Pine Pony Podcast
Friends arguing about sports
Pine Pony Podcast
OFFSEASON BEGINS
In this off-season edition of the Pine Pony Podcast, we dive into a variety of exciting sports topics. From the NHL's all-star game shake-up featuring intense USA vs. Canada action to the lackluster NBA dunk contest and skills competition, there's plenty to discuss. We also give you a rundown on important upcoming NFL dates, explore likely moves in NFL free agency including speculation on players like Aaron Rodgers, T. Higgins, and Jameis Winston. We touch on the financial impacts and future changes to the College Football Playoff, summarize breaking rumors such as Netflix potentially buying CBS and Fox's NFL Sunday deals, and announce the USL's addition of a Division 1 competitor featuring promotion and relegation.
If you have a topic or want to respond to the pod, you can always reach us at
Email - pineponypodcast22@gmail.com
Threads / Instagram - @pineponypodcast
🚨 LOOKING TO BET ON THE UPCOMING NFL SEASON🚨
Head over to
signupexpert.com/pinepony
to join the top sportsbooks in your area!.
Welcome, welcome, welcome to an off season edition of the Pine Pony Podcast. As always, you got me, the OG, hanging out with me is Mr. Persian. What's happening? Howdy, howdy. The original strengthster. Glad to see you again. One and only. Hopefully you've been well over this past week. Yeah, yeah, man. I had a good President's Day weekend. I went camping on a lake. It was pretty sweet. Do anything fun. Do anything fun this weekend, man. Just, just. Deliver those packages. Yeah, I didn't, I took it easy. Actually. I did a lot of rest, which is always nice. So you know what I didn't do? I didn't watch football cause there's none on right now. There's none on. So with that being said, let's get to the show. The Pied Pony Podcast. All right So before we talk about some football in the off season There was the nhl all star game in the nba all star game Now the nhl decided to switch things up this year. They did not do an all star game at all I don't even think they did a skills competition They decided to do a four nation tournament so this was only, only comprised of players in the NHL though, right? Correct. Correct. It was USA, Canada, Sweden, and Finland. Oh yeah. So, but what, what made this interesting was, and I did not get a chance to watch this because obviously I was camping. But what made this super interesting was the USA, Canada games, United States was getting booed by the Canadian team, by the Canadian fans during the national anthem, national anthem was getting booed. By the Canadian fans. And within the first nine seconds of the game, three fights broke out on the ice between the teams for all purposes, I mean, this is, this is real deal hockey, like, you know, this isn't just the guys getting together and having fun playing an all star game. And so, I mean, the three fights that quickly, I mean, I'll let you know there's some real pride in this. And so must see tv thursday night february 20th at 8 p. m. The championship game of this tournament is canada versus united states on espn. So all right Who knows who knows what will happen? I'll have to go buy me a maple leaf shirt or something Yeah, man, you know, it's interesting because I don't feel like they could do this tournament every year because you know, you have you know, The olympics the world cup hockey world cup and all these other various things that happen Where they're already playing for like, you know a country team a team country or a nation team but It at least adds another element that hey, all right, we're gonna do it this year We're gonna do it every other year where you know They've got another avenue where they can mix it up every year and people Cause it could get a little stale year after year, you know what I mean? Sure. So if they just bring it out every couple of years, like that'll be really cool. What do you think about that? I, what do you think about this? I, I'm actually like impressed. I did not realize until you told me just now about the sort of passion that was behind it. I'm used to, you know, these sports where the, the all star game is just this. Ridiculous sort of going through the motions. Nobody cares or whatever. I mean If they got real like country pride that they feel and these sort of things like this I mean it could be pretty interesting. It could be good to watch like with You know people in the game Yeah, like two games went to overtime, you know I mean most games were a one point or two point victory one game was six to one But every other game was you know, one or two points. So yeah, I mean This is I support it. I think this this makes me more likely To tune in knowing that they fought So yeah, right. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we're all just gonna tune in just for the fights Yeah, and it's isn't that what any hockey fan does probably? I think that hockey and nascar have that same sort of like oh god We low key just hope there's some violence here or something, right? I don't know But I mean, oh, I mean for me for me It's like maybe the fights themselves could be interesting, but more than anything I like that they actually give a shit and they really want to win, you know, they really want to win So speaking of giving a shit and wanting to win we switch gears to the NBA All star game or all star weekend where let's see the winner of the dunk contest for the third year straight Jumped over a Kia and the fun fact about him is he plays in the G league. So, man, I don't know, man, I just look at some of these and it's just like, no one cares, like, no, like no one fun wants to enter the dunk contest anymore. Like, like LeBron's never done it. Yeah, what kind of lame shit is that? You know, it's like they never get it like like what happened to getting The top dogs like michael jordan was in the dunk contest for crying out loud I mean, yeah, your top guy isn't even in it. Yeah. I there definitely was a time Yeah, maybe the mid 90s. I'm dating myself now, but there was a time where it felt like there was some real excitement about the dunk contest and then after a while, it just felt stale. It felt like they were, they were trying to sort of like make small tweaks to the same dunks we've already seen before. And you know, and it wasn't just me. I mean, People just kind of stopped talking about it anyway. Like people stopped caring. And so I'm kind of surprised that they're still doing the dunk contest, you know, because it's been at least like 20 years that, that no one's cared. Yeah. Or at least So they were supposed to have the Steph Curry three point against, what was it, Caitlin Clark or somebody else, I don't know, Sabrina, somebody, I don't know. Right. But they cancelled that, it was supposed to be part two, so they cancelled that. And then I didn't even see the three point. I didn't even see the three point contest outcome. So that tells you how not important that was if they even had it and then well, let's get to the skills competition. So Chris paul and victor wimby yamba were on the same team for the skills competition I guess it's how fast the total time and so they were, you know, they found a loophole in The rules and I guess in the rules it doesn't say the shots have to go in It just says you have to take x amount of shots At each, you know, whatever so they you know They're doing the passing and they get to the to where they got to shoot the ball and they just literally chuck this They just get it and throw it. They don't even look, they don't even take the shot. They just throw the ball. They just throw them as fast as possible. And they got disqualified. They got disqualified for it. And, you know, people are like up in arms because they're like, Oh, well, well, I mean, it wasn't in the rules and it's like, but the problem is. NBA, your players don't even give a shit enough to play by the rules. Like who's going to care to watch this? Like, yeah. Oh, great. Great. Now we're going to watch everybody not throw, not actually shoot the ball. I mean, I can guarantee you that the most entertaining part was. That somebody got thrown out, right? That someone got disqualified was literally the most entertaining part. So I will say during the actual game, the only highlight I did see was Trey young through the ball off dude's back, dribbled it through Steph Curry's legs. And I think he passed it for a dunk or something. I don't know. So, okay. Kind of like a trick shot, I guess. Yeah, yeah. Moving on to the NFL, important dates coming with the off season. Starting with today was the day you could begin franchise tagging and transition tags. So T Higgins, holla at that franchise tag. Man, if you're Tee Higgins and you already did last year on a franchise tag, you're pretty shittin right now, aren't you? Oh, yeah, bro. Oh, yeah, and then we got the combine coming up next february 24th through the through the third free agency negotiation begins on March 10th and then free agency begins on march 12th March 30th is April. Owner is the owner's meeting and then April 24th is the start of the NFL draft. So, you know, off seasons getting rolling, getting rolling. So with that talk. The next kind of thing other than the NFL Columbine, which we're not going to talk about because the Columbine is stupid. The only players that should even be invited are people who are not going to be first round, second round draft picks. Like, there's no point in Cam Ward being there. We have plenty of tape on Cam Ward. We've seen him throw the ball. Like, even if he throws the ball shitty, Is people gonna go? Oh, i'm not gonna draft him because he threw the ball shitty in the combine But yeah, he was throwing dimes on the field well No, well, so here's he's already drafted. He's already drafted. Well. Yeah. No, I hear you I I see where you're coming from but here's the thing is like don't you think that they should still be invited to the combine though so that the The coaches and the GMs or whoever that they could actually sit and kind of interview with them and like get them. They can have an interview. They can have an interview anytime they want over zoom or they can fly to them. Yeah, they could fly them out. They can fly them there. Yeah, but at the combine you basically get to get a lot of kids at once, isn't it? I mean, you could have already been, you could have been talking to them now. You know, why wait till the combine? You could be doing zoom calls between now and whenever. Yeah, yeah, it's true literally in this day and age like all these kids got agents anyway, so it's easy to like Here's