The Drive with Josh Graham - Sharin with Darin

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It's brilliant. James Bradbury walked up to reporters yesterday and said that he wants a new contract. He wasn't going to hold out during minicamp, doesn't view himself as somebody who would hold out for training camp either, as the Panthers wrapped up minicamp and are off for the summer, as of right now. But he wants a new deal because he has one year left, obviously doesn't want to play on a franchise tag next year, and he started pretty much his entire tenure with the Panthers. But I don't think that's enough for you to get a big deal or at least get what he wants, because he's talking to Joe Person of the Athletics saying he's one of the best corners in the NFL. He's not even the best corner on this team, let alone one of the best in the NFL.

Could be Dante Jackson over James Bradbury. And on top of that, corners and wide receivers in my mind are the two most expendable, every down positions you will find in football. If you're going to give a big contract to a wide receiver or a corner, you better have a rookie quarterback on contract on his rookie deal, or you better have the number one player at that position, James not check out in either of those boxes. Cam Newton's not on his rookie deal, and he's not a number one or number two corner in the NFL, since he's not even the best corner on this team. There are just so many more at those positions, wide receiver and corner, so many more cheaper, reliable options elsewhere than paying a player on his second deal, and paying a ton for a player like Bradbury. You can get vets like the Panthers did for the 2015 team, sign guys like Roman Harper, sign guys like Mike Adams, sign players of that caliber, Captain Munnerlin, versus signing this kind of corner to his next deal. It doesn't make much sense to me.

So, here's what I do. I let him play out this season. Do what you did with Devin Fungis last year. Devin Fungis, he was another player. At this time last year, we were talking about, are the Panthers going to give him his next contract? Well, he started pretty much his entire career, but much like Bradbury, I didn't really think Devin Fungis was a standout player who deserved a second contract.

I just didn't, and I feel the same way about Bradbury. I feel like you can recreate his production with somebody else. It might already be on the roster, if it's Rashawn Gaulden or Korn Elder, beyond this next season. And let's say he does play great. You let him play out this year, let's say he is terrific. Let's say he's even better than Donte Jackson is. Franchise tag him. Franchise tag him next year, and then let him walk.

You're going to get two more years of control for James Bradbury. There's no reason to give James Bradbury big money, because that's what he's looking for. He's looking for money that would justify him being, quote, a number one corner for an NFL team. Even though he's not the number one corner on this team, and he's not even a top 15 corner in the NFL. He just isn't. So I don't give him this contract any way, shape, or form. I don't care what really happens this season. You don't give him the big deal. Because he plays corner, and you have Cam Newton to worry about with his contract coming up, the money should not be going to James Bradbury in any way.

I'd be worrying about things that matter. You know, Shaq Thompson, Cam Newton, those guys come first before you get to JB. Yes, Steph? So I'm looking at the cornerback contracts right now in the NFL just to kind of get a gauge of what kind of, quote, unquote, big money we're talking about here. And I know Xavier and Howard just signed this crazy deal with the Dolphins of 75 million, about 15 per.

Looking at the contracts, the top two guys are actually Xavier and Howard and Josh Norman, who we all know here very well. He's going to get 15 million. But after that, it's really anywhere between 15 and probably about 13 million per is what you're looking at for the top paid eight cornerbacks in the league.

Not worth it. I'm not willing to pay James Bradbury 13-plus million dollars a year to play cornerback for us. Look what Gerald McCoy's getting.

His base. Between 8 and 9 million dollars, right? With incentives, it'll go up to 10. Right. There's no way I would even justify paying as close as what Gerald McCoy is making. And James Bradbury is probably not going to accept that based off what his agents told him to say and these things that James Bradbury is not worth it. And you don't agree with this premise, but it's fine. Josh Norman, while the way things blew up. Is a black eye on Dave Gettleman's resume, a blemish there. The concept, his philosophy of not giving Josh Norman a big deal was justified. Like you should not have rescinded the franchise tag. You should have let him played on it and then let him walk because corners are not worth this kind of money. They just aren't. I can't think of a corner who's been in the league the last 10 years who I'd be willing to justify pay paying 12 to 13 million dollars.

You just listen to the ones at the top. I wouldn't pay 12 to 13 million dollars for one of those guys. Maybe Xavier Rhodes from the Vikings.

Not even Xavier. I don't think any of them are worth that much. Patrick Peterson.

I don't think they are. That's that's me because wide receiver and corner. Those two positions. There are so there's so much athleticism that you will find out of the draft. There are so many vets that you could get on one or two year cheaper deals and get production that might not be equal to what Xavier Rhodes or Patrick Peterson gives you.

But the drop off is not that significant. The issue with me with the whole Josh Norman Gettleman situation wasn't like you said. Gettleman was willing to pay Josh Norman.

They just had not gotten to that point where they were in agreeance. And then really his agent is what caused him to yank this off the table really out of just sheer pain. No, they were going to pay him the franchise tax, which is a ton.

But they weren't going to give him the big deal because Dave Gettleman understood. Look at his entire track record. There's two positions he did not pay.

Wide receiver and corner. He never did it. He hasn't done it in New York. When he did, he traded him away. But he didn't have anybody to give that contract to at wide receiver or cornerback with the Panthers.

All of it was people he was bringing in from the street from the jump. Like he had no one to give a big contract to at wide receiver or at cornerback. Yes he did. Steve Smith said at the end of his career he wasn't going to give him a big contract. Well he never extended Steve Smith. He just let him walk because he said, I can find another wide receiver who could do what you do production-wise. And he never did.

Guess what? He was right. He never found anybody that did the same. He was right because that year they didn't need it. The following two years they had playoff seasons after Smitty Ladd. But don't say that they replaced his production because they didn't. They didn't replace the production of Steve Smith. No they didn't. They did it by committee. Right.

