently or there's any new trends that he has brought to bear uh to arizona which has reached the elite eight in breathtaking fashion. Listen, I read this in a book. What was the best candy bar in 1946? Yeah. What's the best, the most popular candy bar today? Same as ever. I haven't flinched. I'm playing the same exact style that we learned at Gonzaga that I brought to Arizona, and I'm doubling down on it.

7:26I'm not worried about trends. I never look at trends. I'm just like, what do I think is the most effective way to my team to play? And what are my strengths as a coach? You've got to play into that, too. Why would I try to reinvent myself as a coach when this has been pretty effective? Can I get better at it? Can we double down on our strength? What I do every day, I look at our strengths. And when I wake up in the morning, how am I going to honor our strengths? When I go to bed at night, how did I honor our strengths? Throughout the day, we'll work on some weaknesses. But for me, I'm always doubling down on my strength.

7:59That's 100 % how I think we can be most effective. Call me crazy.

8:03Rich Eisen:Okay, two things. First of all, I thought it was Gonzaga. I mean, the number of times I've said Gonzaga in my career, and I hear from everybody up in the state of Washington like, Rich, you're an idiot. He was there for 20 years. It's Gonzaga, isn't it? I thought it was Gonzaga. Okay. And Snickers? That's what I'm looking at. I would have thought just a plain old Hershey bar back then. how old is snickers clearly long enough i was thinking baby ruth i i by by the way i appreciate the analogy wow but it's this whole thing's flipping me out more than the arizona being a wagon looking like the michigan wolverines did back in december that's what fun size invented in 1968 yeah that logo is you know what's not fun size arizona for everybody but arizona because Because again, when Michigan was destroying everybody, including Gonzaga, back in December, I and everybody else, we in Michigan sports country, we were all like, can we start March Madness now?

9:13Rich Eisen:Let's do it now. And guess what Arizona's playing like in March Madness? That. That's who they're playing. And next up for them is Purdue. which advanced last night by beating your Texas Longhorns. You came so close, man. That was your team. Like, I'm going from first four to final four in your bracket. You look pretty damn smart about it, TJ. I was heavily invested. Dang. I bet you were. Tapping. I bet you were. But Purdue is too tough. And you see this tapping by Trey Kaufman-Ren, who is so good. He's so good. He's a double-double machine, although last night he came a couple rebounds shy of that.

9:56Rich Eisen:He destroyed Michigan in that Big Ten tournament final in Chicago a couple of Sundays ago, 0.7 remaining. And he and the rest of those Purdue Boilermakers have been playing alongside one another for quite some time. you know some of these guys are are those mid-20s players that Calipari was joking about I think Oscar Clough is 24 he's been around so long that he was born way back when people were naming their babies Oscar my apologies to people who just named their child Oscar you're a throwback someone at home is like what did I do yeah I know that they were like where's why would Rich do that Wow, Rich.

10:45Rich Eisen:I know. I know. But that makes three Big Ten teams in the Elite Eight, three of them. And good luck to Purdue. They have got their hands full, the Big Ten tournament champs, taking on Arizona in that one. And then the other game that was tight, in addition to Purdue versus Texas, was Iowa versus Nebraska. And Nebraska had a few possession lead in this game, but Iowa just has that gumption. They have that grit and determination. And they got that coach in Ben McCollum, who we'll hear from in a second. But the thing that everybody's talking about today, well, Chris Weber, who was on the program a couple of weeks ago, or last week, And he called Nebraska's opening tournament win, which is the first win in the history of Nebraska basketball in the men's NCAA tournament.

11:48Rich Eisen:They'd never won one before. And he talked about how he was in the same hotel in Oklahoma City as all the Nebraska fans, and they were drinking before, and they were drinking after, and they're drinking now. And now they're drinking heavily because of a different reason. I mean, a three-point game, Iowa is up with the ball late in the game, and somehow, someway, Fred Hoiberg, who has done nothing but coached the heck out of this Huskers team all year long, somehow, someway, he's coaching this like he's Coach Dale trying to teach Ray to a lesson. Four guys on the floor. And unlike Hoosiers, no refs came up to Coach Hoiberg and said, hey, Coach, you've got four on the floor.

12:35And you could see as Iowa went down the court like a knife through hot butter for an and one, you could see the fifth Husker running off the bench trying to check in as I was bringing the ball up.

