NBA Free Agency has been frenetic, and will Kevin Durant stay in Brooklyn?

This is the best of the Adam Gold Show Podcast brought to you by Coach Pete at Capital Financial Advisory Group.

Visit us at capitalfinancialusa.com. This is the Adam Gold Show. I'm Hayes Permar. I'm in the union of fill-in hosts who all get employed this week. Big week for the fill-in radio host union. We come strong. We do membership drives during this week because everybody's like, man, a lot of fill-in radio hosts getting gigs this week. Yeah, I remember the first time I was ever back in the studio post pandemic was us doing like a July 4th or 5th show in 2020 when no one was here. Yeah, no one was here.

Yeah, that was I mean again part of the union card carrying members. No one's here. Brian Geisiger from acsports.com is here. I have reached out to some other folks just about different topics during the week, you know, some national media guys who I know who you like, you know, tend to talk on these things.

They're all at the beach. They're like, I don't know man, except for the NBA guys. You might be able to because because they're like waiting for a Kevin Durant trade to come through and maybe you that's those that's the one lead you could maybe pull from and we've got NHL draft this week. Yeah, so so we will talk some NHL a little bit later.

It's going to definitely be one of those subjects where I'm there to bring on people smarter than I am so they can educate me as hurricanes draft. Can they do that? Are we allowed to do that?

They should try just see if it works. Well, no, here's been my younger brother. Here's here's how we get kale mccar. Yeah, we we smuggle them into the state. We tell everybody his name's kale maker maker cow maker. That's right. It's cow. It's cow maker.

He's a NASCAR driver. Yeah, then we got him in here for you know, keep him in here for 90 days. So then we declare rights. Give him a give him a fake residence at in Lake Norman. Yeah, just a p.o. box and like nor had give him a real trip to Lake Norman and maybe you'll want to stay. This is great. Like give them a couple of golf rounds in the middle of the state somewhere guys to 32 Bojangles car. That's yeah, we all make we're all in on cow maker, but now can we trade all our draft picks for him? But give me give me give me that that is our advice though to the to the hurricane is like go find the dude that's like that and then draft it.

Can you go find the best player in the world? We've done pretty well recently Jeff. Jeff Jarvis was a couple years ago, right?

That's enough. Yeah was the year before that, right? Yeah, and then I hope not too long ago to 16 maybe 17 and he was second round pick to so hopefully we'll see some more value picks like that right now the NBA the big news is all the free agency that's going on. This is how I know whenever you come on with Josh Goodson lie, you like have to brace yourself for the stupidity where like, you know, you're like, all right. Well Darius Garland's good player. We're like Darius Garland is not a good player because I've never heard of this guy but so like that is kind of a joke and we play into the I don't know anything about the NBA the man nothing made me feel more removed and unknowledgeable about the NBA than seeing dudes that were getting max contracts and I don't mean this in the oh my God students getting so much money sports are stupid.

Like that's it. That's you parachuting in on an ESPN headline and not having awareness of you know, what contracts are worth these days or whatever, but there is an element of who's Zach Levine max contract Darius Garland max contracts were even if like I've heard of these guys, but they weren't on my radar as being like, you know max contract guys that to be fair. I think there is some discussion to be had sometimes you get in that situation where the player is just so good in order to keep him the only place you can get to is is max contract right and so there are guys like the Paul Georges or the Andre Iguodala of the world who are like maybe have gotten max contracts, but they don't it's fine for your max contract. It doesn't mean that like you've got to be Yanis Steph or LeBron right at some point how it works when their contract comes up the time it is you've got to play guys that even though they may not be on that super duper duper duper star level. That's just sort of my own commentary on the thing you can talk about that or in general what's been the biggest move so far in free agency or the most surprising one.

Yeah. Well also you were real close to knowing Darius Garland very well, like he almost went to Duke. Okay, they ended up using trade getting Trey Jones to be the point guard. I know he's not a max contract.

That's fine. He did not sign a max contract. His older brother Tyus signed a really nice deal to come back to play for Memphis again and be jobs back up and that he and Moran play together to Memphis is just they've got a really nice deal. This is just they've got a really nice thing cooking in the oven there, even though they're probably not going to be the two seed like the West is going to be so good next year that Memphis will probably come down a couple of rungs. That's just the nature of it.

Um, I mean the biggest trade so far has been until Durant, you know, maybe gets moved. Although now, like Shams was on the Pat McAfee show earlier today. So Dennis's old buddy Pat McAfee, I guess Dennis couldn't get Shams to come on here today. He's Cox. Yeah, sorry.

He's fun to live for the side. Just like everybody else understood. I get it. I haven't taken days off. Get get woe John here.

I want to woe job on the Adam Gold. But like Shams was saying like a little bit ago that Brooklyn is behaving in a way that they intend to bring Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving back to next year's team, which like we'll see this all feels like a bit of a smokescreen. But the biggest move until Durant potentially gets traded or Kyrie goes to the Lakers and like a trade for Westbrook, which would be hilarious, was the Minnesota Timberwolves and Utah Jazz swapping a bunch of stuff in exchange for Rudy Gobert.

