HR1: The Commanders roster was dreadful last season | Howard’s Head Coach’s emotional speech | Kevin’s MOST hated sports team

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Max Will as well.

Good morning.

This from mechs to open up the show.

Mechs writes Kevin.

Was our team that bad last year that nobody wants our free agents?

Sooner's favorite guy, Jacob Martin, got the only deal that wasn't one year.

Yeah, mechs.

Yes and no.

Yes, the team was that bad last year.

And part of it was yes due to the overall roster composition.

The team's five and 12 record wasn't due primarily to roster construction.

It was due to injury catastrophe in 2025.

But as far as the free agents go, all of the players that played for them last year

who got to free agency last week, none of them were wave one free agents.

By the way, Jacob Martin got a multi-year deal mechs.

But so did Chris Rodriguez.

And if you want to count Tyler Biotis, even though that came before free agency,

he got a multi-year deal as well after they released him.

Which means there's no compensation for losing Tyler Biotis in the 2027 draft.

But in terms of the guys that they had that got to unrestricted free agency, none of them

were free agency week one guys.

So the fact that none of them went last week, for the most part other than Jacob Martin

and Chris Rodriguez, it was expected.

If you look at, and I went back and looked at the ESPN top 100 free agents max

from a week ago before free agency began, Debo Samuel at number 53 on their top 100 free agent

list was the highest ranked Washington player on the list at number 53.

Chris Paul was 61.

Marcus Mario was 74 and Bobby Wagner was 96.

So four total players on the list, none higher than 53.

They didn't have true week one free agency guys.

Now that does speak to the roster to a certain degree.

But it doesn't speak to why players weren't selected or signed last week.

They weren't guys that were supposed to be signed last week.

Now I was thinking about, imagine if Terry McClearn had not been signed and ended up coming

in late and playing on the final year of his deal.

Now, a tag would have been a possibility, but if they didn't tag them and he had reached

free agency, he would have been way up on the list.

He certainly would have been as an available free agent wide receiver.

He would have been top 10, top 15 worst case on the ESPN top 100 free agent list.

But Debo was the highest ranked guy at 53.

They just didn't have guys that reached free agency that were tier one.

I thought there was a decent chance that Chris Paul, because he's younger and he had something

approximating a breakout season that he might get a nice deal from somebody early on.

But he didn't and now he's back.

The roster wasn't great last year.

There's no doubt about that, but it also wasn't great in 2024.

I mean, we've gone around the bend on who's to blame for that.

The previous regime for sure bears a significant amount of the responsibility.

Rivera and company picked 33 players in the draft and only six remain with the team.

One of them actually left and just came back, Deami Brown.

The other five are Juan Martin, Chris Paul, Sam Cosme, John Bates, and Percy Butler.

So six of the 33 players drafted in 2020, 2021, 2021, 2022, and 2023 are on the roster.

There are other players, by the way, to be fair to Ron and to, you know, Martin Mayhew and

Marty Herney, the Marty party as my guy Kevin and Arlington likes to refer to them.

There are other players from those drafts scattered around the league and contributing.

You know, players like Cameron Curle and Antonio Gibson and Chase Young, who had a really good

season last year, Dotson Forbes, Rodriguez. There are a few others.

But the hurt, the hurt from whipping on four straight first round picks.

Top half of the first round, first round picks. I guess with the exception of Jamie Davis,

right? He was not top half of the first round. But whipping on four straight first round picks,

that hurt is lasting. You know, Chase Young, even though he's kind of resurrected his career,

in New Orleans, Jamie Davis, Johan Dotson, and Emmanuel Forbes.

Man, that is something when you really think about it that Rivera and Martin Mayhew and

Marty Herney and all of them. I mean, that's not something you'll ever be able to explain

away if you are and were a part of that front office, you know, decision-making group.

