The Drive with Josh Graham - Seeing Ghosts

This is The Drive with Josh Graham Podcast.

Tune into The Drive weekday afternoons 3 to 7 on Sports Hub Triad. What's a more terrifying sight? Seeing the New England Patriots defense or seeing Ghost? Because Sam Darnold apparently faced both of them last night.

I want to get to the Ghost portion of this in a minute but it seems that New England is in everybody's head. Remember when the greatest offensive mind of the sport seemed broken and the Super Bowl trying to change everything he did to get to that point? Only scoring three points against the Patriots? Adam Gase seemed to be this great offensive mind then he's belittled to the point it's 33 to nothing. The Patriots are intentionally giving five yards to the New York Jets and Adam Gase doesn't know what to do so he just declines the penalty.

Nope, we're not gonna allow you to go five yards back. The camera pans to Bill Belichick and the guy is a robot. He doesn't smile but in this instance when Gase is not allowing him to give free yardage up he couldn't help but smirk. He had that smirk and I put this up on Twitter. That mirrors the smirk Southerners have when they're at cookout and they hear Northerners looking at the cookout menu for the first time. Wait what's a hush puppy? Are you telling me I get I can have a corn dog as a side?

It's crazy man. Des what is your go-to cookout order by the way? If you're ordering cookout what are you getting? The double cookout tray with the fries. Big double burger.

Yeah that's what I always get too. Add cheese and A1 sauce. A1 sauce? Yeah man you got that. You can do that?

Yeah man. You throw that on there with hush puppies and fries or nuggets and fries for my side and in a former life a huge sweet tea but I'm not allowed to do that. Do you know what we should do in the south on this show? The same way Dan Patrick takes phone calls and they give their height and weight what they can bench. We should take phone calls and you have to give us your cookout order at the start of it. Oh I love it. Like your go-to cookout order 336-777-1600. In fact I'm down taking those calls right now 777-1600 on Twitter at Sports Hub Triad. That's the face Belichick gave.

You're in line. Guys asking what hush puppies are. Doesn't understand the cookout menu.

Wait what what's Cheerwine all about? The Patriots they're in everybody's head and the crazy thing is they're unbeaten and they're getting better. So they trade for Mohamed Sanu today in exchange for a second round draft pick. The Pats they've loved Sanu for a while.

They've been badgering whoever's had him to get Sanu and it seemed like they liked them in exchange for a first round draft pick. But now the Falcons they're mailing it in and you get a second rounder. The Patriots they finally solved the wide receiver problems. Pat Mahomes he's gonna be out for the next few weeks. The Patriots are already in an awful division so you got to be thinking in addition to seeing Gase turn down free yardage that Belichick's just looking at the league and laughing. He's a step ahead and things are just lying out so easy for him right now.

All right now let's get to the ghost part. If you missed the mic'd up segment that they did last night on ESPN Sam Darnold gave us this gem. The mic'd up stuff is generally useless. It is television networks boasting sticking their chest out saying look at this access that we have.

And in return what we get is content is usually awful stuff. It's usually hey let's play defense yo pound it in the paint play hard. You've heard these before what do they generally sound like Des when you think mic'd up what's what's usually being said by a coach in the huddle? Usually well my first thought was give me your impression if it's like a quarterback or someone if they get hit they're like oh nice hit man what are you doing? Like nice hit oh dude you really hit me there. Play hard and the good stuff it comes out in the middle of the week inside the NFL gives us Cam Newton talking to Clay Matthews.

Matthews thinks it's gonna be a screenplay oh you did your prep didn't you? The wheel route. Check this out oh the wheel route that's what it was the wheel route and Christian McCaffrey had something for you completion right across the middle for a touchdown.

These are usually useless but then Darnold gave us a huge gift last night. Seeing ghosts. It's like an X-Files episode. Darnold he's starring in it and he looks into the camera deadpan and says Is this a side effect? This might be part of the X-Files.

Side effect for mono seeing ghosts. Usually it's the deflate gate stuff that leads to X-Files like investigations. Did Tom Brady know that the footballs were deflated? The sad thing is watching the replays of some of the stuff from last night pictures are just sending one extra dude. That's pretty much it the whole night just one extra guy. I have the hot take today that I don't think anybody else is gonna have across the sports media platform. Usually we're late to things because we're on in the afternoon everybody gets a crack at it in the morning and DG comes on right before us. I think I have something that hasn't been said yet.

