The NBA’s Wacky West, Tales From Augusta, and the Baby Doll Chronicles | With Joe House, Cousin Sal, Nathan Hubbard, Dave Chang, and Baby Doll

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Coming up on this podcast, Joe House and I stayed up late here on the East Coast to watch Minnesota, Memphis, Minnesota.

Convincing.

We're going to talk about that and what the West picture looks like for the playoffs headed into the final weekend of the season.

And then we talk about the Masters, me and House and Nathan Hubbard, our fairway rolling hosts.

We were at the course all day today.

We noticed a lot of stuff.

We're going to talk about that.

And then last but not least, we had James Baby Doll Dixon on the Tuesday pod.

A lot of questions from listeners, from people in my life.

What's going on with that guy?

So we dove into it with me and Sal and Chang and Baby Doll, and we went for a full hour with him.

So this is quite a podcast.

I think we should bring in our friends from Pro Jab.

All right, we're taping this past midnight on the East Coast because we are here in Augusta, Georgia.

We're going to talk a lot of golf.

We're going to do a big baby doll deep dive later.

We have a lot of good stuff coming up on this podcast.

But Joe House is here, and we stayed up late to watch Minnesota-Memphis, a game that yet again had dramatic Western Conference ramifications.

Minnesota wins, Minnesota now the seven seed,

Memphis now the eight seed.

Looking like they're going to get absolutely slaughtered by OKC.

Wait a minute.

Unless.

Yeah.

Unless.

That's right.

Unless they lose the 8-9 game.

So Memphis,

12-17 in their last 29.

That includes a coach firing.

21st net rating.

in those games,

not counting tonight.

And they would play either Sacramento or or Dallas in the 8-9 game.

And we were watching them this whole game.

And I've watched them a few times.

They can't guard anybody anymore.

It just feels like anyone can go off on them.

If they go a little smaller, they can get bullied.

They can't guard anybody's like perimeter, point guard, scoring guard type guy.

It's a mess.

And I just don't think they're any kind of threat whatsoever.

I wholeheartedly agree.

The interesting thing to me is this whole game flipped in the third quarter.

It was.

Yeah, Memphis was winning at halftime.

They were up five at halftime.

It was 72 to 67.

We knew this.

We knew this because you had a first half bet on Minnesota.

That somehow

you played that perfectly.

It worked out absolutely sublime as usual.

But the third quarter was 52 to 25.

52 points in the third quarter for the Minnesota.

What's the coach's name?

Coach B.O.?

Yeah, T.O.B.O.

T.O.B.O.

Yeah.

The new Memphis coach who apparently didn't have any defensive playbook stuff.

The interim Memphis coach.

Yeah.

The Memphis coach for the moment.

What a disappointment.

When you think where that team was three years ago versus where they're heading going forward and what their assets are.

When you think where that team was two months ago, two and a half months ago.

The most interesting thing they have going is, oh, John Morant, he's doing a grenade now.

He was doing the gun before.

Now he's doing the grenade celebration.

It's like, how about play some fucking defense, John Morant?

How about that?

Why don't you guard somebody?

It's a team that needs some shaking up.

The coach fire.

Would you trade for John Morant?

If you're the Wizards, GM?

No, God, no.

John Morant makes absolutely no sense whatsoever.

If you got the fourth pick in the draft, would you trade Jordan Poole and the fourth pick for John Morant?

No.

Well, Jordan, no, no, no, no.

No.

I understand the marketing stuff.

He's beloved in Memphis.

Verno reminds us of, you know, the trajectory he was on with a Nike relationship and with the league's interest in promoting him.

As my friend Polly Walnuts once said, remember when is the lowest form of conversation.

It wasn't that long ago.

Yeah, I get it.

Well,

so

Ant has grabbed.

And we knew this happened already, but Ja had that cool young on the rise superstar spot and Ant grabbed it and was awesome tonight.

It look now who knows?

This could flip around, but Minnesota plays Brooklyn and Utah at home, two teams that don't want to win games anymore.

Worst case scenario, they're going to be a seven seed unless there's some sort of massive collapse.

Golden State is at Portland, home for the Clippers

next to.

So Minnesota could potentially climb to six,

where

they'd play the Lakers, potentially.

I assume the Lakers.

They play home Houston and at Portland.

I don't know.

This is so confusing.

I feel stupid even bringing up all the matchups.

My point is: if it's 2-7 and it's Houston, Minnesota,

first of all, that's an awesome series.

That's an awesome series.

Second of all, there's definitely going to be some sort of altercation.

Altercations, I don't know what it'll be, but there will be an altercation.

There'll be a Fracas, a Fracas, and a Fracas.

So there'll be a Donny Brook.

There's going to be an Imbroglio.

Imbrolio, yes.

All of them.

They'll all be lined up.

You and I have had this.

We've known each other since 1988.

We never like to bet a playoff series where we don't have the best player in the series.

Houston, Minnesota, 2-7.

The seven seed would have the best player in the series.

It is undeniable.

Now, Houston has a bunch of awesome defensive players and athletes

to throw at that best player.

They could.

Not only do they have Ahmed Thompson, who's been coming on like a freight train, and I think it has to be heard from in all defense.

Tremendous.

Not only have Dylan Brooks, who will try to start 19 fights with Ant.

And I don't know if you remember that game they had earlier in the season, which was one of the most fun games of the season.

They also have Tari Eason.

Yes.

So this is like on paper the perfect team to just throw dudes over and over again at

Ant.

So my guess is because of what I just said about, oh, you never want to not have the best player in a series.

There's going to be Minnesota stuff.

But I kind of like Houston if that's the matchup.

That's interesting.

I do have immense respect for Eme.

I do think they will game plan to try and do their best to limit Ant.

I do think they'll game plan to make sure that Julius Randall has the ball as much as,

you know, possible.

Yeah, but he was good tonight.

He's figured out where he fits in on this Minnesota team from a bully ball standpoint.

Like, Memphis went a little small in that game tonight.

And he was like, cool, I'm going to absolutely, he does that thing and he keeps banging into you, banging into you, does a little fade away, or he goes to the basket.

I don't know.

I do like him going.

He's found his identity a little bit on this team.

My issue, and I've said it a couple of times, I think I said it earlier this week with Houston is I don't trust them scoring, getting the tough buckets that you need in a way.

Give them credit for the wins lately, though.

They've had some nice wins.

They need the tough buckets in a playoff series where the team has engineered a game plan to take away what you do, what you want to do on offense in the last six or seven minutes.

There's bad advanced metrics for them in the half court.

There's half court stats that are bad.

There's crunch time stuff that's terrible.

Yes.

And that would be the hope if you're Minnesota is you have a guy who can score.

And Houston potentially doesn't.

And it's the Fred Banbleet step back.

But I don't know, man.

Houston feels like the perfect team to just frustrate Ant, throw all kinds of shit at him,

throw little staggered, little double teams at him, just get him so that he wants to go into hero ball mode against really good defenders.

And

it's a really interesting series.

So, as unexcited as I would be about Memphis, OKC, or Sacramento, OKC, or the Corpse of Dallas,

Dallas, OKC.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So then here's the other thing.

So it looks like the Lakers are going to be the three seed.

Now, they could blow the Houston game

on,

they have a home game against Houston, who they,

I don't know.

It just feels like the Lakers

really like where they are right now against most teams.

But let's say 3-6 is Lakers Golden State.

All-timer.

All-timer.

All-time fun first round.

Yeah.

Just a history series.

But we watched this happen two weeks ago, and the Lakers are a really good matchup for Golden State because they can go small.

Any team where they can play Draymond at the five is a win for Golden State.

The league doesn't want that.

The league does not want the Lakers in Golden State in the first round.

Oh, I like where you're going with this.

You want to rig it a little bit?

Well,

let's just pay attention to the referee assignments.

That'll be one way.

You go referee assignments?

Let's just make sure we're monitoring all the data points that are out there that might

impact how you want to handicap these last couple games of the season.

Just be mindful.

That's all I'm saying.

Well, so we could get that and then Denver Clippers, but you know, that's not what the league wants.

The league does not want Denver Clippers and using up all of the juice of this moment in LeBron's career and this moment in Steph Curry's career.

I don't want it.

I don't want to see this in the first round.

I don't want to see Golden State and the Lakers in the first round.

Counter.

We're going to have some sort of matchup where you're like, shit, I wish these teams were playing in round one.

It's going to be somebody.

If Kawhi is healthy with the Clippers,

that's a fun matchup just period against anybody.

And then this Denver team, we watched, we were studying the

internet video of Denver beats the Kings, Adelman's first game as the interim coach, gives a little speech.

Locker room seemed kind of raucous for him after.

And it really made me think: like, it might have even been worse than they were letting on.

Just the vibe.

I'm dying for Lakers Clippers in the first round.

Lakers, it's, you know, it's never,

it's never happened.

Dying for it.

Has it ever happened?

I can't think of it.

I don't think it's ever happened.

You would know.

You're the one that writes books.

I can't think of it.

I feel like we've had moments.

I remember in 06

when the Lakers were up 3-1 against the Suns and then they fell apart and then Kobe didn't shoot in the second half because he was so mad at everybody.

That was the year it was supposed to be Lakers Clippers.

I don't, other than that,

I don't think it's ever happened.

I just love it happen in the bubble?

The LA conch aspect of it.

L.A.

conch.

Because Ballmer, with his brand new stadium,

right?

And we have finally have healthy Kawhi.

The Clippers absolutely positively will not

go down.

They are not going to let the Lakers bully them.

Yeah.

And then

I quite like the idea of Denver and Golden State as a series in the first round.

It's another one.

Golden State out.

I think Golden State probably feels like

they have a more complete team, better bench.

They'll just let Jokic have his 35, 15, and 12 and take out everybody.

Denver, the one thing they did,

they started Pickett and played him big minutes.

And it seems like they try to confine Westbrook

to like, and he was two for 11 and 17 minutes.

Seems like a a good idea.

But some of the stuff that came out, the athletic had a piece about how Westbrook was a big lightning rod with Booth.

And it sounds like everything was a lightning rod with those guys.

But Malone was playing Westbrook too much.

The front office was really upset about that.

I mean, he did, he's a nightmare in these crunch times.

They were resting guys.

Like, what do you want them to do?

I don't know.

They keep choosing.

This is the game where Porter Jr.

will sit out.

This is the game that Jamal is going to sit out.

Jamal's got an injury that needs some nursing.

Where do you stand on just firing a coach in the last month or the last week of the season?

Because we did not grow up with flambergasted by it.

I don't understand it.

And it doesn't look like, I mean, why didn't they just fire the GM?

That would have been fine.

Like, if it was all about this, it was such a poisonous thing.

Why not fire the GM and then figure out?

They must have also felt like the coach had just completely lost the team.

It's the only explanation.

I told you, I think that Josh Cronky should have stood stood up and said, this is on me.

There was a moment a long time ago when somebody in that management structure should have intervened and said, we're not going to let this happen.

We're not going to have a poisonous relationship and have tension inside this building.

Yeah, but they're patient with all their coaches, though, in all the sports.

This is how they do it.

They weren't patient.

This time they weren't.

It doesn't make any sense.

I think they felt like,

you know, we have one of the great offensive players of all time.

We're going the wrong way.

Can we still salvage this?

These West matchups are fucking crazy to figure out.

Why not?

How are they going to salvage it?

Well, they're announcing this was done the way it was.

So at least if we do this, maybe it's not done.

But this version is done.

What's this?

Do this inspire the coach, try to change the energy around the team.

The energy.

Put somebody in there who's actually going to play, you know, the younger guys and not Russell Westbrook.

I don't know.

It's the end of the season.

What are we doing?

