The Drive with Josh Graham - The Lion King

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It's brilliant. In CP3's case, he better hope so because if it's not Miami, I don't think there's anybody else who would bring in that contract. Just look at what he's set to be paid. CP3, at 34 years old, is going to be paid $38.5 million this year. Next year, he's set to make $41.3 million.

And 36 years old, at 36, going to turn 37, and 2021-2022, he is set to make $44.2 million. Good luck moving that contract. You need a team that is willing to bring you on that is as short-sighted as Miami is in order to complete this trade. Miami, they have bad contracts they can exchange that'll be off the books sooner than Chris Paul's, which Oklahoma City would want. James Johnson, who's up after this year. Dion Waiters, up after this year. Those are pretty expensive, bad contracts that you can then send back that way and land CP3. If you're Miami, it makes sense because you already have Jimmy Butler. If you bring in Chris Paul, then you likely don't have to give away any of your young assets, which means without the luxury of having draft picks, in order to bring in Jimmy Butler, they had to send some away for cap relief purposes. Miami will have a chance potentially to land a third player alongside CP3 and Russell Westbrook.

That would be the intention. If you're Miami and Pat Riley, this is Pat Riley's last crack at it. I'm getting older.

I don't want to go out on a down note. Here's Jimmy Butler. Here's Chris Paul. And with some combination of a package consisting of Bam Adebayo, Justice Winslow, and Tyler Herro, the rookie who's crushing summer league right now from Kentucky. You can potentially get somebody else alongside those two moving forward.

That would be the hope. And that would be good enough to be competitive in the Eastern Conference. At the very top, you have Philadelphia and you have Milwaukee. But after that, who?

Indiana? They lose Bogdanovich and bring in who? Malcolm Brogdon, I think. They bring in TJ Warren. So I guess they might be the defacto third best team while Brooklyn tries to get their footing this year and then adds Kevin Durant from his Achilles injury the year after that. It's going to be Kyrie Irving and Spencer Dinwiddie against the world for the Nets this first season. The Boston Celtics, I don't know if it's an upgrade adding Kimball Walker in the place of Kyrie Irving while also losing Al Horford. So it'll be a wide open Eastern Conference and wide open in the West too.

But the West is just a lot more powerful than the East is. If you're Miami, you just want a part of that. You want a part of that. So that might be the only way Chris Paul's contract gets moved. If it's not Miami, I think he's going to stay in Oklahoma City, which means I think that's the end of Chris Paul and his relevant basketball career.

He'll stick around. They like him in Oklahoma City. Remember, his career started with the New Orleans Pelicans or excuse me, the New Orleans Hornets. And after Hurricane Katrina, he played a season in Oklahoma City.

So they like him there. And he might play the rest of his career there unless he gets bought out at some point. If that is the case and this is it, Chris Paul no longer going to be on a title contender.

And he's just going to keep declining with the team that's not relevant. What is Chris Paul's legacy? What are we going to think of when we think of Chris Paul?

Well, that's going to be a part of it. Or is that Cliff Paul? Now, that's Cliff Paul's thing, not Chris's. I wonder if Cliff Paul's got a better hamstring. Is Cliff Paul from 2? I would imagine so. Chris, Chris we know is from Clemons. But is Cliff from Clemons?

I don't know for sure. We're going to remember him at Wake for punching Julius Hodge at the nether regions. We're going to remember.

Thank you for that. We're going to remember CP3 for being a top 10 point guard, probably not a top 5. Do you classify Steph as a point guard?

Yes. OK, so there are six guys I would not put Chris Paul in front of them. Magic, Oscar, Isaiah, Steph, Stockton and Steve Nash back to back MVP winner. I put Chris Paul right in the same category as Jason Kidd. That's where I put CP3. Not a top 5 point guard ever.

Top 10, one of the best of this generation. Never won a title, no MVP, but was a part of Lob City, one of the more exciting teams that never won a title. He's going to be remembered for getting hurt with Houston up three games to two on Golden State at the most inopportune time.

Who knows, maybe he is a title champ if that's the case. That Golden State team went on to sweep LeBron and the Cavaliers. That was the closest that Chris Paul got. If he doesn't go to Miami, he's not going to be a competitor anymore.

You know the sad thing about all of this? Chris Paul kind of made he helped build the scenario as president of the players union, because I was just sitting here thinking, I think all the guys that were around that draft class or that year, 2003, four or five. They're all towards the tail end of their careers right now. The only guy, really the only two prominent guys you can really think of from 03, 04, 05, they're getting bank right now are LeBron James and Chris Paul. And Chris Paul is the president of the players union and LeBron, if I'm not mistaken, is the VP.

And they're the ones that helped create this whole supermax thing. If that didn't exist, Chris Paul probably would have been on a shorter deal and probably would have been able to get traded and they probably would have just bought him out. Then he could have went wherever he wanted. He could be a Laker tomorrow if he wanted to. But because of his own doing, he's almost stranded in Oklahoma City. Rich.