my thing about the combine it made sense When you didn't have zoom google meet when you didn't have data at your fingertips When you didn't have video to like, when you couldn't travel to see all these players all the time and like the day, the day two and three kids got agents nowadays too. So yeah, it just made sense back then when you didn't have all this stuff at your fingertips. Now it doesn't make sense. So for me, the combine is dumb. I'm not watching it. I don't care. I'll catch the highlights on threads. Moving on. Just real quickly, this is an idea that I heard on the radio, and I'm not sure how I feel about it, but I wonder if you've got any ideas on it. It is, the, the, the thing that was Was proposition was basically that you could have a much smaller version of the combine that would be like small school kids That are not gonna be you know Having a bunch of teammates going in the draft or whatever and that For everyone else you just have every school will have any kid who thinks they have a shot at being drafted and available to have their pro day on their day and, and the, the, all the power five schools can basically have their own day for like a two month span or something. Do you think something like that would actually be beneficial and do you think it would be feasible? Like, do you think that would actually work or would that? I don't think the time frame in which you're asking for is feasible. I do think it's feasible to have smaller schools part of the combine, especially if you don't invite players that you already know are going to be drafted. Like, I'm sorry, if you're an NFL scout, And you don't fuckin know what the player can do when you've been watching him all season for how many years. Like, the combine's not changing your mind. So why even have those players there? Who gives a shit if Miles Garrett can run a 440, you know, whatever, as fast as possible, if he was already, like, the top 5 defensive end coming into the draft anyway? Like, wha Like that's not going to matter to anybody. I think the combine should be more about the talent that isn't able to put a bunch of You know tape together all the time because they're not maybe on the field starting every game. This should be more of a moving up in the draft And or moving into the draft for players not hey moving up from fifth pick to third Like you're already drafted. Why are you there? What is it to do? What? Yeah, I feel you on that. I feel you on that one. When, when it comes, I like the smaller school, give the smaller, when it comes to like those, those first round investments, you're already doing a whole bunch of investigating on that anyway. I think that the com blind is, is just extra in that way. One thing I did want to mention real quick though, is like, I do think that there's some kids who. You do have a chance to either lose ground or get a bump in stock based on the measurables. One guy that comes to mind here. But what if you didn't go to the, go to the combine? Like, would you lose just real quick? Cause you said like they could lose stock. So what if you decided not to go to the combine? Do you, would you lose stock? I think most teams would not necessarily penalize them for that. I think most teams would kind of leave them where they, where they had them. In their sort of big board or whatever. I don't think they would, they would really move them for that. But I do think when you look at some, some players who are really good, like skilled football players, but they are known or they are seen as less athletic than most NFL players They have a chance to Really bump their stock when the measurables are better than expected I think a guy that comes to mind is like cam scadaboo. This is obviously a really good football player NFL teams. Yeah, those are people that i'm talking about teams love that kind of attitude high energy Good like rah rah Encouragement sort of guys hard to bring he deserves to be at the combine Well, he's seen as like a lesser athlete. I think if he actually does have good measurables, I think it's going to boost him way up, but that's my point. That's what I'm saying. Like you're saying what I'm saying. Like, I agree. He is because he's on Arizona state or whatever he may not have been like, I mean, they made the playoffs. So it's like good for them. But had they not made the playoffs, he might, he might've not been seen as that, as that top tier talent. And so he is a person that I would, I would have invited to the combine, even though I think he would have gotten drafted anyway. Right. Yeah, he's going to get, you know what I'm saying? The question is he could, yeah, he, that could easily be a fringe second or third round player who could move his stock into the first round. I think it could go the other way too. I think if you, if you look, if you look at someone, if you look at someone like Jalen Millrow, the expectation is that he is a super elite athlete. I think if his measurables are not what's expected, then he would actually bump down a lot because he's not that good as a passer, you know, right? Absolutely right. So, I mean, it's like if I'm the, these players, it's like, I'm not going to, if I have any worries about how I'm going to do at the combine, then I'm not going, you know, it's the same thing as