It is the JR Sport Brief Show here with you on the Infinity Sports Network. I'm coming to you live from Atlanta, Georgia. Much love to everybody tuned in all over North America. Hope you've had a tremendous Monday. I'll be with you for the next two hours. The show gets started every weekday at 6pm Eastern, 3 Pacific.
I'm in Atlanta. Thank you to our producer in New York City helping us out tonight, Nico Scarlatos. I hope you're amazing. Well, maybe you're amazing like Fred Warner. This man just got a contract extension today by the 49ers. They said, hey man, we're going to go ahead and pay you three years, $63 million. Good for Fred Warner, now the highest paid linebacker in the league. Brock Purdy got paid. Fred Warder got paid. Good for him. Hopefully you're getting paid too. Hey, how about this?
We'll get into this in a little bit. Nick Sirianni just got paid. Philadelphia Eagles said, ah, you're not going anywhere. They signed him to a contract extension.
If you remember his first ever press conference, oh boy, it didn't look good for him. And now here he is, a Super Bowl championship coach. So much more that we've also discussed. Thank you to Andrew Schlecht joining us last hour from The Athletic. He covers the Oklahoma City Thunder. We talked about the NBA Final Four being set with the Knicks and Pacers, the Wolves and Thunder underway tomorrow. Jalen Brown, is he going to need surgery on his partially torn meniscus? We don't know.
And neither do the Celtics. We have to go out there and wait and see. There's so much more to get into. You want to be a part of the show? You can. 888-710-4ISN.
That's 888-710-4ISN. You can find me online. I exist everywhere at JR Sport Brief. Yeah, I'm just out here doing my thing, talking about sports, realizing that, yeah, the Stanley Cup playoffs are still rolling on. We got the Final Four there. Sorry to Toronto Maple Leaf fans.
They're not there. I know, a very painful thing. And their fans had a fit last night. Maple Leafs ended up losing to the Panthers six to one. Smoked in a game seven.
Smoked. Fans were throwing objects onto the ground, onto the ice. They were having a fit outside. And now I know last break we talked about how miserable some fan bases are. Think about the Pittsburgh Pirates and Jeff Passan earlier today is having talks with Pat McAfee about how, well, yeah, we actually might just, well, the Pirates might entertain trading Paul Skeans if they feel he's not going to stick around. Free agency isn't until 2030.
It's 2025. Pittsburgh Pirates fans are absolutely miserable. Miserable. And the team that's very familiar with being miserable are Nick fans. Now that they have advanced to the Eastern Conference Finals, something that they haven't done in 25 years.
The last time they were here, they were they took on the Indiana Pacers, who then went on to lose to the Los Angeles Lakers in the finals. Nick fans have just completely lost their minds. Nico, did you see the fans that threw the garbage at the kid in the paint? Well, he's not a kid.
He's a grown man. They were throwing like trash bags filled with trash at that fan walking down the street. You saw that?
Yeah, I have no idea what the background is on that situation, but that I will be the first to admit it even as a Knicks fan is completely unacceptable. Oh, yes. So, I mean, Tyrese Halliburton identified, well, somebody identified the guy. Tyrese Halliburton is giving him tickets to the game. Like, that's one way to end up at a game. Let's have trash thrown at you, right? Would you sign up for that? Absolutely. Heck yeah.
Oh, oh, damn. I mean, just there's a New York bag of New York City trash that's been outside? Throw all the trash you got right at me.
I'm ready for it. If it means free tickets to an Eastern Conference Finals game, absolutely. OK, well, the more you learn.
I'm just saying, Nico, I didn't know. So where do you stop on tickets? You do anything for free tickets? Well, I don't know about anything, but not a lot I wouldn't do, I guess I'd say. OK. All right. No, no, no taking.
I won't challenge you to anything in that regard. But we saw some Knicks fans. These fans have lost their minds. There's a fan who is sitting on a gigantic billboard in Manhattan and they crowded the streets.
