J Mac And for JR here on the Infinity Sports Network. Jordan McDonald for JR Sports Brief. I got you for another three hours. Appreciate your tuning in, letting us be part of your Friday, be it late afternoon or night. We'll stick around for another three hours.
And I got three good guests to join, the first of which is jumping aboard right here, right now. You catch him on SiriusXM's NBA Radio. Every once in a while, you see him on the NBA network on the TV side. And I always learn something when he joins me. The hoops critic himself, Brian Geltz.
I will join me on the Infinity Sports Network. Hey, Ben Geltz. I'm good, Jodi. Too kind, my man. How are you?
Always good when you jump aboard. All right. I haven't talked to you in over a month since the Thunder put away their championship and did so in game seven. Got a little hand in game seven with a specific injury, but they were the better team in the series. They were the better team throughout the playoffs.
They were the better team in the entire regular season.
So they're the best team going into the offseason and should start next year as a favorite, at least in the betting markets. They are. with the moves that have happened since the season ended, would you say someone has surpassed them?
someone has gotten even with them, somebody has gotten close to them, or yeah, that's still far and away the best team in the NBA. How would you describe the shape of the NBA as per the Oklahoma City Thunder with what other teams have do done with their offseason moves?
So I would say this. There's three teams that have gotten closer to them, Jody. One is the Houston Rockets. And I you know, what they did what they did was essentially subtracting Jalen Green, Dylan Brooks, And And bringing in Dorian Finney Smith and Kevin Durant and Clint Capella. Like, that's a big plus for them.
And they're going to be a very tough team to contend with. Are they where the Thunder are now?
Well, the Thunder just won a championship.
So it's very tough to say that. The other two teams I look at are the Denver Nuggets, which the Micah Porter deal was a stroke of genius. They need to extend their roster. It should have been done a whole lot earlier. They did it when they did it, and it was fine.
But the Porter deal with getting Cam Johnson and Vienna, but they had Bruce Brown back and Jonas Valentunis. They become a deeper roster. They needed to be that. And then the Clippers, you know, listen, adding, essentially saying goodbye to Norman Powell. And adding Brooke Lopez Adding Bradley Beal, adding Chris Paul, they're much deeper.
They're going to be able to survive a lot of times in the regular season and win a lot of games in the absence of Kawhi Leonard. And then when Leonard's there in the playoffs, I think they're going to be in great shape.
So I look at those three teams and say, okay, they've kind of made inroads on OKC, who pretty much are just going to run it back. And that's all they really need to do with how well they did and how well they played and winning a championship. But there's three teams there in, I would think, in Houston and certainly the Clippers and certainly the Denver Nuggets that have gotten closer. All right. Let me ask you about two of those squads because I certainly agree with Houston.
Denver, I like what they did strategically and roster depth and everything else. I still don't have a grasp on their coach. I was shocked that they did what they did at the end of the season. Hey, they got to within a seventh game of the eventual champion.
So I can't say the coach did a bad job. But is he the guy to take them forward? Is he that good a coach? Did they get that good a hire? Did they get that right when they let Malone go?
They think so. And listen, here's the thing about Malone. Strategically, he was better than anybody. This was a relationship thing. And David Adaman kind of saw where Malone went wrong and is picking up where Malone was strategically and schematically.
And from there, he's, from a relationship standpoint, he's looking to make better relationships with the front office. Listen, their front office had a very good offseason. For where they were and what happened, I think they landed on their feet. The Malone-Calvin Booth relationship was a toxic relationship at a tire organization. From ownership to the front office, right down to the sidelines to the players.
The fact that they were able to rid themselves of that, Jodi, I thought that was significant. I thought that mattered a lot. And so David Adelman's a smart coach. He's been in the game for a long time, obviously, Rick Adelman's son. But he gets what needs to be done here.
He's the right guy. More important than any of that, he's the guy Jokic wants in the job. And if he's the guy Jokic wants in the job, that's the most important asset that he has. I think he's a very good coach and he's very capable. But the fact that he's Nicole Jokic's choice means everything to the Denver Knights.