Chase Young was an obvious selection. You know, at number two, most teams in the league would have

selected him that high, but Davis was a major reach. And you could certainly argue that Dotson

and Forbes were drafted ahead of where the consensus was. We know Forbes being selected

before Christian Gonzales was not the consensus. So inheriting a roster that was limited,

the cupboard was bare when, you know, Adam Peters and Dan Quinn arrived.

Add to that, of course, coming into an organization that had perhaps the worst culture in sports,

not just in the NFL, you know, courtesy of Snyder's, you know, decimation of the franchise over,

you know, a near quarter century. It wasn't going to be fixed overnight.

Jaden Daniels almost, you know, single-handedly resurrected the franchise in sort of quick turn

around way. And he's still the number one reason that we as fans can afford to be somewhat optimistic

going into his third season. You know, his second season, he missed so much of it, his Ben

described it. I think it's a good way to put it that basically it was a red shirt year without

without gaining the extra year of his rookie contract. But yes, Max, the team last year wasn't good,

the roster wasn't great. The players that reached free agency were not wave one tier one guys.

But what's also true is in year three of this group, the recalibration continues or whatever

you want to call it. They were in position heading into this off season from a cultural standpoint,

from a financial standpoint to upgrade the roster and feel a much better team in 2026 or at least

a much better roster. You know, of course, you know, not beating a dead horse or not intending to

be a dead horse, but maybe I am, you know, just being a healthy team in 2026 will make a huge

difference compared to 2025. But thank you for that, Max. I do think it's one of those things where

there's been a conversation about, you know, Washington's free agency, you know, kind of group.

And the fact that nobody was in a hurry to sign any of their players from last year. Yeah,

it's just that they didn't have players that reach free agency. And that happens sometimes

where you just end up with free, you know, players that don't reach free agency that are tier one

guys. They just didn't have those. Chris Paul's back. And they lost Jake Martin, Chris Rodriguez,

Noah Iggman, again, Jonathan Jones and Josh Johnson, who by the way, I didn't even mention this

when we said that yesterday, I think I'd mentioned that he had signed with Cincinnati over the weekend.

This guy's going to be 40 years old. Man, Josh Johnson, the, the Josh Johnson's and chase Daniels

of, you know, NFL Laureate, this point, just guys that have ultimately made so much money,

hardly ever playing. It's a pretty good trick, you know. Now, not that they didn't want to play,

but the trick is be really smart. Jay Gruden said about Josh Johnson to me three, four years ago,

maybe one of the, you know, smartest players that ever played for him. Others have said that about

him. And be smart and be a really good dude in the locker room. And you can end up with a really

long career making a lot of money and not really exposing yourself to the high risk nature of the

business that you're in. All right. Let's get to what you got.

So yesterday in Dayton, Ohio, the coaches who will coach tonight in the first two of the NCAA

tournaments, first four games held their press conferences in Dayton. One of those coaches

is Kenny Blightney, the head coach of the Howard Bison. They play UMBC tonight,

which is the first game of this tournament. It kicks off March Madness 640 PM in Dayton, Ohio.

UMBC is a one point favorite. The public loves Umbach. I don't know if that's still

how UMBC is referred to it was when I was in college park, matriculating through the best five

and a half years of my life. We refer to UMBC's Umbach. I don't know if they still do.

It's a great school, by the way, phenomenal school. As college park just, you know, got better and

better and better academically over the years, every other state public school got better and

better and better because their applicant pool got better because they weren't getting into

college park as easily. By the way, Howard could be a smell test pick. They could be my first

smell test pick of March Madness. I'm going to do smell test picks during March Madness. Last year,

I was 14 and 10 the year before that 13 and 13. That's the only non-winning year in my last four

of doing this and that was a 500 year in 2024, the 2024 tournament, 14 and 10 last year.

