Governor Coupah

This is The Drive with Josh Graham Podcast.

Three internet sensations, guys! Tune into The Drive weekday afternoons, 3 to 7 on WSJS. We're on a Tuesday drive. It is WSJS, News Strong Sports for the Triad, where there's just a holiday feel in the building today. The studio and WD's control room have been decorated. The Christmas tree is up in our lobby. WD is the biggest Christmas nut I know. He watched planes, trains, and automobiles last night.

He'll tell us about it a little bit later on. So just a very festive feeling today. North Carolina basketball will be spending the holiday in the Bahamas, and it's the battle for Atlanta starting a couple days from now.

Since I haven't seen anybody come out and say it, allow me to do so. The Tar Heels could be in for a rude awakening this week. Because they haven't really shown us anything yet to make us think otherwise.

Here's what we've got to go off of. Three home wins against Radford, Lehigh, and UC Riverside, where most of those games, they're playing with their food. Greatly outmatched opponents.

The game closer than it needs to be in stretches. I felt they played pretty well against UC Riverside, but none of the guys really felt that way. Seth Trimble corrected me when I said it looked like their most complete effort. Eh, don't know about that, he said. Armando Bacott, when I caught up with him.

Armando. Here's what he had to say about the Tar Heels effort. Yeah, that's what I still don't think it was complete. I think the next step for us just as a team is keeping our foot on the gas the whole time and not having lapses. I mean, I think the first 12 minutes or so, the second half they didn't score.

But in order to be a really great team, we got to just keep our foot on the gas and not let up. Elliott Cadeau still isn't there yet, which is why he's not starting. Paxson Wojcik is the one starting in his place. He isn't an ACC level guard, at least not on a team that expects to be pretty good.

Cormac Ryan was supposed to come in and hit all these threes. Three of 14 to start. And that's at home against Radford, Lehigh, and UC Riverside.

You think when you leave Chapel Hill, that's going to get better? Because now they're leaving the Smith Center for the first time this season. This is the point of the calendar in both of Hubert Davis's first two years, where things started to get off the rails a bit. Where expectations were high and then they got knocked down considerably. His first year, it was Connecticut. They went to Connecticut and they lost to Purdue and lost to Tennessee. If memory serves, it was either, I think it was the Purdue game that got ugly.

One of the two did. Last year, vividly, struggled on Thanksgiving Day against Portland. And then beaten by Iowa State, beaten by Alabama, and that game that Caleb Love attempted a million shots. That was the start of a four game losing streak for North Carolina.

Both of Hubert Davis's first two seasons started pretty well when you were at home. And then Thanksgiving week, around this time when you go to one of these holiday tournaments, things go south. And they could face two dangerous teams in Atlantis. After playing Northern Iowa, who isn't a walkover by any means, Villanova in round two, likely. The same Villanova team that blew out Maryland on Friday night, Arkansas. You don't think they're upset?

After Mike Jones, who? And UNCG went into Fayetteville and upset them? They're still ranked at the top 25 for a reason.

The bus, bus, all that. And after that, so that's the battle for Atlantis this week. After that, the schedule doesn't let up. There isn't a breather when North Carolina is getting another Radford while playing these high major teams. You're going to face two consecutive high major teams in Atlantis after Northern Iowa.

Then you got five more in a row after that. And these are good teams. The first one you got is Tennessee in the Smith Center. Tennessee, who is ranked number seven in the country right now. You got a conference game against Florida State after that. You've got number five, UConn in Madison Square Garden after that. You play number 16, Kentucky and Atlanta after that. And then it's Oklahoma to wrap up that stretch and Charlotte. I just haven't seen anything from this team to make me believe that this should not be concerning. This stretch here that they're about to go into.

Not to be concerned, especially given the sample size we now have of Hubert Davis's first two years and how things tend to get a bit awry, be a bit off at around this time of year. On X at WSJS radio, if you'd like to chime in 336-777-1600, the phone number, chime in on the chat, on YouTube, streaming video there, Twitch and on X. Will Dalton, the executive producer of this show. We've got the Christmas tree up in studio or in the lobby right down the hall from us. Yep, right back there. Is yours up at home yet? Tonight is the night.