like, you know, whether you play your last season or not, if you're already going to be drafted in the NFL. Yeah. I mean, that's what Marvin Harrison did last year. He was like, I. Everyone expects me to be such a great draft pick. Why should I bother running? There's, I don't have nothing to gain. I only have anything, something to lose, right? So anyway, that being said, let's move on to free agency and discuss some, some of the standouts already. So we alluded to senses. What is their plan? With Joe, Joe Burrow, T. Higgins, Jamar Chase, Jermaine Pratt has requested a trade, their top defensive guy, one of their top defensive guys. So, where's the money going? Where, it's obviously going to these three guys and, and, you know, a fourth person or whatever. It's like Well, I, I have a little bit of a theory actually. They, they are saying publicly that they want to keep Burrow, Chase, and Higgins. that they want to try to work it out and they hit him with the franchise tag. But what I'm thinking is that they probably have a suspicion that they're not going to successfully work out a deal with Higgins. And what they're actually doing is they're making sure That they could still get something back because if they franchise him now a team can't just pick him up off a free agency They've got a trade for him So I think that the fact that the franchise tag him the moment that they could actually Signals that they could be Expecting that they won't work it out with him And I think that they, they pretty much know he's not going to be happy. He's not going to be cooperative playing a second year on the franchise. He wants to be the number one too, though. Exactly. I think he wants us in what better place to be the number one than at green Bay. Yeah. Yeah. Or Denver. We're different and, and man, everybody could use them. I mean, even, even Smith's team and Derek's team could use'em, man. Honestly, Yeah. Yeah. We're all, all, but that's, that's an interesting plan. But I think that's the, I think that's the whole thing is that there's not a bunch of good free agency wide receivers this year, and it's not an especially good year for drafting a wide receiver. So they know that there's going to be a lot of teams in the bidding war and they know that they're probably going to end up losing that bidding war. And so the smart thing to do is making it to where teams are going to have to trade for them. And so I, I don't buy the line that, you know, that. Of course, their public stance is, oh, we want to bring them back. I, I think that they actually are expecting to trade them. That's my, that's my theory here. So what it sounds like to me is you're making another comparison to wrestling where this would be what they call a work. Cincinnati is working the media into believing that they want T Higgins. Only to create a frenzy. Oh. Yeah. Yeah. They're working the media. The work I think it's a work. It's a shoot. It's a full WWE, Situation here a situation. Yeah situation speaking. Oh, i'm glad you said situations speaking of situations I think mr. Mr. Rogers has found himself in quite the situation. He's going to be in another neighborhood We reportedly I heard that He was begging to keep his job in new york I don't believe that for one second because that doesn't sound like him, but it could be true. But i'm sitting here looking at it, right? So the jets don't want him, you know Adam schaffer came out and said this morning that no one is calling aaron rogers. He's not anyone's first choice The the best move for him to do is to retire and get picked up by an injury Happen team in the right because I mean if you if you're looking at teams who's available You got the steelers the browns raiders titans the Rams, but they're going to re sign Stafford the 49ers, but they're probably going to re sign Brock Purdy or, or make him happy. So, you know, the Steelers already said they wanted to re sign either Russ or Fields. Yeah. So it's like, and it's like, well, Rogers isn't going to want to go to the Titans. They're not in a win now mode. They're not gonna want to go to the Raiders. They're not a win now mode. So it's like, yeah, I think he has nowhere to go. I was thinking there's no good fit for him. Although Smith friend of the pod Smith, he brought up the Steelers. And I do think that it, it actually could be a good fit because. I think Arthur Smith will, will let him basically run the pass game how he, how he prefers so long as Arthur Smith can run his run scheme and yada yada with that, with that shit that he really loves. I could see them being a team that might actually let Rodgers do what Rodgers wants to do the most, which is have a bunch of control over the offense. And I think that they could be a team that Rodgers might see as A possibly a contending team, right? I agree with that sentiment. Is there a contending team? However, my thought along with probably a lot of other people's thoughts are Mike Tomlin's not going to allow the bullshit that he pulls in New York. He's not going to be able to go on McAfee show every week like he wants to at this point in Aaron Rodgers career He's wanted more by the media than he is by an nfl team. Yes That seems to be true. I mean people are still trying to make like Documentaries and stuff about him now. They're still trying