Hour 1: Rob Me Blind, Daddy (feat. Pablo Torre)

41m
"Pablo, you have become a great podcast entertainer. Great acting skills. But in terms of getting to the real real. Not so much."

Pablo joins the show to discuss the details of Aspiration Investigation 5.0 and Zaslow reveals that football is not for him.
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Transcript

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This is the Don Labatar show with the Stew Gats podcast.

Pablo

he badgered the Clippers PR staff at two o'clock in the morning again this morning.

We will get to that story in a second.

Part of what it is that we're trying to do here at Metal Arc Media is establish

businesses for the people who we care about around here.

Pablo has his, Zaszlo.

We brought his show on board.

Zaszlo's now officially, his podcast is on board with us.

Do you want to tell people, Zaszlo, what it is that you have been doing for a while now that you are now doing with and for us?

Thank you.

Zaszlo Show 2.0 every day, Miami-based, South Florida Sports.

We do some national as well, but it's a place that you can get just me.

So wherever you get your podcast, you search Zaszlo Show 2.0.

Like, rate, comment, subscribe.

It's great for the algorithm.

Everybody knows I got a good algorithm anyway.

And I love you a long time.

Thank you.

Sazzlo Show 2.0.

Jeremy's going to be doing a live stream as we've segregated baseball again to celebrate the baseball playoffs.

That's going to be tomorrow.

We'll have Jeremy from Heat Media Day talking about that baseball live stream and not heat basketball.

He will join us here in a little bit.

And for those of you wondering about Stugant, Stugant is scheduled to join us later next month as he builds out his things.

God bless football and stupidity.

Later in October, he will be scheduled to rejoin us as he's building out his business.

Stugats and company.

Recent rebrand.

Stugats and company.

Yes, forgive me.

Pablo, you have yet another report here, and evidently Mark Cuban has now tweeted a 323-word response to your five-part Balmer investigation.

The tweet begins with, Pablo, you have become a great podcast entertainer, great acting skills, but in terms of getting to the real, real, not so much.

All of what you said is meaningless in capital letters if KL2 didn't actually get paid.

End quote.

We'll get your response to what Mark Cuban says in a second, but why don't you catch people up on your newest reporting here today?

Yeah.

Shout out to Zazzlo Show 2.0, by the way.

Just, I love that show.

I loved it.

Windows 1.0, 2.0, even more excited.

We're Aspiration Investigation 5.0 right now.

So why are we doing a 5.0?

It's because there has been a lot of talk from Steve Ballmer about how he has been defrauded, victimized, humiliated.

And I want to take him at face value.

I'm going to lead with this part of the story.

There's a lot in here, but the part I'm leading with is because how then is it possible that Steve Ballmer, who was victimized, defrauded, humiliated by Joe Sandberg, and by the way, has said via the Clippers that as of the government investigation, he first began to learn that he was defrauded, victimized, humiliated.

The government investigation began January 2024 in the public eye, right?

So that was Bloomberg's headline about the Clippers, actually.

January 2024, it was undeniable that Steve Balmer would have known about it.

Of course, behind the scenes, people at Aspiration, dozens of them, have been interviewed by the federal government as early as spring 2023.

But.

Jan 2024, let's use that.

October 2024, one of the board members of Aspiration, Ibrahim al-Husseini, he is arrested and ultimately pleaded guilty to wire fraud.

Joe Sandberg has been under investigation.

There are articles about this in January, in July, Bloomberg.

They've been on it.

And so, the question I raise in this episode is: if all of that is so, why would Steve Ballmer, his charity, the Ballmer Group, why would he invest $1.875 million

in a charity founded and chaired by Joe Sandberg in November 2024.

How does one square the circle?

So it's a year, a year and a half, a year and a half after the deal with the Clippers had fallen apart as federal authorities are closing in a year and a half later?

