The NFL Draft (of course!)

Welcome, everyone, to WFHRs, playmakers for this April 22nd, 2024, 304 on the clock.

Got your host James J. Pitch hitting today, our main pitch hitter, our main utility player

and our head of production.

Mr. Seth Havager.

I'm everything now.

Yes.

I'm the utility infielder and the great pinch hitter.

I love it.

Every time Seth makes a new business card, I tell him, like, Seth, I'm sorry, actually,

I got to change it again.

I have to add to that.

His business card is just one of those things that just rolls out.

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Seth, thank you for stopping by.

Yes.

And today, we, of course, it is draft week that is all that is on my brain.

I was going to say that there must not be much room for anything else right now.

I should really tell everybody as a public service note to everybody out there that I talk

to, whether it's on the air or off air, whatever we are talking about, keep in mind, I'm paying

attention, and I am right there with you.

But in the back of my mind, I'm already getting ready for the draft.

That's what I'm doing.

And we're going to have some help doing that today at 330.

Our good friend, Mike Clemmons, is going to join us, and we'll talk some draft with

Mike looking forward to that talking, not only about what Green Bay is looking to do, but

our NFC North, and I think a fun question, and then a fun thing looking forward, these

young QBs, and how we may have, maybe not the greatest, but the top three of the greatest

QBs in our group in our conference, I want to talk about that, along with, you know,

any Mike Memories that he has, I'm going to call Mike Memories.

Mike Memories.

Yeah, he's been to a few drafts, I'm sure, so yeah.

We got all that coming up, our good listeners out there, pay attention to our local sports

and the WIA, and they had a meeting today talking about NIL, I want to get into that as well.

I got some fun stats for everybody a little bit later.

James, before we go on here, there's something I really got to say.

You know, these millionaire players who, you know, we pay them all this money, and then

they don't go out there and perform, okay?

Yeah.

I mean, Bryce Harper, what are you doing?

Come on.

Just because your wife's having a baby.

Oh, I mean, come on, man.

Now I can't use you on my fantasy lineup tonight.

I'm telling you.

You can't have other kids?

No, you already have other kids.

He's got other kids.

You don't need a big man.

You don't need to be there for this one.

Come on.

She's a pro.

She, we are kidding.

We are kidding.

We are kidding.

Miss Harper, good luck.

Where should you well?

Bryce.

Oh, no.

It's wonderful.

It's great.

I just thought it would be hilarious, because I don't fantasy people just get crazy about

this stuff.

I almost guarantee that there is a New York talk radio, talk sports station that is doing

that right now.

Yeah.

Not naming any names.

W.

Let's get to the best listeners in radio.

Good afternoon.

What's on your mind?

You better hope your wife is at listeners.

I even, I'm afraid of seswa.

What's on your mind today, brother?

Well, it's just at WI-88.

When I saw that, that's just been kind of, you know, I brought, you know, a reading article

that was on channel seven, that's what they wrote on the story, and yeah, they can't

use the school's name, the school's uniform, it basically is just their name.

And we should, we should touch on that just for those that may not be paying attention.

I don't mean interrupting, but athletes would be able to make money solely based on their

name, image and likeness, not for the team that they play for.

They'd be able to represent themselves and things such as commercials or advertisements.

There is a lot of gray area to this, and there is a lot of, I think not enough detail

in this proposal as it is.

I know that the WIA met today, they, as far as I could tell online and from the reports

that I could see on a few people I know that I could talk to, the meeting wrapped up

around one today.

And I have not seen the results yet from this meeting.

Have you Kevin?

I haven't seen nothing yet, usually I would, you know, because we're following the news

media and it's like that, they would, if that, this will be breaking news, I think.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

So, I mean, Navi, so they haven't put it out there yet in the press release, but, you know,

I see it in the college sports with it in their name and image and likeness because the

amount of money that these colleges make on these kids, you know, I get that high school.

Yeah.

The schools don't make money on you on any sports, they look on the sports programs, have

or on the brink of failing.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You know, obviously this would probably, you know, if they, this path, this will probably

benefit more of the, the Madison Milwaukee areas, the bigger schools, the bigger areas

that have the, the media to use these kids for commercials and things like that.

But I think, you know, just like what to happen with, with, and CAA, you're going to open

a whole can of a box of worms and it just, it's going to get worse because what's going

to happen.

Ooh, a kid here in Central Wisconsin is very, very good.

Well, let's go, it's have a schools from Madison Club see, why don't you move down

here and we'll find a place for your mom and dad to work.

We have an opportunity for you to get on commercials, you know, even though they're not supposed

to do it, but what happened in the NTA, you have all these boosters that are funneling

money into these programs and you can bring these kids in.

Yeah, it just, I've been talking a couple of people over the weekend about this a little

bit and I had somebody say to me because I am a big, I was, I was very early on a big

supporter of NIL before they even had the initialing of it before anybody, anybody was

really giving it an anagram to it or anything.

I've been fighting for this since I was in my teens.

I've thought this was something that needed to happen in college athletics.

Let's also understand, I think, as adults that this was always going to happen, it was

always going to bleed into high school.

