2-4-24 After Hours with Amy Lawrence Podcast : Hour 2

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A Peanut Butter M&M's Production. In a world where Super Bowl winners get the world's admiration and a fancy ring, but the runners-up get nothing, one retired cop returns. That's one retired quarterback. Read the script.

Oh, sorry. One retired quarterback returns to claim what's his. Um, that's claim a ring with diamonds made from M&M's peanut butter, but you're on a roll.

The Ring of Comfort. Coming soon to a Super Bowl new you. My kind of way to get to Vegas would be the highway to the danger zone, but instead I'm flying commercial.

It's alright. It's a direct flight. I'll be there before lunchtime. Have early check-in at the hotel so I can drop my stuff and then get over to Radio Row, which thankfully is just a walk from our hotel. So really looking forward to what's to come Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and then on into the weekend, though I will not be attending the game.

People keep asking me that. My personal life as well as professional life. Are you attending the game? It's actually a lot of extra, I don't want to say trouble, it's a lot of extra work to be there another day and then into Monday because we would have to do our show from Las Vegas on Sunday night. So it's extra money. It's a lot of extra packing.

It's extra dog care. And so for all of those reasons and because I just prefer to do the Super Bowl postgame show from home and from, well, home meaning back in the home studio, decided, well, and the travel. I did the game once. Did the game in Houston going back to 2016 when it was Falcons and Patriots and got one hell of a game, one incredible atmosphere, spent the weekend with my mom so I didn't have to worry about paying for anything over the weekend. But the craziness was that I went straight from the game to the radio studio. So I got to the stadium, actually I got to the stadium shuttle at two o'clock in the afternoon. By the time we got to the stadium it was two hours later.

That's how long it took to not just get through traffic but get through security, five levels of security for media people at Super Bowl. By the time you get into the stadium, you're talking two, two and a half hours later, which was fine. I still was in the stadium energy in plenty of time to be able to see what was unfolding and watch the warm ups, the introductions, the national anthem, all that.

It was totally worth it. But then went straight from the stadium to another shuttle, a shuttle back downtown Houston, had to get in my car, drive to the radio studio where we were hosting the show and then host the show post game. So you're talking about having been up all day, all night and then do a show and then went straight to the airport. So left the radio studio, dropped my rental car off and went straight to my gate. And it was, yeah, the gate was full of people who smelled like they'd been up all night and had gone straight from the game to their parties or a bar or some other place and then to the airport.

And so it was crazy, the flight was nuts but also just not worth it to stay the extra day every year. I wouldn't mind doing it again at some point but since I did it once and I feel like I can't possibly find a more epic Super Bowl, let's hope that this one is. I would love it but for now the plan is to come back on the red eye on Saturday night and be here in studio for our Super Bowl post game show a week from tonight. Oh my gosh, it's After Hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio. I love your Vegas suggestions, even those of you who have visited before but it's actually really good to get suggestions from people who live there or have lived there in the past.

I've actually got a bunch of friends who are Vegas natives which I never knew, including a friend of mine who works in Baltimore as a meteorologist and he sent me an entire list of do's and don'ts and all that jazz. So yeah, thanks for finding us again on Twitter, After Hours, CBS or my Twitter, ALawRadio and then our Facebook page. So I want to, and I'll get back to your calls, I want to remind you what you told me in 2015. The top three moments in sports that you would most like to see in your lifetime. Number one, the US men win a World Cup. So the US men's national team win a World Cup and I'm thinking 2026 would be beyond our wildest imaginations. Could you imagine what this country would be like if the US men's national team even got into, and we've been to the knockout stage before of course, but even got to say the round of 16 or the quarterfinals and then on into the semifinals.

Colton is a big soccer fan, he's working with us all week. Could you imagine what it would be like? I still can't believe, when did you do this list originally? 2015. I can't believe that was the number one thing on the list. I'm shocked. It was, actually by far the number one.

The top three were, they were very defined by fans all over the country, the top three which I'll get to. But could you imagine though, the US men's national team in the United States with the flags and the crazies and just the atmosphere, it would be electric. It would be electric and I'm very excited. I'm already starting a little piggy bank for hoping that I get lucky with the finals and getting into presale and somehow getting the finals. I don't have to worry about hotel, I don't have to worry about any of that. Cheers!