It's going up. Fake or real? It's fake. I've always done a fake tree. I'm a bigger fan of fake tree. So we do the fake tree and then Sarah Bradford goes gets a real tree. Willow the dog either going to love or hate a tree. There's no in between.

That's right. She's either going to love it or hate it. We will see.

My guess is love. Getting to the Carolina Panthers. Whenever David Tepper decides to pull the plug on the Frank Reich experiment, he should give a tip of the cap to the Houston Texans first with concerts because the Texans have made the decision a lot easier for Tepper to make.

Just think about it. How much more heat has been applied on Reich in this coaching staff by the way CJ Stroud has performed. There be heat on the Panthers for sure if they were one in nine regardless. But because Bryce Young has struggled and he hasn't been adequately supported and CJ is legitimately in the MVP conversation right now, I think takes it to another level. He is second in the NFL in passing Stroud is 28 yards short of 3,000 yards already. His team is six and four. Bryce Young one and eight as a starter while the team one and nine Andy Dalton had that one start. Half as many passing yards, half as many touchdown passes, and twice as many interceptions.

Not very good. The Texans also have a coach that's in the running right now for coach of the year. That's D'Amico Ryans.

Now why might that be interesting to David Tepper? That's their fourth coach in four years. Four coaches in four years for the Texans. They fired Bill O'Brien then hired David Cully. A year later they fired David Cully and hired Lovey Smith. Then they fired Lovey Smith and hired D'Amico Ryans. And I remember during the entire cycle who's gonna want to take the Texans job fourth coach in four years? Turns out a really good coach.

Heard the same thing about the Seahawks or not the Seahawks the Denver Broncos. Who's gonna want to take that job without a first-round pick at all the money they have invested into Russell Wilson? Sean Payton. Sean Payton would take that job. So who's gonna want to take the Panthers job three coaches in three years with an owner who's richer than everybody else and a quarterback that was taken number one overall and won the Heisman Trophy?

Yeah they're gonna get a pretty good coach. There are only 32 of these jobs. There's somebody good out there who would take this job so don't let anybody try to tell you that.

I don't know if anybody's gonna want to take it. D'Amico Ryans. Look at him.

It is also damning. Who does D'Amico Ryans remind you of as a coach? Hmm. Defensive minded guy.

Ejiro Evero. That's the guy he reminds you of? I'm thinking of the guy that replaced D'Amico Ryans in San Francisco that the Panthers could have hired last year. Huh. Hard-nosed defensive coach. Huh. Young and up and coming.

Hmm. Also a lot of ties to the Texans organization. A lot of ties to that city. Steve Wilks. Does he have any ties to Charlotte?

I don't know. And the irony. That's not ironic enough. The irony is Houston might be Frank Reich's only win. So four coaches in four years, yep, that's something that we can follow.

Three coaches in three years, more palatable if they're able to do that. CJ Stroud being good with the Texans, oh, that's applied to Heat, too, with Bryce struggling a bit. And the one win Frank Reich might get is against the Houston Texans, which, by the way, should eliminate CJ Stroud from the MVP discussion.

If I'm sitting there and making a case, somebody else has to have a better case than Stroud because Stroud lost to a team that did not beat anybody else. Frank Reich, I don't know if he survives this road stretch. At Tennessee this week, two more road games after that, December 17th, the next home game. Is he going to be the coach by then? I wouldn't bet on it.

But the Texans have made it a lot easier on David Tepper to make the decision to fire Frank Reich. You know, with concerts. Forgot to ask, W.D., you said that the theme of today's Skips or Plays with Hayes, Hayes Permoire joining us now from Sports Santa Fe, by the way, is actually newsworthy today? Yes, it's it's Thanksgiving themed. OK. And the way it's going to be that is we have three different football games this Thanksgiving that you can listen to on WSJS NFL games and all three halftime acts have been announced. So we're going to get everybody warmed up to what that may sound like. All right.

