A Knicks Miracle (and an All-Time Spurs Collapse), a Mini-Mailbag, and a World Cup Preview | With Joe House, Kirk Goldsberry, Anthony Dabbundo, and Cousin Sal

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Download the PayPal app, save those offers, start scoring rewards. Terms and exclusions apply. See paypal.com slash rewards terms, credit card points subject to issuers, terms, and conditions. The Bill Simmons Podcast, we are live on Netflix following game four of Spurs-Knicks. Kurt Goldsberry is here. Joe House is here. That is the single biggest choke job I've ever witnessed in an NBA, important NBA game. Combined with, you know, one of the best comebacks I've ever seen in an NBA game. And House, I don't know where to start, except I kept thinking Falcons 28, Patriots 3. Oh! As I was watching that collapse. Not to bring a Boston team into this, but when. Oh, not to bring a Boston team into this. When Wimby missed those two free throws, it was like, wow, we're really doing this. They scored 30 points in the second half. They blow a 29-point lead. And they still have a chance to end the game with less than six seconds left. They get a terrible, brunson 30-footer that over Wimby, but OG comes in, gets the tip. House, biggest basketball choke you've ever seen? Is that it? It has to be it because of the circumstances, because the raw data tells it's the biggest comeback in NBA Finals history. And I felt like it was a perfect expression of exactly this Spurs team, which is. Well, I don't know if it was a perfect expression, but it was a perfect expression of exactly this Spurs team. I mean, it was a perfect expression of exactly this Spurs team. And I think that's exactly what a young team under these circumstances, who hasn't been through the gauntlet, you know, comes out and just a little bit tight, then it's contagious. The whole team is tight. And Wemby, you know, some of the observation coming into this game was when the turnaround is this short, he tends to. You can see some of the fatigue still on that man, and the shooting percentage reflected in him. He ended up. 9 for 25. Yeah. With. Yeah. With. Yeah. With. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. With a slew of missed shots. Here's the thing, though, House. 43 minutes for Wemby. Kirk, I thought Mitch Johnson, he was keeping Wemby in there. Remember, he rested him for like 50 seconds, brought him back in. And I think the thinking was, let's go for the kill. Let's get this. Let's get this now. And if we're winning double figures, he's not going to play the last four or five minutes anyway. He wilted. At one point, I think he missed 10 of 11 shots down the stretch. He missed two monster free throws. And then. Combined with everything else that was coming back in this comeback in stages, which we'll cover, Fox gets the steal with 10 seconds left up one because Brunson throws it away, gets tapped out, and Fox is with OG behind him. Yeah. And you just have to fake like you're laying up and dribble it out and try to kill some time and shoot some free throws. He goes for the layup. OG blocks it. And then it's basically the hero on both ends. This is one of the most heroic end of the game things that we've ever seen in a finals game. But when the Spurs look back at this, who are they going to blame? Themselves. I think they. Remember, this is the same team that broke the record for most threes in the first half. They were red hot. That's why this story is so crazy, Bill. It's like they went from the hottest shooting team we'd ever seen in a finals game to maybe the coldest. I haven't had time to look it up. It's 14 for 26 and then three for 17 in the second half. Yeah, they were four of 20 in the third quarter as a team, and I think four of 20 in the fourth. quarter after shooting the lights out. But you brought up Fox. Let's blame him a little bit. I can't believe that guy won Clutch Player of the Year watching him down the stretch in this game. The Spurs were doing an immaculate job taking care of the basketball, too, in the first half. Again, that all fell apart in the third quarter. Fox had a bunch of dumb turnovers in the third quarter. But that play, yeah, that's going to haunt their dreams, too. They had the basketball. They were up one. He's going to the rim, right? That's the moment with. Yeah, but not with. Yeah, like seven, eight seconds left. Yeah, yeah. And he goes up. Maybe he got fouled. Maybe he didn't. But I don't think he should have gone up. I think Darren Fox and obviously Victor Wemiyama missing those free throws was huge. But just an absolute collapse on the offensive end of the court for the Spurs. I think Mike Breen did a great job calling it out. It didn't look like they knew what they wanted to do. It didn't look like what actions they. They weren't confident. Who's the grown-up supposed to be? It's supposed to be the point guard. The veteran, the clutch player of the year. I don't think he was big enough in that late-game stretch. Well, you know, the grown-ups were. They were Jalen Brunson and O.G. 100%. Brunson never comes out, I don't think, in the second half. Played 44 minutes, 36 points. And O.G. finishes with 33. He played 41 minutes and had the two biggest plays of the game, plus just a bunch of three. What was he? Seven for nine from three. A bunch of dagger threes, too. But, you know, when you're coming back from this and the greatest finals come back, I remember before. This was the Celtics against the Lakers in Game 4 in 2008. And that was. They were down 24, and it was basically two runs. And it was some three-pointers, and the Lakers got a little tight. And then you kind of felt with two minutes left, the Celtics were going to take the game. This was different. This was 79 to 46 at halftime, with the Spurs with 14 for 26 from three, and two turnovers house. Yeah. Playing perfect basketball. I'm on text threads. With all these Knicks fans. We're all going nuts about the refs. And I'm like, you guys, it's a 23 to 6 free throw advantage at halftime. You guys are getting your asses kicked. Like, you're not defending threes. Your defense has been horrible, and the Spurs are playing great. They ramped the defense up in the second half. So it goes from. All of a sudden, it's. Castle gets the fourth foul. And I thought all three announcers missed it. Because I thought Brunson was a different guy when Castle was out there versus when he was out. So Castle goes out pretty early. 10.09 in the third. Quarter. Castle's out. But then the thing with these comebacks, these little stages, right? So they get it to 81.59. They get it to 81.65 with five minutes left. It's 90.75 at the end of three. So it's like, all right, you got to make your second run here. And then they make it. All of a sudden, it's 99.95 with 4.32 left. And we've all seen this Knicks team house where it's like, if they're in sniffing distance, you feel like they're going to take it. But Alvarado's out there. We have no Mikael Bridges. Towns has really done nothing. It's basically two guys carrying it. So what did you think was going to happen with five minutes left? Who did you think was going to win? A great chance for the Knicks to win. I mean, the one thing that had me feeling a tiny bit cautious is the poise that the Spurs showed down the stretch in game three, where they weren't completely phased. I mean, the Knicks tried to make a run in game three, and the Spurs were pretty calm. I thought they. They ran decent action. But this is always the case. And I don't have the fourth quarter numbers in front of me in terms of how well the Knicks shot the three ball in the fourth quarter. But that was, you know, they were two for 14 from three in game three. They were vastly improved. And that's the thing that starts to feel like, you know, the avalanche. But really, it was just Brunson and OG as the only reliable scorers for the Knicks. You could feel the poise just falling away from the Spurs. You could feel the young team experiencing it. That's right. Yeah, so the Knicks were four for 20 from three in the first half. I'm sorry, four for 12. And second half, they were 11 for 20. And that was with. Like, what did their bench, like, really. The bench was. You got nothing. Eight points for Alvarado. Yeah, that's it. Two and two. Twelve points from their bench. Harper, like, almost doubled their bench. I thought the cast. Castle thing screwed up that dynamic for the Spurs, Kirk, because. Yeah. He's kind of their I'm-not-afraid-of-anything guy. And the fact that he was in and out of the game with foul trouble, he ends up playing 25 minutes. Usually, he's around 30 minutes. And then ultimately it just became, hey, De'Aaron Fox, you're going to have to figure this out for us because Wembley seems like he's luggage. And there was a moment where Castle was the only one playing offense, it seemed, who was he got to the line a couple of times in the middle of that ice cold slump. He was the only one really attacking the two point area. He was good. The foul trouble, like just with Towns, Towns had the two dumb fouls to open the game. And I had some Knicks friends texting me. I'm like, I'm sorry. I thought both of those were fouls. And the third foul was even dumber. He just shoved somebody in the back and the rebound is out. Yeah. Yeah. And I didn't like the first foul, just for the record. Yeah. Fox going at him. That's fair. I think, look, Jalen Brunson, I want to give some love to OG and an OB. This dude has been great for the New York Knicks, all playoffs. That tip in Bill Simmons, that is going to be something we're talking about for a very long time on your show and every other platform. That was NBA history. That was not an easy tip in. That's one of those. They'll have the. Camera angles from 15 different places on the OG tip in. Now, the big thing was when B was 25 feet from the basket and Harper came in to get it, but OG just came flying in. It was almost like a set play, but it wasn't obvious. I want to quibble. I want to quibble with you. You called that Brunson shot a dumb shot. I don't think that was a dumb shot. I thought that was, you know, I want him taking it and I want them to have a chance to rebound. And with Wemby all the way out, then they had a chance to rebound. And OG had a free run. He had a free run at the basket. It's a 30 foot shot. That was trying to arc it over Wemby. I didn't think it was going in. I understand. It was a classic Kobe assist. They had, they had changed the shape of the defense and then OG. But dude, that was not an easy tip in. That was like five feet away. He was flying. Every time he got the ball in the corner, he, he, it's feeling like clay Thompson too. He just making both plays on defense. And by the way, he was the defender on that Fox play. We talked about this guy is, he deserves so much credit right now for. That's another thing I didn't like about them. Basically riding Fox down the stretch was the Knicks had in an OB on them. I just don't like the matchup. I guess what matchup? I don't like anyone against OG and an OB. I just, I'm out like, let's come up with another thing, but that's part of the problem with when you have a young team trying to figure out what to do. And every time this happened in game three, two, and it felt like it's a couple of moments when the, they started white knuckle in the steering wheel with the, with the weed, the spurs all of a sudden, it feels like. Yeah. It takes 10 seconds for them to get into their offense. They're 30 feet from the basket. They're running this Wemby Fox high screen. That seems like it's too far away. And I just don't feel like anything good's going to happen, but we, we should mention, I mean, there's so many things to cover from this game that Josh Hart mislay up. If the Knicks had lost, wow. Would have been Charles Smith level. That would have been, if the Knicks had lost the series, that would have hit Charles Smith would have been like, come on here, sit next to me in the park bench for the rest. Of eternity. It was, the story would have been two parts. It would have been that blown layup plus his, his failure to box out on the rebound. When, when castle came in, you know, on, on a, they, they did the Knicks defended perfectly on one of those 30 seconds. Yeah. And he, he was the one who committed the foul on Wemby that sent him to the line and then Wemby misses both. Uh, but yeah, not a great sequence for Josh Hart, but we're not sitting here talking about that because his teammate, and that's what I would say. He's hugging everybody. These, these, these, these dudes. Are special, right? That's a special team as a Spurs guy, 28, three great call bill. I was rooting for the Patriots that night. It felt like I I'm not, I was never comfortable as crazy as that comeback was. I've seen this team do this in these playoffs to Cleveland game one, it wasn't 29 points, but this felt like grown men against young boys. And it just, they just got there. And I was like, okay, once, and, and, and how said this, you could feel it on. On, on, in the game, like that confidence of the Spurs, just melting away. You know, who is comfortable Joe house. Cause I checked with him at halftime and said, what do I do about my Spurs over two to one parlay? I should just hedge with the next phase. No, this is done. I didn't write that. All I wrote was you wrote NFW. That's no fucking way. That's right. That is. He told me not to hedge it. That's the correct play up by 27. Now, uh, I will say to, to Kirk's great point, um, this is the DNA of the next, like we will get to see over the body of this season, all the journalism that comes out tomorrow morning and over these next two days will be all of the comebacks that the Knicks have mounted over the course of the season. All of these double digit second half comebacks, all of these fourth quarter comebacks that make them exactly prime for this moment against this team of Spurs that are. Goddamn bad-ass boys. I mean, they are bad. They are bad, bad. They were so good in that first time. I can't call them men because they're boys and that, that that's the difference. That's all a team with a, a DNA where they're playing all the 48, they're going to get to the 48 and you know, the Spurs team, they're really good. It's a, it's a dead even series except for the Knicks are up three to one. Some of my notes from the third quarter, castle four fouls brought some loves with castle. Isn't out there. I'm not sure if it's a good thing. ladies and gentlemen, this is a Knicks coach that is a first year coach. The last year, Nick coach would not have been playing that guy in that moment. And I think the Knicks are at this level because they made Mike Brown, the head coach. And I think that deserves a little respect here right now too. And on top of that point house, they steal Alvarado at the deadline for nothing. He falls out of the rotation pretty quickly because he, he, his shooting goes sideways, but he's a New York city kid grew up dreaming of playing for the Knicks someday. Right. And you just feel like this is, this is smart because whether he plays or doesn't play, he's going to be delighted to be there. Um, he'll be a, he's a great teammate agitator. Like he might have a moment in these playoffs was the feeling. Right. And then he has the moment in the biggest game that they played the whole, whole season. Yeah. Go, go dig out the clips, pat yourself on the back a little bit at the trade deadline. You, you were effusive with your praise to the Knicks. For, um, that, that acquisition, you want me to do the Stephen a and start taking credit. Do I get a championship ring? Um, the, but the thing is like these, we always talk at the trade deadline when we do these pods. Oh, he's a playoff guy. Oh, you can play him in a playoff game. Oh, that's somebody in the right series. He he'll have a moment. And he's one of those guys. You could see it in new Orleans and you know, versus Nicola Vucevic, maybe not one of those guys. OG and an OB also a masterpiece of a trade. Uh, now like, look at that deal too. I mean, the next front office deserves a little bit of credit for, for putting this group together with that trading tool. Not just Can we give them a lot of credit? This has been an amazing front office. Yeah. This is one of the best jobs anyone's done. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, so I think, yeah, that the, the, the guys behind the scenes, the front office and the coaching staff are a big reason why they won this game. Uh, I think that's, that's huge. And yeah, you know, it was another, you know, it was another reason the Spurs completely choked that it was the biggest choke in the history of the NBA. You said you weren't gonna call it a choke bill. Jeez. I don't love the word choke, but when it's a collective team and you blow a lead like that, and what happens happens down the stretch, and then you have major brain farts and miss free throws, and you're not boxing out on the biggest rebound of the game and all that stuff like that, unfortunately is gonna count as a choke. One small aside, Manhattan might be on fire. I'm looking at my hotel. Oh Lord. Oh my God. There's a lot of loud noises and a lot of honking and a lot of let's go celebration. Everybody stay safe. Let's talk about that. Cause we we've spent 20 minutes here and didn't talk about this next team that hasn't won in 53 years. The fans are at it. They're so I'm hearing from people at the game and they're like the refs have just between Trump and game three and the refs in game four, the fans are just in this nervous, angry frenzy. And it's like affecting the team was the, the, the message I was getting from, from the stands. Like the energy is way off. The fan energy was affecting the team. The fan energy was, was just nothing. It was a right. It was almost like they had to hit rock bottom to come out of it. And then it turns into one of the most joyous events, not only in the history of the Knicks, but in the history of the league to win that game. When the Celtics won their game, it was on the road in LA. We don't see a lot of home comebacks like that, but that ends up being, you know, they're probably going to win the title. That becomes one of the most iconic comebacks in, in any sport, not just basketball. Well, we've all been to New York city a hundred times bill, and I've never seen it like this. It is so electric. Everybody walked by on the street, has a Knicks shirt on. Everybody's talking about the Knicks, the cabbies that the we've heard other people talking about it. Uh, but it is electric in there, but dude, there is a lot of pressure on this team. And I fought at some point in this game, they lost some of their composure. Mitch Robinson throws that elbow at Wemby Wemby's motioning the I'm in your head. And it was like, Oh wow. And then Alvarado like picked up Wemby's leg. Yeah. How was that a lot of pressure? And I thought, you know, we're going to have to, we're going to have to do it. I think the refs were afraid of the crowd at that time. I don't know. I agree with that. I think, I think KG is on the money. They were like, we, we, we don't like the energy in this crowd. The refs didn't like it. They were terrified of all those 72 year old billionaires sitting in the first row. No, they definitely, uh, and then I thought in the second half, I thought the Knicks got way more physical, which they should have done. Um, and you know, the net, the Spurs, every time they would get in trouble in this series, we just stopped going to the basket. And that's why castle was so important to them throughout the finals. And then just him not playing enough. They kind of missed their guys. Like, fuck it. I'm going to the basket. Yeah. And I was watching, I watched game seven with, uh, Chris Bosch name drop. And I was watching it with him, the Oklahoma city series. And he said to me, he's like, when he needs his move, what's his move. And in those moments, like Timmy had, we knew what, if the Spurs were going through this 25 years ago, it would be Tim on the left block over the right shoulder off the glass. Um, you know, he needs to develop that. And in these moments when Mike brains, like, it just feels like they don't know what play they want to get to. That's where your superstar needs to have some bread and butter action. And to your earlier point, bill, you know, who has that Jalen Brunson, he can get to the elbow. He can do the step back three, he can get into the lane and draw a foul. And it just feels like that was a real learning moment for these young guys. Like the difference between a mature NBA player and an immature NBA player. And that was on full display in the most important possessions of this game. That's such a good point. And I want to ask you a question about Wendy, but to me, honestly, the guy that I want having the ball under those circumstances that I trust going to the hole and Bill's already shaking his head is Harper Harper's the guy that the playmaker that, that I want, I want to get those touches, those Fox touches at the, at the end. Now Fox did nail that three and that was a humongous three, but I think, you know, the only reason that it's not Harper in those possessions at the end is just because, you know, he's, he's, what is he 20, whatever years old? Uh, and this is his first time in the league, but here's my question. And they were settling for threes over just going to the basket, which was the other, what a segue, what a setup KG. It can't be the case. It can't be the case that the Spurs want third of his attempts from three. It just can't be the case that that's that they prefer that. It doesn't make any sense. He wants it. They want attempts, three point attempts. I don't know why he's so afraid of foul line jumpers. It feels like I always think they're going in like that little spot, like between the foul line and the top of the key. When you talk about, he doesn't have a shot yet. The shot should be like a running jump hook or some sort of, yeah, I'm sticking my arm up in the air and kind of just flicking it down. But that's the thing. He's 22 in five years. Like think of all the great players over the years who every year they added something to their game. So he's going to add something. I think house to answer your question about what's his move. Like, I actually think it's that hard roll to the basket with this hand up and the alley oop. And what the Knicks were started to do during this series is they're shoving them. They're basically committing the foul before it touches it. So it's not a shooting foul. And they must've done that five times today. Totally. They're shoving them off balance as he's about to get the dunk versus fouling them as he's getting the dunk. And it was smart. They've done. I think like they've, I think the Knicks have won every challenge they've had in the series. That's another one. Like they're just like really well coached. Now it didn't seem like that in the first quarter when they weren't playing defense and getting their asses kicked. But, um, but yeah, it's just a smart cerebral team. And it comes down to plays like that Fox play Fox, not dribbling out the clock. OG realizing he might actually go for the layup and somehow blocking and not fouling them. And then in the play on the other end, um, from a Wemby standpoint, Kirk, I hate to frame it this way, but I'm going to do anyway. Maybe, maybe this is, this is the Wemby. I need to be kicked into the nuts as hard as possible. And this will make me stronger for the long-term loss that seemingly all great athletes have. Yeah. I mean, that's the lore, right? That's the conventional wisdom. Uh, I'm still not ready to give up on this series, but if they lose, there's no question that the 90% free throw shooter going to the line for the most important free throws of a season and going over to, in that situation, that's in between the ears bill. And yeah, I, I think he has, he's a great free throw shooter. That's the other problem. He said 90%. Yeah. I mean, it's just like that, like that made it worse. Cause I thought, I know he's tired, but he's great at this. He's going to make these and didn't make either. Yeah. And then castle goes up and makes them. And I feel like there is, you can say those just random numbers. I don't believe that. Uh, I think there was a poise and a fatigue thing. Uh, and that's the other thing is Victor is not the most, um, he doesn't have the endurance of somebody like Stephen Curry or these great players we've seen who've worked on their physiques and their conditioning for years and gotten to the point where at the end of the fourth quarter, a game's exactly like this. Stephen Curry is going to be the one who's in the best shape, uh, running around, making his jumpers, hitting those exact kinds of free throws. Um, and it does, it does look like it to me that Victor has a conditioning challenge ahead of him too. And these late games were kind of prove it. Well, think about Steph. When did he hit all the ankle stuff and wasn't really until like year four, year five, when he started around into who he is house. What do you think the, what do you think the gambling line on this series is right now? You had to guess. Oh, uh, whatever it opened at. Um, but flipped the Spurs were, were two to one favorites. Is it more than that now? Yeah. Oh, okay. I think they're factoring stirring in the chocola that happened tonight. Minus 400 for the Knicks on FanDuel. Minus 400, all right. Yeah. Wow, that sounds right. I mean, the Spurs. Two days off, so. All right, so if you're the Spurs, let's go through this if you're the Spurs. You get two days off, you don't play until Saturday, you're going home. You led all four games in the final two minutes, and I think you led three of them in the final minute. You had two of the most memorable last-minute collapses in the recent history of the finals, with Wemby throwing the pass off Castles back in game two, and then basically everything that happened in the last couple minutes of this. And, you know, you could talk yourself into, all right, come on, one game at a time. We can play with these guys. This team's not better than us. They haven't really beaten us yet. We've led double figures in every game. We've had leads of, like, 17. And 29, and, you know, let's just play our game. Don't get carried away. But what does Mitch Johnson do differently, other than maybe not playing Wemby that many minutes? I think they got to just do what. They were playing so much better than the Knicks for that first half. For an hour. What does he do differently? I don't know. I think one of the things I wanted to see, you sort of brought it up earlier, and it doesn't have to be Harper, but, like, pick on Jalen Brunson on defense. Like, run. You have these three ferocious attack guards. De'Aaron Fox, maybe not as ferocious as normal. He's still dinged up. But could we pick on Brunson on defense? Wear him out? So you wouldn't pick on O.G. Ananobi? That's one of the things you'd change? I wouldn't pick on. Don't pick on O.G. Ananobi. All right, I'm going to write that down. Or Josh Hart. Or Bridges is good. But, yeah, I would try to get Cat and Foul Trouble on purpose. And I would attack with my fleet of attack guards. I would isolate and attack Jalen Brunson in drive situations. Well, and very quietly, that was the impact of Castle getting into Foul Trouble. It was Champagny who was out there. Champagny got the majority. It got 33 minutes to Castle's 26. And he killed them tonight, at least offensively. And that's somebody that was huge for them in the OKC series. And one more thing. One more point on that shit. They're not carried over. One more point. When the Spurs won their only game of the series, guess who was in Foul Trouble? Jalen Brunson. Because they were attacking him. He got those four fouls and he had to sit out. And that was a huge factor. And the Knicks, without Brunson on the floor, are completely guardable. And it's almost like the only time I've seen somebody really expose one defender this playoffs, like I would try to do if I were Miss Johnson, was the Knicks going after Harden over and over and over and over again in that series. I would like to see a really sort of aggressive targeting of Jalen Brunson on defense by these guards. I'm trying to remember other famous last-minute collapses like this. And another one that has come up a few times over the last few weeks was that 95 magic with the four missed free throws. Now that was like Nick Anderson four in a row. That was more abrupt. The game was over. It goes into overtime. And then. I actually went back and watched it after we talked about it on the last pod. And I think Hakeem gets a tip-in with like under a second left and OT to win it. And that young team cratered. There was a feeling maybe that would happen to the Spurs after game two. Didn't happen. And Wendy is one of the most confident young stars we've ever had. And he could just say, look, man, I got worn out. I was trying to do everything. I was going nuts. But I still feel like. I'm the best player in the series. So no castle foul trouble. Wendy responds. What else do you need, House? More Dylan Harper? Well, I will say this to KG's observation earlier. The short turnaround time going from a Monday game to a Wednesday game, we don't have any more of those. Over the balance of this series, we go Saturday, Tuesday, Friday, I think, is game seven. So with that cadence, for sure, that's a step in the right direction for Wemby. But, I mean, honestly, the way these games have played out, I don't think that there are big moves