Pardon My Take - Carmelo Anthony, Wild MNF & Who Wants To Coach USC?

Episode Date: September 15, 2021

We recap a wild MNF game between the Raiders and Ravens. The Manning broadcast was very good ( 00:02:42 - 00:16:08). CFB talk, USC needs a new coach and an Ohio State bet has been made (00:16:08 - 00:25:33). Hot Seat/Cool Throne (00:25:33 - 00:41:17). Carmelo Anthony joins to talk about his new memoir, his HoF basketball career, Syracuse, the Knicks, Big Cat recruiting him to the Bulls and being left out of the Banana Boat (00:41:17 - 01:34:34). We finish with guys on chicksYou can find every episode of this show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or YouTube. Prime Members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. For more, visit barstool.link/PardonMyTake

Hey, pardon my take listeners. You can find every episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or YouTube. Prime members can listen ad free on Amazon Music. On today's part of my take, we have Carmelo Anthony Hall of Famer, Future Hall of Famer, American Hero in studio for an hour. Awesome, awesome interview. We all walked away from it being like, fuck, that was awesome. That was very cool.

Carmelo was very cool to talk to. And yeah, we got into everything. So we have Carmelo Anthony with some Monday Night Football Cleanup, a great Monday Night Football game, some college football talk that we missed on Monday, Hot Seat Cool Throne and Guys on Chicks. And before we do all of that, we were brought to you by our friends at Dave and Buster's. Dave and Buster's adds more winning to anything and everything from regular

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Today is Wednesday, September 15th, and the Baltimore Ravens are. Anyone injured? OK, we'll go with injured. They're injured. Fumbulitis. They're a wait and see. Now, Lamar Jackson, there is something about Lamar Jackson because he reminds me a lot of Daniel Jones, the way that he runs with the football sometimes,

not in terms of speed, because obviously Daniel Jones is the fastest player in the NFL, as we saw last year. But no, when Lamar is running, yes, he will make you look like a fool and he will run around you. But when he's getting hit, he doesn't. He's not the most secure guy with the ball. So yeah, it was a great game, though. Awesome Monday night game over time, lots of twists and turns.

The Vegas crowd was sick. Steve Aoki on the on the ones and twos. Mark Davis looking looking. Wow, like a virgin. He was he doesn't really know how to high five. So he just kind of just fist pumps in his all whites and just looking awesome. Yeah, just sweet. He looked great.

It was great to see the fans there. It was the first time, obviously, in that stadium that there have been fans. And it was it was very cool to see. So the Ravens, that was a game they should have won. They should have wanted a million different ways to let the Raiders hang around. And credits the Raiders, by the way, because I was watching that first quarter. You're like, ooh, the Raiders could be bad, very bad, because it was essentially their defense didn't look much better, which ended up looking better at the end

of the game. And the offense was essentially Derek Carr trying to throw it into Waller, no matter what the situation, a hundred times a game. And just be like, all right, well, let's run this play. If anyone else is open, it doesn't matter. I'm going to Waller. The play was pretty much force feed. Darren Waller, if he's not open, hit Alec Ingold in the flat for three yards. Yes, or maybe Hunter Hunter Renfrow is a good fucking player.

He is. But when he gets tackled, he really gets tackled. Tim, you remember how like when RG3 used to get hit, people would be like, oh, my God, his body just exploded. Yeah, that's what people do to Hunter Renfrow. You know what Hunter Renfrow has? He has wiggle. He's got wiggle is actually a very important thing. I think he's got some he's got some scoot. Yeah, you need a little wiggle, though.

You need that little like where you can kind of fit into small places and then and then make moves that aren't exactly like they're not the fastest moves. You're not going to burn anyone. But you can. I don't know. It's something that a lot of great wide receivers have that little bit of wiggle to them where they're not stiff and they're able to get into different spots, find the soft spots of a zone. But yeah, the the Ravens blew that game and the the ending was insane.

The fact that that play, the touchdown play that ended the game. Obviously, Lamar Jackson's fumble kind of ended the game. But the touchdown play that looked like it was I thought there was going to be a flag or it was, you know, like a false start or something got whistled dead because the Ravens just gave up halfway through the play. Yeah, it was that easy to touch the guy. Stop because they're running cover zero is the old Greg Williams, just defense against the Raiders that we saw last year.

That's what they ran. He got burned on the back end and he was just like, fucking game over. You know, it looked like it looked like when at the end of a game, a baseball game, when they bring the infield in and they bring the outfield in because they're like, all right, if it's a there's a guy's guy on third. If it's a long fly ball, we're fucked anyway. And the ball doesn't even land in the guys just already walking back to the dugout left field. It looked like if I was playing a game pick up basketball and I've been out there

for longer than maybe 10 minutes and then my guy hustles down the field or down the court one time and they throw an outlet pass. I'm like, well, I'm not running yet. No chance. Fuck that shit. All right, so let's talk about the other big thing from this game. The man in camp. Yes, was electric. I so I started with it. I went off of it because they actually the first quarter, I thought it was a mess

because Peyton was a little too. Peyton, he was just very high energy. The Peyton was turned up to 11 and they they did the thing where it was like Peyton and Eli 75 percent of the screen. The game 25 percent of that. It was only a couple of times when Peyton stood up and went to the board and started diagramming shit. I think the problem was mostly in the first quarter.

Yeah, they sat down and they were like, we've got all the stuff prepared that we want to talk about. Look, I'm going to put on this helmet and then I'm going to pretend or I'm going to put on the John Green visor. Right. Pretend that I'm sending in calls and explain to Eli what they mean. But we don't need that. And so after the first quarter, when they got through all their prep material

and they just started talking, it was awesome. It was great. And when they brought Russell Wilson, they made Russell Wilson seem human at the end of the game. Credit them. Russell Wilson brought the big Seahawks energy vibes to that game, which was a Seahawks game. Yes. The ending of that game went full Seahawks at the end. It was. And it was I just like by the by the second half,

they had kind of found their rhythm and they had this the game. The majority of the screen was the game, which was all I really wanted, because that was the beginning. It was it was a mess. And it was if it felt like you couldn't really watch the game. But at the end, it was just Peyton and Eli just talking ball, giving great insight. I do think Peyton Manning would be fantastic if you ever decided to actually commit to this and go into the booth.

But I enjoyed it. I thought it was the rare like double cast that actually kind of they pulled it off. Yes. Sometimes I like watching the coaches cast when they do that for some of the like national championship games in football. When you get to see like who's the guy's being dude's guy from Colorado State? Adagio Adagio. When you see him in a room like trying to act like a human around other football coaches, the fundamental problem with that versus what we watched last night

is when you have like the coaches or any kind of analysts who hasn't fully committed to being like, all right, I'm part of media. They never will actually tell you everything because their coaches are psychos. And they're thinking the entire time, well, someday I'm going to be a head coach again and someone will watch this film and pick something up. And I'm fucked. Whereas Peyton Eli, I would assume that like maybe they could be front office guys at some point, but they have a lot of money.

There's their legacies are completely secure. So they they can kind of talk like the the thing when a half time when they're like half time is bullshit. Yeah, everyone thinks half time adjustments are this crazy thing. The players we go in and by the time we get a drink of water, we're already going back out. Like I think obviously the coaches maybe can do a little, but he's like, yeah, the players, the idea that like there's this big revelation and we change everything at halftime is just completely media fabricated.

I don't know why Peyton isn't in the booth right now, because they definitely offered a bag to him when they saw what Romo was when they lost out of the bidding war for Tony Romo. And well, I guess they got RG3 in that bidding war, but they were probably thinking, all right, Peyton Manning, what is he worth right now? What do you think he'd be worth to get him in the booth? They probably pay him $20 million probably to get it like him and Steve Levy, put them in the booth together.

Then you're set for the next like 15 years. But I think does he just not want to travel? I think it's probably travel. It's weird. Yeah, it is weird. I mean, a lot of production meetings and shit. It's not just like you can't just like he can just show up for the live stream on Monday, probably and do some prep for a couple of hours and then do

it versus Monday football. It's a good point because full week of prep and shit. And you have to be very in tune with how the whole league is going and how everything is going on. It's true. And they basically were able to sit there and shoot the shit. I do love, I noted last night Peyton Manning. The way he talks with his fists makes it seem like he's like punching the

knowledge into our brains and just excited. Yeah. He's he wants to just grab you and and like tell you exactly what's going on. And I, I get excited watching him want to punch me in the face with knowledge. He grabbed us by the face mask last night. Yeah. He was like, listen, here's how it is. Here's how it's how it's going to be.

I did think it was very funny when he put that Ravens helmet on. That could not have been an adult size helmet. No, right. That was a youth size. He's got a big four. It has to be a youth size helmet. Yeah. Are you were you offended that he that I'm living rent free in his head?

Yes. Oh, yeah. PFT tweeted what you what was the exact tweet? I think I tweeted like, look at this helmet. Somebody can we get paint and prescription helmet for this giant dome? And then they brought it up on the broadcasts. It was good to be back on ESPN too. Yes, you know, that's definitely a goal of mine.

But then a little earlier, too, Peyton started roasting me for my air telling. And it's like, hey, Peyton, listen, I know in your family, your wife probably spells out the word prescription more than you do. I can spell HGH about that one. All right. So Peyton's not coming back on. It was funny that people were like, I can't believe this guy. Yeah, they're like, how does Peyton not know like PFT?

They had him on. It's like, well, listen, sometimes when we have guests on it's their 20 minutes and they never think about us ever again, which is totally fine. Peyton Manning has no we he doesn't owe us anything. I think if obviously if we had if we had interviewed him in person, maybe he would have been able like, oh, I know that guy. But it was also my avatar that was brought up. Yeah, it wasn't like a picture of me.

I would I would actually be upset if Peyton Manning knew who I was. Eli might. Eli, probably. Yeah. Maybe. You know, he's got the Barstil app on his phone. Yeah, right next to the fart app. Yeah, right. He's a big fart guy. But yeah, it was great. I credit I think sometimes people think that we just shit on things. For fun, Jake, you do.

You think we give the buddy behind thing? We'll get to that a little later in the show, but we give our real opinions. And my real opinion was the first quarter was a mess. And then once they all settled down, I really, really enjoyed it. I thought it was great. I hope that they don't resort to gimmicks in future broadcasts. I hope they just like put them in a room, get them in the room together, put them on the same couch and then have like Olivia come in with rice,

crispy treats every now and again. Be like, what can I get you boys? Anything. And they didn't like the guests were good. They don't really need the guests. No, honestly, they don't need the guests. Like I thought Ray Lewis was OK. Fine. But it's just weird because it kind of screws up the flow. I also really enjoyed the fact they call each other E and P.

Yeah, that sounds cute. If you're going to bring in a guest, I almost think you should bring in a guest for the entire game, not just like bring them in, bring them out because they had Barclay. Barclay's fine. I love Barclay. I love Charles Barclay. No one hates Charles Barclay at 500,000 on the Raiders. Yeah. And then Charles Barclay looks thin, by the way. I don't think he black jersey.

