Bob Ryan

It's almost here! The Carolina Panthers have officially signed all seven of their rookies. Players are being tested for COVID today. And after passing two positive tests, they're going to be in the building for training camp by the weekend. One big labor chess piece was established by the NFL yesterday.

They conceded to the PA on preseason which all but eliminates exhibition games from happening this year. So let's talk about football. How exactly is that going to impact the Panthers? I think quite a bit.

It affirms something I've been expressing all spring and summer and that's this. There's no team less prepared to play right now than the Panthers. You got a college head coach, a college offensive coordinator, a college defensive coordinator, none of which have head coach experience in the NFL or coordinating experience. And they're going to step in with no in-person OTAs or offseason program, no preseason games. So the first time they're going to face an opponent in the NFL.

Week one against the Las Vegas Raiders. That's mind numbing. The same way, it's crazy to think the Toronto Blue Jays as of right now still do not know their home for home games of a baseball season that's going to start in a little over 48 hours.

That's crazy, but it's 2020. Matt Ruhle, he's a culture builder. That requires trust from your players. They have to buy into what you're selling, buy into a vision of things changing, adapt to some of your philosophies that worked at Baylor, that worked at Temple, maybe even worked with Tom Coughlin and the Giants before that. But you can't really build that trust when you haven't even met players face to face. Coach Ruhle said that about a month ago. He hasn't met every single player on the roster face to face.

On field leadership. So if coaches are new to the NFL, you can at least lean on guys who have been there who are currently on your roster, right? Carolina doesn't have that though. Four of the five captains from last year are no longer on the roster. The only overlap or the only player returning is KK Short. The Panthers are also last place among total snaps returning in the entire NFL. 46.5% of their total snaps returning or total snaps are going to be coming back from 2019. They're the only team in the NFL with a new head coach and a new starting quarterback.

These are all things that hurt the idea of continuity. They're not being a preseason. They're not being an offseason program. Teddy didn't get together with Robbie Anderson and I think that's the first of his receivers he's been working with until about three or four weeks ago. That stuff takes time. It takes time to develop chemistry. It takes time to build an offense and to implement and to do so even when you're in person.

It's harder to do that digitally. It's borderline impossible, but it is an interesting case study. Field Yates from ESPN. He said on social media that the Panthers are one of the most fascinating case studies in the league and I agree with that. There aren't many compelling four, five or six win teams in the NFL, but the Panthers are one of them. I think they're one of the five most fascinating teams in the league this year.

Do we got a bell? Okay, I'll go through five through one most compelling teams in the NFL this season. I think number five on the list is the Buffalo Bills. Can they pass the Patriots in the AFC East?

Josh Allen, can he take a step with Staphon Diggs being acquired? Number four. I got to say number four first, Robert, don't get ahead of yourself.

It's the Carolina Panthers. That was super loud. Why'd you do so so aggressively? I didn't want to get ahead of myself. What's wrong with you today? Are you okay? Just got to check on the producer of this show.

Make sure he's doing all right. The Panthers for all the reasons I just outlined. What is the true value of offseason workouts? How much does it hurt a coaching staff that has no NFL head coaching experience or coordinating experience to transition from college to the NFL without OTAs and without a preseason? Number three, it's the Cleveland Browns. That was a lot better, Robert.

I felt more welcome to give my answer here. The Browns, Kevin Stefanski is replacing Freddie Kitchens. There's no more excuses for Baker Mayfield not to have success. Still have Landry and Odell out wide. You got an unhappy tight end and David Njoku backing Austin Hooper. Two talented running backs in the backfield with Chubb and Kareem Hunt. Great defensive line, great players at all three levels of the defense. Coaching matters.

Stefanski, I think he's competent. I think he's more of an adult than Kitchens was. You got to manage Baker Mayfield. They have to find a way to get to the playoffs, I think, or something's got to give and I don't think it's going to be the first year coach. It very well might be Baker. As crazy as that sounds with him entering year three. Number two, it's Tampa Bay. You're just messing with me now, aren't you? Tampa Bay, Tom Brady, Tampa Bay, Tom Bay.

I mean, there's a lot of really stupid ways you could say it. I haven't gone to Tom's website and bought any of the apparel, but Gronkowski joining him in Tampa. That's just going to be an incredibly fascinating deal and it only trails number one, which is the New England Patriots. Patriots, it's the most compelling story because you got the most polarizing quarterback joining the most hated franchise in the NFL.

That's trying to replace the all time great quarterback in Brady. That I think is the most interesting story, but all those teams are expected to win except for Carolina. I think they're the least prepared team to play right now in the league because of the lack of OTAs, because they don't have any NFL head coaching experience on staff, because they all come from college, because they have a new quarterback, et cetera, et cetera. All the other teams that are supposed to be bad, you at least have reasons for hope. Hey Jacksonville, you look like you're tanking while you have your head coach back and you have a starting quarterback who started games last year and Garter Minshew.

You look at the New York Giants, how can we be excited about Joe Judge? Okay, you got Jason Garrett who has NFL head coaching experience as your coordinator. Not a bad head coaches are really good coordinators, so that could work out.

Washington, Ron Rivera as the coach, Jack Del Rio as the defensive coordinator. There are reasons to be optimistic right there. So I think Carolina is in a really tough spot. I want to shift things because there's something we do in the media that's always irked me. We build guys into these massive superstars only to wait for the earliest convenience to dump on them and to tear them down. And believe it or not, this is crazy. After just a handful of NBA games, it's already happening to Zion Williamson.