It is. It's nuts. And so the New York Knicks taking on these Pacers, it's going to be real interesting to see what they do. I think both series from both the Eastern Conference and the Western Conference, I expect these these series to go down to seven games.
We got teams that I don't want to say they evenly match, but they are. The Knicks haven't won a title and their fans are starving. There's a reason why Knicks fans act well, the younger ones act so nutty. 1973 is when they last won a championship. There's no championships between the Wolves, the Thunder and the Pacers.
None of them. I mean, for all intents and purposes, the Knicks have two championships. Here we are in 2025. They might as well have have none.
Well, they certainly have none in recent memory. No disrespect to the great late Willis Reed and still here with us, Walt Clyde Frazier. But I mean, damn. And Bill Bradley is still here. There's guys on that team that are no longer here. And so the Knicks fans are all up in arms. They're losing their minds. They're throwing trash at Brian Windhorst. He's leaving a game and they're cursing him out to his face about his pick for the Celtics.
I picked the Celtics. What do you want from me or anybody? Jalen Brunson. He's like, man, we didn't finish the job yet. So everybody just relax.
Listen to this. I think it was very important and great for the fans to have our backs and celebrate the way they did for us. We know there's a long way to go. We don't really look at it as an accomplishment. It's just the next step. We're grateful. We're thankful. But we know there's a long way to go.
Oh, yeah. I'm glad he knows it. And I'm glad he's the I'm glad he's the leader of the team. I'm glad that they I guess hopefully they got to follow his lead because his temperament doesn't change. He doesn't get too high.
He doesn't get too low. He's just he's even he's going out there getting a job done. I was I was a little surprised.
Not so much. Carl Anthony Towns was at the Subway series over the weekend. He was at the Yankees in the Mets game and he was showed on the jumbotron.
And of course, he's soaking it all in. He's over. He actually stood up. Nico, did you see him? He had he had the bing bong. You took the L shirt on.
He stood up and he kind of pointed at the shirt. Did you see that? Yeah, I'm all for it.
I love it. I can do like why I get a enjoyed a moment. I'm not trying to be a curmudgeon.
I'm not trying to, you know, sap the fun out of things. There's a possibility. And I hope it's not the case, but there's a possibility that the Knicks players and I don't think Brunson, but that they're loving the adulation a little too much.
I hope that's not the case. If you think about Carl Anthony Towns, he's a man about town. You're not going to see O.G.
and Inobi. I don't think I've ever seen a guy anywhere but the basketball court. McHale Bridges, I know he well, he lives all the way downtown. I've seen him outside walking his dog.
Mitchell Robinson is one for online. As a Knicks fan, there's no concern from you that maybe just maybe the fan celebration and all the love hasn't gotten to them? You're not concerned about that? No, I mean, I think they've been in this position before. They should know what it takes to get here. I guess they couldn't say that they've been in this position before because they haven't made the conference finals in so long. They remembered what it was like to lose last year.
So I think, especially going up against the same team that beat them, they are going to be fine in terms of being motivated and ready to go. Well, just a little bit of revenge. You know, Josh Hart of the New York Knicks, who's also, and people love how hard he goes out and he plays for the team, got cracked open the other day.
A Luke Cornette elbow above his eye opened him up. Josh Hart says, you know what? Yeah, the Pacers beat us last year, but that doesn't have anything to do with now. At the end of the day, if you win, you know, you can really just kind of do what you want. I mean, I think everybody's different. Everybody embraces being in that spotlight differently. So if that's how they want to do it, cool.
Yeah, well, whatever gets you going, whatever motivates you, whatever goes out there and gets you all riled up to get the job done. I mean, from the Indiana Pacers perspective, well, they're looking to get to the finals. They ain't thinking about the New York Knicks.
Well, maybe they are. You know, Halliburton is probably relishing in the fact of going to Madison Square Garden. The fans in New York City are going to, I don't want to say eat him alive.
