Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to WFHR's Playmakers.
Happy Friday, everybody. Hope you're having a good start to your afternoon out there.
Yeah. Seth and James here with you. We're going to be with you for the next hour, taking
your phone calls, call up, get in the game. We want to hear from you. 715-424-2600. Nobody
made a highlight from the sidelines. Get in the game, call up and join the conversation.
We'd love to hear from you. Seth has got an article about Jordan that I wanted to get
into because it's involved Michael Jordan. We'll talk about that in a little bit.
We have AI, AI-L Michaels to talk about, which is a little bit of a word kind of thing
there. That's weird. I want to start off on two notes. Really importantly, I want to get
to some breaking news that just happened a couple of minutes ago. Analysis, Dick Vitel
announces a cancer diagnosis ahead of his neck surgery. I want to wish him his family the
best. Dickie V, one of our favorite personalities in college, basketball of all time. Basketball
Hall of Famer, and Nasebeth baseball, basketball Hall of Famer, and just, you know, hard news
to start with, but wanted to get that out there because that's part of why we are here
at this time slot live and direct with you. That's right. So we can break news. We can
get information to you as soon as possible as it's happening and wishing him well, we'll
follow that story along. We have to kind of start in certain places, Seth. One of them
is the word nepotism. Nepotism? Yeah. Yeah. And it's all over the sports landscape
right now. And it seems like it's the first time a lot of sports fans are ever hearing
of nepotism. And it's a little, little weird and a little weird that the way that it's
being covered. And I'm talking about, of course, Lebron James the Sun getting drafted into
the NBA last night. Right. So for those who didn't hear Lebron James the Sun, Browning
was picked by the Los Angeles Lakers in the NBA draft. He was drafted 55th overall in
the second round 19 year old young man. Lebron and Bronie are now the first father and
son duo to be in the NBA at the same time. Wow. And that's kind of cool. Bronie says
he's beyond blessed. He has been very humble throughout this whole process and really tried
to kind of just be another player. Yeah. It's really hard. Yeah. Yeah. And right now you've
got every talking head under the sun from Foxboards to the mouse network to all of them.
Here some people are saying that it's nepotism and you know he's taking a roster spot from
somebody else. Others calling it pandering and you know they're just trying to keep Lebron
everything every single storyline. For one, can we just take a breath and kind of think
this is a kind of a cool moment for a second that we've never seen this before. And that
Lebron James has been in the league for 20 years. He's literally the oldest player in
the NBA right now. And not only still relevant. And he's not just like sitting, he's not
just a guy on the bench hanging in there or anything. Or even a guy like a Vince Carter
where at the end of his career is more of a mentor played about five, 10 minutes here
and there. Adonis Haslum and Miami who really never played but he had a roster spot because
of how much he meant to that team. Right. This is a guy who's still average in a double
double. Yeah. At 40 at 40, which unheard of in basketball. I mean, which just wow, you
want a great sports conversation everybody in this time of year and everything. What's
more impressive, what Lebron James is doing at 40 or what Tom Brady did at 44 or what
I would have went everything because I think that's a fun debate. Oh, that's interesting.
Yeah. But what I first off want to touch on is the idea that nepotism exists in everything.
And the idea that it's it's it's not professional. It's not fair, et cetera, et cetera. I thought
we already figured this out when we were kids that, you know, sometimes people get jobs
that shouldn't or any of that. So I think we need to be adults about this. I think we
also need to remember that as much as we are passionate about sports and as much as we
love sports and we would literally bleed for our teams. This is a business and it's entertainment.
And if you're the Los Angeles Lakers and you have a chance to make NBA history, you have
a chance to do something before the Boston Celtics do, which you're I promise you that
means something. And you have a chance to make Lebron happy. Yeah, which may keep Lebron
in LA, which whether he was leaving or not, who knows? Who knows? But any of these factors,
how do you not pick Lebron James's son? How do you not do that? Is more of the question
to me like that they would have been more surprising if they did not draft him. Right.
This does not mean that Brony is going to be on their G league team, on their actual
NBA team. It doesn't even mean that he's going to make the roster. That's right. There's
a lot of stuff that's got to make fall into place for that young man to be able to make
that team. But at this moment, it's kind of cool. Well, that it's happened. And I think
the most disappointing part of this for me is I have seen one person in social media
or on the mouse network or anything else. And I haven't had a whole lot of time to go
over this necessarily. But I've done a little bit of homework on this one. And I'm tried
really hard to check and look over. Does anybody care how Brony feels? Because I've seen
Beaumonti Jones talk about this and that's it. I've not seen anybody else mention. Well,
is this healthy for him? Is this what is best for him playing with his dad? A lot of
these things. I would like to know what he thinks. I would like to know if this and are
you going to get a true answer from the young man? Because if I was in his shoes, I don't
know how I'd answer that. You know, if I, whether I wanted to play with my dad or not,
is it more pressure or not? Would he be better off going to a team that wasn't, the
lakers aren't great, but they're the lakers. So they tend to get free agents. And especially
when it's LeBron, heys will take less money to play for him. So that's a roster spot
again, you know, coming back to that. I think that's an important part of this. And maybe
the most difficult part to really get into and to really figure out right here. And
I'll start rambling in a second. What's he going to call him? Like on the court. You
definitely can't call him dad. You can't call him pops. You, you know, I would love it
to be called a pop. It'd be awesome, actually, but I think that I'm joking. I'm trying
to find a funny way to wrap this up. But I'm also kind of, you know, curious like, huh,
I wonder what he is going to call him. Yeah, right, right. It's an interesting, what weird
situation. But it's also something that nobody ever expected to happen. Not really. Nobody
was thinking this was going to happen. I don't, I don't remember anyone talking about