They found other ways to do it. Because he was expendable Steve Smith. Now as for Bradbury. He lost Steve Smith but he was expendable. Wide receivers are. Name a wide receiver in the NFL that isn't expendable.

They all are. The Giants just got rid of one. Julio Jones. Julio Jones when he got hurt the Falcons still won games. He had a bad year last year and so did they. They made the playoffs in 2017 with a bad offensive coordinator who just got fired. And Julio Jones caught one touchdown pass that year. They still made the playoffs.

Right? Again I don't think there's any wide receiver that isn't expendable in the NFL. In the same way about corners. I don't look at any position in the NFL as an expendable position. Like I mean there's positions all over the field where if you fund that one guy that down in the rough. You're going to pay that guy. Most expendable.

Now in terms of Bradbury. I wouldn't have an issue with him paying him nine ten million a year. But not on a long term deal. Like a two year three year deal. You get a team option there after year two. Where we can cut him after the second year if he's not performing. The main issue with contracts like what Josh Norman signed. He's 32 years old. Like he he's past the peak point in the NFL of where you want to be age wise.

And they still are on the hook for. Well Norman was twenty nine. Twenty nine when his contract went up. Right and it was a seventy five million dollar deal. And Dave Gettleman was right. Don't give him the contract.

Don't do it. He should not have rescinded the franchise tag. But corners and wide receivers. Two most expendable. Every down positions.

We're still taking movie lines by the way. On Twitter at Sports Hub Triad. We'll throw that Joe Wiles way in just a bit.

Joe Wile will join us as Dash Baseball is on the air at seven o'clock. Here's an example of a call he had last week. Give me the creme de la creme. The best that you have in here Dez. Davis one of the smaller guys on this Pelicans team. Stands in at five ten.

One seventy five. But certain guys can make it work in the baseball world by being a certain height. And a certain weight.

For me personally I'm just one stomach flew away from my goal weight. So send in your movie lines. Here's a pitch. At Sports Hub Triad. You can send those in on Twitter.

And we'll throw that Joe Wiles way. I'm already getting a handful of good ones from the audience. The drives brought to you in part by our friends at Twin Peaks. The NBA Finals is tonight. I can't think of a better place to watch the finals. I was there on Haines Mall Boulevard for game five.

As KD went down. TVs all across the place. I had delicious wings.

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Scenic views. I think a hammer is about to be dropped in college basketball. That's how we're going to kick off.

Sharon with Darren Vaught. Next. What are we going to talk about? Talking about. This is the Sports Hub.

At AM 600, AM 920. Now back to the drive with Josh Graham. ESPN's Seth Wickersham dropped an AAF bomb today. Dennis Dodd of CBSSports.com. This is the sports hub. This is the sports hub. With the college basketball bombshell. Saying that at least six college programs will be notified of major NCAA violations by the end of this summer.

They wouldn't name which ones specifically, but they've been in the headlines the last two years. It shouldn't really surprise anybody. I think when it comes down, even though Des is staring at me. And you know, But it's like your facial expression there. It looked like. The I hate Duke look. And I'm suspicious of Mike Shusaski look.

That's just the look on your face. No, I didn't say anything about Duke at all, but I mean, just look. Who are the top four or five schools that have got all the top 10 recruits over the past four or five years or so. Just follow the, follow the trail. of Dan Wetzel, follow the reporting of Dennis Dodd. We're sharing with Darren Vaught. By the way, Darren Vaught has stepped into the studio and is waiting patiently.

You can follow him on Twitter, at Darren Vaught. This is all surrounding the violations from schools and the federal government investigation, the FBI looking to college basketball. I don't know about you, Darren, but I feel like the NCAA is going to lay down the hammer because the NCAA did not do the investigation here. They have the ammunition now that they normally don't have because they don't have an investigation to botch. Usually it's like the Miami Shapiro case where they try to do the investigating, do a poor job, so much so that they have to let Miami off scot-free.

That's what this is here and scot-free. Usually they can't because they botched the investigation. The FBI already took care of all that. They did the heavy lifting and now, since the federal investigation is finished, they just simply passed along what they found to the NCAA. And it seems like to me that the FBI is going to be better at this, you know, investigation thing than the NCAA is.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation, better at investigating things than someone else. Breaking news. A novel thought. A novel thought. I, like you, can envision a world where, when these notices of allegations come out in, what is it, July, that is reported?

Yes. I can envision something ground shaking. My only thing, Josh, is I don't know what that is. Like, when you say lay down the hammer, I don't, because of the unprecedented nature of this overhaul of collegiate athletics that is in the process of happening.

Like, I don't know how to contextualize that. Well, here's what I think it's going to look like. I think we're going to be talking about scholarship reductions, as Dennis Dodd reported. And we've seen the NCAA hand down postseason bans like they did on, I think, Louisville a few years ago. Syracuse had it.

UConn dealt with it. I see postseason bans being handed out. And I think some of these decisions are going to lead to coaches getting fired.

And I'm immediately looking at two schools. I'm looking at Kansas and I'm looking at Arizona. Those two specifically, Sean Miller, if you look at the details, I still have no idea how he has a job.

Yeah. The reason, the only thing I could come up with is he defended himself very forcefully, which led to the board of trustees or the regents board putting together a contract that had it, if Sean Miller was found guilty of what the FBI is alleging is here, or the reporting is alleging is here, that he has to not only get fired, he has to give a million dollars back to Arizona. So there's things in place here where people are already skeptical at Arizona and setting up a situation where he's being axed. Yeah, so those would be the two quote big time programs as indicated by the reporting by Dennis Dodd.