It was always going to happen.

You've had kids being recruited in sports from all ages for a long time, 16-year-olds

getting signed a baseball contracts, young kids getting signed, being looked at by the

Dallas Cowboys, these stories that we've heard.

And let's be real as adults as well that athletics is money, that the reason we have athletics

on the level that we do is money.

It's not because of fans, it's not because of our love of the game or any of these things,

it's money.

And that's what it all comes down to.

All that being said, when I was talking to some people who really are intelligent on

this subject and know what they're doing, talking about it over the weekend, I was called

a hypocrite because of how I believe on the NIL, but how I disagree with this for college

of high school athletics.

And my conversation with them ended within five seconds because I was, there are, it

is apples and oranges, it is two incredibly different things.

When we're talking about young men who are 18 and therefore adults making decisions with

their future and their name, image and likeness, it isn't that different than making a post

on social media and putting it out there.

These are life lessons.

You got to learn not to hit send sometimes.

Maybe you learn not to sign that contract or what a contract really means, etc, etc.

But everything about life is being built up to that.

And we already, I think everybody that we've been saying this long before any of us were

even alive, oh, kids are growing up too fast.

They were saying that in the 20s, they were saying that in the 30s and we're still doing

that.

I think everybody has also seen either it was, maybe it was your dad, but it was a dad

that you saw while you were playing athletics that was living vicariously through his kid.

And it was just about him, it wasn't about the kid.

And those dangers of that, the moment we take the I, I use a pun metaphor, I off the

ball and it becomes not about the game and playing for your school or any of these things.

But all of a sudden it's about, well, I'm banged up, I'm a little hurt, but I do have

this NIL contract I have to fulfill.

So I got to go out there and play and then maybe a young athlete is, these are all what

ifs.

Oh yeah.

I mean, there's no concrete thing here and there's no concrete proposal I think yet, because

regardless of what is, nothing's been reported yet, I can't imagine that this has been okayed.

It's too gray.

It's way too gray.

There isn't the very specific language for this, yeah.

Yeah, I don't do this very often, but I did actually read the proposal and it's way too

gray.

Broad, it doesn't seem like they, honestly, and I don't take this, it's so easy to take

shots at the WAA, and I'm not trying to do that at all.

It feels like it was thrown together.

It does not feel like it was put to get, it almost feels like a cut and paste job.

I deal with this with students sometimes.

And I'm not saying that's what happened.

I'm not at all trying to call out the WAA, I welcome them on the air, I've asked them

to join us on the air, representatives of them before, I would love to be able to have

a conversation with somebody who really knows what they're talking about, unlike me.

I admit that, but I do know people, I do know athletics, I grew up in this, I know this,

and I know one thing about young athletes.

They don't know anything.

I don't care if it's LeBron James at 16 or it's my brother at 16.

That's a 16 year old, they're not in charge, their hormones are in charge, that's it.

Let's be real and honest about this, and in the idea of them being assigned to these

things gets awfully dangerous, and regardless of if you agree with this or disagree with

it or whatever, I think we can all agree, we've got to ask questions, we've got to really,

we've got to hammer this out, it's got to be detailed, there is no gray area, we figure

this out because unlike, again, college athletics, apples and oranges, adults, kids, that's the

conversation.

As soon as I said the difference of adults and kids, the person who was fighting me back

out of this just kind of left and took a drink, very nice, I'm with Kevin, I'm with Kevin

on this, it's the money thing, because there is so much money in college sports, that's

what I think, yes, the player should be able to do that, but that's not the case with

high school, it's very different, so I'm 100% with Kevin for that, and then a lot of the

stuff that you said James, especially the part about not about it being, they're being

too much gray area, that needs to be worked out, because then it's ripe for who knows

what will happen.

Well, you know, sorry, go ahead.

What you were talking about in when I was reading that article that was brought up last

year or a couple of years ago, there was 70% disagreement, now there's 70% agreement

on this, or if we kind of flip flop and then there's other states that do this, but what's

the old adage, if Jimmy jumps off the bridge, you're going to jump with them, you know,

that type of, just because there are other states, I mean, as you text us as an example,

look at the amount of money they stick into those football programs and Texas high school

football.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

You know, they make money down there from boosters, I mean, that's where, that's where that

is at.

You know, I don't really think we need to do it, because I think it's a good, it's

good, a tarnish high school sports in the state of Wisconsin, I mean, I really believe

it.

It's going to make it worse for these, these some of these officials, because like you

said, Jim, James, I'm sorry, oh, that's, um, you, you call me anything like, you know,

you keep calling, you don't call me anything like, but if you think about it, look at some

of these parents with these, some of these officials, now you start putting money involved

in this, what's going to happen?

It's going to be, it's going to be the disrespect for the high school.

School officials, even more.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's what, I mean, there's so many angles to this, so much, and we've just touched on

a couple of of here.

Yeah.

This is just part one of this conversation, tune into it next week for part two and part

three.

Yeah.

And this isn't going anywhere.

Yeah.