He also bought a large jersey. Yeah, it was like a couple of sides too big. And then, you know, Ray Lewis was who Ray Lewis is. He makes sense half the time. But even when he's not making sense, he inspires you. Yes. And then Travis Kelsey dropped the shit bomb. And then Russell Wilson, I thought, was really good at the end of the show. Yeah. So although it was very funny when when they threw that interception

from like the the four yard line at the end of the game. And then they just kind of. Well, there's two moments there is they were on the goal line and it was like, oh, are they going to bring it up or they could bring it up? And then also Russell Wilson accidentally brought up the Super Bowl against the Broncos and Peyton just had to sit there and just eat it. Yep. Yeah. So it was it was that that's what we need is we need guys who like beat them or they had some kind of like great moment against them

and just see if it can get awkward. Yeah. I also thought that we'll just like strictly on the field stuff at the end of the game, Derek Carr's interview after the game. That was great. Derek Carr has a personality like I got. I got to experience Russell Wilson and Derek Carr in their most likable forms last night. Yep. Did not see that coming. I didn't see the interview.

You know what it also is about Derek Carr? He's got hair now. Yeah, he's got hair now. He died his hair. He's got more hair. And I also think it's his tattoo. His tattoo is like the most basic. He's got some kind of symbol on his wrist. Pie. I don't know what it is. Now, it looks like fight sad boy season kind of maybe Prince's logo.

Yeah, something there. He's just a cross. Is it? But there's something. No, there's nothing else to it. It's like a cool cross. It's like what a man's on it. Yeah, it's like if Zach Brown band came up with a symbol like Prince for themselves and they put it on and they put it on jeans. Yes. That's that's exactly what he has on his wrist. I don't like his helmet. Did you notice his helmet?

What about it? It's got like 20 holes in the side. Oh, those are the new helmets. Crazy. Yeah. No, those are the new helmets. I've seen a bunch of players have those. It's like, what is that for? To breathe more? I think so. Is it like Cam Newton cuts holes in the tops of his hats now? So yes.

He's Derek Carr is trying to put his like braid his hair into tiny little pieces and put it through. I've seen that. I've seen a bunch of guys have that. So I think that is the new helmet technology. It's a religious marking. And what is it? On his right wrist, he has a depiction of Cairo, which is one of the earliest symbols used by Christians.

OK, because I listen, get a tattoo. I mean, I hope someday have a tattoo, so I'm not going to hate on it. But I also saw it was like, maybe that's part of why I don't trust Derek Carr. Yeah, the forum tattoo thing is a real thing for quarterbacks. Yeah. But it's not for him. It's it's wrist. It's wrist slash forearm. Yeah. Right. If you're going to, if you're going to choose an ancient religious symbol

to get tattooed on your arm, I would go with Christian over Hindu. Yeah. And Cairo, Kygo. He should make a Kygo tattoo on the other one and just, you know, have him DJ every Vegas game. Is Kygo still alive? He is right. Yeah. All right. Who's Kygo? He's a good, good DJ, really good DJ. Bro, you're so old.

Shout out, Max Crosby. Yeah, Max Crosby is a fucking monster. And Carl Nassim for getting the that was the he had the fumble, right? He forced the fumble. Yeah, the raiders, defense played well. They played really well. But Max Crosby is a fucking monster. His arms, I don't know if his arms grew in the off-season

or if they've always been that long, but that dude is terrifying. Action. How quickly he gets from zero to 60 is insane on defense. Yeah. Action, baby. All right, let's talk some college football. Then we're going to do Hot Seat Cool Throne. USC has fired Clay Helton. I kind of like that the guy they should have fired two years ago. They finally were like, you know what?

Enough is enough. We can't let you try to find a way to win your way out of this. Or at least fire him this off-season. And now you just like you could have picked your coach. You could have gotten on the phone with Urban Meyer. No, Kobe fired him. Kobe, he did. It's actually, Clay Helton is not a good coach,

but a great like lesson in being able to keep your job for way past when you should have had it. Like he had the AD switch. Lynn Swanson left or maybe got fired, whatever. And so he got like the new AD came in right when it was a weird time to fire him. Then he won a cup. He beat like Notre Dame that one year.

Then COVID. He basically had just a string of great luck where they just forgot that they probably should have fired him. And now they finally fired USC is definitely one of those jobs that I think mean you could look at whoever they're thinking about hiring, not really know anything about their background and just look at the person and be able to say this person will succeed at USC. James Franklin.

You have to be hot. Yeah. That's that's what it really comes out to you. You have to be relatively hot for a football coach. I actually think you can think you're hot. Sure. Yeah. You don't even have to be hot. You have to think like James Franklin thinks he is hot. But that's fine. You can even be so ugly that you're hot like Adam Driver.

Yeah. You just have to have that hotness about you. Yes. And I we were joking about it. We we we did today a commercial shoot that's going to come out. I don't know when, but it'll be awesome when it does. But there is kind of a little chance that Urban Meyer Kapole Bobby Petrino. Oh, for sure. And if it gets bad halfway through the season, be like, All right, I'm out.

USC, you want to you want to drop the bag? Let's go back to coach in college. I kind of hope that he does. It would be so funny. It would be awesome because if the Jaguars start, I'll even say if they start two and seven, there's like a 50 percent chance that Urban Meyer leaves for USC. If it's like 0 and 6.

Yeah, I think it's pretty likely. It's funny, too, because USC loses their head coach in the same weekend of basically the Pac-12 having their biggest win in forever with Oregon beating Ohio State. Ryan Day punning from the 33 is something that will never get out of my head. But huge, huge win for Oregon. That was like colossal. And they actually have a path now to the college football playoff,

which the Pac-12 has been left out of for many years. And it's all it's all that we want. We talk about it. I think you were the first person I heard bring it up last year. Maybe it was two years ago. It's just good to get different colors. Yes, in the kind of football playoff. And now we're going to have green, yellow, maybe early. Maybe it's very early. It's very early.

But the path is there. Yes. No, you know what else is there? The path for Ohio State to get back into playoff over an undefeated Cincinnati, we get that steak dinner to Kirk. Yes. And what also is there is it to just be the usual colors and actually make it even more boring of Alabama, Georgia, Ohio State. If they get back in Oklahoma. Oh, God. That is just different reds.

Fuck that doesn't just make the big 10, the new Pac-12, though, like they just have no, no, the alliance for all the alliance. No, I mean, it was a big it was a big win for Oregon, but Ohio State is not going to like Ohio State has problems right now. But they're not they're not problems stop anything. Yeah, but they're not problems that are going to take Ohio State down for the next like five years. But what about this season?

Yeah, this season I would be surprised to lose four games or games. Well, that's because you haven't looked at their schedule. They actually won't. I mean, they play Penn State. They don't play Iowa or Wisconsin from the West. They probably will run the table and then we'll be back in this conversation in December being like, how can you leave a one loss? Ohio State team out because the Oregon loss happened so far in the background. Because remember, when they won the national title,

I want to say they lost to Virginia Tech and that week two game, I want to say. So they there's precedent there. If Ohio State loses four games, I won't watch. No, they won't next year. They will not. Right. They will not bet. You want to bet it? OK. Yeah. PFT. Well, what are you going to give up?

Yeah, what are you going to give up? Yeah. If Ohio State, I don't know. I mean, it's it's pretty pretty crazy odds for me, but I am the plus sign king. Virginia to Virginia. Yeah. So there is. So like by the time we get to the end of the season, I won't watch one quarter of football next year. Get a cat. You know, PFT can't watch for the whole year. I'll do the first.

How about this? You have to watch you have to watch football with sunglasses on all all year next year. I like it for one game. For one. No, no, no year. No, he doesn't get to watch football at all. Or game. Literally, the podcast is over. It's four games. I can still listen to it. Yeah, that's true. The podcast is done.

Get in the radio. Yeah. Ohio State loses four games. I mean, that's that's a insane bet. Not counting. Not counting bull. And in in here. Here's ten champions. Here's what I want to see. Here's what it is. I want. Oh, no, that four games.

Total possibly four games. Total could happen. I'll give you four games. Total. OK. If they lose four games, I will not watch football for the first month of the next NFL season. If they do lose or if they don't lose four games, you have to wear sunglasses for the playoffs.

Oh, I like it. And Super Bowl. I like it. And Pro Bowl. I like it. And Pro Bowl. No, odds. That's insane. All right, fine. Here's here's also a month. That's worse than you wouldn't be surprised. You're right. OK, so here's what we'll do.

I think this fair if Ohio State if Ohio State loses four games, PFT will not watch a single second of NFL football in the month of September next year. If Ohio State loses less than four games, you can't watch week one. All right. All right. You can't watch any game in week one. But OK, OK, watch football. Does that include the ball?

No, it's we're talking NFL. It does include the ball. All right, Jake, mark it down. It does it. I mean, it does include the ball. It doesn't include the ball. No, I would say for this one, your stakes are so low. Yeah, championship. And it's big losses.

No, I would say they lost four games in a season. True. Like what are we talking about? Big 10 counts. No, big 10 counts. Bull game does. Bull game counts. When is the last time? No, absolutely not.

All right, Mr. Little facetious. All right, you're already backing out. Bull game does does does count. Yes. OK. You got to also PFT. Don't worry. Like I think it's only three weeks because they've changed September.

They went six and seven in 2011. That was Luke Fickle, right? So yeah, the Gators and the Gator Bowl. Luke Fickle, he seems to be the guy that everybody's talking about for USC. Yeah, because the AD for USC was the AD at Cincinnati. And every time a job like this comes open, we have to have the debate.

We're contractually obligated to discuss what is the best job in college football. Correct. Is USC a top job in college football? Yes. I think USC might be a coach killer. The university itself might be a coach killer. I think USC is a top job, top three job.

Maybe. Yeah, top three job. What would you put above it? Oh, that's tough. Alabama just right now because of like everything that they've done. Don't say Texas. No, I'm not.

I would probably say like like Florida, maybe, just because of the it's in state recruiting. Like, can you just basically roll out a bed and get five star guys? And yes, that's true for USC and that's true for Florida. I think that Texas is the best job to be wanted for, but not to have.

Yeah. But USC is absolutely a top job because the talent is crazy there and they are the big dog in their conference. Obviously, Oregon has maybe changed that. Are you going to say it or am I going to say it? What? Jeff Fisher. Yeah.

It's coming home. He did play there. He did play there. He did. Scott Ties. Other news in Iowa looks awesome. And my other note was Arkansas. That crowd was amazing.

I want to get Sam Pittman on the podcast. I think we will get Sam Pittman on the podcast. He is he's a very great college football character. Mm hmm. Yes, sir. A&M is that the is that the worst win of week? Well, they did lose their quarterback. Yeah.

But that had a lot to do with it. They looked weird. They look they look like a team that should not be as highly ranked as they are. That was I'm going to put that up to the quarterback because when you lose your quarterback in the in like the first quarter, it kind of changes everything, especially in college, if you have no like competent backup.

But yeah, college football, I don't know. We'll we'll see. I do think Wisconsin after watching Notre Dame play Toledo, I think Wisconsin might be back. All right. Yeah. So my heart will be ripped out again. Love it.

I'm ready to buy back in. Well, it's not going to be suicidal big cat until you need to string together a few wins at least. It would be so incredible if it was Ohio State versus Wisconsin. The Big 10 championship came in Ohio State had three losses going in. Oh, my God, fuck that. I don't know how they I don't think it mathematically

could work unless they lose to like those terrible teams. It's definitely but holy shit. Would that be incredible? I hope even if they had two wins, I don't know. Wisconsin beat them. I honestly don't know why I opened my big mouth. Yeah, those a lot. I just I heard four wins come from Mac and I was just like four

losses. Yeah, four losses. And I was like, that's that's for Daisy. Yeah. All right. Let's get to hot seat cool throne. Hot seat cool throne is brought to you by our friends at Coors Light, the greatest beer ever created.