I can't stand this. Not just because I'm a big Zion fan, not to be confused with the Duke fan as we've covered at many points. Big fan of him as a person, very entertaining basketball player.

I don't know how you could be anti Zion as far as I'm concerned, but some are trying. Like when you think about every superstar, especially in basketball, when we build them up, we always try to knock them down. We turn them into these stars and then we take baseball bats to their kneecaps. Michael Jordan, massive star.

Then the gambling stuff happens and it becomes such a nuisance to him. He said in the last dance, it was part of the reason he decided to leave the sport and go to baseball. Media coverage. It almost drove out the greatest athlete we have, the biggest star. And that hurts the industry. LeBron James, the decision.

Is that really that massive of a deal? At the time, I mean, it was different, but vilifying him for that, probably a bit too far. Then you got Zion who had his shoe combust, implode. I was at the game in Cameron and ever since then, you have people questioning whether or not he's too heavy. He didn't participate in much of summer league. And that's a lot to do with him being on the award circuit and wasn't in the best conditioning. Coach K even pointed that out. And then in the fall, he had arthroscopic knee surgery, six to eight week procedure.

But like Duke, they decided to be cautious with him and they didn't return him until January. So last week Zion, he leaves the NBA bubble for an urgent family matter. I don't know what the matter is.

I don't really care what it is because it's none of my damn business. But as that was happening, Shams Karania for the athletic reported that Zion was being attended to by medical officials for cramps that he was having. Now, even in the report, they said he was fine, that these weren't serious. The people that were given that information that he had cramps in the first place were saying that to Shams as well.

But that led from Fox Sports Radio, Chris Broussard, Mr. Can't Tell the Difference Between a DM and a text from Kevin Durant saying this on the Odd Couple about Zion. I'm not a doctor and all that, but this is a 19 year old kid who has been off for four months who just got back basically from injury that kept him out for the basically the whole season. And I think that this is not a good sign. I'm not a doctor, but this is not good. I'm not a doctor. They said he's fine. You know, the medical people, but this isn't good for Zion. He's 20 by the way.

Every Nick, Brouss and cramp is going to be blown up now because that we're building up Zion in so many ways. This is going to be the way you knock him down. Oh, he can't hold up.

He's too heavy. Even though after that precautionary stretch he missed at Duke, he plays Syracuse in Charlotte ACC tournament and he's 13 of 13 from the field. That's the most attempts without a miss in the history of the ACC tournament. That's the first game he came back.

He hits four threes against the Spurs. His first game in the NBA seemed unstoppable when he played and he was on minutes restrictions. And from that point on, he was dominant when he played unlike any rookie we've seen in a very long time yet you want me to be concerned about cramps?

Really? Crazy Robert, 19 year olds get cramps. 20 year olds get cramps.

I got cramps when I was 20, didn't you? Like don't you hate when like you're in bed and you get a cramp and you have to like lift your leg up and you're stretching it out and it's just the worst pain you've ever experienced for about two or three minutes or here's a pro move. Like if you're ever going through that cramp and you feel like you can't stretch it out enough to make the pain stop just look at me Robert this is pretty good. You turn on your side and then you start massaging it until it's just okay. Like you turn it on the side because that's not stretching the muscle and further hurting you. Noted.

I'll keep that in mind. So you didn't get cramps when you were 19 and 20? I did not. I was hydrated. Even after late nights?

Even after late nights. Impressive. And we've covered that legal case that he faced with Gina Fort. A massive scam. Nothing but, nothing but about it was legitimate. Just a complete financial money grab. Trying to put things out there publicly. Trying to shame Zion into giving her some money when her representatives are subpoenaing a Indianapolis dentist by accident citing as evidence information they found on Zillow and Wikipedia. And also bringing up a $400,000 sworn affidavit that turns out to be from somebody who is not one of Zion's friends. Who was posing as Zion's friends and fooling somebody who wanted to represent Zion in Canada.

Stop trying to look for reasons to knock Zion. Just enjoy greatness while you have it. There are a number of things I want to get to with Bob Ryan of ESPN who now joins us.

I hope things are going well Bob and your time is certainly appreciated. But Cam Newton, to me being in New England it's the most compelling storyline in the NFL when you couple maybe the most polarizing quarterback with the most hated team in the NFL. And it's going to be interesting to see how it all works together. Cam said to Odell Beckham Jr. and Todd Gurley last week on a video that his initial reaction was, how is this going to mesh? Him and Belichick.

What element interests you most about the Cam Patriots marriage? It's not Belichick so much. It's Josh McDaniel, the offensive coordinator. Because that's where it's going to happen or not happen with his control of and grasp of and appreciation of the offense that Josh is going to come up with for him. And for Josh this is a real challenge because it's a skill set unlike any that he's dealt with in New England. The complete polar opposite of the type of quarterback physically that Tom Brady is. And it's going to be an interesting thing for both of them to adjust. Cam to the, dare I use the word culture, to the way of life, the way they do things in the Belichick world. And the type Patriots for adapting to a strong personality, a quarterback with this different way of doing things. The celebrations, you know, is Bill going to be okay with it?

Assuming there are enough times he's going to celebrate. That kind of stuff. The one thing that precedes Cam here, we're told, if it's just not false propaganda, fake news. He's got the endorsement, we're told, of some of his prior teammates, as they like him very much.

Specifically Luke and McCaffrey. And that they have endorsed him, at least that's what we've heard. That's good.