Can we talk about what we saw?

And that, and now, granted, uh, Chang was making dinner for 20 people, so we had the Laker game on, and we're trying to watch.

Then we caught up on all the highlights, but uh, I happened to be watching live when Luca just started breaking down during that whole you called this all over.

Yeah, I couldn't believe it.

I, because he was like, Is he getting choked up?

It's with no sound on.

It's not believable.

I can't ever remember in the history of sports a situation like like this with the team i'm talking about dallas and the lakers it it reminds us is once again it's just another chapter in this book that's called this is the dumbest thing in the history of sports so chapter 23 yeah the first time that the player that we traded and then immediately started dragging down in every public forum we could and then we made slovenian t-shirts for him and did a video and then did like thank him a five-minute celebration video.

It is the dumbest of the incredible things that he did for that franchise to make them relevant.

They were on an ascending trajectory.

I was excited to see them in these playoffs this year with Luca.

I bet them to exceed their win total.

I was bullish on this Dallas team.

It's fine for him to have the injury that he had.

Well, he wanted to work out on it, work out his injury on his own.

I mean, you know, it's, it's, it's, they're the fuck off Mavericks, and that's the way they're going to be for the next five years.

That would be a good t-shirt to fuck off Mavericks.

Two things.

One, I've never seen,

it's almost like when they have those probability things of like a coin toss, and it's like, this guy rolled, flipped a quarter and 23 straight times it came up heads.

The Mavericks, 23 straight times, have made the wrong decision where I've completely disagreed with whatever they decided to do.

Starting with shopping,

not shopping the trade.

Not shopping.

Like you go on through every single piece, then the trade happens, the way they handled it, the way Mark Cuban didn't do anything and then all of a sudden went on his little tour pretending he didn't have anything to do with it.

Did you?

Even though he didn't.

I heard a wrinkle here in the last 10 days or so that I hadn't heard before.

What was it?

Which was the idea.

The Mavericks had a concussion.

The concussion barely covers it.

It's brain damage.

That

Palinka was less than forthcoming, less than truthful, less than 100% upfront about the nature of Anthony Davis' injury.

Have you heard anything about this?

I have not.

That Palinka took advantage of his relationship with his protege, the sneaker boy.

He definitely did.

And

an element of that was

an injury that he characterized in their conversations was something that Anthony Davis could overcome was not going to be, you know, as doesn't matter.

Like, to me, that's irrelevant.

It was still the stupidest trade of our lifetime.

Well, I don't disagree.

Get Austin Reeves in the trade, fuck faces.

I have no argument with anything that you say.

It remains, again, the dumbest effing trade.

Also, like, if they had called us in, I've said this before, but did anyone bring up, yo, you might be lighting a fire under him.

This is already a stupid trade, but but the person you're trading, you're basically killing off that person, and he's going to be a much more votivated version of the same person, which is going to be bad for, like, just don't do this.

I wonder what, off to your Davis point, I wonder what happens if they bring him in for a physical, they already have the outcry, and then they fail him the physical, the way the Lakers failed Mark Williams.

They just, they, and they void the trade.

I wrote to you.

That would be an amazing, that would have been an amazing outcome.

And then let a fire under Luca anyway.

In the first 12 hours after the trade, I wrote in our text thread when all of us were trying to make some sense out of it.

What if this was the most Machiavellian big ball, big baller move by Nico, which is, you know, to

create a market that he couldn't otherwise create by failing Anthony Davis on the physical and having every team in the league now see that he's available.

Because it just takes too much time and energy to shot Luca and see what might come out of the woodwork to each of the remaining 32 teams.

I mean, we were here in Augusta, Georgia in the company of a really, God, I love that conversation so much.

An NBA upper, upper, highest echelon person

who

shared with us that there's no price available.

All I'm going to say, they would have paid any price.

There was no price that was not on the table.

I think a lot of teams felt that way.

You know, who didn't get a chance to participate?

All the other teams.

31 teams in the league or 30 teams in the league.

And the two expansion teams.

They also would have traded everything.

That's right.

Well, so that the one thing is just, I can't believe how many decisions in a row the Mavericks screwed up, even to this week with the way they handled everything was amazing.

The second thing,

you know, and we've been moving this way now for 20 years, and maybe Jordan even started it in the 90s where player, where fans like they play are more than a team.

We've never seen a trade where the fans went with the player, right?

So true.

We saw LeBron fans follow him to Cleveland, Miami, back to Cleveland, LA, just because they were LeBron fans.

We've seen the phenomenon in the 21st century of I just like this player.

I'm following him wherever.

Maybe it's Kevin Durant, whoever it is.

We've never seen a fan base kind of switch sides against the team, but yeah it kind of makes sense because you think like people get divorced all the time sure right what is it like 50 of marriages end in divorce that that's the stat

is that the why'd you say it so nervously all right

but but this this could be the first ever i've divorced my team And now I am following Luca and the Lakers, and that's my new team.

I felt like there was real seeds in the stands last night.

I don't know if it was just Laker fans.

Those might, some of those fans might have just been Mavs fans who are now like, fuck it, I'm a Laker fan.

I don't think that's up for debate.

I think that there is a large body of evidence.

But this could be confirmed.

This could be the next 10 years.

I think that's the first time.

Every time he comes back,

the Lakers are treated like

it's a home game for the Lakers in Dallas.

That is going to happen.

I expect that.

Well, there's only one outcome now.

And this has been the conspiracy the whole time, but that

the family gets the vegas team and they make the dallas team the expansion team that's actually like a realistic outcome now the league can't countenance that can the league really live with that outcome well the bad outcome for the league what if cuban bought the team back

i mean mark cuban conquering hero coming up i shouldn't have sold the team let me i'll take them back now my bad and maybe maybe it's worth less because they've destroyed a billion dollars of value i think at least a billion dollars i think it's easy.

You could easily run a map

exercise and get to $2 billion.

I think we didn't plan on this.

Let's do it right now.

Teams you would rather own than the Mavericks.

I'll just list every team.

OKC, Cleveland, Boston, Houston, the Knicks.

You'd want to own all of those teams over the Mavericks.

True story.

Lakers,

Indiana?

Yes, yes, yes.

Denver?

Sure.

Clippers, New Arena?

Amazing.

Golden State, sure.

Memphis?

I would rather own Memphis, yes.

Really?

Well,

they have some things that they have to figure out, but they have assets.

They have moves.

I'd rather own Dallas.

Minnesota?

Oh, Minnesota is awesome.

Milwaukee?

They're in a

crossroads spot.

I'd rather have Milwaukee.

Detroit?

Detroit's incredible.

Rather have Detroit.

How about that?

If I told you two years ago, you'd rather own the Detroit Pistons than Dallas Mavericks.

Well, two years ago, no.

No way.

Orlando?

Yeah, I'd rather have Palo than Florida.

No state tax.

I guess that's right.

Sacramento?

Now we're getting close.

Now it's getting a little bit more of a...

Yeah.

Yeah,

that's the first one.

Atlanta, I'd rather have Atlanta.

Me too.

Chicago, I'd rather have Chicago and be in a major city.

Yeah.

Miami, heat culture.

Come on.

Phoenix.

Tough one.

Because you inherit the crazy luxury tax and all the terrible front office stuff.

I think I'd rather have Dallas.

I'd rather have Dallas too.

I feel like I can get out of my Dallas.

They're in a very similar situation.

Portland?

Portland's great.

I'd rather have Portland.

San Antonio, obviously.

Toronto?

I think I'd rather be Toronto.

Yeah, yeah, Toronto.

Brooklyn?

Black Sheep, New York scene, but I might get Cooper flag in two months.

And I have a bunch of picks.

I'd rather it be Brooklyn.

Philly?

Depends on where my pick is.

I'm going to go from now.

Yeah.

New Orleans.

No.

I would much rather have it be Dallas than New Orleans.

Okay, there's another one.

Not even close.

Would you rather be Charlotte or Dallas?

Dallas.

Hard Dallas.

Hard Dallas.

What if you got the flag pick?

So Dallas, unless Charlotte gets the flag pick.

And I'd rather be Utah.

Would you rather be the Wizards or Dallas?

Would you rather own Washington or Dallas?

So me, if it was me, anyone, normal person.

Well, I mean,

that makes it different.

The problem with Washington is there.

has been no validation of the proof of concept.

It's been moribund for two decades.

I think I'd rather have Dallas.

I understand.

So we, we, the point is, we, it was less than six teams.

Yes.

And a year ago, you would have put Dallas in the top eight of the teams.

They were in the finals with Luca.

They were in the finals.

They had an awesome team.

It's like, you know.

So maybe Mark Cuban buys them back for like $2.5 million.

He makes $2.5 million.

Gets it back for a billion.

Yeah, he gets it back for a billion cheaper.

It's just.

I'm in a really conflicted spot, by the way, because

I kind of enjoy Luca.

And like, I do want him to stick it to them, but he's on the Lakers, the team that, other than the Yankees, I hate the most.

And this is like really agonizing for me.

They have Austin Reeves, who I really enjoy watching.

They have Luca, who I enjoy, the comeback thing.

The LeBron thing's fascinating.

The most incredible thing, and this is why we should never put ourselves in the position of underestimating that what what the nba is capable of is that the first what was it quarter of the season the narratives were stop putting the effing lakers and the effing golden state warriors on television sick of watching them right they stink there there's nothing those teams can do to improve themselves we're we're basically esp and classicking the league with these two teams exactly can you please promote some of these younger players okay cleveland detroit show show us some new people we want to see that And, you know, ratings down.

And

they're going to stay down.

Like, where, what can flip this?

And here we are now.

Right.

With both of those two franchises.

We can't wait to see these Westerners.

The irony of that, Lakers, Warriors round one, the biggest ratings in round one history.

And Adam Sober, like, ah, that's exactly right.

And every one of their TV partners, like, yeah.

Two things happened.

Football ended, and the league figured out how to get Luka Datches to the Lakers

for 80% off.

Unbelievable.

Who are you picking for the West right now?

Still OKC?

Yeah, it's got to be OKC.

Yeah, me too.

All right.

We're going to take a break, come back with House and Nathan talking masters.

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All right, taping this, 7 o'clock Eastern Time.

This part of the podcast.

Joe House is here.

Nathan Hubbard is here from our Fairway Rolling podcast.

We've been at the Masters all week.

We went to round one today.

Trying to keep it a little big picture just because by the time some people hear this, the Masters round two will be going.

Things change.

I'm pretty sure Justin Rose is going to be at minus 14 in two days.

He's at minus seven now.

Scott is at minus four.

Why are you making a...

Never say never.

Why are you taking something away from Justin Rose?

He could be minus 14.

I'll give you $100.

$100?

You can afford more than that, buddy.

Well, whatever.

He's not going to be minus 14 after two days.

It's not likely.

Big picture stuff.

First thing, the gallery excitement thing, because we did not have Tiger Woods this time around.

And I was trying to think who, and we were able to watch practice rounds on Tuesday.

The par through was yesterday's guys were messed around.

Nathan and I had a great moment.

Well, tell the moment when we stumbled into those guys on the fifth hole yesterday.

On the fifth hole.

Yeah.

When it was Rory and...

Right.

We had Rory playing with Fleetwood and Rom.

And who was the fourth guy they were betting?

Shane Lowry.

Lowry.

And they had split into teams, and

it was clearly

Tommy and Rom were playing, or Shane and Rom were playing Tommy and Rory, and they were definitely betting.

Having a great old time.

We were like, these guys are nice at loose.

Yeah.

But the big thing is Rory,

the gallery moves a little differently.

And it made me wonder if he now has.

The conch, as they said in Lord and the Flies, is the conch.

Is that what it's called?