to be made. I mean, the Spurs were right there. The difference is knocking down two more shots in the fourth quarter. And they win by. And maybe dribbling out the clock. Yeah. Any last notes, Kirk? Yeah, I was telling people all week, like, well, I have a question for you. It's like, these teams are very close. And it's almost like if we flip the coin together seven times and heads won five of them, it'd be like, man, tails sucks, you know? That's how close this series is to me. But here's my question for you, Bill Simmons, because you're the greatest sports writer of our time, but you're retired. I have to write the game five look ahead. So I think Joe House will let me indulge. If the sports guy had the assignment that I have at your website, therinner.com, for tomorrow, what are we thinking for game five? Your Brunson defense when Castle can stay on the court is working. I don't know. We haven't seen, like, this is the, you know, I love coming on after these games, but not knowing what some of the advanced stats are. I'd love to know the on-off when Castle's out there, when he's not against Brunson. Because it feels like when Castle's out there against Brunson, he has a hard time looking like Brunson, right? Yeah. That'd be the first thing is like, hey, Castle, like, just try to stay in the game for us because you're our best chance for this. Harper, the more he has the ball, Adlib being doing Harper stuff, I just feel like they're in a better position. I'm not giving OG that corner three anymore. I'm just not. If I have to give up other stuff, that's fine. But he's, it's just going in every time now. And if it doesn't go in, he's beating somebody down the baseline and creating something else. Like, you have to start treating him, I think, like, take him a little more seriously. I'm not afraid of anyone on that, on that Knicks bench. McBride and Shamit have gone sideways. Alvarado came up big, but he was really like the last guy they could put out there. And this hasn't felt like it's the series for Mitch. And then just hope, keep trying to challenge Towns and hope he does dumb stuff. That third foul he had was really stupid. Like, you know, that was a classic Minnesota Towns foul. So I don't know. What else would you add, House? Nothing. I mean, in terms of, of the narrative, the interesting thing to me is what we got in that second half is the version of the Knicks each time they had a closeout game in front of them. They go up on teams, you know, that was 58 to 30. Well, guess what? We watched that against Atlanta. We watched that against every time this Knicks team had a chance to close somebody out. And so that's the fascinating thing to me. This is a closeout game against a team that is, uh, entirely different character than the Eastern Conference teams that the Knicks went up against and, and just ran them off the floor. I honestly love the Spurs. Now, I don't know that the, the line's going to open up at what it's been Spurs at home, four and a half, five and a half, something like that. I'm not going to lay the points out of respect to the Knicks, but I honestly think the Spurs are going to win. It's the smell of a Tony Brothers game. Oh, he's got the whiff. I smell fouls. Oh, I just smell another foul. Yeah. It feels like this would be a Tony special would be. We also haven't seen Foster in a while. That's what I thought the sports guy was going to say. Maybe we save him for game six at the garden, a chance for him to be under the bright lights of Broadway and do his thing. Off the hook. Um, Trump, who I think if the Knicks had lost this game too, I think, I think that the New York city fan base hatred of Trump would, uh, have gone to this level that as would have never been seen before. And then Josh Hart would have been the other one. If they lose that game, like we mentioned, that's, he's immediately taken a seat next to Charles Smith. Um, with one of the worst moments in Knicks history and P and the other irony of it is Knicks fans love Josh Hart. So of all people, and it looked like he was going to dunk, but then realize his steps are too far away and, uh, couldn't do it. So, all right. So house thinks the Spurs are still alive in game five. I think I agree. Um, but I don't think they can beat the next three times in a row. I don't think that without some sort of injury or something weird happening. If this, if these are the teams that everyone's healthy, I don't, I don't see the Knicks losing three times in a row. If obviously they win game five, game six will be fascinating. I mean, a chance to win the NBA championship in Madison square garden in Manhattan with this fan base, that's a lot of pressure. It's going to be one of the most, one of the most electric NBA games in the history of the league. If that happens. Um, but yeah, I, I could see a path for the Spurs, but certainly like I said earlier, you're down three, one, um, you had chances to win at least three of these games yourself. It's just, we've seen too many of these series built to, to, to, to really have faith in the Spurs at this point. All right, guys, I think we covered everything. I I'm in this. I'm amazed we were all coherent. especially like knowing that the Spurs were a young team prone to do this and that the Knicks love coming back. Yeah. Even when the game was 29, I wasn't exactly turning it off, but I felt like they missed their, it was like it became a salats of the Turk game where it was like the Knicks missed their chance a couple of times when they were getting it to 15, 14 and then somebody who hit a three and it was like, oh, this could have been a great comeback. And then all of a sudden the fourth quarter when Wemby got tired, it flipped. And that, and that was that. All right. I'm sure we missed 17 things, but Kurt Goldsberry, Joe House, appreciate you guys. We're going to take a break. Come back. I have a little mini mailbag for the, for the audience right after this. The Bill Simmons podcast is brought to you by FanDuel USA fans. We got one for you. FanDuel dropping a massive USA super boost for the matchup on Friday against Paraguay. Right now, all customers can win up to $25. If the USA has one plus shot, one plus shot on goal, that's it. Whether it comes early or late from outside the box, right in front of the goal, every attack will feel a little bit bigger. You're just going to be rooting for one shot to get on the net back to USA. Get in on this huge super boost before kickoff. Visit FanDuel.com slash BS to get started right now. 21 plus select states are 18 plus DC, Kentucky, Wyoming restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Game problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER. Call 888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat Connecticut. This episode is brought to you by Holiday, in by I-H-G. If I'm ever traveling for work, which I try not to travel too often, but I do travel for work and where I stay is super duper important. I like an easy check-in process. I like to be able to hang up all my stuff really quickly. I like a TV with a remote control that can do some stuff. I'm pretty easy for the most part, but I like to feel like it's just a nice place. This sounds like you, check out Holiday Inn. Has a whole new energy, especially for, for business travelers. You'll see it everywhere from refreshed rooms to re-imagined social spaces and dining done right with new drinks and dishes. And for business, there are flexible spaces that work for the way you work. It's a new day. It's a new stay. Book now at HolidayInn.com. All right, we're gonna do a little mini mailbag here because I'm not gonna have another podcast until Saturday night. So I wanted to give some content for the next couple of days. This mini mailbag, this segment sponsored by New Era. And you guys sent me some great questions. As always, you can send them to bspodcast33 at gmail.com. Thanks for all the nice notes and nice things people say. It gives me faith in society that we're still nice people. Couple thoughts here on home court advantage. So we'll start there. Harrison from Cincinnati. When I was talking about with Mahoney about why doesn't home court advantage matter like it used to. Harrison from Cincinnati said, what about dating apps? Players no longer need to go to a bar or club to pick up girls on the road anymore. Now they can just hop on a top dating app like Rye or check their Instagram DMs and invite someone to their hotel room without needing to drink or stay out late. Maybe this is the single biggest reason of the downfall of home court advantage. You know, I wanted to laugh at this. And then I was thinking about how players probably met people in the 90s and the 2000s versus how they'd be now. And it's probably way easier to be more discreet and meet people without having to actually go out in the general public. And stay up late and do all that stuff. So can't be ruled out. Jalen Rose and I always used to have a joke when athletes would get into a town and they would say on Twitter, you know, they would be landing in Miami and they'd be like, what's good, Miami? And then you would just get all these DMs from whoever that, people that knew you were in Miami. Yeah, maybe that is part of it. Maybe people are out until five in the morning at clubs anywhere. Oliver from Chicago wants to know, is it possible athletes are just better at handling the pressure? They're bigger, stronger, faster over the time. Is it possible they've also improved at handling their pressure and emotions too? This is follow-up from Jake from Minneapolis. What about the impact sports psychologists have on modern players? Top prospects, recru, college players all work with professional psychologists, mental health experts, whoever, prepare them to play in these type of environments, big games, handle the backlash. The impact of mental health to me is the most glaring difference in 30, 50 years from now. It's tough because I remember doing an interview with Adam Silver at the Sloan Conference when he said actually he was the most worried he'd ever been about the mental health of players because of social media and people being online all the time and the tribalism of social and how fast people can mobilize against somebody or try to make them look bad. Not to mention AI and all the other things. So to me, that's an even out. I don't, I wouldn't say that as a factor, but I do wonder like maybe some of the psychology, of sports, we're getting a little better about handling adversity. Maybe that's a little better. This is a theory from Nick from Cleveland. With all the AAU teams, these guys have played probably a thousand different gyms over the years. They're constantly waking up, driving three hours, playing for six hours, coming home, eating McDonald's breakfast, getting back in the car, driving somewhere else. An 8.30 finals game after a day off is a walk in the park compared to what they probably dealt with for 10 years along with proper sleep, nutrition, makes sense to me that they're better. Not against that. There's definitely, definitely, you're bouncing around more and, you know, a gym is a gym after a while. This is the big one. A couple of people brought this up with the refs because I mentioned with Mahoney, like you really felt like you could sway the refs, especially there was two for a long time in the seventies and eighties. I can't remember when they went to three. There was, there's blood in the air. There were just, outright, you can watch some of this stuff on YouTube. There were just some, some games that you just can't believe how one-sided the officiating ones, which is so much harder to do now in the era of social media. I really feel like in the two thousands, this shifted with, from what was going on basically from 1999 through the Miami Dallas series in 06. Then Donahue happens in 07. And all of a sudden we got way better at kind of monitoring what was going on with refs. So there is a before, after that, and then Mitchell Eppner says, what about video review? Not just in-game requests for replays, but the constant drilling the NBA refs get from league offices and calls they got right and wrong. They have the performance report after the games and they're hammering down on them left and right. Maybe the refs are just better at calling stuff. Well, don't tell the Knicks fans this after game three, even though we're taping this before game four, but it's, it's possible. I think it's way harder to have a completely, terrible one-sided refereeing performance than it was. And there's probably more accountability for a variety of reasons. And Byron, a Pacer fan, and this is a tough playoffs to watch. He put in a preface, he said, you can't affect refs nearly as much now because bad calls will be reviewed and made right. You can't be terrible homer refs because it'll be graded and scrutinized by everybody. So the refs are a piece of it. I think the travel, the more I thought about it, I think the travel is the number one thing that it's just easier than it was in the seventies. And eighties, the refs are more consistent. I mentioned the shooting motions with Rob that, but it's, it's a weird one, but there's just less variance. Everybody shoots the same. And then the three pointers is the other one where the three pointers can swing any game possible. So interesting topic, Patrick Franken wrote in about he's a Milwaukee fan and him and his fellow Buck fans are now obsessed with that 82 and O game, which I'm sure people that's taken over. The internet, the last seven, eight days, where you make these teams and you try to go 82 and O and you spin it and there's a science to it. The best I've ever done is 80 and two. I really get now I do the harder one where you don't get to look at the stats and you only get two spins, but I've just have never pulled off the 82 and O. And it's when, now that the finals is, is about to go into a break for a couple of days, I'm going to make a more concerted effort. But Patrick says over the last two weeks, two guys have dominated our group chat. Truck Robinson and World B free truck because of his awesome name and insane stat lines from the late seventies. We're now down a YouTube rabbit hole of watching truck highlights, including a 1978 game against the Spurs where he scored 39. And then he said, World B free, awesome name for the purposes, 82 and O. Average 29 and 30 in the 78, 79 seasons. We got to the Clippers. None of us knew these guys existed prior to the game. My question to you is, can you spend two minutes breaking down one of their careers? Good stats, bad team guys, could they have better career in the right team? He came to the right place. I can't think of anyone on the planet who's more excited to answer this question. So truck Robinson and he used to be Lloyd free. He