Yeah, never a bad thing to have your superstar player say, yeah, you're the guy. That's always going to help. All right. I need to confirm just one other thing. This upcoming season is 2025, 2026, right?
It's not 2019, 2020, is it? You're talking about the clever show, yes, yes, Bradley Beal's best years well behind him. Chris Paul's best years well behind him. Yeah, I think that Kawhi can still play, but you know, Kawhi's gonna get hurt at some point. He's not getting any younger as the years get a little bit further down the line.
You think that they can keep it together to be competitive in the West? I think they're deep enough to get their heads above the water in the regular season. And if they hit the playoffs healthy enough. They'll be in great shape. And that, listen, you make a great point because if you look at the NBA last year, youth was served, right?
Younger teams had more success. Dunder, one of the youngest teams in the league, they won the title. Uh, Indiana young team went to game seven in the NBA Finals. Youth has been served in the NBA, so you make a great point. The Clippers have Some of everything.
And I say that. Listen, the most important player on the Clippers is not Kawhi Leonard, and it's not James Harden. It's Abatsa Zubach. Zubach, I've got a 27, 28-year-old player in his time who was on everybody's ballots for most improved player, everybody's ballots for defensive player of the year, like he had that kind of year last year. Here's my point: you get a guy like Zubach.
With a powerhouse like Leonard and James Harden, even at 36, who can still do what he does, you sprinkle in a Bradley Peale, you sprinkle in a Chris Paul. You sprinkle in a Derek Jones Jr., who's as good as anybody in defending a perimeter in the league. And then you get a Brooke Lopez. You know, Chris Dunn can help with them. They have Bogdanovich.
They have Batum. It's an incredibly deep team. And listen, you have one of the best coaching staffs in the league. You have Ty Lu, who's won an NBA championship, but an excellent NBA coach. His lead assistant is Jeff Van Gundy.
They know what they're doing here, Jody. And again, in a league that youth deserved, I think the older approach of the Clippers was the only approach they could have, and it's the best approach to give them a legit chance against these younger teams. Fair enough. All right, since we've talked about teams that are trying to get better and close the ground with the Oklahoma City Thunder. In the East, well, they've got a bunch of teams that aren't as good as they were because of injury more than anything else, but one that just basically decided, yeah, this is too expensive.
We need to take this back a couple of steps. I thought the Boston Celtics had a chance to repeat. I picked them to repeat last year. Didn't happen. Got waylaid.
And yes, the injury late surely didn't help, but they were going to probably lose to the Knicks anyway before Tatum ever went down. But now Tatum's out for at least a big portion of the season, if not the entire season. They dump, and I use that word with choice, both Drew Holiday and Christoph Sporzingus didn't get near enough in return for either two in my money. I know they've got a very good coach. I know they've got Jalen Brown.
They've still got White is a very good player. But they they they're now a shadow of what they were just two years ago. How is that going to play in Boston this upcoming year?
Well It's gonna be looked at in Boston as a gap year. One thing I'll say is, Jody, with the success they've had, the sustained level of competitiveness, and the championship that culminated in that. I think they have some capital with this fan base.
So, right now, yeah, they're not going to be good. Listen, they've been trying to trade Anthony Simons who they got for Drew Holiday. You know, Georges and Yang was the best piece they bought back for Porzingas. Listen, Bran and White are there because when Tatum comes back, there are good pieces around him. That's the only reason they weren't going to pay Cornette.
And maybe they should have, quite frankly. But they're not going to be a great team this year. And part of this is Brad Stevens playing the long game and reloading this group around Tatum. But one of the things he's indicated here, and then he's given a let us know, is that part of Retooling around Tatum is going to be Brown is going to be here and White's going to be here. And that limits them from a financial flexibility standpoint.
Listen, I thought. That they would look, they would work harder on moving Brown in this offseason. Because, quite frankly, in the second apron era, they have two guys making over $60 million a year, which is what it's going to be with Tatum and Brown starting next year. I just don't know how you can build enough around those two guys. I thought maybe they'd move Brown out.