So a lot of good players. Patrick Beverly, Jordan Vanderbilt. These guys were starters for a Minnesota team that was in the playoff a year ago. Walker Kessler draft pick Leandro Balmoro, who was their first round traffic a year ago for first round picks.

I believe all without protections and some pick swaps without protections as well. It's like it's essentially seven draft first round draft picks in two guys that started on the roster this season in exchange for Rudy Gobert. So you're bringing in an all NBA center to partner with Karl-Anthony Towns, another all NBA center. Now they're going to try to play towns at the four and let Gobert clean up some of their weaknesses, which were they were a bad defensive rebounding team. They could not protect the rim. We saw Brandon Clark and John Moran pummel them in the playoffs last season against Memphis. So you let towns who can really shoot play the four.

You have Gobert be the guy that cleans up all the messes at the rim defensively is your main pick and roll screen defender. So Minnesota is going to be really, really good, like at least in the regular season. They should win a lot of games on paper if they're healthy. They're going to be good.

This is going to be an elite defense. Anthony Edwards, who if you don't love Anthony Edwards already, you should. You should probably watch him play basketball.

You should watch him in the movie Hustle, which he was really excellent villain in that movie. But so they've kind of gone all in, I think, on Anthony Edwards making like another big jump, becoming an all star next season. And Karl-Anthony Towns, like really like turning, you know, becoming the biggest and best stretch for in the NBA next season. And certainly they'll still play some center and they'll stagger he and Gobert, but they treated a ton of picks. And now they're a little insulated because they have Anthony Edwards, who's 20 or 21, is a future all star. You have towns who's an all star and is still just 25.

So you're a little insulated from it. But it is a big risk and a big bet to go all in on the Gobert towns front court, which could get played off the court at times in the playoffs or have issues offensively because Gobert is a little limited. Gobert is a little limited offensively, but they're set up to be a really good team, a good team. Next season, Wendell Moore, who was at Duke, was not involved. It was one of the few draft picks or young players that was not involved in this trade.

So Wendell Moore Jr. going to play with this crew next season. So that was hands down the biggest move. I think there's some thought that perhaps does the Gobert does the package that was exchanged for Gobert, does that do anything to the market for a guy like Kevin Durant, who not apples to apples, but like is just a superior player to Rudy Gobert, is one of the best players in history. Basketball is still averaged almost 30 points per game last season. I don't think it has to like I don't think it's like, oh, because you talk about this much now, Brooklyn's going to want this much. Brooklyn's going to want the farm for Kevin Durant, no matter what else happened. But I do wonder if that has caused like because the sum for Gobert was so large and because of the Durant possible trades, just kind of being a little gridlocked in terms of at least of what's like publicly available right now.

It does feel like that's just put in a freeze on everything else for agency wise for a couple of days now, except for T.J. Warren from NC State who signed with the Brooklyn Nets this morning. Congrats. I saw T.J. Warren like a month ago in downtown Raleigh.

Congratulations to him. T.J. Warren always pops up around Raleigh. Well, I shouldn't say he likes shopping at grocery stores that have nice food.

Yes. I don't want to say where he shops or if people. I've seen him. I've seen him at one as well. But he's always so unassuming, right? Like there's nothing he's never walking around. I've seen him at the North Carolina Museum of Art as well.

Very cool. Huge congrats to him. Two years he's been out. Yes, basically hasn't played in like two years while he's been dealing with injury. But really, like since the bubble, he's played very little basketball. And he's playing on a one year deal because he's going to have to prove it, which makes sense. But I think that's good for him, too. I think he has a very good chance, especially, you know, when he's playing on the team that obviously he's not going to be guarded by the number one guy. It just depends on what he could be an off the bench guy. But like they could also be very easily like in the next couple of weeks, they could trade Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving.

And all of a sudden you're rebuilding. And yeah, T.J. would, assuming he's healthy, would get a lot of playing time and touches to just try to boost his value and get back into free agency. He's just always had such a knack for scoring. Yeah, he's put on Earth to score basketball. Yes, he seems like the guy who like when he when he couldn't go on his foot, probably stood still and worked on his three point. You know, like I'm I'm betting on a comeback year from T.J. Warren, even after stats price suggests a two year layoff in the NBA doesn't lead to much of a promising career. But like, I feel like T.J. Warren's got game left in him. Also, his thing, too, was never like, oh, he's got this incredible first step. His thing was like he's incredibly crafty. He's got incredible shooting touch. He's big. And again, the floater, which is like an impossible to defend shot. And he is elite at it for someone who's, you know, six eight or whatever.