to like He has been successful, even though I think it's annoying as hell. He has been successful at basically getting people interested in him. He loves attention and he wanted everything to play out this way as far as how the media interacts with him. But it is not surprising to me that the NFL is souring on Rogers because. He is such a hassle to work with, that if you're not playing at an MVP level anymore, you're probably not worth the hassle. You see what I'm saying? Like Well, I mean, hold on. Technically, he was playing at an MVP level. God, that's the game. I mean, him and, let's not forget him and Josh Allen, had the same stat line. I'm just saying. They had, they had similar stat lines. That doesn't appear to be true. But, you know, the thing here's, here's the, here's the thing that I was thinking about the Steelers though, is. I agree with you, Tomlin doesn't seem like the type to want to fuck with Rogers. That being said, though, I think that the whole, Oh, we're comfortable with both Fields and with Russ, I think that might be a sort of like, work in the media situation as well. Oh, I don't think they take both. I don't think they, I don't think they re sign both. I think they re sign one. Yeah, but so Tomlin came out and said that, that they're going to keep at least one and that he would be comfortable with either one of them running his office or whatever. I, I think. That that might be a little bit of work in the media and in fact They're probably not not sold on either of them very very much. You know what I mean? Well, I I mean, I think my thought is is that they take fields if they take Rogers on a one year flyer Like fields is obviously the backup again, and they hope that after one more year being kind of You know in the nfl that maybe he could become the starter because either it's either that or they've got a I mean, I guess they take I mean, but see that's the thing is You know kurt cousins is going to be going to be out there. You know, atlanta's going to Drop him. Yeah, you know, I mean Sam Darnold's still out there. So why wouldn't the Steelers go ask those two guys first? Yeah, you know Well, I like why why why would you want to deal with the drama on off field drama that rogers? is going to bring when you could get a guy like kurt cousins who just you know shows up to work and everybody likes him and he just wears his plaid shirts and You know because he knows he's getting back in his gaudy chains Yeah, and one thing about rogers too is if i'm not mistaken the steelers are not in a great spot cap wise and the thing is That rogers has never been one to take like a pay cut for the team or anything. You know what I mean? So it's like The thing about the thing about Russ versus fields is I think fields would be the most likely one to keep just because Russ doesn't have the offset language anymore. Whereas last year, the Broncos were paying it this year. They're actually not going to be paying his salary. So he's open to taking a new contract with someone who might 20, 25 million. I'm not sure what his market worth is, but I am 20, 25 million, but whatever it is. It's going to be more than what Fields is, is going to cost. You see what I'm saying? So I think that, I think that, I think that Fields actually is the most likely option to start, at least start the season as their starter next year. Oh, right. Yeah. A hundred percent. I mean, I also, I mean, call me crazy. I think Sam Darnold staying in Minnesota. See, I, so I, I am starting to believe that that's true. I started to believe that they are actually going to resign Darnold and basically trade McCarthy. I don't think that they keep McCarthy. On the bench, I think and that makes the most sense. That makes the most sense. Yeah, because there's why would you There's teams desperate for a quarterback that'll give you value back for mccarthy Yeah, because he's still a first round pick that we haven't seen play yet, right? You know, so no one, you know, someone's willing to give him a first round pitch for a first round. Right. He doesn't have that stank on his name yet. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. So I think Sam Donald stays in Minnesota. I think Justin Fields stays in Steeler land. Where do you think Famous Jameis lands up, lands, other than on the microphone? Because I will, I'm still seeing videos of his escapades in New Orleans every day. I'm dying. Dude, people absolutely love him. I do too, by the way. I'm, I'm, I'm not poo pooing it because it is. Bro, did you see the thing he said to Burt Kreisler? I'm not sure which one. I watched a lot of videos from the Super Bowl and shit. During the game, Burt Kreisler asked him, What was it like to return a punt in the NFL? And James Winston said, Terrifying. And that the only way he could explain it was, imagine that you're looking up at the moon and 11 ostriches are running at full speed, and you have a piece of corn on your chin. Like, where does he even come up with this? And Bert Kreischer is laughing. He's like, I can't imagine what that would be like. I don't know what that would be like. I guess I'd get scared, yeah. Yeah. Like, what? I think the most likely thing for Jameis is that he does come back to the Browns. Just because the, all his teammates love him. Wow. And I don't think