2 Vintage Sports Guys - Episode 12

Episode 12: Join Joe and Paul as they cover the NBA and NHL Playoffs, the first Day of the NFL Draft and the TV and Streaming Channel Wars that carry these games now. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:07

Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome back to Two Vintage Sports Guys on a lovely Friday. We are here to discuss the latest uh in the NBA playoffs and the NHL playoffs. Did I introduce myself? If not, I'm Joe Rodacci. I'll say it again. It sounds better twice. And I'm throwing it over to my partner across the border, Mr. Paul Gallagher.

SPEAKER_03 0:30

And you introduced me as well. So not only did you introduce yourself twice, but but me once. So yeah, I'm Paul. I'm in Atlanta. I'm here. And uh I'm back counting cards. We're gonna talk about cards too a little bit. We always have to talk about a little bit of cards, but it's it's playoff time and regular season baseball, which is depressing. So we'll stick to the cards.

SPEAKER_02 0:51

Oh my god, how could depressing more could it be for me and you? My team, the New York Mets, lost 12 games in a row, and yet your Philadelphia Phillies are still in less place behind them.

SPEAKER_03 1:01

Because we lost 10 in a row, so yes, it really must be lost 10 in a row. Swept twice by the Cubs and once by the uh uh Braves. So yeah, it's it's misery. Let's get let's stop talking about it and let's go straight to uh basketball and hockey.

SPEAKER_02 1:22

Let me just leave it with we both have to then keep looking up with the Braves off to a terrific start in first place. On top of that, it's horrible, it's horrible.

SPEAKER_03 1:32

It's uh absolutely horrible.

SPEAKER_01 1:34

Let's jump into it. Let's look at the games tonight. We got three games. We have Boston Philly, which is tied one-one, shockingly to me. I do a Boston. Shockingly. Sweep them, or you know, it's gonna be a 4-1, I think, by the time it's done.

SPEAKER_02 1:49

But what's your thoughts on Boston and Philly?

SPEAKER_03 1:52

Uh, yeah, shocking is the word, right? I didn't expect that. I didn't even tune in for that second game, I don't think. Um, thinking that we were gonna get blown up. But it's it's a lot of folks are are are even in the series. I think that uh will we lose? Yes, but you know, we'll we'll give it the old fight. I'm not sure whether Embiid is back, so I don't think he will be back for this game. If we could stretch it out, but it's all about Tyrese Maxie, who I just checked last night, by the way, because I got a Tyrese Maxie tops now card, redemption, uh, and I sent it back in in February and it's still pending. So I'm waiting on my Tyrese Maxie auto one of ten. So there you go. It's all about Maxie in the Sixers series.

SPEAKER_02 2:39

Okay, and so the Celtics, and and this is just gonna show you the regular season, they finished 56 and 26 compared to 76ers at 45 and 37, had to win a playoff uh play-in game, right, to get the seventh in the conference. And here they are 1-1 with with home field advantage now, home court advantage. Sorry about that. And um we'll see where that goes. But if we look at the other two games, we got LA, Houston, LA's up 2-0, going back to Houston. I can't see this being more than a five-game series. And what's your thoughts on Houston coming back for anything?

SPEAKER_03 3:20

Uh no, I mean, we'll just let we'll let LeBron have his little show, and we'll say the Lakers are are gonna waltz into the next round. So Houston getting one at home. Houston will get one at home. Everybody gets one at home, I think. Um, and that's where opening on the road is interesting. Um, Sixers did it, and they were able to scrape out one in hockey. Um teams can can get one or two on the road, and then they come back home. So, yeah, I think it's a big deal to to win one on the road, and you can always get one at home, so they should be able to be okay.

SPEAKER_02 3:57

Let's throw this in there, being that the NHL and NBA playoffs pretty much run side by side with each other. Where do you think there's more of a home court or ice advantage in hockey or basketball for the playoffs?