So, again, a brilliant score. But we're still kind of waiting to see what's going to happen in terms of restricted free agency with DeAndre Ayton, who if the Phoenix is going to manage a trade for Durant, whether it's a two team deal with Brooklyn or they need to involve a third or fourth team to get the requisite assets to send to Brooklyn. Ayton's probably going to be involved in that in some way, shape or form. But he again know like this whole entire season after everyone was saying, pay the man, pay the man. Like being mad at Phoenix for not offering him a max extension last offseason. Nothing's happened so far.

One of the best young sinners out there. We're still waiting to hear about what's going to happen with James Harden. Like he declined a player option for next season. That would have come in at forty seven and a half million dollars.

And it does seem like like he'll like the new contract he would sign would be for more years, but for a lower like annual value. And apparently he was the Sixers were chilling in the Hamptons this past weekend and looked really fun. Yeah, everybody was taking off this week.

We've got to do it. The legislature, the front offices, nobody was working this weekend. That's another reason why nobody was leaving another conference.

Nobody's working for July weekend. So I'll be curious to see because Philadelphia has had a really nice offseason like in general. I'm sure they're going to work something out with Harden.

So like that just seems like a matter of time. We're still waiting to hear on Colin Sexton. I guess we're still waiting to hear on Montres Harrell.

But that could be in a bit of a holding pattern after some of his. I got no I got no beef with Montres Harrell. People who are asking, whatever, I don't want to get into it, but people were like, oh, this can't be a record. He got caught with weed. Yeah. Three pounds of weed.

But I don't care. People are like, this can't be a recreational amount. I'm like over a certain amount of time and with a couple of friends and most certainly can be. Yeah. This guy's not that is not drug dealer level weed to me. Don't be.

No, no, no. Carmelo Anthony. Still a free agent.

Still in the lead. And also he is also a restricted free agent. But Caleb Martin, former NC State Mark Godfrey, the pack pro. We saw his twin, Cody Martin, resign with the Hornets last week. Thirty two million dollars over four years, which is awesome for a second contract for a second round pick. My guess would be Caleb Martin is not going to get something along quite those lines, but is going to sign for a guy that was like kind of in the league, kind of not in the league. His first couple of seasons had a nice year with Miami.

And I would imagine there's a payday down the line for him. But just everything is sort of frozen right now because of Durant. Always cool seeing things like that happen where dudes that you weren't sure if they were going to make it in the NBA and then they lock into those deals.

Like we saw it with Danny Green bouncing back and forth the G League. We saw it with P.J. Tucker. I kept saying P.J.

Warren. By the way, are those both guys that Lavelle Moten worked out with? Yes. Danny Green and P.J. Tucker?

Yes. But dudes are like, you know, you weren't 100 percent sure if they were going to be long term NBA guys. Then when you see that, like the tide turn is like, no, these guys are now, even if they're not on the team they were this year, somebody's going to get them. The power of the three point shot and also sort of like figuring out your role and just being a star in your role can really extend the career of guys and make them.

P.J. Tucker signed up for a lot of money with Philadelphia this offseason, even though he's Chris Paul's age, you know what I mean? He just stands in the corner and defends and like plays and shoots threes.

But like, yes, that's a very valuable skill set. You mentioned Cody Martin signing with the Hornets. We'll talk some more about the Hornets, including Miles Bridges, what he has done to his situation and what's going to happen in his situation. And other questions surrounding the Hornets and free agency with Brian Geisinger next.

Seattle Gold Show. Hey, sperm are filling in on national sports radio guest host week. Fortunately, it's a four day week. I mean, I'm not saying I don't I'm not saying I don't want to be here. I'm just saying when there aren't a lot of sports to fill the week, it's easier to get through four days than five.

I just wonder how it is for people like me who are full time. But I yeah, I did deal with it. Can't you like don't you get a guest host on a guest produced on some other shows? Like you get to be the regular producer here and then you get to be the guest producer somewhere else.

Well, I did do that on shows last week. Yeah. Okay.

All right. Yeah. And you get to complain about being there all the time. There's nothing to do here. I got to do double the work. Right.

So now I get to do the complaining. Brian Geissinger, I'm going to attempt to stump Brian Geissinger on NBA knowledge with knowledge that was given to me by the producer of the show, Dennis Cox, just for the program. Brian Geissinger, do you know what the Charlie Ward curse is? Oh, it's the has something to do with the New York Knicks.

They're like they haven't drafted a point guard in the first round or they have not resigned a first round pick or is it a first round point guard since Charlie Ward in the 1990s? Are we going to give him credit? What do you say? Yeah. If you don't give me credit. Hold on. I thought I thought you were going to the either the correct the wrong right or the wrong buzzer or the right ding ding ding.

I thought you know, I actually I was I was going to give you the right ding ding ding. But they have not signed any of their draft picks to a multi-year extension. No multi-year extension since Charlie. So I'm going to go ahead and give that to you. I think we're going to give it to him. That is correct.

I put the guard qualifier. Yeah. Oh, you got the you got the applause. Even better. It's a pretty good.

It's even more high prestige to the ding ding ding. But why? OK, we're talking NBA free agency. What a poorly what in what a just like inept franchise. And also like keep it up, guys.