That's nice. But it's obviously, it's a compelling story. It caught us by surprise, oh my gosh, this was absolutely a bombshell when it was announced. It always made sense to me though, that as long as he was out there, why not take a chance on Cam Newton?

And damn it if they didn't. Yeah, we were actually, in covering the Panthers the last few years, I never heard, actually one player I've heard say negative things about Cam, and that's Kelvin Benjamin. He's very well liked in the locker room because he doesn't treat it like a business. He treats it like it's personal to him, the relationships really matter. All throughout his life, if you look at Auburn, if you look at Florida, he's not somebody who's done really well with adults, hasn't gotten along well with adults. When he's around kids, that's really who he is.

And he has a real heart for kids, and what he does on Thanksgiving, giving 1300 Thanksgiving meals to kids in Charlotte the last few years and families in Charlotte, it's a fantastic thing. But there's no question, he was coddled when he was in Charlotte to a degree to try and fit that personality the Panthers were trying to build things around him. That's not going to happen with Bill Belichick, is it?

No, we're going to see if Cam at 31 is willing to make some kind of an adjustment here. But Bill has brought in interesting people along the way, and some have worked and some have not. We go all the way back. I started off with Ted Washington. He was an easy fellow to get along with.

They needed a run stopper. By God, he stopped in one year, and that was in and out. Didn't work with some other guys, so it worked with Dylan. Very definitely worked with him. And he was a problem for people's personality. Randy Moss.

Some of them it's worked, some of them haven't. And so it's not like we haven't been down this road to some degree before. What makes this doubly interesting, naturally, and we're all burying the lead here, which is he's succeeding Brady, and directly succeeding Brady.

There's no intermediate stop at near. There's no plug-gap quarterback, and then here comes Cam. It's a direct spiritual handoff, and that is going to make the plot more interesting. Shoot him a follow on Twitter if you haven't already. At Globe Bob Ryan, the great Bob Ryan from ESPN with us here on Sports Up Triad. I want to talk to you about this NBA bubble. Great news.

Yesterday, since July 13th, they've administered hundreds of tests, and they haven't had one positive. So it seems that the system is working right now. And granted, it's a big if, but if it continues, and assuming the bubble holds, I'm right now, I favor toughness. I favor balance. I favor how teams have performed in the playoffs in the past in unforeseen circumstances such as this one. So I really like the way the Los Angeles Clippers are built. I have them as a favorite going into the playoffs. What roster do you like, given the circumstances? Well, you know, you start with, is this Milwaukee's time? Has it come? Giannis is having another great year. He will probably win the MVP. We'll know that soon enough.

You start with them. They did have the best record. It was all for a reason.

It wasn't just about any dramatics of his. They had an excellent team defense as well. The Lakers are always eternal. Any team that LeBron is on is obviously a team of commanding interest to people. And as LeBron approaches 35 or 30, what's he going to be, his next birthday on the 30th of December at 36, as he approaches that age, you know, and every year you wonder how much less left in the tank.

And so far he's been able to perform at an extremely high level to this point. They're very interesting. The team that intrigues me, Josh, is in the East. I want to see, and that's the Philadelphia 76ers, I want to see that now that Simmons is healthy, exactly how he's going to mesh, is he going to even take some threes seriously. He's a very fascinating player. And then of course, Embiid can be a monster at any given night.

I'm curious about them. And of course, the approach to futures at stake there has been for a while. So I think if anybody's going to threaten them on paper, and the Celtics are an interesting story. They had a chance to get healed up. Kemba is battling some knee issues. They had some other people.

Smart had to COVID, but he's okay, apparently. Tatum is on the verge of true big stardom. And they could be an interesting force as well.

So, you know, where else do you want to go? I mean, in the West, Houston naturally is a team of interest. You wonder if Harden will ever figure out the balance. You know, the word I like is calibration. Will he ever calibrate his obvious personal individual virtuoso skills? All that dribbling, however, you know, and all that time wasting with the team need, psychic need, as well as physical need. It's not easy. This is why it took Michael Jordan seven years to win a championship.

He needed to learn how to, and this is my theory, he needed to learn how to calibrate, how to share enough. Harden, I wouldn't think he's easy to play with. I wouldn't think people are really happy about playing with him.

Do you think he'd be fun to play with? I don't think Russell Westbrook feels that way. No, well, that's a rather important person to deal with, and yet there they are reunited, you know, like Peaches and Irv after where they started. Although it's a different circumstance when Westbrook goes to Harden at a point when Harden is a sixth scale to the personal mountaintop. When he left, he was a sixth man. Now he's the man, and Westbrook's come into his turf, and how's that working out for him?

Very interesting mesh there. It's interesting you bring up Philadelphia because they're moving, reportedly, Ben Simmons to power forward, and Shaq Milton is going to be taking over at point guard. I had a chance to cover Shaq at SMU, and Scott was great, and then I didn't hear from him for years, and now he's reemerging this season and going to get an opportunity in Orlando.

We're chatting with Bob Ryan here from ESPN. I also want to talk to you about Major League Baseball too, because Larry Sorensen, former All-Star, he was with us yesterday, and he believes, and I've heard this from a couple other baseball insiders, that strong, powerful pitching teams, those are going to be the teams that have an advantage with a 60 game format, with a 60 game condensed season, and it just had me thinking, is there a team that you think of that has the kind of power pitching that you might believe, when it holed up, over 162 games, but over 60 might just? Well, you look at strong rotations, and even though the Dodgers are the price isn't going to play, and that would have really been the first thing that leaped to mind with what they would have been able to put out there. The Yankees, if they're healthy at the top of the rotation, of course now they're coals with them.