about this at all. And you know, I heard recently, I heard an interview with Nate Albert,
the sports announcer. And someone had asked him they were talking about, you know, the
nepotism thing, you know, his Marv Albert son. So, you know, Marv Albert, you know, one
of the top sports casters of all time, that kind of stuff. And so they asked him about
that. And he was like, well, you know, one of the things is is you're around it so much
when you're a kid, he said, he would remember listening to his dad in his office doing
practicing, you know, going over this stuff. He would, you know, watch him on TV. He
would be around his dad all the time when he was working on it. So that's one of the reasons
why he, he just learned it. He just kind of absorbed it. And he decided, okay, that's
what I want to do. Nate Albert still started at the bottom. He was like doing like minorly
hockey games. That's how he started. So it's, it's one of those things. Yeah, Bronny is around
his dad all the time when he was growing up. He was, you know, playing back. So I don't
know, he doesn't have the skills. I don't think that LeBron James has, but he's like one
in a 50, 100 years talent almost. Yeah. So you're not, you can't expect that. You can't
expect that. It's got, I'm sorry, it's got to be really, it's got to be tough enough to
be LeBron James son. Right. In the same thing that your dad's doing. That's got to be tough
to what you were saying before. How does he feel about it? Well, obviously he loves basketball,
otherwise he wouldn't be doing this. Yeah. So that's got to be a part of it. So yeah, I mean,
to me, it's not, it's just, it's not a big deal. It really isn't. It doesn't seem to
me. It should be one anyway. For one, if this was happening during football season, nobody
would be talking about it. But they need something to talk about. Nobody wants to say the
quiet part out loud. That's the quiet part out loud. There's nothing to talk about. So
this is what they're hanging on to right now. Right. It involves one of the biggest athletes
in the world. So it brings headlines superstar cultural person. He's, even, he transcends
basketball. He's a cultural icon. Yeah. But I, the idea of if LeBron James was a mechanic,
nobody would even, you would want this. You, oh, your dad was a mechanic. Oh, I took over
the family business. Yeah. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. And I understand that they're
obviously very different worlds. But the idea of nepotism turning into this dirty word that
it's turned into is so weird to me and so ridiculous. And sure, we've been doing this
a lot in the last couple of years of taking words and them meaning different things and
such. But with this one, it's so, it's very selective. It truly is. It's like, okay,
this is good, but this isn't good. It's the same thing. But for some reason, these ones
are better for or these ones are worse. Name me an industry that is not littered with
nepotism. Please, please find one for me because I've been trying leading it today from
when that young man was drafted yesterday to today, to to write this moment, I've been
trying to find one and I can't. I don't think there, there is one industry in the world,
not just in America, in the world that isn't involved nepotism at some point. Yeah. Or who
do you know or whose your connections or anything? I mean, who's your daddy? No, right.
That comes up later. Or earlier. I don't know. I don't know. Which game first? I don't
know. Chicken or egg. Well, I can tell you one thing though. It was on first. LeBron James
and Bronny James will not hit back-to-back home runs. Like the Griffey's did. So I can,
I can guarantee you that. They'll never have that on them. No, they will not. It also does,
I'm glad you brought that up too because you have so much of this in baseball right now.
You and I talk about this off quite a bit. The Toronto Blue Jays, they're whole. The legacy,
basically made up of, you know, juniors. Exactly. And it's weird how we are about this in
different sports. It doesn't seem to happen that much in football. It's usually brothers.
NFL players just don't play along enough. Yeah. You'll see the son of so-and-so right now,
UW just signed up T.O.I. Hilton's young son to be a recruit. He's a recruit over there for
a receiver for the Badgers now. So we're seeing that we see it in football, but it's years after
a player has retired oftentimes, at least a couple of years after. Yeah. In baseball, we love it in
baseball. It's shockingly. Yeah. And I wonder how much of that is nostalgia for some of us. They
got to see Griffey senior, Griffey junior. They got to see some of the bonds and Willie Mays and
Barry Bond's talking. And I know that's not the same thing. Yeah. The relationship being right is.
Generational thing. Yeah. There's something unique and beautiful about that. We have something
like that happening right here in Wisconsin Rapids. Max McGuire is playing not even 20 minutes
from us. Not even five minutes from us. Should that young man be feel bad that he has an
opportunity? Man, I joke all the time to my mom and dad because they beat themselves up about
as parents. And I tell them all the time. I wouldn't trade them for Arab Williams and Jody Foster
as my parents. I wouldn't at all. But there are days where I wish my last name might be a little
different. Wouldn't mind having a copula as the last name. Hey, would that be nice? It wouldn't be
nice. Everybody, you know, you have a couple of them. Nicholas Cage changes his name from copula.
Does that mean it's up there for grabs? Can I use that one? Is it out there? No. James Copula.
Don't sound so bad. There's probably some James Copula's in the family. I do feel like it'd be more
Jimmy Copula. It would probably be Copula. And I can't go. I can't do that. I can't do that. Not
even for that. You can't even do that. Oh, okay. Wait, maybe I could. I was going to say. That's
that's a tough one. That's a tough one, man. Although I got to say for baseball. Yes, I do believe
that sometimes your name can get you drafted. It will not keep you in the bigs. Yeah. Look at
Cavambigio. He was just traded. I mean, yeah. And he's not. He's been having a rough time
the last couple of years. So I don't care how what your name is, man, unless you produce, you got to,
you won't be staying. No matter what the industry, it oftentimes. Yeah. I had this at a, I don't want
to bring it because of the boss that this happened with his past sense. And I don't, I don't feel
it's a good taste. So I'm just going to say this and you know, it's generic as I can. But just
the job I, you're a couple of years before I started the radio. I was working in a place and the
owner of the place made no qualms about it. His sons were going to be working with us. And he had
two and one worked really hard and one didn't. And it was, you know, frustrating. But I also worked
with other, plenty of other people that didn't necessarily work that hard as you'd like them to.