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Hot seat cool throne. For the second week of row is myself. This might just be a new weekly segment. Just me fucking up F1 news. I said it was a big week for Aston Martin because Daniel Ricardo won. McLaren. He's not on Aston Martin.

He's a driver for McLaren. So once again. That's OK. I'm sorry. What percentage of our audience do you think really picked up on that? A lot. That's not true.

For the second week in a row, I woke up on Monday to people being like, you fucking idiot. F1 fans are, they're very passionate. Any passionate fan base that you can, you know, piss off in any way. Yeah. Yeah. So.

My bad. Congrats to Aston Martin. But Hank, that's how we improve by making McLaren and learning to do it again. I always grew up the name of the billionaire son. It's the M. I knew it was an M. The shithead that shouldn't be driving. It's either Stroll or it's the other guy.

Yeah. And then my cool throne is award show season. Oh. The Met Gala was Monday night. It's my hot seat. I had that too. And then. Let's talk about it then.

And then the Emmys are coming up this weekend. So it's that time of year. Although usually this is not the time of year for Met Gala. Emmys. Don't care. VMAs was last weekend. VMAs. Hot Oscars.

I'm in for. What else? What's the other one? Oh, the the Grammys. Grammys are the good one. Anything with live music. But I. So my hot seat was going to be the Met Gala

because I just for the 10 millionth year in a row, I still don't understand what happens at the Met Gala. I know they take a bunch of pictures outside. AOC. Your Queen. Hank. Tuxer Rich. Tuxer Rich.

Tuxer Rich. Like the richest group of people ever. But what do they do inside? I don't think there is an inside. I think it's just they walk into the building and then they just like have a drink and they're like, I can't believe that these people think. They all just go inside and like check the pictures.

Yeah, exactly. Their car swoops around and picks them up on the back. From the back end. I think that's it. Yeah, either that or it's like Bohemian Grove where it's just rich people getting together in a room just to get drunk away from cameras. Yes.

Because you have to take those chances any way that you can get them when you're like at that level of fame. Is there music? Is there art? I know there's bathrooms. There's bathrooms. Thank you. Always take bathrooms.

Thank you. It's just a giant line for the bathroom. That's all the Met Gala is. That's big. The Met Gala might also, it's one of those things that just exists for people to get mad at. Yeah. The most, the usefulness of the Met Gala

is for us to look at people who are at the Met Gala and for us to be like, oh my god, the Met Gala looks so lame. I would never go. Who's your favorite look? Kim Kardashian because like I aspire to just wear that much black and look that skinny. She did it on her face too. Jason Derulo.

Jason Derulo falling down the stairs. I thought Jaflak looked pretty good. Nope. They were kissing with masks on. Lib. Uh, yeah. Machine Gun Kelly. Yeah.

Machine Gun Kelly. Travis Barker. Megan Fox. All of them. The whole squad looked good. Conor McGregor. Kardashian. Throwing drinks at people.

That was VMAs. Yeah, I know. We're just combining them now. OK, same event. We're going to say Billy. I like how Billy, we're building like a house. We got the bathrooms done. What else is there?

I think they're just doing drugs in the bathroom. Oh, OK. Yeah. It's just a bunch of stalls. How'd you know that drugs get done in the bathroom? Wasn't it like some selfie and there's like drugs everywhere? Interesting. Probably.

OK. I did see Tyler, our old colleague Tyler, I am, Troll Withers ask what happens at the Met. And then most of the replies were just like very good cocaine. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's, you can probably get those celebrities in town if you're just like,

hey, this is my. Somebody designer drugs. 99% pure Colombian. Yeah. All right, hot seat, cool throne, PFT. All right. Well, I was going to do Met Gala too, but instead I'll call an audible.

My hot seat is just my brain, just my brain in general, because obviously I have to deal with Taylor Hineke on Thursday night, have to get mentally prepared, talk myself into why I want to watch that game. But then I had a thought last night, and I'm almost ashamed to have thought it, but I'm even more ashamed to now kind of be agreeing with that take that I had, which is I wouldn't

hate Mitch Trebisky on the football team. No, he's good. At this point. That's not a bad take. That's not a, that's not even a crazy take. I don't think it is anymore. I thought I was nuts when I thought it last night, but I slept on it.

He's better than Taylor Hineke. And he might be better than Taylor Hineke. He absolutely is. What about Cam? Well, I trust in Riverboat, excuse me, analytical Ron, because he did not invite Cam Newton to come try out for the team when he was a free agent last year. And Ron would know as much as anybody about whether or not

Cam Newton would be a good fit on that team. Listen, Mitch obviously had his problems. He did go to the playoffs twice. And I know that the defense was the main driver of that, but he can do things that don't fuck you up. I like how we're rehabilitating Mitch Trebisky. No, I'm like George W. Bush. No, someone said that to me last night.

They're like, the Giants fans are going through what you went through with Mitch. And I'm like, it's, I feel like it's a lot easier to walk away from Daniel Jones than a guy who, even though for all the problems you had, you still went to the playoffs twice. So it makes it a little bit more difficult in your brain. But yeah, no, Mitch, Mitch, absolutely.

He looked good in that game against the Bears. He looked he looked like a starting quarterback. So I've thought about that. I also heard that Fitzpatrick's out for six to eight weeks now. There's maybe the most local sports radio talk show news of all time. My friend JP Finley, NDC, had a caller call in who is like a lifeguard at a local water park that said that Ryan Fitzpatrick

actually hurt his hip earlier in the week at the water park going down the slide. Oh, wow. Probably maybe 1% chance of it being true. But yeah, it's I'm in a bad place right now. I'm trying to recover from last weekend because as I've said, the season's over, but we bitch, maybe not. I forgot to tell you he texted me and was said that he wanted

to tell you that he's OK. Oh, really? Yes. He said he's S-O-F, sore as fuck. Did he give a thumbs up? I said so I said, how are you doing? And I said, if you thumbs down my question, I will call an ambulance.

OK. And then he said, I'm sore as fuck. Sore as fuck. Yeah, but that would have been funny if I asked him how he's doing and he just thumbs down the message. But he did say he's OK. Yes, he says OK. Thank God.

All right. Also, I crapped my pants last week. Anyways, a cool throne. It happens. My cool throne. It's not even a thing anymore. Yeah, it just happens. It was.

Where? In his pants. My underwear. Where were you? Localized around my butthole. Where were you like on my couch? Yeah, I was on my couch. That's like not even an issue.

That's like, all right, well, let's go change this. And his skitties on the couch. They change your diaper, yeah. I wasn't raw-dogging the couch on my butt, Hank. Well, I don't know, seems to do sometimes. What do you think I am, a couch? No, so no, I was wearing a normal full, I was wearing a full kit, underwear, pants,

the whole nine yards, farted, felt weird, went to the bathroom, checked, bad news bears. Totally normal activity. Totally normal. I've been normalizing it for years. No one should, it's one a year, no problem. We reset the counter on that one. Yeah.

Yeah, I get, I've taken up enough space on this hot seat cool throne, I think, with my problems. Okay, my hot seat, or sorry, I already did the hot seat with the Met Gala. My cool throne is Matt Nagy because he is doing McDonald's ads now. So good for him. All right, I love it.

Good for him. And also he has the entire national media somehow. I don't know what he fucking has on everyone, but Schefter, I like Schefter. Nice guy. Let's leave it at that. Nice guy. Let's leave it at that before I say something

that will be mean and mean spirited. Can I, I don't, I don't want to discount your anger, Matt Nagy. I don't want to discount what you're feeling right now because feelings are never wrong, but I haven't been getting the same vibe from you from the national media. Did you see the Schefter thing? Is it possible that you're seeking out

this stuff to get mad at? I mean, it was watching Monday Night Football Countdown. Schefter said they have a plan, they don't want to ruin him before he's ready. It's look through the list of guys that have sat behind someone. Tom Brady. Don't say he said Aaron Rodgers.

He said Tom Brady, Aaron Rodgers, Patrick Mahomes. Those were his three guys. And Aaron Rodgers fucking hates the Packers now because they sat behind him. And he was behind Brett Fawr. Right. So yes, I like, you might think I'm seeking out, but it's not, I'm not.

It's all been Collins worth because I was watching the Bears and Schefter because I was watching Monday Night Countdown. I do think that Matt Nagy and Ryan Pace somehow have something on certain members of the national media where they're going out and just basically giving their speech for, like they have mouthpieces. Because most people that I've seen in the national media have, you have to acknowledge the fact that Justin Fields

is a better quarterback. Correct. The players know. Nice guy, right? Dude, David Montgomery said Justin Fields has aura. There you go. That right there tells me that everyone in that locker room wants him playing.

Well, I do think that we're getting close to the point where Matt Nagy is going to lose credibility with his team if he doesn't play Justin Fields. He's already lost it. He's more on, I'm not going to say anything else because I don't want to be mean. I don't want to have another like Jake be like Chef. He's a nice guy.

Oh, Big Cat, I've also seen that you and I have been fighting a war on two fronts on Twitter for the last couple of days against Kurt Cousins fans. Yeah. It is, it's something. You guys, I'm just telling you, I've been there. I'm not saying anything about Kurt Cousins to be mean. He was a very nice guest when he came on part of my day.

Very nice guy. We really liked having him on the show, but I'm trying to help you out if you're a diehard Kurt Cousins fan and you're looking at the box score after a game and be like, look, he threw for 300 yards. He's good. Oh, the offensive line is bad, even though he has like maybe some of the best weapons in all of the NFL.

I've said all these things before about Kurt Cousins. I actually think there's a lot of people that agree with us. It's just like, I love arguing online about football because it's just fun. It is. You can argue for an entire morning and nothing gets decided one way or the other. But there was a moment where I was I was like three or four

arguments deep. And then I looked at the guy and he had zero followers and didn't follow me. And I was like, what am I doing? Yeah. So that was that was a let's walk away from this. But I do have fun. I like it.

I honestly I enjoy mixing it up on Twitter. I do think that like there are certain people in the media who don't mix it up on Twitter. And you can tell that they like don't want to get in the mud sometimes and like, you know, talk to people. Talking about Kurt Cousins, though, is it's a really interesting subject for me because he's definitely one of those.

He's one of those ink tests that you can look at and you can convince yourself that what you saw was good. It's the dress. But for me, and I think for a lot of people, it gets tiring doing that after every single game. And eventually you have to be like, maybe it is Kirk after all. And he's had some moments. Yeah, sure.

Yeah. All right, Jake, go. Hot seats, the SEC. So the conference find Arkansas, you're talking about the game earlier, 100 grand for storming the field. I don't get that. You should be celebrating.

Yeah, they just don't want to get anyone like safety-wise. Yeah, but if you pull off an upset one at home, you have to. Yeah, no, I think they will happily pay for that fine any time they do something like that on Saturday. Today, maybe it's not for storming. Maybe the fans, somebody in the crowd did horns down. Not for storm.

That would be a crazy fine for horns down. And then Cool Throne, Paul Rable, calls it a career. Retires. The goat. And there's a lot of MJ versus LeBron, Brady and Peyton. It's Paul Rable and Paul Rable. Session 10 to car. So is he going to keep the league that he created

just so he could keep playing alive? I believe the PLL will move on to your next championship on Sunday. Yeah, let's go. Whips versus Caddx. Paul Rable, the goat. The goat in my mind. End of the discussion.

Billy. Hot seat, all of us. Did anyone pay attention to Marcus Marriota at the beginning of the game? I think it was crazy. I think he broke his shoulder, actually. Yeah. He did?