SPEAKER_03 4:12

Yeah, I was actually leaning towards hockey just because it just seems to be like the Dallas game was absolutely crazy the other night. Um, it just seems like the fans get more excited, unless I don't know whether you saw San Antonio. They do they hand out shirts. So each quadrant of the stadium had a different color shirt to match the pink, what was it? Pink, black, and orange of the San Antonio Spurs on the court. Each group in the stadium had a shirt. It was the wildest color scheme ever going. The Thunder defending champs are are probably the best case example of a of a home advantage, and their their crowd is crazy. They probably don't have much else going on in Oklahoma, so they go out to a basketball game or a rodeo. A basketball game or a rodeo. That's right, there's a lot of space in between that. What else is there in Oklahoma?

SPEAKER_02 5:14

Come on. Let's save that for another day as you get Oklahoma hate mail after this.

SPEAKER_03 5:18

But I love Oklahoma. Wonderful people, wonderful.

SPEAKER_02 5:21

Yeah, kick saving a bit. But I'm gonna think it's more basketball than hockey for this reason. Hockey, and it's been forever and a day since I've been on the ice. But if you're if you're skating out there, first of all, you have your little Lego helmet on, you can't tell any players from each other anymore what these these helmets are. So they have they have their glass, a lot of them, right in front of their on their mask, right? Not take a puck there. Then they have the board and glass all around them. Then they have nets protecting that they don't kill anybody in the crowds. How much do you think they're really looking up and getting further amped by just the crowd cheering as compared to a basketball game where they're not wearing any helmets? You see them, everybody's courtside, you could be falling on Jack Nicholas one night and uh Nick Nicholson, sorry. If you fall on Jack Nicholas, you're in trouble.

SPEAKER_03 6:21

I have one word I think that makes the difference, and it's uh it's violence. The checks in hockey that change the whole crowd, one delivered hit, one fight, it gets the whole crowd up and going. Where else can you cheer on an assault uh with assault and battery with a deadly weapon, other than a hockey game?

SPEAKER_02 6:43

So usually the old joke, you went to a fight and a hockey game broke out.

SPEAKER_03 6:47

Well, not in the playoffs. It is all hockey and then a fight breaks out, but when it does, it gets the whole crowd going. So that's why I would argue for my first love hockey.

SPEAKER_02 6:57

Oh, I love hockey over basketball, but I think the crowd's gonna personalization, the closeness. I don't know. I think if the players cared about anything more than their checkbook, uh I still think it's basketball, but you can say that about all sports. And then we got the third game tonight, which is San Antonio uh now going back to Portland. It's 1-1 because Wemby's hurt, right? Concussion protocol, he's probably not playing tonight. Uh San Antonio's only favored betting line, if you bet, by 2.5, which would have been probably seven or or higher. So what do you think? Is Portland still one of the two at home now? If especially with Wemby out tonight, no, I don't think they do.

SPEAKER_03 7:46

I don't think they have uh all their guns blazing either, Portland. So I'm just gonna stick with the home at court advantage and and go with San Antonio on this one.

SPEAKER_02 7:57

With Wemby, I think it could be over in four, maybe five. Without him, depending when he comes back or not, this could this could go six, maybe, but most likely still five. All three games are on watchable on what network, Paul. I just I just told you before we started.

SPEAKER_03 8:17

I know. I'm laughing because it's it's not right. I they're all on Amazon Prime.

SPEAKER_02 8:22

I mean, what you gotta have up with that.

SPEAKER_03 8:25

I don't like it. I don't like it, I don't like it, I don't like it. Now there's benefits, right? You'd think, and you're the stat guy, you'll look it up on Google as we're talking about how many people have what. You can you can watch it anywhere, you know what? On Claude, yeah, your friend Claude. You can watch it anywhere, would be my only saving grace to that. Because these days, you know, if you're traveling or you're somewhere else, not at home, you can at least pull up on cable and watch it on ESPN or Amazon or whoever it is. I don't know who doesn't have Amazon. I have them all, but I also, you know, pay through the teeth through 18 different streaming services.

SPEAKER_02 9:07

Well, I have them all, and that's a combination of paying through the teeth and using somebody else's teeth because we swap logins.