Yes, 10 months after Bloomberg reports with the Clippers in the headline that the government is investigating Aspiration and Joe Sandberg, the entity that we've heard Steve Ballmer say over and over again, he has been defrauded, victimized, and humiliated by.

Why then is he investing, donating $1.875 million into the charity that, by the way, has since taken down on its website that Joe Sandberg is the founder and board chair?

That page has disappeared, but thankfully the Internet Archive gave us a saved version of it, which was up online as of November 2024.

Why then would they do that?

And so we posed this to the Clippers.

The Clippers chief communications officer sent us a response on behalf of the Ballmer Group, which is an interesting thing that the Clippers PR person is giving us the statements from the charity.

This, by the way, after the Clippers PR person, when we asked, generally speaking, hey, we had heard that Steve Ballmer had invested, had donated, excuse me, in Joe Sandberg's charities.

Can you comment on that?

And their response was, that is germane to the NBA investigation.

We will let the NBA investigation take its course.

So then we come back with the details and we get a statement from Ballmer Group in which they say, actually, actually,

this is the fourth payment.

This is a series of payments that we've made to Joe Sandberg's charity, the Golden State Opportunity Foundation, a very small charity that, again, he co-founded,

is the person, the entire spitting image of the board chair through this entire time.

He said, actually, this is the fourth payment.

And the first one, upon our reporting with the people who now are still remaining at Golden State Opportunity Foundation, they say that the first one started in January of 2018.

And so what we've also, Dan, learned in the course of the reporting is that the relationship between Joe Sandberg and Steve Ballmer actually began in 2017 when that first donation was being discussed, because that donation began per the charity on January 1st, 2018, which is almost four years before they appeared together for the first time in public via aspiration.

So the relationship, the story, the implausibility, the irrationality deepens.

I'm really confused as to what Mark Cuban is doing.

This isn't just a stubborn, rich dude refusing to capitulate.

He's holding water for another owner.

Yeah, he owns still a healthy chunk of the Dallas Maverick.

So, what can we glean from this?

Like, every time he has a rambling statement to you, it's like he either didn't listen to an episode of yours or didn't listen to any of the previous ones.

What do you think of the recent pivot to try to parse between intent and whether or not they actually paid?

Is this some kind of loophole that the NBA is looking to exploit here to not have egg on their face?

Because this seems to be a systematic breakdown of their checks and balances when it comes to these sorts of things.

Let me read the quote again.

The tweet begins, Pablo, you have become a great podcast entertainer, great acting skills.

But in terms of getting to the real real, not so much.

All of what you said is meaningless in capital letters if KL2 didn't actually get paid.

End quote.

So I guess

I haven't exactly exactly poured through Mark's latest tweets.

So I'm kind of reacting to this live, admittedly.

Something that keeps on happening with him, though, is that he gives us these sort of bullet points, and then we look into the thing and prove why his bullet points were either incorrect or, in fact, exactly part of the scheme as described.

And then he moves on to different bullet points.

So that's just generally the cycle.

And lots of people around the league have been asking me, Mike, the same question you've been asking me, like, why is he doing this?

I want to actually zoom out for a second and phrase this and sort of put it in the context of the larger conversation around the league, because Mark Cuban is so explicitly off in public, seemingly in a way that no one else is willing to be.

And every other conversation I have, and we have an anonymous head coach that reached out to me that's in this episode saying it's beyond obvious what happened, right?

That this is embarrassing for the league.

We have that anonymous head coach.

We have a former Clippers official saying that the son of the Clipper solar system is Kawhi Leonard.

The moon is Dennis Robertson.

Of course, the Clippers knew about this.

This is someone who worked with all of the principles involved.

And there are more people I've talked to, by the way, who are actually too afraid to be anonymously quoted because they explicitly have informed me that they fear reprisal from the MBA.

So just to give you a sense of like why this is a tense and fraught topic, that's very hard to get people to talk about, it's because people are actively concerned that the MBA investigation is not a real investigation, and they are concerned that the MBA would take the time to go after them if they express their honest view of what they suspect based on my reporting and their own experience is actually happening here.

