The Ryen Russillo Podcast - The Thunder’s Ceiling This Season, Plus Reassessing Which QBs Will Be Replaced This Offseason With Mike Sando

Episode Date: January 3, 2024

Ryen opens the pod with how good the Oklahoma City Thunder have been this season, after a victory over the Celtics on Tuesday night. What does the future hold for the young, star-studded franchise (00:41)? Mike Sando of The Athletic joins to detail the Russell Wilson-Sean Payton debacle in Denver, and which teams will be drafting QBs this offseason (22:15). Plus, Life Advice! The guys revisit the extortion story from yesterday, and one guy wants to sell some expensive shoes he was gifted (57:43) The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please check out theringer.com/RG to find out more or listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Host: Ryen Russillo Guest: Mike Sando Producers: Cliff Augustin, Steve Ceruti, and Kyle Crichton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I was going to do this at the Thunder Lost. I want to talk about who they are right now and who they could be moving forward. Great win for them. Again, beating some good teams, winning against the Celtics. We've got Mike Sando. What happened with the Russell Wilson thing

and what does it mean for the future of that position with Denver? And then every other team potentially making a change at quarterback as we close out the regular season. And life advice. This episode is brought to you by Uber Eats. Winter is here, so be prepared and get almost anything delivered with Uber Eats. What do I mean by almost anything?

Well, you can't get a ski slope, but dish soap, definitely doable. Sunshine, that's no. A bottle of wine, yeah. And a snow day, again, no. But blueberry muffins with the delicious crumb topping, total yes. Get almost, almost anything delivered with Uber Eats. Order now. Alcohol and select markets. Product availability may vary by region. See app for details. Starting with the NBA today and starting with the headline, which is very obvious, and that's the Thunder's win against the Celtics at home 127-123, one of the best regular season games, a lot of anticipation, finals preview, who knows? I want to get to all of that kind of stuff. It's funny, as I was watching the game, I go, I think the Thunder topic is what I want to open with, even if they had lost

a close one. Now, if they've gotten blown out, the timing of this wouldn't be right. There's an aside, too, of all of this where I think how different we would talk about the NBA if there were just one game a week, because I still think the way the NFL is discussed week to week, where you just have these results, then they have to mean something because you have six days in between the next game, where with this many NBA games, even though I know no one likes a long schedule, there's enough games to kind of get lost. So you don't really feel like you have to have every result mean something. So even if the Thunder had lost, I probably was going to do a big positive Oklahoma City Thunder segment here today.

And they were in control of this game. I know it got close there late, and it was a really nice win to go along with a bunch of wins that they've had here recently. So let's spend some time on Oklahoma City. They're one game behind Minnesota in the West. They beat Denver this week. That was 119-93. They held Jokic to 10 field goal attempts and zero free throw attempts in that game.

They beat Minnesota earlier, 129-106. They shot 61%, had 10 less turnovers than Minnesota. SGA had 40 against Denver, 34 against Minnesota, and last night he has 36 against Boston. If you look at last night's game, the reason Boston was able to kind of stay in it because Oklahoma City was just lighting it up immediately, they had 17 offensive rebounds, and Oklahoma City actually took 12 less free throws

because there are some Thunder games where I'll look at the result and be like, okay, wait, was Shea cooking at the free throw line here again? Where I do feel like in this, I feel like there's a spike in free throws for the high usage guys which could be its own math explanation of yeah sure higher usage i need to dig into some of this stuff with this free throw debate that's been going on for a couple weeks here because i know what i see and i still feel like offensive players initiating contact are being rewarded at a level that's just bad for the game but that's that's another thing i need to

spend more time on because i know there's some math that could dispute it. But with SGA, whenever I watch him get to a free throw barrage night, I feel like a lot of them are more warranted. Hey, an up fake and the guy gets up off the ground and you up fake the jump shot and then lean into him, that one I'm okay with. That's the one that I'm like, dudes have been doing that forever. Guys are doing that in the backyard right now. So I don't have an issue, I feel like, with SGA's big free throw

nights as I do with some other players in the league. The first thing I was looking for were defensive matchups. I mean, it's the first thing I look at, is there anything in there? And specific to what Boston wanted to do is they wanted to put Porzingis on Giddey for a good chunk of this game. It's how they started to allow Porzingis to roam off of Giddey, and that completely backfired. Giddey hit two threes in the first quarter. He was, I don't know if this term, I don't know if I like it or don't like it, but I've heard it, so I'll just use it because I think it makes sense. It showed a maturity level with the Thunder. There was a few plays in there where

like, okay, wait, if the game plan is to ignore Giddy, then Giddy needs to be more shot ready, right? Don't dick around with the basketball here. Know that you're going to have a lot of space. And I thought Przingis was late on a bunch of closeouts too, but it was also asking him to do a lot to help on drives because Oklahoma City just feels like it's this constant, it's this succession of curling drives of players with the ball in their hands, getting angles, decent-sized guys, if not big on the perimeter, getting in, getting physical. You saw Shea bump Derek White off of him.

You saw Lou Dort on some of these drives. They had to change the defensive assignment a couple times with Shea, and it didn't really matter. He's just that good. He gets wherever he needs to get on the floor. He's very crafty. He's fast when he needs to be fast. He's slow when he needs to be slow. Sometimes he looks like he's really slow out there, but he's standing two, three feet away from the rim. You're in front of him and you're actually helpless because he's going to get the angle. He's going to give you the little fake. He's a below the rim player that's like unstoppable when he's in close. So when I'm watching this defensive deal, Giddey starts

firing from outside. Now, when he came into the league, he was 26% from three to then 33% last year, 37% this year. His numbers are down across the board because he's actually playing less minutes as his team gets deeper and deeper. 31 minutes per game last year, 25 this year. But there was a play that I think spoke to how just connected this Thunder team is. Late in the first quarter, it's 22-19. Kenrich Williams drives.

He knows based on playing out the first quarter that if Porzingis is aligned off of Giddey, then he's probably helping to my drive. Kenrich knows it. He throws a ball back out to Giddey at the three-point line. The pass is essentially back behind him, like over his head. But it was all because of his understanding. And this can sound really simple. Hey man, they played it out for 10 minutes like this. He should be aware of it.

Hey man, I see plenty of teams or players that never figure this stuff out. And once they knew the defensive rules for Porzingis and with Giddey and what they're going to try to do, Kenridge is like, yeah, sure. I'll just drive. I'm going to take you left. I get closed off. I'm just going to throw it back out to Giddy. He's wide open, dribbles in, baseline runner, another bucket for him. I loved that play. Loved it because it showed that Kenridge was thinking about another option as opposed to, well, I have the ball in my hands and I'm in the paint, so I guess I just have to shoot it. Presti, when you ask about Sam Presti, the man who's in charge of this roster, because if you ask him, he's not going to tell you anything.

Trust me, we've tried to get him on the show a couple of times. I appreciate the annual Tribe Call Quest text that I usually send him once a year or something. And that's about it. But look, I really like him. He's been super nice to me but he is not one that is going to share and good for him right but he whenever I ask other teams I'm like what do you think he's doing what do you think he's doing the constant and this is played out with the construction of this roster the constant that you hear from other teams is that Presti wants,

and I've shared this before, but I'm going to hammer this point now because it played out this way. They want multiple decision makers. They want a bunch of players out there who can have the ball in their hands, who can hit a shot, who can dribble drive, who can pass, can move, can reset on the perimeter. If they're bigger, even better, right? Because that's also what he's done. But when you watch them play and you run through

the roster, you're like, okay, these guys are all multiple skill set players. SGA is that. Giddy is certainly that with his playmaking and the improved shooting. Jalen Williams, J-Dub, incredible scorer. They went with SGA a bunch of times and then to close the game, they went with J-Dub, incredible scorer. They went with SGA a bunch of times, and then to close the game, they went with J-Dub twice, where they actually worked him into a Tatum switch, and he got Tatum on a step back because they're that comfortable with his scoring ability and that decision-making in that kind of game. Now, granted, it's not game seven, but that was a big game last night, and they're like, we're cool.

Let's actually run something different here, a different action, and get the ball out of SGA's hand. We'll run a switch and you're going to be in control of this possession for two attempts in a row. That's incredible stuff for a player that's that young. Dort has a little bit to him and beyond the defense, but if he has the ball in his hands, I don't know that you're like, look, you're not going to ISO him all night, but he's not helpless like some of these other 3 and D players. Chet is multiple. All right. Chet allows you to do different things. And on top of everything else, he's going to draw your other big away because you have

to respect him so much as a shooter and the ball handling. Look, I know there's a bit of a Chet Wemby thing going on here. Like Wemba Nyama is still based on projections. The guy you take 10 out of 10 times. Minyama is still, based on projections, the guy you take 10 out of 10 times. But Chet, as of today, looks much better getting into his offense than what Minyama does. He just does. He also has a way easier job because the team around him is really good,

and it's actually like there's a plan there, where San Antonio is just not as good, obviously. Look at the standings. Not breaking news. Cason Wallace, another one of these guys who can do a bunch a bunch of different things mitch he brings the ball up for him i've seen him in games this season where he's running the possession um usman jang my guy the reason they took him is because he's like six nine and learned how to play at a pick and roll in the australian league last year so this is who they are this is what other teams knew they were like, hey, why are they

driving? Again, it wasn't like they predicted all this stuff, but they're like, it seems like this is what Presti wants to do. And it's exactly what has happened. And when you watch them close games, they're like, these guys are all pretty smart and they're all a threat in not just individual ways, but multiple ways. So let's look at some stats. They're fifth on offense right now in the league. They're third on defense. They are a little lower in the total passing numbers.