SPEAKER_03 9:13

And well, that's cheating. We're not we don't condone. We neither condone that.

SPEAKER_02 9:18

Hey, share, share, that's fair. But to look to just look at some of those stats, just to give you an idea. First, let's just say that the a the 2026 NBA playoffs this year are the first under you know another new multi-billion dollar media rights deal. So it looks a little different. ABC has the NBA finals, uh ESPN across ABC, you know, it has has games, NBC and Peacock has games. As mentioned, prime video, they carried the play-in tournament and they got all the games tonight. And the notable absence is who? Where did Charles Barkley lose his home?

SPEAKER_03 9:59

Oh, TNT, right?

SPEAKER_02 10:01

TNT.

SPEAKER_03 10:02

But those guys, and that gets us into something else. That's a great point you just brought up. The TNT crew was the best, right? So we lost them. Um, you know, the announcers that you lose by changing is a big, big deal. So yeah, I miss Charles. Everybody misses Charles. That's a shame that we don't have them. So not only are you forced to watch it on and log in and pay for the stream, you're forced to listen to somebody else, which is just as horrible if it's a bad crew. So good point on you.

SPEAKER_02 10:36

We miss Charles. I'll take that. That's going right in the in the 30-second highlight reels. I'll play over.

SPEAKER_03 10:42

You're not editing that one out, are you?

SPEAKER_02 10:44

Oh, that's it. That might be the whole thing right there. But all right, but let's let's let's just finish that off with with the stats so people understand. So according to Claude, which is a GPT, just like ChatGPT, for those that don't know, Netflix leads with between 55 and 64 percent of the house U.S. households have Netflix, which I could see. That's probably been around the longest, and everybody's been on that. Prime Video, between 34 and 47 percent. The Disney ESPN bundle, 22 to 34 percent. Peacock, actually, I'm surprised it's up to 21 to 23 percent.

SPEAKER_03 11:23

People have peacock, which is just all you get it, it's like a BOGO bundle deal. You get Peacock when you got something else, or you get it through your cable channel through your company Comcast, you get it through Comcast for free.

SPEAKER_02 11:37

You used to when I lived in Atlanta, they stopped that two two to three years ago, and then they started charging you. But yes, they did it first when they created Peacock because Comcast was owned by NBC anyway, so or vice versa. But that's not free anymore with your uh Xfinity. So if you think it was checking bill. And then YouTube TV, which I cut my uh Xfinity uh home cable costs for seven percent, which I thought would have been higher, because YouTube TV is great. You get the pitcher and pitcher for not just you could create your own pitcher and pitcher up to four different uh boxes on the screen. So you could do it for four games at the same time. You could do it for anything.

SPEAKER_03 12:25

You could watch those guys for the NFL ticket, so I don't want to pay them more, I think is the strategy there.

SPEAKER_02 12:31

You'd save money if you got rid of your cable, kept just kept your internet and use YouTube TV.

SPEAKER_03 12:38

Don't tell me what to do.

SPEAKER_02 12:39

Uh telling you what to do, but UTD, I'm uh we'll see. I think that's gonna keep rising. Plus, when you hit the road, you access everything from your your phone or your iPad. Yeah, true. So that is the benefit. We got that. Hockey. Let's talk about hockey. Hockey. Let's jump into the NHL playoffs. All right, you're you're driving. I'm gonna sit in the back and play Miss Daisy. Go ahead.

SPEAKER_03 13:05

Well, you can start out with the hometown team. Up 3-0, took two games on the road, came home. Uh, we've got game four for the sweep. Darth Vlader is the goalie for the Flyers. Uh, and he is a game time decision. Took a little thumping on the wrist because of one of their bullies ran over our goalie. Um, so we'll see if we have to put in a backup goalie and give the guy a rest. It's a long two months, just like the commercial says. Hockey playoffs, two months long, and you're just trying to make the whole thing. So it is an interesting question. Do you put a a goalie in, even if he's healthy, do you put a goalie in for game four when you're up three-nothing just to give the guy a rest?

SPEAKER_02 13:50

So yes, it's looking like that. The old penguins are not coming back and beating you four in a row. Uh right.