Yeah, I mean, and that's the irony and the sadness of what we just watched happen down the stretch today, because you're exactly right that he has the energy, he has the crowd, and he kind of was the main character coming in to this masters, playing the best of anyone.

Two wins on American soil for the first time coming into a masters.

And what did we talk about on Tuesday?

His problem has been his Thursday score.

Yeah.

Anytime he plays well on Thursday, he's performed well in these majors.

So you think two straight bogies?

Two straight, two double bogies.

Two straight double bogies down the stretch.

Suboptimal.

House, how did we get here where he's the number one gallery guy?

Because it was Tiger forever.

And if Tiger was here, it would still be Tiger.

And Rory, when you see him in person, he's jacked.

He's not gigantic.

Nice little Irish guy, but the fans fucking love him.

I think two things.

In the first place, he became the de facto voice of the PGA tour

for all of the

processing in professional golf of the rift between the players that left for live and the PGA tour.

And he really was the voice of the tour making arguments on behalf of the tour.

He was the front man, not the commissioner of the tour, Rory effing McElroy.

So that is sort of one element of it.

He was a prominent face and prominent voice, and he's articulate.

He's always given, he always gives a sincere interview.

So there's a likability factor.

So you're going to authenticity, which is a big term in the mid-2020s.

They say that.

People think Rory's authentic.

It turns out authentic wins.

Yeah.

And the other element is this sort of,

I don't want to overstate it.

It's not tragedy that he can't win another major.

Slightly star-crossed.

Yes.

Slightly.

Just enough.

Because he's been super competitive in a handful of majors.

There's been this question since the last major he won in 2014.

When will he win his next?

And he has been super close a handful of times and not able to get across the goal line so there is that element as well anything to add on that one nate i i think that the last time that we really saw him in a competitive major was at that u.s open and he missed two short putts and he has been doing all this work over these last however many months to get himself mentally to a place where he could overcome that 14 today he had a short putt it was a birdie putt but he pushed it ever so slightly right, rolled over the cup.

Next hole, he doubles.

Two holes later, he doubles, and he finds himself seven behind.

There's no energy that the crowd could give him.

He just sapped the energy out of the place.

More

terrible Rory puts and shots today, or more meals for you today?

What was the bigger number?

Meals, for sure.

Way back.

It's such a pleasure to see you not eating for a half hour.

No, Rory put

Rory putt, like whatever Sal dropped in the upstairs bathroom this morning.

Oh, my God.

We can't talk about that.

So Roy's improbably a clear number one.

I feel like Tiger had that spot forever.

Mickelson was in there for a little bit.

For a little bit.

Yeah.

Well, he's more of a kind of villain.

He's also 54 years old.

Well, I'm saying way back.

Oh, yeah, sure, sure.

He had it a little bit.

It's a pretty small group of people in general, but we...

I asked you who you think the top four is right now for gallery, just watching the way the gallery moves.

And when you're at the masters,

especially when the tournament starts, people they'll go two holes ahead anticipating when the person's coming.

They want to get like a good spot so they can get as close as possible.

Or you'll have the gallery just following, which is like you said today when Tigers in the Masters, when he was playing, it was like two separate tournaments happening.

It was like the gallery following Tiger.

25 deep.

And then everybody else who's also in the tournament.

Right.

So it's interesting to watch.

And the number two guy on my list

was pretty surprised by it.

It's Bryson.

It is like clearly, unquestionably.

And I got to say, it's, he's edging closer to the Rory spot than I, than I thought.

And people, so what is it?

Like, let's go through all the reasons here.

It's a massive turnaround from a guy who

the last years ago, he came into the masters, had eaten so poorly, speaking of eating badly, that his body was shutting down and he was getting dizzy and falling over here at Augusta.

Is that you or Bryson?

Both.

Okay.

Nathan today.

Yes.

Bryson four years ago.

Bryson learned his lesson and has this interesting narrative arc where he's bounced back and starting really.

I mean, House, you mentioned it.

It started with his YouTube series where he really, all of the guys who went to live talked about growing the game.

Only one guy has actually worked at it and done something different, hasn't it?

Yeah, and it's a combination of him having whatever the instinct was to sort of create a personality on YouTube like he's a real he's a creator and it's interesting content and he does this the series is breaking 50 he started it in the fall of 23

and it was a weird kind of moment for him because he had gone over to live people were you know in in two camps still in that 2022 2023 time frame but he's like you know what i have this thing i'm going to do it was it was the breaking 50 thing and it became very popular now it has 1.8 million subscribers but then he went and played excellent golf on the heels of this youtube thing he played great at the pga championship um last year at valhalla and nathan was there on the grounds experiencing the pop the crowd pop right yeah he chipped in to end his third round on Saturday and the place went apeshit.

He looked into the camera and did the let's go like

he was a YouTube creator.

And so all of the energy on Sunday was around Bryce and he didn't quite catch Xander, but three weeks later he walked into the U.S.

Open.

I'm telling you, he was the main character there, both for the fans, but also the players were watching him because they felt the energy change in Valhalla.

It carried over to Piners number two and it's out there on the course right now.

But he's not crushing the ball like he did four years ago, like as far, right?

It's different, different kinds of game.

A little bit of a different game.

He's matured.

He's still hitting the piss out of it.

Yeah, but not like we'll never see it again, like it was a few years ago.

I mean, it's interesting the way you lay it out.

It's like, it's basically the

arc backlash re-arc that most influencers and people,

you know, on TikTok or YouTube stars or like the people my daughter likes where it's like, I love this person.

Oh, they got in a fight.

Oh, they got canceled.

No, they're back.

And he kind of jammed all that into four years because there was like, it really felt like the backlash had arrived for him in a major way.

And now it's gone.

Right before he

and Brooks went to live, the biggest storyline in golf was the rift between Bryson and Brooks.

And Brooks was bullying Bryson.

And there was, you know, a bunch of really negative stuff, negative energy was happening.

It was clearly affecting Bryson.

And then, you know, fast forward to this moment, he's like, he's all the way up here.

My hand is is very high up.

And Brooks is in a curious place.

I had Brooks.

So we have Rory one, Bryson two.

Well, let's say, I'll do three and four quick, and then we'll talk about the guys who fell off, which includes Brooks.

So what's interesting is Speeth is third.

And it's Masters-specific.

I'm not sure if it's every tournament.

But one of the great things about the Masters, we were walking the course with a couple of people today who had were coming to the Masters for the first time, didn't really know all the history.

And and we were explaining speech and how there are these certain tragic figures of augusta and they just carry the skeletons around with them as you see them and you're just like oh man just hope i hope they could break out of this that one time and you know it was greg norman forever

30 years 25 30 years ago and speeth now that guy where he's like oh man it'd be so nice if he won one more time and the gallery does follow him and and swell up for him it's interesting yeah i looked at the picture from the champions dinner where he's there with a green jacket, but he's sort of in the back row and he feels like removed from the rest of the guys.

Like he just so badly wants one.

And he had one in his hands.

I mean, the other guy in that picture is Danny Willett, who has a green jacket because Jordan Spief coughed up a five-shot lead on the 12th hole and just an absolute meltdown of putting ball after ball after ball into the water.

And so that ghost hangs over him.

It's not unlike the Rory Arc.

It's just that in that moment in time in 2015, he wins two majors.

He is being called the golden child by everybody.

He's a handsome kid.

He's 21 years old.

And so to see him continue to struggle, this place wants him of all people, I think, to win another green jacket.

And how old is he now?

He's like

early 30s?

Early 20s?

Yeah, yeah.

And he's got kids.

He's coming off of injury, but still compelling.

Still, you know, people recall because he's been in our lives for 10 years now.

And when you have that,

you know, that meteoric appearance into the scene, and he's he's charismatic.

And that's one of the things with golf.

It's why Bryson, you know, resonates.

Bryson's charismatic.

He understands the sort of entertainment proposition.

Well, he's also big in person, which I think

is one of the things that works in the gallery.

And that's like the Rory thing where it goes the other way.

We're like, wow, he's not a giant guy.

Anyway, speed three, and then Scotty's four.

More because he's just been dominating the decade, but I still don't feel like

there's something that he hasn't achieved yet from a Scotty's on 15.

We got to go over there.

There's something missing, and I don't know what it is.

That's it.

Last year, when his statistics were analogous to some of the best Tiger years, people just don't get as enthused about Scotty.

And I think that's part of his superpower.

Like, he is very even-keeled.

He's a man of deep faith.

He's a family guy now.

He talks about that, and he doesn't talk about much else that's particularly interesting out on the golf course.

So you can go watch him.

His swing is interesting.

He plays interesting, but he's not really a character.

And that's part of why he's been so successful and able to win all these tournaments, I think, because he's dispassionate in those moments.

Yeah, Ram's almost more interesting in person, just because he's you know who he is right away.

With the volatility of

his game and his temper, that's an attractive kind of energy.

What does Scotty have to do?

Like facial hair?

What would you add?

Well, I will say this.

I do think like crazy hair, bleach blonde hair.

He got arrested.

It didn't help.

Tattoos.

I've never been to

a master's on a Saturday.

I wonder if people, because like he's in when he gets close to the hunt.

He's the odds-on-favorite right now.

He's plus 190 to win this golf tournament.

He opened at plus 460 or 450 to win this golf tournament.

Just being three back from the leader.

Man, come on.

His odds already went down.

Yeah.

And the data, I mean, today, this is the thing about Scotty.

He's got this floor that he's always going to play well.

He is third T to Green this year, which is to say his

game off the T and approach has been awesome.

Today it was mediocre, but he was fifth in putting overall.

He just finds ways to go get it done.

And I watched that.

Look, he played with my brother both Saturday and Sunday at the PGA, the days after he got arrested.

And on Saturday, there was definitely a lull in the energy.

He didn't play great.

He'd come off that day where he'd walked in on Friday and gotten arrested.

And then he actually put up a good round that day.

Saturday, he was just okay.

Sunday, heading into the back nine, it's clear he's not going to win.

But he and my brother are tied through 10 holes.

They're both three under at that point.

Scotty puts the pedal down, shoots five under on the back, and finishes top 10.

And we get in the clubhouse.

My brother turns to me and goes, That's why he's the number one player in the world.

He just has a floor that is so high and a button.

Yeah.

But he's just got a go button.

And when he hits it, he's the best in the world.

What about Auberg?

Well, he's the new new

he's the new second last year yeah minus four today

uh he passes the in-person test he he is a strike badass yeah i do think he was helped also um by the tgl the tgl helped us learn a bit more about some of these guys and he was dominant in some of his appearances on that like if you tuned in on a february tuesday night you're like let me just see what the thing is about and you happen to catch his team whichever it's like one of the California teams.

Was it the base?

I don't remember.

But he was like, he was

noticeable, distinct, separated himself from other people from how well he played.

Yeah, we've been told this guy's a golf, Swedish golf robot, since he came out of college just a couple years ago.

Right.

And now he's out there playing the part.

And we would have said coming into this tournament after a second-place finish last year, this is the guy.

It's just that he got sick after winning at Torrey Pines, and he has not looked the same.

Well, no, he got sick at the farmer

and then won at Torrey Pines after.

Right.

But he's been up and down.

He missed two cuts coming into this Masters.

He just has, he just, we, we just didn't know how it was going to play out.

Today, he's first T to green.

He was mid in putting, only 40th.

So that should scare the crap out of everybody as we head into the weekend because if he starts putting better on these greens after having been in the pressure situation last year, maybe he is that golf robot and can go get it done.

So he's honorable mention and then Rob's honorable mention.

The falling off list, it's been interesting.

We've been coming since 2018.

I think this is our fourth time in the last seven years.