I don't know who the halftime acts are for Thursday. We'll find out together. Omar, you and I have been on this, you know, this issue for years.

And I've been putting in work to try and get this thing done. NC State facing North Carolina Saturday. Blue uniform on red uniform.

Yes. I've brought it up last year at the game to both Boo Corrigan and Bubba Cunningham. Bubba said he loved it. Boo said I liked the idea. Brought it up to Bubba again this past week. And he said we'd love to go blue as North Carolina was wearing blue at home in basketball for the first time in a long time, by the way. He said, I don't even know if NC State could stop us from wearing blue, but it does sound like they'd have to file a request, which means if it doesn't happen Saturday, it seems it's because of NC State and probably more specifically Dave Doran. Where do you stand on this?

How how can we shame them enough into doing something that would be universally approved of? Well, I think we've talked about this before, Josh, and based on it's the relationship between the two schools. If you have a good idea that both of them you need to sign off on to make it happen. Right. In this case, maybe state would need more of the sign off because they're the home team, I guess.

Yes. But the key and I mean this, I'm kind of joking, but I'm kind of serious because I like people that work at both schools. But the key to being able to sell it is to make it clear that the idea didn't come from the other guy. Like you can't have the announcers going on and being like, and UNC had the great idea to do red and blue for this game, so they wouldn't have did it like, no, no, no.

You have to not only do you have to make sure that doesn't happen, you have to plan accordingly and do all the diplomacy to get an idea in the ear of both schools without either one thinking that the other one was on board first or came up with the idea. And that's where we come in. Like it could be Hayes, Permar and Josh Graham's idea that gets this thing done. And West Durham, West Durham would present it properly. He's calling the game Saturday night.

Who better to call that game? You know, Woody's boy, you can't have West Durham involved in this. I love West. I love West.

And he has great career all to his own. But in this line, you have to walk the tightest of ropes and it can't be anything that's pro UNC or UNC or state. So we can't have Woody's boy involved. Sorry. Okay. Are you willing to use your social media platform and Sports Channel 8 to at least bring this up before it's too late?

Like it's Tuesday. We can bring this up. I've been bringing it up for years.

And here's the thing. I don't know if you saw Tim Peeler. He did a great little run of like, you know, what the flyover should be like, you know, Orville and Wilbur Wright's Kitty Hawk model or whatever.

And he had all the North Carolina tie ins that should be with this game, which to me still the simplest is the best. Pig cooker, pig cooking during the game, winning team eats. That's it.

That's the barbecue bowl. But I've said my piece. I've put it out there.

I've given them free genius ideas for years. But the bigger piece is get, figure it out, guys, because you like every stupid rivalry has some sort of trophy that they market. And that's one of the few things we always complain about, like, Oh, nobody cares about UNC or state football, except for UNC state fans, because we're not going to give them like a national championship run to make them care about it. But Washington, Washington state, nobody cares about them either. But they come up with a name for their thing.

They have a trophy TV can get into it. Like, if you don't think my genius idea, do something carefully, genius, and it's not even my idea. It's like other people have said this.

I've just been the trumpet bear for a while. Do something. The rivalry needs a name. It needs a gimmick.

Make it happen. And again, it's got to be, I don't know what that, I was gonna say, maybe the governor can get involved. But again, no, he is definitely on one side versus the other. My favorite running meme now is, yeah, I don't see the governor talking about Efton Reed's waiver. Anytime anything happens with NC state now, it's like, Hey, hey Cooper, hey Cooper, where you at buddy?

Where's the waiver? You gonna help us out? No, no.

Only Tess Walker. Okay. Okay.

Let's see. Let's play skips or plays with Hayes now. Hayes Permar is somewhat of a Renaissance man, an expert in the finer things, but he hangs his hat on music. Today Hayes will decide if this music is smash or trash blows or blows. It's time for skips or plays with Hayes. Genuinely interested in what the songs are Hayes. RIP Smash Mouth.