And then on the other side of the equation is Mark Cuban, who's just endlessly talking.

And lots of people are wondering why.

And frankly, I am also

asking and attempting to answer the same question.

And so on that front, I just will have to say say for now, my investigation continues.

Okay, can you tell us though what you make of the 1.875 million donated to charity to a founder who conned him a year and a half after the Clippers deal ended?

Because when he was talking to

Shelburne,

the intimation was that that couldn't be so.

That we end he kept saying, and that relationship was over.

And now you're reporting that a figure suspiciously close to the quarterly payments that Kawhi is supposed to get is being funneled into a charity that is publicly, everyone knows, is underwater.

Yeah,

it's very,

it's very strange.

I don't really know how to explain it.

I think that's the point of it.

Outside of the fact that this is part of a larger relationship that is deeper and more personal and involves the flow of money in ways that they never wanted anybody to connect the dots on.

I want to put that timeline in context as well, Dan, because keep in mind, the Clippers have told us previously that they are the ones who terminated the deal with Aspiration in the 2022, 2023 season because they couldn't make their payments.

Simultaneously, we have proven via court documentation that Aspiration had gone into default, that they couldn't get investors from anywhere other than Steve Ballmer.

Dennis Wong, a first-time investor who put in $2 million nine days before Kawhi Leonard got paid that thing that was delayed, the 1.75, as well as the other people either who were now

pled guilty for wire fraud or had already been involved in investments with Aspiration.

So the question of like, was this company a mess?

Was it obvious?

That was obvious in 23, if not end of 22.

And so to see this timeline unfurl in which you go from there to all of the public news about the federal government, for Steve Ballmer to make that donation, it would need to be the ultimate case of something Dan you love talking about, which is separating the art from the artist.

He's like, you know what?

This charity, this tiny charity that specializes in giving low-income families help with tax preparation for these tax credits that Gavin Newsom has rolled out, this cause is so important to me, Steve Ballmer, personally, that I will overlook the fact that the founder and board chair who first solicited these payments from me and and renewed them throughout four years

That guy sorry six years that guy I'm going to put aside all of it and continue to give his foundation money

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Don Lebatard.

Pablo leads all of podcasting in reading while smiling.

If you listen to ESPN Daily, he sounds like he's having the time of his life.

Stugats.

Coming up next.

I'm going to tell you how the Savannah bananas changed the business.

How do you know I'm

bananas?

How do you know I'm smiling?

That's how I find my vocal range.

Sometimes I just say Savannah bananas.

Savannah bananas.

Yeah.

This is the Don Levatar show with the Stugats.

Briefly, because I want to get to some more of your reporting here, but

him opening the door to the difference between intent and putting something into practice.

What do you think that that means?

Can we look into that?

Because what difference does it make?

If they tried to circumvent the salary cap, isn't that a problem?

Yeah, that's where I, I mean, to say the least, right?

Like the whole idea that there was an agreement that was intended to be fulfilled with real money negotiated at painstaking lengths that was never disclosed.

What does it matter if the full value was paid?

I mean, frankly, I don't think it does.

But I think to Mark's point, like one of the things that's just weird about this is that the first thing we reported is that KL2 Aspire LLC was listed as a creditor for $7 million in the bankruptcy filing.

The deal was for $28 million.

So the question of why is only $7 million outstanding would seem to almost be asked and answered by the first document we released, which is that they're owed seven of the 28.

And you could do some math and say, okay, but the company collapsed.

And so really it was a three-year deal for $21 million, in which case, logically logically speaking, then maybe he got paid $14 million.

Is that what Mark is hanging his hat on?

Because we can continue to report out the chain and the timeline.

And of course, our investigation is ongoing on that front.

But that being this new revelation to me is bizarre.