Then again, Tanaka, we don't know when he's going to recover from that frightening incident of getting hit by a line drive off the bat of Stanton. It's an interesting theory, and I have to say that I'm not prepared to answer it, I'm not going to BS you, without having a chance to do a little research, a little study. It's an interesting theory. I'm not sure I buy it automatically, because I'm wary of any and all theories about what's going to happen with the 60.

I really am. I know people are going through all these historical runs of 60 games, runs of teams. The dynamics of it, you have runs in the middle of the season when people have already got their motors running and all, are one thing. This is a total new set of circumstances.

How psychologically are people going to fare with the nature of the life they've got to lead in the other 20 hours of the day or 18 hours of the season? There's more urgency, isn't there? I mean, urgency has to speak to that. I think it's going to be a team that's going to have a very mature psychological team. If I had to look for an attribute that, among the teams that we know are the better teams, we know there are certain teams that aren't going to do anything.

Of course, it's just like any sport. But, among the teams that appear to be up there, obviously, we're talking about the Elites, we're talking about the Yankees and the Dodgers, and we're talking about the Rays, and I love doing this. We're talking about the Twins, who are on the verge of doing something. We're talking about the A's, and then the dynamics of the Astros, who are going to get a break because they're not going to be going into hostile environments.

They're going into sterile environments, which is going to mean they won't have to worry about that, and they would have faced an interesting season. But I'm just wary of theories. I know people have to postulate them, and everybody, we all have to have something to talk about, but I'm just ready to go. I just say, let's just go play. It's funny. And see how it shakes out. I can't be bothered worrying about comparing historical stuff for now. This is different.

As I said, the combination of physical and mental circumstances that people are going to have to bring to the table are unprecedented, and therefore, how do we know? It's funny you should bring up the Twins, because speaking of things to talk about, I see the stuff that's happening with the Toronto Blue Jays, and the Charlotte Knights triple-A team put out a statement yesterday saying that, hey, last week we were in touch with the Blue Jays, potentially to be a home for them if they want to come to Charlotte, but based on Major League Baseball reports, they don't want to go to any triple-A park, so they're looking potentially to go to Pittsburgh, maybe their spring training home in Florida, but it had me diving into some old stuff, and I found in 1998, the Twins, they were threatening to relocate, and it wasn't Charlotte or Raleigh that had a strong chance of landing a team. It was Kernersville, North Carolina, where our studio's at, right on the border of Forsyth and Guilford Counties, they were going to build a massive stadium, they had a third of the money approved for a $240 million project, the New York Times said that was a place that was ready to go at the time, so I dug that up, I figured you would enjoy it. Wow, I love that. I did not know that, I don't remember that, and that's fascinating. Now, Cincioli. I can truthfully say, you know, I can truthfully say that I've been there, I've driven through Kernersville, I know exactly, not exactly, but I know damn well where it is, that's funny, I did not know that at all.

I'll shoot that your way. This whole Toronto thing fascinates me, it's Tuesday, it's not settled, right, am I correct that the season opens on Thursday? It's, their first home game is eight days away.

You've got a flash for me the last half hour, I'm sitting on my deck reading a book, I'm not following the news, so tell me, I don't know. We don't know, they're eight days away from having a season opener and we don't know where that's going to be, they're a home opener. Eight days away on the road, that's very good for them, whatever. But I, you know, from what I've heard, Pittsburgh makes the most sense if it's true that there's only seven scheduling conflicts between those two, the Pirates and the Blue Jays, and therefore they could do it, and then throw a few double headers in there, god forbid, oh my god, double headers, while they're at, you know, eight-day-nighters, they could do that, and then they could get it done.

It seems to me that that's the most logical place. My first thought months ago with Buffalo, I didn't realize that the ballpark was considered to be so substandard that the lighting was no good. I know it's going to be difficult to retrofit these ballparks, I know, I know how much they've been working on Fenway, and how much work was done to get Fenway ready to live the new life in Fenway, so there can be the appropriate social distancing, you just can't reconstruct these ballparks to accommodate this fact of life overnight. But Buffalo has been, I guess if not permanently ruled out, been downgraded, talking about lights. Who knew that they had substandard lights?

Yeah, they were also saying the same about other AAA parks, such as even Charlotte, so it seems they're eliminated as well. Before we let you go, Bob, today would have been Robin Williams' 69th birthday. Do you have a favorite Robin Williams movie? It would be, you know, it's good Will Hunting, in which obviously he was the supporting role player and not the focal point of the movie. And some of his better ones, you know, the comedy movies, the strict comedy ones, I'm trying to... Mrs. Doubtfire is a good one. I think his stand-up stuff, his improvisational ability, his manic, depressive personality, you know, and he was of course the spiritual son, really, of Jonathan Winters, he worshiped Jonathan Winters, and of course they both had superior personal depression issues.

I did read the biography last year, a very powerful book on Robin Williams, so I'll just have to say, even though he wasn't the star of the movie and it wasn't about him, it was Good Will Hunting. Cliche Boston guy, going with Good Will Hunting. It's good to hear your voice, Bob, I hope you're doing safe, and hopefully, hopefully, the NBA news of yesterday and Major League Baseball getting set to start on Thursday? You know, you'll have something actually concrete, something to talk about. I do a podcast on Monday and Thursday, and we're very excited that we're going to be able to discuss actual events, and so I'm happy to get back.