They haven't right now. It doesn't mean they're not going to. But I think for Boston, Brad Stevens is figuring between sometime now and when training camp breaks for the 26-27 season, he's going to figure out to have a better group around Jason Tatum than what he has now. And that doesn't mean Jalen Brown and Derek White are going to be part of that group. He's got to figure out what he's going to do.
But I know that they've been working very hard to try to move Anthony Simons and have had limited luck and been able to do that on an expiring deal. I don't think they want him there right now anymore. And listen, he hasn't played a game for them, but. Quite frankly, he's not a guy that necessarily plays the game in the way they want the game to be played. They're probably going to be stuck with him going into the season.
But I do think when you look at the Celtics overall, this is going to be, it's a gap year this year, and they will use this season to figure out how to put the best group around Jason Tatum when he does come back at 26-27. The team that finished ahead of Boston in the regular season, but also short-circuited in the playoffs, were the Cavs. They made an intriguing deal this offseason for me in acquiring Lonzo Ball. First of all, if you're a Cleveland, you have to hope that he can stay on the court because he's had too many injuries during his career. But assuming that injuries aren't a problem, how is Lonzo Ball going to fit with them?
Fantastic. Listen, the thing about Lonzo Ball, he's a six foot six guard that can run point for you. When you look at their backcourt, what's Garland? 6'2? What's Mitchell?
6'3, right? They need some size in that backcourt. And quite frankly, in trading Isaac Coral for them, which was a guy that didn't fit what they were doing, he guarded well on the perimeter. He had an okay percentage on corner threes, but any other shot he couldn't make or couldn't create. They decided to say goodbye to Ty Jerome and they leaned into Sam Merrill with what I thought was a rich deal for him.
But again, as the shooter they chose, I think Ball will fit well just because from a size standpoint, and they're not going to need him to play 32 minutes a game. Because 20 minutes a game, he's perfect for them. And I'm not saying he's not going to get hurt. He's gotten hurt. The majority of his career.
But if they can have him healthy in a playoff run, he can really matter for them and be a guy that plays with Mitchell and a guy that plays with Garland and with both Mitchell and Garland at times in smaller lineups. But Lonzo can defend. He can knock down an open three. He's a really good passer. He's a really good ball handler.
He's got a lot to add there. And I think it was a calculated risk for the Cavs, but a very, very good one, Jody. I thought that Lonzo was going to go to Sacramento because they seem to be rebuilding the old Bulls team out there to begin with anyway.
So, why not Ed Lonzo today? They're really trying out in Sacramento. They're not Ed Lonzo, but they're trying. Yeah, exactly right. All right.
One team that hasn't done. anything except watch one of their veteran guys and he was never a star, but he was always part of the fabric of championship teams, Looney walking out the door in uh Golden State. They have made no moves. They have not signed anybody, have not brought anybody in. They've still got Jonathan Kaminga sitting out there as a restricted free agent.
Know there have been whispers about a potential sign and trade with Kaminga. If that's going to be the big move of the offseason for the Warriors, they better get it right. What happens? It's a very interesting situation because, listen, Phoenix has made a big push for Kaminga. Grease and Allen's been the lead offer to equal salary, and Golden State's not interested.
The fact is, listen, they butchered this Kamenca situation. I don't I don't want to bury Steve Curry here, Jodi, because the Curry culture is the right culture. Four titles in nine years, right? You bend to everything that works best for Steph because that's been what's made you most successful. With all that said.
Any coach worth his weight and assault is going to be able to figure out how to Find an effective role for a player as good as Jonathan Kaminga. And Steve Burr hasn't done that. And I mean, we have to say it what it is, he hasn't done that.
Now There are teams out there that are interested in Kaminka and that will pay him. Phoenix is one, Sacramento is another. For the life of me, I don't understand why Brooklyn's not in the mix here. Because the truth of the matter is, Brooklyn has a player. And if they wanted to give one of their good draft picks, whether it's one of their Houston picks, Phoenix picks, you know, one of their own picks, give a decent pickup.
And Nick Claxton, who showed that on a good competitive team trying to win a title, he could play a role when he was with Durant and Kyrie Irving. He played pretty well with that team.