And, and hopefully they're, I mean, if they're listening to us, that's really cool, but

hopefully they're listening to the parents, to the kids, and they can come up with the

right way to do this, because I do think something's going to happen in this

regard.

I don't think that this is going to go away.

It's just doing it right and, and doing our best to make it, not lose the essence of high

school athletics, and not lose that so that we're all, not all of a sudden we're starting

to watch our great, our, our great local grade schools and everything, because that's the

only place we can go to see pure athleticism anymore.

I, I, I, I, we'll say those Washington Wildcats, not bad, not bad, keep an eye out, keep an

eye out.

I would direct everyone to James the Lord, I'm talking about, to an episode of Mr.

Show from the mid 90s, where Bob and David are playing recruiters for college basketball

teams, and they're literally recruiting toddlers, toddlers, we're getting closer to that like

every day.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's been, it's been a thing for a long time to the, to the point of what we're talking

about with you, these universities, we'd all agree that UW University of Madison is

our biggest school here in Wisconsin, one of the biggest in the big 10, and the big 10,

and in the mid west.

I don't know if you would put it on the caliber of some of the upper echelon universities.

I'm not talking about athletics, I just mean the university itself, and how much money

it makes revenue wise.

Looking at a 2021 report here, the program revenue wise, they pulled in 273 million, that's

a couple of years ago.

Wow.

That's the university.

Now, they have a budget that's over in the billions, and they've got a lot of teachers

and a lot of other things to pay for and everything.

But this is a, oh, this is an old report, and this is just giving you a three years ago.

A lot of example.

Right.

Or the kind of money that these universities bring in.

Let me pull up how much Lincoln pulled in.

Yeah.

Come on.

Come on, man.

It's not, I don't have to.

It's not, yeah.

So it's, it's so completely different, along with the fact of, of kids and adults in

these other conversations here.

It's our job as adults, our number, if not our number one job, top three jobs to protect

children, not just your own, not just the kids that are coming up or anything, but kids.

It's our job.

This is our main goal as adults, no matter what other things you do as a profession.

I don't care what you do, or if you have kids or not, your job is to protect kids.

If a kid comes up to you and says they can't find their parent or something like that,

are you going to say, what?

No, you're on your own.

Yeah, tough luck.

Yeah, tough luck, kid.

No, no, it's not.

No, it's our job.

And this is part of that, making right decisions for them and things like this, until they can

make their own.

Right.

Yeah, until they can make their own.

Unless they disagree with us.

No, no, no.

Are you excited about the draft this week?

Yeah, I'm kind of curious and, you know, I'm sitting or thinking, you know, you hear,

I heard some conversations with Goody and stuff from his pressur today and, you know,

obviously he's not going to give my job, but I'm just kind of wondering if the top safety

circle and faster than when he thinks, if he bundles that 25th pick and maybe the second

pick in the second round, they try to move up to get that kid out of Iowa, that'd be kind

of cool, because I mean, that kid has been pretty much linked to the packers for quite

a while.

That kid's a patriot, that I'll tell you that right now is a packer or a patriot, yeah.

So I'm just kind of kind of curious and see where he goes.

Like I said, on his pressur today, he didn't really, he didn't really give anything up

on what, you know, what he's looking at and how it goes and, you know, he said he's got

his, you know, his first 15 or whatever, 15, 15 picks on there, you know, and he kind

of figured where they're at and things like that.

But I'm excited to see what happens.

I just hate to say a change, but I think your bears are going to make a big mistake.

I just, I am not a big fan of Caleb Williams.

I just don't think he just kind of reminds me of a little bit too much of like Johnny

Menzel, but he's got a little bit better talent than he does, but it's just the head case

on it that I see.

And that's the thing I like about him is between the years, between the years, everything

about him.

I like, and that in his heart, but I think Kevin, you're actually, you're doing something

really smart here.

You're getting ahead of the disliking on Caleb, because you're going to, he's going to

give you a lot of reasons to dislike him, I think, as a packer.

That's, that's the closest I can do to trash talk.

That was kind of a, wow, that was elaborate.

That's as close as I can get and look at how the, how far I had to be able to go to get

to it.

And he's not even, he's laughing at me because he doesn't believe me.

It's going to be fun.

It's going to be exciting.

We're going to talk with Mike Clemens about that in a little bit.

Real quick, before I let you go, it is NBA playoffs.

We got the bucks going on.

We're going to be covering the bucks here at WFHR as far as they go in the playoffs.

We will have bucks basketball, got them on tomorrow at seven.

Obviously you go into this with it banged up, you know, you don't have the team that

you had hoped for.

It's been an up and down year.

Do you have expectations for this team?

Are you excited for the playoffs with the bucks?

Are you paying attention?

Well, I hate to tell you, James, is that I'm not a real big fan of the NBA.

I just, it's just those guys going up and down the court and shooting the three ball.

I mean, that's just, you know, it pretty much showed yesterday, especially, well, if

you're making your shots, that's fine, in which they were, the bucks were doing the

last thing.

I was at my girlfriend's daughter's last night and watching where they were fianceing,

you know, watching Dame hit the, you know, scores 35 points in the first half, and

that scored a single point in a second half, you know, and, I mean, I hope they, just

because it's, and it's, it's got some team, I hope they do well.

