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[00:00:00] We're back baby after a brief hiatus in which Dan passed a kidney stone. We're back for season three. We're gonna be doing even more extreme sports. I heard it clink off of the toilet. Just kidding. Oh my lord. Um, just kidding.
[00:00:20] We're gonna be talking Colorado sports once again this season. Today we're gonna be talking Jokic, Murray, what happened? The Broncos, what maybe is happening? Bo Nicks, do we love him? Do we not? We love him. Let's see. Dan, play that funky music.
[00:00:46] We are back on the Blucifer Brothers after a brief hiatus. We have been monitoring the sports world and it's healing Ryan. We're seeing football sprout yet again. While the weeds of the Rockies are withering away and dying, they're letting the fertile soil sprout up in Serbia
[00:01:09] and give us a beautiful, beautiful semi-final matchup in which I will be cheering against my home country pretty shamelessly. Um, Ryan, it's been a while since we have spoken over the microphones. We have spoken in real life since then. My child turned three.
[00:01:28] You guys were both there at the birthday party. It was a fun, loving fiesta. So we've been together in person but great to talk to you over the microphone, Ryan. How are you doing, buddy? Uh, as you well know, the Olympics is probably like,
[00:01:44] I mean, in terms of my sweet spot of a sports adventure, I think the Olympics is probably the top of my list. And I honestly... Because it's been unbelievable for me but I also have a toddler who gets up real early. Like that, that Serbia game was perfect.
[00:02:04] Sweet spot for me. I can tell you that I was having a conversation with Sophie yesterday and she was like, you've been getting up really early the last week and a half and she literally didn't put it together
[00:02:20] and I was like, yeah, yeah, the Olympics are going on. So I have been getting up at like 6 a.m. You are correct. Um... There's nothing better to... You... Like for me, I have to sometimes go on imaginary trips to the airport
[00:02:36] or stuff while I'm watching the Olympics but it's still great. But you just have to get out of bed. Like you can start the coffee and then you can just get a little blanket and you're not gonna go back to bed. But you can relax
[00:02:50] and kind of get your day going or is that not your mood? No, no. That always used to be my mood. Well yeah, but I am watching... Wake up slow. I'm watching these like a hawk. You're talking about easing into your day. I'm waking up at 5.30 a.m.
[00:03:08] jacked that Serbia's playing basketball. Like I'm not going back to bed. I'm making myself a quadruple espresso and I'm going into my office. I'm putting the multi view on the TV in front of me. I got... Not even on the couch?
[00:03:24] I got maybe another screen of a different sport going on in my second monitor and I may be cranking away at some emails. Like I'm... Wow. Yeah, I'm not a... You're an intense Olympics watcher. I mean you said it was one of your favorite times. It really...
[00:03:42] Like anytime I can be watching really high level track and level basketball at the same time. Yeah, like that's kind of my sweet spot. I don't care if it's the first round of a 400 meter hurdles at 5.30 in the morning. If it's on
[00:03:58] I'm probably going to want to watch it and if I'm not watching it live I'm going to want to watch the replay which has been great with Peacock. My entire workday is narrated in the background by Olympics. Which... In my current position you could arguably...
[00:04:16] You could make an argument that it is work watching the Olympics. Yeah, that's true. I have to ask you what has been your favorite Olympic... You can't use Jokic or like athletes that you... There may be like well known stars coming in.
[00:04:38] I know you probably have more track knowledge than the average person but like I mean like... Sorry Noah Lyles but you were not my favorite Olympic performance and honestly the 100 is overrated as an event. But that's another story for another podcast.
[00:04:56] So who has been your kind of under the radar performance at the Olympics? You know where you get those things where just randomly you're like dude, I didn't really know anything about this person but they did a nice job of kind of providing you some background on their
[00:05:10] struggle and then by the end you're like, dude I would die for this guy or gal. Because I was... I was very into that 400 today. Quincy Hall. Just like the grit of it. I don't know anything about him but I just like the race almost told the
[00:05:32] story of like coming from that far back but like everyone looked miserable at the end of that race and he just was like, well I'm willing to be 10% more miserable to be a gold medalist than you are. Let's dance. There was a crazy
[00:05:46] graphic going around that was the 100 meter splits from that race and like every guy splits over 12 seconds for their last 100 which is not fast for that race. And he had the fastest last 100 split to your point. Like he was truly just like, in his quotes afterwards
[00:06:04] they're worth looking up. He's just like that dog ain't gonna stop chasing you. Like he is a dog. I think it's his Instagram handle is dog related and he's got that dog in him. But my favorite and I think it goes back to gambling a little bit
[00:06:26] was the Bobby Fink in the 1500 meter freestyle. So I don't know how much you were following the swimming. But the big battle was between the US and Australia in terms of gold medals. And it looked like they were gonna tie because the relays were gonna go
[00:06:44] to the US and maybe the women would win or the men would win and we'd get it that way. But then early that morning Bobby Fink breaks the world record in the 1500 meter and just takes it to this Australian guy. And I had watched him
[00:07:04] swim in the 800 earlier and he won that too and looked unbelievable doing it. And I saw he was like plus 650 on DraftKings and I was like, wow, I'm gonna take a little Bobby Fink flyer. So that was just like, I mean one, it sealed the US having