Hopefully it's foreshadowing more good news. Thanks for doing this, Bob. Good talk to you, Josh. Bye-bye. There you go.

He's on Twitter at GlobeBobRyan, listen to his podcast as well. Mac Brown, he shared some optimism today, talking about having college football in the fall. And in the spirit of that, I'm going to rank the national champions in college football of the last decade next on The Drive. It seems like the regular football world and the fantasy football world are two totally different worlds where teams can be very successful in one and not in the other, and this happens almost every single year. Robert, see, you play fantasy football, you follow these things closely. The Arizona Cardinals, they were not a good football team last year, but they were a good fantasy team, yes?

Oh yeah, for sure. A lot of air yards, put up a lot of points. Kyler put up a lot of points. Larry had a good year. Once they traded for Kenyon Drake, Kenyon did well.

Christian Kirk, a lot of dudes that had a lot of success statistically. The Carolina Panthers might be that team this year, where they might not win a lot of games. They might maybe win five or six, but Joe Brady's the offensive coordinator, you got improved quarterback play, weapons galore. Bill Barnwell calling the Panthers' arsenal of weapons the fifth best in the NFL, improved play at left tackle with Russell Okun. The offense should have a lot of success. So I started thinking about three players statistically who will emerge this year potentially being a Pro Bowler in the next year or two. This year potentially could be a Pro Bowler if not pretty close to it, and I actually want to start with a defensive player, Robert. I think Shaq Thompson is bound for a breakout year.

Without Luke Kuechly there, somebody's got to make those tackles. It's kind of my theory on Kevin Love before he joined the Cavaliers. When Love joined the Cavs, I remember the way it was covered. They treated it as if one of the best players in the entire NBA joined LeBron. Oh my goodness, the league's going to be taken by storm as Kevin Love is with LeBron. And all they did was look at the stats he had in Minnesota and thought it was going to translate to Cleveland when it didn't, kind of like Chris Bosh at Toronto before joining the Miami Heat. Somebody had to score those points. These guys are pro teams. They didn't win a lot, but Kevin Love got the ball a lot and he scored a lot and Chris Bosh, he scored a lot and he didn't win all of the sudden.

There was a better option to get those points and to do so a lot more efficiently. Andy, if the Panthers are trailing a lot in games, the other team is hypothetically going to be running the ball a lot. So Shaq would be in position to get a lot more time.

And Shaq is very instinctive. One of the few first round picks on this entire defense. I think he's going to be one of the league leader in tackles.

I could see that. He's going to lead the team in tackles. He might even make a Pro Bowl because he's going to be asked to do a lot of different things and I think he's athletic enough to accomplish more than he gets credit for. He's going to exceed expectations.

I mean, you look at Madden ratings, which isn't a great barometer on things. He isn't even one of the top 10 rated Carolina Panthers on the Madden game this year. He has a 76 rating, which is kind of remarkable.

So Shaq, I think is bound for a breakout year. Ian Thomas, number two. Greg Olsen, no longer blocking him on the depth chart. He's got speed. He has size. He has athleticism. He has Joe Brady coordinating the offense. Matt Ruhle likes him a lot.

He said it multiple times. That's why they didn't draft a tight end. That's why they didn't bring in really a tight end to compete with him.

So he's the guy. I don't think it's fair to expect him to meet Greg Olsen's numbers, but he's going to be that safety valve. And he's got speed. He's a big dude, not a great blocker, but athletic. Going to be great in the passing game. Then there's Curtis Samuel.

You know, Robert, I've been telling people all summer, buy the Curtis Samuel stock while it's there. Tremendous during camp last year when Cam was healthy. And then when Cam got hurt, he had less touches. He was dealing with poor quarterback play. It's Kyle Allen.

It's Will Greer. Teddy Bridgewater, I don't care how down your view on Teddy is, he's an improvement over what Curtis Samuel had thrown into him a year ago. And I think Joe Brady is an improvement in terms of scheme.

What Carolina had in the past. So Curtis's numbers are bound to go up. They weren't terrible last year, just didn't meet the expectations that were set for him. His yards per touch were really high. His touchdowns per touch were very high. So when he gets the ball, he's dangerous.

I don't think that changes. He's in a contract year. So all of it points to Curtis Samuel having a breakout season. So those are the three guys I look at statistically. Even if Carolina doesn't win a ton, I think these guys can accrue some numbers.

Shaq on defense, Ian Thomas and Curtis Samuel for the Panthers offense. Take note of that fantasy football players. Have you done any drafts yet? Are you planning to do any drafts? Yeah, I'm in a couple of leagues that have already drafted, but most of those are like dynasty leagues where you hold like 30 to 40 players at one time. How has COVID affected the way you might think about the fantasy football draft, if at all? I haven't paid any league dues yet because I don't know that the season is going to happen.

And mostly it's just pushed a lot of stuff back. Like if you're in a keeper league, most of my keeper leagues have pushed back the designated date to notify the league owner of who your keepers are and stuff like that. Not necessarily how I've drafted, but maybe for the preparation for the beginning of the season. We're going to get back to the NFL with our NFL trading card war in about 10 minutes. But Robert, we need to decide, is this going to be the last episode of Dinos daily that we do or Dinos weekly? What are you going to base that off of?

How they're doing or how well I pronounce Kaiwoom? I'm just saying that this is the last week we have no major league baseball to talk about. So if the Dinos are well at way ahead in the standards or the standings, you're not going to you're not going to care.