It had no relationship to anybody. Right. Opportunities happen. You have to take them. That's,
that's what this is all about. The game of life and everything. If you're going to get mad,
it's, it feels like jealousy in a lot of ways. And like calling it without calling it and that,
that to me, doesn't ever taste good. I don't know any situation that's made better with jealousy.
Or, or, or just like, well, it's not fair. Well, man, what do you, if you're over five years old,
you did not get to say it's not fair anymore. I'm sorry. Or, or if you're in baseball and you're
in number, right? You know, it's fair. It's fine. There you got to kind of, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,
you. I would like to apologize to everybody for that joke. Sorry. Terrible baseball joke there.
We are talking a little basketball, a little baseball. Since we're talking some basketball here,
though, talking a little ball, Seth, seems like a perfect time to bring up the Michael Jordan
article that you read. What was this about? And how did you come across this? Okay. Well, I,
I heard it act like I had so many things. I heard it on a baseball podcast. But they,
one of the guys had read this article and he thought it was really fascinating because it deals
with statistics. Okay. I'll give you the, the headline here is from Yahoo Sports. This is from
Tom Haberstrow, who's a writer for that writer. Yeah. Closer look at Michael Jordan's 1988
defensive player of the year award raises questions about its validity. And then it has a writer
on there. Has LeBron James been chasing a ghost? So basically what Tom, the writer, did in this
article is he went back to look at, he needed, he needed to do a little digging to see
Michael Jordan won the defensive player of the year award in the 1988 season. At the end of
the year before, I got, I got to find this quote here that, okay, for those a little background
of Michael Jordan, a man who played like, I don't know what is a good way of saying it, James,
you know, you could say chip on his shoulder. Oh, yeah. Or, or you could just say like a man
possessed or something like Michael's body driven, Michael's body, Michael's maturity. A lot of
those things aged with him. One thing that never stopped being that 13 year old 12 year old kid
that didn't make the Jedi, the varsity team, that part of him never, never aged. I don't think
that ever changed up until the point where he was going into the Hall of Fame and invited the young
man that beat him to that position to the Hall of Fame speech as example A. Yeah, right. Exactly.
I don't think that part of his brain ever evolved. Never, that never shut off.
Of the fiercest competitors we will ever see. Exactly. So in 1986, 87, Jordan's third season in
the league, he was in sense that coaches left him off the all defensive teams, even though Jordan
had become the first player in NBA history to register at least 200 steals and 100 blocks in
the same season. In particular, it irritated Jordan that Michael Cooper of the Los Angeles Lakers,
won defensive player of the year with 25 of the 78 votes that were cast. Well, Jordan received
just one. Okay. Michael Jordan never won to be quiet when something upset him. So in a,
over the summer, he had a spread with sports illustrated writer by the name of Curry Kirk
Patrick, who apparently became one of his dudes, I guess, interview with him. And this is the
quote from Jordan in that sports illustrated article. Michael Cooper is great at bald denial,
but check his other stats. The league gives defensive awards on reputation. It just tees me off.
So my content, and this is not in the article, my intention is that this is what kind of
started the whole thing. Okay. So the writer goes back. He starts to look. And now this is
something that's that in the history of the NBA has been a problem, I guess you could say that
there was, it's called home cooking. Okay. That the statisticians with all the subjective stats,
like in basketball, there's a lot of them. There's a rebound. I mean, rebound's not so much,
but steals blocks. That kind of thing turnovers. Those are all very subjective. So it seems like
in the early days of the NBA, this was a problem that home statisticians would be really patting
the stats of their star players. One of the great examples they give in here is that between the
two of them, Will Chamberlain and Bill Russell both had 26 or I had together had 26 40 rebound games,
40 rebound games. Okay. Every single one of those games is at home. Raises eyebrows. Okay. It
really does. But one of the things it talks about Michael's relationship with the
official statistician of the of the, the bullsman who just retired last year. Yeah. He's been doing it
for like 40 years or something like that. Some insane thing like that. Well, he went back and watch
the tape. He got the box scores out. And there's no question about it. 30% more steals at home
than on the road. There is almost no denying that there were padded stats or some home cooking
going on. And you couldn't ignore those stats when the voting came around. Now they,
he talked to Bob Ryan, the old columnist for the Boston club who was around back and back in the old
days, man. Great. Yeah. And he said, you know, he, because he voted for Jordan for defensive
player of the year because he didn't vote him for MVP. They voted he voted for Larry Bird that year.
He gave it was kind of a stop to Jordan to vote for defensive player of the year. And Bob Ryan's
like, it didn't matter back then. I mean, the words were not like they were now. The MVP was,
eh, you know, in the NBA, it has, it hasn't caught fire yet. It's not like it is now, you know. Yeah.
That kind of thing. Basically, and Jordan never came close to those stats again.
So it really looks like, no, there's no proof, of course. There's nothing there. But there's a lot
of smoke there, you know, there's a lot of circumstantial evidence that really indicates that
in all likelihood, because Michael Jordan really wanted that award. He was helped out a little bit
by the home statistician over there in in Chicago. Yeah. Now I do want to note that
the NBA today is much closer. Okay. The way in the home stats are almost like margin of error.
