Should Court Storming Be Banned? (Hour 2)

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It is the Zach Gelb show coast to coast on CBS Sports Radio. We're about to have a conversation about storming a court or storming a field. And this all comes in the aftermath of Wake Forest, the Demon Deacons taking down the Duke Blue Devils the other day. And the Wake Forest fans who were in a state of euphoria after the big win, like most teams do, when there is a big win and an upset, they stormed the court. Well, you recall a few weeks ago when Ohio State beat Iowa, Kaitlyn Clark got bumped into and that was a big story. And now Kyle Filipowski of the Duke team, I guess he suffered some knee injury here.

We don't know the extent of the injury, but I've seen the video where he was bumped into by fans. And now you have a situation where a lot of people inside the college athletics world are speaking out and they're saying that we have to do something here and we have to stop court storming. Now, it would be very hypocritical of me.

Let me just say this full disclosure. If I got on the radio today and said, you can't storm the court, you can't storm the field. Or if you may or may not recall, all the way back to Thanksgiving weekend of last year, I was one of the fans in attendance for Michigan, Ohio State. And when Michigan beats Ohio State, they stormed the field. So when the game ended, I was sitting 11, 12 rows off the field. We made our way through the chaos to get onto the field. Now, when I was on the field and I was making my way to the field and I was a little bit intoxicated, let's just say, but I was also smart.

Like there was a video of me that I got clowned a little bit and trolled a little bit. Oh, you look like your legs are so weak, blah, blah, blah. My legs aren't weak. I was just drinking and I was slowly making my way down to the field. And I was told this from a friend of mine.

If you listen to the D.A. show, the Bayou Bear, he reached out to me and he said, be careful when you storm the field, because when you jump from the seats down to the turf or the grass, usually your legs give out. So that was in the back of my mind.

And you know, when you get told something sober and then you're drunk and for whatever the reason is what you were told when you were sober, there's sometimes things that just stick with you when you're drunk and you put an overemphasis on it. That was me when I was making my way down the 11 or 12 rows. And I thought it was going to be this big like drop off from the stands to the field that I was just fearing.

You know, sports radio host tears his Achilles or tears his ACL or breaks a leg when storming the field. So I was thinking about that. And then when I jumped and sometimes I forget how tall I am. But when I jumped from the stands to the field, I was going very slowly when it happened. I was like, that's what I was concerned about because the jump was maybe about like this big.

It wasn't that big the actual jump. But you get hear all these stories of people getting hurt when they storm the field. So I'm not going to sit here today and be a hypocrite. You know, there may be other days I'll be a hypocrite, but today is not one of them where I sit here and say we can't storm the field. We can't storm the court.

But I do think there's a conversation to be had. You have to give a little time for the athlete to at least get off the field. And it's probably easier and basketball to get off the court than it is in football, because in basketball you have what? Like 12 to 20 guys on a team that just need to get off the bench and go to the locker room for football. You have rosters north of 100 people.

And I get it. Most guys are on the sideline anyway. But it's a lot more bodies that are moving. And the problem with basketball is you're in a smaller stadium. Like, not all 100,000 people, whatever the big house says, were able to get on the field. But it was like a slow process of a lot of people that got on the field. I never thought any of the Ohio State players were in any danger. Like Jesse Minter, the defensive coordinator now of the Chargers, he was able to run from the Michigan sideline to the Ohio State sideline.

And he waved goodbye to the Ohio State people. Now, I don't think any players were ever in harm. But I do acknowledge that there's a lot of stupid people that are chasing like Internet fame and Internet fandom and Internet clout. That will do stupid things and maybe run into a football player or basketball player trying to get a video knowing that. Oh, it's just they can get caught up in the in the rush of everyone trying to get on the field or to get on the court. So I never want to see any injuries. What happened to Caitlin Clark stinks?

What happened to Kyle Filipowski stinks as well? But I also don't enjoy when you have something like this that is controversial, where people try to lecture to you and people try to like talk down to you and people try to make it as if they have the answer to everything. Like sometimes in society, something happens that's wrong. And just because it's wrong, it doesn't mean that we always need to have this like new idea and we need to change things immediately. And I get it. We live in like a debate society.

There's tons of things, obviously, naturally to this platform that I debate. But you would make it like out to be with some of the intense reactions from people on social media or people on studio shows that like Kyle Filipowski had like his leg chopped off or something like that. Don't get it twisted. It stinks.