SPEAKER_03 13:55

Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 13:56

I can't even remember the last team that won four in a row. Do we know?

SPEAKER_03 14:00

It's uh uh Claude knows. I'm not sure. Claude knows. I'll ask Claude guess.

SPEAKER_02 14:05

You know, say something.

SPEAKER_03 14:06

So then Colorado is the other formidable force uh that's that's gonna march on. Probably the best series is uh is Dallas, Minnesota. Dallas went up. It was a double overtime the other night. Um, so Dallas is up, I think two to one on that one. And then the uh one tonight is gonna be the Canadians. We're all rooting for the Canadians here, and you've also got um Buffalo back in the playoffs, Buffalo, Boston. So everybody talked about everybody who's not playing tonight.

SPEAKER_02 14:40

Well, who's playing tonight? Let's go. Who do we got? Let's go through tonight's games. All right, tonight's games. Well, I teed it up for you. Tampa, Montreal, all right, going back to Montreal 1-1.

SPEAKER_03 14:50

I said we all root for Montreal.

SPEAKER_02 14:52

Uh yeah, go into it a little more.

SPEAKER_03 14:55

So go into it a little more. So it's an it's an amazing team. So average age is 27, which is sixth overall in the league, and I didn't need Claude for that. You've got you've got 21-year-olds, 22-year-olds.

SPEAKER_02 15:09

How geeked out are you to know that if you didn't?

SPEAKER_03 15:12

We talk about it during we talk about it with uh you know with the family as we're watching the game, and I ask questions, and my son answers them. So um uh Caulfield and uh Suzuki and Slavoski and uh Demodov, they're all young, 23 and under. And it's a fantastic small, fast team versus the lightning, which is old and bullyish and just beyond. I think that's and I said it before, I think what we're seeing in both sports is the passing of the torch. Some of the teams, like the Penguins, like the Lightning that have been winning forever, are passing the torch to the young guys, and I think it's great to see. And we have a kind of a new day in sports, and we watch the young people get good. What's the other game on the docket tonight?

SPEAKER_02 16:02

So the other two we have, and first let me just jump back to it's only happened four times in NHL history that a team came back from 3-0. The last one, 2014, the Kings beat the uh the Sharks in the first round. So, I mean, it's 12 years ago already, but and then really only four years before that, and I'm not sure how you didn't jump up and down on this, was your Philadelphia Flyers. Beat the Penguins. No, beating the Bruins in the second round in 2010.

SPEAKER_00 16:35

Oh, came back came back three up.

SPEAKER_02 16:39

And then me goes all the way back to 1975 when the Islanders beat uh your hated Penguins in the quarterfinals, and then the first one and the uh goes all the way back to 1942. Toronto made beliefs beat the Detroit Red Wings. What was there? Only eight teams in the league, anyway, at that point, right? So that's two of the eight. Beat him in the Stanley Cup final. That that would be that's heartbreaking. That you're gonna lose the cup when you're up 3-0. That is that is indeed heartbreaking. You know, that's that's brutal.

SPEAKER_03 17:16

What else we got? What what what's the other two games on the schedule?

SPEAKER_02 17:20

One game, the other one game tonight is Edmund, Edmonton, the Oilers going to visit the Ducks in Anaheim. They're all all three series tonight at type one-one. Yeah, so what's your thoughts about the the Oilers? Are they squeaky or are they oil oiled up?

SPEAKER_03 17:37

They are well they they're so dry sidles just coming back from injury, so it that's a big, big deal. Their uh power plays not running extremely well on all cylinders, but again, you've got a couple of guys that are coming back from injury. I would think, speaking of the old and the young, the ducks are really, really young. I don't, you know, I don't like the ducks, so we will root for the Oilers and hope for McDavid, but I'm not sure that they're gonna get if they make it past the Ducks, which they should, I'm not sure they go much further than that.

