JR SportBrief Hour 3

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That's BetterHelp H-E-L-P dot com slash grow. It is the J.R. Sport Brief Show on CBS Sports Radio.

Come to you live from Atlanta, Georgia. Our super producer and host, Ryan Hickey, holding it down for us on the boards in New York City. Thank you so much for locking in to CBS Sports Radio. Thank you so much for listening to the J.R.

Sport Brief Show. I'm coming to you live from Atlanta, Georgia, which I said, and I love it so much. I don't know where you're at, but thank you for listening. On the free Odyssey app, your local CBS Sports Radio affiliate, Sirius XM Channel 158, a smart speaker, cbssportsradio.com.

Another way that I don't know about because you are your genius. Shout out to somebody listening on a submarine. Shout out to the military. I know you are. Anyway, so much going on right now.

It's Thursday. It's the beginning of March Madness. Is your bracket busted? Duquesne winning and beaten BYU. Did it beat up your bracket? Dayton came back, I guess saved a couple of brackets.

Tom Izzo wins again. It's just some some things old, some things new, like a wedding. Hickey, you know about that, right?

When a bride gets gets married, the bride is supposed to wear something old and something new. You've heard of that, right? No, I've actually not heard of that.

You're not a woman, I guess. Well, yeah, no, that's that you're right about. Yep, yep. Never mind.

I had examples, but never mind. Let's get some scores real fast. You ready for that? Does that make sense, Hickey?

It's time for a J.R. Sport Brief Show tournament update. All right.

I told you there's some things old, some things new. Let me give you some of the latest and some of the newest in current scores. Right now, this moment, this second, Texas is handling Colorado State 29 to 15. For some reason, Kentucky is asleep at the wheel. There's five minutes left in the first half. Oakland, Oakland is beating Kentucky. Well, now it's tied.

Twenty five all. Twenty five all Oakland and Kentucky. There has to come a point in time where the Wildcats are just going to run Oakland off of the court. That's not this minute.

That's not this second. Iowa State in control over South Dakota State. Iowa State leading 22 to 12 and Gonzaga. They are leading McNeese right now.

Eighteen to twelve. Let's think about some games that ended earlier today. I told you some things that are old. Tom Izzo winning. That's that's old. Used to it at this point. Tom Izzo wins his fifty sixth.

Let me say it again. Tom Izzo wins his fifty sixth overall victory in this tournament. This is Tom Izzo's twenty sixth straight appearance in March Madness.

This is a Division one record. Michigan State knocks off Mississippi State 69 to 51. Speaking of something old, let's hear from head coach Tom Izzo. He said that he is proud of the toughness that his guys and his team showed, especially how they defended and rebounded. It was an old school win for us. The Cleavises and Smiths and Petersons and, you know, Draymondts and all the guys from the past would have been proud because it was a it was a tough, rugged game. And we haven't been bringing that all the time this year.

And I thought we did a hell of a job of it. I made this very clear. You don't want the toughness of Draymond Green. You don't want that.

You don't want that at all. No, Michigan State is going to move on to take on North Carolina. North Carolina beat Wagner today.

Sixty or excuse me, 90 to 62. It was a beat down, an absolute beat down. Some of the other scores that we had.

How about this one? An upset. We had BYU head coach Mark Pope on the show yesterday when head coach Mark Pope finished up with us. I said, I got BYU beating Duquesne.

This is Duquesne's first appearance. In forty seven years, they walk away with a victory. Duquesne wins seventy one. To sixty seven.

Let's listen to the final call courtesy of Westwood one NCAA radio network. Four point three seconds to go. Duquesne up seventy one. Sixty seven. Hall, half court heave.

No good. Out of bounds. Duquesne can do seventy one. Sixty seven. Their first NCAA tournament win since nineteen sixty nine as they knock off BYU.

Seventy one to sixty seven. Duquesne. That was that was a shock.