And the Brooks thing has definitely shifted.

And it's just not

an event anymore when he's like, oh, here comes Brooks.

Like, whatever.

I feel like it's because he's always mailed it in.

That's been his reputation is that he just kind of mails it in until the majors.

And so we built up this lore around him that he's going to show up and win.

But when that stops after that 23 PGA championship and it goes away, then he's just a guy.

He might be just a guy.

He has one top 20 since winning that PGA championship

in a major in 2023.

And nobody's watching him on Live.

And he's not out there kicking ass on Live.

So who is he?

What's the compelling reason to go like, oh, I want to go watch Brooks?

What?

So you can see him shoot two over.

What do you end up today?

Yes, there.

Okay, right.

So great.

And DJ was the other one who had that going for a few years.

Oh, DJ.

That makes me sad.

He has so much talent.

And he was one of the most consistent guys on tour.

He won a PGA tour event every year for like 15 years.

He got over the hump with his U.S.

Open win in terms of majors at Oakmont.

Incredible.

validated that with a master's a dominant masters win in the fall in the covet year for november of 2020 super weird but he went out and kicked everybody's ass and then you know they waved a check at him and homie is like i'm gonna go fishing.

All right, I'm going to go fishing.

I go fishing.

There's a little Fred Couples

enjoyment that you could feel.

And he played well today, too.

But he's become the new old guy.

Yes.

It was Watson for a while.

It was Nicholas for him.

It feels like now it's Fred Couples.

It helps that he's got Nance's blessing.

So Nance, every single round, announces how Freddy did.

And today, he hold out on 14 with a hybrid.

He chipped in on the front.

So like that, he was bringing energy to the crowd.

We could hear hear it out there.

Um, one thing I want to do quick was the golfer of the decade because we're halfway through.

So, Scotty has the most PJ Tor wins, 13.

Rory's got 11.

Ram's got eight.

Scotty, Bryce, and Xander and Rahm both have two majors each.

So, it's it's in progress, but Scotty has a chance over these next couple majors to basically take the lead.

So, I went back and I was trying to figure out,

could you figure this out for each decade?

And it's

hard yeah there's some 10 to 2020 especially is hard yeah but because rory had rory at 18 pj tour wins at four majors brooks had four majors so rory technically from the stats speeth was 11 and three

it's rory but i don't think anybody's like 2010s i think of rory first

Well, it's a split decade.

Rory owned 10 to 14, and Brooks owned 15 to 20.

Which is a little what the 90s were like, too.

The 2000s, Tiger,

Tiger won 59 times and he won 12 majors, so he dominated that.

The 90s are a mess.

They're a little like the 2010s.

Nick Price had the most wins, 16.

He had three majors.

It was all kind of clumped together the same way.

And then Tiger kind of dominated the last couple years there.

He ended up with 15 wins and two majors in like three years.

97 Augusta.

Yeah.

So that one was a little split.

The 80s is Watson.

He was 19 and 5.

Pretty clear.

And then the 70s was Jack, 38 and 8.

And then the 60s was a nice little Palmer-Nicholas battle.

Wonderful.

43 for Palmer, 30 for Nicholas.

PJ Tor wins.

Seven majors for Nicholas, six for Palmer.

So it wasn't, I thought it would be easier to go through the decades of like, oh, that was that guy's decade.

And it's kind of not.

I think with this decade, though, Scotty could take it because

when he started coming up, it was the beginning.

Sometimes you need luck with this stuff.

Um, and now it feels like he's positioned the best.

The thing I think we need to see from Scotty, he needs to win a major that's not the masters.

That's what will really, I think, advance his cause.

I mean, the year that he had last year in 2024 was so tiger-esque.

We fought each other, you know, all season long.

Do we dare say Tiger's name in the context of what?

I mean, the man won the gold medal, which is epic awesome.

Yeah, and it really meant a lot to him.

He had the wins on tour, he won the tour championship, He had the masters.

He came.

He had a moment where there was like the single most prominent thing that occurred for the PGA, for all of professional golf last year, was him getting arrested at the gate of

a major championship as the number one ranked player in the world because the cop didn't know who the hell he was.

So there is like, it's a very interesting arc where we're ready to anoint him.

I would like that to happen.

Tiny bit more charisma.

I mean, the menu that he served for the champions dinner this week, Chang talked about it.

It was the least expensive menu of any menu that any champion coming in had offered up over the last decade because it was like sliders.

Lead fish and chili.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Right down the middle.

Fezzier was excited about it.

But we have been looking to anoint somebody since Tiger.

And in a lot of ways, that's been the problem with golf.

We got also used to having a guy, a Jordan, a LeBron in the sport.

And in the absence of it, you just pointed it out.

It was hard to actually find the guy.

Now, for the last 10 plus years, as Tiger's been hurt and out.

So we keep trying to see if that's going to happen.

It's not.

And I think that's probably part of the reason why there's been a struggle to get more attention, more eyeballs on golf.

I think.

Bryson winning the Masters could actually catapult him into that position ahead of Rory,

even in this moment.

I agree.

I agree with this because Bryson now, like 2 million subscribers to his YouTube thing, and he gets a plus list people to come do Breaking 50 with him.

Who could have guessed?

Beefy Bryson.

Unbelievable stuff.

Everybody loves a company.

Beefy Bryson and Beefy Nathan.

When do we eat again?

Do we eat for the next podcast segment?

I'm going to need that.

Nathan and I are both going on a diet after this week.

Oh, Zempa Jason is going to show up for the PGA.

He was housing Bojangles last night, dipping to the ranch, eating the rice thing Chang.

I made 130 in the morning.

I'm feeling great.

An amazing beef short rib and Kim Chi fried rice by Chef Chang at 1:30 in the morning.

Unbelievable.

Come back from

a party, and we're kind of hungry.

And Chang's just there making stuff.

He's like, Chang's the true hero.

He's a bigger hero than Scotty Schoffer.

The number one.

He owns Augusta.

So this is our fourth master's together?

At least, yes.

Anything different, anything better, worse?

Because I think the thing that always strikes me is that I get the exact same feelings and vibes every time.

Well, here's the thing: it's the first without tiger, which is why we began this whole segment.

I mean, the thing that is a galvanizing,

where is he on the golf course when the tournament starts?

And let's go see how many, what we can catch.

I mean, the most noteworthy thing from two years ago was the birdie that we saw with our own two eyes on Thursday on the 16th hole.

Yeah.

And that beautiful amphitheater that surrounds 16.

Yeah.

And the roar.

He finished the first round at one under, you know, top 10 on the leaderboard, was able to continue his make the cut streak, made cut streak.

And we were there to witness like that's that was in my memory banks, my sporting experiences, I have a lot of great ones.

It will always be there.

Tiger on 16, you know, at the sort of end of his career, still rocking at the Masters.

What about the par three people picking up their kids?

That's you.

You'll forever hold that against people.

Russell Henley.

He'll forever hold out against Russell Henley.

This is an old guy thing for me.

I just, I don't know where, how we started involving young kids into professional sports.

Everyone has kids.

Congratulations.

You had a kid.

Poppy McElroy made a putt that was really like inconceivable.

We have kids now taking shots in the par three, these people that are waiting.

And everybody's like, here are my kids.

Whiffing it into the water.

They're not even good.

Here are my four kids that are going to.

It's like, I actually wonder, like, did anybody who had their kids in the par three yesterday play well today?

No, that's.

I bet Justin Rose didn't have his kids out there.

Maybe did.

Bryson doesn't have kids.

That's right.

Right.

It seemed like when you have little kids like that, and we've all had little kids,

You're just constantly worried.

They're going to just do something stupid.

Like when they're six, five, seven, and you have them out in a group of public people, like I would have been terrified of Ben.

Ben would have like run into the freaking water and jumped in.

The only good moment for kids on that Par Three contest ever, I think, is when Jack Nicholas had his grandson take a t-shot and he made a hole in one.

But at that point, he was a grown man.

That's the thing.

If it's Jack Nicholas, you can do whatever you want with your kids.

This is your thing.

I don't care.

It doesn't matter.

Par three is a fun thing.

I just wanted something to be grumpy about.

I love the masters.

Less kids.

I didn't fly here to see other people's kids.

Yeah, how about this?

Don't go.

You don't have to go to the part three.

But we did it.

We only went, we only saw like one hole.

To be fair, we didn't.

Yeah.

There we go.

But we did see Butler Cabin.

We did see Butler Cabin.

Scott Van Pelt.

Give that man a kiss on the top of his head.

Except he's too tall.

All right.

So, you guys, when are you doing the next Fairway Rolling?

Sunday night recap.

We will be,

you know, plausibly live for a reaction.

You should

bring your kids in to ship into the podcast.

It'll be like the par three.

Definitely not doing that.

You can lift your kids up.

They're in the pod.

We'll have our last meal, and then I'm going to retire.

I got to hang up the food.

You know what's funny, though?

You're going to be doing that at the same time your son is watching Clipper's Warriors for playoff position, and his head might explode.

You might be cleaning up shrapnel of his head.

Well, that'll be an interesting way to bring him into the pod.

And are you going to be able to get corporate tickets?

Because you cowarded out and didn't get the.

Thank you for holding this over my head.

The only person who complains more about that than my son is you.

That's good.

I'm going to egg him on.

That's part of my job.

I convinced Chang's wife to have another kid.

I'm just...

Lord, have mercy.

It's all about the kids.

All right.

Thanks, guys.

Thanks.

All right.

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Taping this part of the podcast with David Chang, cousin Sal, James, baby doll Dixon, one of the biggest celebrities here at the Masters this week.

Sal, what were the highlights other than we, so I let me set, let me set the scene.

You don't have your phone at the masters.

And if you're with a group of people, the goal is don't get separated from the people.

It's the worst thing you can do because you have no way of contacting them.

So you take it from here.

So, yeah.

And it was looking like

back in 1992, me, all my buddies, we went to Vegas and none of us had a phone and we were on top of the world.

And then we all lost each other and we were in like a pissed-off mood and didn't talk to each other on the way back.

And that's kind of how it was.

You don't have a phone, you don't have anything.

And you have baby doll who is about 65 minutes late in estimating where he's going to be at all times.

So we picked a spot.

We're like, we're going to be there three o'clock

and then we're going to move.

And

you come back, you meet us with house, and it's me and Chang and Nathan.

You don't have baby doll.

And I immediately panic because I'm like, this is it.

This is now a kidnapping movie.

We might never see him again.

We've turned in our phones.

So we have no way.

He doesn't have a phone.

His phone's with my phone.

And it's just a complete mess.

And how late were you, baby?

And when did did you actually show up?

Let's see.

And why did you feel like you had to buy more stuff?

It was shopping.

Yeah.

You spent almost $5,000 on stuff this trip, right?

I think a little more now, but after the last

pro shop at the Masters, which was thank you, Chang, for

we're not talking about that.

So, but yes.

I would say I was an hour late.

I actually went before you guys guys were supposed to leave.

You're an hour late after we begged you not to be one minute late.

Fair enough.

I was stopped by

many

people I knew, and I just got distracted.

And

it was a confluence of errors, including the women who administer the phones.

Yeah.

First telling me that

Mr.

Simmons took, because we checked our phones together,

took all the phones.

Right.

So

I had to, I walked to the parking lot and guys were gone.

And I borrowed one of the parking attendants.

Should we have just left him?

Yeah.

And I think it was like you had no problem leaving him.

And House and I felt a little bad.

Like, oh, this is our child acting up.

Why is he kicking everyone in the shins?

We should stay back and have a talk with him or at least make sure that he has a ride back.

Because he doesn't have a phone and everything like that.

But you have to understand, like, with him, I'm going to date myself here.