What you're doing is definitely going great. It's working. I mean, they will resign R.J. Barrett. Right. Like he's they could sign him to an extension this offseason. He'll definitely be brought back. The curse of Charlie Ward will be over soon.

Oh, I think it ended. That was why it came up. Mitchell. Mitchell Robinson.

He broke it because they drafted him in the second round. That's right. But also like kudos to NBA players for like having the the smarts and savvy for knowing, man, I need to get out of here. Yeah, it's time for me to leave. You drafted me and you had me. And now now that I'm picking my spot, I'm going like the whole point of NBA contracts feels like has been to honor free agency because the league realized it needs to be a thing. Like you can't just lock guys in, say once you're drafted by a team, you're there for 20 years. Right. But to make it financially viable for teams to hold on to their dudes.

Right. So in theory, guys are incentivized to make more money by staying with the team that drives them. And yet nobody wants to. They can sign for more years, more money with higher annual increases in your salary. A lot of this is also just like New York and James Dolan and whomever is running the front office for him at that time. Like, you know, they traded for Carmelo Anthony in 2011 by trading a host of good young players and picks when like Carmelo Anthony in four months after that was going to become a free agent.

And they could have just signed him for using cap space. So that probably also. But that was that was 12 years ago now. It's not.

It's not. Yeah. Be fair to the Knicks. It's not all the guys who have decided not to sign with you. It's that you have foolishly traded away some of these guys who never have the opportunity to resign with you.

Sure. Looking a little bit closer to home with the Charlotte Hornets, the biggest question I think coming into free agency was what happens with Miles Bridges, a restricted free agent. I mean, basically, if I understand right, Charlotte could have matched any offer that somebody made that we would have seen what he got.

He obviously had a good year to go into restricted free agency and test the market forever. But late last week, we had reports, including pictures and video of domestic abuse. He was charged, arrested and charged with felony assault. I don't know exactly what the updates are on the charges.

But where do we stand right now with Miles Bridges and what the Hornets are doing or not doing from him? Have they officially said anything about it? Yeah. Not other than that, they were in the NBA put out a statement similar to this, but both just both just saying that they were gathering facts and information, which I think is probably the right thing to do at this point. I do think both will come down with more of a hammer in the not too distant future.

But between now and then, yeah, it you put out a statement basically that says nothing, but at least notes that you're doing your due diligence to gather all the facts. Yeah. Look, Miles, he's he had a really nice season two years ago, but this year was a breakout year. You know, 20 points per game for assist, seven rebounds per game was, you know, a guy that you could run offense through that could play with Lamela was just 24 years old. And, you know, looked like he was in line for 100 plus million dollar contract this offseason.

And it sort of seemed like Charlotte had not just Lamela to build around, but they had like a second tent pole. And as far as like the extension with Bridges, for me, that felt like a like not an if but win situation, in part because even at the draft, I mean, even regardless of what they did the draft, I thought that was going to be the case because Charlotte could offer more years, more money because they have his bird rights no matter what. Like they could always outbid or match any offer. But also at the draft, they had the 13th and the 15th selections. They drafted Jalen Durnan with the 13th pick and they traded him to the Detroit Pistons and the three team deal that also involved the aforementioned New York Knicks. And they didn't get a player in return for that.

Right. So but they got some future like middling second round picks and a late first round pick. I believe that belongs to Denver for 2023 or it's Denver's pick, but is owed to Charlotte.

It's probably not going to be that good. But so they basically took the salary slot that would have been Jalen Durnan's like four or five million dollars for the 13th pick. And they effectively like just deleted that that line item off the books, in part because it was like, well, that's more money you could throw to Miles Bridges for next season and stay below the luxury tax, which they just they never pay with Michael Jordan as the the owner of the governor.

Obviously, all of that has gone up in smoke and Miles Bridges. What he did to his wife, Michelle Johnson is her name is it's disturbing. It's disgusting. I'm I mean, you know, I can't say enough words to express my like disappointment and sadness. You hope everyone in the family, Michelle, the children, you hope, like because these kids witnessed this, you hope they're OK.

There's just no way to scrub what he did, especially now that there's there are photos and images, but also like him doing this and then him fleeing and not being there when police arrive and then posting bail hours later. And this is something that is, you know, I think the NBA has it. This is a society issue, but the NBA has its own like within the NBA.

They have problems with this. And it's something that I do think like the Hornets will probably resend the qualifying offer for Miles Bridges, which would make him an unrestricted free agent. My guess is that there will be some type of suspension for him via the NBA. Speculation, obviously. But that seems likely. But beyond that, I don't know. And like the hope would be that there is something that the league does to take a stand on this that goes beyond just a punishment for Miles Bridges.

Like they need you. Miles is going to need help after this. Not like he's the sympathetic character.