Despite how much I've talked about their passing, their total passes per game, you track that kind of stuff. Look, Dallas Clippers are always at the bottom. Oklahoma City is kind of like middle of the pack, but a lot of that's because SGA is just so good running this isolation stuff. You start looking at the drive numbers for SGA, you're like, my God, this guy's just like you almost with Tatum. You're like, hey, do you see what happens when you just keep driving the entire time?

Because Tatum's drive numbers are actually really good. They're just low. If you look at some of the other field goal percentage stuff, they're third in field goal percentage. They're number one from three in the league right now. They're number one from the free throw line right now. One thing I really liked, because I started looking at some of the shot chart stuff,

the restricted area, they actually aren't as high in attempts as you might think with SGA, but that's because their mid-range stuff is really good. If you go from 10 to 14 feet, they are fourth in attempts per game from that area of the floor, 8.8. Atlanta's number one at nine. So basically Oklahoma City is right there with

them. But here's the outlier. Miami, who has, I think they and Atlanta have the most attempts in that 10 to 14 foot range on the floor. Miami's converting 43.6% of those shots. Oklahoma City's converting 53%. That's the best number in the league from that area that nobody's supposed to shoot from. But as we've learned in the past, kind of like with that Devin Booker, Chris Paul, Phoenix Suns team, where you go, well, yeah, but if your guys are really good at making those shots, it's okay, especially because they're open all the time.

And Oklahoma City is better than anybody else in that range. The only other team that's over 50 percent from that range is Milwaukee and there's a hand maybe half the league is like in the 30s from there like incapable of making that shot if they're even attempting it so they defend they shoot it and they have a closer in SGA last night for a good reason this is the stuff I think that's fun and we keep coming back to it it starts to turn into a bit of an SGA Tatum thing. If you didn't know, and you needed this reminder, they're both still 25 years old, which feels like, wait, Tatum's still like, what? He's 26 in March. SGA is 26 in July. So only a few months of separation. Look, Tatum has had the better career. So if you feel like Tatum is still held in higher regard than SGA is,

and maybe he is, I don't know if that's going to happen after this year. And I'm going to share a couple of numbers with you that maybe puts that one to bed. But Tatum, look, he's had the better career. He's had the bigger playoff moments, you know, losing in the finals and losing against Miami. To me, those are not like devastating. These other guys can't even get out of the second round. At least he's doing that. I know it's not perfect. I know the Celtics offense late is always something we're going to be a little worried about. I've done a deep dive on that, trying to find the numbers that show us anything. Some misleading numbers in there, but he's had way more playoff success. SGA's had 13 playoff games to his career.

However, if you want to say today that SGA's the better player, I'm not going to tell you you're wrong, and the analytics would back you up in a big way. These numbers are pretty surprising. I didn't even know it was this much separation. You go to the last two years. I know PER isn't perfect. Windshare is 48.

But look, Windshare is 48. That tells you if you're a stud, all right? There's no flukes in the Windshare for 48. If you're playing a lot, the number one guy in the league is Embiid. Number two is SGA. Number three is Jokic. Number four is Giannis. Number five is Halliburton. All right. So right now, if you look at win shares per 48 the last two years, Tatum was at 0.185. SGA last year is 0.226. This year, Tatum is actually down a bit from last year at 0.163. SGA is at 0.310. I know that number may not mean a lot to many of you listening, but what I'm telling you,

what I'm promising, you have a three at the beginning of that. That is like all time stuff. Okay. And that also speaks to how absurd Embiid stats are that he's actually ahead of SGA at this point. So the metrics, the PER, 24 and 21 for Tatum in the last two years, 27 and 31 for SGA the last two years. So these last two years, we've seen a massive Gildress Alexander jump on what kind of player he is.

And when I say it out loud and I listen to the whole thing, the playoff success thing is real. I can see people still fighting for Tatum. The metrics are telling any Tatum backer right now. You're not even close and you're getting hammered this year and comparing those two players. And again, these are not I know people kind of all these all the made up. These aren't made up numbers.

I mean, somebody made them up. But if you're like, I'm not telling you, Josh Hart's sixth. Shout out to maybe one of the best social media guys going to the game. So now what? They are the media guys going in the game. So now what? They are the second youngest team in the NBA. 24 years, that's the average age of this Thunder roster. Only San Antonio is younger in the NBA this season. These teams do not historically win NBA titles.

All right, let's do some history. The youngest team to win a title, the Portland Trailblazers, 1977. Average age, 24 years old. Same as the Thunder. Hey, man. Okay, but that was 46 years ago, guys. 47 years ago. So it wasn't recent. It wasn't recent. So what's the next youngest team? Do you remember the 55, 56 Philadelphia Warriors? Because I don't. Are there any recent teams that were young that won a title? Well, I have one for you.

It's the 14, 15 Warriors, average age 26 years old for that roster. So that's pretty good. There's something there, right? Because normally a young team like this Thunder team, where it is certainly new-ish, as good as they look, and all those numbers I've just shared with you, and a real guy, a real number one. But again, you can't truly be a real number one unless I see you have some threats in the playoffs. I'm not saying you have to get to the conference finals every single year,

but I think you understand what I'm saying. At least they have that. But the recent history of all this stuff, like if you go to the 10 youngest teams that have won titles, four were in the 1970s, five were in the 1950s, and then you have the 2014-15 Warriors. It's more about when you look at the Thunder, it would be a little dismissive to go up. They're young, whatever. They can't win it because really, I think it's about the West and the West this year. Is there anyone that you're that scared of? You have to pay respect to Denver.

And I know, you know, with Gordon out for a little while, Murray was gone for a bit. I could see them like, I think it's human nature a little bit after that title to cruise a bit. What we know now, whatever playoff issues we were worried about with Denver's defense, maybe some of that stuff, it wasn't enough to derail them, and then they rolled towards the end. I mean, they were clearly the best team in the NBA last year.

So I think you always have to kind of put that one, but is it insurmountable? It would be a big ask for a team with no playoff real seasoning to go up against Denver and beat them. It also depends on kind of how the seeding plays out and whether or not they'd be getting four on the road in Denver. Then the rest of the West, I know Minnesota's ahead of them. As we mentioned at the top,

Minnesota's late offense is starting to really worry me. It is, and that's a huge worry to have going, what will that offense that looks like it's struggling and trying to find its identity late in regular season games, what will that look like in the playoffs? Who knows? Maybe it gets kind of fixed. The rest of the teams, the Lakers, you want to buy stock in them right now? I know it was a brutal December schedule with some of the stuff they had to go through. And sometimes the story is told in the month and how that's playing out, because I want to go back and look this up.

I don't know if it's Oklahoma City that has this brutal January. Because the Philadelphia 76ers had a really easy schedule there for a bit. It felt like, man, are they playing Charlotte and Detroit again this week? Anyway, the point is, I don't know that it's about the age as much as you go, who are you afraid of the start of 24 that much in the West? And I don't think there's a perfect answer for it, but it's still early enough to know that it's probably going to change. I think the last thing that I'd ask on this is that we know about the trades that they've made and the stockpile of draft picks. If you look at Sam Quinn's piece on cbs.com, who did a really good job of explaining this before the season started, just laying it all out, Oklahoma City from this point on to 2030 has

15 first round draft picks and 22 second round picks, but only nine of those 15 first rounders are guaranteed to be first rounders. As of today, five can become second rounders. The Utah pick could expire by 26 if it doesn't convey. And I think the question to finish here would be this. Do we need to think about the Thunder's assets differently because they're this good right now? Because whenever you talk about them, oh, well, they can trade for anybody. And you're like, yeah, but Presti's smart. He's not going to just trade for a guy knowing he's moving all these picks. He's not going to pay the three good first round price for the next mad all-star knowing that the next mad all-star is never picking Oklahoma City to

be his top destination. Now, we can sit here and pretend like, man, they're really good. Why wouldn't an all-star want to go there? Look, I'd still be shocked. There'd be nothing funnier than if Durant demanded a trade back there, Phoenix gets bounced early, but that's just an aside. I think there's probably even some LeBron jokes out there if Oklahoma City were to go on some kind of run. But the reality, the non-meme evaluation of this, the reality could be, all right, so I don't think Presley would just give up a ton of picks for somebody he can't sign, but did he know that they would be this good? Could we look at the Thunder going, all right, whatever, we'll pay the price because we have

a chance to win a championship this year, which is the entire point of doing the job where we have such a surplus that I can pay the higher price knowing I'm probably not retaining this guy, but that we add a dude that makes them the clear, clear favorite in the West. Because they might be it right now. It's just too early for me to completely sign off and say it's Oklahoma City and everybody else. But they could look different and even better because of the way they're positioned. The NFL regular season is wrapping up, but there's still time to get in on the action with FanDuel, America's number one sportsbook. Right now, new customers get $150 in bonus bets guaranteed when you place a $5 bet. That's $150 in bonus bets.

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great time to have Mike Sando on. Love talking about the quarterbacks and the futures with them. And you can read his most recent piece on the athletic, trying to get into a timeline of the Russell Wilson stuff, which I know has been news for a few days,

but I think it plays into the overall kind of transition that a lot of teams are going to be looking at. So let's start. Look, you know the Russell Wilson story, I think as well as anybody. You even, when the trade had happened, you were like, hey, man,

he's really been declining here in Seattle. I understood. Denver, you know, when you're that desperate, it's gone wrong for you. Every transaction, every decision at that position, you're just like, whatever, we'll go here. And I thought maybe it would go better. It went terrible last year.