But the way this season has been with these guys up and down like they have and with the

amount of talent that they have on that buck team and the expectations, I guess, with

those guys, we're supposed to be the NBA championship or boss tonight, if I have a feeling

it's going to be the boss.

Yeah.

I mean, if they get out of the first, first round, they probably don't make it out of

the second round.

It's, um, and my thumb's changes because it's hard to argue that.

And I couldn't, you know, all we ever ask is an honest answer, Matt.

So that's all that matters is you give us an honest answer.

That's one of the reasons we love talking with you.

I do.

You did set me up.

You set me up perfectly, though, from my stat of the show.

Oh, great.

My stat of the show, you set me up perfectly, Matt.

That's awesome.

Thank you so much.

Do we need to let you go?

You got to get going?

Yeah, I'm going to get going.

All right.

Thanks for the call, brother.

Thanks for having a great afternoon.

You too.

You too.

Next week, part two of that WIA conversation about NAL.

Yes.

Um, the all-time points leader in the NBA, um, LeBron James just recently became the

all-time points leader in the NBA.

Creme Abdul-Jabbar, of course, forever for all of our existence.

Seth pretty much was the all-time leader in points.

Let me just go ahead and tell you really quickly, all the three pointers Creme Abdul-Jabbar made

in his career.

One.

In 1987, Creme had a three.

That was it.

That was the end towards the end of his career, too.

He went one of 18 in his career from the three point arc.

Since he took eights, he took 18 shots.

18, three.

How many of those are buzzer beaters?

Yeah, that's a good question.

That's got to be some part of that.

I want to know.

I want to know right there.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I just I couldn't.

I was so curious to see it, everything.

I'm like, well, you know, because now we're see it's no nothing to see.

Ever since Dirk, it's nothing to see a seven footer go back and hit from the arc.

It's it's commonplace now, yeah.

The Golden State Warriors completely changed the way this game has done now to Kevin's

point where guys are jack and a what's a bad shot anymore, you know, well, it's insane.

Well, it's insane what these guys are, what the thing is about this that they didn't just

change the game is that the players changed with it.

Yes.

We're not really giving credit to the evolution of these athletes.

That doesn't happen very often.

And it does.

It does.

But it doesn't happen very often.

No, you can elevate to the game.

Yeah.

Everybody saw Bo Jackson run the wall and center field, the very that very next day, there

was 14 center fielders on the injury report because they were trying to do it.

Nobody's tried to do it.

Six pretty much goes.

They can take a ran through the wall.

Yeah.

Let's take his head.

Could take it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Let's take a call.

Good.

Good afternoon.

You're on the show.

Hi.

I just had to call in with my draft memories.

This is Melissa Kay.

Hey, Melissa.

Thanks so much for joining the show.

Yeah.

Let's hear your draft memories.

Well, I just had to look it up and the NFL draft was created in 1935 to establish, create

competitive balance.

I haven't looked it up, guys.

Yeah.

I appreciate that.

I actually, that actually really, if the dirt had me loved hearing that.

I don't think I knew that.

I don't think I knew that.

That's awesome.

You taught him something.

Yeah.

That's awesome.

Back at the top draft picks, I choose Hot Rod Hunley.

Oh, it's good name.

Good name.

That is an awesome name.

So that is a draft we could have a lot of fun with it.

You don't even need to know these players.

Just picking best names.

It's names.

Wizard white.

Wizard white, man.

Ed Toul Jones.

That's all Jones.

Yep.

I am a sucker for Walter Payton's sweetness.

Sweetness is good.

Sweetness is a good one.

How about the Stork?

Henryson.

Henryson.

That's good.

That's good.

But I will.

You guys, I just had that call and he's like, that I would.

And Pam reminded me, thank you, Pam.

You are the best.

You are so good.

Love your Melissa.

That was awesome.

That was awesome.

Oh, man.

A first, a first for playmakers.

Man, Melissa called in.

I actually gave us some information.

We didn't know.

I'm telling you, that was fantastic.

That was fantastic.

I wanted to make sure to get this in before we wrapped up

what a better segue than going from talking to Melissa.

I shut up to Nellie Corda.

Nellie Corda, L-P-G-A, going her fifth in a row over.

Superstar, man.

She is incredible.

She is incredible.

I know I am not going to lie and say, I watch a lot of golf

or anything like that.

But I do.

I have caught the women's game a bit over the years

and the men's game too.

But Michelle, we and some of these athletes.

Oh, yeah.

And...

Make a storm, Tim.

Yeah, she was good too.

And this Corda, just a lot of fun to watch.

Like the way her approach to the game,

I like the way that she plays it.

She's been a lot of fun and congratulations to her.

Let's take one more call before we go to break.

Good morning, you're on the show.

Or good afternoon.

I don't know what she's going to do with those ones.

Is afternoon aided?

Yeah, it is.

Yeah, it's, yes.

I'm on my lawn, so.

But I wanted to comment on, you know, I'm retired

and I was going to get badger season tickets for basketball.