So Kenny Blightney, who played at Dematha, played at Duke and has been at Howard now for,

this is his seventh season at Howard and this is his third NCAA tournament appearance in the

last four years. Pretty impressive. At Howard in the Meack, Kenny Blightney has made it to the NCAA

tournament three times in his last four seasons. Overall, he's got a 48 and 38 Meack record,

which is a 558 win percentage. So he's had success since taking over the Howard program. It

didn't start that way. The COVID season was a disaster, 429. The season that followed was

shortened because of COVID. But since the 2021-2022 season, he's gone 16 and 13, finished second,

22 and 13, finished first, won the tournament, advanced into the field of 64, 18 and 17,

but won the Meack tournament in 2023-2024. They were 12 and 20 last year did not win the Meack

tournament. Then this year, his best year, and I'm going to go through some of the games that they

played this year against some decent competition where they were pretty competitive. They were 23 and

10, 11 and three in the regular season and first overall in the regular season and then won the

Meack tournament to get to where they are tonight. So during this press conference yesterday,

you'll hear the question and then you'll listen to Coach Blightney get very emotional during

this answer. But I loved this answer. Here it was. Hi, Coach KB. Harmony Bailey for Howard University.

So I know how important culture is to you from your high school days at the Matha Catholic to being

a part of two national championships at Duke. So my question is, how has what has been

important to you translated over to you coaching and coming to March Madness three times at Howard?

That's a wonderful question. Being at the Matha and being at Duke, you don't see the culture

as it's being built. You get in the back of the line and you do what the older guys

are doing in front of you. So I didn't understand how to build culture. I understood how to follow

culture and there's a huge difference. I had to learn how to build a culture and that took some time

thankfully. You know, my man over here, Mr. Davis, was great. It was great. I mean, I don't know

how many games we won our first year four or five. Our next year we were wanting whatever before

COVID and we had to shut the season down. But you know, he was nurturing. He was loving. He was

tough when he needed to be. But he was right by my side as a partner. That was a very, very good

answer to the question. Kenny Blake and he's had an interesting career. Like as mentioned,

played his high school basketball at the Matha grew up born in DC.

Was on the Duke teams from 91 through 95. You know, ended up playing more as a senior. Was

in a significant player on those teams, but he played for Duke during those years. And then

started his coaching career right when he got out of Duke as an assistant at James Madison.

And he's got one of those resumes that just speaks to the grind of getting into the coaching

business. Madison is an assistant with Sal, then to Delaware, then to Seton Hall, then back

to Delaware, then to Marshall, Marshall, then to Harvard for five years, then to Columbia for

a few years before getting the head coaching job at Howard in 2019. So they're the only DMV team

in the big dance, the only one that I would call a DMV team. I think the true DMV teams,

and I'm going to get back to to Blightney and Howard season and the chances they have of

potentially getting into the, you know, 64 draw with a win over UMBC here in a moment.

But I think that, you know, the true sort of DMV teams are from, you know, Maryland,

Georgetown, GW, AU, Howard Mason. Did I just hit them all? I think I hit them all.

Because to me, and I got something from Len, Len wrote, Kevin, enjoy the show. I'm a former

Bostonian who grew up with, you know, he mentions all the different sports talk hosts. He's listened

to and he moved to Philly. My kids mostly grew up in Maryland. One of my daughters graduated from UMBC

when listening to your show, the talk around the NCAA basketball tournament in the MVA area teams.

I found it's interesting that UMBC seems to be a team that's outside of your home team

interest and I'm curious as to why. Well, UMBC's in Baltimore. They're not a DMV team. The Maryland,

you know, the DMV, the Maryland portion of that. This is how I would describe it. Montgomery

County, Prince George's County, and then parts of Frederick County, Howard County, and maybe

even Annerondle County in terms of the Maryland counties that are part of the DMV. Baltimore

County is not part of the DMV. UMBC's not a local team. But Howard is and they are the one DMV team

in the tournament this year. And I mentioned this, you know, maybe like a month ago is they were,

you know, in the midst of winning a bunch of games like they really got hot. At one point this

year, they were, you know, 12 and nine and two and three in the in the me act. That's late

January. And then they went on a run. They ended up winning 11 of their final 12 games. And the only

one they lost, the only one they lost was in was in overtime against Yale 87, 81. Yale was in

the Ivy final on Saturday, which by the way was a hell of a game, the Yale pen game, the kid from

pen had 44 for Fran McCaffrey in his first year at his alma mater after all of those years at Iowa.