Yeah. It's basically they basically solve this problem because of, you know, all the way that we
can track stats now and that sort of thing. You're not, you're not beholden to the statistician
itself, you know. But this apparently went around the whole league. This was a very common practice
in the 80s and the 90s. So certainly is no worthy. It wasn't just Michael that was getting the whole
thing. Exactly. And it's interesting notes about the former players, the greats that we talk about,
the 40 rebound games. Yeah. Those are good notes. I do want to send a big compliment to Tom and
a mean they do a basketball illuminati show podcast and do a really nice job with it. They cover
things and not everybody covers and get really in depth on subjects like this. And I always appreciate
that kind of a different reporting, different kind of work that's done and they're both really
good at what they do. I will say from this right out the gate does not change one single thing
about how I feel about like, Oh, absolutely not at all. Not even close. But, but it's this stuff is
important when we're telling the history of basketball. We're telling the history of sport.
I could not come back at this and say, well, this doesn't matter. This isn't important. And yet
at the same time, I'm the person who was just screaming and so excited that the Negro League
stats are being brought into the MLB. Finally, yeah, right. Finally, a couple of decades late,
but it's finally happening. Yeah. And how cool that is and how great it is to see all these things.
And I don't know. I was kind of a nerd about some of this and getting into like, whoa, oh, so
and so is now higher than so and so in the rankings. And I think that's cool. I don't like picking
and choosing on my sports. If I like stats here, it's hard for me to say that about over there.
I do think integrity matters certainly in sports. I again, though, we'll come back to it's an
entertainment job. And, and you know what? There was a bigger player on the plan at the Michael Jordan.
You could give him an extra award. I could see the NBA doing that. I could see the voters doing that.
I do think it is noteworthy too, though. When we talk about the greatness of Michael Jordan,
how good he was. I don't know if other people do this. So many people just focus on the basketball,
so are the the offensive side of things. Right. I focus on the hustle of the player and the
relentlessness of the player. It's it's what has always stood out to me about Michael Jordan.
Even long before he was great, he was a hustler and he he he absolutely seemed to really want it
more than most, which is I one of those tired phrases we use in sports. But if it was ever evident
in a player, it was probably Michael Jordan. So I do think it's I hope this doesn't take a
make a bunch of like excuses for people about, well, you know, his defense, he see he wasn't great
at defense. No, he was. And that's what I get at it. Yeah, he he was actually an excellent defender.
That's that's the thing. It's just that for whatever reason, you know, we got we've gotten so far
away in the NBA from the the two way player. Yeah, the guy that could play offense and defense.
Right. And doing both at that level that Michael did it. Absolutely. We've gone away from what
is greatness. Now can you you score 30, 40 points a game where we're ready to annoy you as a great
player and everything. Ask ask the Atlanta Hawks about tray young in that. You I don't know how we
I know the only way we fix this is if we actually started a young age and we start getting these
kids younger. I've been rambling about this for a little while now. Well, you people are tired
of seeing these the foreign player drafted in the first top five and you know, a lot of these
things and what's happening to American basketball blah, blah, blah. It is self inflicted. It is
it is self inflicted. We did this to ourselves. We took oh, you're this tall. You're this size.
You stand over there with the forwards. You're this tall. This size. You stand with the guards.
Forward rebound. Get used to that. Go ahead and rebound. Get inside. Get in the paint. All
you other guards. Get used to shooting. Get used to passing. So from a young age, these young
players are getting ball handling skills while the forwards are getting anything like that.
When you look at foreign players, specifically, we'll take I don't know Victor Wombanyama, for
example, who is seven foreign has the handles of a point guard. They ask him what he wants to do.
Hey kid, what do you want to play? Well, I want to play point guard. All right, go ahead.
Take it down. So Victor Wombanyama spends the next 10 years of his life getting ball handling
skills. So when he comes into the m or into the euros long before the NBA into the euros, he's
already making an example of how good this can be and everything. We can do we can fix this.
We need to start training these players. These kids they want to play ball. Okay. Just I don't
I'm not saying you got to give him whatever they want. I want to be the coach. Oh great. Dang it.
Well, if you're Lebron James, then you can be. Yeah, Michael Jordan, for that matter.
Young Lebron, a Michael. Yeah. But it's more of, hey, learn a complete skill set.
Learn a complete skill set. I don't care if you are six, 10 and two, 50 and you don't have the
greatest shooting skills. Work at it. Work at it. Work at that. Work at ball handling.
Because even if you're not going to be shooting, you're going to be handling that rock.
We can fix a lot of those things. Yeah. I do want to wrap up before we go to break
mentioning the end we were talking about the NBA draft. You're Milwaukee Bucks selected AJA Johnson.
A bit of a project, but also some upside with this young man too. Like a lot of this this draft
class. It's pretty much what I could say about almost every NBA NBA kid that was drafted just
over the last night. If they're not, if they're in the G league or if they're in the college
basketball, this is what is pretty much being said about them because most of these people
talking about it, do not watch college basketball and do not know who these players are. That does
not mean they're not good. That does not mean that they didn't deserve to be drafted. They deserve
as much respect as a star. Right. And it's really been insulting to see the coverage of this.
If you're these young people, if you're their family members, yeah. But moving past that,
AJA Johnson may have had the coolest intro to the NBA as he walked through the crowd.
Yeah, I drank without he wasn't invited to the green room, but he had a ticket and he was there.
He actually bought tickets to it, which is so cool. Yeah. And he walks through the crowd to go talk
to Adam Silver. You know, you know, that's cool. Yeah. I don't know if I've seen a cooler. I don't
think I've watched that. I have been watching drafts literally my whole life. And I've never seen
a cooler ed dream. So I shout out to him and that's pretty well done. We'll take a time out. We'll
come back. We'll talk rafters. We'll talk about AIL Michaels. And we'll talk to you. 715-424-2600.
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Welcome back everybody to WFHR's Playmakers.
Oh, if you're having a good, good Friday out there,
ever one. Thanks so much for joining Seth and I. We're here to take your phone calls.