[00:07:22] more gold medals than the Australians which is unbelievable. And the fact that he did it in a world record his sisters were mic'd up during the race. It's like a seven minute race. I love that. And they're good swimmers and they're like, oh
[00:07:38] we're really happy to be, they'd never seen him swim live in the Olympics. Yeah, just perfect. It's that perfect amalgamation of things coming together. But it did happen at 6 o'clock in the morning to your point. Great, great. Seems lovely. It is nice that the US we have like
[00:07:58] different rivalries in like different sports. Like track it's like, oh okay, it's us versus Jamaica. Like it's us versus, like oh China is really good in the gymnastics. Like oh, it's us versus the Australians in the pool. And then, cause like when you look at
[00:08:18] the medal count at the end of the Olympics you're like, oh, we're gonna beat everyone's ass. Like, like total medals we're gonna kind of beat your ass. But it's fun to get the little rivalries through. It's the gold medals really that
[00:08:32] like you gotta kind of look at because that's where the other countries can maybe keep up. The depth of the US is unbeatable. We're gonna get a bronze or a silver in almost every track event. Like it's, yeah, it's just hard to keep up. Yeah, it's
[00:08:52] wild. I still can't believe we let that that high jumper or pole vaulter get away. Oh the guy who's unbelievable. Yeah, Sweden. But he's from Louisiana. Yeah, his his parents. Like why did we just? His parents both vaulted for Sweden. Mondo. Yeah, he is probably honestly
[00:09:16] well, he's too young to really make this argument yet. But there's a real possibility that his world records won't ever be touched by anybody. Like he's so far in a way the best pole vaulter that has ever existed that it's... He's in the Ludecki zone. It's beyond
[00:09:36] it's honestly beyond Ludecki. Because he can only win one gold medal. Like if they gave out eight gold medals for being the best pole vaulter, he'd win every single one of them. You know, like he just can't do anything else but he is more dominant than Ludecki is
[00:09:52] at her most dominant event at the pole vault. Like to the point where the other competitors are like his cheerleaders. Like they're literally just like, alright, we'll see who gets silver. Mondo's gonna beat our ass again. Like it's so he there have been really fun track
[00:10:10] events and honestly I think Tokyo really robbed us because the crowds are just... It's what makes the Olympics fun is like seeing these French athletes just have unbelievable performances because 60,000 people are cheering for you. Like that has to feel unbelievable. And the crowd's been great
[00:10:30] so it's been a very fun viewing experience. Yes. Alright. We promise we will get back to the Colorado thing. Honestly though, it's all Colorado in this Olympics. The two best women soccer players are from Highland-Jerancer and Windsor. Who are you saying are the Sophia Smith and Malory Swanson?
[00:10:56] Okay, great. I thought you were uttering what is a very nice young lady and she has come to the Nuggets games to do the first shot. Oh, Lindsay Horan. Lindsay Horan has been awful. Good Lord! Since the World Cup, she had that one cool header against her teammate
[00:11:16] after she talked a bunch of stuff to her. But, God, if we don't win gold, she will be why. Okay, that's great. Lots of Colorado representation in the Olympics. That's all we got to say. It's been great. So, to give people a rundown of the episode from now,
[00:11:38] we're going to be talking the Jokic Australia game and it might bleed into a little Serbia-US round three. Which is weird to me that South Sudan played the US leading up to it when they're in their group. If I was South Sudan, I would have
[00:11:56] absolutely wanted to blitz them. And you want to have that game that you had the first time against them. I understand maybe you don't because of stakes. But why would you show the US? It doesn't make sense to me. But,
[00:12:12] so we're going to talk about Serbia. We're going to talk about Jokic. We're going to talk about the bad. We've got Jamal. He has been getting roasted online. Deservedly so. He played pretty, pretty bad for Team Canada. And we'll kind of talk about
[00:12:30] why we think that maybe happened and if it affects his contract negotiations with the Nuggets. And or kind of how we view him as a player, right? And what that looks like. And then we've got Broncos training camp. We got our first preseason game here.
[00:12:48] So we're going to get to see Bo the Show with live kind of very base defenses. Not trying super hard but kind of hard. To quote Jason Killers of the Flower Moon. Shoot me! Shoot me! I see. That's how I feel about BoNex. It's
[00:13:18] I mean we're not BoNex believers but I want to believe. Ryan doesn't want to believe that it's the separation between us. Like I can be hustled. Like we're both watching the guy like on the street with the three cards. I've been rewatching a lot of White Collar.
[00:13:36] So I'm the guy watching Neil Cafferty with the cards. Because it's an easy show to fall asleep to. Let's get the, let's go. Let's talk about Serving. I want to step up there and play the three card thing
[00:13:50] even though I'm making fun of the other people for losing. Ryan does not want to approach the booth and try to find the king. It's not lucky. I'm going to watch the game five times and watch five people lose and be like nope
[00:14:04] not interested. Nope, not going in there. I'm not going to do that. Doesn't seem good. Alright so let's start off with a three card thing here. That's what it's called. Ah right you are. Good pull. First things first. Jokic pooped down Australia's throats
[00:14:28] for every minute he was in the game. Despite his coach and teammates seeming to be unaware that he's the best player in the world. A lot of guards calling their own number out there. A lot of rejected screens by Miachich. Yeah. But he to close it out.