And also I got to do my traditional one thing I got to say that I forgot that I thought of during the theme. Did you see that thing of Roy Cooper explaining how to actually say his last name? No. It's the most Eastern North Carolina thing ever. And if you've ever grown up with somebody named Cooper or as is now the case in my stage of life, you have people who are naming their friends, the name that is spelled like his last name, C O O P E R. And they're resigned to the fact that everyone's going to call that kid Cooper and he's going to be Roy Cooper, right? But deep down, and you can see Roy, he's, he's resigned to it too. They want you to say the name and I won't even say it right, cause I didn't grow up in Eastern North Carolina.

I'm only one generation, you know, in Raleigh, my parents are from here. But it's this like, I won't be describing it right, but some literary genius could tell me like that, whether it's a diphthong or an umlaut or whatever we need to make it Cooper. It's not quite cup, it's not C U P P E R. It's not copper, but it's definitely not Cooper. It's Cupper. Maybe it's not even an E R but an A H on the end like Cooper. It should be spelled like C O U P E R, Cooper. C O U P A H, Cupper.

Cupper. Yeah. That's it. We're getting close.

Again, even I can't do it. And I'm in theory from here, but all right. What is the first act from, that we're going to see this week in one of the three games Thursday? So you're going to see Steve Aoki at the Niners Seattle game. Yeah, he's the wide receiver for the Niners. I know, of course he'll be there. He's performing at halftime too.

Yeah, that's happening. Brendan Aoki, what's the difference? Who is it?

Give me a Steve Aoki song. So this is a mix. This was a feature he did with Linkin Park, A Light That Never Comes.

How long ago is this? Is this pre Chester Bennington dying? Yes. Oh, okay. All right. First of all, first of all, let's give this a hard skip. I'm not liking this at all.

Also, is this a real person or a stage name? Because it sounds like, like when Josh Graham has his 40th birthday, how old are you Josh? I'm 30. Okay. So we've had, we passed your 30th.

Yeah. When Josh Graham has his 40th birthday party and we blow it out, what would be the most obvious type of party to have for Josh Graham? Will, don't, what kind of party would you have?

Movie, movie, what does he like even more than movies and he likes cold play. Come on, go into bar and doing what? Oh, karaoke. Yeah.

Yes. So this guy's name sounds like, Oh, it's going to be happy 40th birthday. And we're having Josh Aoki like Stevie Oakey sounds like I'm going to Steve who just loves karaoke. And they're like, Oh, it's a Stevie Oakey, it's a celebration, Josh is going to be Josh Aoki. Josh Aoki. Okay.

So that's, that's an easy skip. Yeah. I don't know how that happened. Steve Aoki.

That doesn't sound great. What else? So Jack Harlow. Oh, he's going to be doing the Detroit and Green Bay game. So let's listen to what's popping. One of his biggest, biggest hits was popping brand new with just how I got options. I can pass it.

It's like stock. Just Josh. I'm spending this holiday.

My body got rid of them toxins. Sports in the top 10. I can put a ball in the end zone, put a bed in the friends on sound like an intro just on give me that tempo. All right.

I'm gonna be honest. So I've been getting into Jack Harlow and by getting into meaning I've listened to two songs over and over and over again. Unfortunately, this is not one of those two songs, but I'm thinking his vibe. And even though this song isn't quite striking me as well as the two that I already know, I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt. We're going to play this.

Hey sperm are all right. That leaves the cowboy game. Who is performing halftime at the cowboy game Thursday. We had to save the best for last Dolly Parton. Dolly is going to get this shit. Yeah.

Yeah. I didn't want to go this has to be better than last weekend when they said she was performing at the Tennessee Georgia game and then she tried to sing over the band. Really bad job on the band's part. Really bad on Tennessee's part. It was horrific.

If you watch the video, it'll make you cringe. Okay. What Dolly song did you choose? I didn't want to go basic with Jolene.