715-424-2600. Call up and join the conversation. I want to send a quick shout out to our GM,
our engineer, really the soul of this station, Mr. Chuck Genero. Chuck got me hooked up with one of
those little screens. Yes. So I shouldn't. A explosive screen. Yeah. Purple people eaters.
Purple people eaters. I've been listening. I've been actually paying attention and I think it's
working. It does sound pretty good. I've never sounded better. We are here to take your calls,
call up and join the conversation, everybody. We'll get into Raptor's conversation a little bit.
I want to talk about that. Certainly I have a couple of other angles I want to go to,
different things I wanted to talk about. But we're going to be honest too. I'm trying to avoid
the Jordan Love contract talk. It feels like that's what everybody in sports talk is talking about.
The state and I just feel like it's much to do about nothing. There are two scenarios there.
He is going to sign a new contract or he is not going to sign a new contract. One of the other.
And nobody, nobody including him probably knows the answer to that. Not right now. So there's
not really any new information to discuss on that until they actually sign him. I think what is
a much more worthy conversation to have is what is going on with a very well run organization
that they didn't get this done sooner. That is more curious to me because that's a very smart,
very well run organization. And I'm curious to know why this doesn't happen sooner. I would
like answers on I don't I don't deserve answers, but I'd love to know what the what the thought
process is that I'm going to let the market decide this for me. That what business is that a good
model, especially specifically not for the NFL and quarterbacks and any excuses you have for
that organization as well they wanted to do this. They wanted to do that. Well, they only have a
small sample size of this young man. Who's fault is that? Who's fault is that? Like it's going
back to the Rogers well. I mean, yeah. Yeah. So you made this you made this mess. You made it's
either go inside. You have to sign him. Let's not act like this is a debate. For one, he's a he's
a valuable quarterback. The most valuable thing in sports, not just in not just in football in all
of professional sports. There is nothing more valuable than a young quarterback. The only thing
more valuable than a young quarterback is a young quarterback on a rookie contract. You blew
that affordable. That window's gone. That window's gone. So now you made your bed. If you don't sign
him to a long term contract, how does that make your organization look? What does that say for the
future of your organization when you let go over three time MVP because you thought his kid could
do it, which he's proven he can. Again, I know it's a small sample size. I'll take it. I'll take it.
I feel like you got enough to go on here. The NFL has turned this is what the league has turned into.
Dang it. We did it. Now we're talking about it. Yes. We're now we're talking about it. I'll get
this point out and then we'll move on. All right. This is what the NFL is right now. You have to
take the leap. You have to do it. That's why Chicago did what they did. What they got rid of just
in fields to draft Caleb with because you don't know. He could be the next home. He could be the
next whatever. He may not be could be the next Riley. Exactly. Who knows, but you got to take the
chance. And now with the Packers have done is they may let's say they go through the year. Nothing
happens. Jordan love has an amazing season deep into the playoffs. Maybe they don't win the
Super Bowl, but an amazing season. They're going to he priced right out of town. There's no way
they can afford it. No, because look it. Look it. I bet I hate going back to this too. Trevor Lawrence.
Yeah. The money he got. I mean, it's incredible. It's insane. Jay where we're a year past it,
but Jalen Hertz and the contract he got and that was insane to me and he took a team to a Super Bowl.
Yeah. And that was insane to me. Let alone the Trevor Lawrence contract. Yes. There is every
literally every day. This is only going up. Yeah. This is not and it has been since you were in
this position at the end of last season and making this decision of what to do with this young
man. And if that you should sign into a long-term deal or not, it might the boy. There's such a smart
run franchise. That's why it's shocking to me. If this was happening, I don't know in Jacksonville
or some other places, it might not be as surprising. Even Indianapolis. Yeah. Panthers is a better example.
I didn't mean to say Jacksonville actually, but to say Panthers. We're not football season. No,
it's my fault. That's our fault. And you know what? If we had AI, maybe that would have been
corrected. Maybe it could have made that better decision, right? Or maybe AI would have messed it
up too. Who knows? I want to get into this one and I'm going to play something for the audience here
just in case you have not heard this. Al Michaels has come back to NBC's Olympic coverage,
but not the real Al Michaels. More of, well, how would you say this, Seth? Instead of Al Michaels.
The AI Michaels? Yes. Nicely done. You can't spell Al without AI. Actually, that doesn't work.
Well, the eye kind of looks like an L. It's close enough for me.
An AI-generated version of Al will give Olympic updates for peacock subscribers, and they'll
be customized to focus on these sports you care about. Plus things like viral moments,
athlete backstories, and other categories. And fake Al will even address you by name.
The real Al Michaels had to sign off on this and he's totally cool with it, apparently,
quote, when I was approached about this, I was skeptical, but obviously curious. Then I saw
a demonstration detailing what they had in mind. I said, I'm in. I will. I do think that
I think Al Michaels, who can make the argument, as far as just overall sports, I'm not talking about
specific sports, specific sports. I love Bob Euker. Bob Euker is in a category of his own.
Nobody had did it better than Vince Cully. Yeah. Nobody. Nobody. That's baseball, though. That's
baseball. I'm talking about guys that did multiple sports and on Olympics and all that stuff.
We've never heard anybody like Al Michaels. Yeah. Never heard anybody that could transition to
all the different things that he has done, especially in his prime. Al would be the first to tell you
he's not in his prime anymore. He's on Amazon Prime. And that's a paycheck. That's a paycheck.
It paid, man. It's a big paycheck. Yeah. And I imagined that Al, while he was skeptical,
got that, saw the dump truck or the dump truck came up into the house with the mod money. Let's
us put this right here. You know what? Doesn't seem so bad. Doesn't seem so bad. I want to play
a little of this for you what these sounds like, everybody. So go ahead and take a listen to AIL
Michaels. They call the exploitation stuff as Brandon Graham is able to get in there. Spear
headed by Wents. Still looking for that tight end. So they worked the middle, but not deep enough
right in his face. Hunter got in there and I think just got a piece.