I would love it. I can't believe in 2015 that was still number one. I feel like soccer is ginormous now in the United States. I mean they just broke records, NBC for the most viewed English Premier League game which is the biggest league in football and I'm still mind-blowing that it was 2015 that was the number one out of everyone. It was. Yeah so we took your votes and your tweets and your Facebook posts and number one moment that you most wanted to see in sports in your lifetime, US men's national team wins the World Cup. So I'm thinking this could be it.

And the reason I have confidence is because of the second and third most popular items on the list. Number two, the Cubs win the World Series. I'm pretty sure that happened a year later.

Colton do we have the proof, the audio proof that it happened a year later? The number of times I've heard that call from Cubs radio, amazing. Pat Hughes with the call and we saw it a year later. We actually got to see the Cubs end their 108 year drought and win the World Series and you all may remember that it was a game seven against the Cleveland Indians. And they were down and had to rally and they went into extra innings and there was a rain delay. All of that made it even more memorable.

November 3rd 2016, the Cubs win the World Series. That was number two on your list. Number three on your list. I just went back and I watched it and I listened to it. I can remember where I was, what I was doing. I can remember my reaction.

I cried of course. A Triple Crown winner. We had that just months later in 2015.

American Pharaoh captured the Triple Crown in horse racing at the Belmont Stakes and ended a 37 year drought. We got two of the top three. Why can't we dream even bigger and potentially even as we build up through 2026? The goal should no longer be, oh, just want to get to the knockout stage. Oh, let's just get to the quarterfinals. No.

The time is now. Greg Berhalter, U.S. Men's National Team. They went through a huge transformation for the last World Cup, which you remember was pushed back a year because of COVID. And it was a younger team. A lot of turnover. Because they missed the World Cup in the rotation before, a lot of those guys had aged out and phased out.

And it was a competitive camp. And Berhalter received a bunch of rave reviews for what he did with the team. Except right afterwards, his contract was not renewed. And the Reyna family, you all may remember, Claudio Reyna.

One of his teammates, when he was a footballer, when he was playing, his family, Claudio and the family, upset at the way their son Gio was treated in terms of playing time. And so, I don't know if that was the reason why the U.S. Men's National Team didn't renew his contract initially. There was also accusations of sexual assault going back to when he and his wife were dating.

And so there were a lot of big ol' handfuls of mud being flung around. After it died down, sometimes that's the best PR move, right? After it died down, and Berhalter got a new contract, now he had gone and he had started to look for other coaching jobs, he was working elsewhere. The U.S., or U.S. Soccer, hired him back. And there was nary a blip on the radar. There really wasn't. I know that he has spoken about Gio, he's spoken about the Reyna family.

I hope they've been able to repair their relationship and maybe in some ways to get through what was clearly fractured trust in a decades old friendship. But that has nothing to do with the U.S. Men's National Team. So Berhalter is back in place, he'll run a competitive camp, they'll go through, well they don't have to qualify, but they will do the run ups, the friendlies, because they're a host nation, they're automatically in. So I guess there's that stress that we don't have to worry about. But they would have been in anyway. I just know it, the U.S. is ranked number 12 in the world. Hey, we've seen bigger upsets.

Let's go. It's after hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio. So I would love for you to find us on Twitter or Facebook if you have maybe new items you want to put on the list. The sporting event, the sporting championship or just a tournament victory. I try to use like open language because there's so many other ways that we can talk about sports, not just championship.

But is there a moment in sports that you so desperately want to see? It's after hours on Facebook and then also after hours on CBS on our show Twitter. 855-212-4227, Paul is in North Carolina. Paul, welcome to the show. Hey Amy, so good to talk to you. Listen, I'm a lifelong sports radio guy.

Cool. I've been listening for so long and to watch your growth in person and professionally is really cool and it's really cool to talk to you. I've been listening to you since you were at that four-letter place years ago.

Wow, that's a long time. Amy, you asked a question earlier in the show about a sports week that rivals Super Bowl week. And the short answer is no, I don't think anything necessarily rivals it.