Didn't expect that one. Duquesne head coach Keith Dambro after the game beaten BYU. He said he was proud of his guys, proud of his team. They never quit and they kept their foot on their next foot on the gas at the end of the game. We've been in a million of these things, so I thought we did an unbelievable job of taking their punches and punching back. They wobbled us for sure. You know, we were wobbly legged.

You know, we had a cut under our eye, over our eye, but we just kept fighting back. We just made enough plays. And again, nothing has come easy for this group. We've had to do it the hard way. We were running uphill all year, just trying to get to five hundred in the league. And, you know, we went to George Mason and VCU and we went a squeaker against George Washington. And then we played pretty good basketball in the A-10 tourney, but certainly we were tested in that as well.

And I just think that the more times you put into those positions, the more you respond. And also says a lot about just how tough the guys these guys are. Hey, congratulations to Duquesne shocking everybody beating BYU 71 to 67.

Listen to this. Illinois, they beat Morehead State. No shock there. Eighty five to sixty nine and next hour and about an hour from now. We're going to Hickey, who do we have joining us from Illinois? Who's coming through? Their head coach, Brad Underwood, scheduled to hop on.

Oh, love it. And a matter of fact, in about 15 minutes from now, we're going to have a conversation with bracketologist, author, writer, basketball expert, college basketball expert from CBS Sports. Jerry Palm is going to come through and chat it up with us in about 15 minutes. Think about some of the other teams to advance about this one. Arizona knocking off Long Beach State.

Eighty five to sixty five. The Magic Carpet Ride, if you want to call it one, is over for Long Beach State. Magic Carpet Ride is also done. It's over. It's a wrap for their former head coach, Dan Monson.

You might recall, you've probably seen this story. Dan Monson was told before the conference championship, before the Big West Conference championship, that he was going to be fired. His team, Long Beach State, they lost five straight regular season games. And the athletic director, Bobby Smitherin, basically said, you're done.

Just coach out the rest of the tournament, but you're done. Well, he didn't just coach in the Big West tournament. Dan Monson won the Big West tournament. First time that Long Beach State did it since 2012. They made it to the big dance. But of course, unfortunately, they lost to Arizona.

Eighty five to sixty five. And so Dan Monson, knowing that he was a lame duck, almost for the better part of two weeks, his story is finally done. But he told his players afterwards, you have nothing to hang your heads about. It was emotional in the locker room, but I made him look me in the eye because they got there was no heads down because I can't be more proud.

This group needs their heads up high and I want to thank them for the ride. He goes on or he goes home and that athletic director looks like a massive jerk. I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt to at least respect him to finish up the season.

But. I'm going to do this to motivate the team and I'm going to pat myself on the back because it worked. Are you a loser? Sorry, athletic director is a loser. What a stupid mentality that is. How about they fire him so the team can win a championship if we want to utilize his logic?

Anyway. Arizona did move on. What are they going to face? Dayton.

That's right. For a while, it looked like Nevada was going to smack them the hell out of the tournament. Dayton comes back. They fight back. They go on a 24 to four run at the end of the game. They trailed. And then they went on a 17 hour run at one point in Dayton moves on. This is their first time in the round of thirty two. First time advancing past the first round since 2015. They're the first team to overcome a 17 plus point deficit since twenty eighteen.

Wild a 24 to four run to close the game out. Matter of fact, their head coach, Anthony Grant, he spoke to the media and he talked about how proud he is of his team that they were too legit to quit. What a battle. What a battle. Just really proud of our guys. They never quit. Showed tremendous resiliency.

And they've they've done that a few times this year, you know, where the where the chips weren't in our favor. They found a way. And so I'm just I'm extremely proud of the fight, the grit, the determination that our group showed tonight. That's a good basketball team that we beat. And they've they've had a great year, but our guys never, never gave up. I'm proud of the way they believed in each other, believed in what we're doing.

Yeah, that's that's cool, right? That's a coach talking to the media. That's a coach talking to the press. Totally different when the coach actually has a conversation with his players. Let's listen to head coach Anthony Grant of Dayton after his team bounces back to beat Nevada.