I saw him use that language, right? I mean, that would assumedly have to be Kansas and Arizona, but how many other cases have we seen that we're skeptical of? I mean, like Will Wade at LSU is another one that there's no way in my mind that he's not involved in this at some level and ultimately loses his job at LSU. There's just been so many that have come out. That's my point.

It's just, it's not pervasive, but God, it seems to be awfully close to that, right? Yeah, what do you do with Louisville? Louisville, the people who were responsible, Louisville got rid of. So Jurich is gone. Patino is gone. If you wanted to pin it on Bobby Patrino, because he's an easy target, he's gone.

Even though that's a different sport. Just take the joke here, Louisville fans. I've been hearing from you a lot the last few days.

336-77-71600 on Twitter at Sports Hub Triad. Before we get to Joe Weil and some movie lines, let's go to Ed in Winston-Salem very quickly. Ed, what do you got on this report from Dennis Dodd and what the NCAA might do with some college basketball programs? Yeah, I think you hit the nail on the head. I think the two schools, I hope they're talking about, and I'm originally from Kansas, and I hate to see this happen, but if they've done what they said they'd done, they deserve to get it.

But I think you're exactly right, Josh. Kansas and Arizona are the two that need to get hit first, and then you're talking about Louisville, LSU, Auburn, Southern Cal, and then we've got NC State that I think eventually will be hammered here too. But I think all these are supposed to be level one violations, so they said in level one violations, you're looking at losses of scholarship, post-season ban, and also show cause where coaches can be fired.

And I really appreciate you guys putting this on the air because this is something that's been long overdue, and to me, it's really been dragging around. And let me just give you a prime example. We'll just use Arizona as an example and say that they get the allegations and they go through everything, but they drag it out till after the NCAA tournament. How would you feel if your favorite team was playing for the championship and Arizona won, and then they come back later and say, well, Arizona, you're guilty.

We're gonna penalize you. But I mean, that doesn't do your team and fan base and coaches any justice at all. So I hope they get it resolved before the NCAA tournament comes around. I don't know if they will or not, but hopefully they will.

Yeah, well, we'll see if it does come down in the next few weeks, but there is a fan base that can answer that question specifically. It's Michigan who faced Louisville and they tore down that banner. I mean, Michigan can't call themselves the champs, but you can look at that situation and say, man, well, all the things that were happening there, maybe we should have been the champions that year. Let's go to Andrew and Clemons as well.

Andrew, what do you got? Well, for me, I think that all these bands aren't really necessary, to be honest, because if you're talking about Kansas and Arizona, they're still top tier programs. I mean, Arizona is still getting recruits.

Kansas always gets recruits. And the guy from Kansas that just got hit, the player, Desua, I'm reading that he's got a two-year suspension for taking $20,000. And in my opinion, Mark Emmer is just running just a sweatshop, basically, where they're getting all this revenue and all this money from players where they don't even get compensated for it. So to me, I think you gotta let the kids get paid a little bit, and it's basically worth their time because you're gonna always have these scandals throughout the entire college career. Well, Andrew, we can't have it that way, unfortunately. There are rules and you have to follow them, right?

Like, even if you disagree with the concept of it, right? They broke the rules. Yeah, you can deconstruct the instead of lay, and no one is saying Mark Emmert is the picture-perfect commissioner or human being or whatever, but he kind of stepped into an environment where what Andrew has a problem with, it was already the case to a large, large degree. But Ed brought up something at the beginning that I thought was very important. This has dragged on to the point where people aren't even talking about this today because, again, this is something we've been talking about for 17 months, and we haven't had much tangible to grab onto.

Actually, it's been more than 17 months. It's been closer to 20 and 21 months that this has been a story, and people have been saying this is doomsday for college basketball, and no heads have been rolling other than the initial one right from the jump, that being, of course, Rick Pitino. But now that the FBI has finished its investigation, the NCAA has the ammunition to do something significant, and it's not just fans calling for something to happen and phone callers on radio shows. Coaches are calling for accountability because now the integrity of the sport is mainstream news being questioned, and it reminds me a lot of what we saw with the Flakgate with Tom Brady, to be quite honest with you, where the NFL didn't have a lot on Brady, really.

Didn't have a lot. But they saw an opportunity where the league was skeptical about Robert Kraft's relationship with Roger Goodell. They saw an opportunity to send a message and to say, no, no, no, we're not partial to the Patriots. We're not gonna have our integrity of our game questioned.

We're gonna make Tom Brady an example, and we're gonna suspend him for four games, the biggest face our sport has to offer. College basketball has this issue right now, where a lot of people in a national way are talking about just the integrity of the sport. The NCAA has ammunition to lay down the hammer, and they have incentive from coaches within the sport and also protecting the brand too, which can't be overlooked. Yeah, and what you just said comes into play, I think, with Louisville too, right? I mean, you mentioned what do they do with Louisville because literally no one responsible for the violations at Louisville is still there if there's more to be uncovered there in the FBI investigation, and they are, in fact, one of the programs that's involved in this. But that's just it. You make the statement, right? You make an example of six, at some point, maybe it turns into 10 or a dozen programs, and no matter who is there, no matter what, you lay down the proverbial hammer just to get everybody's attention. And I mean, they would have to be included in that, right?

You can't just skip over a program that's already self-corrected in that instance, I don't think. I don't think so either. Send in your movie lines on Twitter at Sports Hub Triad. Getting a lot of them right now, some I really like. At Sports Hub Triad, Darren's clapping his hands, he's ready to go. I am, I love the movie lines. We'll talk baseball and movie lines with the voice of the Dash, Joe Wilde, next on The Drive.

Come on! You're on The Drive with Josh Graham. The Sports Hub, at AM600, AM920. We're sharing with Darren. Thought from the David Glenn show? Joe Wilde, voice of the Winston-Salem Dash is with us. Darren, I think every week we should play a pop punk song to see if you could just identify it right off the jump. How's that sound? It's Blake-182. This is Blake-182? What is it, first date?