Plus I feel like we've done that one before. So I went with nine to five. I was about to say this is the most basic one to choose I didn't want to go basic. This song. Hey, it's a great song. It's a jam.

Dolly Parton might be the most popular American currently like is there anybody highest Q rating most well liked Dolly Parton. Most like person and this song also sits like a top of list of songs. I can't believe I haven't done a song parody to yet. Like it's it's a bop. It's got like the nine to five because it's got numbers in it. Like we're a sports thing. You know, you could work in like we're getting out shot nine to five by the hurricanes, you know, like there's just a lot of ways where and I've thought of it before.

It's been on the table. But the fact that I never used this for a song parody, huge upset. Great song.

Definitely a play Dolly Parton is an autoclave. There's one movie on this poll that hasn't gotten a single vote thus far, which doesn't surprise me considering the two that are running away with this, but I'll ask case anyway, which Christmas movie should WD watch for the first time between Christmas Vacation Home Alone while you were sleeping in the holiday. What's the what was the third one while you were sleeping? What the hell? That sounds like a dude. It's the Sandra Bullock movie where it's like a horror film. It's Bill Pullman and Sandra Bullock.

What are you talking about? It sounds like an early 90s, like 30 years ago tragedy. It sounds like like Julia Roberts was in it, like while you were sleeping. You haven't seen you haven't seen while you were sleeping another identity. And this is a classic does sound like a Christmas horror movie that while you were sleeping sounds awful to me.

Definitely take that off the list. Wait, am I am I to believe that Dalton has never seen Christmas Vacation? All these movies he hasn't seen Christmas Vacation Home Alone. I've never seen Home Alone. Vacation comes before Home Alone. OK, really? That's what I told you.

Sean Clark said that yesterday that he needed to see. Vacation comes before Home Alone unless you're like eight years old and it's nineteen ninety one. There you go.

Vacation comes before Home Alone. So there's per Mars vote. Hey. Make it happen. Like you need to go home and watch that now. And in fact, can I brag a little bit?

Please. We had a deaf wrestling match with the movie studios trying to secure rights to all films. And like just today, Warner Brothers and Paramount came through baby Christmas Vacation.

And it's a wonderful life will be seen at the Rialto this December. It was a big celebration over here. That's awesome. Let's go. Get on get on social and don't give up on the Jersey front. Let's try to let's try to push for this since we have both 80s on the record. Help me out. Swing by while you're in town, Josh Graham.

Make it happen. Hayes Permar. Thank you, man. Happy Thanksgiving. Thank you.

Chuck Amato. Happy Thanksgiving. See you guys.

There it goes. You're on the drive with Josh Graham. Winning football games in the NFL is hard. And there's a lot of I think there's a lot of mediocrity in today's NFL.

I don't see the excellence that I saw in the past. That was Tom Brady on with Stephen A. Smith taking a shot at the NFL's product in the first year. The product hasn't featured Tom Brady in 20 plus years. But that can wait a second. It's always the weirdest things that gain virality or a ton of attention.

It feels like on the show or on social media. And just in passing, I said, App State should be the black and yellow. My East Carolina Pirates should be the purple and yellow, not the purple and gold, because colors are things like you can say that's gold all you want. But it's not actually gold. It's yellow. If you want to see what gold looks like, look at the University of Washington.

Look at Wake Forest. That is the black and gold. That's legitimately gold. You want to see the distinguished or a distinction between yellow and gold. Look at Ricky Proel's helmet slash jersey he used to wear with Wake 30 years ago versus what they have today.

That's the difference between yellow and gold. And it's just led to a stir on social media and in the chat and on the phone line. So you know what? I'm fine with having this battle. I'm wielding a bat. I'm fighting people off. I'm ready to do so. I've been ready for this color fight. Let's go to Bill in High Point who wants in. Bill, are you a am I going to have to fight you off with a baseball bat here or are you with me on this?

No, I'm going to make your mind blow up on this one. Help me out. I go to a jewelry store and ask the jeweler I'd like to buy a gold ring. Any reputable jeweler may say would you like yellow gold or would you like white gold? Yeah, that's that's the thing that happens. I'm here.