They're going to give him crap. OK, we talked about Andrew Reese and Kaitlyn Clark and this budding rivalry that we now have in the WNBA that started in college. I mean, Andrew Reese, she was allegedly the victim of some racial comments thrown her way.
The WNBA is investigating. Like Halliburton is a troll. OK, I mean, we may hear some things and it may not be racially motivated, but we may hear some things thrown his way that just get bleeped out, you know, over the airwaves. He's that much of an irritant. I told you Halliburton is already paying to fly that fan out to the game who got trash thrown at him in a wild world. One of the bench guys on the Indiana Pacers, T.J. McConnell, he basically says, well, nobody believes in us.
Nobody believes in me. It's the Pacers versus everybody. So get with it. Everyone that was here last year and played them in the second round knows the type of environment we're walking into at MSG. And we kind of just have to go in there, you know, feeling like we have our backs against the wall because it's us against the world in that in that environment. We're all we got.
So we have to be we have to stay together and play together as well. Listen, nobody in Madison Square Garden is thinking about T.J. McConnell until he starts going out there, knocking down threes, OK? Nobody has an issue with Miles Turner. Nobody is going to be yelling at at Neesmith.
It's nothing. Nobody cares. Tyrese Halliburton is going to be enemy. Number one.
And everybody loves a good villain, right? I mean, Trae Young is out here trolling. He's trolling over the weekend. Yesterday, he tweeted out how what is it?
Paycom, Sun or whatever the hell they call it in Oklahoma City right now. Trae Young, a Madison Square Garden villain. He pretty much said, oh, yeah, it's louder than than Madison Square Garden. It's like, man, you're not even playing basketball. Just mind your business right now. Everybody loves a villain.
Halliburton. He has he has some Reggie Miller qualities about him. We saw him knock down that big three, eliminating Giannis Atetokounmpo. His dad went out there and lost his mind.
That was irritating. People make fun of his voice. They say Tyrese Halliburton, some days his voice is high and some days voice is low. And he's even talked about it, admitted himself. He is certainly very forward when it comes to his fashion choices. I don't know what he does. He can knock down a dagger three.
But he can also be an irritant. I think when you look at his frame and his body, tall, slender, slim. Reminiscent of Reggie Miller. And I don't know if there's a player more hated in New York Nick history. Then Reggie Miller, I think Reggie Miller might actually be above Mike. There was a respect about Michael Jordan.
I think that everybody respected him. When it came down to Reggie Miller, I think people just could not stand his guts. Running around the screens, knocking down the threes, just flailing all over the place.
The infamous choke sign that he gave to Spike Lee. Like Reggie Miller is a complete pain in the ass. And Tyrese Halliburton, I don't think he's going to reach Reggie Miller levels. But Madison Square Garden will be lighting him up. Now he has some up and down games, especially shooting the basketball in that last series against Cleveland. He had that wrist issue. How much is that going to be a factor for Tyrese Halliburton against the New York Knicks? Or is he going to go out there and give you another 31 points?
He was certainly a hit or miss. I'm going to give the New York Knicks the edge here. I think the only thing that can stop the New York Knicks is an injury because their lack of depth is still a concern. But I think after all of these years, I think we've seen Jalen Brunson step up in big spots. Carl Anthony Towns, I'm not all that much of a fan of.
I'd love to see him be more consistent offensively. But I think these New York Knicks can get the job done. I think they'll advance to the NBA Finals. Now what they do when they get there, I'm not all that confident in. I still am not a fan of their depth, but they've been healthy and they've been able to go out there and get the job done.
Nico, what do you think is going to happen? Are we talking just this conference finals, not what happens in the NBA Finals if they were to get there? I'm just talking about between the Knicks and the Pacers. Give me the Knicks in six. I think they take care of business against Indiana.
It's time for some revenge. Six games. Why are you picking the Knicks?
Well, I think it's just kind of like what we said before. They didn't have Carl Anthony Towns and McHale Bridges last year when they lost in seven. And that was a banged up Knicks team with the injuries to basically everybody in that starting lineup.