That's not the conversation I'm having right now. We love the Dinos, sure, but spending time to talk about the Dinos when there's major league games happening, does that make sense? You sound like a Dino downer right now. You sound like you're not a real Dinos fan. Here's the compromise I'll come up with. When the postseason comes around for KBO baseball, we're not just going to bring back the NC Dinos segment.

It's going to be Dinos daily. We need to talk about these postseason games. I think sometimes, kind of like a relationship when you're going from high school to college, you just say, you know what? We just need a little bit of space from each other to figure out how much we really love each other. That means we're never getting back together. We're never going to do this postseason, this vacation you're planning.

There's a chance that this might not ever happen again. We can get back together during the holidays, baby. You can come over Thanksgiving.

We're doing it at our family's beach house. I miss you so much. We're never going to do this again.

This might be the final edition of NC Dinos Weekly. Welcome to baseball. Come on, hombre. We need mucho home run-o. All right, Josh, I've got good news for you and bad news. What do you want first?

I've always been received the bad news first kind of guy. The Dinos tied the Wiz three to three. The Wiz are one of the worst teams in the league. The Dinos are the best team in the league.

And that's just not up to the Dino standard of the way. The good news, the Dinos have not lost a game since Thursday of last week. Tying out Kaiwoom on two separate occasions, destroying the Wiz after tying them the following two games, six to one and eight to two, and then today, destroying Samsung six to five. They took the own plus.

That's destroying? They won by a run? I mean, they came out very weak and then finished very strong.

How about that? Yep. They're looking good. They're looking good, too, if you're a Dinos fan, NC sitting at the top 43 and 19, five and a half games in front of the Dusan Bears.

Kaiwoom also behind them in third place, seven and a half games back. And you're never going to hear about any of these teams ever again, because if any girl ever tells you, hey, we just need some time. We just need to separate, take a break from each other. She's not coming back.

She doesn't love you. All right. If there is enough demand for this right now, 336-777-1600, let us know if we should still update you on the Dinos every week, 777-1600 is the number. If you don't call in, I'm going to take that as you wanting us to do something different moving forward on Twitter at sports up, try it if you want to chime in that way. If this is the last time that you're going to see the Dinos on this show, is there anything you want to say to any of the guys that have just got us through this? Mike Wright, Minwoo Park, guys that have just been slugging it out for the Dinos. Can you just do me a favor? Can you look up the season stats? I just want you to tell me how Mike Wright did over a month sample now.

If this isn't, in fact, the last time we're going to talk about the NC Dinos on the radio. Yeah, I can do that. One second. Okay.

We got our NFL. You're looking for the whip. I need his ERA.

Okay. No whip. I could take his whip, but what's his ERA? His ERA 384.

Wow. It's pretty good. His whip's at 1.41. That's not bad. So a 384 ERA is pretty good. What's his strikeout to walk ratio? So how many Ks versus walks? Strikeout.

It is listed weird on this website. K? I wish I could throw my monitor through this glass at you and show you that there is no K on this screen.

Or SL? A BK. He has one BK. Shout out to Burger King. Yes, he has. It's no Ks.

I'm pretty sure that's a FOC? It's strikeout. 55 strikeouts to 32 walks. Okay. So a pretty good year for Mike Wright. I'm happy to hear that he did okay. Former Baltimore Oriole, former East Carolina pirate that I went to school with.

Okay. Our weekly NFL trading card war is on the way next on the drive. Now being joined by our early afternoon host, Adam Gold, who's about to be on a little bit of vacation for the rest of the week, but hockey's right around the corner. I see line combinations being thrown up on stories and on social media with the Carolina Hurricanes getting set to face the New York Rangers in a little over a week and a half.

That's going to be in Toronto. And Adam, you've been kind of pushing this a little bit and I'm following suit now wondering why not the Carolina Hurricanes with Dougie Hamilton back in the mix. And if the Hurricanes get back past the Rangers, potentially Brett Pesci could be added to this defensive group as well. I look at a team that made it to the Eastern Conference Finals last year in Brenda Moore's first season.

And I see young players from that team who are now a year older. But I'll even add a, I think, meaningful stat here. Home ice advantage is not going to be a factor, just like home court isn't going to be a factor in Orlando. And with Major League Baseball, no fans at Major League games.

That's going to be an impactful measure too, or not an impactful measure. There are only seven teams in the NHL out of the 30 that have winning records at home and on the road. The Hurricanes are one of those seven, which means at least they're consistent. There are a lot of good teams that you would not think have losing records on the road.

Really good overall records, high in the point totals. But the Hurricanes, really good at home, really good on the road, consistent winning records in both regards. So I ask you, Adam, why not the Hurricanes? I've been saying it since the, look, I thought they would beat the Capitals last year. I picked them to beat the Capitals on the TV station in Washington.

I went in there for the morning show and I said, Cain's in seven and the host looked at me like, what? I'm like, yeah, they're going to beat the Capitals. I think they're going to make it to the Eastern Conference Finals. Maybe I was just pulling stuff out of my shoe, but I liked the team last year. I liked the team better this year. I think the head coach gets teams ready. And for those of your listeners who are old Washington football fans, I think there is a little bit of Joe Gibbs in what Rod Brind'Amour brings from an emotional and preparation standpoint. He gets teams to believe in a cause and each other and play for each other. Like me, that's the culture of the Hurricanes. Rod cares about his players. The players care about one another.