I'm here. Would you like see in the context of jewelry that is different than the color of your helmet and the color that your school goes by because I've learned this is somebody who got engaged and now married in the last few years. You're absolutely right. On the jewelry front, there is a difference between white gold and yellow gold.

Big difference. Well, that's true. But then again, you have to remember a lot of these teams are like jewelry to their fans.

Bill, be honest with me. These schools are saying they're gold because gold just sounds cooler than saying yellow. When people say yellow, they think mustard. When you hear gold, you think kings and queens and reality.

Well, that's why I went to a school that had blue in it. All right. There you go. We won't even try to guess which one.

That's Bill and High Point joining us. If you're against me on this, give me a good reason. Give me a good reason why it's OK to just say that you're a color that you're not.

It's not. I don't care how you identify. And I'm talking about we're not getting into politics, we're talking about colors of team schools here. It's what we're talking about here, W.D. Identity politics.

Josh Graham getting into it today. Is this like how the Cleveland Cavaliers call themselves wine and gold? Does the wines because they are gold, but does the wine and gold and wine is the color? Oh, is that actually a color?

I thought maybe that just sounded cooler. No, it's a color. That's very specific. Like I thought maybe that was maroon. No, that's wine.

That's fantastic. It is. Yeah, like South Carolina, garnet and black. Very specific.

They're colors. This is the debate I'm ready to have, but let's get to TB12. Tom Brady, he's getting kind of clowned today for being the guy criticizing the NFL's product now that he's not playing and talking about officiating when he's the guy pointing at his knee when Terrell Suggs barely touched him to get a flag.

But putting that aside, the message itself is the right one. And Tom Brady is the right guy to sound the alarm on the NFL's product or just the football product in general, because he is the most noteworthy player in the history of the sport. When he says something, it becomes a national conversation. It becomes a headline in a way when pretty much anybody else in the history of the sport says it, it probably does not. The NFL has been noticeably worse, and I'm not talking about ratings or the following or all that.

All that's up. Everything the NFL touches turns to gold, like legit gold, not yellow. The NFL has been noticeably worse. Just look at how many bad games you have on a week to week basis.

There is a massive number of those, and there seems to be a smaller number of great quarterbacks that we have. So why is that? It seems like that as the season has gotten longer in recent years, and it's only going to get even longer than that, it's collectively bargained that they can go to 18 games and they have agreements in place. So that's inevitably going to happen.

As that happens, is the product getting better as the season gets longer? Because if the answer to that question is no, then that's not a good thing for the business of football. So why is that? What is Brady's argument? Brady believes it's not just an NFL problem. This is grassroots football, like here he was talking about the collegiate piece of this. I actually think college players were better prepared when I came out than they are now.

Wow. Just because so many coaches are changing programs, and I would say there's not even a lot of college programs anymore. There's a lot of college teams, but not programs that are developing players.

So as they get delivered to the NFL, they may be athletic, but they don't have much of the skills developed to be a professional. I think parts of things when I see these different players come in, they're not quite as prepared as they were. And I think the game has shown that over the last, well, 13 years, I think things have slipped a little bit. And I think a big part of the reason that is, what's happened in the last 10, 11 years, there's been consolidation at the top in college football. You have conference realignment, where everything's streamlined to one or two, maybe three leagues. You have the college football playoff, where your success is only defined one way now. Are you in the playoff?

Are you winning the playoff? Here are the schools that can win the playoff, and NILs made that worse in terms of these are the schools that offer more money and one-time transfer. Can you get to those schools quicker rather than sticking around where you're at? That prevents many schools from developing these programs, and it being about entering a program rather than going to the place that's the highest bidder. So how many true programs are there in college football today?

It's Georgia, it's Bama, it's Ohio State, and maybe Michigan. That's probably the list of true programs that are NFL factories that are doing it the right way. He thinks player safety has gone too far, which is a big deal coming from him.