Ojian Anobi, Josh Hart, Jalen Brunson, all were banged up. So give me a healthy Knicks team with the additions of Cat and Bridges. I like the Knicks this time around. Okay. The New York Knicks.
Yeah. You think about last season, Jalen Brunson goes down and there was no Carl Anthony Towns. Julius Randle was out with a shoulder.
And that's the benefit. You think about the Indiana Pacers. They're healthy. They weren't healthy last year.
Missing Ben Matherin. You think about Minnesota. They're healthy. You think about the Thunder. They're deep.
They're also healthy. It's nice to know that we're heading into another season where we're going to look at a different NBA champ. And it's great. Like this is almost like the NFL. You can think about year after year after year who's going to sit at the top of the totem pole.
It's nice when it changes. I mean, I wouldn't mind if the Chiefs were the first team to go out there and give us a three P. But ultimately, you don't want to see the same teams every single year. You want to know that your team has a chance. And even if they're in a space right now where they're rebuilding, give it a year, give it a couple of years. If you find that star and you build out around them and you actually invest in a team, anybody can go out there and have a turnaround. In the New York Knicks, you think about all those lean years that they had. I mean, they've had some bad teams over the past 25 seasons.
I mean, even looking at that veteran squad that got blocked. Well, Roy Hibbert blocked Carmelo Anthony. That team didn't look like legitimate contenders being led by Carmelo Anthony. These Knicks look like they can actually go out there and get to the finals, which is a crazy thing to think about. Something that the New York Knicks have not done since 1999.
And a lot of people look at that squad and go, lockout, OK, lockout, New York Knicks just go on a run and they get smacked around by Tim Duncan in the San Antonio Spurs. Twenty five years. It's a long time.
It's a whole generation. It's the J.R. Sport Breeze Show here with you coast to coast on the Infinity Sports Network. 888-710-4ISN. That's 888-710-4ISN.
The phone lines are open if you want to give me a holler. We're going to talk about the Western Conference matchup, too, as well. Tomorrow night, you don't have to wait until Wednesday, but tomorrow night we're going to have Minnesota. They will be in Oklahoma City getting ready to take on the Thunder. We spoke to Andrew Schlecht from the Athletic. He covers the Thunder. We got his thoughts. He thinks the Thunder is going to go to the NBA finals.
I'm going to give you my thoughts as we continue on. And I just mentioned the Kansas City Chiefs and history being made. The team that actually won the Super Bowl, they are rewarding their head coach with a new contract extension.
At the same time, he is also or the team is also being punished for his success. I'll explain on the other side. You're locked into the JR Sport Breeze Show on the Infinity Sports Network. It is the JR Sport Breeze Show here with you coast to coast on the Infinity Sports Network. 888-710-4ISN.
That's 888-710-4ISN. Hey, I told you that in our last break, you got to act like you've been there before. If you're a winning team, you know, a lot of teams aren't winning teams. So if you're a New York Knicks fan, you haven't won a title since 1973, there's a good chance you might be acting a complete fool. Well, on the NFL side, there is a team that certainly had their share of success over the past decade. When in two Super Bowl championships, they are the reigning champions. A matter of fact, right now, I'm talking about the Philadelphia Eagles.
They stopped the Kansas City Chiefs from having this three-peat. And Nick Sirianni has been handed a new contract extension. This man has a 48 and 20 record after four seasons. OK, this guy has a winning percentage over 70 percent and he's come in and it's kind of surprising, I will never forget. His first ever press conference because Nick Sirianni, you would he had to be nervous. Absolutely. You would have thought that he's never been in front of a microphone, but he's never been an NFL head coach, let alone the coach of the Philadelphia Eagles.
This is his first press conference. Does this sound like a guy who was going to take a team to the Super Bowl? Listen to this. Next thing that's very important to me is that we build a smart football team, that we have a smart football team here. And I know we have the people in place to do that. The first part of that, the first part of being smart is knowing what to do. We're going to have systems in place that are easier to learn.