I think it's a plus that he could see ghosts. It's a good sign you want your quarterback to be able to see everything on the field so the Carolina Panthers are getting set for the San Francisco 49ers on Sunday. The Niners are the only unbeaten team in the NFC.

In 25 minutes we will be joined by the voice of the Carolina Panthers Mik Vixen. I hate this matchup for Carolina. I think this game is gonna come down to who runs the ball better and I have more faith that the 49ers will because as good as Luke Kuechly is and as good as this pass rush has been, Thieves Avenue the way they've turned over the football, the rush defense has not been exceptional. Carolina is 23rd in the league in rush defense. The 49ers conversely are second in the NFL running the ball.

They pound it. If you haven't watched the 49ers yet they're a team that doesn't mind giving it the burrito four or five times in a row and then just working play action the rest of the game. It's not like an option based offense in college but the ratio of run to pass does remind you of these run based college offenses you'll see and that surprises me a bit because that's not what Kyle Shanahan was doing in Atlanta but it's the sign of a great coach whether you're talking about in college basketball Roy Williams and Coach K being able to change things year in and year out based on the personnel that they have rather than tailoring the personnel to a style.

Kyle Shanahan's the kind of coach that looks at his personnel and then tailors the offense to that versus the other way around. Plus the 49ers they have the number one total defense in the league they're eighth against the run. McCaffrey he's gone off pretty much against anybody except for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Houston Texans. Those are the two teams that have held them under a hundred yards.

Do you know what those two teams have in common? They're both top ten rush defensive and the most recent game Todd Bowles once again helped Christian McCaffrey to under 60 yards total complete. I think everybody's gonna be studying that film from the two games against Tampa Bay and if anybody has the personnel to shut down McCaffrey it's this San Francisco team. This defense is legitimate and I think it's gonna be a problem for Carolina. You might think though Josh Carolina's had extra time to prepare though they're coming off the bye week that's an advantage for Carolina.

Maybe not. Ron Rivera is four and four after the bye week in his career with the Panthers. This is a road game against the best opponent Carolina's had this year. So you can give me all the Kyle Allen's red-hot stuff Rivera oh it's after a bye week but the numbers really muddy that. As good as Houston is they ain't got beat by the Houston Texans or excuse me by the Indianapolis Colts on Sunday and the LA Rams have sputtered in points. They won in Atlanta but they're four and three in the season. This seems to be the hottest team in the NFL and the best team that the Carolina Panthers have played to this point. So I'm not going as far to say right now that the Panthers are going to lose to the 49ers on Sunday.

What I am saying though, analytically where the games being played the opponent that you're going up against just sheer on paper matchups I don't like it. It stinks for the Carolina Panthers. The drive is broadcast live at the law offices of Timothy D. Wellborn Studios.

Learn about the ways Tim Wellborn can help you online at TimWellborn.com. It's the start of the NBA season tonight. It's the start of the World Series tonight. Before we move off to that though, tough news for Wake Forest football today. The heart of the defense, Justin Sternad out for the remainder of the season. It is a tough way for Sternad's collegiate career to end because my understanding of the medical redshirt rule is you have to play in less than half the games in a year in order to file for it and Wake Forest has already played seven games this season.

So I don't think it could happen. He's a redshirt senior. He's an excellent kid.

Somebody I understand is a fan of the show as well. He even tweeted as much when we put out the news on our social media today. So really wishing the best for Justin Sternad and for Wake Forest quite frankly because he really is the best player on that defense. He is a captain. He played in 46 games in his career, starting the last 20 games for the Deags and right now his 69 tackles, a nice total, leads Wake Forest and it's seventh in the ACC. So hoping the best for Justin Sternad and I hope somebody in the NFL is smart enough to pick him next year. Coming up, why I won it, much like bet against Justin Sternad, why I won it bet against Zion Williamson after this latest injury setback.

This is The Drive. Oh gosh yeah it was wide open. I mean I just let my hair down and saw my grandson play a soccer game. He's 12 and just kind of getting into being aggressive and kicking the ball and and that was a blast and let's see I had a spent some time with my my wife's family up there in Burlington, alamance County.