Now, again, it's $25 million a year. It's this year and two more. But you know what? That's the money Kaminga's looking for. And if you're going to bring, listen, Al Horford's the guy they haven't closed yet, mostly because they want to figure this Kaminga situation out.
And it's an order of operations type of thing with why they're not signing Horford first before they figure Kaminga out. But if Horford's going to be there, Claxton's the perfect guy. He's like the basketball equivalent of an innings leader. He'll take minutes up. He can guard the rim.
He's a terrible free throw shooter, but he finishes well at the rim. Good pick and roll dive guy. Can guard guys on the perimeter when he switches onto them. He's a good fit for what Golden State wants to do and a good fit next to Traymond Green. To me, if I'm Brooklyn and I could pair Porter and Kaminga together, I'm all over that.
And Brooklyn can do that if they want to do that. And they have different. Ron Sharp to play center, who quite frankly they like better than Claxton.
So, some of this stuff with Kaminga, there should be more of a market, but Golden State has done such a bad job of upholding his trade value by Steve Kerr's treatment of Jonathan Kaminga. It hasn't been good. And for Kaminga to be upset with the Warriors, I agree with him. Listen, I get the fact that it's Curry culture. I get the fact that getting Curry the ball in his spots is the most important thing in that offense.
And Jonathan Kaminga wants to do his own thing. That's a tough spot for Steve Kerr. But a player this good, when you're certainly at a team that needs every bit of talent that it can to compete for a title, I don't know why it hasn't been better with Kaminga. And right now, the Warriors are in a tough spot because they want trade value for him that they haven't generated through their use of him. All right, a lot of noise since the season ended and it was coming.
As soon as you knew LeBron was just opting back in rather than again forcing an add-on year to the contract that he gets to have command over and leverage of, people started reading into it. LeBron wants out. LeBron's not an LA guy. LeBron thinks he can win a championship somewhere else. You buying any of that?
Is there g give me a percentage chance that LeBron James is on another team other than the LA Lakers this year? Give me a number. Trade deadline, I'll give you 50%. Really? And I say that for this reason.
LeBron has quite frankly never In the entire course of his career, he has been in a situation where he wasn't the most important player on the team that he played on. And he's not right now. And LeBron wanted to step on the Lakers' head to do some things, to sacrifice some future stuff. To be able to bring in the best team they could right now around him. And they don't care about building around him, they care about building around Luka Doncish.
And for LeBron, that's new to him. And I would tell you that if the Lakers found the right deal that worked for Luca, they'd trade LeBron in a heartbeat. The problem is that right deal is not out there. The packages for LeBron and the traits that are out there for LeBron are not anything that makes the Lakers better. And if I'm the Lakers and it's not going to make me better, I'll keep LeBron James.
I don't care. Uh And I think that they're along the right lines there. I mean, listen, could you trade him to Golden State for Jimmy Buttler straight up? Will Golden State do that? They might do that.
And maybe that's out there for the Knicks, for Town straight up. I mean, I think that might work for both sides. That deal is out there as well. The Miami Heat could piece together enough salaries to make that work, where it actually got the Lakers a little bit better around Luca. That's out there too.
There are enough decent deals. The Cavs deal is the one that people talk about that's not really cap-friendly and really could be made. But in Dallas as well, Dallas has been a team that's come up a bunch lately, but unless they're trading Davis or Irving, that's not working. But like when you look at the Knicks, the Heat, the Warriors, even the Clippers in a Kawhi Leonard deal. And I don't know the Clippers would do that, but that's out there as well.
Those are the ones that you look at. The thing is, this: listen, the Lakers are really fine to move past LeBron, and LeBron's fine to move past the Lakers, but it's got to work for both sides. And I don't know that deals have been offered that could be made that would work for both sides, but it wouldn't surprise me between now and the trade deadline in February if that deal materializes. Fair enough. All right.
Last thing. And if I'm being a Biach, just go ahead and tell me that that's the case. But I'm sorry. I never say that to you, this theme's my bean. NBA Summer League.