First date, that's what I'm saying. That's what I'm talking about. Getting a lot of movie lines in here right now at Sports Hub Triad, including one that we might have to dig up audio to find this, but Degenerate King suggests, hey lady, looking for some biscuits from the Jake Delone Bojangles commercial from a decade ago. If we could find that great sound, where the guy in the alleyway opening up his coat to reveal some biscuits. Hey lady, looking for some biscuits?

Hey lady, you looking for some biscuits? That's it right there. I mean, that's definitely what we're going to keep. Well done on Twitter.

We'll revisit more of these in a second. But Joe, you're in five county right now, aren't you? That is exactly right. That is a great, great commercial line right there. I'd never heard of that one before, but if anything with Jake Delone, it's got to be good.

Yes, those great Bojangles commercials from 10, 15 years ago. Joe Weil will be on the call tonight, a little bit later on. Dash, Mudcats, Intense, Carolina League Rivalry, five county stadium. And when I think of five county, that's probably the second deck at five county stadium, probably my favorite view in watching baseball. Because to paint the picture, it doesn't go backwards, the second deck from below the first or on top of the first. They stack on top of each other. So you can be sitting at the front of the second deck and sitting right behind home plate, right?

Yeah, that is correct. It's a pretty amazing view. Because you're high up, but you do get to see everything. And it does go one on top of another. So a little bit different than BB&B Ballpark game, which you see where it does feel pretty separated from that lower bowl to the upper bowl.

It's really on top of the players, so to speak, and as much as you can really in a baseball sense, but with the minor league stadium where there's no seats in the outfield. What's your favorite vantage point you've broadcast from? Anything come to mind immediately? Oh, favorite or memorable?

Because I have an easy memorable one, but it goes back a little ways. What's that? OK, so before I got to do this in the professional sense, I broadcasted on the Cape in the Cape Cod Baseball League. And there is a stadium for the Wareham-Gateman. And where we broadcast, it was actually, it was essentially like on top of the bleachers, which it was right near the third base dugout. So we were on this high metal thing where we got a very interesting view. The only thing that stopped us from getting hit from foul balls was an actual screen that was brought up and put there so that we were safe. Was it an L-screen? It was not an L-screen. It was just like one of those screens where you can put yourself behind a runner or like where the picker is.

Yeah, like when you would put out at second base, but still same concept, like field equipment. But that was what we had. And I remember not only were we, so we were on these metal bleachers on top of third base dugout. And it started to rain.

And like in the distance, you could see some lightning. And I remember wondering if my career was going to come to an end right then and there, that as a 21-year-old on the cave. So that was probably the most memorable experience broadcasting a baseball game.

But obviously, I'd love to tell the tale now. Let's get to Joe Weil's work from last week. Before we get to the movie lines, he will be trying to work it to his play-by-play a little bit later on tonight. This segment has grown very popular within the Dash and also in our audience. It's a win-win for everybody, because it's funny and it's challenging for Joe, who likes challenges.

The Dash get this exposure and this love of something fun, and the audience wins ultimately, too. Let's hear what Joe did last week. But the rest of the Southern Division has sucked the life out of Myrtle Beach, with Myrtle Beach being 7 and 17 against Southern Division teams, with the rest of the league saying, I drink your milkshake. I drink it up. I drink it all up, Joe. I drink it all up.

I mean, it's so great. If you know the movie, that's perfect. Yeah, that's a good way to work that one out. What's the next one you have, Des? 3-2. Swing and a miss, strike three. Mitchell goes down, one out. You know what they say, fool me once, you strike one.

But fool me twice, strike three. In terms of where to squeeze it into the broadcast, Joe, I feel like it was a little bit of a layup, but I don't know. I think it worked. It was good. Well, I think that had bad, too. It actually was somebody striking out in a breaking ball, too.

So I was trying to make sure it was actually an organic working, but I think it ended up working out. And the last of Joe Weil's calls from last week. Davis, one of the smaller guys on this Pelicans team, stands in at 5'10", 175. But certain guys can make it work in the baseball world by being a certain height and a certain weight.

For me, personally, I'm just one stomach flew away from my goal weight. Here's the pitch. Amazing work. Here's the pitch. It's so well done. It's perfectly polished.

It's perfectly broadcaster. It's awesome. So let's get to what we're doing this week. And I want to challenge you, Joe. I want to know if you're up for a challenge.

I'm up for a challenge, always. All right, so Keanu Reeves is the hottest thing in Hollywood somehow right now. I mean, the guy was big in the 90s, 2000s, and then had an 11-year gap where he put out zero good movies. And then now he's the hottest thing. And he's a sex icon at 54 years old who's like in this Netflix movie as the hunky love interest playing himself. Like, it's a weird thing that Keanu Reeves is in this place.

But speaking of Keanu Reeves, this out, you take the blue pills, you wake up, and you leave whatever you want to in. You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes. Man, that's really long. It is very long. That's so long. So there's either that, or I could give you To Infinity and Beyond.

Oh my god. I'll let you choose. Let's save To. There it is, it's too challenging.

That's not us. Let's save To Infinity and Beyond, because Toy Story 4 comes out, but not for another couple weeks. Yeah, Toy Story 4 comes out. Next week. Next week. Next week, that's correct. Yes. So do you think, Darren, let me ask you, do you think he can handle a line of that length?

He has handled everything we've thrown his way so far, with the exception of maybe one that he's titled to. But since you have to write it down, I don't think it's a hard one to work in. It's just long. I don't think it's a hard one. So you would have to have, Joe, you would just have to have it on an index card, just ready to roll. I'm going to copy-paste IMDb right now.

We should be good. That's it. So there it is. You take the blue pill. The story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe in. You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes.