He's not. But, you know, the league needs to do something as far as like education, prevention goes beyond just a punishment for a player, because there's still plenty of guys in the NBA that are coaches, that are players on rosters that have also been charged with domestic violence or accused of domestic violence. And so there needs to be something in place to actually like to mend those fences. But with Bridges, it's it's beyond disappointing. And what he did is obviously completely sickening and unacceptable.

And again, most importantly, you hope the family is OK and that they're safe and supported with Bridges. Like, I'm sure he's not done in the NBA. Like, I bet he'll play, but I don't think it's going to be any time soon. And I'm hopeful that it's not in a Hornets uniform. And so you don't you think the Hornets should move on from them at this point?

I think they need to. I don't think I actually don't think there's like another option. You know what I mean? And you hate to think about it in these terms, but it's like, yeah, eventually, like he'll probably sign two years from now or whatever he'll sign with another team.

It'll be for very cheap. And that will probably be frustrating. But like, that's beside the point. You know what I mean?

You cannot sign this guy after what just happened. All right. OK. I'm not just playing devil's advocate here.

I'm not just taking a side just for the side of an argument. I 100 percent echo everything you've said about it being disgusting, disappointing. Makes you not want to cheer for him. Makes him not want to be a guy who plays for a team that you're a fan of.

At the same time, I don't think it's such a tough needle to thread. You always want sports leagues to put safety and well-being of people first, not just their athletes. Right. But other people. You mentioned the family, not only the wife experiencing the direct violence, but the victim of the children.

I don't believe that. A domestic violence incident is a disqualifier for ever having a sports athletic career again. Is that a fair?

I'm not saying that he should be rest aside. But and so I don't have a good answer for when is it OK or what is it OK? I'd almost like I'd like to say that, like, it would be nice if I meet the legal system wasn't abysmal, that like if you went through that and then you came out with like the proper vanishments on that, then OK. Then you could try to reset your career, assuming that also came with X amount of counseling and help and therapy, like for anger management or for for violent, like any of that sort of stuff. Like, I guess I'd be willing to hear that conversation, but just like none of those guardrails are in place, man.

Yes. And the other thing about it is we've spent so long ignoring coverage, like for the sake of league images, not wanting things to get out where it's like, man, if throughout the whole course of your history, or at least if you had a twenty five or thirty year track record, any league of treating this like a very serious issue, we'd be OK with, OK, a person has served their legal time. They have taken hits financially that counts as punishment. They've been through league stuff. I'm OK with them trying to have a career again because they, you know, and they seem remorseful and whatever. You know, again, it's tough issue.

I never would want to be seen as being light or soft on it. And I do think it has the added build up, like you said, of so many years of doing it, handling it the wrong way that even if they started doing it 100 percent right, you'd be like, all right, but I don't trust you because for so many years, we know that you would have helped a player lie to cover up something just so that we didn't have to hear about it associated with your league. And that's not just the NBA. That's every sports league and even extending beyond sports like companies. I mean, it's also like even you see like your league insiders who covered the NBA.

Woad, Shams, Chris Haynes, Brian Windhorst, these guys that that trip over one another trying to break like, oh, this veteran sign for the minimum with, you know, Chicago or whatever. But like TMZ reported this. It's like no, no one around the league wants to everyone wants to sweep this under the rug.

Yeah. No one wants to talk about it in like if and when Miles Bridges ever plays in the NBA again. Like, it's not like people aren't going to like mention this stuff on the broadcast. Like it's going to be like, where was he the last three years or two years or year or two months? Like maybe some maybe some team out there is gross enough to sign him after this.

Or it'll be, you know, try to come back when he's, you know, I'm sure some people will look at the player of the league in the second round. You know, I guess I'm of the if if we are much whatever, I don't think people should go to jail forever for domestic violence. I don't think it's a life sentence. I think it's a side that we've realized people living together is sometimes a tough thing that doesn't ever excuse violence. It should be punished all to be punished, prosecuted. People should be protected. It should be talked about more than it is. It's just so I again, I by saying I don't think the guys should be banished from the NBA. I hope that it doesn't put me in the camp of, oh, well, you're just soft and trying to cover it up, right?

It is a very tight needle. We've done it so wrong one way. I'm OK with us if we're overcorrecting a little bit. But ultimately, I do think there's a a place where people should, like I said, first starts with the law.

It's nothing there. Well, but like but yeah, admitting it up front, educating players. And it's not education of we don't want this to happen because it's going to look bad for our league. It's here. You know, here's where anger management can be a problem.

Here's where if you're doing these things, sometimes they can lead to these other things or, you know, learning about yourself, learning about life and what relationships are like. I it'll be an interesting situation. I'm with you on I prefer the Hornets not to sign him. You can't bring you can't do it. Especially right now.

Yeah, I don't think you can do it. I don't think he should be playing. I don't like I don't want to watch him play basketball anytime soon. And I don't think he should be playing basketball anytime soon. That's like should not be the priority for him right now.