So they lost to Yale. That's the only game they've lost in basically almost two months. And it

was in overtime against a good Ivy team. Okay. The Ivy League is better than the me act typically.

And they get seated higher in the tournament and they win more games than the me act. But they

also had good results in December. Howard beat a UNC Wilmington team, a UNC Wilmington team

that in the CAA went 15 and three and won the regular season. They beat Wilmington outright.

I mean, that's that's a solid win 67, 66 in a true road game. They also beat Drexel. The game

before that Drexel had a winning record in the CAA, 10 and 8 overall 17 and 16 this year.

They played Missouri who's in the tournament in their opener. They get they lost by 21 in that game

against Missouri, you know, all the way back in November. Not a game that they were really in.

They played Duke and Duke, you know, hammered them by 37. But they had some good results.

Beating Drexel and beating UNC Wilmington is a good result. They lost in Northwestern big.

But then even the loss to Yale was an impressive, you know, loss. Yale won the Ivy League regular season

and then lost a pen in the tournament final in a very good game. That was that Saturday morning game,

88, 84. Over time, really good game, a record performance for the Ivy League tournament from

the kids name was Power, TJ Power. He had 44 points in that game. 14 rebounds, probably, you know,

a player to watch here in the first round. But Howard, Howard had a decent overall, you know,

the Ken Pom and the net because of the conference schedule they play is obviously, you know,

there's just not, you know, many high quad games in that rundown. But they've played some teams

this year and they've played them competitively. UMBC, as a one point favorite tonight,

they played some teams too. They lost to Georgetown. They played a button L team that they beat

in December. But to be honest with you, looking at their schedule, they they lost a date and

early in the year. I don't think that they overall other than maybe in their league in terms of

their non-con were more impressive than Howard. Good reason to watch the first game of the tournament

tonight and an easy, easy guy Kenny Blankney that had coached Howard to root for go bison. I think

I'm going to have him in the smell test plus the point. Can't believe this, but the public action

overwhelmingly on UMBC and there is very sharp money on Howard that usually equates to a

smell test selection. So we will talk about that later on in the show. We're going to do some brackets

on the show today. And we're going to start. We'll do it over a two day period. We'll do half the

field today, half the field tomorrow. And then what are we going to do with our brackets, Max?

Are we posting them somewhere? Yes, so I think we're going to kind of continue the the tradition

that you and Denton had going last year. Just an ESPN bracket challenge. I'll put it out on the

team 980 Twitter. All you have to do to enter is there's a password that all you have to do is enter

capital T E AM 980. So team 980 is the password with a capital T if you want to join in on the fun

on this bracket challenge. All right, we will do some of that on the show today when we come back

the team in the field that every year is the most despised team in the field. That's next.

I'm Mark Salinger, producer and one of the hosts of the Moth podcast. For nearly two decades,

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You know, one of the things I've seen Duke do in the past in situations like this is try

for the quick pass to half fort and call a quick time out so they can get in better shooting range.

There's the pass to Laitner. What's it up?

Christian Laitner, the spectrum in Philadelphia March of 1992, Duke 104, Kentucky 103 and over time.

Simply put, one of the greatest games in the history of the sport and a game and a reaction

that followed that seemed to either start or cement the process of Duke becoming or being the

polarizing team that it's become the most polarizing team in college basketball over now easily.

A 30 plus year period on par by the way in sports with the Yankees, the Cowboys,

I guess Notre Dame football is still polarizing maybe not as much as it used to be.

So why is Duke so despised? You know, as a lifelong Maryland fan, I can take a shot at this one.

You know, number one is they win a lot. If they didn't win a lot, they wouldn't be polarizing.

You know, no super polarizing sports entity becomes polarizing without winning a lot.