This is like the toy when he's there.

He is just shopping and non-stop shopping.

He could shop like for hours and hours.

And like, it's such

so conflicting because you want to walk and you want to go, right?

You're breaking Roger Bannister's four-minute mile.

I'm just saying I can get my steps in and see the course.

You want to go.

You're not even really.

You see the course.

You're checking out your sketches and all the way up.

And baby's stopping every 25 feet.

Like, yeah, this is where Sebi Ballesteros

bailed himself out on 14.

And, you know, I think it's important.

We got to back this up for those that haven't been to the masters.

What kind of rules are we talking about?

Protocol.

It's not just a cell phone.

There's no running.

There's no talking loudly.

These are all things that he's broken.

There's no

smoking in undesignated areas.

Broke that rule.

There's no acts of, I won't say physical violence, but you can't like

do things that you have to be on your best behavior.

You have to be on your best grandparents house.

That's also a problem for selling.

Don't step up from church.

So, like, every rule that the masters has, baby doll broke.

Well, then the other thing that happened today was more your fault, cuz.

How is this my fault?

I mean, I almost got tasiered.

Well, let's see if we can,

we were able to get

well, we were able to get access to this special pro shop that's like for members only because somebody slipped us a badge.

So, a couple of us went in and said there wasn't a badge.

Yeah, you did TV today for you as well.

I wasn't invited.

But

baby comes out with another bag of stuff.

And what happens next, Chang?

We're trying to be on our best behavior, but clearly, Cousin Sal's incapable of that.

Yeah.

And I don't know if people understand the long history you have of playing practical jokes and hijinks on baby doll.

Yeah.

Like I've heard stories of you throwing a suitcase out the window, luggage out of buildings.

Yeah, I want to get into that.

But in this case, it was a pretty mild-mannered one.

You just took the bag and whipped it into a rope shop.

Yeah, you got a backup of the new purchases that Baby Doll just bought

and you just threw it.

Like, oh, let me see that.

And I toss it over, what would it be, like two or three rows of ropes?

To a place where there was a suddenly pissed-off security guard wondering why that was.

Totally restricted area.

And then multiple people came over.

No, no, no.

He threw it over the head of the security guard.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's what happened.

So then baby's trying to get the bag back.

They're deciding whether they want to kick us out or not.

And Sal thinks this is all hilarious.

As I said when we were there, it was a close second

to cousin Sal shoving me

very, very violently into the rose garden at the White House.

Right, right.

And I said, I may be the only guy in the history of the White House who's been shoved into the bodily thrown into the

Rose Garden.

No problem.

This was like a two out of 10.

Yeah, right.

Yeah, this was nothing.

I mean, Secret Service pulled out their weapons.

I was picking thorns out of my ass.

Did they really pull out their weapons?

They literally drew weapons.

They converged.

They converged.

It was insane.

Yeah, it was good times.

But you know Obama, though.

You could have said like, Barack.

Yeah, I could have said.

Baby doll.

Baby, you know me, Mr.

President.

Come on.

Bears Club.

Don't throw me out.

Vineyard golf.

Come on, baby.

Well, the number one thing I ever saw you do to Baby Doll was Jimmy's wedding.

Oh.

When,

which was a great weekend and just a really lovely night.

And everybody had a great time.

And near the end, we're all talking.

We're in the corner of wherever the giant reception is.

And we're talking.

I think you're smoking.

Of course.

And they're bringing the cake out.

And it's the three of us and Lewis and I think Jimmy.

And they're bringing this giant cake out and they're walking by us and we see the cake.

And you just know from knowing the cuz for 15 years.

More than that.

You put it together.

You put it together.

Cake,

Sal, and Sal's watching the cake.

Tongue in cheek.

Sal Trong went to the side of his mouth.

Yes.

And you put it together.

And you just jumped sideways right as Sal was about.

It was one of the greatest athletic moves I've ever seen.

It was like those drills at the NFL,

you know, draft campaigns.

Like the cones.

The cones, the side-to-side shoes.

It was intensely

about to try to push you.

And then Jimmy admitted after it would have been worth it.

Yeah.

Even if you ruined the character, the story would have been better.

It's one of the great what-ifs in wedding history.

I did a Jedi mind trick.

I didn't even touch you that time.

No, no, it was actually, I was very proud of myself.

You almost fell over.

You jumped so violently.

So, like, for me at this stage of my life, at that stage, athletic.

I've never seen Louis Kay laugh harder in the 25 years I've known him.

He loved it.

If Baby had blown out his Achilles jumping sideways, would that have made it funnier or less funny?

No, but much funnier.

Way funnier for Sal.

One more.

Let me just throw one more.

We're in Atlanta once.

We're in a car.

We get picked up.

by these executives.

Jimmy's going there to get a Coca-Cola commercial, we hope, and we're going to tour the factory and everything else.

We get picked up by these guys, and I'm in the backseat with Baby, who's bragging about his sunglasses.

Yeah, these are my $300 sunglasses.

I couldn't bring my $500 sunglasses because you couldn't, you know, I want to put that through the machine, but these are $300.

I've had, I have like four or five of these.

Blah, blah, blah, blah.

And then I had enough, but the sunglasses, I'm like, oh, let me see.

Like, what the hell am I going to do?

And I see, I take a look, and it had a sunroof, which was open.

And I like Michael Jordan, just perfect, like right through the sunroof, outside into traffic.

He's like, you motherfucker, you did that.

He didn't get the commercial.

I was saying.

He didn't get it.

Well, that same day was Coca-Cola, which is also a really good story.

Right, right, right.

He's in the boardroom.

These guys, big PowerPoint presentation, try to woo Jimmy.

They're in suits and everything.

And baby is always on the messed up time.

Although Atlanta should be on the same

time as New York.

But I think I flew from L.A.

with you guys, but anyway.

I fell asleep during the movie during the meeting.

And I take a bottle cap.

And I said, baby, and I toss that and you hit you.

And you're like, spoccoli.

And fast.

I'm like, you dare.

And nobody knew how to react.

I have to set that up slight a little bit.

But getting into the Coca-Cola headquarters in Atlanta, it's

Fort Knox.

There's three layers of security.

Yeah.

It's like a big deal to be there.

And I will give you an incredible amount of credit.

We were sitting on opposite ends of a giant conference table.

And, you know, only his superpower can kick in in those moments.

Yeah.

And he, it was,

it was a 25, 30 foot winging of a bottle cap, and it hit me square between the eyes.

I mean, literally right between the eyes.

And we stopped the meeting.

We literally started arguing in the meeting.

These Coca-Cola people were like, these people are insane.

What is this?

It was really insane.

It was really crazy.

But anyway.

When do you think the cousin's peak of fucking with you, what was the peak year?

If he was an athlete, what would you say?

Early 2000s?

Yeah, I'd say the early aughts, as they say.

Yeah.

So, like, first year of Jimmy's show?

Yeah, somewhere in there.

Yeah, somewhere in the 2002 to 2008 range, I would guess.

I remember when I started working for Jimmy's show,

and you were so legendary for fucking with everybody.

And then we went to San Diego for that Super Bowl thing.

And I stayed in a room with you.

And people are like, you're staying in a room with Sal?

Right.

Yeah.

And I was like, yeah, what's the problem?

They're like, oh, good luck.

Don't fall asleep.

And then by the time we went to bed that night, I was sufficiently nervous.

It was like I was in like Shawshank waiting for fucking Bogs to come get me.

I didn't know what was going to happen, but you left me alone because I did.

Yeah, I had my sights on people.

You probably did think about it.

Yeah.

I don't know if people realize like they're longtime listeners, but

this relationship is real.

Like your impersonation, like I haven't spent this much time with Baby Doll in my life, but everything you've done over the years, I've heard thousands of impersonations.

They're very accurate.

No, but it really is.

It's your madness.

You guys have this weird odd.

I honestly, I love Sal.

I love him.

You're a year old.

What is going on?

No, but I love him.

That's why it's so sad.

He's bad.

It's just like, it's so hard for me to get mad at him because I genuinely love him.

And

everybody does, obviously.

And that's his.

That's why he has the ability to terrorize people and get away with it.

That plus

he's

got like

superhuman strength

that kicks in when he needs it to.

But

no, I'm not afraid.

I just know you could like bend me into a pretzel.

But other than that,

you know, we've had, I mean, the stories are, I mean, he, I was leaving to catch a red eye.

I had my bags packed, and I'm, we taped Jimmy Kim alive.

I have my luggage there, and somehow somebody catered in Bay City.

It was a nine-year anniversary of the show.

Nine-year anniversary.

So that's when it was.

For whatever insane reason, he decides to take the tray of meatballs and red sauce and just dump it over my head violently.

I was covered.

We have pictures of that.

It was on the ceiling.

I'm not kidding.

The sauce was on the ceiling.

And I'm like leaving in 20 minutes to go to.

You know what I mean?

If I didn't didn't kill you then when would I have done it I knew it was a bad idea but it would be good for this I just instinctively but this is the side like people know Sal and my podcast from Guest Alliance and we've been together forever but they don't know this other side of Sal as much right I see I think the best Sal story is the security camera on JK in the in the outside Jimmy's office when our friend Brad started choking on a sandwich right which he would choke from time to time because he didn't doesn't have all his teeth yeah um

but he he started choking and he waved over it was like friend scott friend scott comes over and starts performing the heim look on brad who's choking to death and instead of being concerned you could see sal in the back of the footage running over grabbing his phone and videotaping brad choking

instead of helping brad two things i don't know it's it was the it's the most perfect security camera clip i've ever seen i didn't know the hind look and i didn't know if these security guards were catching it.

So I had to document it for myself.

If you did the camera, maybe you still would have filmed it.

But Brad lived though.

He lived.

Yeah, he did.

He lived.

Okay, yeah.

We think.

You are the most twisted bastard.

Have you tortured Chang or are you still feeling him?

He's afraid.

I'm afraid.

I give him as much respect as I can because I live in a constant state of fear that I'm going to get fucked with to some degree because I've seen it.

I don't want to be on the receiving end.

So I hit you with

older.

You're a nicer guy.

But in Chang's case, he's already tortured.

I mean, can you find a more tortured man?

He's not like bragging about shit like baby.

Oh my gosh.

That is true.

Chang's just a mess.

This is true.

He could also poison any meal he wants.

This is also true.

That's a good point.

I didn't even think of that.

I know.

I told him I was going to do that if he fucked with me yesterday.

Well, Chang cooked dinner last night.

We had some Fando people over, some other people.

It was very fun.

And for some reason, Baby decided to give a toast.

I don't know why

simultaneously.

I thought that was a nice toast.

It was a nice toast.

Baby was very social for about an hour and a half and then disappeared to make a one and a half hour business call at nine o'clock and was just gone the rest of the night and then claimed I was very social.

I talked to everybody.

I literally asked any of the things.

This was the second half of the dinner.

You were on a call.

Did Baby Dog talk to you?

I think I literally spoke to every person at that time.

Who has a nine o'clock ET business call?

Baby Dog, I got business to do.

I got deals to do.

You had a dinner.

It's like we we flew it in and it was out here and they're like the big schmooze people and right we were just hard on your cousin you know me i think you read jon stewart a bedtime story every day i think that just goes on how dare but you know as you said it it's kind of genius he gives the toast to give the impression that he's there for most of the night knowing that he's gonna bounce uh 20 30 minutes later fair enough that was not why i did it but it worked out though you said nice things about you of course

and then he put me in a weird awkward position when he complimented

a colleague of ours, a friend of ours that works at a network, and we love him very much.

And you didn't know who he was.

And then I've never felt this way before.

He's like,

you don't know this, but David was singing your praises.