Darren, what do you have? I'm tapping into a childhood favorite of mine, the Little Rascals. This is my guy, Stymie, who said, quote, babes are like a bad song. Once you get them stuck in your head, you can't get them out again.

I want to get Joe to get all sad boy in this broadcast. That's an incredible line that I haven't thought about in two decades. I remember it, but I haven't thought about it in so long.

I've just been disarmed in a very personal way. We have the Bojangles Biscuits line. Can we hear that one more time? This is from the Jake the Loam Bojangles commercial with the guy in an alleyway opening up his coat to reveal biscuits. Hey, lady, you looking for some biscuits? Hey, lady, you looking for some biscuits? Pretty good. Darren, you let me know which of these from the audience you like best.

This will be the last one we give. Jessica writes in, talk to me, brother. Got a lifetime of knowledge. That's from She's the Man. Amanda Bynes?

Amanda Bynes. I got this one. Nobody Puts Baby in a Corner. And Brent writes in, from Roadhouse, for that line of work, I Thought You'd Be Bigger. Yes, Roadhouse line for the win, yes. All right, so there you have it, your four lines this week. You take the blue pill, the story ends. You wake up in your own bed and believe whatever you want to believe in.

You take the red pill, you stay in Wonderland and I show you just how deep the rabbit hole goes. Darren coming in strong with little rascals. And then you have, of course, hey, lady, you looking for some biscuits? And we have Roadhouse for that line of work, I Thought You'd Be Bigger. I just wanted to give a shout out to Josh Graham and Darren Vaught for this is the week that I'm actually filling in on the dash broadcast on the board. So thank you for all of this. Yes, thank you guys for giving me the two longest lines we've had in the entirety of this.

That's a compliment. That makes things easier. If it's smaller, you might miss it. It's easier to miss.

But if it's long like that, there's no reason you should miss Morpheus. If Joe goes into the soliloquy, babes are like a bad song, and then continues, that should be pretty easy to catch on. Joe, how you feeling? I'm feeling good. I feel good. I got to get my vocals ready.

But you know what? We have had four cancellations over the last six days. So maybe all the energy that I saved up from not calling games those days will translate to getting this done today. All right, Joe. Have a good call. Thanks for doing this.

All right, thanks guys. All right, that's the voice of the Dash, Joe Weil. Love that attitude. A real champ. Joe underscore Weil. Dash baseball, Thursday night, 7 o'clock.

Movie lines from this show being factored in. And we'll play that back tomorrow as the Dash are in Zebulun facing those pesky Mudcats. It is a great view, though. Five County Stadium. One of my favorite minor league parks. I do enjoy it.

You've got the water tower that's painted up with the Mudcats logo. It's beautiful. And it's like a baseball. Yeah.

So it has the seams on it. So I enjoy that very much. You are listening to the Sports Up. However and wherever you are listening, we appreciate that. If you missed any of today's show, The Best of Podcast, you can find it on SoundCloud, iTunes, Apple Podcast, Google Play, and other things, quite frankly, I've never heard of before. But wherever you get podcasts, we're there. Just search The Drive with Josh Graham or WSGS Sports Hub.

The Sports Hub made up of the signals WSGS Winston-Salem, WCOG Greensboro, WPCM Burlington, and WMFR High Point. Let's begin. Let's talk about it. Let's talk about it.

You're on The Drive with Josh Graham. The Sports Hub at AM 600, AM 920. What a neat scene that was in St. Louis last night. No, the Blues didn't win on home ice. They won in Boston.

But that didn't stop Blues fans from packing their hockey arena and their baseball stadium in the rain to watch their team win their first ever Stanley Cup. The St. Louis Blues on top, a wonderful story as we're sharing with Darren Vaught. But speaking of the team that occupies that baseball stadium, in honor of the Blues, we are trying to figure out who the Nickelbacks of the St. Louis Cardinals are. And the Cardinals, this is an interesting one.

They won a World Series right in the middle of the 2000s. They are a team, I think, have some fun options here. And if you think you have team players that would qualify for our Throwback Thursday baseball segment, you could tweet us at sportsubtryit. I think there's a name we have to get to right from the jump.

And we're getting this on Twitter. And it's the most logical choice. It's the best choice because he's the current manager of the St. Louis Cardinals. But in the 2000s, he checks the box of leadoff catcher.

If you're a leadoff catcher, more than likely you qualify for this list. I'm, of course, talking about Mike Matheny. Yep.

Look at this photograph. I think we need to. He was a little obvious, I'll say, by the way. I didn't even include him. I've got a list that does not include Mike Matheny. But here's something we need to do that we haven't done in the past with this list. We're looking for guys who are in the 2000s. Players who aren't the best guys but are memorable and we're nostalgic about baseball. So there's just names that resonate with us from that decade, 2000 to 2009. But we'll even extend it to 2014 so that way we cover the entire amount of time Nickelback was putting out music that some people thought was good.

336-777-1600 if you want in on today's show. But what we haven't done is we need to just go through and disqualify guys right from the jump. We usually figure out the hard way that somebody's either too good or too obscure. The obvious ones that need to be disqualified, Albert Puhlholz. Yes. Of course. Jim Edmonds.

Sure. Yachty or Molina. Yeah. Chris Carpenter.

Yep. Wayne Wright. Those are ones that need to be disqualified. Is there anybody else that you would say is disqualified? I'm glad you said it that way and only included those guys because I don't know that there are a lot of players that don't qualify. And it sounds weird because I've got, I had a feeling this one would be a controversial team for us to do this because I have a couple of World Series MVPs on my list. You're going to say a player who won that 2006 MVP, the player that played shortstop, I'm going to push back on this.

Well, all right. So to be clear, he's my favorite baseball player ever. He is. We're really setting this up because me and you both know what we're talking about. Dez is just staring at me. We know exactly who we're talking about.