he's going to get signed as a starter elsewhere. I think that they can bring him back on a backup deal and they could draft Cam board or Sha or even Jackson Darter. They could take a shot on somebody and they could just keep Winston as the backup because the thing is sup, all the reports are that all of his teammates love him, even though he throws the pick sixes. They just love playing for him. Yeah, because he says wild shit like that. Yeah, and he really does try to get them the ball. Like, they, they love the fact that Yeah, that's why he throws so many passes. Yeah, he will constantly give them a chance to make plays. You know what I mean? And so The same as the other team. He gives the other team as many chances as his own team to make plays. Yeah, I think every player in the NFL Even equal opportunity. Every, every player in the NFL loves him in their locker room, I think. That's the, that's the interesting thing about it. But I, I think that they probably bring him back. Because they do like him, they, they probably don't have faith in him actually being the starter. But I think they bring him back because they like him. And they, they either try to trade for J. J. McCarthy or they try to take a shot in the draft. They do have an early draft spot, so they could take a shot on one of these guys if they want to. I think, I think the smartest move would be to Take a shot in the draft, even though history has shown that it, it doesn't necessarily work out for them. Yeah, right. Take a shot in the draft. Remember what, remember when they took the oh what was his name? Wheaton. They, they took, oh, Brandon Wheaton. They took him first, the 28-year-old. They took him first over overall, and then he was like, God awful. He literally, like, he was old too. He like literally never had a. I mean, when you draft a player that age, it's like, you're only going to get like six seasons out of them. Like, come on, what were y'all doing? Yeah, man. So you know, I just wanted to kind of look at the QB free agency market. We already kind of went over Jamis Winston, Justin Fields, Sam Darnold, Russell Wilson. But what about Daniel Jones? See, he's like on the bubble. I think I, I think that he's more like a backup quarterback, but I think we're in a position where the demand is outnumbering the supply, you know what I'm saying? So, I think he has an outside chance of actually being signed as someone's, like, bridge quarterback because they don't The Jets? It could be. It could be. I could see him going to the Jets for a year. I could see him going to the Raiders for a year. I mean, you know, I mean The raiders tom brady, you know brady's probably like oh bring him on over here. I can I can train him up I can coach him up. I can cook him up. Don't worry I can I can get him to throw on time instead of having to wait for everybody to be wide open before he throws it But the thing about the Raiders is, yeah, I feel like he'd be going to a similar situation where it's like, not really a wide receiver, you know, not really, you know, he's got one, the tight end, but like the better fit for him would be the Jets. Like, like a better spot, like he, cause he's got, you know, talent around him. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, honestly, like, even though he himself is not always like great for fantasy He, he, he has like been a little bit of a gunslinger sometimes where it's like his first, whatever his top receiver is. Like in this case, I'm, I'm assuming it would be Garrett Wilson. I like, he will target that, that, that. Receiver a lot. So I think it like as far as like if you have Garrett Wilson on your fantasy team You you're probably fine with Daniel Jones coming over to be, you know, he's not a great quarterback But he will give give the top dog a ton of targets. They have to bolster up that offensive line though Oh, man, that often wouldn't need some help that offensive line took a step back this past year. That's for sure And then, so even when you look at the rest of some of these teams that are looking for quarterbacks, you know, Cam Ward, Shadur Sanders are going to be drafted. So I mean, back to the Aaron Rodgers, it's like, when you look at these quarterbacks that are in free agency and the people coming in the draft, it's like, there's no spot for him. There's no spot that he would openly choose that would want him. Right. You know what I mean? Right. I think the big issue is that most of these teams that have QB openings are teams that are, he's not going to see as contenders like that, you know? Right. Yep. So. All right. Well, that's quarterback free agency. We'll break down a little bit more free agency as it is. The offseason goes and deals get made and done and, you know, draft and all that jazz. One last little major thing I wanted to discuss was the future of the college football playoff is in 2026. As of, if they wanted to change anything this year, they would need a unanimous decision between all the conferences and they're not going to get that. Because the Mountain West made 4 million off of Boise State going into the playoffs. Wow. Yeah. Nice. So good for the Mountain West. But there's a lot of drama have going to be happening because so in 2026, everything's on the table talking. They could be expansion of the