So that, that, yeah, right? What is that? Yeah. That's
there was a different example, though, one of the fine two. But that's all right.
I'm going to find that, though. I'm going to find that because that was not the example I
necessarily wanted. When it comes to the sound, it's, I actually want to play, I really do want
to play for everybody because I don't think it really is that convincing. It does sound like him.
It does. Yep. But it doesn't sound like him. The AI is never going to be able, like,
it's interesting because you hear it and you can hear the breaths in between his words and
things. And that's very realistic. But then you hear him saying words and they just don't have
that tone, that context, that emotion, the uncanny valley. Yeah. There is no replacing that.
And AI, and even any am not, you know, a novel or anything like that has never been able to do
that. Even in science fiction, even science fiction writers have not done that. Right. Exactly.
And they're wildest dreams, right? Yeah. I don't think that necessarily, I really, I just really
think there's other things to focus and worry about. I don't mean to take your eye off the ball.
I mean, AI something to keep an eye on. But I mean, they worry about it. What I think is more
silly is the people investing in it. And the people thinking that this is better than getting
somebody other than Al Michaels to do it or something like that. What worries me is people lose
of jobs. Yeah. People, we're hearing this conversation about, well, Braun James's son taking a
roster spot. I want to hear as much focus about what about the announcer that could have been doing
that that just lost a job to AI. These, these production companies are still looking their wounds
from the strikes. And they're still upset. And they're going to get the revenge any way they can.
They're going to do this kind of stuff and lean into AI over the next three years while these
contracts are going on. And the only people that are going to suffer are other entertainers,
other creatives and the audiences. Right. And we have to pay attention to that part of this.
You have to, you have to realize something. And I think James can, can back me up on this one.
If every, if, if any industry could get rid of all the workers, they'd be so happy.
If they could find a way to do the job without having to pay someone, they would be so happy.
This is something they're looking for. That's why you see all of this AI stuff coming up right now.
That's, that's why why we're looking at it is because they want to get rid of everybody.
Because they'll make more money. Yeah. Except the people that were making the money can't buy it.
Wait a minute. There's a, there's a flaw in this. There's a flaw in this thinking.
That's not going to work too. No. 424, 2600, 715, 424, 2600. Call up and join the conversation to
look at your rafters real quick. Gonna be a fun weekend for the rafters. Whether we win or lose,
we've got some fun things going on at the whole park for our rafters. And, and boy, that matters
right now. Being honest, being honest. It's been rough. The team will tell you that themselves.
It's been rough going this first half. I think that there's a handful of things that first off,
I trust that coaching staff. They have proven themselves. They have proven themselves.
Good. Yeah. I think that these players not only in good hands, but in good hands for the second half.
And while we may not be getting the W's, we want every play, every round, every, every game that
these guys are playing, they're building chemistry. They are getting better at their craft.
And they can take that into the second half as well. Right. Even when you lose, you still got
that going for it. You still have the reps. I look at those things and think that's a positive.
And it's baseball in the summer. Man, I mean, we love it. You can't go wrong with baseball in the summer.
Rafters, hoping to be able to play this game tonight at 620 start time. Just a couple of,
just a little bit, a handful of minutes after we're done. And of course, tomorrow's the game will
start at 620 as well. That one will be in FondoLac as well. Sunday back home, 1250 start time as we
wrap up this four game series with FondoLac, hopefully with the W on free family day night
over at Witterfield. Yeah. That's going to be a fun night feature. It's going to feature various
children's TV characters. They're going to show up with at least, and if you show up with at least
one adult and one child, you get to receive a free ticket. Hey, how about that? This can be done
on the day of the game only. Family fun day, pre-game games will be played with the kids. Rafters
players are going to play catch with the kids and everything. That's going to be fun. And of course,
the concession special $3 ice cream in a mini helmet. In the mini helmets. Got to get me one of
them helmets. Got to get you. That's for a big size helmet. Can I have an extra large helmet?
Yeah. And a jersey. And a bat. I got my own glove. I can play left field. Wait a minute.
How does that help you with ice cream? Wait a minute. I don't understand. Might be trying to still
lift some dreams out over there Witterfield. Get you to find out more about your rafters at
northwitzleague.com, northwitzleague.com. I did want to mention the standings as well. If you haven't
been taking a look, I don't blame you. I get it. It's been rough. It's been rough. But as far as
it looks for us right now in this first half with the rafters, the rafters are in fourth place
right now in the Great Lakes West Division. Walsha Woodchucks in first by a mile. Well, not
necessarily them in Madison or neck and neck. But Lakeshore is right there and then the rafters
are right up there at 13 and 17 on the season. So again, let's support these boys. Let's
go ahead and start fresh to the second half of the season. Home field advantages and everything.
Make sure to get to Witterfield whenever you can. And of course, whenever you can't, we got
you covered, every hit, every win of rafter baseball right here at WFHR all season long.
Seth and I are going to take a quick time out checking with our partners. When we come back,
we'll have more playmakers here at WFHR.
Welcome everyone to WFHR's playmakers.
Proudly brought to you by a great friends at Quality Plus printing,
getting your words out here in Wisconsin Rabbits. Be sure to follow Quality Plus printing
on social media. It's a great way to keep up the date and all the cool things they are doing
over there. And join us every Wednesday about 8.45-ish. Phil Hartley joins us with our Wicked
Awesome Word of Wednesday. Wicked Awesome. It's wicked awesome. We have a lot of fun with that.