Number two is they've done all of their damage with all of those wins with this feeling of

entitlement of that comes from, you know, a very wealthy and affluent student body. You know,

there's been a condescension that's gone along with it, especially, you know,

a condescension that's been off putting to most notably Duke's biggest rivals that have had to

deal with it for a long period of time. You know, North Carolina, all of the ACC schools,

and I'm talking about going back to the, you know, the original ACC schools, you know,

when Duke was becoming this team, you know, the players were in many ways polarizing themselves.

Christian Latener was dirty. Bobby Hurley was too scrappy. You know, JJ Reddick became kind of a

manifestation of everything that was either loved about Duke or hated about Duke. Back to the

condescension. Coach K was a great coach, one of the greatest that's ever lived. No doubt.

He was also while winning at times it came off as very belittling and condescending towards

his arch rivals. I mean, I don't know how many times Maryland lost a heartbreaker and coach K

in his press conference was talking about how Juan Dixon was truly special. Usually not after

a loss, but after a win. The officiating followed. There's no doubt Duke got the benefit of a whistle

for many, many years, especially in the ACC. The media coverage in hype over Duke became hysterical

and it led to literally this rock star, you know, experience. I mean, when Duke traveled and

arrived in a road environment, especially in a big, you know, city like Madison Square Garden,

or even here, I mean, it was nuts. And then I think finally the Cameron indoor experience,

the Cameron crazies. Look, I lived it as a road rival. It was an incredible atmosphere. It was

as passionate as it got, but it was also choreographed. It was too theatrical and it was theatrical

and, you know, in an organized fashion by some of the geekiest kids you'd ever see none of whom

could ever probably consecutively dribble a basketball or at least that's what we would like

to say, not to mention the very mean spirited taunts towards opposing players, creative at times,

no doubt about it. But in many cases, very, very mean spirited. I mean, the list goes on and on

about Duke. And that's not the segment that I want to get into. Duke is definitely in college

basketball, the most polarizing team. And because of that, you get a level of hate and despise that

is not directed towards any other team in the sport. There's also those that, you know, walk around,

typically not Duke alums, typically not people that grew up rooting for Duke, but just our bandwagon

jumpers. We all have them in our lives. I mean, my guy big Tony roots for the spurs, the Montreal

Canadians, the Steelers, and I'm forgetting his baseball team. How does that work for a guy that

grew up in Montgomery County? We all have them in our life, the bandwagon jumper, the guy that

just grew up saying, I'm only going to root for winners. So Duke's got a lot of those people as

well. What I want to know from all of you on the day that the NCAA tournament kicks off

is not specific to this sport, but Duke's a good way to kind of think about it. And that is,

who's the team in your life for whatever reason that you've despised more than any other?

I have to say that as a skins fan and as a Terps basketball fan, primarily, those are the two

teams that I've always loved more than any other. And I do, I'm a big bullets wizards fan, but there's

never been a rival for the bullets were the wizards because they haven't been good enough. They haven't

been good enough. But for me, over the years, you know, the Eagles have become something that I

truly despise, but it'll never match the way I felt for a long period of time about the Dallas Cowboys.

The Dallas Cowboys were Duke. It's interesting that, you know, in this town, the, you know, rivals

of two of the teams, college pro that played had truly blue blood, most polarizing, most despised,

most loved teams in America that they played on a regular basis. Washington's football team playing

the Dallas Cowboys twice a year, sometimes three, Maryland playing Duke twice a year, sometimes three,

sometimes four as they did in 2001, 25 years ago. To this day, Maryland was on its way to its first

final four and they would face Duke in Minneapolis in a final four for their fourth meeting in one

season, which is very rare as we know in sports. For me, I really despised the Cowboys for longer

than I despised even Duke. As a kid in the 70s as a child of the 70s through the 80s, the Cowboys

were America's team. They had Roger Staubach, they had Drew Pearson, they had Randy White,

they had, you know, this weird flex defense. Their offensive line did this thing where they

moved up and down right before the snap. They had Tom Landry, Textram, George Allen and still

that in the 70s. Gibbs took it over. He was different in his approach. But man, the biggest

games of my childhood and into my formative teenage and 20s were against the Dallas Cowboys.