Oh yeah. So it was um it was great and I enjoyed watching some ball and listening to some ball. Still can't believe that Tar Heel Virginia tag game. That was crazy. So and then the NFL my gosh what theater over the over the weekend it was just kind of fun to sit back and look at some of it.

Shout out to the folks listening on 1 0 4 5 and 9 20 a.m. in Burlington. Mick Vixen broadcasts in the Panthers for a good bit of time now. I'm not sure if you've seen the breaking news in the last 20 minutes that the 49ers have acquired Denver wide receiver Emmanuel Sanders in exchange for third and fourth round draft picks next year but it already looked like a pretty tough matchup Sunday. How do you see this matchup? Is it the Panthers biggest test to this point?

Oh without a doubt yeah I've enjoyed looking at San Fran a little bit. Their defense is very very stout. Their safeties will come up and thump you. They they get past rush in a variety of ways. Good tacklers. Not a lot of yards after after they they show up in the vicinity.

They kind of get there in a bad frame of mind. Good tackling technique. Kyle Shanahan's he's always had the play action game when they run though they couldn't you know they're they run the ball with a determination that gets you wadded up to stop the run and then you know how many times when Shanahan was with Atlanta do we see Matt Ryan ride the ball into Coleman or Freeman and then you think you think you know where the ball is and then you don't know there's a long downfield pass so it's going to be a tough challenge but I think the Panthers have an exceptional defense I think that the team has rallied around Kyle Allen and I don't know if it sure didn't seem like it at 0-2 but it now seems like there is something special about this Panther team. It was great to see earlier today some of the pictures and videos of Cam Newton outside of the practice bubble stretching working out participating with trainers on the side not actually participating in practice to this point so Allen is going to start on Sunday but it's crazy that this is somehow a divisive topic and it's only taken like a month for us to get to this point may make with the quarterbacks what do you make of how strongly a non small contingent of the Panthers fan base feels that Kyle Allen should remain the starting quarterback once Cam's foot heals? Well I don't see what all the fuss is about Kyle Allen is a starting quarterback for for this week and possibly beyond I think unless you're looking at Breeze or Brady you probably don't change away from a hot hand at quarterback. Brady you could argue and it's not black letter law but you could argue body of work just bring him bring him back in I think Teddy Bridgewater probably knows he's a bookmark and he's been fantastic but with our you know with our guy it's a little different I think the foot injury questions about can he you know can he plant can he run can he jump can he leap over tall buildings in the single bound can he be that dual threat quarterback that that we've come to know and admire and love you know if so then why not look at it in the way that's most favorable to us why not look at it as the Panthers have depth at quarterback and we have two two guys that could win a game. We all agree that this is probably a great problem to have if you're Carolina knowing you have Kyle Allen while Cam is down and Ron Rivera deserves a lot of credit when people were doubting say where Carolina was at with their quarterbacks when Cam went down heck even during the preseason Ron he stuck with Allen and it's been rewarded what he saw in his talent evaluation but be it with Brees or somewhere else it's usually the fan base that backs the superstar unless they express they prefer to play somewhere else which has not happened at all with Cam Newton he loves Charlotte he wants to win a Super Bowl in Charlotte but the fact that there are fans I don't know if it's being spoiled or something else for them to say hey this guy who's won an MVP here probably the most talented single-player this franchise has ever had we prefer to have someone else playing under center is it at least interesting to you that this is kind of a talking point not just between us but around the state of North Carolina? I guess I mean I'm not on social media so I don't believe in I don't see the wisdom and slugging it out with with people I don't know and people who don't really know me I think that with with Cam Newton with Kyle Allen the psychology of all this is very fascinating is very intriguing but it makes me as mad as can be this idea that that these there's a group of Panther fans that don't want Cam anymore I guarantee you that if Cam Newton walked into their place of work or if they saw Cam Newton if they rolled up on him at a car wash a mall a restaurant what do you say how do you think they would behave? Hey can I have a selfie? Of course oh okay okay okay okay and and players players know that I mean they know that the same people who are criticizing the way he dresses probably there's pictures in their closet somewhere of them in the disco era where they they probably weren't exactly looking like Yves Saint Laurent so I just try to focus on the football I think it's fantastic that Cam is a competitive competitive combative warrior king he wants to get back Josh here's how I could see this playing out yeah that helps the Carolina Panthers Cam Newton internalizes all this and he comes back mad at it and determined even more determined than ever he's already determined but he comes back even more purposeful even more determined