It's slightly better this year. But the real story is the ask for him to waive the injury guarantee or move that date back or be benched and now we're kind of left with trying to figure out what the timeline is so can you take us back to like the beginning when you'd heard rumblings about there being an ask from management side to russell wilson yeah so i guess we found out since then uh russell himself confirmed that it was that bye week, whatever, October 29th, I think I'd heard, I was hearing some things, you know, not that long after that, that he actually had

a wave to guarantees of what I had heard. So, you know, I didn't have enough information to certainly report it. I just sort of sat on it. And then as time went on, I was getting more and more curious and I had some people, you know, who can look at the contracts, right? There's people in the players association side and on the team side who can actually look at the deal. And I finally asked somebody, could you look at this and see if it's been changed? And it had not been changed, but sort of the whole time, just, you know, knowing what I know too about not just Russell Wilson, but Sean Payton, I was kind of waiting for a spot along the way for them to bench him and thinking this is going to be coming sometime. And it just didn't come. And I think Payton alluded to it. They were, you know, they won some games on turnovers and

that sort of a thing. And so when it finally did happen, I don't think it was a huge surprise that Sean Payton wasn't in love with Russell Wilson. But the way Russell characterized that negotiation or back and forth that they basically had threatened him to bench him if he didn't change the deal was confusing because they didn't bench him after that. Then we learned the NFL and the Players Association were involved. So I don't think we have the entire full story. But as I wrote Monday, the fact that Denver

or no sources close to peyton or the broncos they haven't really pushed back on russell's version of this so it feels to me like some version of that happened you know and that just spells even more the end to me it's it's uh not something you would do right to somebody that was in your plans yeah i read your piece and i was like oh maybe that happened and then you would do right to somebody that was in your plans yeah i read your piece and i was like oh maybe that happened and then you would counter your own position and i'd be like oh well that makes a lot of sense there too because you feel like peyton's never afraid to say anything so if you thought russell wilson was full of shit then he would say something at this point like he

clearly doesn't like the guy uh i found it ironic a little bit that russell wilson decided to actually give us an answer with any real depth to it for the first time in forever um but i also think he's so worried about how he's perceived like this was so embarrassing for him that he was like all right i will tell you my version of things but you're right he played seven more weeks and it may just have been that denver got a little scared because i mean how rare is the ask when you talk to other people around the NFL, how rare would this to be? Cause you know, look, NFL contracts are kind of renegotiated on the fly all the time anyway, but this is such a big number. It's the quarterback. Um, what was the reaction around the

league? Yeah. That it's not uncommon to ask for certain things to be changed in a contract, but this specific thing is unusual. Like people couldn't think of a time you would go to somebody and say, hey, let's forfeit some injury guarantees. That's a little bit more fundamental to going to hit the books or, uh, you know, certainly there's been pay reductions or things like that have been talked about, but, but to fundamentally give up guarantees, um, is not. So I think people, most people found that to be kind of, you know, a little troubling or not, not looking good for the Broncos on that side. And the fact that they, like you said, they haven't counted it. Now, the other thing you said is interesting.

Like Russell Wilson has a lot of pride and obviously cares a lot about, it's embarrassing to be demoted, right? I mean, for anybody, especially to be on that high of a platform as he is making all that money. We saw last year how important the status was to him. Everything was about his status, right? I mean, he's posting pictures of his house and everything was about being a star. So it has to be a tremendous come down, you know, a big humbling thing. right? I mean, he's posting pictures of his house and everything was about being a star. So

it has to be a tremendous comedown, you know, a big humbling thing. So you could see in that moment, maybe if that happened to you or me, that you would want your story out there and you might convey that, uh, Hey, I was really sort of wronged by the team because that's what the focus has become. Uh, so that's was my initial suspicion really was like, okay, is he just saying this part because it makes him seem sympathetic? But I think that's pretty cynical way to look at it. If the Broncos don't suggest that, right. There's been no inkling of that.

So I think you have to take Russell's reaction a little bit more at face value. Like we said, that's been hard to do because everything seemed kind of contrived, but it's really the balls in the Broncos court to tell us it wasn't that way. Yeah. Like I've seen some people go like, Hey, he's better. I remember even get up having a segment where it was like, do we owe Russell Wilson an apology? And it's like, no, you owe it. You should write a thank you note to the defense because they were forcing like a remarkable number of turnovers.

I think there were like 15 turnovers in four games and we were tracking it the whole time. And yeah, he's better than he was last year, but last year no quarterback would even have kept his job, but they had already made the investment and all these different things into it. So look, no one, this isn't breaking news. Anybody listening to me talk about Russell Wilson on this podcast, because I think everybody knows that I haven't been the biggest fan, although I know that I've been fair about how good he was at times as a quarterback I remember at ESPN even arguing for him to be MVP

I think over Brady until like the very end it was clear Brady was going to win it so the reason I say all those things is like kind of your point like I just wonder if he had handled himself differently if Peyton would be more willing to work with him and not want to embarrass him because this is embarrassing and it was embarrassing on the sideline for a guy that's been in the league and has the resume Russell Wilson does to yell at him the way he did but I also wonder like when you're in the building with the guy if that was that's Peyton going I can't I can't help it anymore uh I think the simple answer is like hey when you have a 37 QBR and a 50 QBR and you're supposed to be the guy in back-to-back years, then everybody's going to be frustrated with you. But I wonder if his own personality had actually finally put him in a position where everybody is collectively out on him.

I think there's two components to the Sean Payton rejection of Wilson. One is what you said, like here's a Bill Parcells type coach coming in who can't stand the quarterback as the diva, right? Everything that Russell represented last year just goes against every fiber of Sean Payton's being. Yes, Drew Brees was a star, but he wasn't like that, right? And so I think Sean Payton came in with this huge power, you know, his ego probably a little bit on overdrive with some of the comments he was making. And Hey, this room is only big enough for one star, right? It's going to be Sean Payton. It's not going to be Russell Wilson. So that's not 50 QBR Russell Wilson. Right. But then the other part of it is, yeah. But what was Sean Payton specific complaint about Russell

Wilson early in the year? Cause early in the year, they were going back and forth, and then it kind of died down. I think Sean Peyton just sort of said, hey, you know what? I'm going to stop trying even anymore, and we're just going to put the offense in a shell, and we're going to babysit this guy like he's a rookie. That's what happened.

That's how you can have the decent stats, but we know you're not really playing. And I think that was Peyton's frustrating with russell wilson's inability in his opinion to run the offense at the proper speed and tempo taking all of this huge amount of information and being able to go go go go go right when you think of drew breeze you think about super processor in charge of everything and this coach can have his quarterback be an extension of his everything he wants to do offensively and so the first month of the season was sean payton going we can't get out of the

huddle in time oh we had to call time out look we'll wristband it if we have to okay another slap another slight and that went on for a while. And then, like I said, I think we got to that point in the season where he just stopped complaining about it almost he was frustrated, but it was like, okay, you know what? If we're not going to be able to run the offense the way I want to, then we're just going to throw one yard passes every week. And my quarterback's going to be nine of 14 for 87 yards in the through about two and a half quarters and then when we really have to go you look he'll hit on some big plays down the field there'll be some off schedule stuff but when the quarterback russell wilson complains and says hey let's go two minute let's go up tempo

all the time that's when i'm best sean payton goes yeah it's not a sustainable offense kind of in another sort of diminishing way. Right. So clearly there's a, there's a disconnect there and Sean Peyton doesn't think he can run his offense how he wants to with Russell Wilson. And that's the crux of this whole thing. If he thought Russell, look, if he thought Russell was just a little, uh, in front of his skis and the ego stuff and all of that, uh. I think he'd tolerate that. He would push back against that. He would shape that if he thought Russell Wilson

could take this offense and really run with it and go to where he wants to go with it. That, to me, is the number one deal breaker in the whole thing for Sean Payton. Yeah, look, when you started looking at the throw charts when they were winning games, and I'd see the next-gen chart for Russell Wilson, even if you were watching a game,

it's not like I'm watching every single pass attempt for the Broncos on a busy Sunday, and then I go back and look at those throw charts and be like, well, this is – but it's just how we are with wins and losses with these quarterbacks, and we start having these awful segments. All right, so last thing on this. He's still owed all this money. What happens?

Well, I think that they will release him. I don't think they would be able to trade that contract. So I think they would release him, you know, before that fifth day of the league year, this would be sometime in early March. And then they would have a period where instead of his contract counting, I'm going to guess like 40 million, it would count like 80 million until June, start of June. And then 40 of that would be pushed off into the future year. So it creates some real challenges for them.

I mean, I don't know if they're going to. They'll probably have Stidham in the mix, and maybe they draft somebody or whatever. But I would think Russell Wilson would have to be on a different team next year. Now, they're going to try to sell the idea that he could come back and all of that, but I just don't see how you do that i don't see how russell wilson would want to do that when he knows he's kind of been disrespected here right yeah i think there's there's like it's like two paths to the same ending right and that is did they have to do it this way

if they knew there was no version he was coming back for the 24 season? They probably didn't. And that'd be the part where I would side with Russell Wilson, where I'd go, you didn't have to do it this way. You didn't have to ask me to move this injury guarantee for next year and tell me you were going to bench me if I didn't do it. And that might be the tea leaves of all of this. Well, then he played seven more games. So maybe the NFL, PA, and Kessler, and these people get involved and are like, you can't do this.

You can't do this. Like, we know you guys can do this. Oh, yeah. But you can't do this. And maybe that's why Denver steps back. That's why Peyton hasn't. Or maybe we're getting the sit down in February with Peyton where he tells his version of it but didn't want to do it.