But I've got one that I can contend and I thought of one that I was on hold. And the first one, and hear me out so you're going to laugh at me because it's the exact opposite of football. I think Masters week is pretty darn close. When you think of, you know, the Super Bowl is mostly remembered for moments, not necessarily the whole game and as is the Masters. There's so much hoopla and people that are not necessarily not necessarily golf fans are drawn in from the Masters like the Super Bowl. I can tell you I run a sports bar and there are very few events that from the time it starts four days later that it is on, you know, sound on every TV, you know, a change menu like not in the southeast and maybe safer for here in the south. But I can tell you that Masters week is a huge week that gets pretty, you know, ESPN and CBS have been advertising the Masters for two months. In the in the other one that I think that I just kind of thought of sticking within the football family is almost the NFL draft.

Every NFL pundit puts out a mini mock draft. We've been talking about the draft six months down the road. And again, it's going to be a three day event. And, you know, now that it's traveling city to city, that's a party and cities are transformed much like Augusta. So I think those are two that I would throw out there for weeks.

That might, again, not not beat the Super Bowl, but at least in the same same conversation. Well, you know what? Having just been to Augusta National for the first time and having my host, my friend Diana, drive me slowly. Thank you so much for your call, Paul. I have she drove me slowly, in fact, stalker slow by Magnolia Lane three times in a row. Having the chance to peek down Magnolia Lane because the gate was open. And then driving around just to see the park, empty parking lots. And actually, they're just wide open fields that the the Augusta National Golf Club has purchased. Just seeing the trees and the green gates. You could peek through some of the thinner trees in January and see onto the course.

You couldn't see a lot, but you could see a little bit. It was moving just to be there and be just to be outside Magnolia Lane for the first time in my life. So I would certainly agree with what Paul said about Masters Week. There's so much buzz, there's so much build up. And then if you think about those years when one of the top golfers in the world has been contending. I mean, think about Tiger Woods in 2019 and the talk about buzz and the electricity over him being able to close out his. What was it, 15th major win? I feel like if I don't talk about it very often that the numbers escape me, but it was his first major win in 12 years.

It had been that long. And and so it was awesome to to see the Masters Augusta National come alive. But it's the same when you're talking about a U.S. Open.

You know, I covered one not that long ago in the Hamptons out on the end of Long Island in New York. And to have Phil Mickelson out there on the course on Saturday. Again, the buzz, the just the anticipation of every shot, even waiting for him because he was golfing later in the day. Even waiting for him to get out there on the first tee was incredible. So, yeah, would love to see that type of buzz that would take place at, say, the United States getting to the final of the World Cup since it is on native soil.

It's after hours here on CBS Sports Radio. A few of you finding me on Twitter. Javier says this. Without a doubt, Cristiano Ronaldo winning a World Cup before he retires, possibly this World Cup. Well, you know what? I can't imagine Americans would be upset if Ronaldo won a World Cup on their own soil or in MetLife Stadium to be able to witness it in person.

The people who did witness it in person. That would be pretty incredible. You know what? This is not one that I remember being on the list, but I will say it only because I know it was incredible for soccer fans slash football fans around the world.

In fact, we talked about it extensively here on the show. Messi finally winning a World Cup. And I know there's always, speaking of drama, there's always drama with Messi. Remember the buildup, the anticipation, and the circus that followed him when he got to Miami and how every place that Miami went to, whether it was a friendly, whether it was those in-season tournaments that MLS holds, everywhere he went last year until he got hurt and then he wasn't playing as much.

I would say the first, say, 12 games or so, as he was making MLS defenders look like kiddos, like children, as he was toying with them, it was all the rage here in the United States. It was the hottest ticket in the United States. So you had to finally see Messi win a World Cup. Pretty incredible, right? So that happened, what was it, December?

Winter of 22? Maybe Ronaldo winning a World Cup. I'd like to see Cristian Balistic win a World Cup myself.