I think that's it in there are channels to get help for this that don't that don't require you being on an NBA roster to do also. Well said, Brian Geistiger, ACC sports.com. He's going to stick with for a couple more minutes because we're 90 minutes into the show. We got 90 minutes left. It's halftime. All right, I want to start off with something that you brought to my attention.

That's right. 25th anniversary of Lilith Fair. Twenty five years ago, Lilith Fair. Who was your favorite Lilith Fair artist, Brian Geistiger?

I've got I've got a list for you. Do you remember Lilith Fair? No, is it bad that I don't know what this is?

You don't know what it is at all? That's definitely a generational thing. Lilith Fair was basically on the heels of like Lollapalooza when music festivals were becoming a thing. This was an all female one. Oh, so it was like Sarah McLaughlin, Terry McBride. Yes, she was the big name. Cheryl Crow, Jewel.

This is definitely a generational thing because it was like even if you didn't know it, like they were spoofing it on Saturday Night Live or something. You know, it was like it was talked about Paula Cole, where have all the Cowboys gone? Susan Mary Chapin Carpenter, the Cardigans. My only beef is how did Julianna Hatfield end up on the secondary stage, dude? Come on, Susanna Hoff's secondary stage?

That's the Bengals. But nah, Lilith Fair was huge. It also feels like in the wake of Supreme Court rulings curtailing abortion rights, feels like Lilith Fair needs to make a little bit of a comeback. That was one of the things that they it was it was a women's concert. It was pressing women artists, female artists to the front of not only in their field of like, hey, you know, female artists should be able to headline festivals and we can throw successful festivals just as well. We don't have to be the eighth person on the bill behind Red Hot Chili Peppers or whatever.

And I think they also, you know, use it as a chance to activate and engage with women about women's rights and other things. So 25 year anniversary to Lilith Fair. I was hoping there'd be like somebody super cool on like the second or third list. They're like, nobody ever heard of in 1997, like Adele. Like Adele so-and-so, some 13 year old singer that was there just like her.

But I didn't find anybody that was like, oh, man, they're huge now. But yes, Lilith Fair. I'd be lying if I said I ever went to a Lilith Fair concert, but it was like a cultural. I own CDs of Sarah McLachlan, Sheryl Crow, Chacey Chapman, Jewel. I don't own a Paula Cole CD, but I own the Dawson's Creek soundtrack. So I think that counts. Yeah, it counts.

Because I don't want to wait. I like Mary Chapin Carpenter, Love Emily Harris, Lisa Loeb, Indigo Girls. I mean, come on, that's a strong lineup.

I would go see a lot of those artists, but in 1997 as a senior in high school, I probably thought I was a little too cool to get a little fair. What next up on Halftime? All right, over the weekend, longtime ESPN personality and the original sports betting guy, Hank Goldberg, passed away. Wow. Hammerin' Hank.

Hammerin' Hank, age 82. Wow. Not the only thing. Not the only thing. One thing I didn't like about this, and there's probably somebody who knows Hammerin' Hank from like the first 50 years of his career that I don't know about that associated him with the Indianapolis Star or something. But to me, he was always ESPN, right? He's always the dude that Berman talked to. And he also was talking gambling when I didn't really understand gambling, right?

Yeah. Like Berman would make his picks against the spread. I'm sure there was a very mathematical formula that Chris Berman was using.

No, no. But I didn't even understand what it meant of like, wait, you just picked the team to lose, but what does it mean they're winning because they're plus four? I don't even understand. But I always associated Hammerin' Hank Goldberg with ESPN, and all the headlines were like, CBS is Hank Goldberg. Okay, I get that he finished his career. Or that he was a sportscaster in Newark in 1962 or whatever. It's like a Call to Tutor, long time North Carolina legend, right, who finished his career with WRAL writing for online stuff.

But if somebody said WRAL's Call to Tutor, I'd be like, now hold on, hold on. By the way, according to Wikipedia page, Hank Goldberg, part of the brotherhood, studied at Duke before graduating from NYU. Oh, just like my dad, started at Duke and left.

All right, he's in the brotherhood. But you got to be good to make a career in gambling like before the internet. Well, every league, I mean, everyone now is just like, yes, give us the money. But once upon a time, they were sidelining it as heavily as possible. And like, I mean, you know, a certain programming like ESPN wouldn't allow it. Like they wouldn't let their Monday night crew say what the line is, what the over under is, but like randomly they're like, all right, all right.

Nobody's watching, you know, the Gillette NFL matchup at 11 p.m. on Saturday. We'll let Hammerin' Hank come on there and just talk to the degenerates about what's going on. I used to when I think of like being like a kid first watching ESPN, the two like really old reporter or three guys. I remember Hank Goldberg, Dick Shapp, and Bino Cook. Do you remember Bino Cook?

Oh, yeah. R.I.P. Bino Cook. There's no way he's still alive. No, he's been dead for probably a decade now. He looks like he was about to die. Every time he was live on air, you're like, that guy's going to die when he gets off the air. But no, Hammerin' Hank, he was a good one. Again, it was like, I don't even know if I necessarily understood what he was talking about all the time. He just, you were like, nice.