But again, the season is kind of lost at this point anyway. And it's not like Peyton has much of a governor on his thoughts in the past. So that part of it, like, I guess just to finish the thought, Mike, is like, I get that part of it. And I would get him being like, hey, this is not the way to do business. This is bullshit because you didn't want me back next year anyway. And then another component of that I think we can see coming is that Sean Payton has also tried to play the card of,

hey, I don't deal with that contract stuff anyways. At the appropriate time of the season, George Payton, these guys will talk about it. And there's some truth to that in that I don't think generally coaches would be into what mechanism would be used in a contract to make it more palatable. They might be apprised of certain things, but Sean Payton's probably not going to have a lot of strategies

on how to maneuver with contracts. Now, he could have been briefed on stuff during the buy, I would think. So, you know, that part of it is interesting too. You're right, this could be sort of an elaborate way to play it out as we didn't really bench him over the contract, right? And he's saying they wanted that to be clear. Football-related decision. Now, I think the most, right? And this is saying they wanted that to be clear. Football related decision. Now, I think the most interesting next part of this will be, okay, Russell Wilson's going

to go somewhere else. How's this story going to be managed? Because couldn't you, can't you just see, hey, Russell Wilson's, Russell Wilson, according to sources, would consider a return. He would play for the Seahawks for the minimum or something like that. That would put pressure on them. You're not going to bring Russell Wilson, according to sources, would consider a return. He would play for the Seahawks for the minimum or something like that. That would put pressure on them. You're not going to bring Russell Wilson back? That sort of a thing.

Where's that? How are those types of stories going to come out as far as where Russell could go? Because he's going to make whatever, $37 million next year, no matter what. And whatever he makes on a new deal would offset off of that. Meaning, you know, he's going to probably go somewhere on a cheaper deal. So where's that going to be? Where, when are those stories going to start to come out that he'd be willing to do this, to go there?

And that sort of a thing. Cause because the Russell Wilson name is still a big name, right? And for some of the half the league, even if Russell Wilson's a mid quarterback, half the league needs a mid quarterback right now. So those, that's going to be interesting to see where he wants to go, how that, how that sort of gets out there. Half the league seems a little high. I'm not, I'm not like, it just, I think there'd be, there'd be, there'd be half the league that would be set with stars. And then there'd be another handful of teams that have the young guy that they're just like let's see our new young guy so maybe i'll give you a third

of the league but you're right like this is somebody who had a leak where it was like i'm not asking for a trade but i wouldn't mind one day playing totally the raiders chicago and you were like what is that like i don't want to cheat on my wife but if i could pick four of your friends here what how here's how i would rank here's who they would be right he wanted he wanted snyder he wanted carol fired because he felt like they were limiting him mr unlimited so like look i i know i can't help myself i just like it's i think the most shocking thing that i've seen here is that the handling of this got most of the least the social media public to side with russell wilson in a way that i've never seen him back but that's backed in recent years.

That's incredible. That's hard to do. It is, but I think that Denver miscalculated. Usually these types of discussions behind the scenes don't just come out like that. I think they've just miscalculated on Russell Wilson at every turn. I don't think they thought he was going to do that. I think they were shocked that that was going to come out and they were going to have that narrative late in the year. Well, guess what? It's not shocking. If you've been following it, it's not shocking that Russell's play had declined some and that he wasn't going to be what they thought he was going to be. What's happened, some of the extremes have been surprising, but like, I mean, before the season, I thought there was a great chance that

Russell Wilson would be benched by midseason and said so. This stuff hasn't been that hard to predict. And that's why I'm saying the next thing will be something like he'd be willing to go to Seattle for the minimum or this or that. Those types of things are coming. I guess I still have one more thing on it,, because I, I can agree with the handling of it. Like you're going to threaten to bench me to, to, if I don't move this, this injury guarantee date. But I think the sympathy was almost a little too much because ultimately if

anybody were running this football team, we were like, at the end of the day, we can't have him back in 24. We can't have him back with Peyton. We've now established a new investment peak with what we've done this football team. We're like, at the end of the day, we can't have him back in 24. We can't have him back with Peyton. We've now established a new investment peak with what we've done with Peyton. He's going to be here for the long haul. And as somebody who's been a part of a few negotiations, you'll be shocked what someone will ask for at some point.

You're like, wait, what? Why would I do that? And then the person will be kind of like, well, you know, just throwing it out there. You know, just want to see if you'd be into that. Be like, I would never be into that. I'd have to sell my house and move. do that and then the person will be kind of like well you know just throwing it out you know just want to see if you'd be into that be like i would never be into that i'd have to i'd have to sell my house and move well yeah i don't know you know okay so we won't you know so like i wonder if that was like hey he's not going to be here we're already going to have to pay him that money but

we don't want to have to pay even more is there any way we just ask them like just hey dude we're gonna bench you if you don't move this thing and then it's like look it happens you get asked stuff all the time you're like why would you even ask me that it's like because there's always a chance that one percent of the people will say yes and what's really a threat ryan what defines a threat right it doesn't necessarily mean that someone comes up to you and puts a gun in your face and threatens to kill you if you don't give them your wallet, right? A threat could be a subtle, like, Hey, uh, about your next contract. What would you think about, you know, cause it'd be important. It could be important for us, for your future. And you're like, Whoa, was that a threat? Yeah, that's probably, there's probably some, some gray in there, some nuance in there.

You know, I don't know that it was to the extent of, hey, let's talk about your car. You're going to be benched. And Russell Wilson said, I'll give away my guarantees to keep my job. Like, I don't necessarily think that's what happened, but it may not have been them saying, listen, you take these things now, or you are benched tomorrow. It may not have been that saying, listen, you take these things now or you are benched tomorrow. It may not have been that overt either. So, you know, maybe we'll get some clarity on that. Maybe. Okay. Give us clarity on what the Bears are going to be doing. They have the Panthers pick. They have the number one pick. What do you think happens with Fields? Well, I think that they will trade him and use the top pick for a quarterback

now the bears are the type of team though that can sometimes stick with regimes and and that sort of a thing i just think if you're ryan poles uh you didn't pick justin fields you've you've hoped he would succeed you've probably seen some progress like if this was russian fields rookie season and you were seeing this, you'd be like, hey, let's come back and try this the next couple of years. I just think it's a rare opportunity, a rare situation to have the number one pick in a year when it seems like there's some quarterbacks you'd like to take them. So that to me, I don't know how if you're Ryan Poles, you could let that opportunity

pass you by twice when you have kind of a promising but flawed player in Justin Fields, right? And also with their winning and they've won seven of their last 12 or whatever, be honest about why you're winning, okay? Because it's really since whatever, I'm going to guess the fifth or sixth week of the season, they're a top five defense. That's what's been happening. And even everyone says, since Justin Fields comes back, it's looked better. I agree.

I think he's made some strides, but they're the, I think I got it here. Since week 11, they're 19th in offensive EPA per play. Fields is 18th in EPA per pass play, which, hey,

I'm not saying that's the, that means everything. Cause Stroud is 19th. Mahomes is 20, which, hey, I'm not saying that means everything because Stroud is 19th, Mahomes is 20. But let's not just act like, wow, the offense is really driving this thing and Fields has really turned a corner and we need to bet on this for the long term. I'd have a really hard time doing that. So, you know, that being said, the emotions of a team and you may feel like you've got something with this group and Justin's been a part of that. And it could be hard to it could be a hard thing to do in your locker room.

Right. These are people. It's really easy to sit here on shows and say we should make this move and that move. It's way harder to do when maybe Justin Fields has done every absolute thing they've wanted and they and the the players like him and that sort of a thing as a leader though I think you have to make the best strategic move for your franchise and I would think it's that involves resetting a quarterback and then hoping you have enough of a runway and backing from your ownership to give that some time too. Defense has allowed only 17 or more than 17 points once in the last five games. And you're right. It kind of a little bit on that Russell Wilson turnover run there where you're go, okay, like I know you're winning some games,

but are you winning enough? And it's Caleb Williams. You know, it's not talking yourself into, you know, I don't want to use one of the other drafts because this this is a different kind of draft with the quarterback depth at the top um but i think in the past there's there's times like jared goff felt like the golf went here yeah like you're like wait these guys are going to go that high look cam newton wasn't projected to be the number one guy the entire time that built that was momentum there through c through. Caleb Williams has been the number one guy two years ago.

So if it was something else, you're like, man, this quarterback class really stinks, then okay. But I do not know what it is. You need to write a book on it. Win-loss records with quarterbacks, I just see so many people lying to themselves when I hear them talk about how these guys are turning around or how much they're struggling just based on what that final score says all the time. And I don't know, maybe I'm being too soft or too harsh.

I don't know. No, I think it's a great point. I think we've gotten better at figuring that out, sniffing that out. And just through numbers and the better metrics now, we can kind of see it easier, right? When a team's totally winning with defense, there's less confusion if you really know what to look at so with new england here and i had a you know a comment as they have pulled out a couple games here i was like i almost feel like this means belichick's definitely leaving because there'd be nothing more belichick than to win a couple games at the end of the year to screw up their draft positioning on the way out.

Again, I'm just kind of making a bit of a joke. And then, you know, someone looked at it as, well, if he could do that, why wouldn't he win more games? I'm like, no, no, specific to this point. The season is lost. The most important thing is where is your pick? And if you want to bring Malik Cunningham back and say, hey, let's try this for a few weeks to

close it out like that's how nba teams tank all of a sudden you're like wait why is this guy playing point guard all the time um i know that's not in the football culture nearly as much i understand that but for them to be winning games here to close things out as he wants to win record and i imagine he would coach again if he wasn't going to be at new england hey who knows maybe he comes back that whole thing got super confusing on whether he had an extension and we found out that he didn't have the extension and all this stuff. I have to think for New England here, they're still going to be picking the third best quarterback based on now projected to have the third pick. Possibly, yeah, but there may be enough to go around. I think obviously Caleb Williams is there. I think the quarterback from LSU, Daniels, is good.