This is his locker room speech. This is when the fun starts. This is when the fun starts, right? Got that win. Hell of a fight.

Hell of a fight. You never gave up. Man, you never gave up.

All right. Listen, I've been a part of this thing before. That right there was what you would call a near death experience. You know what you did? Didn't die.

You didn't die. You found a way. You found a way. OK, so listen. So right now we know what it takes to win in the postseason. We know what we got to do. All right.

I am so proud of you guys for not giving up on us, for not giving up on yourself. That's that's great. I like I mean, I've heard more impassioned speeches, but hey, what do you call that, a near death experience? Yeah. Oh, yeah.

You saw the light. I mean, well, 24 to four run at the end of a game. I guess so.

Right. Let's see what Dayton can do against Arizona. Maybe I'm just playing the odds here.

And the answer is yes, I'm playing the odds. I'm going to go ahead and say that Arizona is going to take care of Dayton. I think Arizona had a little bit of a warm up here against Long Beach State. And if Dayton is going to perform like that against Nevada, I'm going to say Arizona is basically going to pick the bones.

I mean, if that's the approach that you want to have to the game, they're going to go out there and pick the bones. Let me give you a quick score on the games that are also right now. It's time for a J.R. Sport Grief Show tournament update. Still rolling, still active.

There has not been a runaway yet. It looks like it's going to be close pulling into halftime. Oakland still leading Kentucky.

Still a close one at this point. Oakland leads 36 to 35, 90 seconds to go in the first half. Texas still handling Colorado State 35 to 24, about 13 minutes left overall in the game. Iowa State leading over South Dakota State 31 to 24, six and a half minutes to go in the first. Gonzaga leading McNeese 25 to 17, about eight minutes to go here in the first half.

We have four other games for the evening, for the afternoon that have yet to tip. Coming up for the rest of tonight, St. Peter's take on Tennessee. North Carolina State, shout out to all my folks with the Wolf Pack. North Carolina State is going to take on Texas Tech.

We got Samford and Kansas. And then to conclude the evening, the last game of the day, we have Drake and Washington State. It's been busy.

It's been a busy day, an afternoon, an evening. Hickey, your bracket is still good. You said it was perfect, right?

It's not perfect anymore. I jinxed myself, but we're still in good shape. Who screwed it up? Well, Delphi Oregon, Jermaine Kuznard, great performance.

Well, boy, did he screw me. But it's South Carolina, that one. Forty points. How about this Gamecock, play a little defense. Yeah, beating his old team 87 to 73. Oregon beat South Carolina. Kuznard taking on his former team.

He dropped 40 points. As a matter of fact, let's listen to Jermaine Kuznard, because I know he spoke at the end of the game. Jermaine Kuznard talked about his grandma and how she really added to the extra motivation. Everybody's grandma is a motivating fact, I think. This is courtesy of CBS Sports.

Everything, man. This is my grandma's first game here this season. So I knew I had to make sacrifice for her. Just one day, that's all I dreamed up for her to come to one of my games.

And man, she was able to come tonight. Yeah, well, you got Creighton up next. Drop 40 again. OK, that's it. High hopes. It's the J.R. Sportbree show here with you on CBS Sports Radio. We are going to take a break. When we come back on the other side, it is time for a conversation with a bracketologist from CBS Sports. It's Jerry Palm. Jerry Palm joining us to talk about everything that we have seen, what we will see, what we should look forward to the rest of the tournament.

It's the J.R. Sportbree show on CBS Sports Radio. Oh, should we start this show? Yeah, I'm down. Just buying a car and carvana first. For real? Yeah, it's super convenient. I already got prequalified in two minutes. All I had to do is answer a few questions. Oh, that's helpful. And now just customizing my down and monthly payments. Oh, that's a very fair deal. Yep. Boom. Just bought a car and you get to take me to the Carvana vending machine in a couple of days to pick it up.