Yeah, when he got up, he looked woozy. I didn't know if it was his shoulder or feet. It looked like a shoulder. He might have had a concussion too. Maybe a rib. But we all watched an amazing game, and none of us paid attention to what happened in the very beginning.

All right, bro. Football Doc, what's your diagnosis? Banged up. OK. Upper body. Upper body injury. My Cool Throne is mammoths. They're back.

They bring them back. This has been said a couple times, but there's a new startup that's actually gotten funding, $1.5 million. And apparently it's $15 million. Yeah, no, it's $1.5. That's a steal for a mammoth. That's not a lot of funding.

I didn't know if it was that cheap. It's going to be a fucked up mammoth that's going to need braces. $15 million, that's decent. Apparently, it's supposed to solve global warming somehow. What's a mammoth going to do? I have no idea. Eat carbon.

This is good. They're releasing it. Reanimating extinct creatures is going to save us. It is bullshit that we're going through all this trouble for a mammoth, and we still haven't had a billionaire that's put his nuts on the table and made Jurassic Park. Yeah. I mean, honestly, Jeff Bezos, can you just

make a fucking mammoth? Do it. Dinosaurs. Do it. He has dinosaur bones. Doesn't he have that dinosaur bone in his house? Like a huge. That's Nick Cage.

No, Nick Cage has skulls. He has a T-Rex. Yeah, he has skulls everywhere. He drinks out of skulls. All right, thanks, Billy. Let's do Carmelo. Carmelo Anthony. Before we do that, PFT, you got a quick word?

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free shipping, and 100% satisfaction guarantee. Go to meundies.com slash take. That's meundies.com slash take. Now here is Carmelo Anthony. Okay, we now welcome on a very, very, very special guest. Future Hall of Famer. 10-time All-Star, three-time gold medalist, Carmelo Anthony.

American hero. American hero. I like that. I like the American hero. Yeah, I mean, it is a good, yeah. I mean, it is a very, very special guest. There's very few guests that get the three varies when I introduce them, and you definitely deserve it.

So, Melo's got a new book out. It is called Where Tomorrow's Aren't Promised, a memoir of survival and hope. Go buy it. It is about his, you know, childhood up until going to Syracuse, that decision process. So let's start with that. Let's start with the book.

Yep. Going through it, like reliving everything. Was there a moment that you went back and like looked at, and you're like, okay, this is where everything could have changed. This is the fork in the road moment that my life could have taken a totally different path than it did to everything we just said,

three-time gold medalist, American hero. It was a, first of all, a piece to everybody out there. It was a moment when I was writing the book, and I'm just like, damn, like I really survived this. Right. Right, and it's a lot of things that I couldn't make the book, you know, so it might be like some behind the scenes or like, you know, an offshoot of the actual book

that I'll do, but it was just that moment, I was like 13, 14, and like I was losing everybody, his friends and family, and just it was just, I was asking my question, why me? Why are these things happening to me at the end of the day? And I just knew, I just knew I was going left. I just, I felt it. I was on my way going left.

I started doing things that I wasn't supposed to be doing. And I just had a, it was, I wasn't rebellious. It was just like a 13, 14 year old, you gotta figure it out. And I had to make a hard decision. So when you were in Baltimore and you're trying to, you know, figure out what you're gonna do for your next step, I know a lot of people probably wanted you to go to College Park, stay local.

I'm sure that was a conversation that a few people had with you. You know, the ACC at the time, like there was probably some strong pull from North Carolina, Duke, you name it, all those schools. You decided to go to Syracuse. What went into the thought process for why you felt that Syracuse was the best place

for you to go at that time? Well, I was always a Big East fan. You know, growing up, I was always a Big East fan. And my family living in New York and Red Hook, my family was St. John's diehards. Like you walk in my uncle house, God bless it. So you walk in this house, it's all St. John's. So that's all I knew was St. John's, St. John's.

And you watch Knicks games and you watch St. John's games and Giants games, that was it. And I used to always say, man, I want to, I got to play in the Big East. I have to play in the Big East. And as I got older, the Big East was the best conference in the country at that point in time. And Syracuse came and I was like, you know,

it was something about that carrier dome, 30,000. No AC. No AC. Never lost the carrier dome. I never lost the carrier dome. And that's something that people don't talk about. Yeah, I just, I mean, I know that you're proud of that. We actually had Jim Calhoun on the show about a month ago

and we talked about how awesome the Big East used to be. Never losing at the carrier dome is a big time accomplishment. The Big East, the Big East was special. Those tournaments that they'd have sometimes where like at the height of the Big East, when it was just physical basketball, you had all the best teams in the Big East, like all at the peak of their powers at the same time.

To me, sometimes I liked watching that tournament more than I liked watching the NCAA tournament because it felt like there was actual bad blood between those teams. Well, in the Big East, right, I would say, like when you compare conferences, and I'm talking about back then, the ACC had rivals and we all know Duke Carolina,

you know, we know those rivals. In the Big East, you know the rivals and you feel that every single time you go out there and play. Syracuse Georgetown, you said Calhoun, Syracuse Yukon, Syracuse St. John's, Syracuse Seton Hall, Boston College, Providence, like these games was Rutgers, you know, Syracuse Rutgers games.

Georgetown. Georgetown, like I said Georgetown, but it was like when you really get a sense of what a rivalry is, the Big East had it. Yeah, and you had basically the perfect college career in that you went for one year, you won the first national title for Syracuse, Jim Bayheim, everything that's perfect,

best player in the country. Did you, I remember reading at the time, and I've seen stories about it, that you actually wanted to stay. And Jim Bayheim was like, no, you're not staying. Was that real? Was that real that you actually wanted to stay? That's a fact.

You just loved it that much? Bayheim told me to get my ass out of the campus. He don't want to see me no more. I bet not be back on campus. But it was, you know, I was explaining this to somebody on the way here. I wanted to go back because at the time when we started to win, that March, April,

we won a championship to go back on campus. I was just starting to get my feet wet on campus. The weather was changing. First of all, it's 20 inches of snow every day in Syracuse. So the weather started to change. That's when the school started to blossom. So you're seeing people, the bars is open,

the quad is popping, the student center is popping. So you just, I started to be a student again. Big man on campus. Big man on campus, a student, not a basketball player. So I started to experience it from the regular students perspective. So I started going to frat parties and shit. I started hanging with like regular students.

I would just enjoy myself. Yeah. I mean, I could see why you would want to go back, especially after a run like that. And you're right, like upstate New York in the spring, in the summer, it's nice. And it makes you forget about what it's going to be like. Because you would have gone back.

And out of regret, out of the sick. You would have been so pissed off and you would have seen all, you would have seen where you would have gone to the draft and you would just be like looking at your bank account, like, what am I doing? I should have listened to coach. So when you, when you're at Syracuse,

I'm a big fan of the zone defense at Syracuse. Just how it will suck the life out of us. How it just confuses people that are prepared all week for it sometimes. When you're playing in that zone defense, can you tell like in a moment, if like the zone is too big for your opponent, if they're feeling like they're over matched

and just like almost super confused and it's not going to work for them? Yeah, because I mean, Bayon been running the zone for 82 years. So it's like everybody, if you haven't figured the zone out by now, you're not going to figure it out. But as much as I say that,

a lot of people haven't figured it out. And when we, when I was there, it's funny because we never practiced the zone. In practice, we was man to man until like a day or two before the game or something like that. We would practice, we never practiced the zone. We would practice our region on the court.

So you just had to know your region on the court and protect your region. And you know when you're outside of your region, cause something happens. Something might, you know, something's going to happen on your side or whatever. But we never, the zone was just, people just talk about the zone.

All Cerak's you do is play the zone, zone, zone. But it was effective. Why would you change it? Yeah, of course. I mean, it came work in the block. If we wasn't in the zone, we'd have got that block. That to me is like the perfect zone. Like you got a bunch of guys who are super tall, long,

and they just disrupt every shot no matter where it is. And I think what made us special that year was we were long on the wings. You know, I came was on one side, I was on one side. We had Cwepter Wainey up top of six, five, six, six. We had Jerry McNamara up there. We had a seven footer in the paint. So we were, you know, we was getting to our region.

We was closing out. You know, if you could shoot, we would, you know, we was taking that away from you. So to answer your question, yes. It was, it was times where we would play teams and we'd be like, okay, they're not gonna, they're not gonna figure it out. They don't want to fuck with the zone tonight.

Yeah, they're not tonight. Yeah, the zone came to play. Yeah, and then it's something nice to be like, fuck this zone. Well, shoot, yeah, right, right. If you're shooting, it was, it was a couple. It was only like one team, like who figured the zone out. Yeah, it's crazy.

It was Calhoun. Yeah, it's crazy that like, when you can figure out the zone, the zone looks like the worst defense ever. For sure. It seems so easy. Like get a guy on the baseline. Get a guy in the middle.

Get a guy in the middle, shoot some threes. And you're like, wait, this is easy, but it's obviously a lot harder said than done. I like the way you described it. It's like, it's a man-to-man defense, but inside of regions. That's, that's like a really granular way. It's a matchup.

It's a man-to-man zone, but you just playing your region. And you just know, you know, not to let somebody get behind you on the baseline. We know what's going to happen. If the guy in the middle gets it, we collapse, everybody stay home, shooters. So we had it, we had to figure it out.

And then we should throw our own little tricks into the zone. We should cheat it a little bit. We should test you out. But that was like amongst the players that we talked about. So you go from Syracuse, you go to the draft. Legendary draft, LeBron, Mellow, D-Wade, Bosch.

I mean, when Darko got picked, were you like, what the fuck? You know what? I was, I was actually looking to go train against and work out against and with Darko prior to the draft. Especially when I knew Detroit had the number two pick. And I couldn't ever find them. Like they used to hide them in the gym.

They used to like just keep them in the gym. Like nobody could see his workouts. Nobody knew what he was at. And I was just like, man, I want, wherever he's at, I want to go work out with him and against him for that team. Right. You know?

And that Detroit was just like, I actually thought I was going to Detroit, man. Yeah. And that was just a loaded team, yeah. I just knew I was going to Detroit. And that's got to hurt Pistons fans because you added to that team, that's the team that won a title,

what, a year later or something? That year. That year. They were a great team. That year. And you would have complimented them perfectly because they were winning a title, scoring 80 points. Could have used a guy like Carmella Anthony.

And then they traded, they got Rashid Wallace that year. They got traded that and that's what kind of put them over the top. They was already good. Right. But Rashid like really gave them, you know, another personality on that team and a different personality on that team.

That team was so good that they had, I think they had four out of five All-Stars. Yeah. And the one that wasn't All-Stars, Rip Hamilton, who's an excellent player, like an awesome player. Right. Speaking of that draft night,

we got something that I think we want to pull up real quick over here. It's a picture of that draft night. You probably know where I'm going to go with the picture that I'm referring to. So it's, you know. So there it is. It's draft night.

You and I share a similar taste and styles because we both like Jinko pants. I can tell you, we evolved. I can tell you that. Yeah. I would say actually, Kirk Heinrich does you a favor. Kirk Heinrich is the one that always sticks out to me. Although LeBron, I don't know what,

LeBron looks like he's going to a prom. Oh, what? Yeah. I don't know. At the time, everybody on that stage thought like we look real good. Yeah. Like you rolled up there.