So that's one that we got from Javier. Kavon says, I would love it so much someday Tom Brady comes back to coach the Patriots to another Super Bowl. I don't know, I don't think Brady could be patient or could be the kind of guy who would overlook mistakes. You know, he kind of pitches fits or did pitch fits on the sidelines when he was a player, when everyone else did not live up to his standard, which is one of the reasons why he was great, right, because his bar was so high. A lot of times the best athletes in their respective sports make terrible coaches because they just can't deal with guys who are only there to skate and earn a paycheck. They just can't deal with guys who don't get it and don't see it like they do. And obviously, when you are, say, a bench player or you're a reserve, you watch a lot more and sometimes the guys who watch a lot more during their careers make the better coaches.

Okay, that's a good start. A sporting event or a moment in sports that you would most like to see in your lifetime. On Twitter, on Facebook, it's After Hours with Amy Lawrence right here on CBS Sports Radio. Football is revered and food is enjoyed.

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Instacart for the win. A peanut butter M&M's production. In a world where Super Bowl winners get the world's admiration and a fancy ring, but the runners up get nothing. One retired cop returns. One retired quarterback. Read the script.

Oh, sorry. One retired quarterback returns to claim what's his. Um, that's claim a ring with diamonds made from M&M's peanut butter, but you're on a roll. The Ring of Comfort, coming soon to a Super Bowl new you. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio.

Good to hear from you. You're all sending me your most desired, most epic that you think. Sports moments that you need to see before your lifetime, your hourglass runs out. Is that morbid or is it like making light of a situation?

I guess once I'm gone, I don't really care how people talk about it. But the top three that you gave me in 2015. U.S. men's national team winning a World Cup. Cubs capturing the World Series. American Pharoah winning the World Crown. The Triple Crown. Those two have actually happened.

So maybe we're looking at just the last one that comes to true in 2026. And so it's good to hear from you on Twitter and Facebook. And yeah, some of you are passing the word.

I see it on Facebook. That I will not be here in studio in 24 hours. I'll be, I hope, catching a couple hours to sleep. And then we'll be on the way to Las Vegas early on Tuesday morning.

But we'll keep you updated on both of our social media sites as well as on our shows. Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Now the Pro Bowl festivities took place this past Sunday, right? Well, not even Sunday. The flag football game took place on Sunday.

The festivities, the skills competition, they go back to even late last week. And of course it never features the guys who are in the Super Bowl. Oh my gosh, I look up at Travis Kelce's face and his mouth moving on one of the TV screens in front of me as he's hawking.

Direct TV, I believe it is. I wonder how many Super Bowl ads he will be in. But the build up, of course, is to the Super Bowl. And the Pro Bowl generally, I think a few years, they played it after the fact. But generally has been always between the end of Championship Sunday, right? That week off in between Championship Sunday and the Super Bowl.

And so a bunch of these guys are out there having a good time. One of them, well he's a Kelce, but he's not Travis Kelce. And Jason played against his brother last year, remember? Because it was Eagles and Chiefs. And so there was that emotion, and I'm sure being torn, you want, if it was me, and I remember saying this last year, I'd want my brother to win more than I'd want me to win. But Jason already had a Super Bowl ring from his time with the Eagles, so maybe that made it easier for him to root for Travis. So this year he doesn't have those emotions, it's a completely different experience in Vegas. Last year was a unique experience, very odd to, very much on your own, you're with another family of yours, your football family. And the guys that you've played a lot of football with, and all season with, and you're really excited to go.

But then you're also, still you're playing your brother and you want the best for him. And very conflicting feeling, whereas this year, hey I get to enjoy this one, I'm only rooting for Trav. And I hope he can get another one, him and Pat and Andy and all those guys. So Jason doesn't have that conflict this year on Sirius XM NFL Radio. I wonder if it's a conflict for him when it comes to his future, because you may remember right after the Eagles bowed out, that was early, after the Eagles bowed out the first Monday night of the playoffs, what did we hear from the locker room? Well we heard that Kelcey addressed his teammates, it very much sounded like a retirement announcement, or at the very least a goodbye. And yet that's been retracted, he himself has indicated, he's not sure. Now maybe he doesn't want to take attention away from the Super Bowl, maybe it's that.

But it seems like if he knew, he would have said something by now. So again, Sirius XM NFL Radio asking him about his future in the league. Yeah I mean obviously you want to make it quick, you want the organization to be able to move freely with free agency coming up and all that stuff.