[00:14:56] Oh my god. He was a master class. Block, steal, block oh and then after the second steal he gets a put back bucket. He does the legal goal pen. Yeah knocks it off the rim. Then he gets the Serbian announcers laughing with the Sambor shuffle. If you haven't
[00:15:24] seen that call, a lot of media copyrights took it down on the old X but I'm sure you can find it. But the guys there speaking Serbian and then Jokic hits the shot and you just hear the guys start laughing. And Ryan you and I in section
[00:15:40] 371 have had his exact laugh. Like it's just that disbelief of like well good try other team. But he's decided you're going to lose now. And he he tackles laughing and then he just goes Sambor shuffle baby. And I was showing everyone at work this highlight. It was unbelievable.
[00:16:12] Jokic is so so good in these Olympics. Obviously first time in group play he played US. They were even when Jokic played and they lost by 26 points in the nine minutes he It's like it's the true Jokic viewing experience because he like I've watched
[00:16:36] almost every Serbian game. To be fair I didn't watch them play South Sudan. I skipped that one. But I did watch that one. I skipped the one where they beat the hell out of Cuba. Puerto Rico. But he has been impactful like a lot
[00:16:54] of what you said was not on the offensive end. Like the thing that has been the most impressive to me about this Olympics is even when Paddy Mills hit the unbelievable shout to send him to overtime that was great defense by Jokic. Like Paddy Mills was
[00:17:10] chasing the ball that he had lost because Jokic was playing good perimeter defense on him. Granted it's Paddy Mills and like that's not the NBA's elite but like Jokic is just so impactful and he's so smart and it's so evident in the international game because of the way
[00:17:30] that the play it's played. Those guys around him don't have to do anything. They're just he's I think probably the best analogy that it's like to watch Jokic play in person is he's a planet and everything else on the floor just like orbits around him. In this play
[00:17:54] he's making these guys from Serbia look good. Yeah no it gets lost because of the block steal into the Sambor shuffle you know like the hook shot. But that cross court pass he made to hit that guy for that three to go up in overtime was absolutely dirty.
[00:18:20] He flings it basically no look and we've seen it in Denver all the time but like it's not just that he gets it there it's that it's right in that guy's pocket. Like that guy wasn't crazy open. It's not like you know sometimes Jokic gets it and
[00:18:36] a guy is so wide open. And once again it's because of all the attention. But like you know you have to see him but once you've seen him it's kind of like yeah just throw it anywhere near him and he's wide open he's gonna score. This one
[00:18:48] was like it's like a quarterback throwing wide receivers open almost. He's like I'm gonna put this in this spot and this guy doesn't think I can put it that good. So he thinks he can be that extra step away to help off of me.
[00:19:04] But I know he's one step too far if I throw it perfect to you. And it's filthy to watch. No he's too good honestly like it's this team should not be where they are. It's him in Bogdanovich and it is it I mean even watching against Australia
[00:19:26] like you said Patty Mills and Josh Giddy are not going to be playing in the All-Star game this year in the NBA. And these Serbian guards I heard Josh Giddy was going to do a program at some high school in LA. Was that Ah I can't be good
[00:19:46] Was that just a rumor? I don't know. Yeah I think just a rumor. But I mean you do you see also the other thing that I wanted to mention from Serbia that for better or worse you see the style of basketball and you see some of the
[00:20:06] influence upon Jokic is that we it's frustrating for us to watch it and go hey man remember how you're in the third division in Serbia? Jokic is the best player in the world in what fucking world do you look him off and not pass him the ball?
[00:20:28] Give him the ball please. But it's kind of that mentality that they have and like hey we make the right play, we run the system we do the thing, the shots will come and so you see that early Jokic when there would be games
[00:20:44] where he would shoot four times and he'd be like well I mean that guy's open all the time. Why would I do it? Yeah and you're like well sometimes him open is worse than you. That's such a great point and I think
[00:20:58] it's part of what's made his performance so outstanding is that he doesn't break the system when he's taking over the game. Like when he took over that Australia game everything was in the flow of the game he just made it so like there is no other option
[00:21:16] but to give me the ball in this position where I want it because it's the right basketball play and I'm going to orchestrate everything to make sure that we get to that position but you all aren't even going to know what's happening necessarily
[00:21:30] but like I'm going to make that happen and he's it's unbelievable I think they're probably going to get wrecked tomorrow. That was going to be my next question is there any chance? The only way I see a chance because that first
[00:21:46] game against the US they got out to a run their guys were hitting threes I don't think you want to punch the US in the mouth early. I think you want to just try to keep yourself down ten and hang around and then the only
[00:22:00] thing we haven't seen from Jokic yet this Olympics and we haven't seen it from him in a while because he hasn't had to and it's definitely we need Jokic to not make the right basketball play all the time because he's going to have to jack some threes here.