Well, did you ask them if they could like shorten the legs of the pants just a little bit? Like just couple inches? No, because that was, that was the style then. What size t-shirt were you wearing when you were like wearing a t-shirt back then? I was, I was 4x, 5x, you know,

it was 4x, 5x, t's. They'd give you a double X, you'd be like, with the size, you know, you had a size 56, 58, throwback jersey on, you know, 42, 44 jeans. I mean, that picture, it does look like the era was crazy. A blimp landed on Kirk Heinrich's pants. The era, that era, that era was crazy.

I love the idea of just, yeah, like you, you definitely are what? Like an XL normally now, what do you wear a t-shirt? I'm a large now. Large? Did you wear the 4x, 5x? Well, it was 4x, 5x. Unbelievable.

I look back at pictures. I'm like, yo, what the hell were we doing? I also love of this era when, like there's pictures. I'm sure you had the same like guys carrying like playstations around to like, you know, on the road. I just love that. Something about that. So it was, so I was a DVD guy.

Yeah. So I used to carry the DVD player. I used to carry the Walkman. You know, I had my Walkman and the iPod. I'm talking about the Wheel iPod. Yup. Oh yeah. The original one.

So that's what I, that's how I was, that's what I was traveling with. Yeah, I think we're all, I think we're the same age. How old are you now? 30, I don't know. You don't want to say that. Yeah. You're 33.

I'm 37. Okay, yeah, we're all the same age. Yeah, so did you ever carry around the camcorder? Oh, for sure. I have pictures out there of me carrying a camcorder. I recorded the Olympics all on a Sony. Like the shoulder one? The shoulder one.

I remember going to, we went to China and I went to China and then I bought the camera. And I mean, there's pictures of me like at the opening ceremony, walking around with the Sony camera, but it was, I went to school for photography. Oh, really? Yeah.

That was like my minor. Got it. They didn't want to give me a major because I guess they said they was sending me on my way after that. Yeah, right. Bayhunt was kicking you literally out of school. But you're getting shots

that nobody else from that program got. Oh, I was getting a lot of shots. That's right. What, so the, when you're in the Nuggets, at the Nuggets and you guys go to the Western Conference Final, I always thought you don't get enough credit for that series because you played great defense in that series. You guys, you know, lost four or two to the Lakers.

When you were like in that moment, it felt like the Nuggets were really building something. Did it, like in your mind, how did it kind of all fall apart where you end up getting traded, you ask for a trade, go to the Knicks? Like what was the demise of, what it felt like was gonna build something long there? What I can say about that is,

in anybody who plays team sports and you catch this rhythm, you catch a flow, you know, you catch a vibe and you feel it like this is it. Okay, we established it something here. And that was the year prior to that, we had AI. And I just felt like we were starting to like, okay, got AI, you know, we will start adding a couple pieces here. Like we really gonna put,

they really doing what they gotta do to put a team together in Denver. And they trade AI, so it was like bittersweet for me. I'm like, fuck, you got rid of my brother. Like, you know, we were just getting it started, but they bring in Chauncey. And I'm like, that was, you know, bittersweet. I'm like, oh, we get rid of AI, I'm mad,

but bring Chauncey, cool, like I bet. So then we just started building like, and you just felt the culture shift. And like we started winning games, we started feeling good about winning games, like we was going into games like, if we do this tonight, we'll beat them by 20, right? And so that was like our mentality.

Like we was just going into games and like with one goal and one focus, and we, you know, with a whole list of things that we had to do in between, but if we took care of that, you wasn't gonna beat us tonight. And that was something Chauncey bought to our team. He bought that cerebral kind of energy to our team

to make us think the game as opposed to playing it physically. Like we had to really think the game with Chauncey. And I just knew after we went to the Western Conference finals, I actually thought we were supposed to beat the Lakers. Yeah, that was a competitive story. I always say we was two inbound passes away

from going to the finals. And that feeling was like, oh, we gotta get back here again. So let's, all we need to do is maybe plug and play two guys here and there. I think we was looking for another shooter, you know, alongside with JR, we was looking for another one. And I think we was looking for maybe another big

or something, we was looking for something. And they get rid of Dante Jones, who was a very pivotal part. He was like a connecting tissue. My former teammate. To our team, you a dookie? No, I played on the basketball tournament first year. He was on my team.

Oh, he was a, okay, okay. Yeah, no big deal. I was kind of his enforcer. But I can show you where I had his back. Yeah, yeah. No, but he's a glue guy. We both can speak on it. He was a glue guy.

Yeah, we can both speak on this. He was a glue guy. So when they get rid of him, when they got rid of him, I'm like, no, you don't get rid of, like, sign a guy. I mean, he asks for a million, one more million. He's a pro's pro. He's a pro's pro. He asks for another million.

If you give him another million, he'll take it. I know he got other money somewhere else, but if you give him this million, he's gonna take it. And we talked about that. And they didn't, and we lose him. And then that was the effect. That was a domino effect. They wasn't gonna resign Chauncey.

They was thinking about trading JR and trading Kenya Martin. So it was just, at that point, I didn't want to rebuild after going to the Western Conference finals. That's also an interesting point because one thing I love about basketball, I don't think it's the same. It's definitely not the same in baseball,

probably not the same in football too, where chemistry, team chemistry matters so much in basketball. It's underrated. And yeah, like I think that we forget that sometimes. You find that with the way that it has evolved where it's Saber metrics and everything is on a spreadsheet that sometimes people in the media are just forgetting like, it matters if like the shooting guard

and the point guard like each other. Oh, for sure. I mean, you know, if I think Jay-Z said it best, if the team got, if the point got beef with the big, I put the champions, I put the ring in jeopardy. And that's a, that's a true statement. Like if you don't have chemistry with your teammates or on the team, I don't care how good you are,

you're not going to win. Right. You know, because you're always second guessing something or you always might see it your way and you might see it your way and we might not see out of eye. But if we sit down and we build that chemistry, then the way you're thinking, the way I think, we can come to a common ground and make something work.

So I just always think that chemistry and bonding and basketball, I know with us, it's a must. You have to. So the people who's watching and just, you know, media and people who announced in the game with just spectators, I think they know that, but I don't think they understand how, you know, how important that is for us.

We have to have a chemistry. That's why it's training camps. That's why it is team bonding events. You go here with teams, you work out, you train because a lot of that stuff happens off the court. I feel like you have to care enough about your teammate to understand why they're doing certain things. That's off the court and that's also,

but that translates 100% on the court. Yes, that takes a special individual to go about it that way, you know, to kind of learn everybody in their surroundings, what you like to do, what you don't like to do, when you like to go to sleep, what you like to drink, what you don't, what you eat for breakfast, how do you work out, how long you in the gym?

And all of that stuff comes into play. And that's why, I mean, I truly love basketball because when a team does hit that point, you see it, you see it. It's incredible, it's incredible to watch. It's free-flowing. Yeah, right, it's like poetry in motion. Absolutely.

It's just everything works perfectly and you can see that they know where they're gonna be before they're there. Yeah, it's like when you're watching a game and you just be like, somebody can make a crazy pass, a no-look pass, they just knew that guy was gonna be there. That's chemistry.

That's stuff that's been, that wasn't luck. That's stuff that happened way before. I knew my guy was gonna be there. Yes, yes. So you get to New York and I always, I felt like you got a bum rap with the New York media. I never thought that you got a bum rap with the fans. I feel like the fans of New York loved you

because you wanted to come to New York, right? You were the one that stood up, you said, hey, I wanna be on the Knicks. Probably going back to when you were watching them, you know, as a kid playing. Do you ever, do you have any animosity towards the New York media that like, they're not easy to deal with.

They try to stir up animosity sometimes. Yeah, the way I look at it is like, that's their job. You know, and coming into New York, I knew what was that state. Like, forget on court. Like, I just knew what I was about to face. And I was ready for that.

You know, I sat back as a fan of New York sports. You know, I've watched how they handle Marbury. You know, I've watched how they handle A-Rod and Manning and G. You know, just everybody who came through New York, I've watched them, how they did it. And I studied it. You know, like, I studied Jeter, right?

I studied A-Rod. I studied Marbury and how they was handling different situations where Isaiah Thomas as in the front office and as a coach. Just New York sports as a whole, I studied that. So I knew, okay, I ain't gonna play that game. I'm not going on that path. Right.

I'm gonna just be here. I'm gonna be honest with them. I'm not gonna lie to them. I'm gonna be straightforward. I'm gonna speak to you when losing draw. You know, regardless of what you ask me, I'm gonna answer your question. And at first, I don't think,

I thought that they maybe thought that I was full of shit. But as we went along, it was like, you know, some of the media started to flip on my side because they realized, okay, this is very organic and authentic coming from him. So I just, I never played in media games because I know you can never win with that. Yeah.

So I knew that coming into New York. How many times did you watch the I'm Coming Home video? I still watch it to this day. I love that answer. You were the original. I can't lie. You were the original. Yeah, I still watch it.

I still watch it to this day. It was the most incredible video. Like I don't care about the Knicks whatsoever. And I was told that you were on the Knicks. I was like, this is awesome. You know, it was a moment in time and in history. And as sports fans, and me being a sports fan of other sports,

we don't get those moments. We don't allow ourselves to cherish those moments. It's like on to the next, oh, this one, okay, cool. That's one, but when we did that video, it was like I had to make a lasting impact on New York. Not just the Knicks, but New York, the whole state of New York. And even if you wasn't from here,

you felt like, yeah, like a damn, I should have been in that moment. I should have been at that moment. Yes. That was the feeling that we was going for. And we accomplished that. I'm so happy that you answered it that way. Cause like, if I were you, I'd do the same thing, you know,

just on a random Tuesday night, just be like, yeah, I'm just going to pull this up and watch this real quick. Get some loose bumps. Come on, man. I watch it all the time, man. Because again, I don't watch it for the actual game. I watch it just that moment.

Because I also know what I had to go through to get to that moment. It made me like envious of New Yorkers. And that would never be a thought that would occur to me. Like, honestly, that's why I always would feel like, not indebted to New York, but like, this is mine because I've never seen anybody receive or get received like that.

And people came through. Like Michael Jordan came to New York. He played with Chicago. But I've never seen like somebody from New York sports franchise come into a city and be received that way. The doors are open, open arms, embrace, hug. You're ours now.

Yeah, and there's something like romantic about Madison Square Garden and the Knicks, they haven't been great. Like there's an energy that I think is like an elusive energy that people are trying to recapture that is just something special. It's, listen, moments in the garden are moments in the garden.

You can't recreate that, you know? You gotta let the moments happen. What's your favorite moment ever in the garden? I think that one, like that, and not even playing just like walking out that tunnel and waving is just like seeing the video. And they wouldn't show me the video prior to that. They was just like, man,

we just gonna give you a nice introduction. You know, you'll come out and I come on, you can't do this shit before the game. I got goosebumps. Yeah. I might shoot the ball over the basket. Right. I'm so hyped, but it was a great moment, man.

And you know, that was one I think, I know we play Chicago. I think that was St. Patrick's, St. Patty's Day or something like that. Sent us tied the game up and won the game with the two game winners. So that was a moment. The 62 point game was probably the top.

What, so I told you before we started that I still, I'm a Bulls fan, I still contend that if you had joined the Bulls in 2014, that team would have competed for a title. So walk me through that. I have a question first and it's gonna be creepy. And I know the answer to it, but I gotta ask it anyway. Do you know the answer?