With a blatant stare, he has no idea who we're talking about. He's my favorite baseball player ever, Josh. And it's because he shouldn't be anyone's favorite baseball player ever.

He never, ever should have been on a big league roster. Do we just want to keep her long in this and not saying the guy's name? No, I'm going to say his name. I'm going to say his name. How about, like, this guy's the Ringo Starr of baseball. Oh, Dez, who is it? He's the guy, I mean, the Ringo Starr of baseball.

It's like Zooey Deschanel in my favorite movie, 500 Days of Summer. Wait, Ringo's your favorite Beatle? Nobody likes Ringo. Well, that's why I like him.

And that's why it was her favorite Beatle. Who are you talking about? I'm, of course, talking about two-time World Series champion, David Eckstein. Not going to win except, not going to accept it, though.

Because. I'm OK with that, only because he's my favorite player ever. So I like when people acknowledge that he was good.

But just know that I love David Eckstein because he wasn't ever supposed to be good. Like, he had to walk on to make a team at Florida. He just, his size and strength, like, he never should have been a viable big leaguer. And he won a World Series MVP.

I love his story. He batted.280. He won a World Series MVP. He was on the cover of Sports Illustrated, got a massive contract with the San Diego Padres.

He's too good. He only made the All-Star team twice. Yeah, because there's so many great short stops. He was playing short.

It's hard to make the All-Star team as a short stop. There are a lot of good bands, Josh. People just kind of, like, threw a lot of bands better than Nickelback. If Dave and Clemons has this guy, then we'll do it the same way we argued and squabbled a few weeks ago. Who was the twin we got really mad about? Michael Kedire. You got so upset over Michael Kedire. I used to have a Michael Kedire t-shirt. What?

That's a true story. Kedire's affiliated with USA Baseball. Like, he's a teammate of mine, a colleague. Michael Kedire. But he's a Nickelback, man.

I had Michael Kedire in a Austin Morneau t-shirt. True story. This David Eckstine dude only hit 35 home runs for his career? All right, no, no, chill.

That's true. Yeah, he was scrappy little short stop. Dave and Clemons, what do you got for our throwback Cardinals, Dave? I'm going to start off in just being cool with a guy who never really panned out.

He had so much potential and promise. See, be true. Wow, that is a good one. No, he counts. He counts.

Look at this photograph. He did have some good years with the Red Sox afterward, but you know, that's OK. How are you feeling about third baseman Scott Rollin? No, too good. See, I think Rollin's a should be Hall of Famer.

So Rollin's too good. We're going to get David Eckstine into it. David Eckstine, is it?

Yeah. Rollin was a way better player than David Eckstine. Scott Rollin. I mean, that's just a guy that resonates.

How many says? Seven time All-Star, eight time Golden Glove, 2006 World Series. Dude is a borderline Hall of Famer, Josh. Rick and Kiel. Yes. Both of them, the pitcher and the outfielder. Hit it, Dez.

Which career are we talking about? Look at this photograph. Doesn't matter.

They're both Nickelbacks. And the outfielder. He was on the outside looking in on our sports injuries list yesterday.

Sprained a sprained ankle. Stop. You know I hate those lists. Yeah. You sent us a message yesterday on Twitter in response to that list. I forgot what it was. It was during the show. I said, they're only good in the context of being before and after answers on Wheel of Fortune. Thank you for that. You know the category they have?

That's the two words stacked. And not even all of your top 10 fit that description well. Oh, you didn't like Larry Bird flu? Stop. We need to get to a pitcher here. Other than Rick and Kiel.

What do you got? Woody Williams. Who's Woody Williams? I don't know who that is. He was their number one starter for the early 2000s. Their number one starter? Yeah, Woody Williams. Dez hit it. He doesn't know.

He made the All-Star team once. He doesn't know. Woody Williams is Nickelback. I thought that was a surefire Chad Kroger. I don't lie on this segment. I don't know who Woody Williams is.

I'm trying to find out what he's playing for the Cardinals. Should I be shamed? Should I be shamed for not knowing who Woody Williams is? No, but sometimes I admittedly can get too obscure.

This one is not obscure. He was their number one starter for a few years. Yeah, he played from 01 to 04. Just with the Cardinals or that was his career? No, he played for Toronto. He played for the Padres.

He ended in Houston in 2007. All right, hit the damn thing. Look at this photograph. Intern Nick, what do you got? How about Alan Craig? Alan Craig. I know Alan Craig, so I think that does qualify. That was a few years after Woody Williams.

I know who Alan Craig is, yes. Look at this photograph. Braden Looper? I can't believe I didn't have him.

Look at this photograph. He was on a staff with Kyle Loesch. We're friends, but Kyle Loesch had a good career. I like Kyle Loesch and Matt Holliday. He was a Nickelback for the Twins too, maybe arguably.

I don't know. All right, so you didn't know Woody Williams. Do you know who Bud Smith is?

No, who's that? Bud Smith threw a no-hitter for the Cardinals in 03. Oh, I remember the no-hitter, but I don't remember. I didn't remember Bud Smith. Bud Smith? How could you not?

That's just the most Cardinals dude name ever, Bud Smith. Ned is from somewhere? Ned, where are you at right now?

Do you know where you're at? Ned, where are you? I'm in Kernersville now. I'm going to drive and go down the road. All right, you're just going down the road, but you're from Kernersville. Midway, now I'm in Kernersville.

Why? I was just making sure you knew where you were at, right? Like, I thought it was a situation where we could give you some directions.

Oh, man, I don't need directions. Give me a throwback, Cardinal Ned. Great, great, pretty little guy. Second baseman, Fernando Vina. Yes!

Look at this photograph. Fernando Vina! How did it take us that long to get to Vina?