[00:22:20] Like Serbia you can't be close to the US in three pointers now. You have to have Jokic start pulling bam AD all those guys way out there they're biting on fakes then all of a sudden he's getting free throws
[00:22:34] he's doing you know like he's just putting them in tough spots and they're getting frustrated but I agree with you I think the US The only other thing that I can say is you need somebody other than Bogdanovic to get hot from three. Like that French
[00:22:48] guy was just unconscious and Canada's gone. But he was like whatever six for eleven from three or something it was not a normal performance and so you need one of those Serbian guys to just get hot but to your point I think you need him
[00:23:06] to get hot in the third quarter and go on like a 22 to 8 run and then be up 15 and then let Jokic control the game and just be like big fella's got every possession here and you know we'll see if he can come back. We're going to score
[00:23:22] a lot of two points here. We've seen this US team under pressure they sometimes go back to some of that individual basketball and jack some threes to get back into it. It's the only way. And they pay really fast. Honestly the international game is so fast you really
[00:23:40] just need to be within like 10, 12 in the fourth quarter and then go for that run right at the beginning of the fourth quarter and get their butt holes puckered a little bit because to your point I think the only thing that can really rattle the team with this
[00:23:56] much talent is when they start questioning who should be taking the shot. And these guys don't question that like they think they should be taking the shot which again make it's a problem because you get a lot of ISO ball when they're like
[00:24:10] why would I be passing right now? We need a bucket. I am a living bucket so it doesn't matter. This is what I do. No problem. I'll go get a bucket. So I But I would predict the US to come out. Yeah yeah I think.
[00:24:26] But if Jokic goes nuclear I'm telling you Ryan I might leave the country. I might just not be able to be around other people that don't want to talk about Jokic. So I might just buy a plane ticket to Serbia and just spend some time there and watch
[00:24:50] the gold medal game from Serbia. Other side of the bracket quickly just to do it. Germany's gonna smoke France right? I don't know dude. These referees have been wild for France by the way. For French France has been insane. And it's not like the French team is bad.
[00:25:08] Like they're good players on that team obviously with Wemby. And Fournier's been playing well like there are NBA players on that roster. That one guy just shot the shit out of the ball last game as I mentioned. I was gonna say. But
[00:25:24] I don't think he can do that again. Yeah but the Germany Germany is a bigger team so I kind of think France does match up a little bit better against them than I thought they did against Canada. I thought Canada was gonna smoke and they should have really.
[00:25:44] That's a great transition for you. I'm picking Germany. Are you going on the French team? I think I'm gonna pick France. Are we getting the French US? Yeah. Okay. I mean that'd be pretty hype. NBC would be thrilled to get Wemby versus this US team.
[00:26:00] French would get dog walked down in that game. All I'm saying is that a lot of these officials are European and there have been a lot of officiating scandals in European soccer. So let's just, I would just be placing a bet on the money line for France and
[00:26:18] just saying I think there might be a quick doot doot on one side here. Yeah it might be but this Germany team is really fun to watch too. The Wagner's and Schroeder Schroeder, like they're such good international type. I mean
[00:26:38] they're good in the NBA too but they're really built for the type of game that is played internationally. They just play smart. The team that France knocked out, Canada, Jamal Murray, our boy. I was ready for Jamal to kind of rise to the occasion
[00:26:56] and kind of have some moments in this Olympics and the only moment was him pooping down his leg every game pretty much. And can I say I know that there's a little bit of like well he had a little injury thing then don't go. Don't play.
[00:27:18] You're about to be up for a max contract and your team if there's one thing this Canada team didn't need it was another guard. Now obviously they missed his scoring. Like it was pretty obvious that like outside of Shea it wasn't a lot of which has limited
[00:27:40] internationally too. Yeah and they tried. He just couldn't make a basket so then they were like yeah. Here's my so I guess I'll just ask you first. Where is your panic meter about Jamal Murray? We saw him not look good against Minnesota. Obviously a team with
[00:28:02] unbelievable defenders and he was banged up worn out a little bit. But now we've seen him look pretty bad. We were big on last season was going to be the year of Jamal pre-season. I thought he was going to carry
[00:28:20] over his momentum. I thought he had a lot of contract reasons that you see in the NBA for guys to have big years. And he had some injuries once again. But at what point are these injuries adding up? And we are in a bad spot.
[00:28:40] And we're in trouble here and like I don't know anyone who is sane who doesn't think that the Nuggets should pay him. But now there was those reports that there were some disagreements about injury clauses you know just kind of details in the contract.
[00:29:06] I'd like to see the Nuggets hold on those. And I am concerned about this back half of his career. Because he could rewrite it and it could be unbelievable. We could be like dude why were we concerned about that? The Nuggets went on. He did great and got
[00:29:28] two more titles and he's going to go down as a great guard. But there's a world in which the wheels do come off. Yeah okay so I think there's a couple takes there. Well there's a lot there but I think I in terms of how concerned I am
[00:29:48] Listen he doesn't look healthy. So that's number one. The Canada coach came out and said that he has been on a minutes restriction. To your point about why go, I think to him it's just a pride thing. He wants to go. He wants to represent
[00:30:08] his country. He did probably think that he could come off the bench and score in short bursts and give them some energy and even in limited minutes. You can talk yourself into that easily. I'm not worried about why he went. The contract situation is interesting. It's not anything
[00:30:28] to go when you're in negotiations over a a Max contract extension is an interesting move. He's probably regretting that right now. He probably wishes he would have signed whatever deal they put in front of him because those injury things are not going to go away.