Yeah, you probably have no idea who I am. You probably never, never on your radar, but I did go on a hot dog strike for you to sign with the Bulls that summer. I only ate hot dogs for dinner for like two weeks straight. I tweeted at you every day being like, please come. Probably it was the hot dogs. I wasn't gonna reply, I wasn't gonna reply to that.

You're not a hot dog guy? I just wasn't gonna reply to him. It was never gonna work. It was just every treat. The hot dogs, it got me. I packed on the grill, I'd be like, Mello. I couldn't respond to the hot dogs. Three of them are for me.

Come to Chicago. He actually answered the question, like it would not have been good. It wouldn't have been a good fit for you to be in Chicago if you don't like hot dogs. Yeah, well, you like hot dogs. When he messaged me and I just saw the hot dogs, I backed off for that message.

Never offer another man your hot dog. I got it, I got it. It might have been tampering too now that I'm thinking about it. But let's talk about that because I do think you were the perfect fit for that team. Was it the fact that the front office and the coach, well, the coach thought the front office was spying on him,

which actually I think was true. Did you catch wind of all of that? Oh, see, so you getting it from the other side. No, I just know how dysfunctional it was. Because you're a Bulls fan. Yeah, right. So that's what I'm saying. So that's helpful to know.

When I'm about to say my answer. OK, all right. Because you're giving it to me from a different perspective. Tom Thibodeau thought that Gar and Pax were spying on him, which I think was actually true. I don't know. I don't know what was going on. I just know I'm a very, I go off for energy.

I go off for vibes. And when I get to Chicago, the vibe was there. Joe Kim was there. D-Rose was there. We talking about it. And I'm sitting there just like, I want to make this happen. I feel like if it's going to be a time for me to make a move,

this is the right move for me to make. And then I leave and I go to a couple other cities. It wasn't the same reaction and vibe and energy. But I'm starting getting these texting calls like, man, this shit is crazy over here. We don't know who want to be here. And I'm like, I'm not about to leave one of them's type of situations

that go toward another time, the same situation. I'd rather just come back home. I'd rather just stay where I'm at. So it is kind of true that the front office and there, I've always thought that they're, at least in that regime, they've changed now. But that regime had trouble landing big free agents because that type of word gets out there around the league

where it's like, hey, it's a little dysfunctional here. Yeah, I think it was. I don't know, but I've never heard of Chicago as dysfunctional being an outsider. Oh, it was. And John Paxson choked Vinnie Delnegro. I've never, I've never, I've never heard of it. But you would see things, you would read things.

You see reports on different players. And you just be like, well, what is going on over there? Would it have been a good fit though? I think you would have, because it was the, you were the offensive piece that needed to be added. They was a great, gritty team. They needed to score. And they needed, they needed somebody else,

somebody else to score the basketball. It was, I thought it was too much on D-Rolls as a point guard to try to score, get everybody involved, lead the team. You know, he was MVP, but that's still a lot when you don't have that, that robbing with you. You know, Batman or whatever. You know, you don't have your other superhero with you.

Yeah. You know, you just have a great team, a well put together team, a great coach. But when you got to do it, when you got to do it yourself, even though you can, when you got to do it yourself, it's tough. Yeah.

I'm glad you brought up the Batman Robin because I'm about to ask a question that I'm going to hate saying, but I have to ask it. So Batman Robin, 80 LeBron, which is which. Who's Batman and who's Robin? Yeah. I'm a Justice League guy too. Okay.

So I know the original Robin and I know the new Robin. Right. I watched Teen Titans and all that. So I think they both Batman. Come on. But I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to say this. I think they're both Batman.

I think at times I think AD can be Robin. Right. LeBron could try to be Robin, but that ain't who he is. He is Batman. You know, he Bruce Wayne. AD can be Robin. He can switch it up. And that's how I like to, I like to say that.

Now they both Batman, but AD can be Robin a little bit more than LeBron can be a Robin. Yeah. How frustrating was it when you were out of the league knowing that you were still better than a lot of guys in the league? Cause I, you know, I'd see the videos. I am convinced that, what's the gym called

that you guys all work out at here? In the sky. Yeah. I'm convinced the rims are slightly bigger cause no one ever misses in that gym. It's a shooter's gym. Yeah. Right. Exactly. It's a perfect.

It's a perfect gym for the Instagram. But how frustrating was that? Because you're sitting there like, I'm still better than a lot of guys here. Why am I not playing? Yeah. And it was my runs too. Like I was, you know, I put the games on. So it's like, I don't even want to go to my own runs

because it's like, I was embarrassed. You know, I felt uncomfortable being around like other, you know, my colleagues, other players. And just at that time away from the game, I was like, at first, and again, it took me back to why me. Like, why is this happening to me? Like out of all people, why me?

Right. Is this karma? Is this, what did I do wrong? I started reflecting back on just things that I've done in life. Like Dan, does this have anything to do with it? And then I just had to get away from it. And I had to just say, you know, basically it's fuck it.

Like I don't care about the game no more. Yeah. You know, the game, the game don't, didn't love me the way that I love the game at that moment. So when that happens, you got to walk away from it. Yeah. When did you know that the game started loving you back? When did you start feeling that?

Going into the runs, playing, you know, playing pick up. I mean, the game, that never went nowhere. That would never go nowhere. And then I started traveling with my son and his basketball team and just being around family and kids and, you know, having conversations with them and them still looking at me and thinking like, man, you should be in the league

or you should be, what's going on? And where are we going at? We can't wait till you get back on the team. And, you know, who's that player? Why is that player? Like it was, you know, a lot of that stuff. So they, you know, the kids really gave me that energy back. Yeah.

I feel like that happens with artists, with athletes, with musicians, where, you know, it becomes, no matter how fun your job is, no matter how perfect people think that your life is, doing the same thing over and over, it'll have a grind on you. It has an effect on you after years and years. And when you see it from a different light,

from like a kid's mind, it kind of reminds you of where you used to be when you were thinking about whether it's your art, your music, or your sport. And it kind of rekindles that a little bit in you. Well, it rekindled the fire. I can tell you that because you start, it took me to say, okay, I'm done with it.

Like, you know, I had to put it in perspective. I was 15, 16 years in NBA. Not many people could say that they accomplished that. I really, I stood on that. Those 16 years, I did what I had to do. I wanted to do any championship. I couldn't, I didn't do it. Fuck it, I'm cool.

Like, I'm gonna get away from the game with basketball. But I had to really come to a hard stop. I don't want to talk about the game no more. I don't want to watch the game no more. I don't want anything to do with basketball because I'm completely done with it. I'm on to my, I'm on to something else. And the more time that I was off,

the further and further away that I was detaching myself from the game of basketball. And I started to see it differently. I had a different perspective on the game of basketball, the business of basketball, and just how to maneuver it. Cause I never got a chance to step out of it and look at it from a different perspective. I always had to go off of somebody else's perspective

and what they think and what, you know, what I should do and what they think I should do and so on. So when I got away from the game with basketball was really when my whole perspective on life changed. And I started really believing like, basketball is not who you are. It's what you do, but it's not who you are. So don't allow yourself to be sulking on the couch.

And you had two, three months to do that. Like now it's time to put your big boy pants on, man up, stand up and get the walking. And that was, that was my mentality. Yeah. So you just mentioned something about how you kind of came to peace with the fact that you didn't win a title. Now you're on the Lakers.

I can't come to peace with this one. Yeah. Like odds on, I mean, I think it's either you or the Nets, odds on favorite to win the title. Do you feel that pressure going in? Like this is the best chance I have. Yeah, this, this, I mean, I don't feel the pressure. I embrace whatever is happening.

I know what's, I know what's at stake. But I know, like I said, I know it's at stake. Right. Like I'm not naive to that, you know, but I don't feel, I don't feel the pressure right now. And I don't, I don't feel pressure. I get, I get anxious. I lose sleep.

I think you're describing pressure. Wait, but so. No, that's, that's, that's, that's when you, when you thinking, you up thinking, you just up and you just trying to figure it out. You're not, there's no pressure. You just want to make sure everything goes smooth. Everything goes right.

I would imagine. And I want to make sure I do what I got to do. Right. To be, you know, an integral part in, in whatever team success we have. And maybe this is wrong, but a lot of athletes we talk to, they have that feeling of like, all right, I don't feel pressure.

I have anxiety before a game or something. But once I'm playing the game, this is what I've been doing my whole life. Yeah, but it's different because I don't, even though I'm setting anxiety, I do a really good job at compartmentalizing, right? And this, if, if, if this is what I got to deal with, I'm going to deal with this.

I'll deal with everything else as, as I move along. But I know the situation that we're in. I know it's at stake. I know we all know it's at stake. And I know the mindset that we have right now. And it's, and we haven't even started doing anything together yet. Right.

I know where we at. I know based off of reactions. I know based off of conversations. I know tone of voice. I know tone of conversation. And I know how locked in guys are. And if we do what we have to do, we'll give ourselves a good, a good chance to get there.

And once you get there, you know, anything, anything can happen once you, once you get there. We just want to get there and give ourselves a chance to win a championship. Yeah. How concerned are you with the new ball that's coming out this year? Have you shot with a new ball?

The Wilson? Yeah. Yeah, I shot with Wilson. I had to get used to it. Is it different? So it's a little bit different. It's a little bit different. Would you say that it's like, you remember a few years ago

in the NBA, switched up the ball? It wasn't that. No, no, no, it was not that. The reason I'm asking is I'm trying to figure out what to bet on if I should just bet all the unders. The sticky ball. Oh. Yeah, yeah.

That ball was bad. I can't tell you what to bet on. Yeah. All right, I got two steps. All right, let me ask you this. Are you a better shooter with a new ball or a worse shooter with a new ball? I adapt.

OK. Good answer. I mean, I assume. Me too. I would imagine it's just, is there ever a time where you're just like, this is so fucking sweet that I'm this good at shooting? Is that a dumb question? No, it's not a dumb question.

People ask me that. Yeah, because I would think that. Like, how do you, like, people would say, how do you, how do you, how do you get your shot that way? Like, how? And I'd be like, man, I've been playing basketball for 30 years. Right. I've been practicing this for 30 years,

and I'm still practicing it. So just the way somebody can tell you you need 10,000 hours to anything you do to be successful, I have maybe double or triple that, quite triple that those hours that I put into my craft, which is I'm reaping what I sold right now. Yeah. That's the benefits of what I, of the work that I put in. All right, so I have two stats for you.

I'm not, I hate stats, but go ahead. OK, these are a little bit, don't worry. These are a little different stats. Don't worry about it. The first one is the, I got it fuck out of here stat. So I don't know if you know this, but TNT audio dropped 16 times per 48 minutes when Carmelo Anthony was on the court because you were swearing so much.

Did you know that? I did. I've, I've heard, I've, I've, I've heard tone, tone it down. I've heard it. I've heard it. I love, I mean, you should just keep playing the way you're playing. Don't worry about that. You can't change a player's game in a night.

Yeah. The other stat. So 2015 All-Star game. OK. At the time, it was the most points ever scored in an All-Star game. I think it was like 168 to 157. I was here in New York. Yeah.

OK. You played 30 minutes. Yep. You had zero assists. Yep. How? How? Yeah, how?

Nobody was making shots. There's 167 points scored. Or 300, yeah, 300 plus. See, that's knowing your personnel. Yeah. You got to know your place. When you on a team like that, you got to, you do what you do best.

And everybody would tell you, do what you do best. Because if you don't, you got all stars on your team. Yeah. So why would I try to come in and be a passer when I have a passer on a team? It's true. Why would I come in and try to block shots when I have a goal to block shots?