All right. Complicated to the defense or offense that they're going against or the special teams group they're going against. But easy for us to learn, because when we can put that, because we when we can learn our system and we can get good at our system, then our talent can take over. Less thinking equals talent take over.
But we need to have systems in place and we will have systems in place to do so. Oh, my goodness. Yeah, right.
Does that sound like a guy who is just going to lead you to victory? I mean, there were points in time I felt like maybe not this past season, but it was like, man, if this guy doesn't get it together. They're going to fire him. Because the Eagles, they were before they went to the Super Bowl and won.
They were a team that was looked upon as just like, why are you all falling apart? Just a year before. So if they didn't get the job done, he would have gotten the boot. And so congratulations to Nick Sirianni. His contract was set to expire after the 2025 season. And now he's agreed to a multi-year contract extension when it comes down to the coaches.
We don't know the details financially of the deals. We just know he's going to be sticking around for years to come. Jeffrey Laurie, the owner, says as an organization, we've always strived to create a championship culture of sustained success. Nothing is more important to fostering such an environment than having tremendous leadership. Nick has embodied everything we were looking for in a head coach since we hired him four years ago.
Good. That's not to say that one day he still doesn't get the boot. I know this isn't the NBA, but man, it's a it's a it's really rough going in every sport when it comes down to coaching.
One day you're here, one day you're not. I mean, in the case of the NBA, we've had multiple championship winning head coaches just just get fired. They got the boot. Meanwhile, I told you that he's being rewarded, but ultimately the Eagles, they're being punished. The NFL owners have tabled this multiple times. They tabled this in their last meetings.
I think I want to say last month, two months ago. They're going to vote this week as to whether or not they should ban the tush push, the play that the Philadelphia Eagles run to a higher success rate than anybody else in the NFL. And the NFL and this this is pretty much coming from the Packers. They're pretty much leading the charge on trying to eliminate this instead of saying, hey, let's go out there and beat it. Let's get it the hell up on out of here. They're saying that it's due to the injuries and the risk of injury. Well, damn it.
Who's gotten hurt during the tush push? And people are saying, oh, it's not a football play. Like.
If this was so. Damn easy for everybody else to do if it did not require skill. Then how come the Eagles are doing it?
To success and nobody else is. Like just because you can't beat it now, you want to just go out there and ban it. I've always found that to be ridiculous. I hope it doesn't pass.
And someone who would like to see it gone is a guy who had to face it. And what could have been a championship run for the commanders? I'm sure you remember in the postseason, we got a we got a bold threat. The referee went out there and basically told Frankie Louvou, hey, if you keep jumping offsides, which is going to go ahead and award the Eagles points. Frankie Louvou was on Good Morning Football earlier today, and he pretty much said they should get the tush push the hell up on out of here.
My personal opinion, I think they should ban it. I know the argument is going to be about like, hey, you guys have to stop it. Don't get us and show the artists and whatnot. But I mean, it's it's it's kind of like a Chico play, man.
You got Jordan, my lot on the right. You got you know, it's pretty much the scrumming rugby. That's how I kind of look at it. And we got to have the scrum too on the other side. And the scrum is, you know, we have a cadence where we all go at once. It's not like you hard count or and this and that were, you know, now you're getting us or myself jumping over the pile thinking that they're about to snap the ball. That's just my own personal opinion.
And I believe that that. Oh, OK. Stop the play. I mean, you are the one jumping off sides. Stop the play.
Why does it got to be a rub? Why does it got to be a rugby play? This I'm watching an NFL game. They got on pads.
Everybody got on on the helmets. It's this ain't rugby. It's football. It's the NFL. Stop it.
And I hope the NFL owners don't take no lame approach by utilizing science and injury risks that they don't have data on. So go ahead and make this decision. Figure it out and stop it.
Simple as that. Eight, eight, eight, seven, ten for ISN. That's eight, eight, eight, seven, ten for ISN. David is calling from Los Angeles on the JR sport. Reshow us updated a JR. Thank you for taking my call. Good to talk to you again, as always. Well, thank you.