It's good to see Hammerin' Hank back there. I'm 12. I don't know what it means. What's next? All right. Final part here of Halftime Entertainment. I'm going to touch on a couple things related to Stranger Things. Now, season four just on Friday dropped their final two episodes of the season. I'm not going to spoil anything because I have yet to see the final episode. Spoil away. I ain't watching it. Spoil it. No. Spoil it.

I don't care. I've been off after season one. Wow.

It really is. Okay, you can't claim overrated when you haven't seen the whole thing. There's better shows out there. You've seen season one.

Yeah, I think you can. Finish what you were saying because I'm going to chime in. And I'm kind of with Brian Geissinger on this one. Okay, well, season four has actually been the best season in my opinion. So, did you even try season two, Brian?

No, I didn't actually. See, I watched season one and it was really good. There's a lot of thrill. I mean, monster thrillers are hard because at some point you have to produce the monster, right? And that ultimately can be disappointing. There's a lot of movies that are like this, you know? Even like the new Batman movie, I feel like it's really good when it's the suspense of finding the villain, but then when I feel like it drops off- Paul Dano shows up. It drops off a little bit once you start realizing things, right?

Spoiler, yeah. So, to me, Stranger Things has that same vibe of like, whoa, whoa, what's happening? Oh, lost. That show, it was like the anticipation of what's going on was better. Once they started explaining what was happening, it was like, all right, this kind of stinks. Or I suspended my belief long enough, I could suspend it no longer. So, that's how it was with Stranger Things.

The build up, the lights, obviously the 80s nostalgia was cool, but then once you had to actually explain everything, it was like, no, this explanation isn't as cool as it should be. Well, here's the thing. That's not the main monster. Yeah, I see. But there are more seasons for that. Multiple monsters, yeah.

Yeah, okay. Well, anyway, as I was getting to- RIP, who'd they kill in season one? Barb? Barb. I was mad about that.

They never brought Barb back. That pissed me off. Okay.

Well, sorry about that. All right, what else you got from Stranger Things? All right, well, Stranger Things, they're going to have one more season, season five, and it looks like they're going to start filming that next year. So, it looks like it's going to be released in 2024. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. And it's going to be shorter than this current season.

Well, how could it not be? Didn't they do a two-part, a bifurcated season four? Yeah. You can't do a two-part season unless it's your last season. Although, Netflix is like, we kind of are struggling right now.

So, you can just make some more of those, we'll give you a big bag of money. Well, the second part of season four is only two episodes. All right, but still- But they're long episodes. Bifurcated seasons are only for final seasons. You can't have a two-part season four and then just go back to have a regular season five. It's not how this works. I don't know if they're going to do a regular or not. It's not how any of this works.

I don't know. Yeah, but I'm kind of like BG. I'm surprised at how huge Stranger Things has stayed, and I'm trying to figure out exactly what its sticking point is. And again, admittedly, I tried to go along with season two and was like, I can't stick with it. Definitely, part of it is, the show is objectively good and slick, you know what I mean?

Just because we say it's overrated doesn't mean the show isn't good. And by the way, I'm getting texts from people listening that are angry with us right now. As they should. As they should. But also, there is a massive media apparatus around it, where Buzzfeed is going to write 72 stories a day.

They're all going to go trending about what's up with Will in the most recent episode of Stranger Things. The other things I give them credit for is, it is hard, sitcoms in the 80s used to always struggle with this problem, but the good thing was the kids were always the fifth most important character, right? The adults were the thing. Like when you start a show with kids that are like 12, you have no idea what these kids are going to be when they're like 16 and 17.

I don't mean that from like a looks, you know, like you don't know what you're dealing with. And so kudos to them for like mostly keeping the game together, I guess. But yeah.

Especially like there was like a pandemic that happened in the middle, it's happening still, but like that probably complicated things as well. Do you have beef with, I can't remember what the exact thing they got wrong. I see some people that are like, love the Durham references, but then I see Durham residents who are like, hey man, you can't be intersecting Cornwallis and I can't remember what, like you can't be- There's a coal mill road. Where is the verisimilitude here?

Come on. Yeah, you can't be naming a corner of a town, like you're just name checking two streets and you didn't actually check to see if they intersect when you said to meet at the corner of Cornwallis and something else. Like that I don't like, that's like taking a ferry from OBX to Chapel Hill. I wish the creators of Outer Banks would get mad at that. They're cubbing our style. We have horrible geography on our show.

That's our lane, all right? Like local small towns like Raleigh and Durham, yes, I'm calling them small towns. They love to be name checked on big shows. They hate it when you get some reference like nitpicky wrong. They do not like that. Well, they actually did here in season four directly refer to Durham, North Carolina in this season. Fantastic.

They still don't know where the roads are. Brotherhood also. I'm looking at the Adam Gold show doc, the official roadmap of how this show is run. What happens, what's going to be talked about, what audio will be played, all the plans laid out here before me.