That's true. I'm not, I'm here to score. Yeah. I like it. And this is, that's what I'm going to do. Yeah, it's a really good point. Yeah. Was there ever any moment this summer

when the US national, when the Olympic team got off to like a slow start in some of their qualifying games? Were you like, or not qualifying, but the practice games that they had leading up to it in Vegas? Were you thinking like, hey, maybe I should just give pop a call? Because like. No, because again, we talk about chemistry earlier. And you need chemistry.

Like you, you talk about guys who just, even though we compete against each other every day and we play some guys play with each other on each other's team, it's still, you can't put that together in two, in a week and expect that you're going to be successful. So I've been, I've been part of USA basketball since I was in 11th grade. You know, I played in four, four Olympics, you know, I know what it is to put these teams together quick.

I know in 04 we put that team together in two weeks and we went over there and got our ass wet. And but I also know what it, what happens when you take your time and put the right pieces together and build that culture and look at us. Now we three gold medals and after that world championship, three gold medals. So that's your question. No, I knew we was going to win. We the best in the world.

I don't care what nobody say. I don't care how much the rest of the world is catching up. You know, they're learning from us. They're only catching up to us because they're learning from us. And I embrace that. I embrace the international play. I embrace the new guys that's coming in. But we're still the best in the world.

And we had, regardless, we didn't have the, you know, the top, top of the top, the cream of the crop, but we still that those guys are top of the top. Yeah, you know, and what they do. So I knew they would get it. I knew they would get it together. I never had no doubt. What is it about the the international game specifically that makes you such an awesome play? You are a captain America for for the United States team.

Is it just like you've had the experience you just said yourself like you you've been a part of USA basketball for so long. Or is there something specific about the game? I can adapt. Like what I what I can do, my skill set, I can adapt anywhere in any type of game. You know, so the USA game, that was an easy game for me. You know, international game is an easy game. Again, I'm playing with the best players in the world, not in the country, in the world.

So when you in a court with four to four other best players in the world, you just do what you do. Yeah. And it wasn't complicated. You catch your shoot if you open, you swing it and pass it. If you're not and just be just be ready for whatever, you know, whatever we need. And that was the mentality. And I found myself having success in an international game because this is just my take.

I just think that my game flourishes when I'm on a court with other great with great players like that. You know, because they respect me. I respect them. We know how to we know how to make it work. I don't need, I don't need, I can go get my own if I really wanted to. So I don't need somebody to spoon feed me. I just know my place in the game.

And when you playing with the best of the best, you just got to find your place in the game. And that's what I did. I found my place on the USA team and I've had success with it. It's kind of like when Kevin Durant talks about playing with the Warriors and obviously from a fans perspective, people were mad when he made that move. But when you hear him talk about it, he's like, this is the most fun I've ever had playing basketball. How could you, how could you not, how could you not enjoy that?

Right. Like if you have the opportunity to do it. I mean, now, before it was different, like early, early when we first came in NBA, it was no way I was going to somebody else's team. Right. You know, it was no way I was going to play with Kobe. It was no way I was going to play with T-Macket. Like it was, it was just no way, you know what I'm saying?

Because it was the mentality was different. The game was different. The situation was different. Everybody had their own situation and made the best man win at that point in time. Now it's like, you try to do that now, your ass will be out the league. Because it's, it's impossible for anybody to do that. Yeah. It's, it's, I don't want to say it's sad, but it is sad because it's, it's, it's impossible.

It's impossible for you to try to go do it by yourself. And I know guys who still have that mentality, who want to do it by themselves, it's just impossible. The problem with that is it wears you down over the years if that's your mentality that you stick with for forever. Because unless you're the top of the top, unless you're the one that's, you know, winning multiple rings, you're going to have that chip on your shoulder and pretty soon that chip's going to be a boulder and it's going to just kind of like, it'll drag you down

mentally. That's when the pressure, that's when the pressure comes on. Yeah. When it's just, you feel weighed down, you feel bogged down, you feel like no matter what you do, it is just not going to be enough. And you're not speaking about anyone specifically who still acts like that, like someone maybe you were a teammate with last year or anything. No, no, no.

No, okay. All right. Got it. Who are you referring to? I'm a column. Dame is, you know, Dame is, everyone's like, hey, Dame, go somewhere else. And it's like, you know. See that the thing is people don't know Dame, right?

And Dame don't speak, Dame, you know, Dame quiet, Dame is in Portland, Dame doing his own thing, Dame chilling. And the minute that he says something, it's like, oh, he went out, oh, he want to leave, oh, he want to do this, oh, he want to end up, but don't nobody, it's nobody speaking to him. Yeah. So I know, I know him. So I understand what's going on with him and how he's thinking.

Now I always, we'll have these, these, these man to man conversations and I tell them, look, you got to take care of yourself at the end of the day. I've been in your situation. I'm not telling you to leave. I'm just telling you that whatever you need, whatever you want, whatever you feel like will get you to that, to a ring, then you have to, you have to make that happen. Yeah. And it's not about being disrespectful.

It's not about, you know, going in and kicking out of the door, saying, no, you go in there, you handle your business the way that you handle your business. And you go from there. And if it don't work, it don't work. That's, it's, it's, it's life. Yeah. People move on in life. Yeah.

So we have a couple of minutes left. We're going to, I have a last question that I'm going to ask you about your memoir. Where tomorrow's aren't promised a memoir of survival and hope. But I have one, before I do my last question about the book, I have the toughest question you're going to ever get in your press tour. And I'm sorry that I have to ask this, the banana boat, not getting invited on it. Was that the worst moment of your career? No, I thought she was a great moment of my career.

I dodged the bullet. I dodged the bullet. I dodged the bullet. You got left out. You got left out. You know what? I didn't get left out. I didn't get left out.

They was already down there. And I was meeting them. Oh, this sounds like someone's getting left out. But keep going. No, I was, I was, I had just flew in and we were going, we were like taxiing to the, to the boat. Right. And they were already in the water doing water sports.

So as I get to, I see them as I'm going to the boat on the banana boat. And I'm just like, what, what is this? And they're like, come on. I'm not getting on that. I'm not. I'm not. You were invited. You turned it down.

You were invited on the banana boat. Informally. It was like, it was the hand wave. Right. Come on. It was that. I want to know what a formal invitation to the banana boat looks like now. We're going to wait.

Yo, this is the plan. We get on the banana boat. We'll wait for you to land. Right. We'll get you on the banana boat. They send you a calendar invite. Yeah. Right.

That's a, that's a formal invite. If you had been on the boat. I wouldn't have been on it. I wouldn't have been. No. I wouldn't have gotten on it. But, and I don't like using but with that being said, I am, I am an extension. I am a banana boat family.

Like we are, you know what I'm saying? Like they got on me one time. Why you keep saying you ain't a banana boat? Like, all right, man. Fuck it. I'm going to be part of the banana boat. Fuck it. I wasn't on it.

And like, you keep arguing. You keep fighting it. I'm part of the banana. You give off the boat vibes. Yeah. You're an honorary banana boat member. I give banana boat vibes. It's a compliment.

We recreated the picture. Yeah. With you guys? Yeah. And Ryan was there. Okay. His bodybuilder. Yeah.

Okay. So, you know, we, I just wish you had been on the banana boat. That's all. I felt bad. I was like, where's Noah? You know what? I know everybody wish I was on the banana boat. Yeah.

Because that's the picture everybody want. Yes. Other pictures cool. It's so funny. They want to see Mello on the banana boat. Yes. Listen. I think it's perfect the way it is.

Let's do this though. If you win a title this year, I think you got to get on the banana boat. I think you got to recreate the banana. No, if you win a title, you get on the banana boat. No hell no. Why? Then what does it matter? You've done everything.

Your entire career. You've done literally everything. Yeah. Except the banana boat. Right. So. I'm good. You win the title.

Get on the banana boat. I'm gonna be thinking about a banana boat if I win a title. It's the last mountain to climb. That's all you got left now. I won't be thinking about that if I win a title. What's going to happen is you're going to win a ring. You're going to go on vacation with the fellas and you're going to be drunk. And a banana boat is just going to happen.

That's the worst time to get a banana boat. It's just going to happen to be next to a banana boat and you guys are all going to look at each other and be like, are we doing this again? We're getting the band back together? Hell no. I'll take that right now. I have one more visual aid I'd like to show you real quick. I just want to get your take on this picture.

It went viral a couple months ago. It's you and Buddy Bayhime. Is that wild or what? That's wild. Is that wild? That's wild. Because then he was in the NCAA tournament. Yeah.

Right. That was wild. It was wild. I agree. Because then he, yeah. It's wild that he took them. How deep did they go? No.

Where did they go? Sweet 16. Sweet 16. Wild. And now the other Bayhimes on the team too. Jimmy. Jimmy came back. Yep.

Wild. Just wild stuff. Just wanted to point that out. That picture was, I mean that's actually a moment though. Right. Like we talked about moments earlier. Like that's actually a moment to see that picture and to see what he's at right now. Like that, to me, that's a special picture for me.

Yeah. Because I, you know, that was him when I was in the locker room every day. You know, he comes sitting next to me in the locker. He come and pulling me. I play one and run and chase him around the locker room, chase him in the arena. Like it was, that was our relationship. Yeah. And to see where he's at now is a special feeling.

It's awesome. And that looks like maybe a 4X, 4XL shirt. Yeah. That was from the flea market too. Okay. After we won, I went down to the projects in Syracuse and it was like a flea market and they spray painted it. I love it.

I think it was 5X. 5X. Okay. Yeah. All right. My fault. My apologies. All right.

So we're going to wrap up. Next question, the rowback question. Go to rowback.com, performance zips, t-shirts, everything. We actually have a performance zip for you, but you're probably not going to take it, but we have it. Rowback.com, use code PFT. You get 20% off. Use code PFT.

You get 20% off. All right. So the book, everyone should go buy it where tomorrow's our promise and memoir of survival and hope. People read this book. What's the one thing that you hope they take away with them from the book? You know, honestly, like I want, this is more for the younger generation. Because I still feel like I'm the connective tissue to a couple generations.

And why I'm still able to speak and that younger generation still listens to me. I want them to feel like they have a voice. I want them to see my story and hear my story and feel like, damn, if he really did it, not just somebody putting together some pictures or a story. This is me writing my own story from my perspective. And that's what I want everybody to just know that it's cool to be vulnerable. It's cool to talk about things that's uncomfortable and be comfortable being uncomfortable. And I don't regret anything or how I grew up, what I've been through.

I don't regret none of that. And because that's my foundation of who I am today. So what I'm saying is, what I want to say is, it's a universal message also. It's not just for boys, it's not just for young girls. It's for any and everybody around the world who's going through some type of struggle and looking for some type of light at the end of the tunnel. So that's what I hope everybody get out of it. And on top of all that, stay mellow.

When in doubt. Stay mellow. We can do a whole other hour about stay mellow and everything. But this has been awesome. Carmelo Anthony, we really appreciate you coming by. We've been looking forward to this interview for a long time. Indeed. I appreciate you guys.

And I would say good luck. But I don't like LeBron. You know what? You good luck. I'm rooting for you. I'm rooting for you. And I'm rooting for AD. You know what?

I think you're like Ross. I think you're Batman. Yeah. I'm Batman by nature, though. Just, you know, I'm... That's so fucking cool to just say that. Batman by nature. You know, I'm a...

I am who I am. Yeah. Yeah. Well, thank you. Captain America. Yes. Appreciate it. They can be Batman and Robin.