It's unfortunate what happened. I just think we need to fine tune court storming and storming the field. And I'll go back to the experience that we had in Ann Arbor. They encouraged it.

But when you encourage it and when you have people that are on board with it, there is a way to kind of organize the chaos. Like there was a little bit of a buffer, not long, but a little bit of a buffer from when you were allowed to storm the field at Michigan and Ohio State. And then once you got on the field, it didn't last that long.

And eventually the big P.A. announcer came on and said, we appreciate you storming the field. Now it's time to find your nearest exit. And I thought it was even in my state where I had a few drinks, I actually thought it was very organized. Now, the problem is, since this is a tradition and right people have it just engraved in their brain, you have an upset, you storm the court. It's that immediate rush that is difficult to control because you could have a security guard standing there at the sideline. Is that actually going to prevent like 15000 people if they wanted to from storming the court?

No. So I think that there is a time and place to storm the court, storm the field. I'm not empty storming the field, storming the court. But there at least has to be a minute, two minute buffer. You know, Max, where you could safely get the players on the opposing team or the team that lost off the field because that team that wins.

You want to be a part of the storming the field, storming the court process because you have all these people running up to you and celebrating. But let me defend Kyle Filipowski here for a second. It's where they have to defend him because this is also this is a big pet peeve of mine. And as much as I love social media and I love the Internet, I also think it has at times ruined sports. We're now when something happens, we zoom in and we slow down everything.

And when that happens, you could have mixed interpretations of what actually occurred when you're looking at it at live speed and full speed to compare it to something being slowed down. And anyone attacking this kid today. Oh, he was trying to embrace contact. He was trying to fight the wake forest fans.

What are you talking about? I can't believe how many people actually. Listen, and are taken seriously, that say that when you have that many people running at you, like, for example, if there was like 15 Zach Galves, let's just say running at Michael Samter. The immediate reaction out of anybody would be to put their hands up and protect themselves. And you had that many people in that storm of people running at him.

He was just putting his hands up to kind of. And it's a big guy to kind of like box out so he could try to get through all the people and make his way into the locker room. So once again, I'm not against storming the court, storming the field. I've done it before. It's fun.

It's an awesome moment. It's a great tradition in college basketball, in college football. But you've got to give the losing team a little bit of time. And it doesn't take long, especially basketball. All you need, Max, is a minute and then have the schools embrace it. A lot of times schools don't embrace it because they end up having to pay a fine, which is one of those things that they pretend like they're unhappy with paying the fine, but they're fine with it because they ended up winning. So, Samter, where do you stand on this when it comes to storming a court, storming a field after a big win for a college program and a big upset? The fact that we're even having this conversation is asinine to me. The fact that there's even a conversation that it's okay to storm the field is so ridiculous to me that I can't fathom the top reactions that I was talking about.

I've had the same reaction for the past eight or nine years and it just keeps happening and nothing changes. And not only does nothing change, people continue to defend it. Someone is going to get seriously hurt. I have videos on my screen right now. Texas Tech players punched a Texas player when they stormed the field. That's stupid. I have an old Dominion fan getting knocked on his ass against Virginia Tech. I've got an LSU player elbowing and punching. The old Dominion Virginia Tech game, by the way, was a great upset. I have an LSU player punching and pushing an Ole Miss fan for storming the field.

This was on football. We've seen what's happened in basketball. Guys are going to get hurt. And it's one thing if the players are getting hurt, which is ridiculous, but a fan is going to get hurt. Because you talked about a thousand of yous running at me.

No, no. Imagine a thousand of me's running at you. These are smaller non-athletes. These are students. These are freshmen and sophomores. These are student section kids running at full padded, gigantic 300 pound athletes on the football field.

These are basketball 7-1 players. Someone's going to get hurt. A student is going to get severely hurt. A player is going to get hurt.

The liability is too strong to let it continue happening. Now you talk about, okay, well maybe let's have a little bit of a buffer. Fine.

If there's a buffer, like a five minute buffer. I think that's too long. Then suck it up and deal. Then don't storm the field. The players, the coaches, the staffs need to be able to get off the court without any concern.

Players are going to continue getting hurt. Now here's the other part also. Wait, hold on, hold on. When you say suck it up and deal with it. Yeah, suck it up and deal. When you said that, I just envision your daughter is just a little over a year old.

Yes. I can only envision when your daughter is like 11 or 12, the parenting of Michael Santer. You got a problem with the rules at school? Just suck it up and deal with it. That's how I kind of envisioned you. You sounded like a parent right there.