to when he gets his chance show everybody all the tweeters the chatters the bloggers the talkers the instagramers the FaceTimers the Facebookers that they they they did not realize what they were working with that's about as well as you can put it and I agree with pretty much all of that Mick Mixon the voice of the Carolina Panthers with us on sports hub triad were there any old photos of Mick once upon a time in the disco I've got to ask if if they had had if taking pictures was as easy then as it is now I could I would have to move out of state possibly out of the country David Cutcliffe once upon a time was here telling us about how he was big on discos and still after every win at Duke he's dancing with people all over the place he loves to dance at Duke this is a question I never thought I'd be asking in an NFL context but after last night's Jets Patriots game it's one that I have to ask the mic up microphones for ESPN called Sam Darnold on the sidelines saying this he was seeing ghosts he said Mick Mixon do you believe in ghosts so I watched a little bit of that game but I did not see that was he was he concussed did he was he suffering from head trauma what was the contact not a side effect of mononucleosis which he was which forced him out for about a month no he was looking at one of those tablets they have on the sideline and he was talking to a coach and he said that he was seeing ghosts well I don't really know I mean I don't it's not something that that I that I believe in if you know if my wife and I were gonna buy a house and then we learned that there were that it was haunted this would affect my bride way differently than it would affect me we would if she were in charge which he is we'd have to have some sort of exorcism some sort of ridding of the some kind of ceremony candle something or other bring somebody in to get the evil spirits away our producer by the way claims Desmond claims that his house is haunted is this true des that your house is haunted well my kids and my niece all proclaimed that it's haunted I don't believe in ghosts so I can't subscribe to it but everyone else around me claims that my house is haunted okay what reason weird sounds hearing things walking up above us things moving lights stuff like that your house doesn't have those side effects back does it well we were in an apartment now we sold our house and sort of in a little bit Donnie and I a little bit of a housing transition now we so we're we got some apartment sounds that we've heard that I would rather not be hearing but that's that's a topic possibly for another type of show yeah perhaps Vic it's always good to talk to you about football ghost and whatever else thank you so much for doing this oh you're the best Josh thanks for having me on brother got it that's Mick Vixen the voice of the Carolina Panthers kind enough to spend some time with us as he mentioned not on the Twitter so there's no place you can follow Mick what other details can you tell me about your haunted house I mean I've had I've spent like a month in there by myself you know when my kids and my wife took off for Ohio during the summer so I was there alone for a month and didn't see anything here anything funny but they say there's some sort of I guess spooky vibe to the house which I will attest to there is something kind of you can kind of feel a weird vibe to the house when you when you when you're in there but haunted or ghosts I'm not really the ghost type I guess but they subscribe to it totally this next segment's gonna be tough there are three confessions I have to make on air that's next on the drive now I want you to be calm don't get too excited but this is the drive he likes to kiss and cuddle be warned this is extremely graphic so if you have small children in the room don't let them disturb you back to the drive with Josh Graham I have three confessions that I need to make here and I guess since the NBA is opening up tonight we might as well start with the Lakers and Clippers 1030 tip-off time I'm not staying up for this game I bet 95 that's an accurate number 95% of the people listening in this audience right now whoever is hearing my voice here 95% of you will not be staying up for this basketball game 1030 tip-off time and I guess it's one of those things where I got to be in Raleigh at 9 o'clock in the morning tomorrow so that might factor into it but even if it wasn't I probably just staying up for game one of the World Series tonight then I'm calling it quits there is there are a few things less meaningful than a single NBA regular season basketball game like obviously a Major League Baseball regular season game when you got 162 of them it's something that's very insignificant but despite that there are gonna be so many conclusions drawn tomorrow and I'm not looking forward to it NBA Twitter just being Twitter is very over reactionary so you have people losing their mind on Michael Jordan right now who said jokingly in a very MJ ask way that Steph Curry isn't the Hall of Famer yet they lose their mind and whatever happens tonight whoever wins between the Lakers and Clippers people are going to lose it when every year in these opening week opening week or so results happen that turn out not to mean much of anything so I'm not staying up for things that don't mean up mean much of anything I'm fine watching the highlight tomorrow Kevin Harlan will be on the call to game for the game tonight on TNT and he will be our guest at about this time tomorrow to talk about it so that's my first confession I'm not staying up for this number two the NBA on