But we just want to have our team.

Hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So, I understand what college wants to do in these games

to deserve to make some money.

But I think they need to put a cab on it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, that's the transfer portal, too.

Yeah.

How are we going to compete?

It's the Wild West right now.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Absolutely.

It's the whole reason we have a draft.

Right.

It's why you can't just let the Delas Cowboys go out there

and grab every player they want.

It's why we have drafts and sports and everything.

It's a very good statement, sir.

I appreciate it.

Thanks so much for calling in.

The thing is, you know, the one thing is football.

We have a salary cap, correct?

Yes.

And we don't have that like in baseball.

Right.

I mean, in baseball, the Dodgers infield makes more

than the whole brewer team.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's a better record.

Throw that.

Hmm.

Yeah.

It's just that.

I mean, I just had a, I mean, it's just that.

It just sad that, you know, you as a, so put yourself

in that position as a coach and you, and you get a guy

and you recruit him and you give him a scholarship

and he's with you for a year.

And then the next year, I mean, he decides the goal

because now he can get all these endorsements

and you put your time and money.

I mean, is that right?

Well, and I agree with you.

I agree with you.

And it gets just as heartbreaking when that kid's

from Chattanooga and he decides to go to UW.

It's just, it's just, I completely agree with you.

It's the toughest part, it's one of the toughest parts

of this.

And it's, this is the growing pains

we're going through with this.

Yeah.

Because they didn't get on this long,

because they didn't get on this stuff long before

any of us were alive or anything like that like they

should have, we're paying for it now as fans

and as just people to take in the game.

And people like our good caller here

are not even getting season tickets

or getting tickets to games or anything like that.

We have to get the brakes, sir,

but I do appreciate the call.

Good luck with the mowing.

Good luck.

Good on you for doing it, man.

Yeah.

It's a good idea.

It's a good day to get it done, man.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Talk to you later.

Talk to you later, man.

And yeah, great day to get out there.

Yeah.

I think I might need to do that.

Actually, before the sun goes down.

Before me.

Yeah.

Before me.

We're going to get out.

We're going to go ahead and check it

with our partners real quick.

We'll come back talking sports with my climbers.

I'm playmakers brought to you by quality plus printing

here at WFHR.

Welcome back, everybody to WFHR's playmakers set

in James here with you and proudly joined right now by our

friend, Mike Clemens, talking some sports.

Mike, before we get to you, want to go ahead and play that

sounder that you sent over to us from a Packers GM Mike

Gutenkutz just to get our go ahead and get our conversation

started here.

I think whenever there's discrepancies, whenever you're

not sure you go back to the tape, and that's going to be

your best predictor of future successes, what they've

done on tape.

So that's kind of what we live by.

Again, it's all important.

It all factors in.

But at the end of the day, it's, you've got to be able to

play this game and not play it at a high level in college.

We're able to translate to our league and play it at a

high level here.

Again, Packers GM Mike Gutenkutz, Brian Gutenkutz, talking

there.

I got a mic on the phone.

It mics on my mind, I guess.

Good to have you with us, sir.

How have you been, Mike?

Please don't put me in charge of picking.

Oh, God, just gave a flash right there.

Too much, too much.

Appreciate you joining us, Mike.

Let's go ahead and dive right into what Green Bay might be

thinking.

I think most of the experts, a lot of the, the pomped door,

Mike Melkiper himself, talking about looking at DB, some

of the safeties out there.

What are you hearing?

I'm not hearing anything because the Packers won't

tell you, but I just know that I've been through this.

You know, there was a year, maybe 12, 13 years ago, where

Ted Thompson, the sly, slow poker player from Texas was

up there at the podium a few days before the draft got

underway.

There was a guy that you might all know that's in the media

is a great reporter and does a great job.

But then, I mean, like, like Lucy setting up the football

for Charlie Brown, this dude would fall for it every

year, Steve, that just the right person that's like one or

two degrees away from Ted, would call him and tip it off and

say, hey, you know, I got to pick it to board or you know

what they're, you know, who they're really talking about.

I like one year that they did it was, was to get the

attention off of AJ Hawk, because they were picking fifth

or sixth and it's not, you know, anybody can figure out

the first 10 and just trying to get him off the center.

They said, oh, they're looking at this tackle, you know,

and then they go and get they get AJ Hawk again and they

kind of embarrassed this guy because he kept on, you know,

tweeting it out and put it on.

Hey, sources telling me the packers are really high on

this guy and they would and so somebody said, do you guys

do that?

Do you do that sort of misinformation leading up to the draft?

He says, yeah, there's some sub refuge.

You look that up in the dictionary because, you know,

such a huge used in order to achieve one's goal.

Perfect.

And so today someone brought up that old story to, to

goody, you know, who is a disciple of that Thompson, he

said, oh, yeah, it's going on right now.

Yeah, you know, so this, you know, and I even going

into this morning's press, which lasted almost an hour on

the elevator and one of the beat guys goes, well,

welcome to the most useless press conference of the year.

You know, dude, don't be so cynical.

You need to work a little harder and work at the questions.