It's a fun thing. It keeps the NBA season going after you've crowned a champion. Nobody else has got that. It's another leg up the NBA has. But this year, more so than ever before, and I know it's been going on for a while, but and maybe it's all about Cooper Flag.
People are going out there to go to games, have a vacation, double dip, get a lot done, NBA diehards, and they go to the games, and the most recognizable names aren't even playing. It's a whole bunch of guys that are going to be in the G-League or in Europe this year. They shut it down. He has one good game to Scooper Flag done, put him in Mothballs, over and done with. Bunch of the other young star player, potential young star players, they handle the same way.
This is a league where the commissioner stepped in and changed some rules to get load management under control. Will he do the same with the underuse of riots? The only reasons to go to a summer league, being told, yeah, you can take the rest of this short season off. Will the NBA do anything about it or am I just being a pain in the rear end? You're never being a pain in the rear end, but the NBA is not going to do anything about Jokie.
Listen, two things involved here. Number one, if you want to see the top guys in Summer League, book it early. Go there the early times of summer, like the first three nights. You go there, you'll see the guys you want to see. If you're going to book it, I'm going to go to the summer league a little later this year.
If you're going to go to summer league a little later, you're not going to see the topics. I'm going to shut them down. You have to understand that's part of the deal going in.
So I don't think you're being nitpicky, but that's kind of understood. With how this works at Summer League. The second part of Summer League is this: one of the great things about Summer League is that if you're a big NBA fan, Whether it's the hotels that you stay at, whether it's the Thomas and Mac Center, you will see so many different NBA people, personalities, former players, current players, executives, coaches, media people, anybody you're excited to see, you'll see it Summer League. And that's not just the early game, Shodi. That's the entire time there.
There's a lot of different people there.
So if you're going to the right places and the wind and their tower suites area is a big area where you can see as many of the NBA people as you want to see. If you're doing it that way and everybody there is so amenable to fans coming up for pictures and stuff, they're thrilled to see everybody. It's a relaxed atmosphere and almost like a convention of sorts. If that's what you want to do, then that's a great time. You can go there and do that as well.
Again, seeing the big draft picks, you better be there early in the week. Otherwise, but there's a lot of other stuff revolving around Summer League that's fun for people. And again, you're always going to have people that are there the entire week that you're going to be thrilled to see, take pictures with, be able to interact with. Everybody's open to that in the NBA. It's really a unique event in the fact that you can go see the people you watch on TV, that you see play basketball, that you see coach, and they'll be amenable to talking to you.
Like 90% of the guys will have whatever conversation with whatever fan that you want to have with them. And it's kind of awesome.
So I say from that standpoint, I don't know that the commissioner is going to intervene, but if your whole goal in going to Summer League is seeing some of the best high early draft picks, go the first three days. Yeah, shame on me. I want my cake and I want to eat it too. I want to see the best young players and have all those. Doesn't make you a bad guy, Jody.
It doesn't make you a bad guy. But it makes you a bad guy. Me a whiner, and I don't care. Screw them. All right, Geltz, always a pleasure to have you on.
You never whine when you come on. Thank you much for doing it. I will talk to you when the NBA season rolls around again, bud. Thanks much. I look forward to it, Jody.
Always my pleasure, buddy. Have a great rest of your summer. I'll talk to you soon. And good luck to your son in his AAU season. That's Brian Geltzeiler here with me on the Infinity Sports Network.
All right, NBA just wanted to get that in. Love Geltz whenever he comes on, hadn't had a chance as the season ended. And there was some Summer League stuff and the movement of free agents I thought was worthy to talk about. You want to talk to NBA? That works.
Or baseball, probably more pressing at this time. Or football, because you can't wait for the season to get underway. Pick and choose what it is, and then get on my phones. 888-710-4ISN. That would be 888-710-4476.
Jody Mac, in for JR Sports Brief here on the Infinity Sports Network. This portion of the show brought to you by Wesley Financial. Stuck on a timeshare and what out? Contact Wesley Financial Group and get a free Timeshare exit information kit at Wesley Financial Group.com. You're listening to the JR Sport Brief.