12:50Rich Eisen:And I don't know how that happens. But it did. And Hoiberg raised his hand and said, my bad afterwards. 58 seconds left. They had that deep ball to Alvaro for the bucket. I think there were four players on the court. Can you say what happened? I'll address that one, Myron. Put that one on me. It was a miscommunication, and I'm the head coach. Put that one on me. I've never been in a situation like that. I know they always count to make sure there's not six. I don't know the rule on that with four. But, yeah, I mean, again, it was a miscommunication, And, you know, unfortunately it, it happened, but that, you know, as far as the rule, I've never been a part of anything like that.

13:34Rich Eisen:Again, was he insinuating that somebody should have done what they did in the movie Hoosiers come up to him and say, you've got four on the floor. I mean, I guess by pointing out that, yeah, they do it for six. Why wouldn't they do it for four? Because four's on you. Six is something that causes a technical, right? That's true. That's how you tell the coach you've got six on the floor. They tee, they tee your team up, right? It's a YP. Yeah, it's exactly YP. There's no T for not having enough people on the court. So, listen, Iowa's just the better team right now. And they're going to be taking on Illinois, which just absolutely crushed Houston last night.

14:13Rich Eisen:Houston couldn't make a shot. And Kelvin Sampson has got to be sitting around right now going, what in the world do we have to do to get this team to cut down a net? I mean, because Houston has now made 18 trips to the Sweet 16 in the history of their vaunted basketball program, and they're now 0 for 18 in winning the tournament. And Illinois made shot after shot. You knew when you were sitting at halftime of this game going, when it's 24-23 at halftime, somebody's going to start making shots, and whoever does is going to win this game by double digits, and it turned out to be Illinois. And Houston's got to be sitting there going, All right, so we're not the one seed.

14:58Rich Eisen:We're the two seed. And the one seed in this region gets bounced by Iowa. What a break. All we've got to do is beat two Big Ten teams in Houston, in our hometown. And we're going to the Final Four. And Illinois is like, nah. With Get Ready to Feel Old, I don't know if you did last night, Peja Stojakovic's kid. Yes. You see Peja? Peja looked good. He did. You know? Houston didn't cross 30 points until 10 and a half minutes. It was brutal. They couldn't make a shot. They couldn't make a shot. And Iowa now has a trip to the final four on the line against Illinois. And they know each other. And they got a red hot coach in Ben McCollum who's being called the Kurt Signetti of basketball.

15:53Rich Eisen:because this guy won four national championships at Division II Northwest Missouri State before Drake snagged him, and he won there, and Google it, okay? Now he's got Iowa in the Elite Eight, and he also has a way of talking that kind of makes you dig him. Hit it. Yeah, I mean, I guess there's Cinderella. You know, we were so close in a lot of games, and I don't like to use that, and we were right there. we just and then we lost some games we probably shouldn't have I think part of that is it's just like those games where those teams get up we don't have enough just complete talent to be able to overwhelm you know maybe the the bottom tier teams in the big 10 and so we lose a couple of those games that we maybe should have won if we're at 97 97 doesn't work for us like we have to be at 100 100%.

16:46So, yeah, I mean, Cinderella, whatever they want to call us. I mean, just we're in the Elite Eight. That's what they need to call us.

16:54Rich Eisen:Right? That's awesome. I'm sure people in Iowa are wigging out. Last time, Iowa in the Final Four, 1980. Last time, Arizona in the Final Four, 2001. The coach of Arizona at the time, Ludo Olson. The coach of Iowa in 1980, Lute Olsen. No way. Yes, sir. That's right. May he rest. Wow, that's cool. And he's maybe guiding the hands here. Maybe guiding the hands. If Michigan and Michigan State win tonight, Michigan taking on Alabama, at the same time Duke takes on St. John's, make sure you get yourself two screens if you can. Mandatory. Uh-huh. And Michigan State then takes on UConn. If Michigan and Michigan State win tonight, that would give the Big Ten an all-time record five Elite Eight teams.

18:03Rich Eisen:The record is four, tied most recently by the SEC last year. Half of the Elite Eight last year was SEC. the Big Ten would have five teams and it would basically be a de facto Big Ten tournament with a possibility because it would be spread out amongst all the brackets, all the regions. It's possible the final four could be a Big Ten tournament in Indianapolis. If Michigan State wins the East, Michigan wins the Midwest, Purdue wins the West, and we know a Big Ten team is winning the South because it's Iowa versus Illinois there. And that's the state of affairs in the Big Ten, if you will, men's basketball tournament.