SPEAKER_02 18:10

I agree. They definitely should get past the Ducks. I don't see them going back to a third cup in a row to lose. Um but you know, we'll see. Teams, you know, people always have to keep in mind what happens in one series doesn't always have anything to do with the next series, depending on matchups, style of play. You know, so we'll see. But I think the uh the oilers should get past the the the what what do you call who was it the Emilio Esther's ducks?

SPEAKER_03 18:41

Yeah, yeah, right, right. The mighty ducks, the mighty ducks.

SPEAKER_02 18:44

You'd have to be vintage if you remember that. That's probably 25 years ago already, 25 to 30 years ago.

SPEAKER_03 18:50

Well, they went back to their their um logo is back to that original duck uh duckbill ghouling mask.

SPEAKER_02 18:59

So well, anyway, sometimes you you gotta listen to the crowd. I don't know. Let's let's speak vintage. The islanders back in mid-90s, '95, went to this fishermen logo, if you remember that.

SPEAKER_03 19:15

Which oh you the Gordon's fisherman, yeah. That was one of the worst of all time.

SPEAKER_02 19:20

People don't know what you're talking about. Gordon's Fisherman sells those really bad um almost fish uh sticks that you throw the microwave. And everybody said, Oh, it looks like the Gordon's fisherman, but they also said at the same time in New York, because the movie I Know What You Did Last Summer with Jennifer Love You, it was out, and the killer, if you remember, was the guy dressed like the fisherman. So you're like they're like you got the killer from the movie or the Gordon's Fisherman. Took the Alanists, I think, less than a year to get rid of that and then uh retired in the in the hall of shame.

SPEAKER_03 19:56

That one of the five worst. We'll have to do a show on the uh five platforms. Yeah, I think we'll that that's a good show to do down the line. I think the flyers have ever gone off the glove, right? No, it's always been the same. I mean, it's black and orange and a flyers thing. We've never had a mascot or you know, now that we have gritty, it's different, but no, we've never had differences, right? And so it's good to be solid. Penguin's logo is a pretty good one, though. We I give them credit for that. Penguin's logo is not bad.

SPEAKER_02 20:30

The new one is that old stupid one of that like stick leg thing skating, look ridiculous. But hey, the others like them, so stick with the bad logo, right?

SPEAKER_03 20:42

So, as we're closing, what other sports do we have? Cards, cards, cards.

SPEAKER_02 20:46

Give me some cards discussion.

SPEAKER_03 20:48

So it's obviously everything is about um tops NFL Chrome. That got dropped last week. Prices are insane. Um, there's a shortage of cards everywhere. People are going around to Walmarts and Dick Sporting Goods and Targets trying to get whatever they could get their hands on, and in that shortage of product comes pricing. So, you know, you'll see online hobby boxes going for twelve hundred dollars a box. That's a Saturday. It's yeah, I it it either will I mean tops is making money, of course, but it may just be one of those things where it's the peak of the of of the wave here, and we'll see what happens because you're spending twelve hundred bucks on a box, you're not getting a return on that once you open it. So it's a crazy, crazy time right now. It's April and and Topps is releasing football cards, number one, which is crazy, and number two, the the prices are just insane. So, you know, that's been the talk all week. I know there's some other products coming out. Bowman uh basketball came out as well. Um there's going to be more tops football products, I think five more over the next five months. So you're just going to see a wave of tops, and then you know, we'll see if they if they break the backs of the consumers, because I just can't imagine. Prices have peaked online, they're starting to come back down. So you could probably go online and find a box for 950 versus 1200. But I saw them yesterday at a major store here in Atlanta for 1200 bucks online, which is nuts. That goes beyond a hobby into uh an addiction of some kind.

SPEAKER_02 22:38

All right, well, let's not leave it on an addiction, but speaking of football, which we didn't mention since round one started last night, was the NHL uh edit the NFL draft.

SPEAKER_03 22:52

Well, and and and back to tops again. Every player that got drafted on the stage walked over and hand signed their tops football card. And that'll be you know going in a pack out on probably a tops now product or some sort of tops product. So when you talk, when you when you mention it, it's getting into every aspect of the game. And perfect example is last night's draft. Every player signing a card and tops being prevalent at the draft, too. And the Eagles making a great pick uh and in trading with our hated rivals Dallas uh to get a wide receiver to replace AJ Brown. So that's great.