changed his name to world. Be free. Lloyd free was on the Sixers. Truck Robinson was on the bullets. Both of them played in the finals. Truck Robinson, 75 finals and Lloyd free 77 finals. They were bench guys with better players ahead of them. And then they got traded and their stats went way up. And truck had truck had one of the craziest stat seasons. I think of anyone in the history of the league compared to when you look at the rest of their career where he averaged, he, he went to Washington, he signed a free agent, um, contract. I want to say with like Atlanta, but somehow ended up at new Orleans at one point and put up 23 and 15 for an entire year in the 78 season was first team on BA. And this was a big stretch for power forwards where, um, this was when we had the fight. white with Kermit Washington, um, they, he had Morris Lucas who George McGill, Dennis, Kermit Washington, you had Truck Robinson, just a lot of big physical power forwards that were around there at the same time. Buck Williams eventually came in the league and Truck was probably the best rebounder of all of them. Now, as a kid, I don't think I ever saw him play. He was barely ever in the playoffs with Pat. He was in the wrong conference, but he ended up getting traded again to Phoenix. And I think 79 playoffs made the Western finals with them and they lost to Seattle. So he was in the mix in real games. And then in 81, they lost to the Kings, but that was a team that Suns team maybe could have made the finals too. He was good though. He was a banger, super physical, really good rebounder and ended up with the Nike poster. World B free, I was way more focused on as a little kid, going from being just the ultimate Dion Waiters type guy on Philly, goes to the Clippers and just 29 a game the first year, 30 a game the second year and was really fun to watch in person. You think like now he would probably bomb, I don't know, 10 threes a game. Nobody, the three point line didn't even show up till 1980, but with him, um, kind of, he, first of all, he was bald, but it was one of those bald, but had hair in the back. So he looked really distinct. He had this weird body, had like kind of no neck and strong arms and this really cool, uh, jump shot. And it was just this really physical scoring guard that could score on anybody and was a classic. Like if you played at the Clippers, uh, we'll be free. He could just put up 47 and beat you by himself. No matter what team you are, the Celtics, the last great run he had, the Celtics had a four game series in 85 against him. And, and it was a great Larry bird series, but, uh, he went toe to toe with world B and, uh, and we'll be finally kind of had a playoff moment. He never really from the moment went to when he left Philly was just never in the mix for the playoffs. So it has this whole career it's pre league pass. It's pre Twitter. Um, but he was cool. And his Nike poster, I think is one of the hardest ones to get. So these guys, like, I'm not surprised they're finally having an 82 and oh moment when there was a micro league basketball. Um, these were two of the seasons that were always great seasons. Cause they, you know, how many guards have averaged 30 a game? So anyway, I'm glad congratulations to truck and to world that also the insanity of somebody changing their name from Lloyd free to world. Be free. Like it gives you a sense of, uh, what kind of character he was. Cody from Bloomington, Indiana said how me and Adam Friedland discussed the nets, having no identity, how to break into the city and, and wondered if it could be like the Italian rivalry between inter and AC Milan, where, um, he thinks the net strategy should be to go in only on international players. He said, enter an AC Milan, have a deep rivalry initially based on AC Milan wanted to have primarily Italian. Players and enter, hope I'm saying that right. Wanted to bring in international players, um, cause more of a class divide between fans, inner fans being part of the bourgeois Milan fans were be a little more working class. This sounds great. I didn't know any of this stuff. Um, but he said how lifelong New Yorkers will always be Nick fans. So maybe the nets should cater to the multi multicultural aspects of the city and go with an all international team. Honestly, best idea I've heard for the nets. All decade. Um, you're not going to beat the Knicks conventionally. You're never going to get the city to care about them. If this whole last two months, they didn't tell you once and for all that you're a second class citizen. Um, you might even be like a fifth class citizen. I like the international plan. Uh, I'm going to pass that along to the size who I don't know. James was saying how, when I, we were talking about how Chet had to go to the Australian Outback. I forget who was on that podcast. Um, but I'm going to pass that along to the size who I don't know. Um, like Dirk, the whiskey to get his game back. And, uh, and he was saying, here are my three options for him a month in the Amazon rainforest climb Mount Everest. He could be the tallest person ever to climb Mount Everest. And then, uh, he said, embed himself in a Ukrainian drone factory. Learn from the experts about protecting home court, learn an underdog mentality and, uh, just garner some incredible goodwill. Um, I thought about this Chet thing. I'm not sure he's at that dirt point yet. The more I think about it, guess what? Wemby's destroying everybody. Um, he needs to figure out this summer. I would advise him not to go on vacation, but he needs to figure out how to get his three point shot off faster so that when he plays Wemby, he can go in the corner and release a shot faster than Wemby can come out and challenge the shot. Now would be my advice. I would, I'm not ready for him to go to a Ukrainian drone factory yet, but maybe we're a year away. Eric Moore wants to know, is Brunson's dad, the most embarrassing parent in pro sports right now. So, I mean, this was LeVar, LeVar balls title forever. Um, this would be a really fun championship belt to pass along the most embarrassing port, uh, most embarrassing parent championship belt holder year by year. There's been some, some classics Brunson's dad. So I go back and forth on this cause I thought it was really lame when he crossed mid court. Nobody else. First of all, you're not allowed to cross mid court. You're a coach, right? You're it's mid court line only. But when Fox and Brunson got into it earlier in the series and Rick Brunson walks all the way over and just kind of became a dad, it was like watching, um, you know, somebody in a 10 year old AYSO game getting upset at the refs and just decided they could walk in the field and then started talking shit to Fox and the announcers kind of let it go. I thought it was pretty embarrassing. Actually. I thought it was weird counter though. I think Brunson might be the enforcer. This next team, he might, you know, they don't really towns in an OB McHale bridges. Um, Brunson, Josh Hart is gets a little feisty. Sometimes Mitchell Robinson can throw some elbows, but if there was ever like a brawl, I feel like Rick Brunson would be the first guy in it. So in some ways it's a little embarrassing that he still behaves like he's coaching an 11 year old a team with his son. On the other hand, he might be the toughest guy on the bench. So, uh, I think LeVar ball still is. Um, Adam from Waterloo, Ontario says, um, I talked about the prolonged misery, misery title belt about how the Knicks are probably the most miserable team with the most fans, Toronto's in there too. And Adam points out there's really a ton of parallels between the Knicks and the Leafs, a title drought of 50 plus years center of the universe for their respective sport, having to deal with their fact that their biggest rival is actually the more decorated franchise, the Celtics and the Habs. For the Knicks and in the, uh, the Canadians, one of my least favorite franchises. I'm so excited they didn't win this year. Um, for the Maple Leafs, hell, the Leafs have even endured their own Dolan S bat shit owner situation. Go ahead and Google Harold Ballard. Pretty good. Google the Leafs are at least 20% of the reason that will our net still smoke cigarettes. Can't speak to that. Um, and then he said, my favorite part of this email is that you have to acknowledge the Celtics or the Habs. Uh, you have to acknowledge the Celtics or the Habs of the NBA. I think this is a great parallel. Um, and even though Toronto doesn't have as many fans and they have the generations of fans like the next do, um, the city is not as big as New York, but it's big. It's one of the biggest Canadian cities. And if they ever really got into the finals, um, the way the next did with a good team that had a chance to win, I think we'd be running all of the same. Check marks that we're running with the next right now. Um, I didn't really like your joke about the Celtics being the Habs and the NBA. So I'm gonna ignore that. This is a good one. Um, from Jeffrey Thompson. Oh, no, I'm sorry. This is from Michael in Los Angeles. Then the next one's from Jeffrey Thompson. I feel like anytime a role player is a good game in the playoffs, everyone's too quick to anointed as the blank game. Alex Crusoe goes off against the Spurs and sorry, the Crusoe game, Luke Cornette makes a game altering Bach. It's the Luke Cornette game. Not really. We, we said in the moment, but he said, which the blank games do you think stand the test of time? What's in the running for the best, the blank game along with Jordan's flu game. Um, I put some thought into this. I'm going to give us some thought starters and I'm not ready to have a final list yet, but, um, just off the top of my head, these were the 10 that came to mind for games. The Robert Horry game. Now he's the king of this. I wrote a. A whole column about this free SPN that I then kind of turned into the Robert Horry chapter in my book about the best thing about Robert Horry is if you said, oh yeah, the Robert Horry game, you wouldn't know which game you were talking about. It could have been the, the shot he made against Sacramento. It could have been that unbelievable barrage of points that he scored in game five against Detroit when Rashid fouled them at the end, which is one of the dumbest plays of the century. Um, but he had multiple Robert Horry games, but he's a good one. The Steve Kerr game, 2003, Dallas game six, Steve Kerr. It's like a sports movie. Steve Kerr barely playing anymore. It comes in, hits four threes and it's great. And it's the Steve Kerr game. You know that one immediately. The Bennett Salvatore game. Game five, 2006 finals. Yeah. The OJ game, not OJ Mayo, OJ Simpson game five, uh, the 1994 finals. That's a really good one because that was the car chase split screen. The Jr Smith game, game one, 2018. Derek Fisher game. There might be some people pushing for a game four of the finals against the Orlando, I think it was game four when, um, I think it was Ray for Austin, maybe Jameer Nelson. One of those guys didn't realize Fisher was going to shoot a three with nine seconds left and the Lakers are down three, some of the worst defense of that decade. Uh, but the Derek Fisher game is a 0.4 seconds shot against the Spurs. The heat game. This is for Boston fans only. This was game five of the 1984 finals when, uh, it was a hundred plus degrees and Larry bird somehow wasn't, wasn't phased by the elements. The Jason Terry game underrated game five, 2011 Dallas. When he hits, I think the number one, he checked shot I've ever seen in person. Um, he's there. They have the lead. There's like 30 seconds left, either Wade or LeBron. I haven't seen in a while. Wait, LeBron gets switched on him and the shot clock's running down a little bit. But he's maybe four feet behind the line and just says, fuck it. And takes this three and makes it. And the crowd absolutely lost their shit. The Mavs fans know what I'm talking about. This was as great as that Dirk was that whole time. And it was the Dirk and that that's it. He's the story from that Jason Terry making that three, you could argue was the greatest moment in Mavs history. It was so incredible to be there for that. And I still can't believe he took it because it wasn't. We love Jason Terry, but it wasn't like he was the best guy in the team. It was like, I'm not even sure Kobe would have taken this. And he was just like, fuck it. I'm taking it. Uh, but I love that one. So that's the Jason Terry game for me. And then you have the flu game. And then you have, uh, the artist melee, which is in the artist game. But, um, those were the 10 that jumped to mind for me. The flu game is still the number one biggest impact, most important, most famous blank, the game or the blank game. And, uh, really important to the Jordan legacy. Jeffrey Thompson sent us before game three. He said, if the Spurs win game three and whatever happens after is bad for the Knicks, will we call it the Trump game? Yes. If the Knicks lose this series, which, you know, we're doing this midway through the series, but I think the Trump game will rise into that group that I just mentioned. Well, you'll know immediately what the Trump game was. Elias Posey from Milwaukee says, you mentioned comparisons between cat and various players and how they turned their careers around improbably and became impactful playoff guys. I did that on Sunday's pod. I think you missed an obvious parallel pal Gasol to towns, very talented, big men questions about their ability to be top level championship guys. You pair them up with all time leaders, clutch guys, Jalen, throwing them in there and through proximity, that guy levels up. And, uh, true number two option. Um, maybe not as many questions with pal, but I think that's the closest comp. I think that's great. I'm mad at myself that I didn't think of that. You forget after the 2008 finals, even after the trade and they make the finals with them, there were still questions about, are you, is pal tough enough to be the guy, the number two guy in a title team? Is this the, is this a good enough wingman for Kobe? So, and he shed that. And I still, I'm going to duck. The Laker fans are going to get so mad. Um, I, there was a real case for pal to be the 2010 finals MVP. I'm already in the record. I always think the best player in a team should win unless they're an absolute disaster. But I thought pal is awesome in that series. And if we're going to do the Iguodala Curry thing, or we're going to do the Jalen Brown over Tatum thing. And that's just our mentality with picking finals MVPs that we're not bringing in. Who's the best player who has the biggest responsibility. I thought pal swung game seven, like that series came down a lot. One game and pal going against KG who admittedly