So I think within the next, I don't want to put a timetable on, but I feel pretty firmly I'll be able to get things ironed out before the organization's in any type of bind or anything like that. Does it sound like a guy who's made up his mind, although he may just be a really good actor. I remember we saw him shirtless in Buffalo, jumping in and out of a suite and putting on a show of sorts for the fans. So I wouldn't put it past him not wanting to take the attention away from his brother and the Kelcey family for another reason. Speaking of that, all the attention on Tay Tay when she was on stage winning I think two Grammys. And I don't know if it was her first two, I felt like I read that somewhere that she finally won Grammys, but that seems like it can't possibly be true. But anyway, she did win Album of the Year and it was presented to her by Celine Dion, but she was up there twice. And she dropped the announcement that she will be, or she's working on a new studio album, that she will be dropping a new studio album soon. So the announcement was a bit of a bombshell that she dropped, but then the album comes in next. I don't know a lot about her progression, but apparently it's not going to be Reputation, which is the continued re-release, Taylor's version of her various songs.

I like a lot of her, I wouldn't say older stuff, her earlier stuff, she's not old, her earlier stuff. But she was the life of the party, apparently she walked into the Crypto.com center late, and so there was this grand entrance and people gave her a standing ovation. And she was up there twice, but did not mention Travis. That's the controversy. Oh, the drama. So now, for those of you who don't believe that the relationship is real, maybe that's what you're going to fixate on. I would say the two of them being in work mode, and as much as it's nice to win awards, it's still work, she still has to be on, there's still a lot happening.

From the photos and the red carpet and the entrance to the people, and just in general being in an arena full of your peers and all the people who want a piece of you. And so, who knows what the motivation was, but maybe she just doesn't want to feed the tabloids or feed the speculation, or maybe she just forgot because she's human. Who knows if she wrote it down. I don't know if she wrote down her words, but I will say sometimes when I don't write things down, I will forget them. Which is why I take notes all day on Super Bowl, well I will on Super Bowl, Sunday night, but also NFL regular season. There's so many games, it's impossible for me to watch a game at one o'clock, and gosh, sometimes there's eight games going on at the same time in the one o'clock eastern time window. In that early window, it's impossible for me to watch a game in that early window and remember all the details with so many other games going on. And so, maybe she just forgot.

Sometimes I forget things if I don't write them down just in the heat of the moment. It's her moment also. It's true, it's not about him, it's about her. And he's also going to Super Bowl this week, so he could be thinking, please don't mess around, I don't need any more attention than I already got. I think he's pretty comfortable in the spotlight, but it is funny, he has made jokes about the fact that people are going crazy over just this relationship they have. I just think it's really cute that he tried to give her a bracelet at one of her concerts and got snubbed, right?

Was told, oh no no, she's not taking these things right now, or he didn't actually get to give it to her. And over the course of a few weeks, it became such a big story that he got snubbed, that he was able to shoot his shot, but he got rejected of sorts. And now it's turned into a thing, right? Where she went to a concert, and he went to a concert with her, and she's gone to games, and now they're a thing.

So, good for Taylor. And for a while, there was speculation about whether or not it was real, that it could have been a publicity stunt. She doesn't need the publicity, and neither does the NFL. So it's just one of those worlds colliding thing, it's not really about PR. Though the NFL has had fun with it, for sure.

Especially initially. During the AFC Championship, she was on camera for all of 40 seconds. Not that big of a deal.

It's not like she's invading your home and you can't get rid of her. That would be more about the Grammys, and about the eras tour, and about the movie, and all that. Yeah, she's a conglomerate unto herself. The NFL probably doesn't give her much of a bump, and the NFL doesn't need her. Though it is funny that people have tried to quantify what her presence and her relationship with Travis Kelsey has meant to the Chiefs.

And I think it's more about the mentions, and the number of imprints on social, and all that kind of stuff. I don't know how you quantify that, but somebody came up with the number that it's 335 million dollars that Taylor Swift has made for the Chiefs. Now, what happens is it expands the fan base, right? Because there are plenty of Swifties out there that had no idea who Travis Kelsey was. So now they're watching YouTube videos, or they're paying subscription services to listen about the Chiefs and get to know Travis Kelsey, her boyfriend. But also, they're buying jerseys, right? There's no doubt that Travis Kelsey jerseys have seen a major spike.