[00:30:50] NBA franchises particularly the Cronkies are not people that do these deals out of good will. That is not the type of thing that they're going to do. Ask Carmelo Anthony. So I think the overall concern level is not that high for me. Because I think a diminished
[00:31:16] Jamal Murray can be made extraordinary by Nikola Jokic. Do I think that we should just shop Jamal Murray? I don't think that's a crazy idea. I don't think that riding this entire year out and being like, alright man, if you aren't going to sign this
[00:31:40] deal that we put in front of you, don't negotiate anymore. Just stop negotiating and be like, listen, we made our offer. This is a max extension. These are the injury guarantees we need in it. If you want to play it out, let's play it out.
[00:31:56] Who gives a shit? Honestly, Jamal Murray is a really excellent basketball player. And I think that he obviously fits extraordinarily well with Nikola Jokic. That pick and roll has been unbelievable. Do I think that that skill is not replaceable by some level of guard similar to Jamal Murray?
[00:32:22] No, I don't think so. I think that a lot of people can do similar things to what Jamal is doing. Obviously you don't want to lose him for nothing. So playing the year out is probably not the smartest thing, but Jamal Murray for Steph Curry. Who says
[00:32:44] the Warriors have? Oh my god, they'd hang up that phone so fast. But can you imagine if the Warriors just said like, hey, we're going to do right by you, man. There's no way we can build a team here for you. Honestly,
[00:33:02] do you want me to throw you a realistic one? Because I think this will be an informative conversation of, hey, where is your pecking order in the NBA where you're like, hey, I think the Nuggets could realistically get this player for Jamal. I honestly don't even know.
[00:33:26] I haven't done enough about what I would want back, but the pipe dream that I've been dreaming of, you said realistic and I was like, oh, this is not we're not thinking this, I think. Oh, the way you said it.
[00:33:38] The pipe dream that I've been thinking about is just packaging Mike and Jamal and being like, listen, like who wants to make a fucking deal? Like if you call the Pelicans, could we get Zion and like a guard Jose Alvarado and some picks for Michael Porter
[00:34:00] Jr. and Jamal? I would do that. So I just think that there are those type of if you're willing to just say, hey, like maybe we're not as tied to Jamal Murray as we thought we were. I think there are some things that you can
[00:34:19] sort of get creative with, but it's not easy, right? I'm not even endorsing that sort of thing. But what about and I don't know if I'd be, I don't think I'd be excited about this, but what if the Hawks say hey, we're
[00:34:41] ready to get out of the trade. I don't want to trade Jamal. I think I'd be okay. He doesn't set picks. He can't set a pick. He'd set a pick if Mike Malone told him to set a pick for Nicole. He doesn't. Like it's the whole
[00:34:59] reason their offense doesn't really work. I don't like that, but I think you're in the right. You can get a guy who's been an all star. You can get a star. Murray has it, but he's out east. You can get a star for Jamal Murray. You absolutely
[00:35:13] can. And I think if you're really willing... Cavs for Garland. They say hey, we're going to go with the Bubble Brothers. The Bubble Brothers, baby. They once dueled against each other combined. Sexton. Their powers. And honestly, you could also get some serious draft capital back. Like if
[00:35:36] Booth really believes in his ability to identify talent and the league is trending younger, it's sort of becoming the NFL where it is pretty much a hard cap. So like the rookie contracts become really valuable. If you can hit on a
[00:35:52] rookie, you have a cheap deal for the next five years and that opens your championship window longer. It's kind of trending that way. So if you can offload Jamal for like a really good wing defender and a replacement level guard and then
[00:36:12] get a bunch of draft capital back. Go fleece the magic. Like they're sitting there. They want to be fleeced. I don't know. I think the magic kind of like their team. I say all this. I think it's a fun thought exercise. In the end, do I
[00:36:34] think anything is going to happen? No. I still think if one of the big three is going to go, it's going to be Porter. And I think that's good. I think we've had unbelievable moments with Murray and I kind of want to see him
[00:36:48] go down in a Nuggets jersey. Whether the wheels fall off, they fall off. Nothing is exciting. We never thought we were going to win a championship and I never thought we'd have a guy who just put it in the Lakers behinds in a series
[00:37:04] and let them know about it two years straight. So I'm good with it. Yeah, the cluster injuries are a little worrying. That is what like when you start getting your knee and your hamstring and your ankle and it's all on the same side, trust me, I know
[00:37:20] like it. My right side is a nightmare and it was all on the right side of my body and it just compounds on itself. And I just, I think back to that profile of Jamal Murray and it's been referenced a lot and in positive ways
[00:37:40] of like this was a guy who his coach, you know, took his shoes away and found Jamal Murray shooting barefoot. So a soft tissue injury, the only way to make your hamstring better is to stop moving on your hamstring. Like, you know,
[00:37:54] you can do treatments and you know, like that but like he needs to not play for a while now. Like he just needs to rest. And I feel like he's going to be pissed that he sucked and he's going to want to get
[00:38:08] back in the gym because that's the only way he knows how to fix things, how to get things right. You hope that there's just somebody in his corner. You hope that there's somebody who's like, hey man, you don't have to burn the house