But anyway, continue to make your point. I mean, you know, I don't know if I'll be talking to my daughter like that. You know, I'll be a little bit more kid gloves with her. So you're the softie. Is your wife the bad cop and you're the good cop? Is that what you're telling me?

No, no, no. I mean, we're both capable of both. But man, my daughter's just, she's so cute.

Like she looks at me with her eyes. Of course. I'm the disciplinarian, but I'm also a softie. So it's like I'm battling both, right?

That's the thing. I have that parent inside of me and I have that like, you're too damn cute. How could I stay mad at you? I don't want to call you a tough guy because then your ego will just get crazy. You'll be bigger than the Atlantic Ocean. But Samtor is someone in a weird way that has somewhat of an intimidating presence.

But when you get down to the root of Michael Samtor, he is a giant softie. And that's why I think your wife would be more of the bad cop and you would be more of the good cop here. Because your daughter looks at you with those eyes too. You're just screwed. You'll melt like a soft serve ice cream sitting out in the sun on a 95 degree day. I know. I'm going to present tough, but deep down inside I'm just going to be melting. So to continue on with my anger.

That's your Dynatribe. Continue. Let's say this happened once every couple years because Old Dominion beat number two in the country or something. Appalachian State beat Michigan.

Yeah, yeah. When a team like Ole Miss beats like ninth ranked LSU, you storm the field. Yeah, there needs to be certain standards for it. When Duke gets beat, we're not talking about all-time epic upsets. We're talking about literally any time a team that's not ranked beats a ranked team, they're storming the court. It's gotten too much. So again, if this happened once every couple years when we had a historic level update and you stormed the court, fine.

Maybe I can like, you know, I would still want there to be some level of regulation and rules, but at least understand it. It's happening like 15 times a year in every sport. I don't know.

Is it really happening in that grade of frequency? We've already talked about it three or four times this year in college basketball alone. I remember the Kaitlyn Clark one. Obviously the Philipowski thing is right in the news. I remember someone running up and getting in the face of Caleb Williams when Notre Dame beat USC. I mean, there has been multiple, multiple situations. And I'm telling you, someone is going to get hurt. Now here's the last part of it. Someone did get hurt.

Philipowski. I don't know the extent of his injury. Someone's going to get seriously hurt.

You know what's fascinating to me? You care more, it seems like you care more about the fans than the players. No, I think both are apart. Listen, the players definitely need to be protected. Because I think the bigger issue is the protection of the players, not the protection of the fans. The NCAA doesn't give a crap about the fans. They do in the sense of like legal liability, right? Like if a fan gets hurt storming the court or the field, and the league or the sport is doing nothing about it, the NCAA is doing nothing about it, they're going to be on the hook. That kid's family is going to sue the school. There's got to be some protection though. Now with all these electronic tickets, you'd probably sign your life away by accepting the ticket, I would imagine. You know what?

If a burglar gets injured in your home because you have something that's against the code, they can sue you because they got injured trying to break into your home. So you know what? There would be some loophole that the fan could sue.

The other part of it is this. With NILs and all these other things, these athletes are getting paid now. They're not amateur student athletes anymore.

These are paid professionals for the most part at this point. They don't really storm the field in the NFL. They don't storm the field in the NBA. And if anyone tried to get on the field or the court, they would get tackled in a heartbeat. But you don't have atmospheres at those professional games like you do with the loyal, crazy college fans. But if a fan tried to, if Eagles fans, crazy wild Eagles fans tried to storm the court, not just one guy. I'm talking about 30, 50, 100 people.

They would all get arrested. At the end of the day, now that these players are going to get paid and they're professionals, they're no longer amateurs. These are professionals. They have liability. They have money. They have futures.

That is not just like, oh, we're like fun students having fun here. There is something more going on. The unions, the players, their agents, they're going to put a stop to this because these guys have value, financial value that are being put on their bodies at this moment. Not future potential draft pick money.

Actual real money now. This is going to go away and it's not going to go away from the NCAA. It's going to go away by the players and their representatives.

Yeah, but it's all the wild, wild west. You're not going to get everyone to get on the same page. There's no format right now for everyone to get on the same page. It's going to take one giant agency that represents a bunch of players to take this to court. Won't be enough. And it's going to happen.

All righty. Anyway, my brain just goes in many different directions sometimes. You could say something that you didn't even like mean to be a talking point, but this is where we are right now.