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The J.R. Sport Brief Show here with you on CBS Sports Radio. So much action to open up March Madness. Yes, we know about the first four games.

We know about Tuesday and Wednesday. But by the time you roll to Thursday and get to Friday, you got games all day. You got games all night.

You have brackets that have been busted. Thank you, Duquesne. You have comebacks. Thank you, Dayton.

And then we're not even done yet to talk about it all. Joining us right now, courtesy of CBS Sports, he is our bracketologist. Thank you so much for joining us, Jerry Palm. Jerry, how you doing this busy Thursday? I'm all right. How are you?

Absolutely fine. With so much to get into, I guess the first question I'd like to pose. What has caught your attention today amongst all of the games and all of the storylines that we witnessed? It seems like the lower seeds are getting off to good starts in all these games. You know, a couple of them have won. A couple of them have made them interesting.

A couple of them faded. But the lower seeds are showing up ready to play. And the higher seeds are not coming out of the gate as quickly as the lower seeds are, even if they do run them down and eventually win. Well, Jerry, we have a game going on right now between Kentucky and Oakland. Oakland leads at halftime 38 to 35.

That would certainly be a massive upset. You want to talk about some of the lower seeds getting off to a hot start. What the heck is going on with their Kentucky? Yeah, well, they're not really defending the three point line, which, you know, is I mean, the lack of interest in defense is eventually going to get Kentucky in this tournament. Either they're going to figure out that they have to play defense if they want to win this thing, or they're going to take a day off playing defense and somebody is going to beat them.

And I don't know if that somebody is going to be Oakland, but if it's not Oakland, it'll be someone else. You know, you have to commit to play defense. It's it's not just something, you know, it's not like you're shooting is you're shooting where you you're shooting, you'll come back. No defense is a commitment. And Kentucky doesn't really commit to it. They're capable.

We've seen it at times, but it makes spot appearances in this tournament. They're going to have to play defense, especially later. They go in this tournament if they're going to stick around.

Well, Jerry, that's that's Kentucky and Jerry Palm is joining us courtesy of CBS Sports, CBS Sports dot com bracketologist. What team do you believe is playing that defense and can kind of shock people going on through the tournament? Oh, you mean among the teams that play today?

No, the entire field. Oh, Houston's got the best defense. That's their M.O. That's a really good defensive team. That's how they win.

You know, they're going to be hard to break down. It's why they're one of the favorites to win this thing. Sometimes their offense is spotty, like against Iowa State. But, you know, their defense is pretty reliable. And that's why they're one of the best defensive teams in the country. Well, you talk about Iowa State right now. They're heading into halftime, 38 to 28 over South Dakota State.

A lot of people look at Iowa State and say, oh, they can they can certainly, you know, go on a run. What are your thoughts on what they've been able to do going from the conference tourney and now even the start here in this first round? Well, that's another pretty good defensive team. Iowa State is one of the top defensive teams as well. It's, you know, it was an impressive run through the Big 12 tournament, beaten Houston by, I don't know, what was it, 30.

Just annihilated them. So that's a team that's on a hot streak. Sometimes you go out, you win your conference tournament when you weren't expected to. Not that Iowa State was way down the standings or anything, but and you kind of run out of gas. You get into the into the NCAA tournament, you start kind of slow or maybe you get beat early. Well, that's, you know, that's probably not going to happen to Iowa State.

I mean, they're built for long term success because, you know, their M.O. is defensive, just like Houston's. Houston's has been better over the course of the year, but certainly not as good when they played each other last.

College basketball expert Jerry Palm is here with us. You talk about defense. Well, we saw an offensive explosion. Jermaine Kuznar drops 40 points for Oregon against his former team, South Carolina.

Oregon wins 87 to 73. How much how much juice could he potentially have in the next game? Did he shoot a shot too soon here?