Here he was again with Stephen A. You know, your coach is complaining about their own player being tackled and not necessarily why don't they talk to their player about how to protect themselves, how to get rid of the ball, how to throw it, how to run out of bounds, how to get down, how to lower your pad level. We used to work on the fundamentals of those things all the time. Now they're trying to be regulated all the time. You know, I think that offensive players need to protect themselves. It's not up to the defensive player to protect the offensive player. The defensive player needs to protect himself. You shouldn't ask the offensive player to protect them. I think a lot of the way that the rules have come into play have allowed this. You can essentially play carefree and then if anyone hits you hard, there's a penalty. And it's very different than how I played. I didn't throw the ball to certain areas because I was afraid players were going to get knocked out.

That's the reality. I didn't throw it to the middle when I played Ray Lewis because you knock him out of the game and I couldn't afford to lose a good player. It never stops.

Tom's right on this one. It never stops when it comes to limiting what defensive players can do. Have you noticed in recent weeks guys like Warren Sharpe and others are saying, oh, the next thing that needs to be eliminated from the game is the hip tackle. That's how Mark Andrews got hurt.

Here's how a few others got hurt. We need to take this out of the game. It's never, hey, we need to roll it back because offensive players aren't defending themselves as well as they need to and that some of the onus falls on the offensive guy. It's never that. So shout out to Brady for saying that as an offensive player. I'm not sure if I completely agree with his conclusion, but I do agree with the problem that he's pointed to because it's something I've said privately all season long that, man, these NFL games have not been as good. They just haven't been the style, the product.

It's not the same. It doesn't seem like there's many good quarterbacks and, you know, it's not as entertaining as it was. And that's something that the NFL should care about as it looks to lengthen its season. And this coming from Tom Brady's voice, who's going to be the lead commentator for Fox starting next year and the most iconic player to ever play the game, should send off alarm bells for a week. OK, we'll watch Planes, Trains and Automobiles last night. And boy, my dogs are barking today at the movies is next before we review Planes, Trains and Automobiles, which W.D. watched for the first time last night. An update on our poll at Josh Graham show at WSJS radio on X, which Christmas movie should W.D. watch for the first time next week?

Your options. Christmas Vacation, Home Alone, While You Were Sleeping in the Holiday. Predictably two have run away with this. Home Alone right now with 55 percent of the vote, 39 percent belongs to Christmas Vacation. So vote on that, Hayes Permar and Sean Clark, advocates of Christmas Vacation.

You have about a half hour or so to vote on that before we ultimately decide what W.D. is going to watch. We know we watched Planes, Trains and Automobiles last night, so let's get into it at the movies with the W.D. All right, well, Planes, Trains and Automobiles 1987, John Candy, Steve Martin. What did you like about this holiday classic? It was very relatable because we have all been on a long bus trip, a long flight or just stuck in a hotel with somebody who was like John Candy's character with the socks in the sink and and all that and taking up way too much space.

So like I felt for Steve Martin's character in that sense, so it's very relatable. This is the best road trip movie ever. Road trip movies, that is a genre that has always worked for decades and decades and decades and this might be the best one of all. And the core at the core of a road trip movie is relatability because of what you mentioned, we've all been on road trips and have dealt with the discomforts of being in a contained space with somebody, a tightly contained space.

I don't think it's much. That is a wide category road trip movie and I don't think say it lightly to say that this is the best in that category. It is not a jam packed category for Thanksgiving movies.

This and Charlie Brown, Charlie Brown's Thanksgiving that I think belong in that conversation and I think this is better. Instead of what you're talking about, like in order for John Candy, I don't know which role is more difficult, John Candy's role or Steve Martin's role. I can't think of five people in history that could play the John Candy part as well as he did or five that could play the Steve Martin part as well as he did because of what needs to be accomplished. Steve Martin was a jerk pretty much the entire movie, but you still like it because it's Steve Martin.

You still like the guy, John Candy as obnoxious as can be, but you need to feel bad for him and feel sympathy for him. Like when Steve Martin goes off with him in the hotel or some of the other spots, it's very difficult to find people. It's like Chris Farley probably could have done that and a very short list after John Candy.