wasn't the same KG after the surgery and no Kendrick Perkins and Rasheed Wallace playing 35 minutes, basically passing out on the court. Um, pal bullied us that game. And I, I sat behind the basket second half. He bullied us and he's the reason I thought they won game seven. So yeah, that towns versus pal. Good one. Corey wants to know from Kelowna, Kelowna, if you could put Wembley on any team from the past, who would you pick just for fun? And he said, as a British Columbia guy, I'm biased towards Steve Nash, put Wembley on those sons teams. And I think it would have been unbelievable. He said, um, you could also just put them on the Jordan bulls, Curry Durant. Well, that's not fun. Um, I was thinking eighties Lakers. If you put him, if you just time machined him in for Kareem for the 87 and 88 teams. Um, what that would look like. This is a very strange question. Um, yeah, but Steve Nash, maybe, maybe the answer is Steve Nash. It's trying to think of centers that would, uh, it just would have, Wembley would have been unleashed versus the center they had. And tough question. You broke my brain with that one. I'm much more ready to talk about world. Be free and truck Robinson. Nat H in Oakland wants to know, um, I listened to your podcast with Mahoney. You detailed all the finals MVPs with funky results. Iguodala, Tony Parker, Jalen Brown. Why don't replace, why don't we replace finals MVP with playoffs MVP? Playoffs MVP would clear up all of this. Um, I pushed for this hard in my book and I even laid out who all the playoff MVPs would be. And I have a document that has all of it out and it's very helpful. Like the ultimate example of this is Tim Duncan in 2007. If you handed out a playoff MVP, he wins. He was the most important player in that team. He should have won. And there's no record because the finals MVP went to Parker and that's all we had, um, of him being the most important player in that team. I would say the same for Tatum in 2024, by the way, in general, I like having it. And I think there's some good arguments like 2015, the question would be, could a losing player win this? Um, 2015, you could make a case. LeBron could have been the playoffs MVP. Um, with what? Everything he did that throughout the entire playoffs. But I'd like, here's the thing. Who's not interested in this. I didn't really like the Eastern Western conference finals MVPs because I think, I think giving out awards before the end of the championship, I think can screw a team up a little bit. I don't know if it was awesome for the 24 Celtics. I also don't like finals MVP because it's a small sample size, but I'm not against having it. If we had, playoffs MVP too. And not only that, I would do like what they do with the NCAA, where I would have my, my first team, all playoffs team at the end of the year, because the whole point of this is you want to be able to look back at this 30 years from now and remember like, oh, what, who was the best guy in the playoffs? Who was the best guy in the finals? Who were the best five guys in the playoffs? And like, if you did it for these playoffs, you would have Wemba Yama and you would have Jalen Brunson. Right. So there's three. I think you would have Stefan Castle as the fourth. And then who's the fifth. If I was just picking like these are, cause it doesn't just have to be guys who could be from the finals, right? Like maybe, maybe SGA is your fifth guy on that. Or maybe it's no, it's nobody from Cleveland. But anyway, I like that. I like when the more we can do to capture snapshots of a season, the more happy I am. And then the last question I got, just a lot of where's Giannis going? Where do you think he's going? Is the trade going to happen before then? Um, I thought Boston was out of this. I know Boston was out of this. And I was wondering if they were playing possum or not. I think they were playing a little possum. I think they ran on Giannis. So I'm not recanting what I said before. I, I don't really know the reasons for it. Um, maybe they felt like Miami's offer is an offer they could beat. Um, maybe they wanted to drive, maybe they want to drive the price of Miami's offer up and they don't actually have interest in him. But as I said over and over again, Giannis is pushing for Miami or Boston. Those are the two locations and really wants to end up in Boston. Um, because it would have the best chance to win a title. And I think Boston is not ruling out the idea is, is my Intel. Um, and in general, I'm prepared for anything of Boston now. Um, I think you could basically say I'm prepared. It goes back to the Brad Stevens speech right after the Philly series when he was really mad about the result and really questioning whether this was the right style and whether they needed to be in the paint. More. And I wonder if they're going to use this opportunity with the assets they have with the $27 million trade exception, um, to completely change what this team looks like. So who knows? They might not do anything, but I thought they were sitting out this Giannis thing and I no longer think that that's all I'm going to say. Uh, we're gonna take a break. We're going to come back with cousin Sal and Anthony to bundle and we're gonna talk world cup. You ever sit down ready to watch the game only to search and scroll endlessly? If so, you need Fire TV. It shows your live games from your favorite teams all in one place, right on the home screen. No more searching. Just sit down and turn on Fire TV. Separate subscriptions may be required. Feature and content availability may vary. This episode is brought to you by TikTok. When you watch a football game, you follow the ball, right? Well, there's a video on TikTok where this guy says to watch the players without the ball, watch the routes and the action away from the play. I'll change how you see the game. And guess what? He's not wrong. So that's the thing about discovery on TikTok. One video can change the way you see the game. You can learn something new or see things in a completely different way. Your next discovery is waiting on TikTok. Visit TikTok.com slash discover more. All right, the World Cup is here. Anthony DeBundo is in Los Angeles. Cousin Sal is also in Los Angeles. Somehow they're not together, but they are on the Ringer Gambling Show and we have the World Cup. Wait a minute. What? Wait a minute. You are not there either. Nobody wants to be with DeBundo. I thought it was a three-person Zoom. I'm lonely. I thought it was going to be everybody on Zoom. DeBundo is so upset. He's like, why did they put me on a bus to stay in a hotel and blog three blocks from Skid Row? What am I doing? No one comes to see him. I came to LA. I'm staying downtown and I'm like, okay, they're going to go to Hollywood to go to the Sycamore Studio. I'm like, great. Can't wait to see it. Sal, what time are you coming in? He said, coming in. I'm not doing that. Then I'd have to get lunch with you. No way. We have him in Skid Row working on ballots, sending in for ramen to try to lock down second place. But guys, the World Cup is here. It's six weeks. Sal, you always get really sad after the NBA Finals and then you make some NBA draft bets and then you talk yourself into Wimbledon and then you lose some bets on that. And then July is just a wasteland for you. But now you have World Cup every day, basically. And then my favorite thing about you is you pretend you know what's going on in the World Cup. DeBundo actually knows. Who has a bigger advantage, you or DeBundo? You, bandwagon soccer fan coming in, or DeBundo who's thought about this way too much? Well, I would hope that he has the advantage. I mean, I'm actually excited for him. Because he has never, he's gone on record saying he's never been this excited for an event. He told me in private he hasn't been this excited since the first time a woman touched this piece of deal, which was like six weeks ago. So it's a vivid memory. April 27th, he said he had the date. No, it's good for you, DeBundo. DeBundo, what's your favorite thing about this? Is it America rooting for the host country or the bets? Uh, it's just everything surrounding the world. It's the fact that once the games kick off, we don't have to talk about FIFA. We don't have to talk about ticket prices. We don't have to talk about all the kind of disastrous stuff that's happened in the lead up to this World Cup. We get to talk about the games, the culture. I mean, all the videos that are coming out. You got this German guy who's like doing a tour of the American South. And he's got a huge following, just going to fast food places and sporting events. And people are like, this is so cool. You've got people in Kansas, who are like, we're so happy to root for Algeria because they chose to come stay with us in Lawrence, Kansas, right? So that is the beauty of this tournament, is that at the end of the day, we're all coming together to watch sports. And like, yes, I'll, of course, be rooting for my bets. I'll be adopting other countries, hoping the U.S. doesn't let us down. But there's just so much to get excited about for this. So who do you root for now that Italy is not involved somehow? I know, I know. Italian men are not going to be in this. Yeah, we did lose our home country. I'll root for the U.S., but let's get it off the table. It's not a good bet, the U.S. futures. I'm sorry, because every book, it's like the biggest liability if U.S. wins. Like, this is betting Conor McGregor against Floyd, right? Like, every line should be different. Dibondo, am I wrong about that? Are they adjusted? No, they're not adjusted. We're not going to win the World Cup. And if we did win the World Cup, I said this in Sweden last week to a few of our other soccer fans at The Ringer. I think I might be done with sports if we win the World Cup. Done with soccer. There's no reason. There's nothing that will ever top that in soccer. So why am I even hanging around? I'm done. Well, we don't have to worry about it. It's not happening. Exactly. Well, now I'm rooting for it. I want Dibondo to be done with soccer. This would be great. Let's start with that. All of these bets are unfandled, or all these odds. USA to make the final 16 is minus 130, which seems high to me. Like, really, that's better than even odds that the USA is going to be one of the 16 teams left? Do you buy that one at all? That seems like a bad price. And we just talked about this on The Ringer Gambling Show, actually. I do think that we're at the point now with the U.S. men's national team where maybe everybody's a little too down on them. Oh, are you zagging? This is exciting. I'm making the case. I'm making the case. I love this. They have not really lived up to the hype of this golden generation, and people have had a whole hundred think pieces and theories on why it is that the U.S. hasn't been what we all hoped they would be. But the number one reason is that this group of players, this core group, you can talk about the heart, all these other things, they have not been healthy. Tyler Adams, Christian Pulisic, Weston McKinney, Serginio Dest, all these key players for the Americans have missed a ton of soccer over the last four years to the point where you can basically count on one hand the number of games they have played with a full-strength team in the last four years. And it's still fragile, but the team that they're rolling up with on Friday night against Paraguay is about as healthy as they're going to be. Chris Richards is still in doubt, but it looks like he's going to start. So why not the United States? This is still the most talented group. They have a system that I think works in this back three that Pochettino's adopted. They have a ton of pressing energy, and right now, for at least the first game, they're healthy in a group that's pretty winnable. I'm buying. I'm buying the U.S. Wow. Sal, what are your thoughts? Well, I think that number that you just read, minus 130, it probably should be plus 140. I think people are betting out of their minds here. And let's look at Friday night. Like, USA is minus 110. Are they going to get free money out Friday night? Like, everybody looks at that. Oh, what a convenient number. Minus 110. That's what we all deal with. It's a coin flip game. That's got draw written all over the bundle. You know it does. Yeah, well, we got to go through. I still don't understand the soccer betting. The three odds are minus 110, plus 240, and plus 330. So, plus. So, one of those is the draw, plus 240. We're betting, like, after 90 minutes, it's a tie game, plus 240. Even Sal doesn't want to bet that. And Sal loves nothing more than betting on the things nobody else wants to bet on. Right. You can't even talk yourself into a draw. You're the same person who bets on no buzzer beaters in March Madness, which is the least fun bet an American human being can make. It's the most fun. I don't even think you would bet on the draw. I wouldn't. What I like to do is, with soccer, because, you know, I love waking up and having money on something. So, I'm EPL all year and everything, but I like the double chance, and the bundle laughs at me, but I like to find a dance partner with the double chance, which means the U.S. either draws or wins. That's plus half a goal at minus 475, and then I parlay it with six other things that lose. So, that's what I would do. It's not necessarily taking the draw, but it's covering yourself a little bit. One of my favorite parts of working with Sal in the last year, is that it'll be like a random Tuesday afternoon, and I'll be just at my desk or something, and I'll get a text from Sal, Real Madrid plus a half with like a money bag sign next to it. And like they scored like a last second goal to tie at like 3.30 in the afternoon, and he's just locked in on Real Madrid versus Osasuna. Four more legs to that. I have like three more UFC guys to win before I cash that parlay. But yeah, that's how it goes. Well, the bigger gambling story with you guys is the French Open. And I think bankrupted both of you. Oh, terrible. How do you declare for bankruptcy, Bundo? Is it like, do you have to go through Spotify? Is it like an individual thing? How does it work? You tell me, Bill. I don't know. I have to, I got a text from Danny Heifetz like three minutes after Sinner lost. He goes, are you still liquid? I hadn't heard from Heifetz in like a month and a half. He's been ducking my calls. He's been busy. You know, I think he got married or something. Yeah, he's on his honeymoon now. It's the summer of Heifetz, but he still managed to get in a text to me that said, hey, you still liquid after Sinner just died in the heat? Barely. We are still liquid. Well, so you know more about tennis than literally any human being I know, right? How did we not factor in the French Open gets super hot