So I waited for all the kind of anticipated questions and

there were some good ones and based on every hours that

people have spent searching mock drafts or scouting

reports and those kinds of things and what else is going on

the league.

And, you know, Brian, another page from Ted Thompson, he

comes out, you know, about this time.

There's, hey, first of all, I want to thank my department.

I want to thank, you know, John or Sullivan and Mill, but

he names people by names and scouts and all the hard work

they put in that's going to culminate to the start of first

round Thursday night at seven o'clock and out through the

weekend.

So about 20 questions in, which is usually when he kind of

loosens up the tie a little bit, I said, let me ask you, what

makes your scouting department one of the better ones in the NFL

or is it?

So that's a fair question.

Yes.

It's not a heckler question from some guy on Twitter, right?

And his reply was, well, first of all, there's a lot of good

scouting departments in this league.

It's a very competitive league.

But you know what?

I'm going to say our process.

And there's no question about it.

If you got into the, if you're a 25 year old guy with some

smarts and some potential and you get into that scouting

department, you're going to learn the stuff that Ron Wolf

brought here over 30 years ago from his years with Al

Davis and the Raiders and a time with the Jets.

And then, you know, refined by Ted Thompson, who is a broker,

a financial broker before Ron hired him to basically say, you,

here's your checklist.

When you go out on this call, when you go to Madison to the

pro day and you talk to four or five Badgers players, here

the questions you have to get, whether it's vetting for

character, the measurables, you know, give me examples of

this, it's a form that you've got to fill out.

And boxes that you have to check and you have to be a

detective and talk to coaches and the kids pastor and is

counselor and all that to make sure you're getting the whole

picture for that profile.

And that's what leads to the successful draft.

Mike, do you think that part of that came out of necessity?

And long before number 92 Reggie White signing Green Bay,

the Packers would have to make really good on this scouting

because that was, and still is in some ways, the heart of the

team. And I think you can make that argument with a lot of NFL

teams, but not a lot of NFL teams are the smallest league in

sports. So long before you were able to bring in free agents

some of these things, the Packers have a history of having to

be being good at scouting because they have an necessity.

Right, and you have to stick to, you know, not being swayed

or flashed. I mean, sometimes you felt like, all right, Ted,

great job. You got a bunch of boy scouts, but, you know,

they're all average football players, right? And maybe you

need a little crazy. On the other hand, you know, you don't

want your star rookie ride receiver racing down the Dallas

freeway in 11 because you're correct. It's like that. So

that's, you know, that's the fine line that you're trying to

find. And I think that the real key is this is once that kid

gets here to Green Bay, how hard is he going to work? We don't

expect him to be just so at certain levels of rookie. Where

is he going to be three years from now? Is he going to work

at the wayroom? What has his ascension been so far through high

school and college? And can we project that he's going to even

triple that effort once this is his full time job? And that's

really a key is to find those guys that are hungry and keep

trying to improve themselves. Is there a position that you

would look at stronger than most Mike with those first couple

of picks? Is there somewhere you'd like to see them go?

Well, the Packers like around 25 and in the first round, they

have, they had a tremendous draft last year, James. I mean,

my God, they took 13 players. They traded Aaron Rogers,

Matlow Flores, like, what are you doing? I mean, okay, so we

trade Rogers, but, you know, you just get, you got rid of

tight-end Robert Tanya and Mercedes Lewis has gone and all

these other veterans are gone. And then you come out of the

draft with 13 picks, like, how am I going to teach all these

kids? I'm running kindergarten in the NFL. Well, and then I

asked Goody about that. I said, my God, you know, you had 13 picks,

11 of those players played significant time last year.

Like, Carrington Valentine, filling in a corner, right? When

Jay here was the intern and suspended. I mean, on down the

line, even the lead Keith, an undrafted guy, significant

playing time. Come up with big plays at wide receiver and

on special teams. And then Indianapolis, Goody said, you

know what, they had to buy necessity. But, you know, you

just sort of threw them in the pool to see if they could swim.

And by week eight, just like the quarterback, it's like, all

right, now they're making less mistakes. Now we're getting on a

roll. Now we're beating the Lions on Thanksgiving. Now we're

rolling Dallas and the playoffs. And look at, you know, at the

potential and the promise they have going into this season. So

now he goes into this draft the other night and serves

tonight. And in terms of need, you know, at first you might say,

well, it's safety. So they went in free agency and got the

Xavier McKinney 24 years old out of the Giants. He ends up

being the highest paid safety at his position in this year's

free agency. The Green Bay Packers, the highest in safety. The

second was Darnell Savage, who got the highest contract with

the Jaguars. And Doug Peterson was asked, why don't you take

that advantage? Because we think he could play in the nickel

slot. We think he could be up in the box. And it's like, OK,

did you see him against the Buffalo builds? Yeah.

Josh Allen. OK, good luck with that. So if you need maybe

safety and maybe offensive line, because there's kind of a

rumor that they want to take the right tackles back top and move

him to center. But that means that they're probably going to have

to use that first round pick on a right tackle. Mike, is there

anything sports wise on your mind you want to touch on before

we let you go? No, just that I thought it was very interesting

today that in terms of the Packers, you know, the veterans

were here all last week for these individual meetings they have.

