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Welcome to the Winkler Verse. I'm Bart Winkler. Bill Ryder is here today. What's happening than you? is the name of the show, which is still alive.
On Subspect, Bill is another Infinity Sports Network. Former colleague. How you doing, Bill? Are you down? I'm I'm good.
It's interesting. Unemployment, I've lost a bunch of weight and a bunch of money.
So I don't know. Take that as you want. Like, I'm living, man. How are you doing? You're losing weight during this?
I'm gaining it back.
Well, I stepped on a scale so I lost two jobs last year. You know, not to not I lost the Infinity job and before that, I lost the CBS sports job that I had. And so shortly after that, I stepped on a scale. And you might have heard it from Wisconsin. There was a rip in the universe when I looked at the number.
Can we swear on here? And I was just like, oh, bleak. You can. You know, you can. Yeah, I'm trying not.
My wife gets mad when I swear on the podcast.
So, yeah, bro, I've been. I've dropped 24 pounds and whatever small amount of money I had.
So it's been up and down kind of six months. Hmm. Um I have gained a little bit of weight. And just, I'm just reacting live, just live reacting to a text I just got. From my wife that says There might be a sewer rat down in the basement where you are recording.
Yeah.
Okay. She re is she referencing me? No. No, okay. Got it.
Yeah.
Um My wife saw the news and she was like, oh, good, that Suaret writer got canned. No, no. No, I just came down. I came down, I recorded my basement.
Okay. And a lot of people. in the market. You know, the first time I started, made fun of me. Oh, you're just in your basement.
You're not a that doesn't sound like radio people.
Well, a lot of those radio people that made fun of me. also got victimized in the last few years. And and we're all end up, you know, I think we're all gravitating. Here, but I came downstairs to talk to you, and then the drain cover had been removed. And I go, I didn't do this.
Did you do this? She said, I didn't do it. I said, well, maybe just like there was a little flooding and it popped up. She thought animal and she must be doing some. Because I saw this drain.
I'm like, I'll deal with it after I talk to Bill. I'm not on rats and spiders. No. Hell no. When I was in college, we lived in a house.
I saw a rat that was probably the size of this Mountain Dew can bottle. Dead on the ground.
Sounds like New York two New York to my two years in New York City. It was just a habit. I used to work the six to ten sh shift and I would get to the train at 10:30 p.m. and just watch rats attack each other while I waited for the train. Yeah.
Did you was there betting on them happening? It was a metaphor for radio, it turned out. It was just a guide to my career, which was, you know, rats killing each other. Similar thing, the other day, my wife made me clean the house and we picked up a bookshelf. And there were fifteen black widow spiders that were on the bottom side of the of the bookshelf.
Yeah.
I don't like spiders, dude.
So I may have yelled. Liking a little girl, and run the other side of the room. But Lori made me kill them.
So there we go. I'm still here.
Okay, we can stare at the man in the house. That's rapidly. That's good. Um So I think. A lot of people, this audience, my show.
knows you Love me. You were on for a while. See, that was weird.
So I got laid off in 22. And then our the station I was on went full CBS Sports Radio. Yeah, that was weird. Is that the one that Sparky ran? Because that's sort of my reference point with it.
Okay. Yeah.
Yeah, and you were just down with him, I think, a couple weeks ago because now they just rebuilt it back.
So good for the with local pe talent? Yeah, they had an exterminator out to kill all the rats in 2022, I would say.
Okay, I remember that. And then, so I was like, screwed. Uh But They had hopes of bringing it back at some point. Got it. So then like this last year, they had a full-time lineup back and there's like.
There's former Packers on it. John Coons on it, Mason Crosby's on it. And So then I got the national fill-in stuff filling in for your show a lot. You work with Tom all the time. Yeah, he loved you.
Yeah, well I I loved when you were off, no offense, because wow, that They'd be like. Hey, there was one time. What was the time? I think it was like Christmas. And our boss had gone, hey, I got all these fill-ins.
This was before I was full-time. I got all these fill-in shifts. And he's like, what do you want? I go. I don't want to I don't want to like shoot my shot here, but can I just fill in for writers two hours every day?
Did you get paid by the show or the hour? I got Chope. Oh, that's crazy.
So if I did a five-hour weekend show on Saturdays, which I had a shift to do. I'd make as much doing your two hours as the five hour Saturday. And the reason my show is two hours would take Two hours to explain to you, but suffice to say that wasn't what I expected when I took that shift.
Well, I'm glad that somebody enjoyed the two-hour show. I did. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed working on it. They paid you the same amount for two hours as if you had done four hours at night as a fill-in.
Well, I want to be clear, five hours. I was doing five hour shifts. on the weekends. Is that David? I love David, but David, bro, what are youbody doing, man?
But good job for you, Bert. That's crazy. Do you think he should have paid me less? I mean, I think I don't want to speak to the economics of the Infinity Sports Network other than to say It has not lost on me the irony. It was not infinite.
So I don't know. Maybe we're maybe. Maybe they should have when they got you full time should have paid the other fill-ins left after that. Yeah, the Infinity Sports Network, if Infinity means a year and a half. Yeah.
Does it translate to 18 months in Latin? I'm not smart enough to know. Yeah, that's a shame. All right, so we're going through it. We're looking to come out of this, out of the sewer.
of us being rats emerging.
So, but I was wanting you, if you could, to just. You gotta hear how. What what Basically, what is your career like up to this point? Here's my life story: I'm from, I love when people ask me this question because, like, yeah, I just love talking about my path, but go ahead. No, I mean, look, I've been pretty blessed, and it's all been pretty accidental, accidental.
I got, I moved to Dubuque, Iowa, back to Dubuque, Iowa from the Chicago Burbs when I was in high school. I joined the school paper. I went to the University of Missouri because I wanted to be a newspaper writer. Was a newspaper writer for years. Thought I did that for a living, worked for a sociopath, got lucky to get hired by a great guy to go cover the heat in Miami during the Heater 3P time.