In 30s against the Dallas Cowboys until obviously 1999 we ended up with a different owner and

things started to kind of fade away. Now, even during the fade away period, I mean, I don't know

that there was a night that I screamed louder than the miracle Monday night in Dallas in 2005.

Mark Brunel to Santana Moss twice in the final few minutes of the game to turn what was a

dead night and an embarrassing loss offensively into one of the most memorable in the history of

the series because it was. And then the following year, even during, and I'm just mentioning during

the bad Snyder years, the following year the Troy Vincent Block feel goal picked up by Sean

who gets his face mask ripped and then we get a walk off on time, no back feel goal.

I think the games over the years with the Cowboys are the most memorable and the ones that really

generated the most fury for me. The true sort of, you know, bloodthirsty environment. Duke was

that for me too, but longer period of time for the Cowboys and more of those moments.

So I'd put the Cowboys at the top of my most hated team list. This by the way doesn't have to be

for you a team that was a rival or you hated them because of the team you rooted for. This can

be for whatever reason. I want to know what's the team during your lifetime that you've hated the

most and the reason why were the reasons why 301 2 3 0 0 9 83 0 1 2 3 0 0 9 80. Duke's the number one

seed in the draw. They are without a doubt the biggest draw when it comes to television and eyeballs

because polarizing cells, the Yankees, the Cowboys, Duke basketball, cells big time. It brings

the casual, disinterested at times fans to view the game, especially when they are big games.

And there's a couple of them that Duke could have in this draw that will be major heavyweight

TV ratings games. 301 2 3 0 0 9 80 3 0 1 2 3 0 0 9 80. Give me the team that throughout your life

you've hated the most despise the most and the reasons why it can be for any reason. It might be

a high school rival for somebody. For me, it's the Cowboys and I don't feel the same way today that I

used to feel. I don't. In some ways, the Eagles, I, I, the, the feeling about the Philadelphia Eagles

franchise and their fan base has certainly increased my level of venom towards them, but it's not

anywhere near the way I felt about the Dallas Cowboys for roughly 30 some odd years. You know,

even again, the Snyder years, the first 10 years, we had big games, they're a couple of big games,

couple of memorable games, for sure, against the Cowboys. 301 2 3 0 0 9 80, Kevin Schiencho,

the team 9 80 and the team 9 80 dot com. I'm Dr. Mary Claire Haver, ready for honest conversations

about thriving in midlife. Listen to and follow my new podcast, Unposed, available now wherever you

get your podcasts. From Tim can't believe that the Cowboys top duke for you. One word,

denard. Yeah, look, I mean, I could say one word longly. There's a lot of those one word,

Kenny denard, by the way, undercut Buck Williams in the ACC tournament final in 1980 in Greensboro

on an Albert King shot that hung on the rim. Buck was getting ready to go up and slam at home or

tip it in to give lefty his first ACC tournament title. Maryland was the regular season champ in 1980.

Duke actually wasn't the two seed. I think North Carolina was and I think Duke upset

Carolina in the semis. And this was not a coach K team. It was the year before coach K.

It was a Bill Foster coached Duke team. But yes, you know, throw Kenny denard in with

Carlos Booser, you know, Lonnie Baxter. Booser should have fouled out of the final four game,

not Lonnie Baxter. Terrible call. You know, Steve Blake in the gone in 54 seconds game in 2001

should not have fouled out of that game should have been in that game. Yeah, we were on the wrong

side of a lot of whistles over the years. And I know that sounds like Maryland complaining,

which we did a lot of and a lot of whining. I'll be the first to admit that certainly it's been

a lot of, you know, red headed stepchild sort of, you know, rat cornered. Gary gave us that

inferiority helped sort of perpetuate that inferiority inferiority complex of being the northern

most outpost of the ACC and everybody was against us. I think we thrived on that in many ways.