What's going on? All right. I'm going to start with the Eagles because I am an Eagles fan and I wanted to call in and just defend the tush bush a little bit here.
I did call into Bill Ryder show this morning and said, well, I need to say there's a hundred any of that there. But, you know, here's the thing. We can't deal in hypotheticals in the NFL because then we can just give our way to whatever. You know, we can't talk about being the tush bush in terms of, you know, if it causes injury or if other teams start doing it well, then it becomes an unstoppable play. It hasn't happened yet. OK, let's wait and see to see if that even happens and then we'll make a decision then.
How about that? Now, I know that there is a good chance it's going to get banned because the owners have just tabled it over and over and over again. And it's seeming like, you know, it's looking like this could be the end of the run for the push if it does get banned. I just want to say as a fan of Nick Sirianni and the Eagles, I am not too worried because what they have shown me is that they are capable of innovating. The tush bush was an innovative play that they were able to create from gathering knowledge from rugby, as well as making sure they were within the rules of the game to create a play. And of course, you know, a play that that allows them to utilize the strength of their players, most notably the offensive line and the skills of the offensive line to make play seemingly unstoppable.
So I'm not worried if they do ban it because they'll find some other play that they can utilize as well. You know, the tush bush was not the only tool in their arsenal. Well, I don't.
Well, and thank you, David, for calling from L.A. I don't think anybody is worried about the Eagles now falling into the toilet because they can't run the tush bush. And yet they've been able to utilize the offensive line, which has just been massive to go ahead and move the ball whatever feet or inches that they need to. It's not about, you know, the Eagles hurting as a result. They're one of the most talented teams even through the offseason and some of the changes that they have made on the line. They're still one of the most talented teams in the league. So I don't think anybody's concerned with that. It's just the idea of we got one team that did something very well that other teams could not do well and did not execute. And now it's going to be taken away from them. That's the part that sucks.
OK, tush bush or not. The Philadelphia Eagles will still have a great chance at going out there and repeating barring injuries and things that would typically happen in a season that you can't account for. It just sucks. This is like going back to college and saying, oh, well, we can't have Kareem out here dunking the basketball. There's no dunking or we can't have Wolf out here dunking. There's no dunking. Could you imagine 25 years ago at this point, 30 years ago, could you imagine in a new era where the NBA just like I Shaq is just whooping too much ass out here. No more dunks because we got to change things like you have players that that come around and just change things and how the game is played and what's put together.
But a singular play in football. I'm sorry to ban a tush push, a brotherly shove, whatever the heck you want to call it. It's just weak and to have the Packers leading the charge on this.
If I'm a Packers fan, I'm looking at my team and I'm going, why? Why are we out here worried? Mark Murphy, why are we worried about a tush push? Can we keep on improving the offense? Can we figure out what the heck is going on with Jair Alexander? Is he going to be healthy enough to play? And how much do we have to pay him? Let's keep adding more weapons to help out Jordan Luft.
Thank God they did it in the draft. I'm not worried about no tush push. Worried about what you can do to get better instead of trying to beat a team with the rules book. Like, come on, man, do better than that. Eight, eight, eight, seven, ten for ISN.
That's eight, eight, eight, seven, ten for ISN. Leave the tush push and actually focus in on something else like like injuries that happen in the NFL, which, by the way, tush push or not. Injuries are going to happen. It's a violent game.
People are getting ripped to shreds every single Sunday. It's the JR Sportbreeze show here with you coast to coast on the Infinity Sports Network. We're going to take a break because people can argue about the tush push and whether or not it should happen. Is it a good play? Is it a fake play?