Was a writer. That's FoxSports.com is who hired me. And then I don't know, man. Randomly, I woke up one day and they hired me to come out to LA where I live now, where I'd never been other than to cover Lakers game. And I never stepped foot in LA or New York until I was in my 30s, 32, 33.
I was a Midwest kid, lived in Kansas City. Went to I was at the KC star, went to LA to do T V and radio, got into radio, got a radio show in L A. This guy named Chris Olivero talked me into going to CBS Sports Radio, quit local drive mile midday radio in Los Angeles. I want to try a solo show. And did CBS Sports.com and CBS Sports Radio slash Infinity for A decade?
Things were going great, and then one day I woke up and they're like, You're fired in. Actually, like, you and I think had a different views on this. I did not love the way CBS Sports treated me on the way out, which, by the way, is totally there, right? I have no hard feelings at all toward Infinity. I mean, I They gave me some notice.
They were, I thought they were kind, and they didn't sort of. chop us the way, in my opinion, that I experienced it five months earlier.
So then I woke up on January 2nd without any jobs. And I'm not complaining, you probably aren't either. I've worked. Two full-time jobs for 18 years, and I've worked 40 to 90 hours a week, many of those years. And I was tired, and I was fat, and I was grumpy.
So, even though I'm broke and poor and I can't do this for much longer, you know, for very long, I'm a better dad and a better husband.
So, I'm weirdly in a great headspace. Even though I need to find some work at some point. Unless the substack, billrider.substack.com, goes through the roof, baby. Come on, Wisconsin.
Well yeah, we need you to we're we're build substack. Um And I am gonna I think I'm going to try to get stuff. My dad's doing some sub stack stuff, he's retired. Did he like it? Yeah, he's doing it's writing.
He's just. He's he's been he was a teacher for 40 years. He did he does like writing a little bit. He wrote he wrote a book about coaching and then My mom and him wrote a book about their they moved from Wisconsin to Florida and they wrote about that. My parents moved from Iowa to Florida.
That's funny. Oh, okay.
Now I've asked you. I must ask you now where. Fort Myers, seven months out of the year, and they just got a place in Iowa City because they missed the Midwest.
So then, so their Iowa City. A good chunk of the year because all of our family is from Nebraska, Iowa, Wisconsin.
So, in fact, my favorite uncle and aunt are from Wisconsin, but I used to say that on the radio because I thought no one listened. And then I've turned out everyone, all my family listened. I got in a lot of trouble. But hopefully they're not. None of the non-Wisconsin people are watching.
So you're my favorite, Uncle John. Yeah, they're half the time in Fort Myers, half the time in Iowa City. I can promise you that your non-Wisconsin relatives are not watching this. Safe space?
Okay, good. I think I can. Maybe we got Uncle John. I don't know. I don't know.
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We're doing okay. I think um I So I had gotten laid off. I'm having Bill on to talk about the Bucks, by the way, but we're talking about this too. I think it is interesting for people. I do too.
People can relate. Yeah.
And if you can't. You're going to soon because AI is going to kill us all. Yeah, did you see what Jack Dorsey did last night? Yeah.
Yeah.
He fired. A bunch of guys. I want to get into AI in a second. Yeah.
Um I was fired laid off.
Okay. What I'm telling people is I can say I was fired. You have to say I was laid off. Not you, but other people. No, I get it.
Like, is it my word to say? I've had plenty of Wisconsin people tell me they're glad I got fired.
So I get it. Me, too, Bill. Me too. Um But the the so In Milwaukee, it was, hey, by the way. I know you're on vacation.
I was on vacation. We're having a meeting in three hours. Be there. Hey, we're done.
Okay. We had two months. Right. of knowledge Which I do appreciate. Me too.
It was weird and challenging and demoralizing on different nights for me. But I do appreciate that. I don't know what the right way is. I feel like two months might have been too long. Personally.
But I do appreciate that because then You know, they trusted that we wouldn't like act a fool. They did treat us like adults. in what was a horrific situation. Yes, and I was respectful of that. Carlos and I would like make jokes that only we would get for a while.
you know Yeah. I got it. I listened.
So, yeah. No, I remember. I would be. We kept promoting that we were going to start new segments like January or December 29th. Like, right.
Oh, December 29th. And then, obviously, that was the first day. I just when I when I Signed off. I just wanted to, I was thankful of a lot. But I also made a big stink about.
I'm just I'm not Understanding why this is happening. I mean, you did, you were vocal in your. This is happening. And I Thanked the people that helped me be there. I wasn't going to thank people I've never met.
You know, I wasn't going to do that.
So I think what has happened is. I think any I don't know. I didn't have you on to talk about Mike Gloria. Throw whatever you want. Yeah, I'm here for it.
But I just I'm gonna give the headspace to another fellow radio man. Is I With the lay of the landscape. For what's coming. and how radio's gonna look. And I had not gotten any, like no one reached out to me knowing that I was about to lose my job.
I don't feel like I have a viable path to radio again. It's cold on the streets out there, man. The job market and AI.
So I think my calculation was. Who do I need? Take the hand of here as I fall. Do I want to? Take the hand of The listeners that have been with me that I know will cushion my blow.
Or do I, as I'm falling, want to reach out my hand? to people that have not yet considered me Other suits around, like for a next potential job. hoping that they Reach me as I fall. When they're falling, yeah, they're not even aware I'm falling.
So my calculus was. Let's, if this new chapter is going to happen, we're going to do it. With the listeners. Rather than me Saying, all right, screw all you guys. I need to suck up to somebody and get a job somewhere.
Yeah, I get it. We'll see how many days. Yeah, yeah, I'm not getting hired at. Whatever. AM570 here in LA.
I. Our experiences are different. I was there for 10 years and you were there for four. I don't even know. I can't do time since COVID.
So, if you were there for seven or two, I apologize. Like, COVID post-COVID can't do time. I did a show for two years, but I was filling. Four is a good number. Four is a good number.