and this means anybody could die in the heat and who were the top five people most likely to die in the heat? Where was that conversation? Because Sal, I know I didn't have it with the Bundo. Did he have it with anyone? No, we talked about it. We just chose to ignore it. This is what he does. He has all this knowledge and he knows the players and he waits for you to talk about a matchup and then he loves to correct you on the pronunciations of, oh, it's Svea Tech. It's not Svea Tech. There's an N in there somewhere. It's like screw you. You told me Sinner at minus 275 was undervalued and I didn't know it freaking cramped up like my wife the third week of, you know, whatever. I don't want to get into it, but for God's sake, you're betting against cramps in these French Open. Yeah, hot, warm weather tournament. Well, it really sounds like global warming is now changing the French Open that we once knew and that anybody could just, it could be 98 degrees and somebody could just die. I've never seen the highlights of that Sinner match were unbelievable. And I don't know why you don't just retire when it gets to that point. You're basically just like a boxer wobbling around, falling into the ropes and all that stuff. All right, we digress. I mean, he's not the only one too. There was a bunch of players. I mean, one player, Menchik collapsed on the court. He had to be wheelchaired off and then he won his next match and then won another match into that. So, you know, Kasper Ruud had a heat stroke, went into the locker room, came back, and then won the match. So I don't know. It's crazy. But global warming is the biggest threat to Yannick Sinner's tennis dynasty. No question. All right. USA Paraguay, Friday night. SoFi Stadium. Los Angeles, California. And basically they're saying USA is dead even to win. It feels like this is the sucker bet of a lifetime just to grab USA to win. What is the case for not making this bet to Bunda other than it's a sucker bet? Paraguay is really good defensively. That's their calling card. They only give up 10 goals in South America during qualifying. They're a very defensively organized team with a ton of pressing defensive energy. So traditionally the U.S. has kind of struggled against these kind of teams, especially the South American ones, because what the U.S. lacks is that deep-lying passer, that player who can make that special pass that unlocks a defense that's very tightly congested. But I will say, and this is why I like the back three, they are freeing up Anthony Robinson and Serginio Dest, who are traditionally fullbacks at the club level. They're playing more like as wingers, almost, essentially, in this system. And I think Dest could be one of the keys to unlocking some of these more defensive teams because he's so effective at getting in space on the right and then playing crosses in. He has a really good connection with Pulisic. They connected at the last World Cup. They connected for the opening goal against Senegal and the friendly there. So I think Dest is kind of one of the underrated X factors for them trying to break down a team that's going to make it as difficult as possible to score. Sal, I'm going to just end up betting us because I'm going to the game and I want to root for it. I have to ask, though, your son, Jack, Hall of Fame Zagger, loves swimming against the stream more than anybody. It feels like him not rooting for USA has to be in play right now, right? What country has he picked that's not America? He likes Cameroon. Of course, yeah. I feel that's old news. I feel like that's a 90s World Cup team that you would like. So he's in. Cameron, did he get the jersey? Yeah. He likes Cameroon. Yes, there's something. There's the Amazon guys banging on our door right now. I'm sure there's some kind of Cameroon-ish item coming here. Sal, is he aware that they're not in the World Cup? No, I don't think he knows. Don't tell him. Don't tell him. He'll just be searching for the games. Their first game is in four years. I'm on pins and needles waiting to see who he picks on the fly on Friday when he realizes they're not actually in. I'm going Sean O'Malley. Sean O'Malley. Sean O'Malley. UFC parlayed with USA plus a half a goal. And that gets it to like minus 170 or something stupid. Sean O'Malley with USA plus half a goal. Yeah. So USA has to score a goal? We could add something there. No, they just have to. No, they just need to not lose. Need to not. All right, got you. So they're basically minus or plus 0.5 goals. Yep, that's it. Sal, I know you've studied this probably way longer than you should have. But there's two different ways to look at who's going to win the World Cup. One is who do you think is going to win? And the second is what's the best value to bet on? You and I always tend to gravitate toward value over the actual logical here's who we think is going to win. So what is your value pick for the World Cup? My value pick, believe it or not, is Europe to win at minus 350. Europe, the continent. The whole continent. Yes. Don't laugh at these winners. This is a winner. You don't think, right? I mean, we might get an all-European final four. You think we could get an all-European final four, right? Like Portugal, England, France, Spain. It should be one through four there. And the bundo is taking Spain after all this, after all the money Spotify's had to send him out here. He's just taking the favorite after all this. But you could expand. It does feel like the coward's way out. I know. I hate it. Also, their best player is not playing in the tournament and has a hamstring injury grade two that he's coming back from. So we'll see what it looks like with Yamal when he gets into the tournament. But ultimately, by process elimination, I crossed off everybody else and was like, I guess I'm picking Spain. So who do I get with Europe at minus 350? Because the favorites right now, the top eight are Spain, France, England, Portugal, Brazil, Argentina, Germany, Netherlands, and then Belgium and Norway after that. And we all know England's not winning the World Cup. So you have Europe, but also knowing that they're, well, it is England. This is, yeah, this is, although maybe if the Knicks win the finals, maybe, maybe now England is on the table. Maybe anything's possible. But do you like that minus 350 to Bundo or no? You seem like you're scoffing at it. No, no, I do agree. I think the three best teams, and I think they're a small tier above the rest, are Spain, France, and England. England, I think, is the best defense in the field. France is the most talented team in terms of just naming guys. But, you know, they're a squad that have kind of underperformed their talent in terms of the eye test the last week. They've had the best few tournaments, especially at the Euros two years ago when France looked pretty undercooked. They struggled to create chances at that, and they had a lot of the same players they do now. And then last year at the Nations League, and this is why I picked Spain over France. Spain and France have played each of the last two summers in the semifinals. At the Euros, they beat them 2-1, and France really couldn't generate much in the whole second half. Spain just kept the ball and really dominated the second half of that game. And then last year in the Nations League, Spain won 5-4, but it was 5-1. It was a total demolition until France scored a bunch of consolation goals in the last 5 minutes, 10 minutes. So, Spain has kind of been dominating France the last couple of summers. I don't think that much has changed. Same managers, same midfields, similar attacks. L'Amin-Yamal is kind of the one big X-factor. If they play again in the semifinals, I don't know how you wouldn't favor Spain over France. So, the biggest threat to minus 350 Europe is what? Argentina repeating? And the budget you also, aren't you shorting them in the group stages? Brazil and Argentina or just Brazil? I'm shorting Brazil, yeah. I think Morocco's somewhat live there, yeah. Europe's good. Let's get on that. Let's get some nice NFL money bundled together there, Simmons. We can get it. Can we parlay that with the Chiefs to win the AFC West? Oh no, that bet's dead. What is our easy NFL bet that we could just throw in every year and feel great about it? We had the Pats to win the AFC East for the first 15 years I knew you, basically. Yeah. And then it became the Chiefs for the AFC West is, do we have that team now? I don't feel like we do. It's kind of sad. Cardinals to come in fourth place? I don't know what we would do. Let me throw something your way, Bill. Well, I liked, I heard on Gambling Show you talked about the Browns under five and a half wins. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Are you locked that down now post Miles Garrett? I thought that was, like, they're going to play Sanders all year. Like, I, it's not like their schedule is super easy. Right. Five and 12 are worse. Feels like the best over-under I've heard for wins so far. We don't even have to hit it. Feels like there's more NFL tanking teams than usual heading into the season. Yeah. Jets, Cardinals, Dolphins, Browns. It's more than you know. Well, because it's all the quarterbacks. So this is, this is, we, this was the thing and we all did bad with basketball over-unders, the totality of them for the win totals. And the thing we didn't realize was with as many teams tanking as we're tanking, it actually weirdly shoved the records upwards. Because over and over again, you had two shitty teams that didn't want to win playing each other. So you had all these teams in the 20s and high 20s. Dibundo, a team that's never won the World Cup will win the World Cup is plus 200. Wow. Terrible bet. Seems terrible because these are the countries. If you're looking, yeah. Well, it's Netherlands, Portugal, Belgium, Croatia, Hungary, basically. USA. And USA. But USA is not winning. Come on. So first-time winner, no, is minus 260. I was about to say that if you're looking for like a bridge jumper bet, a huge, like, we're just going to lay a huge number. That is my favorite one. There will be a team that wins the World Cup. I think so, yes. Could we parlay Europe will win the World Cup with that won't be a first-time winner? I don't know if that, is that legal in Fandle? Probably not. Probably a little too correlated, yeah. Yeah, I like the no first-time winner at minus 260. I like the odds more than the minus 350 for the Europe one. I'm doing both. There's seven teams that I think are in the quote-unquote favorites tier. And you could break them up. You could say contender, pretender with all those seven. But six of those seven have won it. And the one team that has never won it is Portugal. And we're going to get into futures, I guess, a little bit later. But the Ronaldo problem is kind of the defining situation for Portugal right now. And how they solve that is not very obvious to me. The problem is that they probably should be playing him as much as everyone expects them to play him. And I feel like we were there four years ago with this. Yeah. Right? We were. And two years ago and last year. And we're still doing it. Yeah, so this is like LeBron, if LeBron's on the dream team at age 45, it's like, well, it is LeBron. And you just kind of have to throw him out there. But I think LeBron would be more willing to take like a third or fourth chair role and be like a really good passer, IQ player. Ronaldo, like they have built this environment with the entire attack around him. Portugal, most crosses of any international team the last two years. Their midfield is elite. They have probably the second best midfield of the tournament. Fernandes, Vitinha, Neves, like it's an amazing trio that can do a lot of different things. Fernandes just broke the record for assists in the Premier League. And yet they end up just playing all the crosses into Ronaldo. They have nobody who runs in behind. It's like this is not optimal. And as a result of Ronaldo and Rafael Leal, their left winger, not really doing a lot of defensive work, their defense isn't that good. like they struggle defensively relative to the, to the, you know, top elite teams. They're not as good defensively. So they have a manager who likes to attack. They have a manager who's relying on Ronaldo and like, they just need to tell grandpa, like they got to take the keys from him and say, you know, Hey, you're allowed to go to the grocery store, but no more, no more highway driving, no more starting matches. But the problem is it's Ronaldo. So how do you say it? Like, what do you say? We're having the exact same problem right now with Chris Ryan. Like he's on too many pods. People are saying, you got to phase it back. He's at a different point of his career. No, I'm kidding. This reminds me of, of, of when you coached the, um, the celebrity basketball game. And, uh, then you try to take Snoop out and, uh, he's like, no, I'm not coming out. Was it Snoop? Who was it? Snoop put himself back in. He just looked me in the eye and said, I'm going to go back in. There was like five minutes left. I was like, okay, Snoop. It just, we kind of had a moment. No, Kevin Hart was the one I had to get. I just couldn't take him out because he was the biggest star. In the game. And, uh, and Michael B. Jordan, who was the best part in the game. And it's just like, oh, we, we could win if we just give Michael B. Jordan the ball, but Kevin Hart's doing ISO. I'm still mad about it. You go back four years ago. Right. And this was the crazy thing that happened at the world cup. Portugal started Ronaldo in the group stage. They played Switzerland in the round of 16 and they played this young up and coming striker named Gonzalo Ramos. Who's now at PSG and Gonzalo Ramos scored a hat trick and they beat Switzerland six to one. And everybody was like, that's it. They're moving on. Like, he's been, he's been usurped the next match. They play Morocco. They lose one nil and everybody's like, well, you know, they wouldn't happen if they had started Ronaldo. And then they went through the next qualifying cycle and Ronaldo scored a bunch of goals against a lot of bad teams. He's still very capable. If he just stands in the penalty area and creates space, he's got great instincts, the vet, the vet classic move, but they get back to the international tournament Euro 2024. And it almost got comical at the end. Like it was kind of sad because he kept taking all the free kicks. He was trying to get the ball. He was trying to get his goal. Then they want a penalty kick against Slovenia. He missed the penalty and he's crying on the field. And you're like, this is actually getting to the point where it's like a little uncomfortable. If you're trying to like do a hate watch, it's like, man, this is, I don't like Portugal. I bet