And then... Drake May. Yeah, Drake. It's interesting. I do the Football GM podcast with Randy Mueller, and I love Randy's evals on quarterbacks. I think they're great. He has not been as high on him,

but actually thinks that J.J. McCarthy from Michigan has a chance. Now, thinks he's hamstrung a little bit by their offense, but has a chance to kind of rise up in there. We saw Michael Penix the other night, who's just a wonderful thrower. I mean, just a great passer of the football. Had some concerns with his durability in the past, right? But, man, what a great-looking passer he looks like, too. So he could be in the mix.

And there may be better options for them. They're certainly in a way better position than that year they took mac jones i think they can still get one yeah the problem with the mac jones draft is like okay you needed a quarterback because you didn't have a plan before and then it's like now you're taking the fifth one you know and it it's a little different if you're taking the third one at the number three overall pick as opposed to taking the fifth one in the middle of the first round but i don't know if you need to get this position right i would hate losing any place in there where now i'm getting somebody else i want to stay on pennix because i know you're from that area uh mcshay and i were joking i don't even think we said it on the pod but we were just going back and forth before we did our

recap of the semi-final games i was like if if you told me Indiana Pennix was going to be this, like I would have thought you were the dumbest person going. He is the best pure thrower of a ball in college football this year. His accurate, his misses are still catchable balls for the most part. And then the mobility in the pocket that he showed against Texas, the two knee injuries, clearly going to be an issue. Maybe some people won't like the age, but are you, I know this is really early for you. So I'm putting you on the spot a bit, but no, like, do you just have moments where guys in the front offices are talking to you about him because you're, you're up in that area? Because this is, I'm open to it, man. If somebody said, Hey, I have panic second, I don't know that I would

tell them they were wrong. No, I agree. I, You have to go with your eyes to some extent, right? It is early in the process. I think he's somebody that hasn't been on that early radar to the same degree as the others. So we just haven't, teams probably aren't as far along in talking about him. And so I haven't heard as much. I haven't been pressing on that, obviously,

at this point in the season, usually don't. But you can't ignore the way that he played. I mean, I i just think he some guys you can tell just have also a feel for the position right i mean he just like they're able to do so many things on offense because he just knows seems like he knows how to play and then the placement of the football even on some of those short passes over the backfield he he's throwing these guys runner's ball. You know, it's a, it's right in front of them. It just looks so good. It's incredible.

I just love how he passes the ball. So how could you look at that and say, you know, cause, cause every, anyone who's looking for a quarterback, you want somebody who can win from the pocket, right?

So how could you watch him and be like, you know, I'm just concerned about his ability to win from the pocket. so how could you watch him and be like you know i'm just concerned about his ability to win from the pocket yeah right there's all these guys where i'm like man that guy's awesome but eventually you're gonna have to like deliver on third and seven in a big spot and then i go well why look i'm not gonna put anybody ahead of caleb williams i'm just not i agree more the more i watch pennix i'd be like why would i have I have Drake May or Jaden Daniels ahead of him? And look, Jaden was incredible this year.

And there's a slight comparison there with Burrow too, where Burrow's first year with LSU was like, oh, okay, this guy's coming back next year. And then it's like an unheard of level, an incredible team, great run, national championship, Heisman number one pick, and he's a real franchise guy. But his first year, there's some similarity there with Jaden Daniels

where Jaden Daniels' first year at LSU, I was like, I don't know. I'm like, maybe. And then as the season played out, it got a little bit better. He's a completely different person, which also is kind of funny. We see the Bo Nix transformation. We see the Penix transformation. We see it with Jaden Daniels. Does that mean NFL teams need to give quarterbacks a fourth year if you're a rookie you know should we get to the games or should we get to like 50 starts before the team

is ready to move on from a guy uh no i don't think so at all you know i think you know i know but yeah yeah i think you'll see the the real guys you'll see it earlier you know i think that history shows that out you're going to see it even if the team doesn't have great success you'll see the real guys. You'll see it earlier. You know, I think that history shows that out. You're going to see it. Even if the team doesn't have great success, you'll see some things from them. So it is interesting, though, to see the evals evolve. You know, another part of this, too, I mentioned Randy Miller. He wrote a column today about Kyler Murray.

We think Arizona is going to stick with him. So, you know, we were talking about these teams at the top needing quarterbacks. stick with him so you know we were talking about these teams at the top needing quarterbacks you know if they're going to stick with Kyler Murray and build around him which has sort of been their message the whole time and I kind of am taking I'm kind of believing them on that because of the contract it would just be a pain to and expensive to move on from that you know they may just use their draft hall for other stuff. And so that could give somebody an opportunity to either trade up in there or at least mean a quarterback's not going to go off the board there. So if we ran through the replacements, I did a list, I think mid-season,

where I was like, okay, I'm going to try to come up with the five most likely to be replaced. I had Zach Wilson one. I think that's pretty much self-explanatory i had mac jones two we weren't being dismissive of mac jones future in new england correct like there's not is there still a window there yeah i mean i wouldn't think i think they have too much of an opportunity to draft a quarterback so you're not going to reload with him i had fields third okay um and And then we get to Kyler. And, you know, it's interesting because you're watching the Kyler part of this

where he's had some really good moments again. It reminds me of the time where it felt like he was absolutely carrying this team. I am scared to death of his long-term health outlook. It's just, I don't believe it. I don't think it'll happen. He takes hits that other quarterbacks get up. I feel like it'll be lingering for him for a few more plays. Uh, I think that's a very real thing, but as this is all played out and now they're sitting at the projected fourth pick, um, they

may, they may have been too competitive here down the stretch to then say, Oh, let's, let's move off from the Kyler money, which was extensive for what he had done. But so you, you feel like Kyler staying. Yeah. I kind of feel like Kyler's staying. Yeah. I kind of felt like when those guys took the job, part of it was kind of make this thing work, unless Kyler Murray just can't stay healthy again or turns out to just be a guy you can't work with, right? And it feels to me like from day one,

they've gone out of their way to signal that he's their guy and they're going to make this work. And the signs that we've seen so far sort of support that. I don't think there's, we haven't heard anything, any rumblings of negativity or, you know, we haven't seen probably the same amount of like that bad body language stuff or immaturity. Um, he seems like he's been on point. I give him a lot of credit. He came back, you know, quickly, he looked good right away in terms of being able to run around and sprint.

He hit some top speeds that were just like before he was hurt. So it looks like he's put in the work. And like I said, to eat that type of a contract is a hard thing to do anyway, but it's probably harder when your team wasn't bought five years ago

by somebody worth 20 billion, right? I mean, this is a family team that probably doesn't have the same ability to eat a contract or willingness to that like a stan cronky did when he unloaded golf right so it just this just has felt to me like hey guys make this thing work there's worse situations to be in and build the rest of the team and i feel like that's what they're going to do. Daniel Jones? I think they have to be in the mix to draft somebody. I don't know where they're at on that, but that's where I would be.

Okay. Is there anyone else that I'm missing? I mean, the Derek Carr money tells you, look, you know, look, you thought it would be a little bit better than this. And I know there's still alive for everything in that division. That isn't exactly the strongest,

but I'm just trying to, I guess I'm spitballing here. A bunch of different names that you close out. So there are $30 million fully guaranteed next year. So he's probably going to be there. I think we just need to see what's the extent of a reset button there and then i would be i would definitely be you know trying to have somebody or if you could get somebody in there easier said than done but have an alternative uh the

raiders certainly have already moved on from jimmy garoppolo so that's an easy one right um what about did you mention mention Ritter for Atlanta? I didn't. We hadn't gotten there yet. Yeah. So you have more on your list. I had Russell Wilson fifth, so I only did five.

I mean, Ritter was discussed. I mean, look, he's already lost the job there and then got it back. Yeah. There's a bunch of guys like Tannehill who came into the year as starters

who are not going to be started well he's going to be done because i mean yeah levis levis at least has showed enough here that you go all right we have to give this guy a year of snaps i'd imagine yeah we'll see i don't know what their plan is they're 5 and 18 in the last 23 games so does this minnesota run of quarterbacks go you know what maybe we need to get back in the Kirk Cousins business. It has to. I think it'll be very interesting to see what he thinks his options are, what they think theirs are.

I thought about him for like a Sean Payton, you know, somebody like that. You bring in a veteran quarterback, let's go. You know, a poor man's Drew Brees, right? Can get the ball out quick. He's accurate. That sort of stuff. So, um, yeah, I think Kirk cousins is going to have options and this year has to be a teaching experience for them. You know, they got a lot of flowers thrown their way for a couple of wins here

there. Hey, great job with Dobbs, but do you think that they've been able to adjust their scheme offensively super effectively for the other guys. Could be an unfair question because there are a bunch of backups, but Kirk Cousins looks pretty darn good compared to what they've had out there offensively. Yeah, you know, it's one of those things where that's why I understand the price Denver paid for Russell Wilson. I mean, you go through all the guys that they went through thinking, okay, well, the guys that they went through thinking,

okay, well, the Flacco's just below average. We'll be okay with this defense. You know, Hey, it looks like Simeon might be something, you know, just on and on and on. Oh, Case Keenum had this nice little playoff run. We'll bring him in here. All he has to do is be average with this defense. And then it doesn't work and you get real desperate. You wonder if Minnesota got a few week version of the multi-year version that Denver got. And they go, hey, let's just give Kirk Cousins guaranteed money again. Yeah, no doubt. Yeah, absolutely. He was good. He was good this year.