[00:38:20] down right now. Like we, now you've done your thing, like it's over. Now we're building towards May of next year. Like, yeah. Have we maybe, even as Nuggets fans, as much as we've had to fight with them and the national media to give yogic recognition, have we
[00:38:46] maybe undersold yogic? Because watching Murray without yogic, and like you said, injury, like I'm not but like it's always been the thing of like, hey we never had an all star, we've never had someone on a first team defense, first team. And like we kind of,
[00:39:06] it's hard to be like Jamal Murray is a top ten guard in the NBA. Like when there's performances like this against Minnesota, like you know what I mean? Like it's hard to, and so I'm like man, did I not give yogic enough credit for just
[00:39:26] how good he is? Like for our championship run? Like you know, like because there'd be games where Murray would lose his mind. But it's just kind of like, oh geez man. Like you know, good god. I think that the Olympics are solidifying what everybody sort of already
[00:39:46] knew, which is that yogic is the best player in the world. And it's not particularly close. Like we're talking about, to me it just seems generational. We're talking about a gap that is like almost MJ in the 90s big. Like because people are arguing that Joellen Bede
[00:40:08] is the second best player in the world. Okay, he doesn't start for the US team. Like he didn't play an entire fucking game. Jason Tatum is the third best player in the NBA? Like I don't know. Look at the minutes. Like what are we talking about? So I
[00:40:26] just, and he's gonna play for a bronze medal. At the very least, the guy is gonna play for a bronze medal with like the Serbian national team. Which again, not a bunch of slouches. Like Serbia is a very proud basketball country. They're very
[00:40:42] good at basketball. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. None of them play in the NBA except Bogdan Bogdanović and Mijicic who sucks. Like Mijicic and Jovic. Don't forget about Jovic. But Mijicic, you watch him on a on an NBA court and it is like watching a toddler. It's
[00:41:00] so frustrating. And watching him on this team it's like, oh you're kind of good but it's only because Jochen just standing there setting the screen for him. Like I think that you're right to point out that it's generational and it's not to be taken lightly. And I think
[00:41:20] we just have to continue to remind ourselves. Yeah, like I think we're just at this place where Bill Simmons famously said hey if you're gonna be an all time great, I need to know that just you and a halfway competent roster is gonna make the playoffs. And Jovic
[00:41:44] and some not halfway competent rosters due to injury have always made the playoffs and have just like he's just like hey we're winning. We're winning games. I'll go back to that Warriors series and I think two like all Nuggets have that Nuggets fans have that little bit
[00:42:04] of imposter syndrome of like we don't really belong. And I think it was the Warriors series with Fakou and just that terribly depleted roster where we took a game off of them. And Dremont afterwards was like Yo, Jokic is a real MFer. That guy is not
[00:42:26] to be messed with. And I think that was where everybody's truly like the real basketball fans, the real people following it. Obviously I think that was his MVP year. So he had had an unbelievable season but it was it was clear from that series where
[00:42:44] he made it relatively competitive with the Warriors team that was stacked and we were literally starting Fakou Kampazzo. Like it was that's worse than the Serbian team he has now. And he won against the Warriors. Like that's unbelievable. I just yeah I'm so excited. Argentina did
[00:43:04] not qualify for the Olympics and Fakou Kampazzo is their best player. They can't qualify. And like that guy was starting on a playoff team. It's wild. Alright, that's enough of that. Jamal Murray signed the contract. Let's get back to cheering for the Nuggets and just loving all
[00:43:26] of our Nuggets. Come on back. We're already ready to love up us. Are you going to buy a roster Zay? I think so. Yeah, I really think I want to. Yeah. Yeah, it's going to be awesome. It's crazy because I'm only going to have
[00:43:42] owned a Jokic and a Russell Lesbrough Nuggets jersey in the championship era. Seems good. I think that's the right move. I can't wait to have a hard to defend but just doing the Lord's work defending our point guards. Both of them. Let's get into some Broncos talk
[00:44:06] though to close this thing out. I don't want to go too much in depth to give people a little bit of a preview of what we're going to do. Next week, we're going to do our NFC preview. We'll hand out some quick fire division winners. We'll
[00:44:24] talk about some things we're interested in. Kind of a big picture who we think is going to come out of the NFC. Then we'll do AFC and then the week before the season maybe. It's time for the Broncos preview. We'll have seen the preseason. They will not be
[00:44:41] a Dolphins preview. Dan will mute Ryan's microphone if there is too much to a talk. But so don't worry Broncos fans. Don't feel like we're neglecting you or we're never going to talk about it. We are absolutely going to talk about it. I will say be worried.
[00:44:59] Right now there's been no meaningful football. Yeah. You may not like all the things we have to say. Okay so training camp takeaways. Obviously the depth chart doesn't matter. I think everyone caught on to that. Everyone's like oh Bo Nix is third
[00:45:19] except he's gotten all the first team reps six of the last nine practices. So I think we haven't looked good offensively since we put on the pads. And it's concerning to me because I'm starting to you know getting my fantasy football research. And I forgot
[00:45:45] that we were like a pretty historically bad defense to start this season last year. We gave up like five points something yards per run. And we play a unbelievably hard schedule this year. So it's I think sharp as this is like the 25th hardest schedule.