against them. But like, this is, this is kind of awkward now. And here we are again, he shows up to the world cup. I hope he gets a goal early on. They've got a, they've got a couple of easy games to start the group. I think there'll be fine in the group stage, but you get to the knockouts and I think they're vulnerable. Isn't it only eight teams ever have won the world cup or eight countries? Yes. Eight countries, right? Italy, Uruguay, and then the big six favorites, right? And Italy is no longer out. Okay. Before we get to the bundles, favorite futures that Sal and I are going to critique. Sal, are you a straight up or a parlay strategy guy for the world cup? Because I think both you and I fall into trouble when we start grabbing things from different games and we talk ourselves into it, but it would seem like almost with world cup straight up would be the smarter way to play. And yet neither of us are going to do that. Of course not. In fact, I got a whopper to throw at you guys. Let's hear it. Before we get to the bundle, the bundle. I need a legal pad. Which one's the draw? You know, illegal pad. Cause I don't know if this is going to work, but which one's the, which one's the draw? Which one screws me? Germany to beat Curacao on Sunday, Spain to beat Cape Verde on Monday, Norway to beat Iraq on the 16th, Brazil to beat Haiti on the 19th, France to beat Iraq on the 22nd. Pays 150. A five teamer? Five teamer. These are monster numbers. As you can imagine, it adds up to minus 150. Who screws us? Uh, I mean, I think Iraq is one of the three worst teams. I think Curacao is one of the three worst teams. Cape Verde is decent and they're not good, but they're, they could compete with Spain, especially without Yamal. And like Spain is liable to have one of those. You're picking Spain to win the whole thing and they can't get by Cape Verde? On Monday? Are you kidding me? Yes. I mean, I don't, I think it's going to be a winner. I think that one of the storylines, if you're being critical of the expanded format is to say that traditionally the world cup has not had a lot of blowouts in the, in the group stage. There's just not that many bad, bad teams. The gap here is pretty big. I mean, Spain, three goal favorite in their first game, Germany, three and a half goals. Like there could be some real five, six nil pastings. Whereas at the last world cup, uh, we only had like one or two in the whole tournament that were like that. This tournament with Haiti, Curaçao expanded Qatar, you know, it's like, there's some teams here that, that really aren't on the level. So you could see some crazy blowouts more than you're used to seeing with those multi multi-game parlays. Do we worry about the heat at all with that French open style? Cause there's going to be some games that are super hot and yes, in temperatures that aren't are pretty unusual for world-class soccer. And I'm wondering, could that swing one of these? One of the funniest photos slash videos from the club world cup last year. Cause right. A lot of players played in their club teams played in, in the U S last summer, including Byron, the players would actually sit in the locker room in the dressing room during the first half, the subs just so they wouldn't sit on the bench and overheat. It's like Byron was like, we're going to keep our subs in the dressing room, in the air conditioning, watching on a TV screen for the first half. And then we'll bring them out for the second half. They'll be fresh. They won't be exhausted. I do wonder if we see that because the studies have shown that any, any soccer game that kicks off above 85 degrees, there is a noticeable decline in just output, pressing shots, goals. The game just slows because the players don't have the stamina to play like that. Uh, it still favors the better teams though. Cause they just have more good players. They can bring on, you get five subs. That's a big advantage. So, uh, I think ultimately like, you know, the, the small minnow nations that don't have the subs are going to be the ones that hurt the most from the heat. Who has the most gingers, I guess, is what we're looking at. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Sunburn. I mean, we didn't have those Scottish, Scottish maybe. Right. Short Scott, Norwegians. We didn't have those studies when my daughter is playing youth soccer and Norco at 103 degrees and we're doing two games in three hours and kids are collapsing in the field. We're like, pull them off, get a sub in this episode is brought to you by Carhartt. We spend a lot of time talking about football, the players, the coaches, the big plays, but there's a whole other team. We rarely think about the people who make the game possible. The workers building stadiums, paving parking lots, growing the grass, welding the goalposts, even making the footballs. They're committed to their craft and they're doing the work long before kickoff. Carhartt is proud to outfit those crews. So next time you're watching a game, take a second to appreciate the people behind it. Learn more at carhartt.com/join-the-trades. This episode is brought to you by Michelob ultra, whether you're racing to build the biggest sandcastle, seeing who can throw the fastest pitch or competing in a championship match. It's always better when there's a prize on the line, like a Michelob ultra smooth, refreshing, satisfying. After all that hard work, superior is worth playing for Michelob ultra superior light beer enter for a chance to win superior soccer, basketball, golf [email protected]/superior access. Enjoy responsibly copyright 2026 Anheuser-Busch Michelob ultra light beer, St. Louis, Missouri. Um, wait, before we go to your futures to bundle Serena Williams and Wimbledon, there's no way to. There's no, it's not on FanDuel. Is she playing singles? I don't know. Are you following this? Is it, is it, could it be doubles? Could it be singles? Like it feels like we're drifting towards something. And I feel like this story should be a hundred times bigger than it is. I mean, she played doubles yesterday, uh, Tuesday with Victoria and Boko. Who's one of the top young up and coming players. She's Canadian. Uh, and they won comfortably in the first round. They played two players. I'd never heard of, uh, the crowd though at the Queens club in London was amazing. Just every seat filled. Uh, it has a chance to, to be a huge story, but they haven't come out with wild cards yet. I, I, I can't imagine that she's playing singles already. Can I give you my theory doubles? Does she get on center court? Why not? Doubles for Wimbledon paving the way for us open, you know, singles, singles. Yeah. Like this is, I've always thought this I've been predicting this for years. She's too, she's too great. And she's too competitive. And now that her kids are a little bit older, I always stopped. Maybe I, this, if she's at the us open, that would be the fucking greatest thing that could happen for tennis. They would be like tiger in 2019 at the masters. Like, can you imagine the crowds for that? Can you imagine playing Serena at the us open being the other person? Like what a fucking nightmare. Well, you know, Venus did this. Venus is not Serena, but Venus did this last summer where she got a wild card in DC and she beat. Uh, Peyton Stearns. And I think it wasn't the first round, like a top 30 player and DC was mobs for Venus Williams. Then she went to the us open. They put her on the center court the first night against Carolina Mohova, who is a top 15 player. She won a, she won a set offer. And I was sitting on the other court on Armstrong and like, you could just feel it. Everybody kept looking over their shoulders because the roars coming from Arthur Ash were so loud that it was almost like distracting the players on Armstrong. And we're all sitting there like, damn, like, why aren't we at that match? Why are we at this match? And she's like, I'm too big. Summer predictions, Serena, US, Serena, US open LeBron and the warriors. I want to parlay that really those two together. I'm convinced both of those things are happening. Can we add something that, um, Fandle just threw on the menu there that Bill's voice doesn't last six and a half NBA games. You've adopted doc rivers, his voice. What happened now? I just need to retire. It's just too much talking this year. Dude, two hour rewatchables live episodes. I'm just dying. I love it. Bill, Bill really needed next. He needed Nixon for, because his voice wasn't going to make Nixon. Doc Simmons. Got him, man. All right, Dabundo, it's time. You want to do your three favorites, your four favorites, or your five favorites? You want to set the over-under on number of futures I have so far. Oh, it's easily 50, right? It's under that. It's about 17. 33. Oh, 17. You got to do some work there. Yeah. All right. So give us. Fandles, they're not done putting stuff up. Give us your best five, and then Sal and I will critique them as we go. And you can go in descending order from five to one if you want. Okay. We're going to start with number one, which is my dark horse, a team that I have been a fan of. I'm an honorary member. I might have to take a trip to Quito to get excited for this World Cup. Maybe if they make a deep run, I'll go do some tourism with the winnings. But we're going to be on Ecuador. This is going to be an Ecuador group. They are a popular underdog pick, but I like to think I was at least somewhat early to the show because we bet them at the Copa two years ago. I think this is a top five or six defense in the whole world. They are captained and led by a trio of defenders in Kapie from Arsenal, Pacho from PSG, and then Moises Caicedo, their defensive central midfielder, who is probably the best ball winner, just pure ball winner in the world at Chelsea right now. So we know that they have an elite defensive spine. The big question is, can they score enough goals? They're led by 36-year-old Ena Valencia. They have a young kid, Kendri Paez, who Chelsea bought, and then loaned out back to South America. This Ecuadorian team is the textbook definition of the quote-unquote team nobody will want to play in the knockouts. And I think as a result, they're in a tough group. They get Germany, they get Ivory Coast. It's going to be a tough group for them. But when they get in the knockouts and they're playing a team who's maybe comparable to them or even better than them, they're very capable of making that match a total stalemate nightmare. And you can go back even two years ago, they played Argentina. They played Argentina at the Copa America in the quarterfinals. And they went toe-to-toe with them, lost in the penalties, but were right there and had chances to win that match. Like this Ecuadorian side is not afraid of anybody. They're physical. They're ready for the heat. They have enough depth to withstand some of the potential, you know, gruelingness of this tournament. So here are the three bets that I think are worth placing a little money on. Ecuador to win their group, plus 380. Ecuador to make the round of 16, plus 150. And if you want to get really crazy, plus 550 to make the quarters. I have them in the group. I have them in the quarterfinals in my bracket. I think they can make a run. Well, you also have South for the semis, 12 to 1. Finals, 3 to 1. And to win it all, 100 to 1. Yeah, they're not winning it all. This is going to be the team that knocks out one of my European teams, right? That I need to advance to the finals so I don't have a heart attack. Yeah. There's been action on the quarters. It's down to plus 460 to bundle. Wow. See, people are, obviously people are tuning in to the starting 11 on YouTube, seeing my videos. My video where I'm hyping up Ecuador at every possible time. That could be it. There could be some movement. So, 12 to 1 for final four is too rich for your blood? I mean, if you want to get really crazy, it wouldn't surprise me, right? Morocco did this, and it's not that dissimilar from what Morocco did. Like, we have a very defined way of playing. We're a very good defensive team. And we have two or three guys who can go on a run and create some chances on the break. And that's kind of what this Ecuador team wants to be. They only gave up five goals in 18 qualifying matches. And they're playing. Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Uruguay. Like, they played all the good teams. And they really, you know, shut them down. They came in second behind Argentina. So, I think it's a fun team. Again, like, they might have to grind their way through the group stage because they're not going to score a ton of goals. But once they get in that knockout, which I think they will, they're going to be a tough out. So, for the group, Ecuador is in the group with Germany. Yes. So, you could do an exact order where you do Ecuador 1, Germany 2, and then you could go either way with the other two and do both bets and try to put some major action on that. I like the group bets, Sal. I know, but how many third-place teams make it to Bundo? Eight out of 12. That's a lot. A lot. And the thing is, with Curacao being in that group, it's kind of like the cannon fodder. If you just get three points, you're almost certainly advancing unless your goal difference is truly terrible. Equity, Germany. Ecuador, Germany. Ivory Coast. That being the top three would be plus 500. That's pretty good. People like the Ivorians, too. They have Yandy Amande, who's one of the most exciting. Yeah, Ivorians. See, this is why Bundo, this is why he's elite. Wow. We wouldn't have known to call them the Ivorians. We would have called them the Ivory Coasters. Yeah. Their nickname is Les Elephants. And the city of Philadelphia is getting behind them. They're in Philly. We're very excited to root on the Ivorians, too. This is too much. What's the other thing with Ecuador? Like, used to hot weather. Yes. Okay. All right, what's your next one? Play right on the equator. Used to elevation if they end up in Mexico. Yeah, it's true. It actually means equator, doesn't it? Yeah. Ecuador, equator. Wow, unbelievable. What's your next one to Bundo? Next one, we're going to go with the most reliable thing in my life, which is Switzerland to do well, make the knockouts of an international tournament, and then lose very quickly once they get there. Switzerland, to win Group B over the Canadians, minus 120. It was the last I checked at Vandal. So you're not scared at all, Canadians, any home field advantage with that? Canada, they're the chaos maxers of international soccer. Their manager, Jesse Marsh, who is an American, who has certainly made his feelings known. He's a little bit hurt that he didn't get offered the American job when it came open once they fired Berhalter. He is known for the intense press, chaotic energy. But the problem is Alphonso Davies is their best player by a wide margin. He's the best player in North America and he is not healthy. He's coming back from an injury. He might be back at the end of the group stage, but I don't know that he will and he won't be healthy if he does come back. So that's a problem. Bombito, their starting center back, just got hurt in their last friendly. One of their other midfielders goes down. So all of a sudden, it's not a very deep team. It's a lot of like a couple of stars and some okay MLS guys. Now, they're really short-handed. And I think Canada, like if they try to press and run Switzerland off the pitch, Switzerland is very, very capable and experienced in their midfield. Like they have so many good passers. I kind of think the Swiss just beat them even though they're in Canada. Like Canada will still advance. Sal likes this. Sal likes going against Canada. It's exciting. Never mind it. Never ever mind it. Yeah, Sal definitely perked up. I like John Candy, Michael J. Fox. Otherwise, they could go to hell. And they'll still probably come in second. Again, this group is not tough. Cutter is, by my money, the worst team in the field. But, like, you know, I don't see the upside them beating Switzerland. Switzerland's a class above them. All right. Your third pick. My third pick, we're going to go back to our old friend Ronaldo in Portugal. I think Colombia is another team that I'm loving to back in these international settings. They have their own Luis Suarez. They have Luis Diaz. James Rodriguez, who is kind of like bookending his career. 