He was good. And like we said, already coming into this year, it was the youngest starting quarterbacks for week one since 1957. And then Rodgers got hurt. There's a bunch of guys who've left this league that could line up and play quarterback at a mid to high level for a lot for the whole season. So Kirk Cousins, the middle class of quarterbacks, he was used to be middle class. He's very much upper middle class right now relative to what else is out there. Yeah, makes sense. You can check out Mike Sandoz.

Excellent work throughout the week on The Athletic and the Football 100, the link for that book in prominent is displayed every time we have Mike on right behind him. So thanks, man. Thanks as always. Hey, thanks. Always enjoy it. You want details? Fine. I drive a Ferrari.

355 Cabriolet. What's up? I have a ridiculous house in the South Fork. I have every toy you could possibly imagine. And best of all kids i am liquid so now you know what's possible let me tell you what's required the email address is life advice rr gmail.com and uh look credit to the audience here uh what's up kyle what's up steve we had a pretty dramatic one yesterday for a guy that was in the middle of this right now

uh freaked out about being extorted um after sending a video to a girl that he thought he had connected with on a dating app and now the video obviously if you didn't hear yesterday's pod we're just getting you caught up to date great storytelling just trying to make sure everybody's on the same page here so he's freaking out. They asked for two grand and I read it because I didn't really have a great answer for it. And I figured the community here would. And, you know, it just as an aside, I really do think that we spend a lot of time, um, thinking that things have never been worse, um, because we have such recency bias, like throughout history, all the times that in the moment,

everyone was like, this is the worst. It blows my mind that in 2024 now, we would have people think today is the worst it's ever been when I feel like most of us, a large percentage of the population is actually really good and do the right things and actually have like decent instincts and are reasonable. And yet all we see is all the division and all the awfulness. And the reason I say that is because I look at like an example of just reading an email. I think we've got a few hundred emails from people offering up help, which I think just speaks just kind of how most people actually are wired. But we just you know nobody's gonna be like hey this person's a really good person yeah i think you're a good

person cool talk to you tomorrow on social media you know what i mean like it's just not the way that it works and this isn't anything new but i think it's just a nice reminder at times of of what's what we're aware of versus what i believe is the reality uh maybe i'm naive maybe i'm completely misguided but i don't think that i am as somebody that has to not only talk for a living, but now 20 years of seeing reaction to talking and kind of just seeing how things work. I do think I have a pretty good gauge. I'm like, okay, this is what we see and this is what we consume, but it doesn't necessarily mean this is how the majority thinks. And I'm not even talking about politics or anything like that. I'm just talking about people just in general general getting through their day and how they're wired and what they

actually want to have happen. So I think this was a good example of it because you guys were unbelievable with the feedback for this. People have had their own experiences. So for the emailer that's still listening, I would say the overwhelming advice was to not pay, which I would agree with. Because if you pay, then they're like, hey, we got a live one here and it's never going to end. And I know it doesn't feel good because the anxiousness, you know, the unknown versus the known and the unknown can actually be way more damaging to your mental health than the actual known, even if the known is bad news. Because you're worried about this video getting sent to all of your contacts, specifically relatives, friends friends maybe some female friends it's super super fucking

embarrassing totally get it man it sucks but there really wasn't anyone that's gone through we had a lot of people go happen to me this is what happened this is what i did uh as far as the legal part of it i think local police is a complete waste of time. We had some people in law enforcement reach out and say that, you know, you can contact the FBI if you want. I think the most helpful advice that we can give you, or at least pass your way that we got was there's a Reddit thread about sextortion and there's all of these people sharing their stories and what they did or didn't do, the mistakes they made, the things that they made were right. Now, I don't want to tell you because we had a lot of people say hey nothing actually happened i didn't pay i blocked the person didn't pay him and and nothing happened uh that's not a

guarantee because we had other people said i blocked everybody and they sent the video to like four buddies and you know or somebody got an uncle or there was an ex that got it was terrible we had other people offer up preemptive attack here just tell everyone do a notes app thing hey i was hacked do not open up any messages um which you know is a gamble right it's a bit of a gamble because you're you're alerting a lot of people to it that probably are never going to see it so do you really want to play that game? I do think as a society, we're a little more desensitized to this in a very quick amount of times. Thinking back 10 years ago versus how we're at now with this kind of stuff,

just because all of it's flying around all over the place. But we had some high school teachers even chime in saying, hey, we have to cover this now with like some of our older classes because it's such a common thing. And there's been some real tragedies from it too, because basically you've got these guys set up in these offices in a foreign country, hammering away all day, trying to find somebody that you can link with working for the videos and then just asking for money over and over again and i would tell you this as much as it sucks right now what would drive me crazy is if i had two thousand dollars to my name and i'm sending it to some

fucking guy overseas and now i'm out of money and i'm still not sure i'm off the hook right i would feel way worse about actually giving him every dollar to my name than I would just not paying him knowing that everything else is still in play here. So I think there's also a lot of good advice about making all of your stuff private, you know, block them, make it all private. You know, it's not a guarantee that any of this stuff is going to work because you know, the video is out there, but at least it might help our emailer to go on some of these threads and just talk to other people about it and get a little bit of support

and kind of discover or examine, I should say from every single angle. So I don't want to just talk the whole time about it, but I just want to be a little bit more buttoned up on it because it was just a ton of really good advice without any surefire, hey, this is the way to fix it because it's not 100% fixable. But sending that money and then knowing that they're probably going to ask you for more and they don't have to do you any favors. They're not going to be like, like hey man you were really cool about this thanks for sending that wire so soon you're good you're off the hook yeah you know so um i know you had something to say well there was this one guy who tweeted us and you kind of touched on it um where you know you could do the get ahead of it thing but you're right you're kind of alerting people who probably wouldn't even have any idea

what you're talking about. But what you could do is you could just be super vague about it because it feels like on Facebook now, every time you go on there, somebody has a post up that's like, hey, I've been hacked and this is the thing. And nobody even really reads them. They're just like, all right, look out for a link from this person. If you get a link from this person, don't open it.

So you could actually make it really vague. You can get out ahead of it, but not mention maybe what it is specifically. And then the guy even dropped a link. Basically, it seems like a fake website, but it's like a public service announcement. It says malicious actor manipulating photos and videos. So if somebody clicks on that to see what's going on, it's like, oh, this guy actually is for real.

He did get hacked. I won't open up anything from him. And you don't even mention what it is. So they don't even know what it is. So I think that's a way to kind of get ahead of it, but not also like pique people's curiosity to be like, well, now I'm definitely gonna open this thing if it's like an explicit photo because some people are weird like that.

So I think that's probably the way to go. But there's, I've seen so many people that just say there's no, and it's so easy to say this as the guy not going through it. But so many people have been like, there's no way they're gonna send, you know, stuff. if you just ignore them and you don't send them anything there's a good chance that they're not going to do anything but yeah you're playing there's a good chance but it's not a guarantee because we had plenty of emails and again i didn't get to read every

one of them so i'm sorry if you sent the best one and you're not hearing me acknowledge it there was just so many um you know we had people that were like yeah you know they did send it to a handful of my contacts and you know luckily they they sent it to a couple buddies but like you know you're thinking about your mom or you know a girl you're interested in and all that kind of stuff like it well they also mentioned like it's you could just say hey like there's a deep fake of me it's not real you know yeah we said that yesterday yeah so. Yeah. So maybe that gets around it. The other thing I'm thinking is really it's either they send or they don't, right? That's what it comes down to. If we've decided we're not sending $2,000 or your $350 that you have,

and then hoping that they don't ask for more, which they absolutely will. If you're not doing that, it's really about how you feel and the sickness in your stomach, right? So what if you deactivate your account, right? It's not blocked because you blocked this one guy. He already knows your name. He could just add you from another account. If it's contained to Facebook, I don't know. Are people linking stuff to their Facebook still? I don't know. But maybe it's deactivated because if you're blocked, he'll have another one of his 150 accounts that this guy has wherever he is and he'll just find you and harass you again. But if you absolutely are wiped off Facebook,

maybe, maybe that's a little different. Maybe it's like, all right, we can't even try to harass this person again. So maybe that's because it also, it'll stop you from checking every day to see if something, you know,

if you have a message from somebody like, what the fuck is this? Cause I mean, really, if you're not going to reason with them, which I think nobody, they're not reason, they're not reasonable. So really it's just about how you're feeling in the in the next days and the wondering will they won't they so maybe if you're just off of it you won't

even check because every day that goes by it's going to seem like the longest day ever you know when you're wondering like oh did they do it yet do they do it yet so maybe if you just delete your whole shit rather than just blocking this one account that you know of that might help you feel better um all right cool um so again thanks to everybody that chimed in for that but i would really encourage you to check out the reddit thread that people kept sending us links to over and over and over again um you know again i don't think there's any guarantee here uh Uh, and I think that was also the other kind of cool thing and reading through them is just, you know, if we had the perfect, if the perfect solution existed, more people would know about it because it's happening to

people all the time, you know, like dudes are lonely, man. And you know, sometimes you're going to fall for shit and you're, you're going to think you have it covered and you're going to think you're good. And you know, it's, it's endless and it's unfortunate, you know, whatever. I mean, you're trying to reason with people that that have no conscience whatsoever. So, you know. Yeah. I mean, how many I get a bunch of texts from my parents being like, is this, you know, is this fraud or is this real? Is this fake? And it's like so obviously fake. But there's even stuff there's even stuff, though, where like I'm like, I don't know, man man like and you just google it and you're like okay yeah this this website or this at url is definitely like a fraudulent thing but it's it's harder i've hit stuff i mean obviously these