playoffs. So 14 team. Reseeding in the playoffs. So what the big drama is, is the big 10 and the SEC are trying to take all of the pie and they're saying we should get each get four automatic qualifiers being, they want eight teams being from two conferences. No, automatic. I know I don't like it. No. And I don't like that. And the one reason why I don't like that is because you're basically saying. You can predict who's going to be in it. Like if you have four teams from two conferences, you could say, Oh, by, by November, you kind of already at this point would know based on record, who's going to be in it. So then what would be the point? Defeats one of the biggest pros of the, the playoff, one of the biggest pros, in my opinion, is the fact that there's. You still don't know how it's going to shake out, even all the way up to the last week of the regular season. There is a lot of teams that are still have a chance, even if it's like less of a chance there, their fan bases are still really engaged in to see if they get in or not. And if you're, if you're going to have that many automatic bids, then like you said, people are going to know too far ahead. It's going to take. Out the, that like people are going to lose hope, like, right. And so the idea behind them is that, Oh, well, we'll get more money for our conferences. And it's like, yeah, okay. That might happen at first, but then when it becomes an SEC, big 10 invitational and everyone's like, great, another sec team versus an sec team, why watch the game? So then, Oh, all that money you were making. Is now losing money because no one's watching the game the tv deals, right? So essentially you're just Monopolizing the product which is always bad whenever you monopolize something you take away The the fun out of it and the competition and therefore no one wants to watch it Yeah. And I mean, the fans even just on a, on a base, like, is this fair? Like most fans are like, this is bullshit anyway. Like you, you don't need these really popular, powerful conferences having a guaranteed eight. Like you, like fans are not going to feel like that is fair anyways. Right. So Iowa automatically gets in who, who two years ago, couldn't even put 12 points a game. Like, how does that, how does, how does that make the product any better? Like, like I think anyway, we talked about it at length. The college football playoff was perfect this year. I think this is exactly what they, what we wanted as fans to see. And I think if they tinker with it, it's only about greed and they'll ruin the product even further than they already have. Yeah. With the greediness. Yeah. Yeah, I think the worst thing that happened this year is that a smaller. Big conference like the Mountain West got four million and you feel like they didn't deserve it that We're doing pretty fucking well because that's not a big deal brother like Right if that's the worst thing that went down then we're doing pretty well. I felt like it went off really well. Lots of people were Interested and invested and what was going to happen? That's what you want You want that engagement and you want things for people to be excited about? I mean you and I basically had a week after week for like what five six weeks in a row where we were Updating each other like well, what did what happened? And what was this? And okay, okay Yeah, all the twists and turns are legitimately interesting when you have it the way you had it this this past year And so and if you already know the team eight of the teams by november 1st and boring Moving on to the final thing The rumor mill. I got two rumors for you. Oh, okay. Or maybe not so much rumors. One's a rumor, one's not a rumor. Netflix wants to buy CBS and Fox's Sunday NFL deals to air all of the broadcasts on Sunday on Netflix. Well, except for, I guess, Sunday night would be NBC. Oh my god. And the NFL would be okay with that? Well, that's why I said it's a rumor, my friend. Whaaaaaaat? We don't know. We don't know. I just, it's just the peak of the iceberg. Ooh, man. I will say this, though, If Netflix did that, they'd make a boatload of money. They would make a boatload of money if they if they could literally get that AFC and that nfc side of it and just have a monopoly on sunday games like well, my worry would be You know Does viewership go down? But that would be my only worry. So my list of pros would be maybe they'll finally do the, everybody can watch their own team sort of thing. Or, you know, what are, what are, you know, could this explode into multiple different viewing styles and all of this other stuff, so like, yeah. I'm, I don't, I don't have cable. So, and the only reason why I ever get YouTube TV is to get Sunday ticket. So if I don't have to pay for YouTube TV and I can get Sunday tickets standalone and, you know, or whatever, or not even have Sunday ticket, like I'm all for it. So, yeah, I, the reason why I say. Would the NFL let that happen is because of what, what you first said, which is it could have the effect of a lot of people opting out and they would get less viewership, which you got to think they're going to hate. But unless you made, unless Netflix made an option to where you could. Watch the NFL games for free. Oh, if they worked out some kind of deal like that, I think everyone would