I mean, 130 million will buy you a lot in Oklahoma City, I would imagine. Mike, the courtesy from the Sporting News Hall of Fame basketball writer will join us to talk about the NC State notice of allegations in just a little bit. I am interested in what Chris Paul's legacy is going to be. Your thoughts are welcome on Twitter at sportsupdryad3367771600. Don't want the Hornets to go after him. No, no go on the Hornets.

Of course not. What would that do? Utter chaos.

No, it wouldn't be chaos. It would just be dumb. You're not going to be a playoff team with that.

Bringing in a guy with that awful of a contract without making the postseason makes you look even dumber than you already do, letting Kimball Walker walk away for nothing. The Lion King is something a lot of people are excited about. I'm not one of those people because it's not real live action. These aren't acting lions.

They're not acting tigers. It's CGI. Wait, wait, wait, hold on, wait.

Hold on a second. You would have been more excited about this if they had real lions and tigers? I'm just saying, don't call it live action if it's not live action. None of it's live action. Where's this tiger key coming from in The Lion King?

Oh, I didn't even catch that. Another thing that bothers me is that tigers or lions or whatever animal you're talking about can't emote. You need these animals to be expressive while they're singing songs. That clip that Donald Glover and Jimmy Kimmel showed earlier this week with Hakuna Matata had a warthog and a lion running through the forest and they weren't showing any emotion. It just looked like a warthog and a lion with their mouth flopping around. Well, the music was good. I think this is a major flaw in Lion King, which led to Haskell tweeting in on Twitter.

I don't know where else you would tweet. Beauty and the Beast remake did 1.6 billion with singing candles and dishes. Those candles in that movie looked more like the animation, more than an actual candle. Take Scar, for instance. Aaron, how would you describe what Scar, the villain in The Lion King, looks like in this remake? Because in real life, there aren't tigers or lions. I don't know why I keep saying tigers. I'm sorry.

You got me rattled now. There aren't lions with red fur and black manes. But in the animation version, of course you have that. It makes them look evil. You don't have that in the live action remake because there's not a red furred lion with a black mane. Yeah, you're right. He kind of just looks dusty and mangy. Yeah, he doesn't look as regal.

Looks like one of those lions that keeps losing territory back. I really think this is an oversight by Disney. I do. And it might cost them.

It just might. Joe Weil did some work for us last night. Do we have some of his play-by-play calls before we get the Mike de Courcy? He finagles movie lines that the audience sends in for the broadcast that we carry once a week.

Dash game. He finagles a movie line into his play-by-play. Give me the first of two that we have from Joe last night. But Michael Papierski was a star collegially with the LSU Tigers. Here's something about the Tigers. Tigers love pepper. They hate cinnamon. That's why I'm thinking of Tigers. I was about to say, I think that's probably where it came from.

I don't think that's a certifiable fact that Tigers love pepper and hate cinnamon, even though Alan from The Hangover says so. Next movie clip. It's going to make sure that that glove is in the right spot.

If it's not for any of Lado's flame throwing fastballs, you'll shoot your eye out, kid. One, two. Such a craftsman with words, Joe Weil is. He's a pro.

Is it wise for the NCAA to target head coaches rather than the schools when it comes to this NCAA probe and what's coming ahead? We'll discuss with Hall of Fame sports writer Mike DeCorcy next. Whenever you are, you're on the drive with Josh Graham. Now the sports hub at AM 600 AM 920. Joining us live now from the Nike Peach Jam is Hall of Fame sports writer from the sporting news, Mike DeCorcy. Somebody we could talk to about basketball, football, soccer, movies and pretty much anything else.

That's why we love having him on the program. Mike, how's it going? I'm great, Josh. How are you doing?

Doing great. But before we get to the basketball, I want your movie expertise on something because I seem to be the only person who's skeptical about this Lion King live action remake that really isn't about live action at all because it's all CGI because there aren't talking lions out there. And on top of that, I'm not sure if you've seen the footage that features singing of the animals, but animals don't emote. And I think that could be a massive issue when it comes to enjoying this movie.

What say you? Well, I saw the Jungle Book. Now the Jungle Book was not presented as the Jungle Book musical that was made in 67. It was presented as basically the Rudyard Kipling story in the same fashion with Jon Favreau directing. And it was magnificent. It was one of the best movies of 2016.

I guess it was maybe 2015, whatever year it came out a few years back. It was tremendous. Matthew Lawrence, the actor who was in 90210 and is familiar to Duke audiences.

He did radio work with Duke a while back and now lives in Lexington. He's a good friend of mine and he recommended it to me. He said go see it and he was absolutely right. So I have that to go on and the early buzz from the critics on this is tremendous. I have to say that although I enjoyed the Lion King, I've never looked at it as a musical masterpiece. I don't think the music to it is that great.