And he's asked about Jair Alexander and he claimed that Jair's

he's in step. It's going to be here for the Aussies and

programs. He's all set to start with his new defensive coordinator.

So that's that's huge for them. And then the other one is just

what the Bucks pulled off last night. Losing, you know, for the

last five, but they put it together to beat the Celtics at

home, but they lost Yannis with that calf injury. And now even

with the Yannis out last night, they pulled off a dominating win

over the Pacers. Thanks to Damien Luller just peeing off

a 35 point in the first half. So they, they, you know, the

the odds makers had the the Bucks losing last night. They flipped

the cards that way. Now let's see if they can retool and come

up with even a more adjustments to their game plan. Let's just see

if they can take out the Pacers tomorrow night in game two of

the best of games series at Pfizer form. That was a fun game

to watch. I'm a big game fan. And it was, it was pretty

fun to see him start that game that way. And there, and there

was some Packers there too. I saw Jordan love there. I don't care

how old I get. I hope I always get a kick out of seeing that.

I love it. Athletes from other sports. Yeah.

Support each other. I love seeing that. We love talking

with you, Mike. We'll talk again real soon. Safe travels out there.

You take care. And thanks again for joining us. Thanks James.

Thanks. Thanks. Thanks. Appreciate it. Take care. Thanks, Mike.

Mike Clemens joining us here on Playmakers at WFHR. We'll take

a quick time out. We'll come back and have some more fun on the

show. Welcome back everybody to WFHR's Playmakers. Seth and

James here with you. Thanks for being brought to you by quality

for getting your words out here in Wisconsin rap. It's big

thank you to them for the sponsor in the show. A gigantic

thank you to our friend Mike Clemens for joining us. I got to

let the audience know a little look behind the curtain here. I

threw this at Mike. Like it's like Saturday. I was like, Mike,

I want to talk about the draft. And Mike was like, okay. He

just joined us like that. That's just like that. That's

pretty cool. Thank you for pulling the audible off with us.

Mike is a team sport. So we appreciate our teammates.

Thanks to him for that. He left us talking a little Bucks

basketball. Remindered everybody. We've got Bucks

basketball on the radio, right? This all week long as long as the

Bucks are in the playoffs, we've got to do the games.

Their games come first as far as programming wise as far as

we know. That's what we'll be doing going forward, you know,

knocking on wood. That's the way it works out and everything.

Bucks in action tip off at seven tomorrow. Take it on the Indian

of Pacers and game two. Bucks are up one nothing. Just want to

piggyback off of Mike. Mike. What Mike was saying there?

Those games are one because I think because Dave starts

out the way he doesn't sets the tone. He's the best player on

the court. He acted like it. And not just on the on Milwaukee

side. I mean, on Indiana side too. He is the best player on the

court. He's one of the best players in the NBA, acted like

it. But also Chris Middleton doing what he did, Brooke Lopez

doing what he did in a shout out to Bobby Portis, who is in

the finalist for six man of the year. Nice work by him as

well. That's how you win those games. You hold the line until

you get the big man back, you get the deer back. And as soon as

you get that wonderful gazelle back, that freak of nature, the

the Greek freak back, then you're really talking here. Because

this is what it's all about. The NBA has a problem with this,

but it doesn't matter right now when you're in the playoffs.

Right. Just throw out the regular season. Yeah, nobody seems

to care. Even the players don't seem to care that much. And while

it's difficult when you got a guy like Jimmy Butler, who rests

almost all year for playoff Jimmy. And then he's hurt going into

the playoffs. Yeah, that's rough. So it makes you wonder, well,

how much does that matter anyway? Michael Jordan played all

62, you know, all every game. Like nowadays it's it's gigantic

when I like Austin Reeves does that for the Lakers and plays

all 82 and stuff. It's, it's, you know, sports and things

like that. And I'm not going to be old man yelling at crowd

cloud about it. But it does need to be a asked, you know, when

these guys get hurt. Here's a guy like, you know, who does play

almost every game and tries to the only games he doesn't is when

he's hurt. Exactly. They don't really rest him. They did rest

game a little bit. And you know, he got hurt a little bit in the

season. So I'm sorry, James. I was not paying attention. I was just

thinking about how great Anthony Edwards is. That's all I was

doing. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

I that young man is becoming this you don't get to see this

happen very often. This whole year and this playoffs, I believe

and going into next season, he is slowly taking over the face of

the leak. That's something slowly becoming that and doing it for

your team. I know not the Lakers, not the next, not even the

San Antonio Spurs. Like he's doing this for the Minnesota

and the Denver Wolves. Yes. I we got so lucky. I will admit I

was a gigantic heaven Garnett fan. I really like KG mostly

when he was in Minnesota. So it's not the first time many of us

have paid attention to the Denver Wolves. Right. But that is

pretty exciting when you could say maybe the most exciting player

in basketball is playing for the Minnesota, Denver Wolves. That's

pretty cool. Well, it's not that he's so it's not just that

he's great because there's a lot of really great players. He's

got that charisma that can really turn it on, you know.