I don't know. It'd probably be a lot to ask for him to come back with another 40. You know, that's probably not realistic, but, you know, he's a good player. But yeah, I don't think I would hold out. I don't think he's getting 40 against Creighton.

You know, that's a that's a different animal. South Carolina is a good team. Creighton is a very good team. I don't think anybody's getting 40 on Creighton. Another matchup that we saw earlier today, and I feel like we see this every single year, feels like for the past 25 years, for the most part, is Tom Izzo and the Spartans walking away with another one. And this is a record.

This is a record now. 26 straight appearances. He's 20 and six in the in the opening round.

What's the special sauce here with Tom Izzo besides experience? Yeah, good players usually. It's unusual for them to be down around an eight seed. They're usually much higher up the bracket, significantly better than their first round opponent. This time they've got an eight, nine game.

They're the nine in this game. And when they got their shorts turned around the right direction, they were able to put it on Mississippi State. And Mississippi State looked like a team that hadn't been there before. And I don't know if they were there recently or not.

I don't remember off the top of my head. But, you know, almost, you know, like happy to be there kind of a thing. And Michigan State was more businesslike in their approach. And it worked obviously very well for Michigan State today. That's about as well as they have played recently in that game against Mississippi State. And they might have something for North Carolina if they could play like that again.

That was going to be my next my next question. North Carolina with a little bit of a warm up against Wagner. North Carolina is going to be playing close to home. Do you take North Carolina against Michigan? Yeah.

Yeah. I like them against Michigan State. But Michigan State playing the way they did today will be able to put up a fight.

But Carolina is Carolina is better. They're playing in front of a home crowd. It's going to be tough for Michigan State. Another game that that went final.

This took much more of a of a bounce back, if you want to call it one, a 24 to four run. Dayton knocking off Nevada. They got a date with Arizona.

I'm going to assume that they have used up a lot of energy and a lot of gas. What say you or what was your observation from what Dayton just did? Yeah, we were listening to that game on the radio.

I'm on my way to Indianapolis for the games tomorrow. That we were stunned. It was like Nevada had this thing in the book that it was 17 point lead in about five and a half to go. And Dayton puts up a 17 nothing run to tie the game. And it was it was defense. You know, they they put a press on and Nevada just could not handle it.

Kept turning the ball over and given Dayton easy points. And that's a it's a great comeback. But it starts with you got to make a shot so that you can put the full court press on.

And then it was a very effective press. And yeah, Dayton, you know, tremendous comeback. It's they were fortunate to win. And it's but now you get Arizona and you're probably not going to be able to do that against Arizona. Arizona's big and strong at every physical, at every position. It's it's going to be it's going to be tough for Dayton to beat Arizona.

Jerry Palm is here with us, bracketologist for CBS Sports. When you think about the tournament as an overall and as we march towards Phoenix, who do you have seen in Phoenix who's hitting that final four? I took the three teams that dominated college basketball this season. Yukon, Houston and Purdue.

And I also picked Arizona, Arizona. I get to see them in Indianapolis earlier this year when they played Purdue. That's a good team. They played well in non-conference play, kind of swept walk a little bit through the Pac-12, which, you know, they are so much better talent wise than everybody else.

I think they just laid a few eggs. But I the talent is there for Arizona to make a deep run. And I think Arizona is going to go and get the home crowd and play in Phoenix.

OK, now, Jerry, we've had a lot of controversy. I know a few minutes ago we talked about Tom Izzo. We know the teams that got in over the past four days. We know the teams that didn't get in on Sunday that pitched a fit out of the Big East. We heard Tom Izzo's explanation. Everybody has an idea about how you can make the tournament a little bit more equitable.

What say you? What do you think about the standing of the tournament and how teams get in and not get in and how they are rated and whatnot? I think the committee just had a rough year.

I mean, usually they're they're pretty good. I mean, the Big East teams that didn't make it all had perfectly good reasons to leave them out. Everybody who got left out gave the committee a reason to leave them out. The only team that got in that I just thought didn't make sense to me was Virginia, but it wouldn't have opened the door for a Big East team. Oklahoma with their first team out. So, you know, the the Big East needs to play better, especially outside the league.