I know Elton wrote it and all that. It's fine, but it's never been my favorite of his work. So I would say that based on what the critics have said, based on what Favreau did with Jungle Book, I'm going to have to say that it's probably worth a shot. Where does Lion King fall on Mike D'Ocorsi's favorite Disney movies list? It's pretty far down there. It wouldn't make the top 50.

I liked it, but I'm pretty sure I could find 50 Disney movies I like better. I don't think that would be that hard. I've never sat in.

But I'm pretty sure I could. That is stunning. There are people in the control room right now just shaking their heads, stunned. What's at the very top of Mike D'Ocorsi's list? Of Disney movies. Gosh.

I hadn't thought about that very much. Disney get credit for the Poppins remake, the one that just came out last year. That was a Disney film, right?

Yes. That was magnificent. I certainly put that in the top 10. That's the first one that comes to mind because it's the one I most recently saw. It was tremendous. I loved it and I'd certainly put it much higher than I would Lion King.

Follow Mike D'Ocorsi on Twitter. But I don't think it was great. Alright. Fair enough.

We're looking forward to this Lion King remake that's going to come out next week, the live-action remake. If the coaches, moving things over to NC State and what's going on with this notice of allegations they received earlier in the week. If the coaches are in fact the NCAA's target more than the institutions, would that send the strongest message possible to try and serve as a deterrent for more coaches acting improperly moving forward? It depends on what's the penalty going to be. What do you do to the coaches in that respect? They have used coach control to punish particular coaches in the past. But what's the penalty that serves as a significant deterrent? I don't know whether they even have that in their arsenal. I don't know.

The second thing I would ask is that I know that there are people out there that are just sharpening their knives for particular schools. But if you look at the cases, and really look at the cases, and particularly the ones where assistant coaches were arrested, indicted, and pled guilty and therefore have convictions. The interesting thing about that is the cases against the schools and or the remaining coaches, not much came out of those particular proceedings relative to those four coaches that puts the schools or the remaining coaches in all that much jeopardy.

The only thing that I can see, unless they got a whole lot of cooperation from the federal government that from what I've been hearing isn't forthcoming, I don't see it. And I know that people are going to be like, wait a second, you sold us all this. What bothers me, Josh, is that when they initially said, when the Justice Department initially said, you know, we have these 10 arrests, here's the charging documents, we have your playbook, and the immediate reaction was, ooh, heads are going to roll, I mean, there's going to be some big names and all this. And my reaction, Josh, and I don't remember if we talked or not, but I talked to a lot of people, and I said, here's the thing, if they thought they could have gotten the head coaches, why did they shut down the state? Why did they shut it down? Because it was up, it was active, and nobody knew about it.

Not anybody. You know, when those 10 arrests went down, I mean, the whole college basketball world was completely shaken and no one saw it coming. So if there was something more for them to get, if they could have gotten head coaches ensnared in this, why didn't they?

Why would they have shut it down? And I believe the reason for that is that it wasn't an operation that was going to lead them to that, and they recognized that and got out when they could get, you know, and look, people think that they did a poor job. They batted like a thousand. I mean, they batted a thousand with the exception of the one gentleman who they withdrew charges against because he never gave anybody any money.

He just took it. And then some of them that became cooperating witnesses, they basically batted a thousand on their convictions of the people they went after. And so they did. What they promised they were going to do is just that people extrapolated from that that bigger names were going to be involved in this than was reasonable to expect.

Well, it wasn't the media that extrapolated this. It was Stan Wilcox, the NCAA vice president for regulatory affairs last month, saying that they were going to get they were going to move forward with level one cases against head coaches and saying that there were going to be big names involved in this. Do you think it might be a situation where the NCAA is overpromising at the risk of underdelivering?

I don't know why Stan did that. I don't think that that was good for the NCAA, but it also I also don't think it was good for member coaches to be shouting that that things had to happen now. And it's like, wait a second, if they came after you for a bagel and cream cheese or whatever, like, would you want them to not give you your day in court, so to speak?

And I realized that what's being tossed about is a little higher on the food chain than the bagel and cream cheese. But, you know, my point is that there were coaches who were actively lobbying for sanctions against coaches, against fellow coaches who hadn't been charged with anything. And so I think the NCAA, Stan Wilcox, thought that by declaring what he did, that he would sort of calm those waters. But instead, you know, he kind of got some attorneys who represent particular coaches rather bothered and, you know, thinking that, wait a second, don't we at least get like not you haven't even charged us with anything yet. You haven't charged our clients with anything.

And already you're saying that you you're going to get them. I mean, that was not necessarily, in my opinion, the best approach. And of course, you have the sporting news with us here on Twitter at T.S. and Mike, I just want your reaction to a couple of the details with the NC State NOA, starting with the fact that NC State was the first one to receive the NOA.