Wow. This show, this show right here, you're not getting Fernando Vina content anywhere else. Nobody's talking about that guy today. You're not getting any of that. Like, no one. Fernando Vina might be doing a radio show today.

He's not talking about Fernando Vina. We cornered that market today, and I'm proud of that. I got another corner that we can conquer.

It better be a good one. Close us out strong. So to Gucci. Whoa! Wait, who? So to Gucci! So to Gucci!

He was on that World Series thing! Hit it, Ned! Yes, he already did hit it!

Darren! So no? That was a no?

No, that was a yes. Oh, OK. All right. Wow, I've never heard of this guy before. You haven't heard of any of these guys! Yeah, you haven't heard of any.

Josh hasn't heard of, like, four or five today. You're looking to be puzzled. Just like, are they making these names up, or are these real people, or?

I always end up with, like, people left on my list. Can I just, like, rapid fire a few? Yes. Ray Lankford. No.

Yeah! I know Ray Lankford. If Des knows Ray Lankford. It's probably not going to make the list. No, if Des knows Ray Lankford, he's going to make the list. I know.

I don't think he was fantastic, but. Next one. Eli Marrero.

Absolutely. Look at this photograph. Next. Bo Hart. That's too obscure. Who's Bo Hart?

Way too obscure. I knew that would be the case. I knew that was going to be the case. I don't know who that is. Do you remember Matt Morris?

Yes, I do. But again, this. See, some of these guys just have such ho-hum names that you don't, like, they're not really that. Do you have one more that you know is going to deserve it, so we can punctuate this segment? Yeah, because this dude, I'm going to throw in an R.I.P., Darryl Kyle. He deserves it, but R.I.P. Darryl Kyle.

Look at this photograph. Enjoy the College World Series this weekend. Darren will chat sometime soon. You know I will.

Talk to you then. That's Darren Vaught, hanging out with us once a week as we're sharing with Darren. Coming up, why the future of the AAF, or what happened with the AAF, speaks optimism, reasons to be optimistic about the XFL and what Vince McMahon's doing. Keep it here on the drive.

I love talking and conversing with you. It's so amazing how this song became an anthem for the St. Louis Blues. Apparently, last January, a handful of players went to a bar as Philadelphia Eagle fans to watch a playoff game and saw a bunch of people celebrating, listening to this song. So they brought it to their locker room, St. Louis Blues players, and it just has taken over, kind of like the Blues did at about that point in the year.

Last place at some point during the season around the halfway point, and with an interim head coach winning their first ever Stanley Cup. It's quite a story. John Forslund has covered the Carolina Hurricanes for a very long time, but has also been one of the leading voices on the NHL on NBC as well. He's kind enough to spend some time with us.

He is the NSMA's North Carolina Sportscaster of the Year. Johnny, it really was a tremendous story we saw fully coming to fruition last night with the Stanley Cup win. What's your favorite part of this story? There's so many. Josh, could this be with you again?

I don't know. Maybe just everything in totality. You mentioned the theme song, the genesis of that, the coaching change, the last first story. Layla Anderson, the young girl with a very rare disease that's become a shining light for the team and was able to follow the team to Boston and be on the ice with the players long before the spotlight, long before the even thought of a championship entered anybody's mind. She was a big part of what the Blues were doing at the time in the fall.

So it's a great, great story in total. And again, I think it just depicts what the National Hockey League is all about, because just about anything can happen, and it did once again. Yeah, it's a story I think that's exclusive to hockey. I don't think we could have a story like the St. Louis Blues in another sport. In the NBA, there's maybe five or six teams that are true title contenders. So the idea of that team being in last place at the halfway point of the year is just foreign.

And in the NFL, there just simply isn't enough games. When you think about head coaches being dismissed, we've talked about this before, how strange it is in hockey. The Hurricanes in 2009 making a coaching change, and then that team going to the Eastern Conference Finals only to lose to a team that had fired their coach in the middle of the season two and won the Stanley Cup Pittsburgh. And then that coach was fired in 2017, and then the coach who took over for him won the Stanley Cup for Pittsburgh. And Coach Sullivan, we see it now with Craig Berube. I mean, what do you make of this in hockey, where you see a coach getting fired as potentially a spark plug for a team that, in this case, culminated with the Stanley Cup?

Yeah, this one goes all the way, and we have seen it before. And we've also seen situations where it doesn't work. But I think what needs to happen to a team, to a hockey team, when there's a coaching change is whoever's brought in needs to be almost the direct opposite of the predecessor. Maybe that's true in other sports. Sometimes you see in other sports, they'll go to a member of the coaching staff. They'll go to a guy who comes from maybe the same coaching tree who might be almost just trying to tweak the same hymnal and trying to get the guys to work the same game plan, but just in a different way, maybe with a slightly different approach.

If it's a stark contrast, I think it works in hockey. I think players just become run down with the same message over and over again. They become vacant.

They become, you know, it's hard to find their pulse. And in this case, Craig Berube didn't have it easy at first when he took over the Blues. They stumbled around in December. Wasn't quite right. They were dead last at the first of the year. And then it started to come, and I think he was similar in his approach as Rod Brind'Amour was with the Hurricanes, where he was preaching to his team, listen, guys, I know what I'm talking about. I do have faith in you. We are playing correctly.

At some point, we're going to break through. The Blues did, so did the Hurricanes. Hurricanes made it to the final four of the NHL.

And in this case, this is a championship team in St. Louis now. But I think he was able to get to the guys with an honest approach, an approach where they were able to say, we like this guy. We respect this guy.