And you know, that's how Dennis Cox and I talk, what do we want to talk about? We add things in, hey, I need some audio here, hey, here's some cool audio you should use or hey, here's some updated info and Adam Gold, much like the rest of the world is off on vacation this week somewhere, hopefully having fun. Everybody's just chilling, shoveling horse stuff around his horse farm and just not doing the show. He's probably working.

He usually is. But usually the stuff on the document is the stuff from the last show, so like you're going in there and taking stuff out, right? But there was one note that was clearly left specifically for me. It says Gold won his first four Wimbledon plays, I think he's updating on the weekend. Then it went the other way. Richard Gaskette and Liam Brody both lost.

Then we didn't get a break of serve both ways in the first set of Rafa and Adal's straight set wins. That's minus 300 right there. Good thing India got the better of England in cricket. Really Gold? Really? Yeah, he bet on it. Plus 165 and Raleigh's Chesson Hadley finished in the top 20, actually made it in the top 10. That was a plus 350. I respect that. I respect Gold betting on the local gods and winning.

So that is plus 315 in the stretch, and he ends with Hayes, don't screw it up. So Gold is basically up $4,000 so far this week. Units.

Units. We're going to see how far I can bring that down with my reckless plays. It is time for Place Your Bets. Place your bets, place your bets, here we are. I bet you slice into the woods a hundred bucks. Gambling is illegal at Bushwood, sir, and I never slice. Damn it! Okay, you can own it.

I owe you this. By the way, I took on a futures bet, Webb Simpson to finish in the top five of the John Deere. Didn't even make the cut. So therefore now he's Charlotte's Webb Simpson. Okay, Charlotte's fair enough.

I could have told you. John Deere is not. He's saving for the Wyndham. Some guys, Tiger builds his schedule around the majors.

Webb Simpson builds his major around the Wyndham, baby, because he literally named a baby after the Wyndham. That's where he got his first win. He's always good there. He's going to be good again. Don't sweat it.

He'll be back. All right, where are we starting? I'll go first.

Go for it. It's upset season in Wimbledon, baby. I don't like that Rafael Nadal, one of the guys that I want to cheer for, is going against the only American left on the men's side, Taylor Fritz. I don't like that, but he is a Virginia guy, but Taylor Fritz beat Rafael Nadal earlier this year. Granted, it was hard court and it wasn't with a potential grand slam title in the line, but Fritz is one and one against Nadal, so he's not scared, and I just find good value.

Very rarely do you find somebody, well, I mean, anybody playing against Djokovic or Nadal is usually a pretty big underdog. I like the value in Fritz plus 220, I'm putting 100 units on that. That's going off tomorrow morning, so I had to get that in today. We'll be able to recap it tomorrow. That's my first play. Okay. I'm going Major League Baseball. About a month or so ago, I was on the Shohei Ohtani home run bandwagon, and he finally did hit one. I'm going to go back on that bandwagon.

Ohtani hits a homer plus 425. Okay. All right, I feel that. All right, next up, I'm going with another underdog.

I don't like all underdogs, but it does have the potential for a huge payday. Very rarely in baseball, much like tennis, once you get to this deep in a grand slam tournament, it should be 50-50 for everybody, right? Maybe you got the better starting pitcher, or maybe your team has a better hitting lineup, in which case you're like minus 160 or something, but the Astros are big old favorites over the Royals tonight, and my man, Zach Greinke, who does not sign autographs... Did you see this last week?

Yes, I did. When he pump faked a kid, and acted like he was going to come over and sign the ball, and he's like, nope. Zach Greinke's one. Joey Votto's one of those dudes, too, who he's not a jerk to people. He doesn't cuss at you, or throw things, or do mean things, but I am totally fine with an athlete to the opposing fans being like a little bit of a jerk, in ways that don't matter, right? You can't actually go up and knock a beer out of a guy's hand just because he's an opposing fan, right?

I say do it. But if he's talking smack to you, and you want to talk smack back, you can do that, and if you want to pump fake and act like you're going to sign an autograph for an opposing fan, and then be like, nah, sorry, sorry kid, eat it. I'm fine with that. Zach Greinke's my boy, he's on the mound tonight. Plus 2.05 Royals over the Astros. Okay, I'm also going to stick with the Angels.

Mike Trout doesn't get a hit, plus 1.60. You just all in on the Angels. Alright, finally, I'm going with the Indiana Fever today. They're plus 4.60 against the Seattle Storm.

I'm off the Storm because they didn't keep our girl Alyssa Curnane. It's another big underdog play, but I'm taking it. Fever, plus 4.60 to win. My final one, soccer matchup. The New Saints play Linfield, no idea who they are. Give me a draw, plus 2.50. I'm changing mine real quick. I'm taking the Fever plus the 10.5 points, so it's only minus 1.10. They're not going to win. This is The Adam Gold Show.