NBC theme that everybody loves the old one you know this theme right here oh it's so great it gets you excited for basketball tonight even though it's been out of rotation for how long 15 20 years at least it's been forever since it's been in rotation but we're all excited very excited because of this theme it's not one of the three best sports themes of all time not one of the three best people proclaim it the best there is I will show you right now what the best sports theme is something when you hear it you know exactly what we're talking about and there is nothing in sports better you hello friends ah yes it's that time of year it's early April and Augusta National was ripe to crown a champion a tradition unlike any other the Masters best sports theme that's number one for me number two is probably March Madness College basketball and then just Monday Night Football that checks out to among the best sports teams those are the top three and today's sports talk radio where everybody's yelling at each other just spewing hot takes it just feels good to have that theme even though there are general managers and people who study analytics who say don't play soft music such as this because it's not good for radio and rating I disagree with that Josh disagreeing with everybody who tells them things a tradition unlike any other yes does this is the best theme song best sports theme ever this right over this yeah weren't you listening I want to go dunk on you right now not not top three I mean the college basketball March Madness theme objectively better and still in rotation I mean the March Madness theme gets you pretty jacked so it's a confession that I needed to make I needed to get this off of my chest that I'm not staying up for Lakers Clippers tonight I'm just not and the Masters theme is my favorite sports theme of all time followed by the March Madness College basketball theme Monday Night Football not the most accurate portrayal but then you have the NBA stuff maybe after that so three three six seven seven seven one six hundred on Twitter at sports hub triad if you have thoughts on that I can get with you on the NCAA bath the March Madness thing it just puts you there you do remember my hot take about one shiny moment though oh I remember I think the whole tribe remembers not a fan I don't think it's a good song I think you can put anything with those highlights at the end of March Madness and it's gonna be just fine do you not see the kids faces but whoever the national champion team I know they wait for you that you could put any song there and those kids are gonna be just as happy oh because they just won a national championship you can put Beethoven on with that music playing and they're still gonna be happy they just won the national time they tried that though remember they did not try the whole Luther Vandross got replaced by Jennifer Hudson thing I know because they were singing the same bad song not a good song Oh last confession here if there's a pre 1970s classic in movies I haven't seen it I've claimed on this show to be a movie savant I love movies I'm an enthusiast I don't really like action movies much I like rom-coms I'm not afraid to cop to it um I I love movies that are kind of a bummer have no problem watching those if it's depressing I'm in on that too but pre 1970s movies the classics I haven't seen it let me clarify something though Wizard of Oz Snow White I saw those movies growing up I haven't seen them since I've been an adult I tried to watch Citizen Kane one time because the real film snobs said hey this this movie is unbelievable man it's one of the most influential movies ever you're gonna love Citizen Kane fell asleep halfway through so going with the wind haven't seen it Casablanca haven't seen it sound of music not as an adult Lawrence of Arabia nope West Side Story not saying these movies are bad that's not what I'm saying I am saying that if it's made before 1970 there's probably about a hundred percent chance I haven't seen it and I'm probably never going to see it that's just where I'm at on it let's go to Jay and Jamestown who wants in on the sports theme music subject Jay where are you falling in terms of picking a theme song you like yes sir Jay from Jamestown junior tray double corndog double fries thank you so much are you there I am here that's that's a very good okay sorry about that all right very good I can hear the timpani's right now and I cannot believe that you've left the Olympic theme song oh that's that's an excellent one but we only boom boom we only could you could continue we only get every four years though Jack so I knew you were gonna give me an asterisk on that but I just had to call in anyway thank you Jay all right and I like this new rule that we set yeah every caller that we get like when we do a giveaway like today's show it's Wake Forest NC State football tickets it is we're giving away a $50 kickback Jack's gift card we're doing that today before every single one of those calls I want to know what your go-to cookout order is that's the new policy on our show I like it we can do that here we definitely can I didn't even tell you what my go-to cookout order you didn't what is your big double burger with lettuce mustard ketchup and bacon on the burger no cheese sides I'm going chicken quesadilla and fries and I used to go dr. pepper to drink in fact I haven't been back since I've been off soda hmm and I haven't last night was the first night I ate a burger and like two months it's great yeah welcome to welcome to the club oh I'm kind of there what club the anti soda