[00:46:13] And it's not good. So yeah the I guess has there been for you anything meaningful coming out of these first few weeks or something that you're kind of I'll be interested to see what that kind of looks like. I'm only on Sean Payton launch. Like I
[00:46:41] just want to hear what he's saying. I want to know exactly what his expectations he's obviously not going to tell us. But he was sort of telling us when Russ was shitting the bad in preseason. Like he doesn't really have a very good poker face.
[00:46:59] So I'm hoping that I'm hoping that as training camp evolves he'll start to get a little bit more colorful. He honestly hasn't really even dropped anything yet but I listen I mean the quarterback situation is what it is. Like who do you want to start with?
[00:47:19] It kind of appears like they're going to give it to Nick. So stupid. But I agree with you. Every single use case that we have is that starting a rookie is detrimental. It's never ever helped anybody. The NFL game is crazy. Just throws to them out there
[00:47:37] you know he sucks but so does Nick's. I'm not saying Nick's is always going to suck but they're going to be very similar in that first week because Nick's is going to make rookie mistakes that everybody knows that rookies make. It's really honestly I think it's
[00:47:53] super detrimental to Nick's development to start him week one. I don't think that that's a smart decision and I think Peyton's ego is probably going to make him do that because he got such a big boner on draft day that he made him draft him.
[00:48:09] And by big boner I mean it's like two and a half inches but it was rock hard. Blue steel maybe. Like the Rocky Mountains. The point that I want to make to Broncos fans is that you should if you have the right expectations
[00:48:37] and I think we talked about this briefly like you can have fun this season being a Broncos fan if certain things go right. You just can't have your expectations for those things to be us winning a lot of football games. You can still have a fun
[00:48:55] four and 13 season. Like you can do that and walk out of this season feeling good about the fact that it has become very clear that Sean Peyton is going to run this team for better or worse until that contract is up. This team has over $60 million in dead
[00:49:15] cap. And the other thing that I saw that I really liked from Kevin Clark formerly of the Ringer now at ESPN but he was talking about like rookie quarterbacks pretty much always suck and it's not like it's not necessarily bad to suck or an indicator.
[00:49:37] Like he was talking about like Manning has the most rookie interceptions. Alex Smith who went on to he was not a barn burner but he made over $200 million as an NFL starting quarterback and played for playoff teams and was a very like he was Kirk Cousins
[00:49:55] before Kirk Cousins right. Like you're going to be a competent offense if you have him but there's a ceiling to you. He threw one touchdown and 11 picks this rookie year. Like it's okay for Bo Nix to not do this and I encourage Broncos fans don't exhaust yourself
[00:50:17] by feeling like oh we have to defend every single thing for this season. It's okay. Bo Nix is going to throw some truly horrendous balls. It's going to be okay. Like this guy played behind the best offensive line at Oregon. This guy had wide receivers
[00:50:35] running wide open all over the place. Guess what? Our wide receivers are not going to be wide open. Our offensive line is not going to give him all day. Like he's going to make mistakes. It's okay. The real problem is that in the ideal situation the Broncos
[00:50:55] the Broncos could sit him for like the first six or seven weeks and then they have a bye week and it's natural whatever but the bye week is super late. So you just don't get that option and I'm looking at the schedule now. So the first game is
[00:51:11] on the road at the Seahawks. You really want to throw your star first round quarterback in the state that hates Oregon the most. Like those Washington Huskies fans in Seattle are going to be I mean they're going to be double cheering
[00:51:29] for the Seahawks which is one of the worst places to play in the NFL. Anyways and then they play the Steelers. Then it's the Buccaneers but then you go Jets. So just sort of seesaws. Like you're playing a good team then you're playing a bad team
[00:51:49] and there's not like that natural okay you play two, three bad teams in a row you know where it seems natural to put them to switch quarterbacks but I honestly would wait until the bye week which I think is like comically late. Yeah for me I just want
[00:52:13] him to have it can't be a short week and I need it to be at home. That's what I need. Those are my two criteria and So you're looking for like October 6th the Raiders but then you play the Raiders and the Chargers
[00:52:31] back to back. You play two division rivals. Sounds great. Sign me up baby. You're going to get a juice building. That is probably the best way to do it because then you go Raiders Chargers, Saints, Panthers but then you're just going to get absolutely boat
[00:52:49] raced by the Ravens and the Chiefs. But yeah listen like you said there are going to be fun parts to the season just watch number two as long as he's on the field. I think this may be the last half of a season that he's
[00:53:05] on the field for us. So we need to really enjoy Patrick Surtain and other than that I think it's going to be really rough. Yeah that feels right to me. I think that the defensive performance that you're going to see this year is going to be really bad.
[00:53:41] And I think that's the part that people aren't talking about enough is like oh also we didn't get a chance to talk about it when it first happened. I'm just curious why did I understand it was a favor to the player and we like what we have.