SPEAKER_02 23:34

I think the whole draft was weak this year. I mean, not that, you know, the the guy who goes number one for the quarterback from the winning Hoosiers, and I always get his name. Yeah, Fernando Mendoza.

SPEAKER_03 23:48

Yeah, yeah, right. Awesome pick, awesome guy. But you're right, I don't think there was a lot, it wasn't very deep, a lot of controversy of the Rams drafting a quarterback at 13. Did they really need to do that while they're trying to make the Super Bowl? If you saw the coach's face, um, he probably wasn't a big fan of that move.

SPEAKER_02 24:08

So, yeah, so I actually watched that on first take on ESPN this morning, and they were all for it because they said he's the next 15 years. You you take him, you go fill in what you need for free agency to try to win it because you're this close. And if you look back at uh Mahomes, Jackson, and they rattled off like four Super Bowl-winning basically quarterbacks that were taken in the same type of situation. So I don't how do you fault it?

SPEAKER_03 24:44

Well, because what they didn't rattle off are the hundreds of other guys that are taken that don't pan out. Yeah, you could for every Mahomes, there's a hundred AJ McCarruns, you know.

SPEAKER_02 24:55

So I don't I I'm sure everybody but AJ McCarron would agree with that right now.

SPEAKER_03 25:01

Well, um AJ might even do that, but you know, or you can even take a Jordan Love. That's still that's still playing out, right? And and Aaron Rodgers doesn't have a a receiver, and they draft Jordan Love, and Aaron Rodgers gets mad the next year he's gone. And and is Lord is Love as good as the money's paying them and the replacement. I don't I don't think so, but I'm not sure that you can always just point at four guys and say that's the reason because of Mahomes. You look at the other side of the coin and say, What could we have gotten? I hate to sound like Mel Kuyper, but it's it's it's the draft. What do you need? And they could have gotten they could have gotten Mikhail Lemon from USC, and not only for their fan base, which is there, but a great pick because they need receivers and they didn't replace Cooper Cup.

SPEAKER_02 25:53

So back to the number one pick, Fernando Mendoza. You good with that for the Raiders, the awful Raidership? Of course.

SPEAKER_03 26:00

Of course, yeah. Yeah, they're gonna be able to do that.

SPEAKER_02 26:03

Let's just let's just talk top five. Jets will somehow screw it up, but they take the edge rusher from Texas Tech, David Bailey. Good with that?

SPEAKER_03 26:12

Well, they got rated the best overall. I think they got another pick later, too. So the Jets had a good night. I don't know about drafting an edge rusher, but linebacker, but yeah, the Jets got rated very well.

SPEAKER_02 26:24

So Jeremiah Love, Notre Dame running back going third to the Cardinals.

SPEAKER_03 26:31

Two solid skill positions in Marvin Harrison Jr. at wide out. Um Jacoby Brissett at quarterback is you know, listen, I said it last night. I would take offensive linemen every pick, the more vowels in their name, the better. And uh, and that's that's prominent with three of the picks, one from Utah, um, and then two other Samoan guys. If you take the big Samoan guys, you can't go wrong. And I would take linemen all day long. But take a running back with with the three or third overall pick, I guess, can't be too bad.

SPEAKER_02 27:10

All right. We'll leave it at the top threat. We've babbled long enough, and um I'll have to edit this for a while. So I'll t I'll take 40 minutes to get it down to a crisp 18.

SPEAKER_03 27:23

All right. Well, you know, don't lose don't lose my voice in the whole editing process. I don't, you know, this there was some.

SPEAKER_02 27:29

Yeah, if you introduce yourself as Paul, I'm cutting the rest of it out right there.

SPEAKER_03 27:32

All right, all right. Congratulations.

SPEAKER_02 27:34

It's your all right. Well, say goodbye, Paul.

SPEAKER_03 27:37

Goodbye, Paul.

SPEAKER_02 27:38

Take it easy, everybody. We will talk to you soon.