That's that's how you get in. You know, you schedule good games outside the league and you win those games. And, you know, three teams did that this year. You know, the Yukon and Marquette and Creighton are all great teams and everybody else just kind of muddled along.

And muddling along is not necessarily going to get you in the NCAA tournament. Jerry Palm here with us. CBS Sports bracketologist. When we get to Phoenix, the confetti is falling. The tears are falling.

The nets are falling. Who's holding that big trophy? Purdue. Wow.

Finally getting over the hump. Tell me, is anybody ever been more do than Purdue? It's you know, they've got the best player in Connecticut, the best, probably the hottest team, best team going in. There's probably a dozen teams actually capable of winning it. But Purdue is going to repeat what Virginia did. That's my pick.

And now I have to say up front, I'm a pretty guy. So take that for what it's worth. OK. Of course, most Purdue fans, you know, are probably thinking, you know, wait, wait for something stupid to happen.

OK. Honestly, I'm waiting for something stupid to happen because something stupid tends to happen to Purdue. So maybe this is the year that finally nothing stupid happens. Yeah.

I mean, at some point you finally got to get over the hump. Does this mean that Zach is he's going to improve his his draft standing, right? You know, until NBA guys figure out how to use guys like him again.

I mean, if he was, you know, more, he's the same height as Wamayama, but if he had more of a game as him, he wouldn't be at Purdue this year. You know, that they just, you know, guys like Shaq, you know, Zach needed to play in Shaq's era. Shaq wouldn't be in the NBA right now.

You can imagine that. Young, wait, young Shaq, Jeffrey, young Shaq on LSU. They but he they don't play guys like him anymore.

OK. He can play on the perimeter any better than Shaq Eddy can. He was never out on the perimeter.

Never. If you can't play on the perimeter, if you can't defend on the perimeter, they don't have use for you anymore. And, you know, Shaq was one of those guys. But, you know, and there were other guys, you know, and Zach is one of those guys, at least for now, is, you know, the painter says Coach Painter says he can shoot threes and shoot them in practice all the time. But that's not how they use him.

Because why would they? But, you know, we'll see. I hope somebody gives him a shot. I just think if you can't figure out how to use a guy who's that good, you're the idiot, not him. Yeah, well, we see a lot of the NBA. We got a lot of idiots because all these idiots are doing a shooting threes, Jerry. You got a good point, man. So we'll see.

Not most definitely. Well, Jerry, thank you for the time. Let's see how things continue to roll out here in the tournament and on the brackets. Where can people follow you and all of your work with CBS Sports?

Yeah, on CBS Sports and then also Twitter, J.P. Palm, CBS. Hey, Jerry, thank you so much. Safe travels and good luck with everything.

OK, catch you soon. All right, thanks. No doubt about it. That Jerry Palm bracketologist, CBS Sports. Yes, Purdue winning it all. He's taking a look at Zach Edie and he's saying, listen, man, Purdue A is going to get over the hump.

And then besides the hump, maybe Edie will also improve his draft standing. And he had some comments and thoughts on Shaq. I want to talk more about that on the other side of the break as well. So the J.R. sport show here on CBS Sports Radio, the phone number eight five five two one two four CBS. That's eight five five two one two four CBS. Next hour, we're going to have a chat with Illinois head coach Brad Underwood.

That's going to happen next hour. What's the first thing you do if you'd had more time in the day? Take a nap, read a book, talk with a friend. When you know what's important to you, it's easier to fit it into your schedule. Therapy can help you figure that out. Better Help offers affordable online therapy that comes to you. Start the process in minutes and switch therapists any time.

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The J.R. Sport Brief show on CBS Sports Radio. Let me tell you something. Kentucky might need a lifeline. Oakland is leading Kentucky 43 to 40. Little less than 17 minutes left in a game. Yeah, they just came back from halftime. It's very early. But there's a reason to be concerned.