It is the JR Sport Brief Show, but no JR tonight. He's got a nice long weekend. Hopefully, he enjoys. Yet, me for the next two and a half hours, that would be Joseph Anthony Outwishes McDonald Jr. Most people just call me Jody Mac.
I want you to call me Jody Mac, and I want you to call me. Get on my phone lines: 888-710-4476. Good spot brought to us by Brian Geltzeiler.
So talk NBA if you want to go. The fact that NFL practice is underway everywhere in the National Football League now. Our first game less than a week away, the Hall of Fame game between the Lions and the Chargers. We can talk anything NFL that you so desire. Or baseball stuff, nighttime action, East Coast games underway.
No trades yet with the games underway, and nothing's jumped out at me from the box scores I've been able to look at for guys who were always starters for their team. And not in the lineup tonight. Can we read in between the lines a little bit? If you see something like that, you want to make a point of it. Get on my telephone lines: 888-710-4476.
This NASCAR race preview is sponsored by WeatherGuard, truck and van equipment. They're just driven as hard as hard-working pros that they serve. All right. This weekend, NASCAR Cup Series heads to Indiana for a packed schedule. Cup Series returns to the fame.
Two and a half mile over for the Brickyard 400 on Sunday, this Sunday, the 27th. They'll drop the flag at 2 p.m. airing on TNT. Practice in qualifying can be found on True TV with just five races left before the playoffs. Drivers like Kyle Larson and Denny Hamlin battling for momentum and championship position, while the final race of the in-season challenge adds a million-dollar incentive.
That's this weekend. All right, Juddie Mac, who will be here this weekend as well, but it's sticking around for another two and a half hours. I need your help getting me through this next hour. Then we've got our second of the three good guests we've got joining us. That would be Rowan Kavner from FoxSports.com to talk all things baseball.
Baseball, football, basketball, you can get on my line right now, 888-710-4476. I'll get back hopefully to a couple of calls on the other side after the latest Infinity Sports Flash. It's officially an act. attack. You're listening to the JR Sport Brief.
That's the show, but you got me, Jordy Mac, filling in for J.R. tonight. Appreciate your being part of it. By listening, you can be an even bigger part of it if you pick it up and check in on my telephone lines 888-710. 44 is 76.
Yours really was here on the Infinity Sports Network yesterday. filling in for uh Bill Ryder. When he does the show it's righter than you. When I do it it's wronger than most. Can make up words whenever I feel like.
But unfortunately at the very end of my show yesterday, News broke that we found out we had lost one of the greatest of all times in his genre. And I can't call it sports because wrestling's not sports. It is. Entertainment. And it is phenomenal entertainment that I've been a big fan of for 50 plus years.
And Hulk Hogan. had a bigger impact On making wrestling a more national outlet than it ever had been before. Vince McMahon, the guy who ran it and did so very successfully. He and Hulk Hogan For me, really put the WWE on the map. There had been some good wrestlers.
I go back to Bruno San Martino when he was the king and continued champ of the WWE. There were some high-profile wrestlers before, but nobody ever took it to the level that Hulk Hogan did when he became the man in the WWE. Passed away of a heart attack. Hulk was in his 70s. And he stayed in the line like.
became more of a political Figure than a wrestler in his later years, but when you hear someone like that passage, it always saddens you. And it's funny because I said that to someone yesterday and said, Jody, I never would have thought of that. Any time you find out that someone that you knew, be it either personally or through their celebrity, passes away, it it makes you stop and think for a second. And here's what I thought of when the hookster passed. You know, seventy one's not a bad age for a wrestler.
Because there were so many problems in wrestling with the steroid abuse, and that's the reason why they couldn't call it a sport anymore, because they just didn't want to take the steroids out of it at a time. Do I know that Hulk Hogan ever took steroids? I do not know it. Do I suspect that that Hulk Hogan tell oh, you bet you bought him dollar? I suspect that.
And almost every other wrestler that has gone through the WWE doors. Um they've had so many guys pass away at such younger ages For the Hulk to make it to 71 was really not all that bad.