Is it belong in rugby, not the NFL? There's some more talk that is still starting to, I don't want to say run rampant. But after last week's NBA draft lottery, there's a lot of conversations about Cooper flag going to Dallas and Dallas ending up with the number one overall pick. Shaquille O'Neal is now putting in his own two cents about whether the draft lottery is rigged. And at this point is getting kind of lame. The talk is getting kind of lame. 8 8 8 7 10 for ISN. That's 8 8 8 7 10 for ISN. Do you think the NFL should ban the tush push? Should the NFL get rid of a play that the Eagles run almost to perfection?
Is it unfair? The phone lines are open 8 8 8 7 10 for ISN. I'm going to tell you what Shaq had to say about the draft lottery being rigged.
Apparently he thinks it was rigged in his favor as well. We have so much more to do. It is the JR Sport Brief Show here with you on the Infinity Sports Network. I need you to thank O'Reilly Auto Parts for all of your car care needs.
Get guaranteed low prices and excellent customer service from the professional parts people at O'Reilly Auto Parts. 8 8 8 7 10 for ISN. That's 8 8 8 7 10 for ISN. Right before we went to break, we talked about the Philadelphia Eagles. Nick Sirianni got himself a contract extension following the success of the Super Bowl championship Eagles.
But then also told you that Nick Sirianni is being rewarded. But the Eagles are pretty much in the process of potentially being punished. The NFL has pretty much tabled the issue for weeks, months. But apparently this week when the owners get together and they do their blood oath and they do their chants, they go down to the cave and they sit at this big table. They're going to figure out whether or not they want to ban the tush push where the Eagles have pretty much been the only team that's been successful at this at the rate.
And so the Green Bay Packers and Mark Murphy have pretty much led the charge on eliminating the tush push. And I'm just like, man, just get over it. Is it that big of a deal? Why? Because you can't stop it. It doesn't look like a football play.
Nobody else runs it. Like, what are we doing? Why are we having such a fit about something else that's not all that frequent? Like, go ahead and just spare us. 8 8 8 7 10 for ISN. That's 8 8 8 7 10 for ISN. Brian is here from Appleton, Wisconsin. You're the chair of sport. We show us up, Brian.
Hey, JR. I don't think it's a huge deal right now, but I expect that it will become more and more one. If you think about it, there are tush pushes going on all over the field.
And I'd really rather watch football than a than a rugby scrum. When you see when you see offensive linemen that are standing up a running back, pushing him down 20 yards from the line of scrimmage. That's just a that's just a modern day push, push, push. Pushing didn't used to be legal. If you remember, I don't I don't remember when it became illegal. But if you remember that famous Ice Bowl picture with a lineman who looks like he's singing a touchdown with his hands in the air, he's not doing that. What he's really doing is trying to make certain that the referee can see his hands.
So he's not going to get called for a penalty for pushing Bart Starr into the end zone. Well, the second point I would raise is. Go ahead, Brian. Go ahead. Go ahead. No, I was I was I was just I wanted to get to brass stacks. Do you know, you know, hold on, hold on. Brian, I'm sorry. Go ahead. How often do you see the push?
I'm a Green Bay Packer fan, so I see it too often. Oh, that's that's that's the problem. I'm going to tell you this. No, no, I don't I don't think it's a problem. I think it will it will do certain things.
It will encourage people to to copy it. It may not be a quarterback. The Packers, candidly, I love our quarterback, but Brian, nobody is nobody is copying it.
The only the Buffalo Bills have attempted. No, no, no. But you're right.
You do. Brian, a whole. Brian, Brian. No, it's not. Wait, wait. You get a lot of talk and I haven't even got my main point out. I want you to listen for a second. Because my points are so solid. That's why. No, no, because I want you to listen.
No, it's not because your points are solid. I asked you how often you've seen a push and you say too often the push push and hold, whether it's the Philadelphia Eagles or Houston, that doesn't go out here and run it. It accounted for point twenty eight percent of all plays ran last year. Let me say this again. You said that you want to watch football. You don't want to see a rugby scrum.