support it. Yeah. Where like you sign up for Netflix, but if you just want the free, like a free account, it comes with, you know, you could get already, you could get certain kind of content, you could get certain kind of content with like commercials in it or something. Yeah. Well co I mean, just your basic, like whatever would normally have been on your basic cable television on Fox, whatever the normal broadcast for Fox would've been, right? You get that broadcast and the CV s broadcast and then, you know, maybe you get some, some other content to kind of entice you to, right, to want to, you know, buy the, the ad give like free previews of their popular shit or something. Right. Yeah, man. Like there's there's a whole route they could go to like advertise why people should i mean i'm only paying like 8 a month anyway, so like I I don't care about ads. I grew up watching ads. I grew up with ads So for me like the ads that's time for me to refill my water go use the bathroom, you know, go do stuff So I don't mind ads, but you know, maybe i'm a boomer not really And then the other thing that I wanted to leave everyone out on And this is freaking awesome, especially for me and you and charleston Mls is going to have a division one competitor. The usl is making a Competitor to the mls and they will have promotion and relegation And so what that means is I think teams like the Charleston Battery could be relegated, could be promoted to a higher league. You know, which would be, which would be cool if it took off. I don't know if, you know, you know, obviously things like this and it's infancy. It's, it's going to be hard to get people to watch because you don't have the names like messy and, and, you know, Patrick, Ozzie bond and, and, you know, some of these other guys that I just, for whatever reason, blanking on right now. Yeah. You don't have the name recognition. Yeah. You don't have that. So it's going to be hard to get people to watch, but I will say though, I like as a spectator to any kind of competition, relegations are. Always fun. Like they're always interesting. Like they, I think it's, it's an ingenious concept. Whoever came up with it way, way long ago, man. You know, one thing that I think I've mentioned on this part before, but in case I haven't big fan of the professional halo scene and in there and their pro league. They actually have, at the end of the season, a relegation tournament where the bottom two teams have to play the top AM teams to keep their spots in the league. And so the fact that every now and then An underdog bad news bears team actually gets into the pro league is fucking exciting. You know what I mean? Like people love that shit. They love that shit. And a lot is a lot is on stake. So they're not going through the motions. They're really, really trying. And, and. You know, it's basically it's always interesting no matter who actually ends up winning or losing. It's always interesting to see how it plays out. Absolutely, man. So, I mean, that's pretty exciting if you're a soccer fan in the United States, more competition for soccer is always better in a, in a country where you're trying to grow that product. So sure. Yeah. That's all I got. Yeah, that's that's it. That's the rumors, but that's the news this week I'll probably have some more next week. Maybe some fun facts right now. Oh, I do have one fun fact. All right Kendrick lamar ran more yards in the halftime show than the chiefs did in the entire game couple that they did on office Yep 220 something like that. I don't know. Wow. Damn. He ran a lot too. Geez He was all over that field, man. And, and shout out to the cameraman who had to do it running backwards. Oh, yeah. That guy's in shape. Yeah. Yeah. So one last thing that you didn't mention because it's, it's very, it's, it's very small news, but I thought it was interesting is that the Panthers not only decided to bring Dalton back as the backup, they actually signed him to a two year contract, which. You know, I was gonna mention that, but I was just like, I don't, I don't know. He's the backup, so I just didn't think it was that big of a news. Yeah, no, it's, it's really not. It's a small item, but it, it did like raise my eyebrows. I was like, oh, okay, this is pretty cool. You know, this is pretty cool. Cause I think he is. One of the better backups in the league. And so, Hey, well, I mean, you're solidifying your quarterback slot. Now you have Bryce Young as your starter, Andy Dalton as your backup. There's no question of who's who and who's doing what exactly, which is always exactly it's stability. And you know, they, they got a good relationship going anyways. It's a young quarterback who probably gains a certain level of wisdom from an older quarterback. And Andy Dalton started. Yeah, and the thing is, like, he actually will give your team a chance to win a game if he needs to be in there. Yeah, that's a good move. Good move by the Panthers. I don't know how much he cost, but No, it was cheap. It was cheap. It was a good move. Fantastic. Fantastic. Well, looking forward to next week. As always, you can hit us up on email at pineponypodcast22 at gmail. com or on threads and Instagram at pineponypodcast. I'll probably be yelling about wrestling and sports sports. Anyway, check you later. Adios.