But yeah, the cowboys because of the first look for me as a kid in the 70s NC state in North

Carolina were bigger rivals. I hated Carolina long before I hated Duke. But none of that, you know,

superseded the way I felt about the cowboys. Growing up into my, you know, teens, 20s, 30s,

probably, you know, I feel differently now. I do because I feel differently about the team

in general. But that would be my number one. The question being, you know, what's the team you've

despised or disliked or hated the most in your lifetime? What team is that and give me the reasons

why? Max, what is it for you? As my life has gone on, it's ebbed and flowed. It really does depend

on the context of what's going on in the world of sports in that moment for me. Because back when I

was a kid, it was, it was, I hated, you know, the Dallas Cowboys, New York Rangers, Pittsburgh,

penguins, because those were the big, you know, teams that eliminated us in the playoffs or, you know,

humps that my teams couldn't get over. But right now, it's, it's filled out the Eagles fans. They're

just, I love them, but I also hate them. I hate how annoying they are. But I really do respect

the lengths that they go to piss you off. And, and so yeah, Eagles fans are kind of the,

the barometer I have. If you, if you get me going more than an Eagles fan, you, that will,

that'll put you up in the ranking. But right now, Eagles fans are kind of number one.

You know what Max's answer does for me in listening to Max answer the question. It's,

it makes me sad that you didn't get, you know, maybe with the caps and penguins you had it,

you know, in terms of greatness. Oh yeah. Same time. Oh yeah. True rival. But man, that's been

pretty much it for you in your lifetime with local teams. I got to experience the Redskins at

their best with true genuine heated rivals. Both ways, you know, the Cowboys hated the Redskins,

Cowboys fans hated the Redskins. Redskins fans hated the Cowboys. You know, Maryland Duke,

a Georgetown Syracuse was a massive thing, but I'm talking about greatness. You know, it's,

it's, I'm not saying that your hates any less. If it's involved in a matchup that's between

mediocrity, you know, or between bad teams, but it goes for my boys too. They just never had the

feeling for another team like I did in multiple situations because of both of the rivals being

great simultaneously. You had that because you're a massive caps fan with the penguins. So I

understand that, you know, when I understand the caps, penguins rivalry, even though I'm not a

massive caps fan at all. But in listening to you kind of mentioned so many different places that

you went to over, you didn't get to experience. Yeah, I never had that one. Never had that one big one

that was really like the, I would wake up in the morning thinking about it. Yeah. The Cowboys,

man, Dallas week was so special in these parts. When Dallas was on that schedule twice a year and

it turned a Monday of Dallas week, the intensity of the city, you could feel it. The build up every

quote magnified from each locker room during the course of the week. It was truly special.

Ross, Ross, the most hated team for you in your lifetime and the reasons why go ahead.

Man, look good in the hood. Make you hear me? Okay. I got you, Ross.

Cool. Hey, real quick, man. How do Whitman do and then lost in the state final to Blake?

Great season. Another state final, their third straight, but they did lose to Baba,

who's going to Maryland, one of the highest recruits in the country and they lost in the final.

Tough game for them, but a great season. The Whitman girls are in the state final, I think tonight.

So good luck to the Whitman girls team. But go ahead. Give me the team and the reasons why, the team

that you've hated the most in your lifetime. Man, I'll never forget when the Colt McCoy led

Redskins beat the Cowboys and over time about 11 years ago. I was watching that game with Ryan

Kerrigan's sister and it was nearly a huge brawl because there was a couple Cowboy fans in there

and I just had to let them know where we saw that robbery. Them Pittsburgh penguins, the Houston

put the ass and ass rows, but I will never hate a team more than the Detroit pistons. Reggie Miller

should not be in the same category as Charles Barkley or Patrick Ewing, some of the greatest

to never win a ring. 2004, 2005 was a Pacer's year and because of heartbroken Ben Wallace played

in that game, he went over his head and he got to emotional and then everything went from there

to our our test and everything, all that. We would have won that year. We would have beaten the spurs

and because everybody got suspended and it just weren't the same. And so, you know, we did decent

in the Paul George era. We didn't do as good as we could have done in the Reggie era, but I'd

always just look at Detroit and think to myself, man, what could have been, what could have been

and it's all because of them and their fans and till the day I'm gone, I will never have anything

good to say about that organization. Stems from the Dallas in the palace. That's interesting.