I was there for a long time. They moved me to New York City, so I was in that office for two years before I moved back to LA for family reasons.
So I know Chris Olivero, no, he's a great guy. No, Jeff Solano, no, he's a great guy. No David Marinick, no, he's a great guy. And so. And some of the people I worked at CBS Sports, which is a different place, I knew them.
and some of them I knew not to be great guys. happy to say it when it is true. And so my experience at radio I'm not saying you were bitter, but some people were. And I was more just sad. Like that, I said the words: I am bitter.
Yes. Yeah, yeah. Radio, I love that job. It made me happy. I liked doing my show.
I liked the people I worked for. I like the people that I worked with. I've had five producers there, they're five of my closest friends. And one of them is Adam Klug. I love you, Adam, but you're hard to be friends with, but he's still like super guy.
So I just had a different connection and relationship with that radio show than I did my other job at CBS, and maybe for me. Leaving Infinity was easier because I'd had a bad breakup with another job and overshare. I made a lot, like my income, how I supported my family. was much more based on my CBS job. That They told me I'd be there and I'm not.
And that's that's their decision, right? Like new bosses came in. They're your So, when radio happened, I had already kind of gone through it and the anger and the frustration, and maybe I was a little more prepared to be like, A. I've already done this. And B, I actually like the people who are getting rid of me.
And I had some. sympathy for them because I would imagine they didn't love getting rid of every single person, whatever their reasons. I don't know what their reasons. Maybe that's the other thing. I was on a.
A ship with a lot of people. We all went down together. It's different than kind of getting assassinated by yourself, right? Where you're just the only one that's you're gone, which is what happened to me at CBS five months earlier. When people comment to me like, oh, I see now why you don't have a job.
Like based off the take I like based based on the take I say.
Well, you know that, like, look, you and I are not aligned on Giannis or Giannis coverage, which is totally fine. I would never look at your Giannis take and be like, I'm so glad that you got fired. Many of, I don't know about your listeners, but probably, but certainly, it's weird because I have a huge on Substack, I can see where people are at. And a huge percentage of the people that listen on substack and that pay me on sub stack and thank you are from Wisconsin. Yeah.
Also, the largest number of people who will tell me, and I think your producer was one of them, but maybe I can't keep it all straight. One guy was like, You have the worst hair ever, and I'm glad you're fired. I don't think that was your producer, it was like a guy in the same timeline. But the meanest people are from Wisconsin. I'm glad you're fired.
You are an idiot. You're a liar about this. People are mean, man. I can't remember. I could be totally false accusing you.
You have the worst hair ever. Yeah, that's what somebody told me.
Well, I got it trimmed yesterday, but I'm not cutting my hair anymore. I just don't care. I should have come on. I had a like yesterday, I had a fro. But I trimmed it a little bit.
I'd take your hair over whatever I'm working with. I mean, what it doesn't matter what our hair looks like. You know what I'm saying? We don't have jobs. Who am I trying to impress?
My wife's made my forehead. Takes up the exact same amount of space as my The parts of that face I use. But you pull a beanie off well. Whereas I can't even fit it on top of my hair. Yeah, my official headshot has me in a beanie.
Does it? Yeah, because I hate and I hate it. What you just did there, it's a visual. But my point is people can be mean and I'm with you, man. It's.
I I've covered LeBron a long time and his c The mob that loves LeBron and the people that work for LeBron are vicious. It's like covering politics, which I did in another life. And so, kind of used to it. But people are mean. People are mean.
And I... It is what it is, but people celebrate and other people losing their jobs. I don't love it. Directed at me or directed at other people in the business?
Well, and then the last thing on any of that, and I'll talk some hoops with you, is uh I I think that there is a way like. I sort I'm I've been yelling about AI. For a long time. And not that I don't use some of the AI tools, so I'm a hippo. Do you?
I did for clipping, I didn't. I should have clipping. Like clutch, okay, I did too. Yeah, um, but for that. I don't use it for like writing.
Because AI writing is such a... You can tell the style right away. Yeah.
When I do see it online, I comment, I go. Chat GPT, bro. Um and I feel like I'm trying to make a difference in the world. I'm not. But I don't But I so I think like I think we're gonna get to a place where It's going to be overall rejected.
By enough people that I think, like, we're kind of last people off Titanic situation. Where if we Have these other places where we can go, even if we make them by ourselves. What AI is going to start doing is. Start Coaching the real host and stuff. To do things a certain way, I think, and also there's going to be AI versions of people.
I just saw cowherds. I didn't read the article, but I saw. I know Colin. And if I could, if I saw, I know, I'd be like, what are you doing, man? And maybe, maybe he's right.
I think that's crazy. But I think what people are going to want to do is. They're going to the same reason I was talking to someone that does music radio. Like, why would you listen to music radio right now, ironically, for the human voices that you like that are in the that are.
So we're going to go back to humanity at some point. Gotta like be I Um I would stay I would really I I don't want to give you advice. I have a darker world view. Yeah? No, give it to me.
I want advice. But I would I would these are our boats, Bill, and we better make them work. I will say this about leaving Infinity and what you're in the boat that I have and you have. I. I loved my job.
And when I did the 6 to 10 show, I knew I had an audience. Like, that was, we had a lot of coverage back when I did it. And we were on a bunch, we were on Milwaukee, right? We had a huge following there, Portland. I assume nobody listened when I was doing 10 to Dude.
It was two hours long. It's hard to fit a two, right? Like. Whatever. You know, radio-wise, it's They have to have exactly a two-hour slot because no one's carrying Phil Bider, Bill Ryder for one hour in Spokane or whatever, anywhere, right?
Like or Green Bates. They have a two-hour slot or they don't. And even for me, I was shocked the audience I had when I announced that I was leaving, when I was leaving the network. And the reason I'm doing substack And thank you. I had this sub stack that I had set up because they had called me when I left CBS and I turned payments on and never, it was dormant.