And thank you so much. Right before we went to break, Jerry Palm joined us, a bracketologist from CBS Sports dot com. And he said that Kentucky, if you got to take a look or if they have a bugaboo, it's the fact that they play no defense. And unless they wake up and decide to play defense, they're going to have heart attacks like this, even against Oakland. And they are still playing it close. You would think you would expect that Kentucky would go on a run sooner than later. We'll keep you up to date on this game as it continues on. Currently, 43, 42, Kentucky at the free throw line, looking to even up the game. 8 5 5 2 1 2 4 CBS.

That's 8 5 5 2 1 2 4 CBS. Amongst everything that's going on today, Dayton's bounce back, Duquesne beating BYU. One thing that we discussed with Jerry Palm. He thought he thought Purdue was going to come out on top and ultimately win the championship and said that, yeah, they're pretty much do. And then I asked him a question, not not so much in jest, but I'm like, hey, you know, if Purdue wins the national championship, then Zach Edie, the seven foot four center for the Boilermakers.

He's going to elevate his draft standing, right? He's seven foot four. He's a center. And Hickey, we talked about this a little bit the other day, like he's seven four, but he don't move like when Benyama. Right.

He's he's more so a traditional center. And, you know, then Jerry made the point that. You know, somebody like Shaq wouldn't be playing or be utilized in today's NBA.

And I had to go, whoa, whoa, wait a minute. I know we got a few different versions of Shaq. We got Shaq with the Orlando Magic a little bit leaner going up and down the court, giving you 20 and 20 and blocking shots.

Speed demon. We got the incredible Hulk version of, you know, Shaquille O'Neal down low with the Los Angeles Lakers just abusing everybody. And I'm thinking to myself the point that Jerry made. I think Shaq would be playing today and I think he would be even more unstoppable because the players are I don't want to say the players are smaller, but they are like the guys are smaller. Now, everybody's lean and thin and running up and down the court. Shaquille O'Neal playing today would be like a souped up version. Of Giannis Atteracumpo.

That's it. Giannis Atteracumpo goes to the back, goes to the basket, finishes at the basket. No one wants to see him as lean and mean.

And yeah, he's put on plenty of muscle over the past few years to help his case. Giannis just goes to the basket and nobody could do anything. Well, I think Shaquille O'Neal, he would be doing what Giannis does in an even more abusive way. He would basically be a combination of Giannis Atteracumpo and Zion Williamson and Shaq would be destroying people if he played today. I disagree with Jerry Palm respectfully.

Hickey, what are your thoughts on that? Do you think Shaq would be able to play today? I'm surprised Jerry said that. It's interesting just because like I think to your point, if he like was like more like the Lakers Shaq, like size wise, like everyone's too skinny now. Like even Giannis for our Jack is like Shaq would just body mass wise push everyone around. I think the tough part would be just having coaches accept that because now it is like a three point shooting league. And it feels like, you know, whether it's analytics or just style of play, it feels like everyone's like, all right, we got to shoot threes, got to shoot threes, got to shoot threes. I just don't know how many coaches, I'm sure there are some.

There are definitely some. But how many coaches would sit there and say, we're going to get Shaq twenty five paint touches tonight and have that work in our favor? Yeah, I don't know if it's so much paint touches.

I don't know if it's slow the game down. You run down the court, you give him the ball and he just goes straight to the basket. That said, Shaquille O'Neal for as big as he was underrated athlete, underrated. This is crazy to say Shaquille O'Neal wasn't just a bulldozer.

Shaquille O'Neal had touch. He had handle. Was he out there crossing people up and this and that? No, he was not. But the man was light on his feet for as big as he was. He was skilled. And I literally think that they would just get him the ball and go down low.

I don't think it'd have to operate in a post manner. If he's in the post, give him the ball. He cooks. Be like Joel Embiid. If he's cutting to the basket, give him the ball. Nobody's doing anything. Just go over the guy.