So he will be missed. He was one of my favorite entertainers of all time. Our condolences to The family, the Brea family, and any of Hulk's close personal friends. We lost a giant of an industry. What I tweeted after I got off the air yesterday was The word legend is thrown around much too easily.
in our world, our life, our society, and sports is a big part of that. Guys get called legends that I just don't think of as legends. Hulk Hogan was a legend in the race r wrestling industry. 888-710-4476. Oh, it's my guy, Gary, from Jacksonville, coming on in the middle of the show.
Hello, Gary. Hello, my friend. I'm glad you just said what you just said because I read that the other day, you throwing out the word legend, and it was a tough, tough week in the entertainment world. First Malcolm Jamal Warner. Then the passing of the Prince of Darkness, Ozzie, and then Hulk Hogan and Chuck Manjone the same day.
Two definitely legends in their field in Ozzie Osborne and Hulk Hogan. Correct. And the others were very talented in their own literal fields. Don't know that I would call either of those other two legends. No, but I mean, they will be missed though.
Just showing respect for the other two. But the uh Oz, he was the founder of Metal Music, you could say, in so many ways. one of the very at the very early stages of uh he like Hogan took it up a notch There was wrestling. He took her to another level. There was metal before Ozzy.
He and Sabbath took her to another level.
Well said, and I think we're going to do an Aussie tribute, Jenny. We're going to do This is according to LA Times. On Sunday we're going to do a Three essential Aussie songs and three essential uh Black Sabbath songs songs because our Tribute Did you say the uh The emotional interview Ric Flair did on KMSing about Ol Cogan? No, I did not. Where was it?
On TNC, you have to check it out.
Okay. You probably catch it on you on you too. It was only about five or six minutes long, but he got so emotional about a. You know, a lot of times you don't see Hulk Hogan when his son was going through. to addiction.
It's a Hulk Hogan gave them money to go to this expensive rehab. And he tried to pay him back one day. He said, You don't owe me anything. Just I hope your son gets better. And they all.
People don't see a lot of it outside of it.
Well I wasn't jealous of the money he made. I might have been not like the promoters, no art dealers at the time. There's never any personal jealousy with Hulk Hogan. He loved the man, and he said, outside of his family, he was. Remember when Rick Flayer was at ITU?
Yeah. You said uh Holk was one of the first who visited him. I'm not sure if I can do it. He didn't remember it because he was in a coma. He was told that, you know.
Right. And again, use of the word legend. Ric Flair, also a legend. Hulk and Flair are two of the biggest legends in the history of the game of wrestling. And one last thing, Jody.
My Orioles, they started today with Sodo. I think it's got to be one of many moves.
So I expected that, you know. Right. And if you start small with Soto, it doesn't mean that something bigger is not going to happen. I think their DH is all but out the door, but it just hasn't happened yet. We still got six days to go.
Mullins will probably go too. Baltimore is they're out of it. And there are some people coming down hard on the Orioles, my buddy Jason Lockcomfour, and they deserve it. They had a lousy season. But you don't compound it by kidding yourself that everything is okay, just things went wrong, injury here or there.
No, you stunk it up this year, Baltimore. And if you can take a small step back here to potentially, not a given, but potentially take a step forward down the road. You got to do that. The Orioles have to be sellers. Yeah, the math says they're still not mathematically eliminated.
But the reality of the American League East, the fact that the Blue Jays have opened up a fat league, that the Yankees are still a legit World Series contender, that the Red Sox have been over five hundred for quite some time and Cling to that last wildcard spot, they're all just better than the Orioles.
So the Orioles have to, and Tampa as well. I shouldn't leave them out, although they are behind Boston as of right now. Orioles are legitimately in fifth place. You can look at the number of games back you are from the third and final wildcard spot, but you also need to look at up at the number of teams that you have to surpass to get there. And it's a hell of a number for the uh Bost uh the Baltimore.
Let me do that for just a second. Punch up the. I can't, for some reason, get the standings here. Um. On MLB, I'm telling you, they are well behind in the wildcard race.
Maybe not a ton of games, but the number of teams they would have to surpass. Right now, American League. Yankees have the top wildcard spot. The Mariners are second. They're a game and a half behind the Yankees.