It was kind of the first thing that we reported that they actually did intend to pay and did pay millions upon millions of dollars in a deal that no one ever announced, let alone completed to its full extent, but literally ever mentioned in public when it was an endorsement deal.

That's where I just don't know what leg anyone is standing on at this point.

You have to get a little bit better at using allegedly, no matter how content

it is you are in your reporting.

I'm going to read this to you again, though, because I want to hear your best guess theory.

Pablo, you have become a great podcast entertainer, great acting skills.

But in terms of getting to the real real, not so much.

All of what you said is meaningless if KL2 didn't actually get paid.

What is Mark Cuban

doing?

There's a phrase

that comes up when people don't really have an argument.

And it mostly resembles the, we're going to throw shit at the wall and see what sticks approach.

And I think the only thing I can imagine is that he is.

most generously seeing my podcast, as he said, like a true crime story that he cannot help but be fascinated and entranced by.

And then on top of that, he is pot committed, is what one NBA executive called it to me.

Mark Cuban is pot committed.

He is so clearly team ballmer in public that even most generously, he just can't back off a thing that is flying in the face of lots of evidence.

And so to me,

there are more, I would say,

disturbing explanations, which I won't speculate on in public because that would be, to Dan's Dan's point, about my legal clearances, that would be a little irresponsible.

But in the meantime, it just seems

like an argument he won't give up.

And for that reason, I am frankly ever more interested in why Mark Cuban and what Mark Cuban is saying.

And I'm also kind of bored.

Like, I don't really, I'm just like, I don't know, man.

Like, I feel like I'm kind of explaining this step by step, but I guess if you want to come back on the show, we can arrange that.

Mark Cuban

would appear to be just wanting to be stubbornly right when you say pot committed.

That's what that feels like.

In that tweet, he is offering for a return engagement.

We haven't had an opportunity to go through the entirety of the tweet, but it looks like Mr.

Pot Committed Mark Cuban is offering his services again.

Well,

I like that he is because we tried to book him multiple times two episodes ago, which is why we got the other Cuban that is talking to me right now in that episode.

But if Mark's down,

I wonder why he decided to talk to Kendrick Perkins and Channing Fry instead of Pablo on this one.

Let's, again, I've told you before, one of the great prides here at Metalark is that we could use the modulated voice and the distorted fuzziness of keeping people protected anonymously, even though, as Pablo said, there are now real fears around some of this.

And this is real power and real money that disincentivizes people from coming and talking to Pablo.

But the report in this morning, Pablo Torrey finds out

is that Steve Ballmer, the seventh richest man in the world, quietly donated $1.875 million to charity

Aspiration co-founder who conned him, quote-unquote conned him, a year and a half after the Clippers deal ended, when the feds were already closing in and this was all in headlines.

Here's a modulated voice for you again to explain how somebody at Aspiration, who knows something about the finances of Aspiration, took that charitable donation.

It's just inconceivable to me to be both hoodwinked and bamboozled, but yet continuously giving money to Joe Sandberg.

It does not make any

iota of sense

to invest in 2021, contribute nearly 100 million in carbon offset pre-purchases, reinvest in 2022 or 2023 around, claim all of that to be lost in 2023, and then come back for more in 2024 and be a charitable donation.

Maybe Steve Ballmer is a secret masochist.

Steve Ballmer's kink is being robbed.

Rob me blind, daddy.

I think that laugh wasn't modulated enough.

And that laugh is going to be

recognized.

That laugh is going to be recognized by fellow employees.

I believe that you did a poor job of protecting that person's anonymity.

So something that Cuban keeps on bringing up, I was just scanning his tweet while you guys were playing that clip for me, and I love source number one sense of humor, by the way.

It really does keep me going.

The question of like, hey, you don't talk to enough business people.

I, Mark Cuban, am the business authority.

Here's what you're missing.

I just cannot stress enough how many people I talk to that we don't quote for these episodes, so that I am as sure as I can be that I'm not missing stuff from the business world.