club well that too and the stay away from red meat as much as possible club I guess I'm at the point where I reward myself once a week yeah I asked the question on the internet because that's the best place to go how do you eat healthy during football season because I'm at a place where I go to two maybe three games a week and it's gonna get even crazier in the month of November it's not generally the most healthy food that they have at these places like for instance if I go to a wake basketball game they'll give you a voucher and it's great that they provide food for us we appreciate that but you go to the con concourse and your options are tenders burger or I mean that's pretty much it the burger or the tenders and okay you got soda they're hard to really resist that if you go to NC State North Carolina whoever else it might be it's usually burgers and dogs the Panthers they have that and then at halftime they have hot dogs again and after the game there's pizza and there's a damn ice cream self-serving machine like you gotta be care these ice cream machines keep following you around I know how am I supposed to resist it when they just keep following me around like ghosts like random spots they just pop up I just keep following me around like they're ghosts on the field that Sam Darnold staring at yes yes he was speaking of that I'm trying to think of other instances in sports where athletes claim to have seen ghosts and the only one I could find this audio coming courtesy of ESPN radio Derek Rose in his second year in the league got so scared at this Oklahoma City hotel thinking that it was haunted that he went into James Johnson's room who was on the team at the time and forced him onto the floor and took his bed because he believed his room was haunted this is some of that from James Johnson this is probably five or six years ago we would just come back from dinner and we were walking to his I was walking with him to his room to grab something out of his room and when we got that all his stuff was flipped upside down the bed the couches the chair in there and he immediately turned white and took off running scary it's clearly his teammates who did that it's like my first thought was Joe Kim Noah was on that team money yeah that sounds like something Joe Kim Noah would have done and the only reason you might think it isn't because Derek Rose wasn't a rookie anymore so you immediately default I'm not a rookie anymore it must be ghost but I'm not gonna hate on Derek Rose I'm the same person last week who woke up in the middle of the night had like a nightmare and then felt something like under the covers so I got out of bed rather than just like ignoring it and going back to sleep I just slept on the couch well wait while Winnie was sleeping on my head but my cat just just slept on the couch I got out of my bed did it cross your mind that maybe it was Winnie it wasn't Winnie I would know if it was Winnie she wasn't in the room so you so are you are you firmly in the supernatural ghost camp I believe in ghosts sure I believe in ghost drive brought to you in part by our friends pie guys pizza and more find them in Clemens off of Lewisville Clemens Road a great sponsor of the program tried the gram slam people pizza Arabian sugarcane pie and also visit them because they might have ghosts kidding I'm kidding there are no ghosts no ghost at pie guys kidding just kidding pie guys calm I'm sure they're gonna love that read you are listening to WSJS Winston-Salem WCOG Greensboro WPC in Burlington WMFR high point those signals picking up sports up try it the drive with Josh Graham he's confident smart witty vicious brutal addictive a monster maybe but he knows his sports back to the drive with Josh Graham on sports hub triad find the ACC rankings from the hosts of our local 7-hour block in the afternoon and ACC sports.com our weekly ACC rankings are there David Glenn now with us as he is each and every week at this time you can find his rankings and my rankings again at ACC sports.com not a shocker that Clemson's at the very top and we'll get to the ACC football topics in a bit but we need to get to the most important stuff Sam Darnold last night said he was seeing ghosts when he was mic'd up on ESPN's Monday Night Football it was probably the best use of the mic'd up segment we've ever seen DG do you believe in ghosts well let me just say Josh that I'd like a cheeseburger all the way with slaw and onion rings and a huge tea please excellent work there done great job that's the requirement to get into today's show now on the ghost front my children taught me the right way to order trays I had to learn it from my own kids it's funny because Bill Belichick's look last night is Adam Gase is denying five free yards they look to Belichick he's smirking he's a robot who never smiles it's the same look Southerners have when they hear Northerners order it cookout for the first time well what's the hush about yeah what's your wine all about so I figured it out hey oh hey buddy order already we're dying back hey I'll tell you I you raise an interesting question with the mic'd up session because you know me well enough to know that I love being an independent journalist in fact when some people hear that I created the ACC Sports Journal and ACC sports calm they assume that were officially affiliated with the league which we're not as a young person I did videos and books and other things that had to be approved by the ACC or had to be approved by Duke or Carolina or I did some work for raycom the big TV partner of the league for a while and one of the