Do you make anything of that? Yeah, I think that, you know, like some of the bigger name schools that people have been aiming for for a long time, the cases, like I said, against them, if there are any, are more complicated to mount. What was alleged to have happened at NC State that was testified to in a court of law, that was pretty plain. And that doesn't necessarily mean it happened because it was one guy saying it. And with the way the case was prosecuted and defended, no one ever went after that witness to impeach that information. Usually, if you have a charge made in a court of law, the defense who, by the prosecutor and his witness, or her, his or her witness, I should say, the defense will go and say, OK, you know, are you sure, you know, basically, are you sure? Because I don't think you're, I don't think you're sure.

And here's why I don't think you're sure. But the defense's approach was, we're not saying this stuff didn't happen. We're saying it's not illegal. And nobody went to impeach the witness. So that sort of even changes the nature of the testimony we heard.

It was, it was, it was unchallenged. So does the attorney, or do the attorneys for NC State and or Mark Gottfried and or the assistant coach, do they get to have a shot at trying to impeach this witness? I think that's going to be problematic because I suspect that that witness won't want to cooperate because it's not, there's nothing to gain.

And so at that point, it becomes a little bit unfair to take it at face value when no one's even had the opportunity to challenge it. And we don't even have the hard evidence. We have TJ Gasnola saying that some things happened here, but we need the proof.

We need the proof that that money exchanged hands and the people who Gasnola said was involved were, in fact, involved. But when it, when you look at it right now, Mike, you see that the level one infractions that were levied to NC State, the notice, the allegations to NC State, they are directed at Gottfried and his top assistant Orlando early. The level two charges, which I mean, don't feature a failure to monitor charge, which is another thing for the NC State institution. That seems to be all that NC State is facing as a basketball program presently. Do you think the level one charges going towards and directed at Gottfried and early set a precedent for what we might see for future notices of allegation? Well, you know, I think that, I think that one of the mitigating factors for NC State is that those coaches aren't in place any longer.

And so I think there was a feeling that NC State had made a fresh start. No one that's there presumably had any involvement in this. And so, okay, like maybe somebody gets vacated, but hey, they didn't make the show that year.

So who cares? It was all performance based. They got fired because they went 4 and 14 in league. They might have lucked out in all of this if they get no punishment because they cheated and they were bad at cheating. Yeah, that was, you know, that was one of the ironies of this is that they got the particular player and then didn't win with him. And the coach lost his job three-fourths of the way through the season, although he was allowed to continue in it until the end of that year.

And it was kind of amazing that that would be the case. Usually that's, you know, that's one of the reasons why the idea that you have to have the one and done guy, you better know what you want to do with him. And you better know whether he fits into your program because it certainly didn't work out for them. And although they may be one of the few that got punished or is on the verge of getting punished for that, they're not the first and only to ever struggle with a player like that on their roster. Which coach is on the thinnest ice among the schools that are alleged to be involved in this? Head coaches? You know, I don't think that there are many that are in that kind of trouble. I really don't. Not Miller?

Not Will Wade? That's what I'm trying to tell you. There's less there than people think. What is there against Sean Miller that suggests that he has a problem? Well, it would be if the wiretap is so.

We don't know that that doesn't exist yet, do we? The wiretap with DeAndre Ayton? I'm telling you right now that my firm belief, based on what I've been able to gather, and talking to various people and knowing what I know about the logistics of that relative to the timing of the wiretap, relative to the incongruous nature of the... Why would that particular handler be involved with a player that he barely knew?

All that added up suggests to me that that tape does not exist. And so that's my feeling or intuition or whatever you want to call it. And so that's why I think that people have extrapolated things into issues that may be less dangerous for the coaches that are, for lack of a better term, involved.

Whether they did anything or not, they're involved. Those coaches may be in better circumstances than people think. Everybody thinks that Kansas' Bill Self is in trouble, okay? Well, you just mentioned T.J. Gastonola before. Well, T.J. Gastonola testified that he gave a lot of money.

I can't remember the number. Short of six figures, but I believe not far from it to the family of a player who, although he enrolled at Kansas, never played. He also testified he gave a small amount of money and promised much more to the guardian of a player who enrolled at Kansas, has played half a season and presumably will play next season.

It's incredible. Again, that's all testimony that he made that was not challenged in court because the defense wasn't challenging those things. And then when he was asked subsequently, did the Kansas coaches know about these activities, he said, and this is the exact word he said, never. He said they did not know. So if you're going to say, yes, we believe that Billy Preston's mom got a bunch of money and that Silvio DeSosa's guardian got a smaller amount of money, then you have to believe that Bill Self and his assistants didn't know about. That's the way it works. I mean, you can't say, yes, we believe this.

No, we don't believe that. So how do you go after Bill Self then and say, you know, you've got to, you know, you've got to be punished severely. You've got to lose your job because these things happen or whatever, whatever punishment you might, you know, you asked me about, is he on thin ice? That's why I'm saying I don't think his ice is thin at all. I don't know what happens to Kansas because in the end, you know, DeSosa missed a whole year and then has been allowed to return by the NCAA. And Preston never played for them.