He's not blocking us down with X's or no's. We just want to play hard for him and for each other. And sometimes in our sport, that's all you need, because it is such an emotional and sometimes a random game. Jon Forslund with us here on Twitter, at Jon Forslund, I always find myself getting emotional watching the Stanley Cup presentation. It doesn't really matter who's winning it because of what that moment represents to so many. And it feels unique in hockey to even other championship trophy presentations. As somebody who's studied the game and been around the game as long as you have, what do you think makes the Stanley Cup celebration and presentation ceremony perfectly unique to hockey and special? Well, it's a majestic trophy.

I'm biased, obviously. But I think it's the most beautiful trophy of the ones that are out there for pro sports. And it's a people's trophy. So it's a trophy that's shared with not only the players, but the staff, the employees of each arena, the fan base. There's a good chance if you're in St. Louis over the next few months, as a fan, you're going to get an opportunity to somehow see it, maybe even touch it, maybe take a photo with it.

There'll be plenty of opportunities to do that. And of course, the great thing about it is every single name that's etched on that trophy is there for a reason. So every team gets 50 names they can put on the trophy. Well, there's only anywhere between 20 and 25 players.

So when you have 50 names, there's managers and scouts and PR people. And sometimes, of course, the owners, but sometimes people are put on that trophy for sentimental reasons because they were that important to the team, that important to that specific year and their names on the trophy. So when you look at the trophy, it's a history lesson. And I know when we had it here and we shared a day with it back in 2006, I was amazed at how many people were taken to it. And it just has this lore that brings people in.

And I don't know. I'd have to be around the other trophies to see it and see if it is the same type of an effect that the Stanley Cup has on the general public. But I'm not 100% sure it does. And I think that's why it's special. What do you remember about the first time you held up the cup? Well, I never held it up. I never put it over my head because I don't know many do. I just felt I didn't compete for it. So I was in its company. I took a few photos with it. Most of the photos I took with it were either with my family or with people that I was sharing the cup with. But I never wanted to raise it over my head.

I think that should be left for the people that competed for the trophy and the players and the coaches and so on and the direct hockey staff. So I never did it. That was my own choice.

Many people do. Maybe I cheated myself. But I also was able to show it to 1,200 people the day I had it in various different ways, various different parties. And we figured out a way to make the most of it.

It was tiring, but it was well worth it. And I think that's the joy I had was sharing my opportunity to just have it, which isn't a given for a broadcaster. We were very lucky that Peter Karmanos, the then owner of the Hurricanes, gave the broadcasters a day with the Stanley Cup.

Sometimes it happens in other markets, and sometimes it doesn't. But we were lucky, and we did. I'll never forget it. Do you ever get to be in the same room alone with the Stanley Cup?

Oh, yeah. It was in our bedroom for the night. And so what we did with it.

Is that the only place? Don't run away with too many ideas here, but it wasn't that exciting. But anyway, we had the cup. This is what we originally planned. We're originally going to take it to the Raleigh School for the Blind at 9 AM that day. But unfortunately, the night before, it got held up in the previous engagement, and it could not make the early flight out of Detroit. It was coming from Detroit. So it took a secondary flight, second flight out of Detroit.

So I didn't get it till 11 o'clock. So we had to do something else for that group at a later date. But then I took it to my kids' school, and we shared it with every single class.

Every single class had a 15-minute history lesson on the Stanley Cup, and every class, pre-K through 8, was able to pose with the cup and take a group photo. And all the parents came. So that was 600 kids and parents and so on. So that was a boatload of people. Then we had a private party at a restaurant where people that could not get to the house party could go. That was another group of people, and that was from 4 to 7, and then we brought it to my house. And then we had a party at the house that was crashed. A lot of people came through.

It became like a big receiving line. They'd come in the front door. They'd come all the way down to our basement, out onto the patio in the backyard. That's where the cup was.

Take a picture, and then they would leave. And that went on to the wee hours in the morning. But the keeper of the cup has to stay with it. So he sleeps wherever the cup's going to be that night, which was in this house. And so the keeper slept in the basement, and the cup came with my wife Natalie and myself up to the bedroom. We put it on the floor and went to bed. And we gave it to Chuck Caton the next day, and he took it.

Excellent. That's a great story. You're also a big Red Sox fan, so I wonder what do you make of this David Ortiz story this week, where we learn that, apparently, the suspect was offered, I think, what, just around $8,000 to kill David Ortiz? I mean, there seems like there's more to this story. I don't know really how to talk about it.

I don't either. And that's news to me about the money. And I've been doing a bunch of things today, so I haven't been That's according to police, by the way. That's not a report. That's according to police. OK. That's, yeah. Well, that's unbelievable. So I knew it was likely a hit. I heard the reasons why it might have been a hit. I mean, it's just god-awful.

I mean, I don't even know how. I don't think any words can start to describe or explain how you feel when something like this happens, because he's an iconic guy who can make mistakes, who was in the wrong place at the wrong time for the wrong reason. I think David Ortiz will be, God willing, when he's back to full health, will be able to speak to this and will be able to teach some lessons to some people about it.

And it's just a real shady deal and very unfortunate. He is just a larger than life guy, so genuine. I know a few people that know him. And I think he is what he is. And maybe he made a mistake in his life and was going to pay some kind of ridiculous price for it from some evil people who think that way. But it just shook up everybody throughout sports, because David Ortiz is a, yeah, outstanding athlete, championship caliber athlete, but is this big larger than life figure that has helped a lot of people and will continue to.

From the outside, I've admired David Ortiz for a long time. The big NSMA banquet is a little less than two weeks away. It's on a Monday. We're going to be broadcasting our show from one of their seminars that they have earlier that day. So we look forward to seeing John Forslund when he is named and recognized as the North Carolina Sportscaster of the Year. We'll get you down on these parts sometime soon, John. Thank you for doing this. Anytime, Josh. You take care, and I'll see you then. You got it. That's John Forslund on Twitter, at John Forslund.