There is nobody. If I could interview anybody in the NBA right

now, they say James, you got a full Adam Silver says you can

interview anybody as we're getting ready for the playoffs here for

your show, your show playmakers and all that. I love Steph Curry. He's

probably my favorite player. One of my favorite players of all

time would love to talk to Steph. I think that LeBron would be

a very interesting conversation. He always seems like no, give me

Anthony Edwards. That young man is the best interview. Maybe

the best interviewer in sports. That's something you talk about

like even even when he was a rookie, he was like this. But now

especially that he's got some clout to his name and all this. I

like his ways playing the game. His interaction with Kevin

Durant. A lot of people have been taking some shots at that

saying how disrespectful all those things and everything. Well,

Kevin Durant, I believe, is one of the bigger competitors in the

NBA's history and certainly wanting to get back in game two

and show him what the grim reaper can do. He was laughing at that.

He was enjoying it. He had the best seat in the house. Nobody.

If Kevin Durant was not in the playoffs right now, Kevin Durant

would be playing basketball. That's what he does. I'm worried

about what he does after basketball. I don't know what that

young man is going to do. He's still a young man. He's only 35.

I don't know what he's going to do after basketball because he loves

that game so big much. If he's reacting that, you don't we need

to come, we need to get back to this rule in life. You don't get

to get more upset than the person that is actually being offended.

Supposedly being offended, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. What did that happen?

Yeah. It's like, come on. You don't get to do that.

It's like, look, you're Kevin Durant. You're going to be

dealing out of it. I'm not. You can't be offended for

someone. I mean, that's just weird. How do they do that?

It's it's going to be a funny. I think it's going to be fun.

It was a boring first weekend of playoffs. Don't get me wrong.

It was even a little boring in hockey, you know, which is

interesting. I don't think it's going to stay that way. I think

it's going to be quite interesting. I did have a couple of

interesting just news and notes to get to before we wrap up.

All right. Shout out to Yammy Ryager scoring in the first

pro hockey game at 52. Breaking Gordy House record of

oldest player to score a professional point. It should be noted

that Yammy Ryager did this for the team he owns. He owns this.

Now we got on the ice. Yeah. Yeah. Right. But he still

scored. He'll shout out to him. I watched the goal.

And it's a it's a it's a legit goal. It's a legit goal.

And the fact that he wants to. Yeah. He deserves points for.

I don't think that then he's ever going to. Nobody's ever

going to replace Gordy. How as the ancient man that you had

to drag off the ice. Right. Literally.

It's one of the great. It's fun. I love I love it when

when guys do that. You know that that obviously it's a stunt.

I get it. But it's still fun. You know, like when the white

socks did it with many menoso or or when satchel page would

come back in his 50s and throw like three innings.

You know that kind of thing. Yeah. I thought this was

interesting. Caitlin Clark is one of the most famous athletes

in the world. Male or female. And she just got picked

up. Number one overall in the WNBA. Wow. Well financially

speaking, she is not going to be making that much as an NBA

rookie. WNBA rookie. Her salary will be a little lower

than most as you would expect. She's going to be making

nine 76 grand somewhere around there her first year.

Nobody's trying to spill milk over that money. But as comparing

this to athletes, Victor Wimbanyama, the number one overall

picked by the Spurs is making 55 million in his first

four years. Right. They're in comparison in comparison.

I hear a lot of people talking about well, the WNBA to really

prove that women's athletics is where it's going to be the

trajectory and all that that they have to do it on their own

that the NBA can no longer help with this. That's something

and a separate organization needs to own that or they need

to go out on the road and all these things to which Adam

Silver is saying, please no. Dear God, no, we can't lose that.

Not now. Not now. No. Not now. Like they need to make

this better. It needs to get corrected. I think that while

some of it needs to be pushed, some of it also will happen organically.

I think both are right. I think both are absolutely right.

But I think we can all take a note of hopefully we're getting

away from the days of a Brittany Griner having to go over to

Europe or Russia or something like that and play that our

American athletes can stay here and play here and star and be

famous and be celebrated for their talent. Let's put it that way.

Here's hope and we're getting closer to that. And athletes

like Caitlin are part of the reason because you can't deny

anymore where women know it and just it's already made it.

She's already made her presence felt. Look at the road

schedule for the Indiana team. They've been selling out

other arenas, which is cool. It's just fabulous to see.

And let's one of our last conversations of the day and the

phone lines are still open 424, 2600 everybody. I had two

last things that I didn't want to touch on one. If anybody

gets a chance, go ahead and try to find the video of the

New York Knicks trying to lure LeBron James into New York.

It is one of the funniest pieces of video you will ever see.

Unintentionally funny. Yes. And it also aggravates me as a

soprano's fan and as a James Gandalfini fan. I know.

If you watch it, it is some of the worst acting you will ever

see by some of the greatest actors you will ever see. No,

that's the sad part. They were just really not into it.

Shout out to Pablo Torrey for finding that video.

Whoever his team is and helped him find that video. I'm telling