And when that is established, it almost becomes easier to play because you don't want to let anybody down. I love this team, Pesci is still way off. Pesci wouldn't come back, even if he is able to come back, he wouldn't come back until the Conference Finals. But I like him against the Rangers and I like him going forward. I picked him to win the Stanley Cup.

And by the way, if you are somebody who is prone to doing things like this, 50 to 1 isn't bad. He's on Twitter at A Gold Fan. Shoot him a follow there. It's normal, you and I, we would be in Charlotte at around this time of year for ACC kickoff.

Tomorrow and Thursday was set to be those days. So I ask you, with coronavirus, taking coronavirus off the board, what if we were convening in Charlotte tomorrow and Thursday, what topic would dominate the room? Do I really have to be there?

That would be what would dominate the room for me. Most people say, why is Gold here? He doesn't really want to be here. And that's me echoing those sentiments. Why am I here? I don't really want to be here. I have a problem with all of these things.

They're sort of forced content. In all honesty, the best part of the, whether it's the football media days in Charlotte or basketball when they do that in the fall, the best part is simply seeing friends that you generally just talk to on the phone or communicate with through social media. But it's kind of hard to get like, I'd have a hard time getting wrapped up in the sport of football, like as hot as it is right now.

And I would simply be looking to the buffet dinner at this point. But I mean, I don't know, what would the topic be? Can Clemson win another title?

I think that would be the topic. Is Carolina really the second best team in the ACC? Can Mike Norvell repair whatever relationship damage there was between he and his players and get Florida State back?

To me, maybe those are the three storylines. I don't know what it what did Nick Saban say at SEC Media Day about Clemson or that's right. What did Larry Fedora say?

Did Larry Fedora say anything about America and CTE? Gosh, that was we sat there. We sat there listening to him do that. And we're just like, what what what's going on here?

Why are you doing this? I mean, it's not like the science isn't pretty much settled on this. But it's not that people don't blame football. I mean, it's just contact in general, contact with the head. Not just football.

Football is not the only sport that has this. But yeah, I don't know what was provided us all with a lot of things to talk about. What was amazing is that was two years ago. And those were my first set of shows I've done in the Triad. Two years ago, we were at ACC kickoff. And I was there was like six people at that that breakout station because I was going to grab Larry Fedora right after that for a quick interview away from Radio Row. So he said that thing. And I knew immediately it was going to be big because once we tweeted out the quotes on spot on the spot, you just see dozens of reporters flocking to that to that stage to ask Fedora follow ups on that very answer. But anyway, let's not get bogged down on the things Larry Fedora said, much like much like him with that East Carolina game in 2014. Let's just forget it ever happened. Moving on to I think we should get to a couple of important things before we let you go on vacation and curse on the golf course. How about I don't curse on the golf course. Robin Williams.

He would have turned 69 today. What's your favorite Robin Williams movie? Birdcage. Birdcage? Birdcage. Robert is fist pumping.

He's excited about that answer. It is an amazing, amazing movie. It's got the sneaky best cast in a movie in the last 30 years. You've got Gene Hackman as the father in law. You've got Nathan Lane as the wife who is phenomenal. Hank Azaria is in it and he is tremendous. It is a Callista Flockhart is in that movie. It is a phenomenal movie. I think Diane Lane is also in the movie.

I think she plays the mother in law. I mean it is just a ridiculously great movie, nonstop start to finish. That's my Robin Williams movie. But I said this today, there's like two bad Robin Williams movies.

Ishtar and Moscow and the Hudson, you can throw both of those in the trash. And if your favorite Robin Williams movie is something else, I'm not going to argue. A comedic talent like that, we have not seen in such a long time. And I go back, you're way too young for this, but Mork and Mindy, his character Mork, the alien, is one of the all time great sitcom characters. And the show got better when they brought in Jonathan Winters, who very much like Robin Williams was very much an impromptu comedian, a lot of physical comedy, but kind of wild and all sorts of things going on in his own head. And they all came out and they were funny.

And those two guys together were just absolutely tremendous. On Twitter, A Gold Fan, he won't be able on Friday this week to tell you what's for lunch, but he will make up for it right now by telling us what's for dinner. We're doing chicken carbonara with Caesar salad. Chicken carbonara was always my go-to sub. My parents used to run a couple of Quiznos franchises, so I used to pop in there, always get the chicken carbonara.

That was always the move. My son brings leftovers to camp for lunch. Awesome. Hey, enjoy your time off, Adam. We'll talk next week. Thanks for doing this.

Peace, bro. That's Adam Gold on Twitter at A Gold Fan. Robert, he is petrified right now because when he said that I was too young for Mork and Mindy, I'm a nerd and I love Robin Williams, so I've watched a lot of his old stuff and watched a lot of the old TV shows too.

I mean, even the stuff that you look at when he was on Cheers, I mean, he's happy days or excuse me, happy days, getting things mixed up as I'm trying to tell you what I know. Robert said something that I thought I could only hear in my headphones saying when he's finished talking, say Nanu Nanu and Adam heard it and then said Nanu Nanu. It's not, okay, if you want to talk about inside radio, this is inside radio.

I'm down for some inside radio. It's not the talkback. He heard it because the aux function on my mic is on, which relays information to all other output devices. So he could hear me through the phone because my phone is an aux, which is why. Oh, so anything you said he could have heard.

Yeah. If I was snoring over here, like if I talked crap about Bob Ryan, he would have heard it. There is one time, I forget who the guest was. Oh, I know exactly who it was.