We think we look pretty. Big shout out to Phil and the gang and our friends over at Quality Plus
printing. By local support, local support, those that support us. Yeah. And be a part of the team,
everybody. Reach out to us. We get a lot of sponsorship opportunities. That's hard to say,
especially on a Friday, almost night. Yeah. We've been a long week. My throat is just barely
hanging in there. Everybody in my personal life is really happy with this new schedule.
Because by the time I get to the weekend, my voice is not talking anymore. You don't have to worry
about James talking anymore. A little bit of breaking news. Atlanta is trading Dijon Murray
to the Pelicans for layering its junior in two first round picks. As Atlanta is starting the rebuild,
the next dominant fall will, I imagine, will be trade young, being traded somewhere. That'll
be interesting to see a lot of the moving chairs in the NBA. And we started our show mentioning this.
Dick Vitel analysis for just basketball analysis. Mostly college, but yes.
Announced his cancer diagnosis ahead of a neck surgery. Wishing Dicky V. Well and wishing
the best for him. Yep. So I came across something that I thought was kind of interesting,
Seth, as we're wrapping up our show here. And please, please, please feel free to call up.
Join the conversation. 715-424-2600. Get in the game. How'd you like to face any pitcher
any time? Now you can with M.O.B.'s new trade-ject tech. This is an interesting one that's going
on right now. So this is something that a lot of baseball players right now are using this tech
to prepare for pitchers, especially pitchers that they have not played against before. Oh, I see.
Okay. And now Willie Calhoun figured this out a little bit ago when he was going to be facing
off against the Los Angeles Angels. And he queued up on the tractor arc, the cutting edge machine
that has quickly become a go-to throughout the industry for its ability to replicate major league
pitchers. Calhoun called up the Yankees high leverage relievers, most of whom he had never
faced in a track. Tracking as many pitchers as he could over the course of a couple of innings
when he was summoning face Luke Weaver in the bottom of the eighth. And so he felt ready when
he was in this situation. Wow. It's a wild kind of interesting thing that is happening with
this M.O.B. right now. And I think it's so unique to the sport. I don't know another sport that
could do something like this. I couldn't be patching my homes and I want to prepare for this defense.
I don't know if you can do that. It's too hard to do. This is very unique for baseball and it's
pretty cool. And I think it's something that it's exciting going forward. And maybe a little,
you know, I'm curious to know what people think and how this might affect the game and all of
that. I'm open to hearing anybody's conversations about that. But what I really want to do is ask
if you could play this. Yes. You could do this. What pitcher would you love to face off against?
Oh my gosh. Any pitcher in M.O.B. history? Who would you like to face off with? 715-424-2600?
Just a touch or two away on the Civic Media app. And thank you for downloading the app.
You know what? First of all, this would be an amazing. If they decided to spin this off into
like an entertainment thing, this thing would go like crazy. People would be just
liming up to play this thing. Put this on Dave and Buster's or all my whatever.
Yes. Call up whatever pitcher. Like you said, any pitcher in history. Any pitcher in history.
How cool would that be? You think you'd be terrifying. And terrifying. Oh, you thought you would
write where I went. You would write what I would. I don't know what's wrong with my brain.
Immediately, the first pitchers I think of Bob Gibson, Nolan Ryan, Randy Johnson.
The first three off the top of my head. The biggest,
biggest pitchers out there. Yeah. It's something about, I don't, I almost want to be John
Cruck. I almost want to be one of my favorite moments in baseball history of John Cruck to sit there.
Randy Johnson. What's the all-star game? Oh my gosh. Yes. And John Cruck's like, no, I'm not getting
bad in that box. No, you can do it right over his head. And that's one of the funniest
on-field things of all time. Oh my gosh. Even if it's a computer animated Bob Gibson,
just to have an I glimpse of an idea, you're not going to get the true idea, but just a glimpse
of an idea of what it's like to face him. I don't, whether I get a hit off from or not,
who cares? Who cares? I get to have a glimpse of an idea of what it was like to go up against
or a Randy Johnson with that height difference. And him, do we ever think about this? Randy Johnson
is tall as he was. And then Randy Johnson on top of a pitching mound, like with super long arms.
No, I can't. How did anyone exactly? How did anyone ever get a hit off of him? That's what I want to know.
Oh, just see if you're a left-hander. Forget it. If you're a left-hander, man.
I think this is kind of an interesting tech. I'm sure there's an interesting conversation to be
had about. Does this help patterns too much? If you are a pitcher, are you okay with this?
You know, there's a lot of that, too. And I welcome to having that conversation. But I just
thought this was more of a fun angle out of it. I would go after the guys that had like funky
deliveries like like Louis T. Ongter, something like that guys that had like, you know, like these
weird windups and stuff. That would be fun. Steve Carlton have a weird line. Am I thinking of mixing
him up with Tom Sever or something? Tom Sever had more of an interesting one. He had the drop-and-drive
which meant that man, he got really low and he would use his lower body mostly. That's how, I
mean, some of the best pitches of all time did that. I mean, Nolan Ryan did that. Roger Clemens did
that. They had those massive lower trunks, you know? And that's how they generated their speed
and their power. Sever was one of those guys. So it looked like the ball was actually coming up.
Yeah. Because he got so, yeah, Roy Oswald Oswald, oh my gosh, he can't believe we did that.
Was another one of those guys that had that kind of pitching style that it looked like the ball was
coming up because his trajectory when he was throwing it. But I would like to see like a Hideo
Nomo. How about Hideo Nomo? You remember him with the tornado windups that he had? Yes. How cool
would that be to see that coming, Nadia? Even calling up a Jim Abbott just from that position to be
able to see how he flipped the glove. Yes. I think that would be kind of cool. That would be fascinating.