So all of, not to mention the jacket, the TaylorMade jacket that she got from Kyle Juszczyk's wife. I bet there have been some who tried to get jackets just like that. Swifties are a little obsessive. Like the hardcore Swifties, they will pay whatever it takes. And they will throw, some of them, the younger versions, will throw tantrums if they don't get their way. So their parents are spending hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of dollars for tickets.

Right? So this is the type of impassioned fan base that make up Swifties. Not all of them, but the core of them.

The core of them. So, what are the sporting events, the moments that you would most like to see in your lifetime? Harry says, oh you football. I've seen seven natties. That's how the cool kids describe it. But I'd love to see the Boomers get a college football playoff win before I die.

So there's a personal one. Let's see. This comes from Todd, who points to the 40-40. The 40-40 man this year in Major League Baseball. Gosh, it seems like forever ago, doesn't it? That we were talking about baseball and the run to the World Series.

Oh my gosh. But 40 home runs and 40 stolen bases. And the fact that it happened so infrequently. Ronald Acuna did it this year. But our listener in Atlanta, Todd says, I'd actually like him to be the first player since Ted Williams to bat 400 in a season.

We've had some guys flirt with it. We've had some guys manage for an entire half a season. But all the way through is tough. You've got to stay healthy, number one.

You've got to be productive all the way through. So could we get a 40-40 and a 400 for Acuna? That'd be cool. I'd be here for that. So on Twitter, ALawRadio, and then also on our Facebook page, The Moment in Sports, revisiting a topic from 2015 that you would most like to see in your lifetime. Coming up, if it's the Sixers winning an NBA championship, well, it may have to wait.

Because the MVP is going to be out for a lengthy recovery and healing process. We'll give you the latest on Joel Embiid. I'll let you remember the night that we were on the air after he had that performance. We were hearing other people, so other NBA players, react to him scoring that 73. And it was kind of fun to get the reaction of not just guys like KD, Steph Curry, and others. But remember, Kat, Karl-Anthony Towns, also had 62 that night. And so it was one of those banner nights in the NBA.

And since then, it's gone downhill for Joel. This portion of the show brought to you by Southern Recipes Small Batch Pork Rinds. Between this pork rind giveaway and the delicious recipes, you'll want to ask your friends to pass the pigskin, especially this week.

Do it at PorkRindDay.com. On Twitter, AlawRadio, asking you, is there a bigger week than Super Bowl week in sports? Right, so someone said, well, your wedding week was probably bigger. Yeah, yeah, yeah, but that's not a sporting event. No, definitely not a sporting event. We can debate over whether cheerleading is a sport, but we cannot debate about the wedding. So whether it's a bigger week, we had Paul from Atlanta, I believe, say that he believes the Masters Week and the build-up, and the fact that it's a unique event and there's nothing like it, can run a close second.

And then we also saw, I saw this tweet, I'm going to have to go back and figure out who it was before I share it with you. But also, oh, Creflo says that, Creflo or Remy, Remy, says the first week of the Summer Olympics is also right up there in terms of the buzz. And I would say if it's Summer Olympics and it's the first week with all the swimming, oh yeah, I'm in. That is my favorite in the Summer Olympics with all the events in the pool and how well the U.S. does and just the excitement, people who are allowed to be there, and of course we've had such memorable and world record performances. The excitement around Michael Phelps when he was in his last few Olympics was off the charts, so I'll give you that too. Chase on Twitter says the U.S. winning a World Cup would be his number one moment that he most wants to see in sports, but then Oregon State, his alma mater, winning a national title in football or men's basketball. We'll take either one. What about the Sixers winning a title?

Is that possible? Well, maybe not right now because Joel Embiid, as we're finding out, will be out for an extended period of time. Coming in the next few days, he has this to look forward to, he'll be laid up Super Bowl Sunday because he's undergoing a procedure to fix the left meniscus injury he has, and this is what we know, according to multiple sources he will miss, quote, an extended period of time.