I'm going to say it again. Less than one percent, not half of a percent. A quarter of a percent of every NFL play ran last year was a tush push. Now, if I got to think about that, of all the plays that I watch in the NFL, you know what I don't like watching in an NFL game. I don't want to see a punt. I want to see action. But every now and then they put a guy out there with a big old foot and he kicks the ball down to try to pin a team in its own territory. I'd rather see them move the ball. So to see somebody at the saying, I need an inch or two inches. I don't care how they get that inch or two inch.
People have been at the goal line trying to jump over, run around, run through. So it doesn't matter to me. I think it's much to do about nothing. If that's the case, JR, then what you just said is another way of saying is we can get rid of it and no one will miss it.
So it cuts both ways. The other issue is that polling is also illegal and it's always been illegal. You can't poll. So maybe someone will figure out how to poll instead. I would get back to you do see what is effectively a push push down the field where running backs are being held up by linemen. I think that probably happens a lot more often. I would like to see it. And for the same reason, I think they should just make pushing illegal.
That would cover everything. But thanks for your thanks for listening. I enjoy your show. Well, thank you, Brian.
I appreciate you for calling from Wisconsin. Yeah, it's who like who's sitting around watching the game? Cares like do we just got the rules police? I could sit down and watch hours upon hours upon hours of football on a Sunday. And the one of the worst things that ever happens is when a referee comes out and he's explaining rules that people have never heard of in their lives.
I mean, come on. We talked about Frankie Louvoo getting ready to jump off sides about eight million times. And the referee stood there and basically said, if Frankie Louvoo decides to keep on doing this, then I, the referee, have the power to award the points and give the Philadelphia Eagles a touchdown. The referee said that and everybody went, what?
The referee can just hand out points because the opposition is doing something they're not supposed to do? My point being is, aren't there more important things to worry about than some stupid ass goal line play? I need an inch. I need a yard. Like, do you really sit at home watching the NFL on Sunday or Monday or Thursday or Saturday?
NFL is like, we're going to take over all the days. Do you really sit around and go? No, no, no, no. That's not the pushing and the pulling.
Oh, no. They're beating the hell out of each other. Yeah, there's rules. OK, every damn play. We've got to stop somebody.
If somebody is holding, they didn't see the hole. The referees are human beings out there. The last thing that I'm worried about on an NFL Sunday, OK, is whether or not somebody is pushing the quarterback or pushing the running back up the field. I like I want to see what everybody else wants to see. I want to see scoring.
I want to see hits. And I know the NFL, they have to change and market the game. We don't have no Saturday mornings and a lot of bone crunching hits because that's not what the NFL wants to sell because they want they want to market the game.
They want people overseas watching NFL football going, oh, let's eat it up, not let's ban the damn sport from our country. So I just I want to see athleticism. I want to see skill. And let's all be real. It's a tough game. People get hurt and worse. We sign up for violence when we sit down and watch an NFL game.
All right. So you telling me that about a tush push, a play that I will say again. Point twenty five percent point. OK, not twenty five percent. Less than one percent of plays ran.
You will rarely see it. You will really see it outside of watching the Philadelphia Eagles. Get over it. As simple as that. So it's just find something better to do.
This is like the NFL. Oh, we care about safety now all of a sudden. Oh, yeah. Oh, sure. Yeah. NFL kids about safety, player safety, your safety, my safety.
They don't care about nothing but a dollar sign. OK, cut it out. It's the J.R. sport we show here with you coast to coast on the Infinity Sports Network, 888 710 for ISN.
That's 888 710 for ISN. We're going to take a break. We come back on the other side.
No, no tush push. We'll talk about all the things that happened today. Fred Warner getting a new contract, getting ready for the Western Conference Finals tomorrow, the Eastern Conference Finals on Wednesday.
We have so much to get into. And then I also told you that while NFL owners are figuring out about the tush push. We were getting more and more reports and stories from NBA players who think that the draft lottery is rigged. Shaquille O'Neal is getting in on the action, too. It's just it's crazy. You're locked in and you're listening to the J.R. sport we show on the Infinity Sports Network.