Is there a pitcher that you have in mind? Is there a pitcher that you would pick? I'm trying to think,
you know, gosh, I'm trying. There's a couple of actual twins pictures. I think Frank Viola would
be interesting. I loved Frank Viola. He wasn't like scary or anything. He was just a really good
pitcher. I would like to face Burp Lylevon's curve ball. Nice. Because it was during its time,
was considered the best curve ball in baseball. On Hideo Nomo, until he hung it and then 50 people
hit home runs off it. But everyone said that his curve ball was one of the best. Just to be able to
like, if one of those knee bucklers is where you can't, I just can't swing. Yeah, kind of thing.
I just got excited because I thought of a pitcher. I hadn't thought of last night. Dave Stewart,
another intimidating pitcher. What is wrong with me? I still, he says something and then he's
not intimidating at all. True. That is so true. That is so true. I want to get into our weekend
lineup a little bit before we get out of here, everybody. Because we've got some really fun,
exciting things going on. I mentioned Raptor baseball all weekend long. Boys are of summer,
are busy all weekend. Be sure to be here for Raptor baseball at 620. The next couple nights and
at 1250 on Sunday. Looking forward to that. Coming up on July 1st and 2nd. No games. So get your
games in while you can. A little break for the boys. Tomorrow we got our weekend lineup kicking off
without doors with Dan Small. Looking forward to that. 7 a.m. Sunshine Poke Show. Woo.
Join our guy Tim Hubble for a great hour of polka that he scours the universe to find
and brings you the most unique polka you're going to hear. Indeed. And one of the better talkers
in radio. He's great. He's great. He's great. He's great. Check out Terry Talks Nutrition
from 8 to 9. Our friends and family and natural foods bring us one of the icons and godfathers
of the supplement industry. And that is Terry Lemran who really, I mean more than most, not only
knows his stuff, but cares about his clients, his people. It's a great hour, very informative
hour. I encourage you to check that out. Stick around from 11 to noon for over the back fence.
Yes. This is your call in show. Seth runs this show. You tell him about it. Well, uh, call in.
That's a lot of noise. Yeah. Please call it. It's a, it's a, it's a guy swap show. If you want to,
you know, buy yourself stuff from your friends and neighbors. Call in with that. Anything else
you want to talk about. It doesn't matter. Um, you, you guys seem to call every time James does
the show. You call in and give him a hard time. Which is, no one gives me a hard time. She
doesn't want that. I don't know. Does that mean you're not care? Don't care about me. It's one
of those weird feelings. Yeah. Like way a bit. It's a, it's a fun show. It's our, it's our live,
uh, you know, community billboard show. I brought events and stuff too. Yep. Absolutely.
Garage sales we want to hear about. Yeah. Uh, we also want to hear about how we can make that
hour better. Yes. I thought Pam brought up an interesting point a little while ago about maybe
moving it to earlier on a Saturday. Yeah. That may be about that. Yeah. There's, there's options
there with that. Uh, not only does Civic encourage us to tinker if need be. But uh, our, our,
the man making these calls in truck, generic is going to go ahead and do what's best for the audience
every time. Yeah. So always feel free to get us your feedback, everybody. Yes. Yes. We want to
give you the radio. You want not the radio. We want. It's the radio you want that we want to do
here. Yes indeed. Um, and of course, Sundays, we got a great lineup for you. We want to encourage
you from five until nine to stick around here at WFHR. We ease you into the work week in the
year Sunday night, the right way directors cut from five to six. Uh, got a great one lined up for
you this Sunday. Yeah. But what I want to focus real quickly on coming up, we are going to have
Jane Mattenair and Greg. Uh, Bob. Yeah. On with us. Looking forward to that. That is going to kick off
our Civic series. Um, after interviewing with them, we're going to interview with Pam and Chuck
from here at the station. We will have Seth and Melissa being interviewed the rest of our staff.
I want to put a little highlight and do a little focusing on our team here and give everybody kind
of a little look behind the curtain of us and a little more about us. Lots of new changes,
lots of changes going on. So it's nice to reintroduce ourselves. We'll have our friends from WRCT
on as well as we celebrate their programs, other local theaters, and we want other local musicians.
Everybody on reach out to me and get on the show James at James dot mail off at civic media.us.
James dot mail off at civic media dot us. Be sure to join us for a Seth basis music from set
is six to eight. Yeah, you're all going down. Yeah, going down. Everyone's going down. I did my
up show and I have to do my down show. So, uh, so it goes with, you know, sports first down,
touchdown. I mean, there you go. So nicely done. That would be some great songs. So check it out.
Uh, I, I, I'm immediately thinking of a bunch of downtown downtown and some of those that
they're some really good ones. Uh, it's, it's one of our favorite shows. Check out Seth
basis music six to eight every Sunday. And after that from eight to nine, put on your headphones
and your CD player and you try not to have it skip as you're walking and check out unlabeled your
90s mixtape. Uh, we play anything from 1990 to 1999. And I want your requests. James dot mail
off at civic media dot us. Got a brand new episode for you this Sunday. We're going punk.
Punk, man. Oi, Oi, Oi going punk. The 90s version of punk, which yeah, took a lot of different, uh,
took a lot of different trails. It was really interesting to go through all the songs you picked. It's
really, uh, it was fun. I enjoyed it. This was fun. Thanks for hanging out with us, Seth. Yeah,
great. And thank you for everybody joining us all week long. Our first a week full week of
playmakers. Uh, congrats, congrats everybody. Now we're going to the showers. Yeah, yeah,
we'll talk to you soon. We really need one. Yeah, yeah, yeah, badly.
This is locally grown radio WFHR 1320 AM W24 ADE Wisconsin rapids and always streaming on the civic media app.