reasons is a very young man that I tended toward the independent side of things and did not really like sort of the official side of things is I didn't like people having to approve my work right if it's if it's historical if it's interesting if it's relevant I wanted to include it but if Duke hires you to write the history of Duke basketball or raycom hires you to write the history the ACC tournament well of course the league or the school want approval and when I see these mic'd up situations whether it's TV partners you know the traditional broadcasters or in this case NFL films I'm reminded of the trade-off right like the NFL and these leagues want to cooperate with people who are giving them billions of dollars in money to televise their product but they want to draw lines as well and as soon as Sam Darnold was painted in a negative light by seeing ghosts and it looked like Bill Belichick was in a young quarterbacks head I knew Adam Gates wasn't gonna like that I knew he was gonna say we need to find out what we're obligated to do and what we're not obligated to do and it's just a fascinating gray area to me when you move from truly independent journalism to something where you're half in bed with the school or the league that you're covering because it gets really complicated once you get into those weeds sometimes and that's why we're talking about it today because we've grown accustomed to play our defense hey get the ball in there and it's just it's just leagues or excuse me TV networks boasting the axis they get because of these massive contracts that they sign with leagues and as you mentioned they're in bed with them but DG I feel like you're sidestepping the issue do you believe in ghosts do I believe in ghosts I do not although I love Casper the friendly ghost as a kid and when Demi Moore thought she saw ghosts I like Demi Moore so much that that's as close as I've ever come to somebody convincing me to believe it goes excellent work there um the NBA season tips off tonight so I assume we'll have like the plugged in or mic'd up segment and you'll see exactly what we're talking about it's probably gonna be useless sound but Desmond is convinced this is the best sports theme of all time this right here it's so great it hasn't been on television in an official sense in 20 years it's great it's the NBA on NBC it is good right I don't know the last time the that NBC carried basketball the NBA specifically but it's been a while for me this this was seen as a hot take I don't really view that as one of the top three when I'm trying to figure out what the best one is I start with something that we have in the month of April something that is a little calmer than what you just heard there it's specifically the Masters when you go to it the Masters is what I look at where do you start well I don't know how to exactly say this because I don't have a button to push to cue up the audio but I believe it's an old Monday Night Football theme way back and I mean that just got way before I think that was you know before Hank Williams jr. was singing the Monday Night Football theme and all that stuff I love that pure sound I'm not anti lyrics but I love when that got you charged up for the game of the week and in terms of pure instrumentals that's probably the one that jumps out in my head the most this is here for me DG it's the Masters a tradition unlike any other voice right there yes yes friends hello friends welcome to Augusta National that's that's probably where I begin I will keep this music going I'll ask this next question in Nancy's calm Masters voice we're being joined by David Glenn the host of the David Glenn show on Twitter at David Glenn show I'm looking at the ACC poll it is really hard to whisper in this voice I figured out at this point DG would you be surprised considering what we've seen in the coastal if it wasn't Pittsburgh or Virginia playing in the ACC title game I would be surprised I think Virginia is the best team they were my preseason pick I'm sticking with them although they have some injury issues as do others you know they of course each have only one loss the Hokies the Devils the heels all have two I do think Caroline is talented enough to make a run but you know they had a chance to beat app and it got away a chance to be awake and it got away a chance to beat Virginia Tech and it got away so I don't know how much confidence I can have that Mac Brown and the Tar Heels will start winning more of those close games they're two and three or wait what is it yeah two and three in the closest games I guess all but one has been close so yeah I think Virginia's the team to beat remember they already have the head-to-head win over pit if they need that as a tiebreaker later I wouldn't surprise me if it came down to that Virginia Virginia Tech game at the end of the regular season where remember the Hokies have been on the right end of that for over a decade so wouldn't it be interesting if the Cavaliers chance to actually make a trip to the ACC title game for the first time columns in the context of having to try to beat the Hokies head-to-head for the first time in forever that scenario wouldn't surprise me at all my theory on the Zion Williamson front who's not going to play tonight as the Raptors unveil a banner against the Zion list New Orleans pelicans he's out for the next six to eight weeks with a torn meniscus in his knee he's a physical enigma and I'm not betting against him because last year a lot of people said that he needed to cut weight in order to be competitive in the ACC and he dominated all