And so I'm not sure whether or not there are severe sanctions in their future. Even for that, you're over and above whatever they do or don't do to Bill Self. Mike, I hope you enjoyed the Nike Peach Jam. Enjoy Lion King. Always appreciate the insight. Thanks for doing this. You bet, Josh. I had had a fun day.

Likewise. That's Mike DeCorsie on Twitter at TSN Mike. This is the sports hub.

At AM 600, AM 920. Now back to the drive with Josh Graham. What a 48 hour period it's been in Raleigh with NC State. We knew it was inevitable that they would pass beer sales at Carter-Finley Stadium at PNC Arena for NC State basketball games that got done. The first game, fittingly, will be against East Carolina noon kickoff time at Carter-Finley Stadium, ECU and Dowdy Ficklin Stadium also approving beer sales at their sporting events, too. Then you have the NCAA raining on the parade, raining on the party there as they send a notice of allegations NC State's way that they make public Wednesday afternoon. A couple level one infractions, which is the most severe charge targeted right at Mark Godfried and former assistant Orlando Early. Couple level two charges against NC State as well. Jeff Gravelly is the award winning sports director from WRAL Television. Kind enough to spend some time with us in the triad. Jeff, it has been an interesting couple of days, hasn't it?

No doubt. And it was interesting that those two items were discussed at the board of trustees meeting. So they decided to send out the beer memo first. And then right before six o'clock, they sent out the oh, by the way, they dropped this notice of allegations on us, too. So have a beer and read the notice of allegations. NC State. I did not. I did not.

I just read the notice of allegations. NC State ECU week one noon kickoff. Jeff, what do you suspect that crowd's going to look like? Got to hydrate for a hot noon kickoff, right? Five o'clock somewhere, as Dave Doran says. That's one way to put it. Yeah, he did. You know, they keep having these noon games and he says, hey, you know, you all come early.

It's five o'clock. I think I saw a video where Debbie was telling you that this story, this case has damaged NC State's reputation nationally. Considering the packs history with the NCAA dating back to Jimmy V in the 80s, how do you think this affects the perception of pack basketball? Well, I don't think. With the surroundings that were with all that was surrounded by Mark Godfrey in his past and when he was hired, I think people's radars were up from the get go and not maybe necessarily paying players, but but other things as well.

He arrived with some skepticism. And as we see now, it's been at least alleged that that was true. You know, I think it's one of those things where people are saying, well, NC State was the first one for the NCAA to come out. They're going to hammer on this. The worst it could be. No, don't read into it. If there are six schools and the NCAA is coming out, I think coming to state first, don't look at it as, oh, it's the most severe.

No, it may be the most simple if you look at Arizona, if you look at Kansas, if you look at others. So I think that's one of the things that they did now is come back to them now. You have the two level one allegations. And what NC State is doing as a university is none of these people are here anymore. They're trying to distance themselves of what happened. The coaches aren't here. The player isn't here. The AD isn't here.

Who's remaining? And I think that's what their argument will be when they respond to the notice of allegations and when they go to the hearing against the committee on infractions. Do you think it's a coincidence NC State hired the same law firm that North Carolina did for the AFAM scandal? When you when you need a good lawyer, you hire a good lawyer. Right. And if you're looking at track records, I think North Carolina has spent its money well in hiring attorneys as far as NCAA investigations, as far as academic situations.

Yeah, I think if you're in dire need and there is a track record of a firm, go ahead. WRL sports director Jeff gravelly with us here on the sports. Follow him on Twitter at Jake gravelly. WRL. You noted a little bit about the strategy NC State's had here in distancing, distancing themselves from Mark Gottfried in Orlando early. Did NC State really have any other play here or what do you make of that strategy? Well, I mean, I think it's I think what that is is, OK, well, who are you going? I'm anxious to see who gets punished the worst here.

Is it going to be NC State or will it be Mark Gottfried in Orlando early? You know, a lot of talk has meant that the the federal investigation, the NCAA may be looking more toward individuals than schools, because if you remember, the federal investigation was against individuals committing fraud against schools. So I think it's it's going to be interesting to see which one of those entities received the worst punishment. Look, the state will get some type of punishment. There's no doubt about it, because this happened at your institution under your watch, whether those people are still there or not. So the worst thing you could try to do is try to predict what the NCAA is going to do, particularly under these new rules.

Now, this is this applies. How did they get this information? Because the rule was passed that they would be allowed to obtain information that was that was obtained by outside entities like the FBI investigation. Basically, they took that folder and said, OK, well, let's see. Now, the NCAA did conduct more interviews and conversations with NC State based upon what they got from the FBI. So they didn't just take it and go, OK, we're going to rubber stamp this. This is what we're going to do. They did their own due diligence and asked their own questions and deduced these notice these allegations, which were in the notice of allegations. So I think it's going to be interesting as we move forward as to see how much NC State will be punished on this.