So I brought up a point. Imagine like 20 of me running at Santer and then Santer says, no, no, no. Imagine 20 of me running at you. So I was once at a Super Bowl and it was opening night and someone asked Tom Brady, would you rather fight one horse sized duck or 100 duck sized horses?

What's your answer to that, by the way, Santer? One horse sized duck or 100 duck sized horses? What would you rather fight? I'll take the horse sized duck, the one horse sized duck, because I think horses in general are more dangerous. So 100 small horses, I think would be more dangerous because like a duck, what's a duck going to do? It can't use anything with its wings for the most part, but it's the size of a horse. Yeah, but I can just jump on it and like ride it like a horse. And then like its beak, it's not like its beak is going to hurt. It doesn't have teeth.

It's just a beak. So you're probably right. But whenever I get asked this question, this is how I envision it. Remember that game Dance Dance Revolution?

Were you young enough for that? I know the game. I suck mentally at it.

Yeah, well, everyone does. But like you would be standing in one of those arcades, wherever it was, and you're basically just stomping on like a thousand miles per hour just to try to get as many arrows or whatever it was on the screen. I feel like Dance Dance Revolution, that's what it would turn into with the 100 duck sized horses. You would just be like stomping on those on those ducks over and over again or the horses over and over again. I will say this, by the way, I'm not endorsing that, so don't come after me.

I'm just making sure. Yo, horse stomper. No, no, I love horses. As a lover of dogs, I've been in a situation where I've been surrounded by a bunch of little puppies jumping over a hundred horses. It's a lot. Eventually, like you can stomp on a couple at a time.

I got two feet. I can only stomp on a couple of horses at a time. But it would be like Dance Dance Revolution. That's what I'm saying. It would be to a point, at a certain point. I think it would be more fun, part of that.

It would be more fun to stomp on horses rather than to take down the big ducks. Good to know. All right, Zach. Interesting. All right.

Good to know. All right, it is the Zach Gelb Show on CBS Sports Radio talking about people that do stupid things. We'll get into the people that basically jumped Cam Newton at the 7 on 7 camp. Also, we're going to get into more fighting when we return. Man, this has turned into a malicious show here on this Monday.

We're coming on Back in 5. All right, it is the Zach Gelb Show on CBS Sports Radio. So it seems like whenever Cam Newton does one of these like 7 on 7 events or anything for trying to give back to the game and help people out with their future and put them on a bigger platform, that always something goes wrong here. Remember a few years ago, like there was some Q&A and some guy called him like trash or something and was talking about how his money's going to run out because now he's no longer in the NFL.

Something stupid like that. Now, I don't know who's in the right or the wrong here because you hear different sides of this story. Like I saw some video that one of the guys that was in the fight, he was talking smack about Cam and basically said Cam can't throw the football even though Cam won an MVP in this league. I'm like, who the heck is this guy that got into the fight to say that about Cam? So who the heck knows, but it's an incredibly bad look either way for Cam and then also the people that fought Cam.

Because if you started the fight and you were at something that Cam was trying to do, well, then you're just I guarantee you just trying to go viral and that's just stupid to start a fight with Cam because you notice in that fight Cam is enormous. Like we saw Cam at the Super Bowl. You know how I said earlier where you sometimes see someone and they're like huge on the field and you see them without pads on and you're like, oh, I thought that guy would be bigger? That was Brock Bowers at the Super Bowl. Cam looks even bigger in person than he does on TV.

Like, Sam, I don't know about you. When you saw Cam who was broadcasted right behind us at Radio Row, it looked like this dude has got even more jacked since playing in the NFL. He was enormous.

He was an absolute hulk of a human being at Radio Row. So you could try to fight Cam in all likelihood. And I know there's tons of times you're a big guy and you end up losing a fight, especially when there's three people. But look at the three people that tried to fight Cam. Not only did Cam hold his own, it looked like he won the fight. And also, I don't know how the heck the hat that Cam was wearing didn't fall off with how much hair Cam has.

That was my biggest takeaway from the entire thing. It was, wow, this is stupid that there's a fight at the 7 on 7 thing. But how the heck did Cam's hat not fall off the top of his head? It was amazing.

It really was. I mean, I don't know if he has it tied on or something or if he was just beating them down so badly and so undisturbed by them coming at him that he just never actually tilted his head enough for the hat to fall off. Yeah, I would never want to fight Cam. But we talked about it earlier with the ducks and the horses. One of Cam is impossible, I think, to fight.