Yeah. Captain America. Appreciate it a lot. Thanks, man. Always. Thank you. That very, very, very, very, very special guest, Carmelo Anthony was brought to you by Cross Country Mortgage.

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Okay, let's wrap up. We've got guys on chicks. Henry, we're back. I want to say real quick before we get to guys on chicks. Terrible news today. RIP, Norm MacDonald, maybe the greatest. One of my favorite comedians of all time. Agreed.

It was kind of crazy after the news came out on Twitter. You could just hear people in the office pulling up various routines of his and listening to them on their phones or their computers. It made me happy to hear that stuff because Norm's jokes, I mean, there's something about Norm that makes him just a uniquely talented voice in a very crowded field. He's one of those guys that it's very rare to see, but he made other comedians laugh so, so hard. And when you see that, you're like, Oh, okay.

So this guy, that's, that's funny, funny to a different level because not just making, you know, regular Joe's and audience members laugh is making some of the funniest people. He's the funniest guy in a room with full of comedians. Yeah. Yeah. RIP for sure. All right, guys on chicks is using the fan app or real fan for white noise beta. It sounds like you're trying to drown out your thoughts so that you can go to sleep.

Big Cat recently said overthinking is beta. What? Addison Ray recently said overthinking is hot. What? So are you, the question is, are you guys settled? Are you guys using the fan app because you're trying to drown out your brain? Yes. Absolutely.

I use it just because it's like, I don't know. It's there's, we live in New York City, like a fucking trash truck can come by at four in the morning and just start throwing shit into the back. Like I don't want to be woken up by that shit. They start construction. There is no rules with construction. No, the fan app is still confusing to me because I've tried to listen to it. Well, it's just a fan.

I don't, the fan app. Yeah, I know. It's just a fan. I don't find anything, I don't find anything soothing about it. It's just white noise. It misses that part of my brain. White noise is not soothing to me for whatever reason. It's just for, it's really just because I live in New York City and I don't want to deal

with anything that could wake me up in the middle of the night. What's up? Please help a sister out. What is the deal with a chick seeing you pee? My husband and I are very comfortable with each other. I mean, he's been on the business side of two births. Help me pull stitches out of my hey nanny nanny after our daughter was born. And yet if I come too close while he's peeing, he literally freaks.

I think he's worried I won't want to give him head if I see pee physically exit the same hole. Ha ha ha ha ha ha. I don't know. Is this weird? Is this all guys? Just speaking for me, but like I don't care. I don't, I don't care. Yeah, I don't know.

I don't know what's weird about. I think, why would you ever be afraid to pee in front of a girl? I think the only, the only thing I can think of is he probably pees all over the seat. He doesn't want to be that probably is something he's hiding. Might have bad aim. Yeah, but I don't, this is not a thing. Your, your husband is weird. Is he, are you married to Ed Sheeran?

He's, he's jerking off and peeing at the same time. Hey, PMT gang. We recently moved into a house that has a microwave in our kitchen island that my husband refuses to stop calling a dick microwave. Yes. Well, he's correct. Whatever someone new comes over, he insists on showing them our dick microwave. I've asked him to stop calling it a dick microwave, but he insists. He says it is a sign that we've made it.

It's actually, it's a convection oven. How can I get my husband to stop telling all our friends and family that we have a dick microwave? You can't, you have made it. That is, we were so stupid to not realize that that is truly the sign of like being financially secure as having a dick microwave. Yeah. As many things as you can have in your house at penis level. Yeah. There's something like subliminal about that.

The only way that you can get him to stop calling it a dick microwave. If you call it a dick microwave before he has a chance to. So when you're giving the tour, you jump in and you're like, that's the dick microwave. And if he hears you say that enough, he'll just stop doing it. Or you could. I don't think that's true. You could store your dildos in the dick microwave. He would probably stop talking about it then.

You're like, what? I, I got confused. He said the dick microwave. And then he'd be like, wait, you have this many dildos and they're that big? Damn. Football is back boys. I need some advice. When my boyfriend pees, he sometimes drips a couple drops of pee on the bathroom mat in front of the toilet.

Normal. When I go to use the toilet after him, I sometimes step in his drips of pee when I'm going to sit down on the toilet. Is this a normal thing guys do or should I make him clean it up each time? It sounds, I mean, not to judge because listen, it takes all body types, but he just might have a short dick. It sounds like he needs to, you might need to hover. Yes, agreed. Get over the target. Just squat.

Yeah. One thing that always, you know, I've never really been a huge fan of the fly system because I feel like whenever I do that, I end up getting some of my leg. Like it's hard. Dribble? Yeah. It's hard to get it all out unless you really, you know, go over the paint. I agree. It's childish.

I feel like this is something children do, but it's like, I've had bad experiences with fly. I've been having some issues because my son likes to walk in while I'm peeing and he likes to close the toilet. He doesn't know when I'm about to be done. He doesn't know there's something that comes after like, you know, all your pee and then there's that last like, all right, it's actually a lot of pee. He gold tends. He fucking just shuts it right on me and then I just pee all over the place. Hello. This is a chick.

I would like to know what your impression of girls who went to beauty school instead of college are. Honestly, not sure if there's a topic for these or if they're just random. Anyways, don't talk shit because I'm in beauty school. Okay. Why would we talk shit about beauty school? I have no problem with beauty school, although there is a very specific type of girl I think about when I think about beauty school. I don't know why they do great job on other people, but they always have like a giant highlighted stripe through their hair. I got no problem with beauty school.

Come on. That's that keeps the world going round. Honestly, what do you learn in beauty school? Just makeup and hair and is that it? Waxing. I think a lot of, yeah, hair nails nails. I mean, if you ever try to give yourself a haircut, you know, you know, you know, you know what I mean? Nails.

Nails. I mean, if you ever try to give yourself a haircut, it's not, it's not like super easy. So I, I respect all barbers, beauty school, all that stuff. All right. So I don't even remember this, but this is someone responded with an update about my boyfriend was small junk. I took your advice and just pulled out the toy. It did not go over well. Oh, no, we gave that advice.

He immediately got mad and was asking why I needed it. No. Didn't have the heart tell him the truth. So he stormed out. Oh, no. The bus ended up having a good time. Okay. Well, here's the thing.

I don't remember giving that advice. I don't regret giving that advice at all. And you know what? It worked for you because if he got that pissed off and that insecure that he left, that's not a guy that you want to be with for the long term. That's not a guy that cares about you. Yeah. It is a small dick. Yeah.

Self fulfilling prophecy, small dick energy. Yep. To get that upset. All right. Last one. I say the more toys, the better. Yeah. Bring them out.

Bring them out. Keep that motherfucking thing on me. Big cat. PFT. Jake. Dot, dot, dot, dot, dot, dot, dot. Hank ranked in order of best podcast voice. Rude.

Uh, what was it? I have a terrible podcast. Billy. Billy big cat. PFT. Jake. Dot, dot, dot, dot, dot, dot, dot. Hank.

Okay. No Bubba was listed on that list. And then I mean, that's got to sting for Jake. Jake's really the big loser in that for not being number one. And also Billy's definitely going to use this in like the end of the year review when he's like, well, reasons why I should take over part of my take. This one chick said that I have the best podcast. Studies have shown that I got like a pretty sweet voice.

Yeah. Sample size. I've listened to PMT a little over a year now and I love the podcast, even though I know absolutely nothing about sports. Love it. Neither do we. I think your guys banter is hilarious. Thank you.

Problem is my ex-boyfriend, that is even worse because it's just like, she's just being brutally honest. And she wrote, there's so many dots before my name. Yeah. That's actually true. Not that it's in my head about it. That is true because she's not really even listening for the sports. No.

She's just listening for the voices. Right. She is the best person to judge that. The. The pro. I mean, I know I have a bad voice too, but. I don't think you have a bad voice. No, I do.

I do. I think we all have below average voices in general. I think I've got a terrible voice. We just have voices. Jake has. No one has remarkable. Jake went to school for this voice shit. Yeah.

That's true. Sorry, Jake. The problem is my ex-boyfriend is the one who introduced me to PMT. It also came to light that he is a cheater and a scumbag. Fuck him. I'm now finding it difficult to listen to the podcast without wanting to text him funny shit that was said on the podcast. Advice?

Thanks. He'll know who he is. Oh. All right. So text him this. Fuck you, buddy. You should have cheated on this fine piece of ass. Me.

Mm-hmm. Big cat. Just making sure she knew I said that. I don't like the fact that we have people that cheat that listen to our podcast. Yeah. So that guy's disavowed. Yeah. He's not allowed to tell him he's banned for the rest of this episode.

Mm-hmm. Probably because he likes my voice. He likes your voice? That was probably a big disagree point that they had in the relationship. Mm-hmm. Definitely. All right, Billy. Any recaps?

Yeah. This is now our number one voice. So the hardest part about... She just likes bros. Yeah. Your voice sucks. Yeah. I know it does.

Your boyfriend cheated on you and is a scumbag and you also are attracted to Billy, huh? I can kind of figure this one out. Okay. Harsh. But McGregor and MGK both caused a scene on Sunday night at the VMAs and that made everyone realize that they weren't at...they weren't invited to the Met Gala. So it kind of... MGK was definitely...

MGK was at the Met Gala. MGK was at the Met Gala. He made out with Megan Fox, while Kardashian was making out with Travis. No, that's yesterday. Actually, you're right. No, he's right. Because he's right. Because all the pictures...

Billy's right. Yes, Billy's right. But MGK was at the Met Gala. Yes, but he is right because they presented Kardashian and Megan Fox presented together at the VMAs. Yeah. Yeah. So we're all right.

Wow. I have no idea. Billy deserves credit here. Billy's extra right. Good job, Billy. I think, yeah, because the whole thing was about McGregor wanting a picture with her in that see-through outfit. Yeah.

Anyway, Gronk is also the biggest stolen valor guy. Why? Why? He's been stealing valor. Why? He wants military insurance. U.S.A.A.? Yeah.

He ruined the joke because he's actually trying to get insurance. Is he on U.S.A.A.? He's been trying. I actually think if you win a Super Bowl, you should be allowed to get into U.S.A.A. What is he doing? Haven't you been seeing the commercials? He's the spokesperson for... U.S.A.A.?

He keeps trying to get military insurance. I think he's crossed the line. Is that the point of the commercial where he's trying to get U.S.A.A.? But he can't because he's Gronk? Right. Whenever Gronk's on my screen, my brain just shuts off and I'm just like, okay, there's Gronk. He's trying to claim military benefits.

I assume this is for LMFAO's greatest hits. Improper benefits. Okay. I knew Gronk are the same guy. No, but he's the more military stealer. Like if you could be one football player, you could be one U.S.A.A.? If you could be one football player in the world, you would have been there. He's the more military stealer.

Billy's career aspirations are to marry into the Gronk-Hauske family. Someday I want to be a Gronk. Yeah. Okay. Nice. All right. Numbers. You mean eight?

Nine. Seventy-seven. Ninety-five. I don't think ninety-seven exists in here. It's never been pulled. Forty-one is out and thirteen is out. Male giraffes, headbutt, female giraffes till they piss. Then they drink the piss to taste if they're pregnant.

Sixty-five. Bonk. Sixty-five. It's a big time bonk. Love you guys. I'm coming for your love, okay? I'm coming for your love, okay? I'm coming for your love, okay?

I'm coming for your love, okay? I'm coming for your love, okay? I'm coming for your love, okay? I'm coming for your love, okay?