You hear people say, oh, they're going to get hammered. What's getting hammered by the NCAA right now? It's forfeiting wins, vacating wins. So they've got to give up 15 wins that they had that season. And I'm sure state fans will say, hey, can you throw in that 51 point loss that we got at Chapel Hill to vacate that?

But I don't know. There could be some fines. There could be they'll be put on probation. But I don't know that we will see a postseason ban on the group that's there now that had absolutely nothing to do with what happened. When Dennis Smith played here in 2016 and 17. What would NC State view as a win here?

You think Jeff? I think if they can get away with no postseason ban, I think that's a huge win. I think that that would be the one thing scholarship reduction. You want to avoid scholarship reduction. You want to avoid postseason bans, things that really impact your program right off the bat. If it's a fine, OK, you pay the fine.

If you're on probation, keep your nose clean and stay out. But I think the two things that they would hopefully and try to avoid postseason ban and a reduction in scholarship or recruiting limitations. You noted that the NCAA has more ammunition than it had before with the Condoleezza Rice Commission. They can obtain information from outside entities, including court testimony, which means with the legwork of the FBI, they have they have more.

And the FBI has resources, including subpoenas, that they could get information from. So it seems like if they are going going after the head coaches more than the schools, it seems like they have more ammunition to do so here. But if you're looking at it from the perspective of the NCAA and you're trying to lay down some type of a punishment that will serve as a deterrent for this to no longer happen moving forward.

Who do you think would send the stronger message? What do you think would send a stronger message going after the coaches and the individuals or the schools? Well, I think this is another part of the new rules that they are operating under that holding coaches more accountable for what happens within their program. And that was also noted in the notice of allegations that Mark Gottfried failed to monitor his own program. And I think two, three, four years ago, that would have never even been included. So they have felt that to put more onus on the coaches, that it's your responsibility to monitor these things.

And I think the fact that both Gottfried and Early were named and mentioned points to that. And I think we'll see the same thing at Kansas. I think we could see the same thing at Arizona.

And we have certainly seen it in the FBI investigation with assistant coaches having to take the stand and take pleas or make pleas to lessen what's going on. Here's the other thing, too, that you have to ask yourself. Where is the smoking done in this investigation? Are we going, are we basing these figures upon what was said in court by TJ Gasnola, who basically made a plea to avoid being sent to prison for fraud? Are there canceled checks?

Are there bank account statements? Or where's the physical evidence? If it's just hearsay, that will also be a part of NC State's argument. If there are those physical pieces of evidence, then I think you'll see a different scenario.

But here's the other thing, Josh. These people that do these things, these under table handouts, they ain't writing checks. They're not going to the bank and filling out. This is cold hard cash transactions. This is under the table. Don't leave a paper trail at all.

Don't make it traceable. And that's what makes it so difficult about these things. But it is interesting that they were able. They took the forty thousand, which Gasnola testified in New York. But then the rest of it, the six thousand seven hundred was based upon complimentary tickets, parking passes and other impermissible benefits.

And that's how they got the forty six thousand seven hundred dollars. We'll see how this proceeds. NC State has 90 days to respond.

Respond to the notice of allegations has to do so in a written format. Jeff Gravelies on Twitter at Jay Gravelies. W.R.A.L.

sports director from W.R.A.L. in Raleigh. Jeff, it's good to hear your voice. I'll be seeing you next week.

It's crazy to think the ACC kickoff is a few days away. We'll be broadcasting live from there. Well, I can't wait to see you, brother. Thanks for doing this. You got it, Josh.

That's Jeff Gravelies. And a good question to ask on the back side of this. It seems like that these charges are based solely on what was heard on wiretaps. What TJ Gasnola testified directly correlates to those who received the stiffest punishment. Now, while we have a lot of information from court testimony, what Jeff says is true. We don't have access to the hard evidence. We don't have access to. Some of the.

Checks some of the payment, some of the paper trail, if there is one. And, you know, you know, with the chess match. This law firm that represented North Carolina, what they were able to win five years ago, it was a chess match of allegations being sent back and forth and written responses. The NCAA and this law firm, North Carolina hired trying to figure out what the NCAA can pin them down for. And we'll see not just what the NCAA charges some of these coaches with and programs with, but what hard evidence is there to support it, because we don't have all of that information right now. Coming up, Grayson Allen is at it again. This is the sports of you're on the drive. Now, I know a portion of you, maybe a significant portion of you might detest Grayson Allen, who was ejected from a summer league game last night. But as someone who sits in this chair every single day and is asked to talk about mundane things at times and make it interesting. Hey, the NFL has Roger Goodell talking about a TV contract four or five years from now.

Make some content. I miss him. I miss Grayson Allen, how juicy it was when he was tripping up people. Kobe, what do you have against Grayson? You never were tripped up by him. What are you talking about, Kobe? I'm sure he's heard stories. Perhaps so, but he never tripped any tar heels. It is funny, four years of him playing at Duke. He tripped up.

Well, he didn't really trip him. He bumped Garrison Brooks, remember that? I don't.