That's always dangerous when there's no specific timeline, just an extended period. Often that means the doctors don't know until they get in there, which means there's no definitive timetable because they don't know how bad the damage is. Of course, as a seven-footer with all of the bulk that he carries, this happens a lot with guys who are that tall, whether they're built in a way like Joel Embiid or they're built like Kristaps Porzingis, right? It's always foot and knee injuries, a lot of foot injuries, of course, but a lot of knee injuries as well. Just because of the pounding that their knees and their feet take, and so it certainly does make sense, but I hate it for him, right?

I hate that he's going to have to miss some time, even as they believe the Sixers have, again, a championship contender, and the fact that even with young superstars like, say, a Tyrese Maxey, they're going to have to forge on without him. Manute Bol, he's not built like Manute Bol, but Manute Bol also had knee and foot injuries. He was 7'7". Was it George Mirasan, too? Remember him?

Oh my gosh, like a blast from the past. That's kind of scary, though, with Wen Binyama, too, right? With his size. Victor Wen Binyama, yeah, and he's really athletic, very athletic, doesn't carry the same weight as Joel Embiid, but I would think that the Spurs would want him to bulk up so that he could withstand the pounding of playing inside a lot of the time, and of course, guys who are way more and have more experience sitting on him, leaning on him, defending him, even though it's not really a contact sport anymore, but yeah, he has to deal with that. Yeah, that's what scares me, because Porzingis isn't big, either. He's on the thinner side, and he has all the injuries, too. Yeah, he gets injured a ton, and he gets beat up a ton, so Embiid's dealt with knee injuries, he's dealt with a bunch of different maladies over the course of his career, but he's only 29, and so he's still theoretically in the prime of his career. He had the meniscus tear in the other knee, going back to a couple of years ago in the playoffs, and then had season-ending surgery on the same knee that's hurt right now, a few more years back, and they struggled with him out of the lineup, let's be honest.

As much as they have other guys, he's the glue. Last year, they lost back, well, last year, he won the MVP because he was healthy most of the time. This year, without him in the lineup, they've lost 10 of 14, so this could be a blow to the Sixers, not to mention he's tops in the NBA in scoring right now, ahead of Luka by about a half a point. 35.3 points per game.

It's after hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio. Sixers are only in fifth place in the East, and without him, again, this is tough sledding. It was a homecoming Sunday of sorts for two guys who built legacies with former franchises not there anymore.

Such a shock when Marcus Smart was traded from the Celtics to the Grizzlies last offseason. He was back in Boston to face his teammates. He did not play because of a right finger injury, but they played a special tribute video, and a lot of the Celtics and fans were thrilled to see him.

They actually were chanting his name and gave him standing ovations every time he was mentioned, and he was overwhelmed. Thank you, guys. I love you guys, and forever. You guys will always be in my heart, and Boston will always be here, so never forgotten, and thank you, like I said. Not only did they have a video tribute midway through the first quarter that then the fans started chanting, we love Marcus, but also he was honored with a Hero Among Us Award during the second quarter because of everything he's done to support different charitable organizations and projects in the area. A lot of the guys, Jason Tatum, Al Horford, they were so happy to see him back. And then Bradley Beal, who scored 43 points in his return to Washington. Beal on the left side. He's been the star with 41 on the afternoon.

Step back three, give him 44, actually foot on the line, so one too many there. It's 43 still for Bradley Beal, adding more on to his season high in a Phoenix Suns uniform. So Bradley Beal was able to get his own video tribute, and he was also emotional about his return to Washington. That was a big feeling, and to just get going, like you said, man, it was crazy. Once the ball was in the air, it was just like a normal game.

It was just a normal game, and I enjoyed every moment of it, and just enjoyed the process, enjoyed the fun. Beal played over a decade in D.C. before he got traded to Phoenix last offseason, and we've seen them go through some iterations of rebuilds and reloads, and it's just never quite been the same. The whole Russell Westbrook with Bradley Beal experiment. And then Marcus Marr played nine years in Boston, so these were pretty emotional for good reason. We're halfway through.

It's After Hours on CBS Sports Radio. The Ring of Comfort, coming soon to a Super Bowl new you. There's joy in every journey.

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