guys are good at their jobs uh for a reason and they keep like pivoting but it's sometimes it's hard to figure these out like so it's not you know it's not just like oh this guy's an idiot for getting fooled like it's really difficult no i mean i i think the scamming of of older people like i'm i can't imagine how much money these people make off of old people that don't don't know i mean look i remember the first time i got a phone call from some automated thing it was the first time it happened to me and it essentially was like you have um defaulted on your tab i was like what yeah i was like are you you know and you hear it and you your first thought is like wait everything's good like everything's buttoned up and then you know i just type in the number into a google thing and then there's a thousand

people going oh all right yeah right yeah i mean somebody got obviously i think at some point if you were to call a number back being like wait do i have outstanding tax debt and they'd be like oh hold on let me get my let me get my worksheet okay first of all we need we need your bank account numbers you know like for the social yep there might be something where you'd think hmm this doesn't this might not add up uh how long did the nigerian prince thing go on for you know that thing went on forever and it was still scamming people back in like the early 2000s right so yeah i remember one time uh something happened with me and it like the

email was like i am in tears right now i'm lost or whatever you know it was like i don't think rossilla would send an email that he's crying yeah find a new slant they got my grandma got got in college uh somebody called her pretending to be me uh saying that i was in jail and i needed like thousands of dollars and she called my dad and honestly it took like an hour before anyone even called me because they all just believed her like oh kyle's definitely in jail because at that time my dad called me and he's yelling at me and i'm like what but i mean this is we're talking about like 20 year old kyle so i mean this isn't the same dude no that one's crazy that one's crazy because then there was there was something i saw on

twitter i don't know last month where it was it was a guy explaining this whole thing where they said his son had been arrested he had a dui there was an accident and that this lawyer was assigned and you know whatever you had to like send money um and it was it was crazy i think it was even somebody like doing the voice or something it was nuts but the thing is the problem is the guy they did it to i think was like a state representative like he was actually like a politician and he even though he was freaked out and thought something had happened and he was like that's not my son they didn't go with hey that sounds like kyle we'll we'll go after lunch okay all right um let's let's get back to uh to the less serious ones here.

All right. Give from my boss. Six feet, 200 pounds. Trying to get back to 185, 190 after two back surgeries. I only have one third of my discs left. Ouch. Player comp would be crossed between Kyle Korver and Brian Cardinals. The custodian.

Can hit the three, but also know all of the crafty tricks to stick around and open runs longer than the other guys think i will great 41 work for a small gc in an area that focuses on insurance funded construction i.e hail damage roof siding etc nine months of the year i spend walking around my neighborhoods and getting on roofs to assess for damage okay at our company Christmas party this year my boss asked me do I wear a 10 and a half size shoe I say yes he says he has a pair of shoes for me that his wife bought him but they don't fit his wife is aware he is giving them away the next day I stop it at the office and pick up these shoes they are extremely expensive and

something I would never buy myself also I'm very particular about my shoes because of a my back and b what i do all day i have cougar paws for walking on roofs um all right so the these are gucci leather low top sneakers holy shit black with red highlights how's that for a christmas bonus fuck yeah and Christmas bonus. Fuck yeah, dude. And there's a little lower shoelace deal here that says Ace on it. Yes. Yes. What's the advice, dude? He sends the link here.

These are 870 bucks. Oh, is he going to ask if he should sell them? The shoes are comfortable, right? I feel super uncomfortable wearing them out because it seems super pretentious. I'm not like a Carhartt guy or anything, but it's just not my jam. These shoes are not many people's jams, especially 41-year-old guys with back problems. Now, did your boy dabble in some Ferragamo sneakers when it was hot?

Yeah, I did it. I'm not even sure if i know where they are anymore and i there was one pair i legitimately was like these are these are sick um and i don't know and i don't know where they are which tells you how quickly i phased out of that uh because there was a big i know it's still going on but there was a big push there for maybe your non-traditional guy to get into the aggressive designer sneaker game. Which, again, is not news to a lot of you listening. You could say, hey, that started so long ago. You're even late talking. I'm aware.

Fully aware. But it's lingered a lot longer. And then it just turned into like Joe prunty is in a pair of gucci's um we get to the point of tv at espn where nobody was wearing dress shoes it felt like anymore now which that's so rudy i know you have thoughts on sneakers with a suit i do i i i don't like the fake sneaker like if you're gonna wear a sneaker with a suit wear cons wear nikes wear something i don't like like the i don't know i don't even kohan makes them but like a kohan sneaker like a leather i don't like it easy on me

i don't like my kohan phase no well you're you did have an extensive kohan phase you had like the ones with the color bottoms right remember that was pretty sick i thought about buying a pair of those at nordstrom when i saw you in them but no no if you're gonna wear a sneaker like wear a a real sneaker i just don't like the fake sneaker look for that but the lunar grand i believe comfortable shoe comfortable shoe but i i did what i normally do i was like i really like these and then i i grabbed a few pair and then quickly you're out of it and then all of a sudden you're like what am i gonna do with all these i actually donated a couple pairs recently i feel like those went out pretty fast they went out and style pretty fast they did but the original the first um the gray with the fluorescent yellow those were a real eye catcher like the first issue of those and they were so

comfortable because it was like a nike soul and then i remember i went to the store and the guys like nike's discontinuing this collaboration they're not going to make the souls anymore and i was like man it seems like this guy's trying to sell me a couple extra pair in don't care and then i went all fluorescent 60 bucks on poshmark right now just saying okay so not not at a 52 high all right so uh here we go my first it's my first year working at the company my boss has gone through a difficult last six months, and I've become good friends, and I've been a listening ear and a positive and encouraging voice through it all. Also, he's making me sales manager for 2024.

So my question is, is it bad for him to sell them? I know what the value is. I've attached a screenshot for what they go for, or do I hold on to them, wear them to a few company outings, and then sell? I genuinely don't know what to do. Thanks, guys. If you're coming to the All-Star Game this year, let's hoop. I'm not coming to the All-Star Game this year. I would not sell them, man. I would not sell them. I don't know if $850 is new. I don't know if used means they're going for $8 bucks. Think about it. It sounds like you're making a decent enough living is $850. If you're even going to get that, okay. Use my guesses. You're not.

Let's, let's just play with it. Cause I, I think that was the Gucci listing link that he sent me to. So I don't even think it's 800 bucks. It is not, that math is not even close to being worth it for you to have to tell this guy who clearly likes you a lot and is now making you sales manager that you have to lie to him about where the shoes are or admit the truth that you sold them. This guy thinks he hooked you the fuck up. Right. All right. They're aggressive. They're not for you. And not for a lot of people.

They're aggressive. They're not for you. And not for a lot of people. Yeah, to keep them in a box, to avoid the price of that, because he may tell, oh, yeah, no, that's funny. I totally get it. He's going to tell somebody. He'll be like, I can't believe you sold those shoes.

I gave those to him. So I don't think that that little boost in the old savings account is worth what would be a very difficult conversation or a resentful one. If karma is real, I wouldn't do it. If you could prove to me karma is not real, I mean, fine, I guess. But it's not like you made an investment and you have to get off of it before the stock spikes or whatever. This is fine. It's all found money it's found shoes i mean maybe you know maybe it's your vegas shoe who knows i don't but like uh it's not like it's not like you don't have space for them and it's not like you're you know if you don't wear them then you know it's a it's an issue uh and it's not like uh you don't even have the kind of job where you could wear them to your job where you need to show them off be like look see look i'm doing

the thing that you gave me so i think i wouldn't and i don't i can't imagine what especially with all the other good stuff that's happened to you via this guy i mean i can't imagine you're hurting for the the money that you would get for the for the resale value so i think it's a karma thing i think you got to just play the long game here right i just googled do gucci shoes hold their value and this says they are timeless shoes that hold their value regardless of how long they have been in use um you can still share and now this is okay okay no this is this is like i thought it was big gucci talking to you right now yeah gucci steve gucci's website yeah exactly uh so i don't know i i think you just wait like i would assume that a gucci sneaker at some point is going to hold it.

What do we have going on here? I got my Google Home. Hey, Google, stop that. Sorry, guys. Yeah, no worries. Jesus Christ. Don't love that. Do you want me to play meat grinders again? Sorry, guys.

What was I even saying? Yeah, play the long game. I just think they'll probably be worth whatever they're worth now or maybe a little bit less in a couple of years when you don't even know your boss and maybe a new job.

So hang on to him for the short term and then you'll get a payout. That's great. You've just helped him. You just helped him in his own head about why to keep him. We all want you to keep him and now you have a reason to keep him.

Great job, Steve. Yeah, it might be the best advice. And I'll admit this shoe thing has lasted a lot longer than i thought it would the aggressive sneaker yeah just i'm not talking about sneakers in general okay there's always going to be a market for for sneakers but these specific sneakers they've these you know like it blew up it blew up in the late aughts i believe and here we are in 24 and guys are still going for it with these designer sneakers i gotta be honest i'm thinking about

those ferragamos right now i'm like is there any chance i can find those sneakers again i gotta be honest though because i think i found the sneaker and i'm just not a big you know shocker i'm not a huge designer clothes guy. I don't have any Gucci items, but these shoes are ugly, right? Like, are we all on the same page here? They look ridiculous. Like, you have to be a person of stature to even wear these shoes because it's like the fashion thing

where it's so ugly that it's like, oh, it's fashionable. Like, a lot of actors do that, rappers, whatever, you know, athletes. They're aggressive. They're aggressive. Your average show just can't wear them. And it really sounds like this guy can't wear them like if you're giving me an nba comp and you're saying kelly uber i'd go okay you know maybe but when you say brian cardinal

i almost think you have to donate like you're not even allowed to have them at your house uh okay how do i get my girlfriend back uh okay how do i get my girlfriend back it's never that one's always a little tough 33 year old okay so he's 33 a little bit older six foot 205 um basically a six foot david west great small ball five with terrific mid-range drop step beloved teammate beloved teammates terrific let's get to it i live on the west coast work in medical sales i broke up with my ex-girlfriend of four months or should i say we broke up amicably um cue the michael scott quotes wait so they dated for four months and it was amicable uh all right she's in the medical field as well smart successful hot well adjusted things are always great started strong everything

went well. Easy to make plans, both open to trying new things. Just a really great connection. We were exclusive and all that, but never met friends, family, a few weekend trips, concerts, fun nights out on the town, sporting events, et cetera. All the fun, new couple activities and frills.