In the ACC tournament? I don't. He gave him like a hip check, he fell to the floor? Oh, I do remember that now. Then he did the Grayson Allen hands in the air, what, me? He was actually right in that.

What, hip checking Garrison Brooks? He was right in that. That was one of the times I agree with Grayson Allen where Garrison Brooks, he... Was he standing in the wrong place?

No, no, no. He was all right with the contact and knew he would be the one seen favorably because of the one he was at odds with. That doesn't excuse Grayson Allen's actions, though. I'm excusing Grayson Allen for that one. I'm not excusing it for last night and the other one.

The other six. I'm not going to come here and defend Grayson Allen fully here because I don't care. That's past bycons, but I can tell you're somebody who still has hate for Grayson Allen.

It's weird. It's like a hateful respect. It's like, it's a whole bowl of hatred with a sprinkling of respect on it. How did Duke fans, where does the respect come from? Because he actually was there for four years, and that's one of the things, that's one of the elements of the rivalry where it's missing now, where these kids are gone so fast you can't develop a hatred for them. He actually thought enough of it to just stay four years so we could grow to hating him as much as we do today. He's the last of a dying breed.

Perhaps so. I mean, who's the next Duke guy who's going to be there for four years? Jack White. He's Australian. We can't hate him. It's true. It's hard to hate someone with that accent.

Can you hate somebody with an Australian accent? 336-777-1600 on Twitter at Sports Up Giant. I tell you, mate, want to play some basketball? Let's do it, mate. I'm about to trip you up, see? Yours is better than mine. Put a shrimp on the barbie and we'll open up one of these gallon beers and I'm trailing off. Oh, that's actually pretty good. Keep on going.

Let's see how far we can go before this completely melts down. I might be the only black Australian in the world. I don't think I've ever seen one. Jack White is white. Oh, I'm doing Jack White, that's right. He's not black. I'm Jack White. Is there a black Australian?

Is Des on to something there? Yes, Aaron. Aborigines? They're not black. They're like Indian, right?

What do you mean? Where did they come from? Well, Aborigines are black, but they're not Australian. They're native Australians. They're the first Australians.

Don't confuse New Zealand with Australians because nothing will fire anybody up more than New Zealanders being mistaken, their accent versus the Australian accent, which does sound very similar. I had a good college buddy who took a trip to Australia, a black guy, and he was like, man, they treated him like royalty because they had never seen a black guy before. Like, every place he went, the girls and guys would come up asking him weird questions and stuff about being black, and the girls were just fascinated by him just because of his skin color.

We'll return. We'll circle back to Grayson Allen in a second, but what you just mentioned there reminds me a lot of Aziz Ansari's standup special from this week on Netflix. They just dropped it randomly because, again, he was somebody who got caught up in the Me Too scandal, and he was talking about having a Danish girlfriend and how people overseas, they don't know to be racist because they've never seen a lot of these races before. But that special was fascinating. His new special was a rebuke on cancel culture because Aziz Ansari was almost canceled just because he was thrown into that group, wrongfully, I believe, wrongfully, he was put into the same group as some of the big kingpins of the Me Too movement, Harvey Weinstein, among others, Kevin Spacey. When you look at the facts, Aziz Ansari was not, he might have made someone uncomfortable. It didn't seem like he did it willfully, maliciously.

So it's a lot different, and it seems like he's still going to have a career after this because it was, again, a very entertaining special that I enjoyed a lot. And I don't know how productive cancel culture is. I remember Josh Brown, when he was dealing with domestic abuse charges by his ex-wife with the Giants, everybody just said, you need to fire this guy. You need to kick Josh Brown off of the team, and we don't want to see him again.

And quite often, that's what we do in sports and in entertainment. We have a very poor tolerance when it comes to forgiving people of celebrity and of higher status. I don't put Joe Mixon, if we're going to keep it with sports, I don't put Joe Mixon in the same category. Or even Ray Rice in the same category, I put Floyd Mayweather and Greg Hardy.

Why? Ray Rice offered to play a year for free with all the proceeds that would be paid to him going to women's domestic abuse charities. And he went on to marry his then fiance, and he's been an activist ever since, having not played again. He failed his career, and he still is an activist for that cause.

Joe Mixon. He was at Oklahoma, where he punched a woman in the face, and he got suspended, air quotes, for a season as a result of it, even though we didn't know why he was sitting out that year. Many people just thought it was a redshirt season, but it turns out it was punishment for that internally by Oklahoma. And then the video surfaces, and everyone says he should be kicked off the team. He comes out, and he apologizes for it without taking any notes.

He walked out without any prepared comments, answered every single question people had, and he said, listen, I was 18 years old. If you're wondering why I didn't publicly come out and apologize then, now I'm doing it, I was 18 years old being told by my football coach and lawyers not to say anything. What would you do?