And when I announced Bart that I was leaving Infinity, I turned off my phone and I went to play tennis. I was like, you know, I'm bummed. I'm sad. I love the show. And when I turned my phone back on, not that it's a ton.
But I had a hundred subscribers and I think fourteen people had paid me You know, money. I mean, they paid me 700 bucks or whatever to do something that didn't exist. And so, to your point, As that continues to grow, It is amazing to me that we do have these boats, and I don't know how long it's going to float or if it's going to get me where I need to go. But it it's it strikes me I didn't appreciate the audience that I had even if I I think was professional enough to do as good a show as I could. And as much as I love the people that we work for at Infinity, and I do.
I wonder if maybe they, like me, did not appreciate the audience they had because I'm not making enough to live in Los Angeles. That was my whole point. Right, or debuke, but I'm making something.
Something, you know? Yeah.
Well, and that that was my whole point with the stuff I had said. And I think I, you know, wow, I got a little bit of coverage for once in this business. But it was more like it was more like Bart mad at people making decisions, and it wasn't framed as. You definitely. Yeah.
But it wasn't framed. What it was was: Bart goes to bat for listeners. But they gave me like And you and the Barrett people, and you went hard, by the way, good for you, you went hard at that guy. You went hard at that guy. Jason Barrett.
I liked it. I was like popcorn. The whole time. I'm just sipping a cup of coffee to think about what to say next. I love silence.
I'm just I'm gonna Refrain from anything else. I'll say this: it's been a long time since these places mattered, but I used to be covered by the big lead in Deadspin, and they were so unfair to me. And also, it was part of the deal. Yeah, well then then that's weird because like My whole job is talking about other people. And then people start talking about me.
And I'm like, hey, wait a minute. That's true. That's how it works. Wait, wait, you have a microphone too? This is bullshit.
Yeah, yeah. That's quite literally. How it works.
So I'm good on the memory lane if you've got any. I like your optimism, though. I am too. I like your AI option because I think we're all. Potentially doomed.
Um, your outcome's a lot better. I really like, so did you see that chart? There's like a chart that is going around where AI is either going to improve our lives by like 0.2%. Make it better than we could have ever dreamed. Yeah.
Or kill us all. No, no, it's a 50-50 like Uto. Right. It's maybe it's 45 utopia. 45 were done.
You know, David Mitchell at the end of whatever, Cloud Atlas, 10%.
Some of the rich people get richer. And It's easy to clip our videos on our shows. But I think it's probably more like extinction or utopia in the next ten years.
So Awesome.
Well, yeah.
So, my boat analogy is for what we can do in the remaining time. Over the next nine years. My true AI thoughts. Yeah.
The way I think it's going to happen, I read about this. Um And that's also a phrase I've started saying more, even if it's not true.
Okay, like if I see something on Twitter or something, I don't always say, I was just reading an article. I do that now to trick people. Oh, I like that little right intellectual. Even if you heard it on the podcast or wherever, sure, if I'm sharing information, I'm telling people, you know, I was just reading an article. How do you use that?
trying something new But I was reading like The scenarios in which AI Evolves And the one that stuck with me is Well, they realize pretty quickly. that humans are worthless. to them. And so what they're going to do is a mass extinction event. And it's not going to be gruesome or anything.
Uh the AIs take over drones. And they like have figured out this thing that will go into humans' bodies. Like maybe a little microchip or something, like just like so tall, like you breathe it in. A little nanotechnology. Yeah.
Yeah.
A little nanotech. And then the AIs have a day where they activate it. And every human dies at the same time.
So that's what I really think is going to happen. Yeah, I've seen The Matrix and, you know, what it's like, Neo, you know, what I've realized is that humanity is a virus. I mean, that speech sticks with me, you know? Yeah, I I would suggest that maybe we shouldn't create things that are smart, whatever. It's too late.
Like, they're going to make what they're going to make, and we're going to see how it goes. I mean, I'm trying to tell my kid who's six to be a good person and What world is he going to be in? If he is 41 with a six-year-old kid, I mean, I don't. Maybe it's a. I mean, he's not going to be in a world that resonates, but maybe it'll be an amazing world.
I'm a little. You know, if you're flipping a coin and heads is you're extinct as a species and tails is could be pretty great, it is terrifying, even though it can come up tails.
So. 'Cause yeah, my kids are sixteen and thirteen and I don't even like to think about AI in the context of my own children.
Okay. But maybe it'll be okay. Like maybe I mean, I don't really believe that, but maybe it'll be okay, everybody. Wow, Wisconsin, how's it going? Bill Ryder here as we're borrowing.
I said, hey, you want to talk some bucks in NBA? And they said, yeah, well, only if we can pivot to AI darkness at least, we can go aliens. Yeah, there they do. Yeah, Project Bluebeam. They're going to fake an invasion.
That's my thought. I love that too. Here's my take on aliens quick.
Okay. There's no way. For as long as the earth has been alive and around and outer space has existed. There's no way. That the odds that someone from a different rock Are you going to visit this rock?
At the time I'm alive.
So it's like the simulation theory. It's just like simulation. It's why we're probably in the simulation because if you can get to a simulation, there's only one out of infinite that's real. I get it. It's a very similar kind of math equation.
I'll just say, and I don't want to get into any of this in detail. Do you ever watch Community? Did you like the show Community back in the day? We're on the worst timeline. I mean, we are.
There are versions of you and me that are like chill in and still at the NFL Sports Network, whatever. We're on the worst timeline, so maybe the aliens are coming. That's all I'm going to say. We're on the darkest timeline. Damn it.
Okay, one more thing I want to say then.
Okay. I just read in an article somewhere. I read another theory that. That when we die. We don't actually die.
We, at the moment of our death, are transported into a different timeline where we live through that situation. Oh, that's cool. But for everybody else, like if I were to die in your timeline right now. Right. Like if the sewer rat comes and starts eating me.
That's in my basement. I am dead in your timeline. And life goes on. But then when it's time for you to die. Whatever trick you get shifted into another timeline.
It's very rick and morty. Yeah.