And he has an incredible amount of strength. So what was the latest that just came out here, Samter? During the break, I saw you sent to me on Larry Brown Sports about this. Cam was in the wrong here, they're saying now? Yeah, so apparently this is a statement from the Top Shelf performance, which was the facility and the group that was holding this event. They said that Cam allegedly was, quote, taunting the players repeatedly, prompting one of their coaches to have a word with him. Newton allegedly tried to choke the coach, prompting another coach to intervene and punch Newton, escalating the situation. Police supposedly told Top Shelf coaches that they witnessed the entire altercation and were aware that Cam started it. Now again, this is the statement from the people who were fighting with Cam, so that's one side of it. So we don't know for sure if this is the real side of it, but this is the statement being released by those who were getting their butts whipped by Cam. I gotta think something was said stupid to Cam first, right?

Because even though Cam shouldn't have this reaction, when I first saw this video, I just thought back to the video a few years ago where someone said something stupid and that it elicits a reaction that Cam should probably just walk away, but he's incapable of doing so. But from this report, and this is once again from the people that were in the fight that were fighting Cam, they're saying that he instigated it first and what? You said Cam tried to choke one of the coaches at one point? Yes, apparently it started because after the coach was getting in Cam's face, it sounds like, about Cam taunting. Why is the coach getting in Cam's face?

Oh, because he was taunting. So Cam was taunting players, the coach got in his face, and then Cam choked the coach. That's what the guys are saying who were part of the fight, not Cam's side of it. Either way, what happened can't happen. So let's say Cam was instigating at first and he was trying to, you know, encourage an environment where there was a lot of smack talk to get the most competition out there.

Okay, but it can't get to the point where you're starting a fight. Now, I'm taking this with a big grain of salt because I think there's two sides to the story. And I also just, in my gut, feel like the three people that you saw in the video probably weren't innocent here. They probably had part of a reason why the fight did actually happen. They had to have done something beforehand.

That would just be what I would say from afar, but who knows? Anyway, I want to have a fun conversation here because you're watching this video and it's like, okay, I need to get into a fight. Cam's definitely someone that I'm picking on my team. But out of active players right now, and I did this out of the four major sports, these are the four guys that I would most want to start a fight with.

I'm not saying me try to fight them, but if I ever was in a fight, I would call on these four guys first. In the NFL, my answer a few years ago would have been to Damakan Suh, but he's not active right now. He tried to get on a team this year and it didn't work out. And right now it would be Aaron Donald. Whenever we do that topic around Halloween, athletes that could dress up as superheroes or things like that, or they could dress up as something for Halloween, Aaron Donald's always like the Hulk.

That dude is the real-life Hulk. So I would take Aaron Donald to the NFL. The NBA, it would be Nicole Jokic.

And I think some people would be like, oh, why Nicole Jokic? Because his brothers are always following him. And it's more so because he has his two brothers always following him, and those two brothers could beat the snot out of maybe anyone on this planet. Major League Baseball, this one was the toughest one, because there's a lot of out of shape Major League Baseball players. But I would go with Jordan Alvarez. That dude just looks like a hulk of a human being. And then the NHL, I would be Ryan Lindgren. Ryan Lindgren suffers more injuries than anybody. And he plays for the Rangers.

Like, his eye would be swollen shut, and he doesn't even miss a game. This dude's an absolute warrior. So years ago in the NBA, I would say Adonis Haslam. Years ago in the NFL, I would say Ndamukong Su. But right now to the active athletes, NHL, I'm picking Ryan Lindgren if I had to get into a fight.

And looks are deceiving because he's smaller, but he could beat the crap out of anybody. Nicole Jokic in the NBA, Major League Baseball, Jordan Alvarez, and then the NFL, Aaron Donald. Sampther, anyone else you want to throw into this list?

Anyone that you're going to be saying, oh, I would pick to assist if you ever got into a fight? I know Micah Parsons wouldn't agree with this, but T.J. Watts seems like one of those guys who, hey, he's tough, he's fast. He just seems like he's crazy that he would just absolutely just demolish people. In the NBA- I think Joey Bosa, by the way. Yeah, Bosa, too. Like, those guys just look like they're badasses. Like, Joey Bosa, I think, is a guy- Max Crosby, I think, could- Max Crosby, absolutely, but I think Joey Bosa's someone that could take, like, a hundred punches to the face and then be like, okay, when are you going to actually start the fight? Like, he just has- I feel like that dude, even though he gets hurt a lot, I think he could put up with, like, a ton of pain in a fight before he would actually get broken.