By the way, just totally a separate subject. If you haven't watched Soul Power, which is the

Netflix documentary about the American Basketball Association, the ABA, man, the Pacers, your

Pacers are featured at TUNN. They were really the gold standard of the ABA. For those of you.

Mel Daniel, maybe. Yeah, Mel Daniels, exactly.

I was going to make that before you get me up out there, feel mine. You went to high school with one

of my favorite producers for one of my favorite TV shows ever, Jackass. Did you have a relationship

with Jeff Sherman at all? No. I think he's younger than me.

Oh, okay. All right, Matt, appreciate the sound, guys. Thanks for us. Appreciate it. Let's go to Matt

in Fort Washington, Matt. The team during your life that you've despised the most and the reasons why.

How you doing, Kevin? So mine is going to be a local tie. So I went to Gwent Park High School.

My parents went to friendly high school. And when I was in middle school,

I could go to high school. I was supposed to go to friendly, but they had like a zoning issue

that year. So I went to Gwent Park. But my whole high school career, I absolutely hated friendly.

And they had a quarterback there named Joe Hayden that the entire, my entire adulthood ever since

retired. I couldn't stand the guy. And it was just solely because he was a friendly patriot.

I know he was great. You know, we played against him every year. He was a great, great player.

But just because he went to friendly, and that was our rival school, I hated his whole career.

I hated him at Florida. I hated him when he went to Florida. I was going to say, is that the,

that's the, the, the guy that went to Florida and played. Yeah. And he got drafted high, right?

He got drafted. I think it was in the top 10 that year. Okay. But my dad, he, he always brings up

the fact that Joe Hayden, you know, he got drafted. But then I also bring up the fact that how many

of alumni that Gwent Park has put into the NFL too. And there was a couple of high ground,

I wrote picks too. Sure. Yeah. Here it is. Joe Hayden, friendly high school, Florida,

from 07 to 09 in 2010. The seventh overall pick in the NFL draft by the Cleveland Browns.

Of course, he ended up playing for the day. Yeah, exactly. So, but, but he was,

if I recall, he could really run, right? He was a, he was a phenomenal athlete. It wasn't just

a quarterback. He was a, he was a, he was a three time pro baller with the Browns at corner.

We were shocked. So that's when the Gazette was hot. And, you know, the kids, they had the all

county team. Yeah, yeah. It was a really big shock when he went to Florida. And he wanted to

switch the positions because we were, he was such a great quarterback. We didn't even think that he

would play a whole different position. And we, the Florida become a corner. So, you know, we

read that in the papers that he was, you know, switching positions. That's how great of an athlete he

was. Right. That, you know, he was a D1 posture. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Got it. Hey, thanks. Good call.

And yeah, that's that, that's the point here. I want to know the team that you hated despise

the most and the reasons why I'm going to subject you guys. I hate doing this. Sorry about it in

advance, but Big Tony's on the hotline. He probably heard my description of his bandwagon

fan profile, which is not even debatable. But we'll subject you to Big Tony when we come back.

But Brian, Rick, Jeff, JR, Cole, bones, everybody, unhold, stay there. The most despise team of

your lifetime for you personally and the reasons why the Cowboys are number one for me. Duke's

a close second. So there you go. Kevin, she and show the team 980 and the team 980.com.

Welcome to Radio Rental. The scariest stories you've ever heard in your life. All told

by real people and off we go. This wasn't a human being there. So there's something here in

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