Have you noticed I don't know how much you're into the Mandela effect, but how there's a bunch of weird stuff that doesn't makes sense and people think it was the the h particle collider thing. Maybe we all maybe there was a mass extinction event in a different time line and a bunch of us just got moved over here or something. And that's why we're like, wait, the Bernstein Bears is spelled how? If you're the purchasing manager at a manufacturing plant, you know having a trusted partner makes all the difference. That's why hands down, you count on Granger for auto reordering.
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Not anymore. Save up to 40% your first year. Visit lifelock.com/slash special offer. Terms apply. I feel like I shifted this week.
I feel like I might have died this week. Welcome to the darkest timeline. I feel like, I don't know, I really I felt weird this week. I don't know. But yeah, I basically am at least 50-50 non- Is there a timeline where Giannis is already a Laker?
Look at you. Look at you. Did it? I was going to talk doc first, but. Talk, I almost spent my water up.
Talk makes me laugh so much, I can't even drink water without hearing his name and almost spitting out of the screen. Let me ask you this about Giannis.
Okay. Why is he in Milwaukee? Why is he still here? I don't know. I mean, I'll ask you I'll I'll do the old answer your question with a question.
Why does he keep saying or posting with, you know, Wolf of Wall Street gifts that he's not going anywhere and then telling Malik Andrews that maybe he will go somewhere? It's like back and forth. I mean, why can't he make up his mind in his public declarations? I I'm not sure. I mean, they're not going to win anything.
They're not. I don't even think that's John Horace's fault. I think John's a pretty good. I think he's a pretty good GM, but I don't know. I don't think he'll be there in two years.
Yeah, I this contract because he's got another chance to sign a contract in October. Right. I feel like If there was going to be a time to trade him. It was last last summer was like the best time, I think. I agree.
And as soon as I don't think there was ever a good time. I think every rumor and bit of knowledge, I was convinced he wasn't going to go anywhere. And then this last summer... As a Bucs guy, it finally made sense. Like, yeah, they may have to trade him.
And it makes sense for both parties at this point. I'm refreshing myself on his age. Yeah, he's thirty-one. I... But now, the further we go from last summer.
Like this trade deadline He can't win this final match. No, this summer is possible.
Next summer is possible if he can tell someone he wants to extend. Otherwise What's to get me from thinking he's not just going to do another extension?
So, as I've mentioned, I'm from Iowa, and people, no one knows where Dubuque is, but it's the border of Iowa, Wisconsin, and Illinois. And I think Dubuque is like. I wanted to have my bachelor party there. I love Dubuque. I haven't been back in my parents left like the year after I graduated high school.
So my town is on a hill. It's awesome. It's so beautiful, man. Like, me and my buddies from Dubuque, we we sort of In fact, I haven't hung out them in years and now not having a job, I got to go on like the guy trip for the first to New York City of all places. They're like, let's go to New York City.
I'm like, all right. And that was the week we found out we didn't have jobs.
So we're like, they're like, how is work? I'm like, I'm fired. They're like, yeah, from CBS. No, the other job. But anyway, were you in the meeting live?
I was there, the meeting was the day I was flying out.
So I was there like. No, no, I was like one of the sad people on the computer. Here's my point about being from Dubuque. I am not, and I don't think the national media is either, even though you guys do. I'm not anti-Wisconsin.
I want the Bucs to be great. And I interviewed Giannis years ago when Jason Kidd was the coach. And Gary Payton, here's my name job: Gary Payton, who I worked with on TV, told me Giannis is going to be. Hall of Famer superstar when he was still kind of emerging. And I got excited.
I didn't think it was true. It was, obviously. Gary knows more about hoops than I do. Who knew? But I got excited because I want Wisconsin to do well.
I like it when I'm an Iowa fan by birth. I'm a Cubs fan, I'm a Bears fan. I kind of secretly like them when the Packers do well, once the Bears get eliminated, because I kind of, and the NFL is different. I just like that part of the country. I don't I think people underestimate how much sometimes people fall in love with certain parts of that country they're not from.
Like he's not a star, but Brady Papinga is a former co-host of mine and a former Packer, of course. Yeah.
He loved living in Green Bay. He'll like sit you down and have a beer with you and tell you.
Well, he won't drink a beer, but I'll drink three beers for the two of us. And he'll just talk about how much he loved Green Bay and what it was like and the connection. I think some of his Giannis genuinely likes Milwaukee. I believe him. I think he genuinely likes living there and has a connection to that place and has raised family there.
And, you know, when you're from New York or LA and you refer to most of America's flyover country, you don't know what you're talking about. I feel a little more, a little more inclined to understand the country because I'm from there and I live on the coast now.
So that's one. I think he likes being there. I think remarkable superstars, guys who think they're the best players of their generation and among the best of all time. And I think he sees himself that way. think that they can overcome anything longer than they can, right?
If If the shit had hit the fan in Denver, I still think Nikola Jokic would still, if it were delusional, I think it's delusional in Milwaukee. I think Jokic would still think he could do it. He could do it. He could do it. So I think Giannis is clearly having trouble.
I think he probably, it's like breaking up with someone you love. One day it's like, I can make it work. The next day it's, I can't. And then I also think Giannis is in a really difficult position where when he wants to go, he's getting to an age where he's only got, I don't know, you tell me, Bart, two or three more years where his level like the way he plays translates to being the dominating player. And so that leap is not a guarantee.
And we've seen that with Kevin Durant when he left the Warriors. I think Giannis is smart enough to know. If he breaks up with this place that he loves in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, maybe he needs to. He only gets one bite at the next apple. And if it doesn't work...
That's going to create a lot of ridicule and a lot of disappointment.
So I Well said. I think that there's a lot with Giannis that He's he clear to me. He yeah, he likes The life. And he'll play out his life in his head. And he likes the version of his life.
Where he stays in Milwaukee and they compete for another eight years. He likes that version of his life, but I think now he's also that's the one life he's lived. And so now he's thinking.