Anyone else you got? Yeah, and then in the MLB, I mean, just from size, Aaron Judge. I mean, the guy's like 6'7 and a monster. Is he tough, though?

Tim or Giancarlo Stanton? I don't know. Are those guys tough? They're built like they are, you know, what was the- what was it? What did Saquon Barkley once post-Nudon and they were just basically showing? It was like something that- was it the- was Sports Illustrated the body issue? Yeah, the body issue, maybe? Yeah, the body issue. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton are guys that could be on the body issue. Yeah. I don't know if necessarily I'm picking either one of them in a fight.

I mean, if you're looking at 6'7, 300 pounds of pure, ripped muscle, I mean, tough or not, he's gonna beat some ass. Yeah, you would probably think so. That could probably be a new drop for the show as well. It is the Zach Gelb show on CBS Sports Radio Updates and some of the biggest stories in the world of sports with some audio. When we return, we call that segment the News Brief. KJ Wright's gonna stop by.

Coming up at the top of the hour as well. But first up, here is Richard Ackerman, the Ackman, with the latest CBS Sports Radio Update. Alrighty, Zach Gelb shows CBS Sports Radio.

This was very fitting. We were just talking about athletes that you would want to draft if you were ever getting into a fight. I'll give credit to Michael Fry in the YouTube chat, even though he's an Ohio State fan, he can't give us a good idea here or there. He said Myles Garrett.

But once we finished that segment and I tossed it over to Ack for the latest CBS Sports Radio Update, I went to go exit our studio. Now we have a thick studio door and the handle is like a very shiny metal handle that's bolted into the door. And there's a top part and a bottom part. So I went to go open the door, right, put my hand right on the middle of the handle and the handle fell off, which I thought that that was absolutely hysterical. Santa has no clue what's going on.

He's finally about the first time. Stu knows because I told Stu during the break. I even informed management and our boss said, Holy bleep. When I sent him the photo of that, Santa right now was looking at the handle right now and he is amazed. He just put two hands up in the air and said, What the heck?

So maybe I'm getting too strong here for the CBS Sports Radio studio and they need to build me a stronger, more durable studio. Because it was not like I was yanking at the door handle in an aggressive fashion. I opened up the door handle as I do each and every day and the thing just popped right off the door. So what are your analysis on that, Santa? I will say it'll be really fun if that door handle came off and you're stuck in there for the rest of the night.

You get to sleep on the floor and kind of, you know, take a nap on the table. Yeah. So let me clarify that it's the top part of the door handle that fell off. So if I go to try to open the door again, the bottom part of the door handle does come off. Since that door is like slammed shut and it's a very heavy door, there would be no way for me to get out. Because even in the top door handle, you think there would be a hole that you could. Oh, this won't sound right. Just stick your finger in and then just like grab open the door.

But it's not. It's like a little small like bolt where the handle does go in. So there is a chance that I get stuck here and I may have to wait.

Let's say at the bottom part of the door handle does fall off. Well, JR is not here live six to ten. He's in Atlanta.

Bart's in Milwaukee. So I would have to wait for Amy Lawrence to save the day. And she would have to kick down the door and allow me to get out of here. I would hope that Stu would open up the door for me. I know you wouldn't. No way. But I would hope that Stu would at least help me. No, be like a new reality show. Yeah.

Like Big Brother. Or maybe Botcher. I know Botcher's training on the show today.

So maybe Botcher could help me out. No, I'm going to instruct him not to intercede. No, it's okay. Do not get involved.

He may be learning to try to do what you and Stu do. But he'll still take directions and orders from yours truly. By the way. You'll be on camera for like ten hours stuck in a room. It would be absolute gold. It would be so fun to watch.

I would just tune in and watch it all night. Yeah. By the way, this camera's really zoomed in on me today in the middle. I don't know. I feel like I am zoomed in to the fullest today. No, I think it's only because we have the split screen right now.

But normally when we go to just the solo shot of you, you look better. I feel like I need to like, you know, just crouch down a little bit. I don't know. It's now getting into me. Because when I sit up straight, like half my head's getting chopped off here.

You see this right now? Half my head's getting chopped off. It's a little weird.

I mean, listen, I'll be honest. The more of your head that gets chopped off, the better it is for our viewers. So I'm down for that. There we go. A good Sampter shot there. He has about one a month.