And he was going on and on and on about all the compliments I was talking about, this guy.

And I still would have felt weird.

I didn't know what to do.

That's your own psychosis, baby doll.

That's not my problem.

That's yours.

That was a baby doll move i was i by the way not only did i did do you a solid because he said wow he said that i said yes of course he did i said you're like damn he never says anything about anybody right he was like really wow that's really nice to hear it was very sweet so um yeah you shouldn't be uh and i you know yeah part of the secret we've known baby for a while you've known him longer than me but part of his secret is compliments or currency right that's what he does.

He always figures out a nice way to be like just hanging out with Chang one day, be like, you know, it's just amazing everything you've accomplished.

That's true.

I was talking to somebody, he probably didn't talk to anybody, right?

I was talking to somebody the other day about just how incredible your journey's been, and it's just awesome to see, baby.

Great job, baby.

Thank you, baby.

And then you feel great, and you're like, you know, I love baby doll.

I'm a businessman.

Yeah, where did you learn this?

Like, honestly, I don't like violence.

Blood is a big expense.

You know what I mean?

So I go the opposite way.

Salazzo, Godfather.

Or we like.

So, so,

but

no, seriously,

I meant what I said.

And by the way, you were right.

Josh was a hell of a nice guy.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

No names.

Come on.

Sorry.

Sorry.

It's just not even the right name.

He had intensely used the pseudonym.

Is that whoa?

He'll make your your call josh is the help of guy that's wrong josh sorry um i love hilarious one of the other things i love with that's why i call people baby doll there you go what the master is when you run into competitors

i liked a lot of those guys that i met today i don't i mean they leave and then you

one person then they leave and i don't know so Yeah, we had last night, we had an incident where we ran into an agent that we both know, and he was, I don't want to say, but he's a little sloppy and it was like, all right, this is going to be a two-minute conversation.

We know how

let's just be done in two minutes.

And he's like, and then he's introducing Baby to someone else.

And he's like, this is James Babydal Dixon.

He manages Jon Stewart and John Oliver.

He doesn't manage John Oliver, but Baby wants this conversation over so fast, doesn't even correct him, right?

But he locks sides with me.

Like, all right, I'll let him go.

30 seconds later, he's telling this guy,

you know, oh, not only that, but Baby Doll is a member of four clubs, four golf clubs, pretty prestigious.

He's like, excuse me, four, nine.

He's all right that it gets out that he manages John Albert or something, but bread.

Heaven forbid.

You can't get country clubs and cars, bro.

Absolutely not.

I have my priorities.

So we're up to nine.

That's the number?

You got rid of a couple.

I think so.

I'd have to do the math.

Ridiculous.

Do you belong to more or less than former President Barack Obama?

I'm going to go with more.

Right?

How many?

Is he paying for these country clubs, Do you think?

I don't think so.

I don't know.

Do you think Country Clubs charge?

I mean, he served our country, so they should be honored to have him as a member, right?

They should waive the initiation and have him just be

delighted to have him.

Absolutely.

As opposed to having you

smoking all over the court dues-paying member.

That's a lot of dues.

How much is that?

Is that a billion dollars?

A lot of dues, baby.

He claims it's

like you write it off.

Like, what what do you do?

I don't write it off.

No, will you teach him, Chang, about like charity and stuff like that?

That he can put his money to other places.

Like,

what is what's the point of having nine country club memberships?

I just love it.

I love being able to go to different

clubs and different places.

You just want to be able to snap your fingers.

If I'm in Florida, I know I can just go.

I don't have to make a call.

I don't have to.

I'm a country club hoarder.

Can you sell the memberships?

No.

No.

But you get money back when they.

What happens then?

Some of them and some not.

It depends on their arrangement with the members.

But I don't plan on ever

doing that unless

today we watched him have a long emotional reunion with somebody from an old country club that he no longer belongs to.

Yeah, that one I left.

That was one on Long Island.

I upgraded, so I didn't need that one.

One of of your country clubs has Obama in the club.

Yes.

Have you played with Obama?

I did not play with him.

No, I asked him when we were going to play, but I have not golfed with him.

It feels like he'd played with him because he'd follow him on every hole and yelled

words of him.

Barack!

Yeah.

Mr.

President.

You call him Mr.

President?

Absolutely.

I wouldn't call him Mr.

President.

You know, first name?

Because first he said to me, call me Barack.

I would never call him Barack.

Who do you know better?

Roy McElroy or Barack O'Brien?

Do you call Barack Barry?

That's how well you know him?

Of course.

Nobody calls it Barry.

Of course not.

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This is another segment I wanted to do.

This reminds me.

Last time we talked about greatest celebrity smokers that you've had cigarettes with.

We wanted to do

blank canvas.

If you could have a cigarette,

top three people you would want to have a cigarette with that you haven't had a cigarette with.

Is Obama in the top three?

Like you're at the Vineyard Country Club, you see him out there, maybe he sees you out there.

And I'm going to say yes.

So he'd be in top three.

Why not?

I mean, yes.

All right, who else?

Anybody?

What do you mean smokers or non-smokers?

It doesn't matter.

I mean, it has to be a realistic.

He was, at one time, anyway,

a light closet smoker, as I understand it.

Oh, I don't even think it was really a closet smoker.

I think it was in the Rose Garden pinching butts.

Got it.

Got it.

Hey, I would be too if I was.

Who else, though?

Anybody?

Is there anybody you really?

I mean, Sinatra would have been amazing.

Oh, my God.

That would have been amazing.

Johnny Carson?

Oh, exactly.

By the way, Johnny Carson?

Why are you letting him make your list?

One of

maybe the top person in show business.

You know how I always say I've met everybody.

Yeah.

That I never met.

Really?

And based on where my career went, he would have been number one on the list in the late night world of Icon.

Johnny.

You remember me, Johnny?

Yeah, Carson McGood.

Those are all 70s Carson shows.

He's smoking on the show.

Oh, it's a bad thing.

I'm trying to say when you would have lost when you had Ray Romano when he was on, right?

You know what?

I don't know.

Oh, all right.

I feel like probably.

When did Baby retire?

95?

92.

No, 92.

92.

Everybody loves Raymond, probably had not premiered yet, so I don't know.

I feel like Baby's had cigarettes probably with all the best possible people to have a cigarette with, right?

Well, I have.

There's not a lot of smokers.

I'll tell you who I smoked.

I mean, you had three with Chang last night.

It's a violent coughing.

You're up.

I was violently coughing this morning.

But it was more for you.

Like,

I mean, it's a Mount Rushmore cigarette for you.

It's very true.

I was emulating my hero right here.

And I think it's a good story today.

I didn't realize I was talking to almost a rival agent of yours, and he confided to me because I didn't know who he was.

I'd love to get smoke a dart with baby doll water.

Yeah, this literally happened.

And I was like,

well, you know what?

He's right over there in in that rocking chair.

Why don't you knock yourself out?

Yeah, he went over.

See, pulled out of parliament and immediately got heckled by baby.

Yeah, it was a parliament.

You're right.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

Baby didn't like that.

Come on now.

You're going to smoke.

I mean, his filters alone

are not.

It's like double A baseball for cigarettes.

Come on now.

Doing parliaments.

But you reminded me of something.

Now I can't think of it about the

smoking.

Wait, what were we just talking about anyway?

Because because agent that was really an honor

before that but anyway we were spoken a lot of butts with a lot of people the past week yes so it's been an honor so the honor was mine so what's what's the greatest single out of nowhere cigarette you've had with somebody oh that's what i was gonna say thank you

i assume we're all huge game of thrones fans oh this is good

which one do you think it is guys oh can we guess yeah hold on yeah let's guess peter dinkwich wait let's see peter dinkwich would have been a good one let's do

i queen cersei nope jon snow boom

you had a cigarette with jones

i like exchanged numbers with him because um i smoked like

two emmys in a row with him he was one of the

one of the greatest guys i've ever hung out with and that was like i couldn't believe i was smoking with jon snow i can't believe the way you defended the North.

That was fucking honest.

Let's have a smoke.

Let's celebrate.

I remember at Jimmy's wedding, we were out where the food trucks were and the valets,

the three of us, for like an hour and a half just smoking, watching the people come by.

And then.

And then Sal just started trouble, which I won't talk about.

But we had it.

We had it.

Yeah, there's a lot of it.

It was like an hour.

Then my wife, both of our wives were like, where

the hell are we?

We're guys.

We were just,

we were up with baby.

But Kid Harrington was, was, was definitely up there.

In fact, that's what

I mean, honestly,

why I hung out with him.

If I was a non-smoker, I never would have got to hang out with him.

Such a great guy, really.

It was so fun.

This could lead to a Kid Harrington resurgence.

You never know.

This is it.

I mean, but he's short, right?

Yeah, he's like my height.

It's good.

It's a good matchup.

That's why you liked him so much.

tail of the tape 1700 cigarettes a day

what was the what was the i can't even remember what was the little like this the the city that guarded the the wall

sounds like you need to watch game of thrones again i do um

i don't know if i know that like

my hand um anyway the night watch that's what it was there was a time speaking of smokers i don't care if you want to cut this that's fine but Baby, you know how he brags about knowing people.

We saw it with Rory McElroy.

Rory didn't pay attention

at all.

Didn't give him the time of day.

This will happen.

Oh, baby claims to know people.

He doesn't know people.

Oh,

Sean Penn is on the show.

Jimmy, I have to meet him.

I'm going to go see him during your monologue.

And, you know, then he goes on to tell stories about his relationship with Sean.

Maybe they did nefarious things.

Maybe he was smoking more than cigarettes back in the day.

He tells me the story or whatever.

So baby's like, all right, I'm going to go see Sean.

And I'm like, I'm fucking going with you.

No doubt about that.

I need to see this.

So I go in there and he's like, baby, remember me from, where would you have known him even?

What would

in the early 90s?

In the early 90s, baby, dog.

We did this.

We drove here.

We went this on this gig.

Yeah.

Okay.

No, come on, baby.

And then he's like, you're, you know, you're, you're biding your time here because he's not being forthcoming with everything.

I'm like, I'm like, come on, you smoked whatever with baby back in the 1990s.

You don't remember?

And then publicist like shoots up, like, get out of here.

You two, get out of here now.

And he's like, you know me, babe.

You know me.

His last words were, you know, me, baby.

But I think the line of the week, which I've enjoyed so much, is no matter what's gone on, Sal's like, listen, we're not looking for any trouble.

It's really great.

It works every time.

People love it.

About, what, about 800 important people guarding whatever or leading you through to somewhere ever.

And

it's a nice way to F with people.

So, we had after the Tuesday pod, we had some people say baby should host a smoking podcast for the ringer.

Yeah.

How would that go?

What would that look like?

I don't know.

I mean, you're the artist.

Maybe you were so maybe, maybe you have it.

Like, video podcasts are becoming more and more popular.

Maybe it's

not sure what would have to happen is

it's like the

hot wings.

Hot wings.

Whoever comes in must smoke.

Hot ones.

If you're in the room, you're smoking.

Of course.

Multiple cigarettes.

Yes.

the entire time.

First gas Chappelle.

Oh, that would be

a software show.

This is genius.

Did you do it?

It is.

Baby becomes talent out of nowhere.

All from my crazy habit.

Well, it's my terrible addiction.

You're going to need some source of income once your guys start retiring from TV.

What are you going to do?

I was going to say.

You got to afford cigarettes.

They're expensive.

This sounds great, except baby has to negotiate his own deal with you.

It'll be a nightmare for you.

I'm so insulted.

In this case, I'll only take 20% for myself.

Do we do the insulted thing?

That's the question.

Yeah, because we, you know, you've been in our lives for a while.