throughout last year he almost broke college basketball essentially with how good he was and I get the injury that he had for a couple of weeks but I thought that was more freak accident than anything that indicated he needed to drop weight he didn't wear a boot afterwards and people even close to the program have told me that if it was March Zion Williamson probably plays through pain and we learned that he had a high pain threshold because according to the reporting by the athletic they didn't even know he had a torn meniscus and they don't even know specifically when he sustained the injury because he had 29 and 10 and the preseason game against the Spurs that he allegedly had the injury the guys are freaked I'm not betting against freak athleticism that we've only seen a couple times in our lifetimes what's your level of concern for Zion Williamson yeah I'm with you I'm not betting against him you know the human body is designed to only take so much and we have a rare physical specimen who sometimes carries 280 or so on a six seven frame and I'm no doctor but you know we see in certainly a lot of sports where there's repetitive motion eventually even if you have a great golf swing a shoulder a neck a back a knee a hip or some combination of the above starts to go I mean I'm a guy pitched for 20 years and I have a partially turned torn left rotator cuff to show for it I mean there's certain motions that just can't be duplicated that doesn't happen as often in basketball but you know the bigger guys who carry more weight are putting more pressure on their hips and their knees and now you know Zion has had more than one issue with his lower body so I'm with you if I only get to pick Zion's going to be great or Zion's gonna fall flat I'm picking Zion's going to be great and I even think his preseason performance underlined that he can do it his way even against the best basketball players in the world even against you know better shot blockers in the paint where he likes to live etc so I hope injuries don't make this a moot question I'm still betting on Zion Williamson and I have a feeling he'll be one of the best rookies in the NBA once he is healthy six or so weeks from now going into today I already didn't feel good about the Panthers matchup against San Francisco considering how well they run the ball versus the Panthers even though they've been a great turnover defense they've been susceptible to great rushing teams given up a lot of rushing yards and also how well they stopped the run being the number one total defense Kyle Shanahan's 49ers but then we get the news as we're going on the air today DG that they just acquired Emmanuel Sanders in exchange for a third and fourth round draft pick of next year so now it's a rushing team that has more passing ability more options for Jimmy Garoppolo to distribute the ball between I don't think it's a good matchup for Carolina what about you I think they have a good show I mean you know San Francisco is a great team but I don't think they belong in the same conversation as the New England Patriots the only other undefeated team I'm not even sure they belong in the conversation with the Vikings and the Packers and the Saints and the other best records in the NFC we'll see maybe they'll prove me wrong against the Panthers maybe we'll prove me wrong in the longer sense but what I like is the Panthers have gone from one of the worst pass rushes in the NFL to some of the best stack numbers in the NFL and the 49ers have won mainly because of dominated defense Richard Sherman in the backfield but even more so the front seven led by Nick Bosa I don't think the Panthers are going to score a ton on the 49ers but the Niners are not great often and if Luke Kuechly and now for a change a really good pass rush can get to Jimmy Garoppolo can stuff the run can create some turnovers that's your recipe for a road victory so I agree with you about the addition of Sanders that doesn't make it easier but I think the Panthers need to lean on their defense and ask them to bring home a win the way that defense you know stuffs the Tampa Bay Buccaneers until the game was out of reach and has stuffed a couple of others in this four and two start we had so much fun this past weekend with the big tailgate tour being in Winston-Salem it was you myself Darren Vaught and company at the last resort bar right off of Deacon Boulevard thanks to those tailgate tour and then we went on the tailgate lots had some fun as well to be at Duke North Carolina as we will be as well on Saturday right yes that is our final Chapel Hill stop so we'll be set up on Franklin Street at our usual place and it's been fun I mean after catching a great game with the FSU visiting wake glad we picked that one in retrospect we get you know one of our rivalry games you know we get state Carolina later this season we get Duke Carolina on Saturday afternoon and as Mack Brown's been saying all along this is a different Chapel Hill environment for college football you know he knows that's a full Keenan Stadium and even though the heels have come back to earth a little bit I have a feeling it's going to be jacked up for homecoming and jacked up for a chance to get some revenge on the Blue Devils who have had the better of this rivalry and it's a good it's a good spot that you have next to the Methodist Church spitting distance from top of the hill right there on Franklin Street and we look forward to seeing you out there on Saturday thanks for the visit as always DG always fun my man great food at the drive-through window I appreciate that that's David Glenn