Glad you hit your quota finally for this month. Alright, let's update just some of the biggest stories in the world of sports. With some audio. We'll get to a news brief. Extra, extra real about it.

Extra, extra real about it. Time for your daily news brief. We get you caught up on the rumors, reports, and reconnaissance from the day in sports. So I think our boss, who is our boss until we get a new boss, I guess is the best way to say it. Spike Eskin started this whole situation. So Spike, even though he's our program director right now, he's staying in the company, but he's going down the turnpike to take over Afternoon Drive in Philadelphia. But Spike can't start that job until they find us a new program director. So Spike has kind of been parachuting in to the office in Philadelphia.

When he's there, he's been like jumping on the air. He's been co-hosting. And I guess he said something about his father, ironically, Spike's that I'm talking about, which got misconstrued, I guess, to AJ Brown thinking that Spike took a shot at AJ Brown.

That's what I was kind of reading from afar when I was at this bachelor party in Orlando this past weekend. So AJ Brown on Friday, he called in to Sports Radio 94 WIP to I believe their afternoon show, but Spike wasn't on it because Spike is just parachuting in until we find a replacement for Spike around here. And AJ Brown did like a 20-minute interview with, I believe, Ike Reese and Jack Fritz. Here is AJ Brown on is his relationship with Hertz at all fractured. You know, I think that's total BS.

You know, I'm not going to get into me and his relationship on the air, but it's total BS. You know what I'm saying? It wasn't a problem when I was on my sixth game streak. It wasn't talking about that then. So they only started talking about that when we started losing. So I watch a ton of Eagles games. And AJ Brown, I remember when he got traded from Tennessee to Philadelphia, everyone talked about the genuine friendship that is there initially and that has been there for years with Jalen Hertz at AJ Brown. But this year, and even going back to last year in the playoff game, up against the Giants in the divisional round, AJ Brown hasn't always looked happy. Now, you could not look happy and actually be happy.

And I get it. We play and, well, football is played in a very intense environment and sometimes what you could get away with on the sideline wouldn't happen in a normal workplace and it's actually encouraged. But there are often times where you look at AJ Brown and he just doesn't look happy. And I think it's fair to question that and just ask, is AJ Brown happy? And down the stretch, I'm not saying anyone should be thrilled when they were 10-1 and they only won one game the rest of the season. At least from afar, it appeared that AJ Brown was annoyed and he wasn't thrilled with Jalen Hertz because he wasn't getting the ball in the end zone and he wasn't getting enough targets. So that's been there even when the Eagles have been winning and now it's there when the Eagles are losing.

But it always just didn't add up to me from where their previous relationship was how this quickly it could potentially sour. But then yet again, AJ Brown, just from looks, doesn't always look happy in Philadelphia, especially with the way things have been going with the Eagles. Here's AJ Brown.

Does he want to stay with the Eagles? I have no problem. I want to be here. It's as simple as that.

I love where I'm at. It's as simple as that. The locker room is fine. After the season or whatever, I just said players wasn't executing like I said in the interview. That's what it came down to. I think the media kind of ran with the coaches. The coaches then prepared us and this and that. I never blame the coaches. I'm not the person to blame a coach. I'm not trying to blame anyone.

I'm the guy who's going to look in the mirror and go challenge everybody else. It was the players not executing and that's what happened. So that's fine for a player to say that the players weren't executing, but you can't blame the media for that. Like the organization did get rid of the offensive coordinator. The organization did make changes in season to defensive coordinator and then at the end of the season, there were even more changes.

You have a new defensive coordinator, a new offensive coordinator. So that wasn't the media's fault. Here is AJ Brown on how the media portrays him. I just truly just feel like I'm just misunderstood as a player, as a person. It gets frustrating because anything I say, anything I do, it gets magnified. I'm saying I'm classified as a diva, I want the ball and this and that, blah, blah, blah.

When honestly it's the other way around. You see me getting upset on the sidelines and you automatically think it's about targets. No, no, what if I'm holding my players accountable? What if I'm the guy that pushes everybody in the locker room, makes people uncomfortable to try to better themselves for the team?

What if I'm that guy? That's an interesting way to spin it because he wasn't happy with his targets. So he just says he's holding other people accountable and maybe the Eagles do need that, but there have been times once again where he hasn't got the targets and the Eagles have been winning and there's still an issue on the sidelines. Here's what I'll say to AJ Brown. I'm sure he does get mis-portrayed a little bit.