We, we kind of know all your moves from a negotiating standpoint.

Yes, what I do now.

Um, no, I'm just, these are your tricks.

Yes.

Number one, completely insulted by the offer.

I'm always insulted.

Yep.

Um, by the first offer.

First offer, can't almost, I don't know if I can take it back to so-and-so, yeah, like that.

I just can't believe.

By the way, no, my rule is: no matter what the offer is, no matter if it's triple what I was hoping it was, it's the first offer, and there's more money there.

Okay, so and so

he's like Johnny Sack when they all told that Jenny Sack joke about the water ass.

Like, I'm insulted, and like,

I am good, we're gonna deal with this, right?

Deal with the insult.

Um,

second move is

sad and disappointed.

When you get,

you're not just disappointed, you're actually like bummed out.

Yes.

You can't believe that it's gotten to this point.

And I think it genuinely am.

The deal has gotten to this point, and you just can't fathom how we got here.

And then third is angry.

Yeah,

the anger switch will go on too.

Those are the three moves, and you just kind of decide which card to pop.

The other thing is, I'm also very kind and I'm very complimentary to people.

I am.

Oh, yeah.

And

listen,

I always like to leave a little bit on the table.

Do you feel it's a challenge to get through those stages?

Like, oh, I really, I reeled them in.

It's like the five phases of grief.

I told you I was insulted.

I was sad.

I was angry.

And look at that.

It bumped up 25%.

Did you ever get a first offer and you were like, I'm actually not insulted?

That's a great offer.

No.

Okay.

What was the most insulted you ever were?

Oh, God.

That would be a tough one to answer because I've been highly insulted

more times than I could ever count.

I'm doing this a long time ago.

Is there anybody who's not in the executive business anymore that you can discuss?

Who was the most insulting offer person?

No.

Anybody back in the day?

I had some jousts with

Comedy Central.

Yeah.

And I was stuck into them, baby.

I was pretty insulted on several occasions there.

Sorry.

So, but it ultimately works out.

Do you ever talk to a therapist about these people that insult you?

No, I don't go to a therapist.

Well, I'm going to try it.

I come from a long line of

not believing in therapy.

Hard nose.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Some old school bitch.

No.

Figure it out.

Shane, does this make you more or less likely to hire a baby for representation?

I feel like we almost had a moment last night smoking cigarettes.

Of course, we did.

I was like, remember?

I was like,

is he representing me now?

I don't know what was going on.

Yeah, what was that thing?

Someone approached you.

Yeah.

Oh, you said how you can't get out of deals.

Like, people, well, you can't get specific, but people automatically sign you up to

baby just took over and gave me a lecture on what I needed.

He never let you do that.

That's right.

Listen, we'll talk after this podcast, baby.

How many Asian clients on your roster, baby?

You'd be number one when you build it.

Yes.

A bridge it out.

Be one of one, baby.

Thank God.

Baby.

Oh, go ahead, Chaney.

Can I go back?

Because I had to ask when you got, you threw, people need to know.

They were like

the bag was in the air.

Security guards are angry.

And they're yelling at him, like, please do not cross the line because there's like different sections that you're not like buffered from the secret area.

There's an extra wrinkle that I love when it's 100% my fault, but then he goes and retrieves it.

Yeah, and the bag went over like, you know, 20 feet over

the security area.

The entire time, I don't know if you were listening.

I wanted to ask, did you hear the security guard saying, do not cross the line?

And you just kept on going.

Yeah, he pulled me.

Well, what pissed me off is that cameraman was sitting.

He wasn't filming anything.

He was just sitting there.

The bag was.

basically at his feet with all my shit sprewed on the ground.

He just looked at it and I'm like, sir, excuse me, can I get that bag?

And he just kind of like ignored me.

And I was like, you know what?

F this guy.

I'm going to go get it myself.

Is that part of the Dixon negotiating tactics?

I just tried.

It didn't work.

He was insulted.

Yeah.

And I do love this.

It's a great situation.

That is your ideal because you're off the hook.

That's what I'm saying.

You baited me.

I did exactly what you wanted me to do, and I got in trouble.

And these guys are being dicks, too.

And we all got in trouble because of you.

Yeah, and I moved on.

I scattered.

Yeah, yeah.

I didn't want to get kicked out.

There wasn't a golfer within four football fields of us.

Yeah, like that.

It was so ridiculous stuff.

And that was like a weird, like, double barrier that had no reason to be.

Right.

It's just like, why are there all these gates there?

Just so they could yell at you.

Oh, getting in trouble.

I was so mad at you.

So, baby, baby, what's left career-wise?

What's left for you?

You have grandkids now.

Listen, here's what it is.

You're never going to retire

ever.

Never going to retire

until they throw the dirt on me.

I love what I do so much.

I love everybody that I work with.

All right.

This isn't an commercial.

No, I know, but that's

happening.

Here's my retirement plan.

Hopefully, we all slow down a little bit one day and we're still working, but it's not as robust.

And,

you know, he just wants to go to his five-bedroom house and go back there every night.

Yeah.

And then sleep on the couch.

I'm a simple man.

Four-bedroom page.

It's just empty.

I'm a simple man.

All I want is 10%.

How many hours a day do you sleep?

I'd say between four and five a day.

On a normal day.

Is it a straight four to five a day?

Yes.

But then as Jimmy told me in 1998,

you're waking up because you're having nicotine fits.

And that had, I swear, that had never occurred to me.

Like, I don't know why.

It's like stupid.

I should have figured that out on my own after all these years.

And I went, holy shit, he's right.

I'm waking up

because I'm having a nicotine fit.

And for you.

Now I take a sleeping pill every night

and it still doesn't work.

So anyway, what can I say?

Nicotine fit means your body needs to have conditioned it.

I'm waking up to have a cigarette, but I don't really.

Why don't you just have the cigarette and then go back to bed?

It's impossible for me to go back.

Yes.

I mean, you'll see I'm often texting you guys at four o'clock in the morning, my time.

I've seen those texts.

I've wondered why you're up at it.

Right.

1.30

out on my porch smoking cigarettes and doing emails and texts.

And why you can't sleep with your wife in the same bed?

Talking about insulting.

Well, that's the coughing.

Oh, okay.

Yeah, that was a crazy barrage of coughing rehearsal.

No, it's not the coughing.

I cannot sleep without watching TV.

Right.

And she doesn't like TV on once she's ready to go to bed.

See, that's how he lets his clients know that he saw their shows.

He's not technically lying.

Yeah, I'm not.

You have the shows on

because you're asleep.

Yes.

I'm, oh, well, or I'm dozing often, but I'm

making an attempt to watch.

You have been caught lying before.

Remember, we used to take two Kimmels on a Thursday.

Yeah.

And he would have claimed to have seen a show.

You did get sloppy a couple of times.

I absolutely got net.

There were some TV watchers

in baby's life.

Great monologue last night, baby.

And then we find out he had like no electricity.

No, and Shao would go, what are you talking about, baby?

Tell one joke.

Yeah, what did Perry Farrell say to Jimmy?

What did one, one thing?

But then you commissioned, you had your assistants watch and report back to you once.

Correct.

Why not?

They send you like bullet points emails.

Yeah, or and now they say.

Are you going to do that with Chang when you're representing Chang?

Yes.

I think this is going to be a fruitful relationship.

I love it.

Listen, I'm so upfront and transparent.

That's what's going to happen.

Listen, I'm going to talk about it.

I'm going to lie to you sometimes about watching your shit.

You're never going to watch anything I do.

That's okay.

I'll try.

How's that?

I'll try.

The Netflix, they're telling Bella, like, we don't know what's happening at dinner time.

It might not come back.

His agents are having a hard bargain.

James Dixon saying, the guy who gave the toast

to give ladies and salt for an hour and a half.

That's all to do.

One of the famous people here

started to to tear up.

It was like

the Indian that was littering, a little tear who came to the city.

Oh, the old commercial from 15 years ago.

Yeah, she started to tear up.

How do you pitch a new client?

Let the audience

give that out.

Come on.

Come on.

No way.

No.

No way.

Absolutely no.

I don't give out my trail seed.

Thanks all for that.

Now it's a little bit.

How dare you?

A little bit.

A little bit.

Do people ask you, hey, how do you prepare that dish?

You wouldn't give that

space.

He would sometimes.

I would sometimes.

I mean, he has a show and he gives away the dishes every episode.

But what's important to lay the groundwork?

Yeah.

You don't have to get into specifics.

Baby's a relationship guy.

That's right.

And what are you looking for?

Would he click with somebody

that's on a friendship level?

That's right.

And we'll say that again.

What are you looking for?

Like, what's sparking your eye when you are like, I got to represent this person?

Right?

Because you have such a crazy roster of talent over the years.

Well, now it's just all right.

One thing.

You got to make a lot of money north of $3 million.

Would you say that again?

That's what attracts you at this point in your life.

Do you make at least $3 million a year, baby, though?

I need to know.

Because

if I can't money grab $300,000, we need to talk much later.

How's that?

I'm just kidding.

He's already insulted if you're selling.

Listen, I've learned one thing: you are fearless and relentless, and you have no shame or embarrassment whatsoever.

But that's fair enough.

Yes.

Representing his clients.

You know,

liking someone and wanting to work with them, especially at this point in my life, matters greatly.

Yeah.

And that is a criteria for sure.

Baby, could you do a baby doll hall of fame that you could open in Long Island with like your best clients ever, little plaques?

Oh, that's good.

Maybe put that in the basement.

Yes, I could.

I'll put it in the golf sim.

So who would be the first client inducted?

Jay Stew with a bullet.

It's got to be.

Well, that's your longest relationship, basically, right?

It is.

Yes, it is.

Since what year?

Well, I wasn't even an agent.

Right.

I would say we're going on 38 years.

And John.

38 years?

Yes.

John wasn't qualified to be a client, and I wasn't qualified to represent him.

But I said to him, listen,

if I get promoted, you're going to be my first client.

So is he first ballot, and then we'll take another season before some of the inductees come in?

Can we walk how he almost screwed up John's 1990s?

Oh, yeah, do that.

Yeah, because initially, MTV show.

How was that a screw-up?

It was got canceled.

It was

the best and most hottest platform.

He was supposed to take over the Larius Sanders show.

Didn't happen.

That's another screwdriver.

He was in there for another day.

He was in a horror movie called The Faculty.

I feel like that was your fault.

He's got a goatee on.

He ends up turning into an alien.

Well, as John would say, you know, he learned very quickly.

I'm glad he stood by you during all these decisions.

He got power bombed by John Cena.

Busted up his mind.

That was recent.

You let him get power bombed to him.

I was against it.

He didn't listen.

Insulting again.

But Daily Show, that, I mean, then you talked.

I redeemed myself.

You talked him into that.

I don't know how he trusted you after the faculty.

That's a really good point.

I never thought of it that way.

Yeah.

But then there was Big Daddy.

That was a good one for John.

Big Daddy was good.

That was really good for John.

How about Playing by Heart?

Did anyone ever see that movie?

It didn't matter.

My wife likes that movie.

She does.

John was really good in that.

He was good.

It was very good.

You might not have seen it yourself.

I'm looking at you.

I saw it.

I don't remember it, but I know he was good in it.

Can't you tell the Larry Sanders story, or are you still not allowed?

I don't know if John would want that story.

Oh, let's say

go do you want to tell the Larry?

I don't know if I know.

Out of respect to John, I'm not going to speak out of specific.

Okay, cool.

There was a moment there, though, when it seemed like the show is going to continue with him hosting the show and Larry in retirement.

Yes, that is accurate.

I would think, yes, but yes, it was never

guaranteed or affirmed, but that was maybe the plan.

And

many people speculated on that.