Well, yeah, what would it be like to do? Like, I'm curious. What would it be like? He is. He is in a 40-year marriage looking at a 30-year-old girl who's Flirting with them.
You know? He's going to stay with his wife. In the case of LA, maybe a 23-year-old girl. I mean, LA's pretty great if you're rich, I hear. He's thinking about it.
So I do. I do agree, and I do think that Giannis right now is conflicted. And he Like he doesn't want to, but he wants to experience, like, he wants to live it twice, like, run it back a different way. I think.
So he's trying to reconcile with that. But I don't think My issue is I don't think that any of this I think this is new. I don't think this was the case three years ago. Maybe not three years ago. Five years ago.
I think it was 18 months ago. I mean, I reported it.
So here's the other thing. Can I like. You don't like shamps. I have a great If you want to hear a great sham story that's not a positive story, I'll tell it because I've told it seven times. I will say this about shams.
It's going to sound like a put-down. It's not. I think Jobs is the best at what he does at his job in the country, clearly. And as someone who lost that job, obviously, he's much better than I am. He's not Woach.
And I know Adrian really well, so maybe I'm biased. I thought Adrian had a certain Sophistication politically, in terms of understanding the politics of who he was dealing with. Because he was a trained journalist in a way that I think Shams is not. And again, those of you that clip this, I think Shams is great at his job. I think it's more likely that Shams will be manipulated by the people that he relies on for the information that's made him famous and wealthy than Woge would be, would ever have been.
And so, do I think that Shams was legitimately getting the information he was getting on Giannis? Absolutely. Do I think most of it came from Giannis' camp, which includes agents who lie to their own clients? I do. Do I think it's possible that Shams was a was a useful Tool in Giannis basically seeing what the market was and then having plausible deniability and put his Wolf of Wall Street thing out there.
I think that as well. I was told 18 months ago, I reported it. People in Wisconsin got mad at me. Not that Yannis was going to leave. But that every GM in the country was convinced that Giannis would leave over the next two years.
Those GMs are not just like sitting in their house, like, I think he doesn't like Wisconsin. It came from somewhere. It's not coming from Giannis. It's not coming from his brothers. It's probably coming from agents or...
Maybe people in the Milwaukee, because people in the Bucs organization, I call in that story, like, yeah, we're a little worried about it, but that's that's a year, 18 months. We'll cross that bridge.
So, Bart, I do think there was something out there. And I think the real failure is if I knew about it and if random GMs and random sort of places knew about it. Then John Horse knew about it and Doc Rivers knew about it. And you had some runway to, difficult though it is, create a place where Giannis would never think about leaving. And they just, that's the big story to me: the Bucs tried, they tried, but they failed.
They screwed up and there's now, in my opinion, not What Giannis wants to win now, and not the tools to be like, okay, but in two or three years, we're going to be a mate. They're not the Houston Rockets from three years ago, right? They're just. They're a mess outside of Giannis. I think the w the way that So you said John Horst before and you're wondering if he's a good GM or not.
I don't I think his I think his job has always been: keep Yanus here. Your job is not to win a ton of job. He didn't draft Giannis, as you know. Yeah.
Right. Your job, John Hammond gets credit for that. And another guy who I forget his name. But you gotta, um, and they stole the hawks homework, so that's fine too. And um I also I want to tell you this earlier.
I think it was in 2017. Giannis is only four years in. I made a bet with two guys I was doing the show at the time, he'd be an MVP someday. One $600, no big deal. Did you really?
Oh, yeah. That's a great. I'm trying. I think I wish I could. I don't remember.
16 is maybe when I went out there to interview. I did one of those little sit-down interviews with him. 15. I can't remember dates, times. I remember Gary tell me that, I'm like, I mean, I don't see it, but okay.
Maybe. Yeah, As one of the many in the Hall of Fame of Bart takes. Got it. So I think. He's always been like, if we win a championship, we win.
And they did. Since they won a championship, though. It's really So we're talking about the Packers, and the Packers. I think they should have fired their coach. And really.
Oh, the We were not going to do that another time. But I look at the Packers and they're using injuries as an excuse.
Well, Micah Parsons got hurt. Tucker Kraft got hurt. You know, whatever, whatever. The Bucks How it's gone since 2021, they have been. Able.
To use injuries as an excuse, because either Chris would go down or Giannis would go down. They never have though. They even with the injuries, they're like. Not good enough. We gotta fire bud.
Okay, so they fire Budenhalzer. And then Adrian, okay, I know we're winning, but who was 33 and 14 or whatever he was. It's not going to work.
So we're going to fire him. Um, geez, this isn't gonna work. We gotta make a big splash. All of a sudden, Damian Lillard is a buck. Oh, now he got hurt.
What are we going to do? We're screwed. All of a sudden, they found this way to stretch him out and bring in Miles Turner.
So they are continuing. Mm. The Bucks are cont John Horst in 2025, let's say. Has the same strategy as he did back in 2021 or even prior. But He's getting backed into a corner, and there's less tools available for him to survive.
100%. Because he's throwing good money at the best game. Yeah.
You ever been to Vegas and just it's gone sideways, and you like stop yourself from losing more money because you don't want to get divorced, but your buddy can't stop and just like I can win it back. That's John Horse. And John Horse got a bad. I will say this too. I don't know this.
I've asked people. The silence is deafening, but. I don't think John Horse had anything to do with Doc Rivers coming in. And I am a well-documented. Doc Rivers is not a good coach and not a person I want around my culture.
person. And I have I have a Doc River stories I could tell. about my interactions with him on on on reporting things. The minute Doc got hired. I think a lot of that power for John Horse became different.
Doc is. He's not a bad person to the people in organizations. He doesn't fire people, but he takes their power and he cuts them off with the kneecaps. And he certainly did that with the Clippers. And I won't pretend to know.
for a fact with with the Bucks, but I do know with the other organizations and how people view him. There are many GMs, again, who would never bring Doc in because A, they don't think he's a good coach, but B, they don't trust him not to sort of cut, just put a knife in their back. Ah. I'm not sure how much John Horst, how much. Was he the 40% decision maker?