That's probably just natural. But it can't become an issue this year. You can't be seen on the sideline upset in a win, let's say, when the targets aren't going your way. You're losing?

Okay, that happens. But there have been moments where he's been upset in wins and that just can't happen because he basically just said it's all about winning or losing and he's just trying to hold everyone accountable. You guys find a way to bounce back and win? You can't be unhappy.

But if you lose, then I bet you this situation is going to get even more toxic. Here is Russell Wilson. He sat down on the I Am Athlete podcast with Brandon Marshall and Russell Wilson was asked if he still wants to keep on playing. Listen up. I got more fire than ever, honestly, especially over the past two years of what I've gone through, whether it's in Denver or somewhere else. I hope it's in Denver. I hope I get to finish there.

I committed there. I wanted to be there. I want to be there. For me, it's about winning. Over the next five years, I want to win too. I want to feel the chill of that trophy again. I love the city and everything else, but you also want to be a place that wants you too. So the thing that I want to do is win.

That's all I care about. Everyone wants to win. Sometimes you hear someone say they want to win and you just wonder how legit that is. And for Russell Wilson, I used to think he was about winning, but then when he got to Denver, I think he cared more, and towards the end in Seattle, he cared more about the brand of Russell Wilson than the actual play of Russell Wilson. And what started this entire end in Seattle was when he was at the Super Bowl, when it was the COVID Super Bowl where the Bucks won, and he was like, I'm sick and tired of going to the Super Bowl and not participating in the Super Bowl. I want to go win multiple Super Bowls and be one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time.

Okay, you could say that, but were your priorities all in the right place to put you in a spot to eventually achieve that? And I don't think so. Now, don't get me wrong. He got the short end of the stick this year. John Paytum was more in the wrong this year than Russell Wilson. But every time I hear Russell Wilson now open his mouth, I just don't believe anything he's saying now.

And here's the other thing. A lot of people are taking this to say that, and maybe this is true, that he wants to win two Super Bowls in five years. When I hear him say, I want to win two, I think he's talking about himself again. He's already won one, so he wants to win the second Super Bowl because he then said, I want to have that feeling again.

So I don't know if that was necessarily him meaning two and five years or is more so he just wants to win the second one. Here is Russell Wilson on being benched. This is on the I Am Athlete podcast once again with Brandon Marshall. I didn't believe it at first.

I was like, this can't be real. And I got that call that, hey, we're going to bench you for the next nine games if you don't change your injury guarantee. So for me… But be clear here. They don't want to bench you because of play. They're saying they're benching you because they want you to take out the injury guarantee. Yeah, they want to push back my injury guarantee and remove it for the rest of the year. So that way if I get injured, they don't have to pay it. I didn't want to set a precedent for players to remove their injury guarantees, too, as well. And so it was no way I was going to do that. And so when they said we're going to bench you, we're going to bench you, I said, all right, that's what you want to do. Bro, that's like extortion. It would have been stupid for him to listen and actually do what the Broncos were asking him to do.

Now he could spin it and see he was being the good guy. You don't want to set a precedent for the rest of the players. That's a bunch of nonsense. See, it feels illegal what the Broncos did, but here's why it's not. They could ask you to do something and they could, let's say, threaten you. But at the end of the day, if you say no, they're still going to pay you and they have to pay you. They don't have to play you.

Now, don't get it twisted. I think what the Broncos did was ill-advised, I think it was dirty, and I don't think it should have happened, and I don't like it, and I don't think Sean Payton ever really wanted to make it work with Russell Wilson by how quickly he gave up on him, and why did he take the Broncos' job? But ultimately, even though it feels wrong and it feels illegal, it probably isn't, because at the end of the day, they just have to pay you. They don't have to play you, but if it feels wrong to threaten, oh, you don't do this with your contract, then we're going to bench you. So that's where we're at with Russell Wilson, and, hey, I know he could say he wants to stay in Denver, and Sean Payton could say, oh, there's still a chance he comes back. There's a 0.0 percent chance. There's actually a negative percent chance that Russell Wilson is on the Broncos next season. He's not getting traded, he's ultimately getting released, no one's going to trade for that contract, he'll get released, and then you would think he's going to sign a deal on the cheap and try to salvage the rest of his career, which went from being a Hall of Fame career to now uncertainty if he'll end up making the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Coming on back with K.J. Wright and his Zach Gelb show on CBS Sports Radio. We'll be right back. We'll be right back.