So that was, that's not speaking nervously.

up.

No, I finally found the right question.

Hey, I just don't want to, yeah.

Listen, I can't talk about

clients' deals and shit like that.

That, that, that wouldn't be okay.

Were you angry, disappointed?

What's the third thing he does?

Disappointed?

Insulted?

Angry.

Were you more insulted, disappointed, or angry when the Larry Sanders thing didn't work out?

I was rip shit.

What's the most rip shit you've been?

Is that number one?

No.

What's number one?

Just, all right.

So one through seven involves Daniel Kellison.

Then eight is what.

That's not true.

Let's just say.

Yeah, let's just say.

I actually can't talk about it, but that was not the number one.

Weren't you just talking vague

where we don't actually say what happened, but you can give us like a hint of what happened?

I'll just say it was some shenanigans in late night television, and I'll leave it at that.

I know what it is.

You may or may not, but

there was some, yeah, I know what you're talking about.

There was some possible shanking in the works that you found out about.

That's all I'm missing.

Yeah, it's not even worth talking about.

But to be honest, how lucky are you to have navigated this representing three heavy hitters in late night and avoiding conflicts for the most part for two and a half seconds.

Conflict is good.

It can also benefit.

My knowledge of all those can often help each of them.

Even as they're competing against each other.

Right, I know.

Or you're worried one of them at some point would be like, hey, what's going on here?

Does he have my best interests?

Of course I do.

That's why.

They know I always do.

That is never in question.

Ever.

That's not what Jimmy said once.

Any last questions, Shang, before we wrap?

What happened with the gnomes, baby?

You were

what happened with the gnomes?

Stupid gnomes.

You wanted the gnomes back.

You pissed me off.

The masters, they have these gnomes that you can get in different parts of the course, and people show up at 6.30 in the morning to try to buy the gnomes.

Yeah, most of them.

I don't really fully understand.

Most of them, so they can resell them on eBay for a profit.

That obviously isn't my motivation.

You want to put them in one of your seven houses.

Yeah, I want to display them, of course.

Why?

They're dumb.

If you're not reselling them, what's the freaking point?

It's like the beanie babies of the golf world.

Yeah, speaking of beanie babies.

Yeah, I had them.

One could say that was freaking dumb.

But I did it with the whole thing.

You collected beanie babies?

We don't need to talk about that.

So here's why

I wanted to resell them, though.

You did?

Well, yeah, I wasn't attached to them.

But here's what's disappointing about

you getting screwed over on the gnome today that he thought he was getting.

I'm positive Sal would have broken it at some point.

I know you were thinking about it.

Baby, let me see what that just would have been.

You know, God works in mysterious ways.

You're absolutely right.

It was a God, it was a gift from God that I did not get that.

It would have been so good.

It would have built up all week and then crashed.

Simmons, turn your camera on.

You're going to let it catch us.

He would have like dropkicked it, you know, like really smashed it badly somehow.

I know.

Baby, who's going to win the Masters?

After first round today, I mean, I know Scheffler is always hard to bet against, but it's such a boring pick.

Well,

I picked Olberg, and I'm going to go with him.

He's in the Zinon.

He had a really great shot, 32 on the back.

I'm going with the guy picked here.

Who'd you ask?

I had Morakawa.

It was minus three, then Bogey, Bogey, Bogey to even.

I'll stick with him, but I almost feel like at this point, you put money on Scheffler because if he's like this tomorrow,

I think he'll be like minus 450.

He had some 41 to 50.

Would you have any opinions changed?

In our bet, I picked Scheffler and Straka and Struck is like third from last place.

Yeah, stay with Strzka.

I'm saying, you know, Strzka.

He did look strapping.

What did he finish at?

He got plus what?

Plus six.

Oh, God.

Epic comeback.

This is going to be a movie that you're going to be able to represent.

Baby, the match.

Here we go.

I do wonder if

Beefy Bryson might, this could be the moment for him.

We talked about that earlier.

He's one of my biggest.

Yeah, he's in the mix.

He's definitely in the mix.

He's in the mix.

But who do you think will win?

I think it's going to be one of the big guns.

This feels like a big guns, like a Shaffler kind of thing.

Yeah, just one of the real.

This feels like a moment this weekend.

And just in general, a crazy sports weekend with this,

you know, all the stuff happening in basketball all at the same time.

Because God forbid the NBA isn't on a weekend where

other major shit has happened.

Can I ask you as the sports guy question?

Yeah.

Is this

the Masters arguably the greatest sporting event overall for like a weekend sport, like an on like a more than one basketball game or one game seven of a world shift?

Is the Masters the best sporting event if you love, not even if you love golf, just in general?

I have an answer, but do you want to answer that, Chang?

In your opinion?

I do, and I think it is for a consistent basis, not a one-off.

It's not like an underdog that reaches the Super Bowl because because this is like Disneyland for adults.

My excitement every time I said this today.

We're getting into the gates and I was like, this is what my kids feel like going to Disneyland.

Yes.

And I hate everything after a while.

I'm not.

I'm happy every day, right?

I was so happy.

And

you don't even have to like golf

to have a good time here.

The food's great.

The hang.

This felt like we're like a college road trip this week, you know?

And this is the guy that went for the first time.

What do you think?

I love it.

I love everything everything about it, but I don't think you could say that.

I don't even have an answer for you, but I think it's eliminated because most people would be rather be home on Sunday watching on TV than following the action because it's so hard, right?

It's so hard.

I had a million dollars.

Well, it's two different answers, though.

It's like it's fun to go, but you also want to be home on the last day so you can catch everything.

Which is the

televised event, the Sunday Masters.

Is that the greatest day?

Well, it's the greatest if

good stuff's happening.

Right.

So I was thinking today, because I was talking to somebody who hadn't been here before, and, you know, we're walking the chorus.

They aren't huge golf fans.

And I was trying to explain why I love the Masters.

It's the only sporting event that's exactly the same every year, but the people have changed, you know, and it goes back so far.

Yes, the history.

And, you know, I've been here four times and each time it feels the same.

The holes are the same.

It's still cool in all the same ways.

But the really cool thing is, like, you said your first Masters that you remember was like 1970.

Yes.

Billy Casper won in 1970.

So I was eight years old.

Yeah.

So I vaguely remember the 75 one as my first one, but I just remember Nicholas in the 70s and hoping he would win the Masters and becoming attached to him.

But then you just think these different generations just move through.

It's the exact same course.

There's nothing else really like it.

Like they don't play the World Series or the Super Bowl.

Like nothing has like the continuity.

And even in golf, like, all the tournaments are in different places.

Like, it'll be like, oh, cool.

The U.S.

Opens in Pebble Beach this year, but it might not have been for.

So it's just, I think that's what it is.

And like, even when we were talking in the last segment about like seeing Speeth and like Speeth is on the 12th hole and you're just like,

ah, right.

Right.

As they say, tradition like no other.

It's like the players have baggage with the course and the holes and they hit these different stages.

Like, you saw Freddie Couples today.

Now, he's the old guy.

He takes the Tom Watson spot.

There is nothing really walk with you guys.

You guys knowing the ins and outs of every hole.

And hey, if we're in this spot, we could see three holes.

And aside from just a men corner, there's just a whole bunch.

Like, oh my God.

Like, if you walked around your neighborhood, I don't know if you would know the streets as well as you do, like the holes and everything.

Well, and especially like being able to be that close to all these famous golfers, where you could just be like, all of a sudden,

there's, there's Rory.

He's three feet away walking by us.

Why is he ignoring me?

Why is that really tan guy screaming his name?

You're not kidding.

I also, I literally breathe it in.

Yeah.

I literally, the smell, because I know olfactory, even though I probably don't have the smell I should have after all these cigarettes, I literally breathe it in to try to like capture that.

It has everything is

uniquely Augusta national, even the smells.

We're all on our best behavior, right?

Because all history.

But we've been told all these stories this week about players being so nervous because of the history, too.

So it just makes it such a special place.

So if somebody wanted to ask you to cook the dinner, 1,000%.

That would be your number one dinner you've ever cooked?

I would probably put it up there.

Yeah, for sure.

I would be a no, no-brainer.

I'm going to do it.

You mean like the champions dinner?

Yeah.

Oh, that's a great one.

No-brainer.

Here's what I'd say to you.

They'd be lucky to have you baby.

Oh, wow.

Your new agent.

Your new agent.

Maybe not.

Save it for the Amazon exactly.

Baby.

Augusta called.

I did not like their offer.

They wouldn't even pay for a sous chef, baby.

I don't know if we should do this.

Insult.

I'm insulting.

You should be insulting.

That fucking place.

Never going there again.

Jackasses.

Here's what I would do with that.

If they ever called, I'd say, you know what?

We're honored

for this offer.

And can I stay in the course?

In fact,

he will obviously do it pro bono.

Right.

But there'll be just one little, one little cost.

We get to play the course on Monday.

We're going to be playing the course.

Yeah.

Really?

And everyone's going to get a gnome

and throw in three gnomes.

And you haven't played the course.

I have not.

Maybe we got to get we got to remedy this.

I've played it in my mind.

What hole would you be the most excited to play?

That's a great question.

I'm going to say,

I'm going to say 15 because I would want to see if I could get, yeah, get I mean, if I really crushed my drive from the members' team, there's an absolute chance that I could put it on in two.

And

we're talking about baby today or baby when the swing speed works out as 18.

Today, today

I will tell you, and then I will boil it very quick.

I came within within a razor's hair of getting on the course.

Okay, good.

I'm going.

I get invited.

On Monday,

they allow the media to play.

Hidden placements are the same as Sunday.

Right.

Okay.

Les Moonvez,

Ray Romano.

Here we go.

Me, and someone else.

I can't remember who.

I'm literally in my garage.

I'm ready to go.

It's the next day.

I'm home.

It's Sunday.

I'm literally taking toothpicks and

cleaning the

grooves of my irons.

I'm ready to go.

I'm not kidding.

I'm shy.

I get a text from Ray.

Baby doll, I'm so sorry.

You got bumped.

Less invited, like the CEO of AT ⁇ T, and you're out.

I'm really sorry.

And that was it.

I was on my way to go down there, and I got bumped at the last minute.

Toothpick stuck it in his throat.

Stuck it in my eyes.

And that was the last.

Yeah.

Wow.

That was like when Ralph Cox got cut from the 1980 Olympic hockey team.

That's the last cut, most insulting.

That's about as sad as I've ever been.

Yeah.

Oh, man.

Yeah.

But I'll get on.

I know I will.

I haven't really worked it.

I haven't tried very hard.

I figured it would come

quickly.

I think we have to try to get more involved.

We're going to make this happen for you, baby.

Yeah.

If you guys do that,

well, I love you more than I love you now, and I'll be forever indebted.

How's that?

Well, you're his agent now.

So

you just basically sign a contract.

I got some papers out there, baby.

Baby, a pleasure as always.

Sal, Chang.

Thank you.

Thanks, bro.

All right.

That's it for the podcast.

Thanks to Sal and Baby Doll and Chang and House and Nathan.

Don't forget to listen to Fairway Rowing.

On Sunday, right after the Masters ends.

You can get their recap podcasts there.

Don't forget about Zach Lowe's new podcast, the Zach Lowe Show.

Don't forget that I'm coming back on Sunday night with Rosillo.

We're going to wait until after all the Sunday night games and the Masters, and we'll try to break down an early preview of the playoff picture and everything we saw over the weekend.

I am looking forward to that.

Don't forget about Celtic City on Mac's.

First six episodes are up.

We just finished the bird air.

We're about to go into the 90s on Monday night on HBO.

So stay tuned for that and enjoy the weekend.

I will see you on Sunday night.

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