What would you do? I sat out an entire season. I'm sorry. I was wrong. Which is a lot different than Floyd Mayweather saying, hey, even though my kid's saying I beat my wife, no photos, no video, never happened. No video, didn't happen. Just because there was no video. Even though I went to jail for being a serial woman batterer, even though that happened, he would still defend himself by saying, you didn't have video, so you can't say I did this.

Fake news. Joe McCarty never said that he did what he was accused of, which led to him being cut by the Panthers. So I don't put those people in the same category. And I believe in second chances.

So Joe Mixon, I believe, should be able to play football and be a voice for somebody who made mistakes as a way to reach people who are also dealing with issues that are uncomfortable to talk about. That's what we do nowadays. If we don't like something, whether it's me too or domestic abuse, very uncomfortable stuff. We just say, cut him, fire him, get him out of here.

I don't want to hear from him ever again. And I don't know if that solves issues. I don't know if that solves problems. Who benefits from Aziz Ansari, his career being canceled? Who benefits from that? I'll tell you, the real benefit is someone being rehabilitated and then having that person as a voice on the plus side of this. But we never want that because that's harder. And that requires more nuance, that requires more work. So that's what I was thinking of watching this Aziz Ansari special.

Cancel culture, I don't think is productive. And he might have been a soldier for something, a public casualty that didn't have to exist in this me too movement. And he is an example of someone who requires us to look at every situation differently just because the timing, January 2018, the me too movement, let's not put Aziz Ansari in the same box as Harvey Weinstein, as so many people flippantly did at the time.

Yes, sir. Do you believe that, based off of what I'm hearing from you, do you believe that the level of forgiveness is attached to how talented you are? The more talented you are, the easier it is to forgive you?

It's an interesting thing, man, it is. In some cases, I agree with that. That I think used to be the case.

Like Kobe Bryant, Michael Vick, R. Kelly, Order of a Century, I think in the past that used to be the case. But now in cancel culture, I think it's you're gone forever. You're not coming back from this. And I don't know which one's more productive. I really don't.

I think it is different. Let's go to the phones, 3-3-6-7-7-7-1-600, Jerry and Winston Salem once in on Grayson Allen. Yes, Grayson Allen's back in the news, it gets ejected from a game, let's enjoy this a little bit. Jerry, you're on the sports hub, what do you think of Grayson Allen?

Well, I was told I could get two for one, so let me make an NC State comment, then I'll talk about Grayson Allen. All right, fair enough. The main charges for State were Gas Nola gave money to Early, Early gave money to Smith.

Correct. Well, if they can't prove that Gas Nola gave it to Early, it's over. But even if they can prove he gave it to Early, what about if Early just pocketed the money and never gave it to Smith? So they got to prove two passes of the money, and if they can't prove both passes, then the player never got anything. And if the player didn't get anything, then Godfrey properly supervised Early, because just because Early scammed Gas Nola, so what? So that's going to be a tough test, because if they can't prove the double pass of the money, then the player got nothing. And then Godfrey, who wasn't my favorite State coach, but then Godfrey didn't do anything wrong with his supervision of Early, so that's two big hurdles.

I don't know what they got as hard evidence, but we'll move on from that. Now on the Grayson Allen deal, my standard comment. The second time he tripped somebody, when he was at Duke, not the third time, but the second time, if he'd have played for anybody other than Duke or Carolina, the league would have banded him for life immediately. And then the third time, Kruszewski suspended him, the league goes, well, you know, they've taken care of it.

They suspended him indefinitely. Second game later, well, he's learned his lesson. What the hell is the third time he's done it? How do you mean he learned his lesson? There again, Kruszewski got one over on the league on that one.

So no, I'm not a Grayson Allen fan at all. I saw the replays of what he did last night. The first one was obviously, I'm mad and just threw the guy down. That one, he might have argued he was trying to block the shot, but it didn't really matter. He hit the guy anyway. Yeah, yeah.

Thank you for the call, Jerry. He was beyond the three-point line when he got him with a forearm shiver, it seemed like, to the face, knocking a player to the ground. And then on the baseline, you could argue he was trying to block a shot, but man, it was quite a forearm right to the face.

Players have a little bit more control than that. And yes, the old reminder there, the one game indefinite suspension, the one game indefinite suspension. Timing matters too, because I believe that's when Coach K was dealing with the loss of his brother in Chicago. So Jeff Caple was filling in as the head coach at that point as well. So there were a lot of things circling around the basketball program. It was around Christmas break, I think.

No, it was in January, early January. Going back, going back to the NC State stuff, though, you're right. They have to prove what early, or make it gas NOLA, testified in court in New York that the money was exchanged between early to gas NOLA to Dennis Smith Jr. or gas NOLA to early. They have to prove a couple of movements of money.

And it can't just be the voice of gas NOLA. It's got to be some evidence. Now, because of subpoenas, they were able to raid NC State's basketball offices to get some documents. And I assume they have some hard evidence. We're going to see what exactly that is. You are listening to WSJS, Winston-Salem, WCOG Greensboro, WPCM Burlington, WMFR Highpoint.