Hanks probably could have done what Steve Martin did, but not many other guys after that. So in that sense, it's a perfectly cast movie. It's an incredible holiday movie, the best Thanksgiving and probably the best road trip movie ever. Well, and that was the other thing I had written down was like these two characters together, their chemistry, or I guess maybe actors is a better word, but their chemistry was fantastic because of how they went back and forth and Steve Martin going at him and then it comes full circle and he ends up inviting him home at the end. What didn't you like about this movie? It was tough to find something that I didn't like, but I guess maybe the feeling that I felt for John Candy's character as he's being chewed out by Steve Martin, like I felt terrible for him. And then when you realize that John Candy's character was just trying to be nice to Steve Martin's character and then in the end you realize Dell's circumstances, like I kind of felt a lot of sympathy for him.

I felt bad for him. Here's what I didn't like, and this might be the only time I've ever said this about a movie, had this critique for a movie. It's too short. Usually movies can be 10, 15 minutes too long.

This is an hour 32 hour 34 and it's too short to the point. John Hughes wanted to keep it so tight, cut it so lean that I think you cut out key plot points from this movie. Like for example, let's look at perhaps the most iconic scene in the hotel room. They cut out while Steve Martin was in the shower, John Candy blowing up that bathroom with all the stuff in the sink and all that, you didn't get a chance to see it. Remember when they got robbed? If you thought that seemed a bit random, why would they get robbed? Like who would choose to rob these guys at this hotel? Well apparently John Candy paid for pizza with Steve Martin's money and didn't tip the guy. So that guy ticked off about that was the one that robbed them.

We didn't see the beer spill on the bed. So I feel like we missed out on some stuff that could have been needed from the movie. He cut it so lean that it felt like I wanted more.

I wanted to hang out with these guys a little bit more. What's the best quote? There's only one real answer of what the most iconic quote from this is. Those aren't pillows. Yeah, that one's up there. That's a thing that everybody would say if you were in a hotel situation and you're sharing a bed with somebody, somebody would just throw in there. Those aren't pillows. Just give me a bleeping automobile, but I like this one.

Larry Bird doesn't do as much ball handling in one night as you do in an hour. And then it was an ad lib, hey, you know what I would like? Another pair of balls and another pair of hands. That's pretty good. My favorite quote, the thing that made me laugh about this movie, laugh at this movie more than anything else while me and Sarah Bradford watched it. She hadn't seen it before. And of course I've seen it many times.

The thing that made me laugh the most was when they were getting picked up by those rednecks, those country folks. And he's asking his wife to put the, with the baby, put the luggage in the back. And he says, quote, she's short and skinny, but she's strong. Her first baby came out sideways. She ain't cry or nothing. You know what? I almost, I meant to write that one down and I didn't.

She's short and strong or she's short and skinny, but she's strong. So good. All right. Rotten Tomatoes score for Plane Strains and Automobiles, 1987, 91, 87% and that's been at the movies with the WD. The drive feels fitting that the show is called The Drive when you're talking about Planes, Trains and Automobiles. And we're talking about Crossroads Ford of Curtisville, they sponsor the show, John and company will take care of you off of highway 66 in Curtisville.

Not as sharp as I thought you would be right there. Maybe a day they'll, they'll get you in a car a lot easier than marathon, whatever the lady with the red curls and such in Planes, Trains and Automobiles. Yeah, that was it. I recognize her from Ferris Bueller's Day Off. That's right. Did you recognize Ferris Bueller's dad beginning of the movie? You're never going to make the six that guy when he was trying to race out and then Kevin Bacon was the one trying to race with him, but that that's right. That is where I knew him from. Well, I mean, it's the same director, John Hughes. Oh, I didn't, I didn't know that either.

Look at that. Just, or at least he wrote, he might've just written Ferris Bueller's Day Off. He might've directed it too. I'd have to go back and check, but John Hughes is a legit genius.