Was he the 80% decision maker? I don't know. I don't think he was the 100% decision maker. The moment Doc Rivers' advice was: let's bring me in as the coach and get rid of Adrian. And then immediately say, I wouldn't wish this job on anyone.
Dude, he's the worst. I'm just like, whatever. And this is the thing. We all get stuff right, we all get stuff wrong.
Some stuff's easy.
Some Doc Rivers is gonna fail was always was always easy. And so Not only did you guys bet and you bet on Damian Lillard and and I get it. It was exciting. When that didn't work, and not only that. The thunder of the thunder today, because Sam Presty saw the CBA and understood it, decoded it in a way that nobody did.
Not me, not most people, not most GMs. John Horace was playing, you know, the old game. He was playing 90s basketball in terms of building a team. And the world changed out from underneath his feet. And for you guys, you just got caught caught in.
I mean, the CBA is real and financial flexibility and what you need to win. The team he constructed probably wasn't the right team anyway, and Damian Lillard wasn't able to stay healthy. And Middleton kind of deteriorated really, really quickly. And Doc Rivers doesn't know how to manage those sorts of issues and those sorts of problems where you don't have enough. And all of a sudden, you wake up, and if you're trying to keep you honest, You made the moves you thought were the right ones, but they didn't just fail now.
I think they screwed you guys for several years to come. And that is probably what Giannis is trying to get his head around. I don't think, I don't think Lori Nicol of the Journal Sentinel here just wrote an article about like, where is Horst? Because he isn't, nobody, he's not been that available. And I would agree.
with what you're saying. Right now, I think the Eden, no, yeah, the Edens, West Edens has the governorship. But Jimmy Haslam is not here as a silent investor. Right. I don't think that Even in Wisconsin, I think maybe one of the more underreported Or under-talked about things is what is Jimmy?
We know Jimmy Haslam from owning the Browns. He has a major big stake in our basketball team. And we are not talking about him at all. And this is already a state where Our relationship with owners is weird because. The Packers don't have one.
Well, me, but and other fans.
So we don't have like a Jerry Jones villain to be mad about when our team does bad.
So then we got to figure out where else to put it and Packer fans can never agree on that. The Bucs ownership was Herb Cole for a long time, who everybody adored. For the most part. And then. When he's When he sold the team and it was Edens and Lazarie, somehow they were never like.
They're never the people that Bucs fans look at as the top dog. We're always talking GM or coach. And then with the brewers, we do have one guy, true guy, in Mark at Tanasio. And we just anything we're mad about owners, we flame at him because we don't really. Yeah, we don't throw it.
I think you guys are well run. Uh the Brewers are I'm a Cubs fan. The Brewers are I know the constraints. I know, you know, we wish he could spend more money. Yeah, he like goes and There's a story that, oh, he invested in a soccer team or, oh, he.
He wanted to take sand from this beach and pay a lot of money for it. And why won't we just get a third baseman? But I think he's done an incredible job, too. I do too. Yeah.
It's where it's where we're at. I'm just, this is a thing I'm discovering in the last couple of weeks. The Brewers are really the one ownership. That we look at as a true ownership for some reason, the Bucks, because Jimmy Haslam is a viable partner, and things are happening with the Bucks that we don't like. And we're mad at Doc or we're mad at Horse.
We never say, like, Is Jimmy Haslam up to something? We never say it. Crazy.
Well, and the thing is, and I don't know the answer, but certainly if you're horse and you're rivers, you're trying to manage him, and maybe that's your guessing. You know how it is to manage up.
Sometimes you're guessing what your bosses want, and sometimes they're telling you, and they're idiots. And you're like, if you want your job, you do it anyway.
So. The thing about the Giannis situation for you all that I think is really fucking tricky.
Sorry, Lori. That's really tricky. Is one, okay, you got to try to win now. And look, I'm not taking a shot at Wisconsin. This is just, I'm from a much smaller.
Nobody's gonna go to Wisconsin Milwaukee to play. Voluntarily, unless they're from there. They're just Milwaukee's not going to recruit people. New Orleans is not going to recruit people. Salt Lake City is going to have trouble recruiting people.
Oklahoma City's not usually going to be in the LeBron sweepstakes from 10, 5 years ago. Giannis is a once-in-a-generation opportunity, and there's two ways to sort of navigate that. One is to just win with him, and you guys got one. But also, you cannot miss your window to trade him. You cannot miss your window to trade him.
Yeah.
Two titles? Yeah.
NBA Cup? Oh, I'm sorry. Do we count that? I thought you didn't know. I was like, what's wrong with this guy?
My point is you guys are reaching this. You gotta be able to trade Giannis if you're if you're not gonna win with him. To get a haul. And A, I don't know if there's still time. There's probably time.
And B, I'm not sure if John Horst is that guy.
So do your has some thing. You need an owner who's smart enough not just to know when to pull the plug on Aiannis, to have in place the front office that can. If Sam Presti trades to Aianis onto the Kumpo, you have a chance at a championship in four years. for multiple years. He traded away Paul George and got that.
If John Horse is trading away Giannis out to the coupo. I don't know, man. Like, I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't, that's the other. Catch 22. It's not just about trading honest.
It has to be done properly, and that requires a really savvy GM.
So how does dock Who won? He's like the NBA's version of Sean Payton, who I'm very critical of. Me too. We're aligned on this. I think Sean Payton's a total con man, just like Duck.
Yeah.
This this this PR thing. Yeah.
Yes. I don't get it. Doc Rivers. He won a title in 2008.
Okay, thanks. on a team that A lot of coaches probably would have won a title with. I would have won a, I could have coached that team to a title. I could have coached that team to two titles, maybe. I don't think, I'm not saying, I'm not, I don't know where he would rank.
In the 30 coaches. 27th. Put him at 27th. Not high. But it's certainly like.