Never met friends. What's that? Never met friends. Couldn't find the time, huh? I don't know. Maybe they're building that book all right when we decided to end it i didn't want to break up but she had her mind made up i said i understood uh she was trying to figure stuff out and bet up front with me from the beginning no regrets even though i knew i'd have a tough time pulling it off eventually i told her i'd be happy to just be friends and hang out she said that would work for her and that I did everything right in a

relationship. She just wasn't a good place for a relationship. I don't think she's blowing smoke up my rear. I want to make sure I don't use curse words for the 16-year-old listeners. There we go. Bringing it back. I'm just going to take her feedback at face value. She's in therapy, had some dirtbag boyfriends in her early 20s and wants to figure some stuff out without having to be in a committed relationship. However, this last weekend, a week after our breakup, she reached out to me, came over. We spent a couple of hot and heavy days together. She 100% wants to continue spending time with me, but just not as frequently.

I think she still has very strong feelings for me, but just has to go on a bit of a journey. She's going to travel with friends for the next few weeks. maybe but just has to go on a bit of a journey she's going to travel with friends for the next few weeks i have a few weeks of travel for work but she absolutely intends to get together at the end of the month again we've only been together for four months not like pam and roy in the office uh this isn't the worst timing for me i have a new job and get to make that my priority my plan is to give her space hoping things eventually work out but let her call me when she wants to hang out and i'm sure she'd welcome a call from me every once every few weeks or so to get together. My question, is there anything else I can do? I've dated a lot. I've had an 18 month relationship and never live

with anyone or never got that close to popping the question. I think she's the one only four months, but at 33, this is a once in a lifetime connection. There's an age gap. We're actually in smaller or similar places in our lives career wise.wise. And I am in no rush to have kids. I think I have a real shot still considering she still has plans to be with me inside and outside of the old bedroom. What else should I do other than be patient and make the most of the time we spend together? This is uncharted territory for me and would like some advice from the Manhattan Beach Best. I don't know if I'd be ranked number one on the Manhattan Beach rankings, but I appreciate it. So ultimately, this comes down to what you believe and what you don't believe. And it sounds like you believe her. And I'm not telling you that you shouldn't believe

her, right? Let's start from a positive. Sometimes this is that weird window in a relationship where the other person's just kind of freaking out and you're doing everything right you've been great um you you agree with her feedback right you haven't shared anything with us that that seems like it would be something that would derail these things i think we all have friends both male and female that after that first few fun months when it starts to be coming like holy shit is this going to be real people have a freak out not everybody does but there's plenty of people that do have that freak out and maybe that's just what she had she had this four month kind of freak out thing knowing full well that you are the right person that you've been great for her um but it's it's about her issues her hang-ups and that kind of stuff which is really tough because you're not

even you don't even have to fix anything right there's nothing you're doing that's even wrong but this is the way the other person is nothing you're doing that's even wrong but this is the way the other person is wired again i think that's pretty common so four month itch as i always say i mean you guys with me on this one i mean you have to have friends that right a couple months in you're like wait is this going to be real and stuff and then she freaks a bit so i think your approach to the whole thing's been pretty good. Clearly, she still wants to hang out with you if she came over after you broke up a week later.

It's kind of up to you. Like, what are you willing to put up with? Some people would go, hey, I don't want to be an afterthought. I don't want to be something that's convenient and only convenient. afterthought. I don't want to be something that's convenient and only convenient. I need to know that this is because I think you're like the one, you know, it's always the timing of when you want to share that with somebody. But, you know, I have strong feelings for you. I think this could be something real. And I can't be just a call every now and then because that's not going to work. Now, some guys are like, this arrangement's fucking awesome. What's this guy complaining about, right?

So it really depends on your personal preference. And I don't think it becomes like a self-worth thing. Like if you're okay with what you're okay with, then that's your decision to make. And you're the only one that really has to live with it. And I'm not saying one is even better than the other, but if you're serious and you want this relationship, that'll probably get old after a little while. So I'm worried about you

setting yourself up for like a second breakup that might be even more devastating. And if she were due to that to you, then you got to kind of reassess the, her going on a trip thing. Like, I'm not trying to mess with your head here a little bit, but what kind of trip are we talking about? And like, do you And do you know all the details? Is this something she had planned maybe early during the hangout where it's Mexico? I don't know what's going on.

And so she didn't want to technically be with somebody before this trip. Again, I don't know if she's younger than you. If she's older than you, that would seem a little weird. But just like reeks of, you're dating somebody in your 20s, but you rented a house in nantucket for the summer and you're like hey i'll catch up with you in september you know like start a quick fight and then we'll fix it later

yeah right let me see i gotta i gotta instigate some terrible deal ender here in late may because i got a place on nantucket for three months um you know i've known some guys that seem to break up before christmas all the time so uh it really comes down to kind of what you're okay with and if you believe her what i do like about this is that you're not flooding her all right because that's the guaranteed way to make sure you won't get her back um we're weird that way you know it really i feel like unfortunately most of us seem to want what we can't have and as soon as you know you can have it you're like whatever uh and i think it's i think it's good i think you've played this really well to kind of keep yourself

in the mix because it's ultimately what you want here. But there likely will be an expiration point for you of like, OK, wait, we've now been doing the post breakup hangout for like six months and we're no further along. Like, I really care about you, but but this has to be defined a different way. And if you can't figure that out the second time through where you seem to want to hang out with me then i'll eventually have to move on or she'll be way more attractive to you and then every guy would put up with all of this bullshit to still get to hang out with her so a lot of different paths here yeah if you're not if you can't bring yourself to like you know mess around with other people and, and, and just like kind of keep your, I don't know what you're doing in the meantime. You know what I mean? I don't know. I don't,

but if you can't, if you can't do that, because that's going to be the issue, right? Is if you're, if you're just, you know, I'm working out all the time and I'm working really hard at my job and well, I don't know, you're, you just beat your favorite video game and that's what you're spending your time on. And she's doing, you know, whatever she's doing. Plus she's doing plus she's exploring like that's gonna hurt and you're gonna find out about that somehow i don't know how um it's it's gonna hurt or you're gonna be wondering the whole time she's on the trip so if you can't find like just to even explore because i mean i'm sure she's explained to you exactly the parameters of what this is and it's not exclusive right i mean whether that's been said explicitly i'm pretty sure you know you guys are both on the same page on that i would maybe be busy once in a while like not like you know

you have to make sure you're tagged in all these you know photos on instagram where you're hugging two girls or something in a bar but like there might be like maybe you should just be busy every once in a while that's all look a lot yeah i might be busy i like that kyle be busy every once in a while not all the time it's not unattainable she's not like oh he's freezing me out but maybe you're busy every once in a while maybe right when she gets back from that trip even yeah i would say you know you have to it's a good it is kind of a good situation to be i know it sucks because you're into this girl but first off make sure she knows. Make sure she knows how you feel. But that it's okay that she feels the way she wants to feel.

And if she's not into it right now, like, the whole – there's so many cliches that, like, become cliches. Like, you know, if you love her, let her go. But that is true. That is actually true sometimes. Like, some people – like, I know I needed that at one point in my life. I needed to figure some shit out. Came back and we figured it out. Free reign, Steve.

And here we are. Everybody knows. The old ball and chain no it's just my you're just in your own head about stuff you're not sure if this is the part if this is the path you want to go to you sometimes you think you're too young to do this stuff you're too old or whatever you get in your own head some people just need like that space to kind of figure it out and if she comes back great if she doesn't um the other thing i would say is like another cliche, like the whole it's you, it's not it's not you, it's me thing.

That could very well be true here. You're doing everything right. Don't don't beat yourself up over that. It very well could be her. She's going through a thing. So I know like people like to joke about that and they think it's just like, oh, this is just an excuse for somebody because they don't like you. No, there's a reason that those things actually do exist.

And that's probably what you're going through right now. But I agree with Kyle. You can't you can't just wait for her for like six months, man. You said you're busy at work. You can give it a couple of months. But after that, you have to start living your life. And cool, if she comes back to you, that's great. But you can't just be like, I would interact.

You talked about making it look busy on your Instagram. I would still interact with her on Instagram, like her stories, maybe send a message every once in a while in a post. Who's Steve? But don't be overbearing. Don't be the person that's hitting her up every other week being the, hey, let's chat. You want to catch up? Be a little bit mysterious. Also, have a life on your own. If it comes back, that's great.

You'll still be able to know what she's up to and what she's doing. If she comes back from this trip and she's super gung-ho and getting back with you, that might be a little bit of a red flag. But I would say, you know, let her go. Live your life for the time being. You know, I know you said you're busy. Give it a couple months.

And if it doesn't work out, don't beat yourself up over it. But I think you got to kind of let her figure your stuff out. I think we covered it. I think that's good. All right. Thanks to Kyle. Thanks to Steve. Thanks to Steve. Thanks to Cliff.

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