18:58Rich Eisen:The big dance. Man, St. John's and Duke tonight. Patino versus Duke. Oh, what a monster game. game but i'll be watching the other one oh boy you got i know you got a split screen on the telly oh i got i got myself some uh i'll just out of respect to the campus that oh screw it i got youtube tv

19:26campus i was trying to save you youtube tv is awesome it's great you know I'm looking at you that's alright like there's only one TV in the house that's okay is that well I mean yeah alright enough

19:44Rich Eisen:you know how this show is hosted and nominated okay freshness freshness

19:53Rich Eisen:alright let's take a break here 844-204-RICH number to dial let's talk some baseball man stands at a plate it's time for what individual achievement. Let's take a break.

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22:28Rich Eisen:the rich eisen show podcast on the rich eisen show radio network you have no idea what you missed on our tv side of things we could tell them probably better for us it's better for us to just flush it if you will everybody loves ribs all right baseball how much for one rib let me tell you something somebody in this room uh it was fellers I got something for everybody. Good. What? Somebody in this room is like, I appreciate the charm of the human element of Major League Baseball, where an umpire blows a call and it's too bad. It's just too bad. There's no reason to have this ABS, automatic balls and strikes system.

23:17Rich Eisen:No reason to have that. Why? What's the point of it? Charm. It's the charm. Don't need to get it right. You know who agrees with me? Barry Bonds. Oh, great. That's great. He sounds like a reasonable man whenever he talks. I don't know. I shouldn't say that. He loves Susie. He stares a hole through me. It's okay. And I don't mind people who do that. Oh, God, yeah. Everybody loves Susie. I have no problem with that. I know about this. Was Barry Bonds on the baseball? No. Wow. Was the Yankees just like a code word? Barry Bonds did. Did you hear the story you told during the Netflix game? By the way, Netflix had some bad luck the other night when they had Manfred in the booth and they also had Barry Bonds in the booth.

24:03Rich Eisen:And I believe the Yankees made short work of the Giants in both innings. Like Freed had like an eight-pitch inning and a six-pitch inning, and that was the end of it. But Bonds told a story about how he was almost a Yankee before he was a Giant, where George Steinbrenner called him up, offered him a contract and said, you need to sign it by 2 p.m. He said he hung up on George. I read that. And Dennis Gilbert, one of my favorite people I've gotten to meet throughout my sports career, you can also see him frequently behind home plate at Dodger Stadium because that Bonia, Bonds and Bonia money is really, pays for those seats amongst many.

24:45Rich Eisen:And apparently Gilbert's like, what are you doing? And he's like, I need to think about it. And he signed with the Giants. End of inning. Thanks for coming, Barry. What? But at any rate, don't get me off the point of you saying, oh, I don't like this ABS system. I don't like it. I don't. I don't like it. It's a 1-0 Red Sox lead in your opening day in Cincinnati. Roman Anthony's at the plate. Called strike three. And he's so quick to tap his helmet. Look at this. The umpire is still in the middle of him either punching him out or pulling the string. It looks like a punch out. Okay. And Anthony's already touching his helmet.

25:27Rich Eisen:Like the catcher isn't even out of his crouch to throw the ball around or back to the pitcher because there's a man on base. This was ending the inning. It would have been a 1-0 lead, and I know how great a role this Chapman is for you guys, but he's tapping the helmet. What happens next? Wait a minute. I get it. It's ball four. that keeps the inning alive and the red socks score not one but two more insurance runs for you how'd you like the charm of this moment chris huh and here's the thing if there's no box i think the box has ruined our viewing experience for baseball if there's no box it looked like a great pitch and you're like oh man he got us let's go hold this lead like we added seven eight minutes to the game so now you're railing a technology as a whole can we break kind of for baseball It's not extra minutes to the game.

26:18It literally added eight minutes to the game. Because more action took place? Yeah, we had four or five more batters. We scored two more runs. Here's the thing. What I don't understand about Major League Baseball is what do you care about? Because he's looking like you're railing at the moon. For years, it was, we got to speed up the game. We got to speed up the game. We got to speed up the game. Now it's like, let's add something that makes the game longer.

26:42Rich Eisen:No, we're adding what's right, which is Roman Anthony on first base. Who cares? It's the first game of the season. Oh, gosh. Then have this for the playoffs if it matters so much. It's going to be in the playoffs, dude. Then what do we need it for the regular season for? Because you need it because that was a moment the Red Sox were – I can't believe I'm defending the Red Sox here. You're looking at me and him like he's crazy, right? I'm trying to follow his reasoning. He just won't admit he's wrong about the charm. So you want this to show up in the playoffs after not having an all year? Oh, he doesn't know how to handle it.