So there is so you know, to wrap up the buck stuff. This season's been an abject disaster. But There's some plain possibility. The back chord's playing well. There's some things to like.
Giannis will return. I would just like to see. Then get through the play-in. You know, make it somewhat competitive with Detroit. I want that.
I want to see what happens. I do. I do. I do. That tanking, it's not going to work the way that we would need it to work, I don't think.
So that's do you even have your draft pick? I don't even know. I don't even pay attention to it. Does that work for? We have a s there's a swap situation.
So if we get the higher. Of the Pelicans. It's us and the Pelicans. The higher goes of the Hawks, or the better part goes to the Hawks.
So so if the Bucs win the number one pick. Right. We got to then we're drafting wherever the Pelicans get. Yeah.
Which is also, yeah, because that's the thing.
So you need to go one, two. Yeah, that's not going to happen. No, it's not. Uh so so so. I think that I'm Ex there so there's a lot of things there's there are some things to be excited about.
But then if you start like Looking forward in your head, like if you, Phil, if you really try to believe. If you try to, if I were to try to convince you. About this Bucs team and how far they could go. And I could talk about Rollins and KPJ playing together, and some other guys we like, and Cam Thomas off the bench, and whatever this gen guy can be, and Giannis coming back. You can just decide.
Like you can you can let me get as far down the road as you want. Or you can just throw the card in right away. Because no matter how far I go down the path, all you got to do is just be like, And I'm playing the Doc Rivers card. And now you have to start back at zero. It's like they're playing a board game that you have the card.
The card is not, they're not going to do anything this year. They're not going to do anything next year. It doesn't matter if Giannis signs. For perpetuity. That's going to get in the way.
And what are we doing? Your best case scenario this year and next year is, and I don't think this will happen. This is like throw a parade if this happens, losing in five or six games in the second round. I I mean, it's it's and the thing about about this is Giannis is one of the three or four best players in the NBA. He should be talked about as one of the two or three best players in the NBA, but you don't get to be.
When your team sucks. And so the level to which his window is doing. That's right. That's right. Yeah.
And so the talk, by the way, you asked why Doc Rivers and Sean Payton. They're charming. They know how to play the media game and they're willing to be bullies and they're willing to not tell the truth. Like they're. I would argue, and I mean this in the arena of sports, not as parents or husbands, right?
You can be a great day. I got a neighbor, he's a great guy. He's an SOB as a lawyer, right?
So, just professionally speaking, Sean Payton and Doc Rivers are bad guys. who know how to play the game. And that's a very dangerous combination. They're charming. We work with people like this.
Kiss the boss's ass, nice to everybody, but actually, just, you know, we'll put a knife in anybody's back. And I could tell you a million Doc Rivers stories on this. The problem is, Doc's not a good enough coach. And the track record of what he's done in the playoffs isn't a hot take. It's easy to look up, it's easy to verify.
And if you eliminate that title from 131 years ago at the Celtics, he has been an abject failure as a coach on every measurable since he left, certainly Boston. And he's had. I mean, I know the Lob City Clippers we all roll our eyes at. And I covered that team and broke some stories on that team. That's where I got to really know what Doc was about.
But they underachieved by the standards of what that team was for that era of basketball. And now he's going to underachieve with Yana Thanta Decumpo. He's going to take over. I know it's an old story, but a team that was. I don't know if Adrian Griffin was the guy and the defense wasn't good, but they were awesome offensively.
And Damon, Jasper, still kind of figuring it out. And the thing that no one talks about with Doc is that Doc has presided multiple times, Boston, Los Angeles, and maybe Milwaukee, over superstars who not only don't gel, but don't like each other. Doc is not a player's coach in the sense that he goes in and he makes everybody happy. He's a player's coach in the sense that he knows who the star is and he will charm that guy. And so.
Yeah, you have no I don't say no hope, but It's the worst Eastern Conference I can remember in years. years and you still have no opportunity. Making the conference finals is impossible. And that is a that is an that is an institutional failure. all the way across into Jovianis.
A lot of it's doc, and a lot of it goes back to bringing doc in. Good. I think we'll wrap up there on a high note. Do you like that? There's nothing we have to see in 10 years because AI is going to wipe us all out.
Exactly. I was just thinking that we're like, hey, how are you doing? Oh, I'm miserable. Yeah, me too. AI is going to kill us all.
So, what do the Bucks, what does their plan look like for the next three years? I'm not miserable. What are we doing? Why are we paying? We're going to die.
Who cares? Yes. It's not great. But it's great to be alive while we are. And to talk to you.
It's not talk to you, Part. This was fun. Yeah.
When do I pay your producer to go easy on my hair, though? I don't know. Is it that bad? I like your. It's a lot of hair, I, you know.
All right, so I'll come on your sub stack now. When? Tomorrow? Have a night. Or the week after.
I gotta. Tomorrow on Saturday? I skipped my sub stack today. It was my birthday yesterday, and I drank a lot of time. But you're doing an hour with me.
No, because I said I would. I was like, I was like, oh, you know what? I said, I'll do it. I'll go on. I slept in.
I slept. I used to get up at 4 a.m. I slept till 7:30 today. It was amazing. 7:15.
Do you want to post this on your sub stack as like a... It's free. And it's promotion for me. I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna promote I'm gonna uh cut clips from it and then I'm gonna put it on there. Yeah.
What a fucking guy. I'm gonna be like, hey, do you wanna hear about how you're all gonna get wiped out from the face of the earth? But if you root for Giannis, it'll be miserable until then? Check out my appearance with Bart. Yeah.
Bill, it was a pleasure to have you on, and I will be bothering you again in the future. Can't wait, dude. Appreciate you, buddy. Because if these boats Are gonna make it to shore. We gotta stick together.
We gotta stick together. Yeah Thanks to Bill Ryder and all of you for coming into the Winklerverse. It's tax season, and at LifeLock, we know you're tired of numbers. But here's a big one you need to hear. Billions.
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