[00:53:57] I mean I couldn't tell you why but like why did we release Kayden Stearns? Why are we releasing Young Talent on any way, shape, or form? He was fine for us last year. With Mr. Suspension on the team. Like I get it he's had injuries, he's had
[00:54:17] but like we're just not in a position to be throwing away people who could potentially play especially in our secondary. Our secondary outside of Patsy Shane. It goes to show you part of my research always is the Warren Sharp book. And we have the best corner
[00:54:43] in the NFL and our secondary is ranked 28th in the NFL. Like that means that those other three guys have to be four because most people play in nickel almost all the time now. But like good God they must be bad. So I think that there's
[00:55:05] the bad news is that there's some things going on. There's not much to get excited about. The other thing that I don't know how your concern level is but are we concerned that we haven't heard tons of Javante Williams really popped out today?
[00:55:25] And part of that is like I wasn't concerned when there were no pads because I was like that's you know like just running with no pads is not what makes Javante Williams special. Right? Like he's special because he bounces off and he was getting all the angry
[00:55:39] runs before the ACL all that. But like you talk about a young quarterback's best friend is a weird just gonna run the hell out of the ball and like you won't have to make. And he's not the player that he was. Like I don't I
[00:55:57] it's two years removed I was maybe hoping hey you're young enough and it's two years removed. It is the year after the year after a lot of the time. But I haven't heard a lot of oh he's really popping out there oh man was he moving people like
[00:56:13] and I understand part of that is because everyone everything is about Bo Nix and the quarterback stuff and all that but like it'd be nice. I think if he ripped off a 40 year young man and stiff armed some of our crappy secondary or milk check out there.
[00:56:29] I think we'd hear about it. I can tell you that I think the Broncos will be running the ball a lot and I hope to have Javante Williams in zero fantasy leagues. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that's our that's kind of our training camp breakdown. I don't think
[00:56:52] by the way like we said just don't stress yourself out about the training camp. There's zero reason. I understand like there's a local media business invested in making you care about these daily updates and like ah who's the third down drill and
[00:57:10] Zach Wilson was the only one to be success. Well Zach Wilson still sucks so like I don't care. It's fine. Yeah. Like these guys know the plays that's got you know like it's going to be the fact that Zach Wilson is being reported on
[00:57:28] just should tell you that you should stop caring. Like that's that's the level you can stop tuning in after we get Zach Wilson updates. Yeah. Just watch some Olympics. So enjoy the Olympics while they're on. That's it. All right. Anything else you really wanted to to go
[00:57:52] over with this this team out there? No. No. The Broncos absolutely not. Great. I think we covered everything then. We'll be exciting watching these 15 to 18 plays that are starters play. Do you think we could trade Sean Payton and Bo Nix for Mike McDaniel on Tua? No.
[00:58:23] I don't think so. Absolutely not. Mike McDaniel by himself is like more valuable than Sean Payton and Bo Nix. Yeah. Bo Nix is 30. He's not really folks. I know he's not 30. I was hoping the brain damage might even it out but apparently not. Yeah. Oh. Jeez.
[00:58:50] Listen, Mike McDaniel would probably come here and like figure out Zach. I know. That's why I was thinking about it. He'd be like ah this guy's awesome. Like wow. Okay, Zach. Zach would be swaging out there banging mops. Zach's all of a sudden Brandon Ayuk. Yeah.
[00:59:10] Yeah. That would that be a thing. All right. So join us next week. We'll finish up the Olympics if if the Serbia pulls off crazy episode a crazy upset tomorrow. I promise. Maybe we'll record an emergency pod. Our first ever emergency podcast if Serbia upsets the EU.
[00:59:32] I will agree to that. I would agree with that. I would do that or and I'd put an and in there. I assume the gold medal game would be Saturday I think. Saturday. Okay. I would live watch it. I'd live watch
[00:59:52] it too. I'd record the podcast while we're watching. Oh if it's Serbia France. I mean give me a break. Rudy. Oh. Ruedy getting messed up by Jokic in a gold medal game. Yeah. It'd be beautiful. It'd be a Saturday. Saturday. Saturday. Yeah.
[01:00:08] So that's our promise to the people but if not, we'll talk about it a little bit and then we'll get into our NFL previews here. We gave out some real winners last year. We had fastest sack in the Super Bowl from Ryan. We're coming off some money
[01:00:28] making opportunities. Honestly I was actually looking back at my gambling from last year. I made so much money in the first six weeks. I think I'm just going to gamble in the first six weeks and then only live bet from there on out.
[01:00:46] That sounds right. Yeah and honestly basically only live bet the NFL. Alright. Alright boys. Well it's been good to be back. It feels good to be back in the swing of sports out here. This is wonderful. So go Jokic. Go Serbia. Go Jamal to sign that contract.
[01:01:08] Could you imagine what this would have been like if the Olympics didn't happen? What the last week would have been like? There'd been a lot of baseball. Doesn't bear mention. Honestly. I'm already annoyed with how much Brandon Iuke trade talk we get.
[01:01:28] But imagine what it would be if there were no Olympics to break it up. It would be awful. Yeah it's honestly kept some of these training camp takes in check. Because people are watching the Olympics. Which I'm thankful for. Alright well thanks to
[01:01:44] our super producer Dan the Man. And we will talk to you next week. Bye.