The Red Sox are third. They're a game and a half ahead of both the Texas Rangers and the Tampa Rays, who are a game and a half back. Guardians, who have certainly picked up the pace of late, they had a long losing streak before the All-Star game, but have played well since. They're three back. Kansas City Royals are four and a half back.
Minnesota Twins are five back. Los Angeles Angels are five and a half back. The Baltimore Orioles are nine. games out of the third and final wildcard spot. You've still got nine weeks left to the season.
That has always been my cutoff. What I use as a realistic level for a team to be at: how many weeks are left in the season, and how many games are you behind? When you are more games out than there are weeks left in the season. You're dead in the water. We've got Well, like...
How many we got five more days this week, and then we got all of August and September.
So we've probably got ten weeks left in the season. The Orioles are nine out. While they might not even fit by my criteria of being dead in the water, the reason that they are is they need to get past the Angels, the Twins, the Royals, the Guardians, the Rays, the Rangers, and the Red Sox. Not all of those teams are coming back to you. At least some of them are staying ahead of you.
So that's why the Orioles must, at this stage, for my estimation, become a uh seller. The first move getting rid of their um mm m middling bullpen piece and Greg Soto to Metz That's not selling. That's house cleaning.
So the Orioles still have to make a couple more deals. All right, let me get caught up on what's going on in baseball. I told you the Marlins put up a fourth spot in the seventh inning to break a 1-1 tie, beat the Brewers 5-1 today.
So if the Cubs should win tonight, the Brewers and Cubs would go back into a tie for not only the National League Central lead, but for the best overall record in baseball. Games underway now. Yankees have jumped out to a 2-0 lead over the Phillies. That game being played up in the big bullyard in the Bronx tonight. Warren and Walker.
Not the best pitching matchup. Both of these teams have better pitchers. Warren's got three innings under his belt. Tywan Walker, not surprisingly, gave up a couple of home runs already. Bellinger solo shot in the first.
Wells, a Solo shot in the second.
So the Yankees lead the Phillies 2-0 at Yankees Stadium tonight. There are a couple of good. Inter intra squad. Intra means out. Inter means in.
Um. I mentioned the Orioles. They're playing the Rockies. Sure enough, they're winning 4-0 tonight. Don't let it change anybody's mind, Baltimore.
You still need to continue to sell. Dodgers Red Sox. up in Fenway Park. That's a good matchup. It's a fun matchup.
They're in the third inning. Dodgers scratched a run to go up 1-0. Pitching matchup there is she in against Bellow again. Very good teams. With non-recognizable starting pitching on the hill tonight, but Sheehan has not given up a hit in the first two innings.
He has walked a couple of guys, but has not given up a hit. The Red Sox take the early one-to-nothing lead over Boston. And we're going to do an interview with Rowan Kavner from Fox Sports coming up here next. He's an LA guy. I'll ask him about stuff from California.
We didn't even touch on the Dodgers. Dodgers are going to be one of the most interesting teams leading to the trade deadline because. They can realistically look at their lineup and say, We've got the best roster in baseball. They don't have the best record anymore. There are a couple of games behind the Brewers and the Cubs.
But they do have the best roster. They've got Shoe Otani, who struck out his first time up tonight. But if he homers, it'll be six straight games that he would have homered in. The major league record is seven straight games. He tied the Dodger record several other Dodgers, including his teammate Max Muncie, who's on the injured list right now.
But Muncie had previously had home runs in five straight games. Shoe going for number six. They've got arguably the best roster in baseball. They've got some pitching, which is still injured, that they believe is still on the comeback. They know better than anybody else where that pitching is really at.
But the Dodgers are the most all in team in all of baseball. Their ownership group is ready, willing and able to pay any and all luxury tax. They've proven that before with the amount of money they've spent on this team. Are they going to make a move for another big priced player, heavy salary player, heading toward the postseason? Maybe.
We've got six more days to figure it out. All right, Jody Mackin for JR Sport Brief tonight. Two hours in the books, two left to play. We'll talk all things Major League Baseball with Rowan Kabner, FoxSports.com. He's next here on the.
J.R. Sport Brief Show.