2014, he was the golden boot winner at the World Cup. He put his name on the map. People, casual soccer fans still know James Rodriguez just because of what he did at that World Cup. His club career never quite worked out to the heights that maybe people thought it would with all of his injuries. But then he comes back and when he puts on the Colombia shirt, 2024, he was the best player at the Copa America. He's so good on set pieces, free kicks. That kind of player, love if the U.S. had one, is the difference maker at these kind of events. Colombia is plus 200 to win that group. The most exciting game of the group stage. Bar none. Portugal against Colombia in Miami to end the group stage. That is going to be an incredible scene. It'll be two-thirds Colombians, one-thirds Ronaldo heads. It's going to be an amazing matchup. But I think Colombia is very live against Portugal to potentially upset them. And then if Portugal comes in second, all of a sudden the bracket gets very imbalanced. Portugal goes up into the section with France and Germany and everybody is like, oh, okay, what's going to happen here? It's a pretty good one. Sal, does it bother you that America isn't better at set pieces? It feels like the one thing we could really control, right? Why? We could groom a guy to just have the best corner kicks of anyone in the world. This is all, like, just a, I always feel this way with Pulisic. Like, I know he has to take it because he's like the guy on the team. I've never really enjoyed his corner kicks or his free kicks. I think he's, I don't know. I mean, the corner kicks, I mean, don't we just need a giant in the middle? Like, that's, I don't want to interrupt, but I have Holland for golden boot. Like, that guy's seven and a half feet. You know, he's everyone's favorite Game of Thrones stand-in until the lookalike, but that's what I would do. That's, I have a 14 to one. Also, I didn't realize we were doing golden boot odds. I don't even know where to find those. You've seen, you've seen him before, Simmons. By the way, Simmons, he is in the top 100 most influential people in sports, along with you. Congratulations on that. Congratulations, yeah. Is there a dinner? Is there a group photo at Ted Sarandos' house? What happens? Yeah, I don't know. Maybe a group photo at Ted's house. We'll see. The one of those top 100 least influential people in sports. I don't know if you saw that list, but. No, he's gaining influence. Rapidly falling down the rankings once Ecuador loses every game at the World Cup. Yeah. He's ripping off winners for us right now. Okay. All right. Give us, do speed round. I will say this, though. So, the U.S. does have a set-piece specialist. The problem is, he's bad at everything else. He's eight years old. Yeah. Sebastian Berhalter, the son of former manager Greg Berhalter, He is on the roster. He is incredible. Just this? I mean the manager does like him Pochettino has spoken highly of him he said that he's the one guy on the team he doesn't have to rotate because he just has endless energy and all this stuff and look Berhalter is a very controversial figure both Berhalters are very controversial figures but Sebastian's free kicks and corners are amazing I mean if you go watch the Gold Cup last summer he had two assists on free kicks to Chris Richards so they can actually let him do it in the World Cup but you have to play it's not like you can't just sub him in for the free kicks and then take him out again he's like a very mediocre midfielder otherwise so we might see him late like if they're down late you know and they're rotating through their guys he's going to play he's one of their main midfielders off the bench but their set pieces will get noticeably better when Berhalter takes them as opposed to Pulisic who has been always kind of eh with the free kicks it always seems like he should be good at it and he's just not alright you gave us three give us three speed round quick with no extra explanation and Sal and I will decide what we want to hear out of the three which one do we like three quick ones so we'll go Morocco Morocco to win their group so they're about plus 450 they're in the group with Brazil, Scotland, and Haiti no you're too much info what's the next one too much info too much info Morocco plus 450 to win the group yeah Jordan Pickford to win Golden Gloves at plus 750 wow how do you win Golden Gloves what happens best save percentage it's the best goalkeeper so it's just like best goalie in hockey yes like the what is it the Vezina the Vezina yeah basically for the tournament now England is a boring watch nope go to the next one we'll circle back if we're interested in that what's the next one okay Pedri to win Golden Golden Ball not Golden Boot Golden Ball so that's the player of the tournament 25 to 1 alright Spanish midfielder so Golden Ball is best part of the tournament so none of them caught your interest no Golden Boot Golden Boot is most goals most goals yes are there any other Goldens it's just Golden Boot Golden Ball three Goldens three Goldens is Golden Girls for the cutaway to the chick who's bouncing I don't know I don't know what they do so you can do a Golden Parlay the fan cutaways are always special yeah Golden Parlay would be nice yeah that'd be good alright give us one more and then Sal's gonna decide what he wants more info on let's see let's go further down I don't wanna get too crazy with like Scotland and something stuff like that how about Christian Pulisic to lead the US in goals plus 320 now you have my attention he's the favorite though right yeah he's the co-favorite with Balogun yeah so who who screws that up if you bet on Pulisic probably Balogun okay the starting striker who you know I'm excited to watch I do think his connection with Pulisic was a little bit off in the in the friendly against Germany like you know one of the most encouraging things I think for the United States was that friendly the first hour against Germany how much they were able to break through the press and get transition opportunities and Pulisic and Balogun just didn't quite have the link but they were close and like I think that's maybe one other X factor for the US if they're able to do a better job linking up creating chances this team could be actually really dynamic going forward all right Sal your favorite of those four well I'm torn between two I like Morocco because like Morocco and and Snuka and Morocco and Pedro Morales were some of my favorite feuds and you know Morocco would take that strap he would spit on the belt but he loved it I like Pickford though for a golden glove at plus 750 it might not even be his doing right the bundle like their defense is so solid they're going to be in one nothing battles all the way through and also just an English guy with the glove they drink tea they put the white gloves and they slap each other it just makes the most sense plus 750 okay and the other thing is like if they somehow do win a penalty shootout like the England narrative is oh they never win the shootouts right what if they did win one or two and all of a sudden Pickford is the hero right so that's the guy what do you like Simmons oh I got one more Japan Japan to win group oh stop stop it's supposed to be a half hour you're killing my favorite is Browns under four and a half wins plus plus 155 on Fando right now four and a half they're winning five games the Browns of course disgusting plus four and a half plus I'm ready for where's the plus three and a half I love that under three and a half under three and a half I love it but they don't have it yet they only the lowest they are right now is four and a half but I'm I'm three and a half I'd be ready to activate all right so Deshaun Watson's minus 196 to be the starting quarterback is that worse than Shador or or Dylan Gabriel like they're a mess and we know they don't want to win yeah they want to have the number one pick in the draft so they can take the quarterback okay you know what I love Simmons real quick they Jared verse you know they get traded for Garrett he comes on he's on the Browns roster and they're like oh well Dylan Gabriel has the number eight the Jared verse right and Dylan Gabriel's like they're like oh did he pay he's like I don't know man I was expecting to get money for it but he kind of just took it I saw that and didn't he brag like oh yeah I'm going to be taking number eight and then just grabbed it yeah that's it this is mine now he got number logged it's tough to be a short quarterback you even might get your jersey taken away yeah okay well this was good I think this was good prep for us do you have a do you have a favorite NFL bet Sal yet is it the Browns under really like you know Jacoby Brissett showing up to Cards training camp really throws a monkey wrench in that NFC West I'm just excited the Browns under for now that's the only thing I gave out on the podcast but we're 93 days away Simmons Dwight Freeney John Randall your boy Richard Seymour a little later this year the September 9th feels a whiff late for us is it it just feels can they move that up you're one of the top hundred most influential can't they move that up a little I'll talk to some of the other guys in the committee yeah please but yeah it's on Wednesday this year right yeah we're starting it's starting later and then it's just football games all the time from that point on we go Wednesday Thursday no Friday then Sunday and then Monday right just for the and so there's like fantasy football implications and ugh yeah everybody does their drafts the night before the season can't even do it this year I know we got 12 more Sundays bad for procrastinators the NFL is hurting procrastinators what would you put for A.J. Brown over and under touchdowns this season to bundle ooh would you go double figures that would be high but I I think eight and a half yeah oh I think that's every other every other game Sal I did have an idea for us for this they have this yards at 1100 A.J. Brown go ahead what are they I just think we go under on everybody it's the one year we just do 50 unders yeah cause you think like the quarterbacks five get hurt just like the top 50 I just think nobody likes to bet unders for future props oh you're talking about yards yeah for everything for yeah for quarterback yards for touchdowns like listen over and over again this hits and we just stare at it I did this for years you guys have been doing this for 20 years right they adjusted a little bit with the VIG like the under number will be like minus 130 but and you don't like to brag about it cause it does rely on guys getting hurt but if you do it with all 30 let's say 30 running backs are listed 8 of them are gonna be gone by like Halloween and then you like you just have to go even like we all spend 50 bucks on a running back right and how many of us are happy in November like 2 of them stay healthy 10 of them get hurt or whatever they have some sort of small injury or I don't know I just feel like it's roulette one of these years it's like you're just hoping to dodge the bullets all season yeah but I would say this is year 19 of guest of the month guest of the lines right no this is gonna be our 20th year this is 20 this is it for the anniversary you guys just do we're going full hater this year only hate just a full zag I like that yeah what we learned we're just bitter and beaten down that'll be after Wimbledon in the US Open when we finally get broken by that Ecuador screws us thanks to the bundo alright Sal did I tell you about Sinner I don't know tell us he should be he should be a bigger favorite for Wimbledon than he was for the French son of a bitch planting my flag trying to get it back I like it alright you can hear these two on the Ringer Gambling Show all the time basically and we have a lot of good World Cup stuff coming and then Sal where within three months we'll be doing our our annual double over-unders pod sometime in the end of August but yeah great to see you guys thanks fellas good to see you good job by you good job by you alright that's it for the podcast thanks to you Goldsberry and House thanks to the bundo and Sal as well thanks to Gahal and Eduardo I am going to be back Saturday night after game five of Nick Spurs in the meantime don't forget we put up a new rewatchables we did single wife female super fun me and Van and Mallory and the next one's going to be hand that rocks the cradle if you want to watch that on Netflix check out all our podcasts and I'll see you on Saturday night must be 21 plus and president selects dates for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas star casino or 18 plus and president DC Kentucky or Wyoming opt-in required must wager and designated offer market max wager $25 restrictions apply see full terms at sportsbook.fando.com game problem call 1-800-GAMBLE or 1-800-MY-RESET call 888-79-7777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut or mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland hope is here visit gamblinghelplinema.org or call 1-800-GAMBLE Call 800-327-5050 for 24 seven support messages. or call 877-8-HOPE-NY or text HOPE-NY in New York for Louisiana. 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