Everybody moves out the way. And Giannis doesn't take as many three pointers as he did a few seasons ago. Giannis has cut back on that.

A Zion Williamson. He's not out there, you know, putting up three. Zion Williamson is just going to the basket like a bowling ball. And I dare I say this, you know, for as poor of a free throw shooter that Shaquille O'Neal was. If he was playing today, every now and then, not every not all the time, not not by any stretch of the imagination. Every now and then I could see him just put up a three just to keep people honest.

It wasn't necessary when he played, not for him to take them, not for him to practice them legitimately, because they played inside. I think and I've heard Shaq say this and I agree with him. They would give him the ball. And I think the other team would be in foul trouble in an ideal world. Now, on the reverse, you could say, oh, well, you've given Shaquille O'Neal the ball in 2024. And he's the one fouling everybody.

Offensive foul, offensive foul, offensive foul. But I just think he's he's so skilled. Hey, Hickey, I'd love to see it there. I don't want to say there are few. The stars would transcend. You know, there's a lot of people who look at the current stars and say, oh, well, they'd be too soft for an older era.

There's older stars that people say, oh, well, what would he do now? I think Shaquille O'Neal is one of the NBA players that when you say all time, all time, all time, I think we could put him in a time machine. He would dominate in his era, which he did. I think he'd dominate the errors before him. I think he'd be dominating right now if Shaquille O'Neal played ball right now.

And I also heard Jerry Palms comments about his defense. Oh, yes. He. Do you want him defending anybody outside?

Yeah, probably not. No, you wouldn't. He didn't have to do that. Shaq had to defend the paint. If he was lighter, the younger Shaq. Yeah, even even then, he was he was good at playing recovered defense, but I wouldn't necessarily have him on a perimeter.

I think he'd do a good job. But let's put it this way. He's more athletic than Joel Embiid. People would tell you Joel Embiid is a good defender, right? People look at Jokic. I think Jokic is actually an underrated defender. Is he blocking shots? Is he sexy? No, but he can certainly, you know, hold his mark and kind of keep his man from from getting an easy basket.

I think Shaq would kill. I'd love to see it. Hickey, what what what video game do we have to simulate? Do we do 2K, right? 2K.

That would be a lot of fun. What are we up to now? 2K, 25. Is that where we're at? Does this mean I don't play a lot of like a lot of video games in general. This is going to be maybe a stupid question. Does NBA 2K, do they do the the year or is just NBA 2K? I don't I think they do the year.

How do you how do you delineate one season to the next? I don't I mean, I guess maybe just like my friends say, you know, you don't play 2K. It's just like that's like the slang. And it just assumed it's like the older, you know, the newest version. I think it's the slang. So it's 2K, 20.

Yeah, I guess to be 25 right there was due to like a year ahead. I don't know. I don't know.

2K, 25, let's say the 2K, 24. I think Kobe's on the front. Yes. Yeah. NBA 2K, 24 with Kobe on the front. And I'm almost certain that when you get the game, you can play, you know, past errors. And I don't know, somebody needs to simulate what the hell Shaquille O'Neal would be doing against these teams.

And I think it'd be abuse. Just my just my two cents. It's the J.R. Sportbree show here with you on CBS Sports Radio two cents, Texas beating Colorado 56 to 43. You want to think about some of these other games going on right now? Oakland leading Kentucky 52 to 49.

Wow. Iowa State beating South Dakota State 42 to 38 and Gonzaga leads McNeese 48 to 25 at halftime. It's the J.R. Sportbree show here with you on CBS Sports Radio. I'm going to share with you some more scores. We're going to take a look at some of the news that's going on in the sports world. And in about, I don't know, 30 minutes, we're going to have a conversation with Illinois head coach Brad Underwood.

It's the J.R. Sportbree show CBS Sports Radio. Old man winter here. If I had it my way, it would stay winter all year long. Short days, wind chill, black ice and a good polar vortex.

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