You were making fun of a guest, which is an incredibly rude thing to do. I'm pretty sure it was Mike Meniscalco. He was talking crap.

I think it was Mike Decorcy. Maybe Decorcy. Yeah. He was talking crap about the Joker.

Yeah. You love Joker more than some family members. I don't know about that, but it was a good movie and he was like, he was like, I'm listening to the entire soundtrack. You called me even before you got this gig, you started calling me wanting to talk about it. I did love it. It was a good movie, but he was like, Oh, it was, it was just a dumb movie. I didn't understand this. And I, and I talked to the mic and I was like, Oh, shallow and pedantic, like the classic family guy.

And I was like, yes, it was pedantic. And I was like, Oh my God, he can hear me. But he deserved that. That Joker is not a bad movie. And if you think otherwise, then maybe you should stick to Barney. But anyway, since we're talking movies, Robin Williams, I love bird cage. I'm so glad he brought it up. I love when Robin gets to act out a character that seems like a vein from his spastic stand up where you would just get this just little sassy, uh, Latin lover. And that's what you get here. And you can see the, them show themselves in different movies that he does.

And he just blows me away no matter what genre it is. I got my five favorite Robin Williams movies right here. You ready? Yeah. You want to sound or anything? You're just going to, why not?

We'll do that. Uh, number five. I was going to give you anyway. Go ahead.

Let's hear him. Oh, did you want to give me the big deep voice? Yeah. Number five. Jumanji. Okay. You say it like a weirdo, but I respect that.

How do you say it? Jumanji. Jumanji. Listen, Jumanji. Jumanji. Jumanji. You're saying Jumanji. Jumanji.

Okay. Anyway, you love it. It's a great movie. Yeah, I loved that movie as a kid.

I really did. It holds up now. If you watch it again, it's still a good movie. Did the remake do anything for you? Uh, it, it was not the same Jumanji story in the fact that it's like a board game that was cursed. This is more like a video game.

People get sucked in and swapped bodies with certain stuff. It was what it was, but it wasn't the original. My number four favorite, oh shoot. Number four. For Robin Williams movies, Dead Poets Society.

Okay. I like that too. I think that's the- Oh, Captain My Captain.

Yeah, for sure. And if you were watching that as a kid and you didn't feel passionate about learning after that- Yeah, I just, it's, it's become a cliche though to a point where people would write in their yearbook, oh captain, my captain, oh really? You're just now starting to read Walt Whitman? You're a cliche, your senior year, or Henry David Thoreau, kind of a cliche, your senior year in high school to have that as your- You love breaking people down for being cultured, don't you? There I am.

Number three. Aladdin. I mean, it's, it's a digital character. It's animated, I should say. But I mean, I think it's the best Disney movie ever. That's how I feel. I don't know about that, but I do love the behind the scenes and how Robin would do so many takes of lines and different cadences with different inflections and would really work himself to death.

So many takes that never saw the light of day, but he worked hard nonetheless. Number two. Good Will Hunting. Who's going to say it?

What? It's not your fault. Actually, I lied. Can I do number two again, or is that going to take time? So it is your fault.

It is my fault. I just changed my mind. I changed my mind on the fly when number one's going to pick. Number ten. Number nine. Number eight. Number seven.

Oh, wait. Number six. Number five.

Got it. Number four. Number three. Number two. Good Morning Vietnam. Okay. Another great flick. Shows a lot of range.

Should I do it? Go ahead. Good Morning Vietnam. Yeah, that's, I mean, just a lot of great lines from that movie. And I'm a radio guy, so I'm kind of a little biased here.

It lends itself to you. Number one. Good Will Hunting. Those two I go back and forth on, and I can't wait for the people to come in here and say, what about Mrs. Doubtfire? I'm sorry. I actually did my top seven. Three, three, six, seven, seven, seven, one, six hundred. I don't want to hear your top seven.

I'd rather just hear your top five, because I don't want to appease you in including an extra two. Well, that's too bad. So you got to make decisions, Robert. All right.

Life isn't fair. Number seven. Nope, I want the top five. Here comes Jack. I want the top five, Robert. Good Morning in Vietnam comes in at six. Oh, my God. All right. Now we're at our number five.

See how easy that was? My number five is Birdcage. Great flick. Just, I love seeing Robin, especially in the whole outfit and like the ensemble, and he just consumes a character when he plays them. We have stuff we have to get to. Come on, Robin. Number four is One Hour Photo. Okay. Number three.

Oh, God. Okay. You don't want to talk about it.

Good Will Hunting, Mrs. Doubtfire is number two, and Dead Post Society is number one. Oh, well. Where's Birdcage? Josh, you don't listen to Sarah Bradford. You don't listen to me. I say number four. Number five.

Bird. Okay. Move it along, Robert. Move it along. We got stuff to do.

Just take it to the house. It's just like the last three minutes. Nobody cares. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

Take it to the house is a national sensation. You eat your words. I was going to ask, what's for dinner, Robert? I have no idea. I'm going to my dad's. Hopefully, it's something good.

What about you? You making a gardenia box, or what box do you get? What do you mean? What kind of box do I get? You get like a box with meals prepared in it. Oh, you're talking about like a blue apron? Yeah.

I don't have one of those. No. So I think I'm just going to have some tacos. It is Tuesday. Taco Tuesday. See? That's the vibe. Learned that from B-dat. Oh, God. All right. What do you got? Take it to the house. The only robots I like happen to reside in Japan. We'll find out why next on The Drive.