Mark Cuban, who again, I loved the respectful dialogue we had before.

It's why I invited him back for more.

It's why I continue to entertain the premise that maybe we can continue to have that if we're both operating from evidence and from good faith.

I am hopeful about that.

But the question of whether Mark Cuban is the only billionaire I've ever talked to in my capacity as reporting this story, he is

one of an increasingly long list of incredibly wealthy people that I have to ask, hey, what do you think about this?

What have you heard about this?

People who are in the NBA and people who are just in finance.

So I just want to just, there's this thing that really rich people like to do in which they say, if you are not me, you cannot imagine what it's like to be me.

And a lot of what I'm doing in the story is proving that, yes, there is complication and complexity.

There are terms that we're going to spell out to you as best we can, but there's also just the fundamental fallibility and desperation of human nature.

And do not let a billionaire tell you that you do not understand human nature when so much of what they're doing is stupid.

Yeah.

It can be both.

It's kind of a dirty move, Pablo, where Cuban tweets to you there.

Just have me back on the podcast.

Like he makes it sound like you won't have him back on.

Just have me back on the pod.

Like he's begging you when you've wanted him on.

Anyway, what do you think is going to happen at Clippers Media Day today?

I'm excited.

I'm excited to see what questions get asked.

In the episode, we kind of give a step-by-step guide.

Like, here are the questions that I personally would ask Kawhi Leonard, Ty Lou, Lawrence Frank, who's the president of basketball operations.

I mean, in this episode, we established that if nothing else, the way the Clippers power structure works is that Steve Ballmer and Lawrence Frank would be the ones to handle as sensitive a case as Kawhi Leonard, sensitive for for all the reasons that have been publicly reported since 2019, before then,

and then how to handle something like this, in which, of course, secrecy, to the extent that they never even announced this deal Kawhi had with their own team sponsor.

Of course, that would be paramount.

So I look forward to those people being asked questions.

I have questions for them if they are not asked such things.

But it's going to be, it's going to be.

It's going to be interesting.

The last time that Steve Ballmer ever talked at Media Day, he's not supposed to talk today.

Maybe that changes.

I hope it changes.

But the last time he talked was in 2021.

And at 2021, and we play the video in the episode, you will see Steve Ballmer sitting next to Joe Sandberg, the co-founder of Aspiration, and they are both celebrating and discussing in terms that are now very interesting to relive

why this deal between the Clippers and Aspiration to the tune of over $300 million, $50 million personally from Steve Ballmer, why that was struck and how it's not against the rules at all.

It just seems almost very interesting,

very conspicuous, even, that they went out of their way to reference some of the legal and financial intricacies in that introductory presser in 2021.

The name of the podcast is Pablo Torre Finds Out, and he is the only one doing this kind of reporting.

I've told you a number of different times that this is very difficult stuff to do, and so no one else is doing it.

No one else is catching up to him on this story, and all of the information in five parts is that Pablo Torre finds out.

Tony, you might be surprised to know that Pablo investigated for longer a different story than this story, which was

why isn't there tickling in MMA?

He actually reported that one for a year.

Tony, do you know the answer to the question of why there isn't tickling in MMA?

I don't know the answer to the question.

What do you say?

Pablo, you want to tell him?

You want to tell him what it is that you discovered there, what you found out?

I mean, tickling is an effective strategy, as evidenced by an actual fight, an MMA match about that happened in which one guy tickled the other to escape one of those like Suzanne Summers Thigh Master leg locks on their head.

and then came back to win.

So this is an episode about a fight in particular involving a a tickler and a tickly and why the sport of mma refuses to take the lesson that clearly should be taken which is this works and so we go to germany to interview a scientist who studies tickling and tickles lab rats literally lab rats for a living we go to a fight in rochester new york in which we go and interview the tickler We go and interview the it's just listen to the episode.

This is like a bird watching thing for me guys You're wasting so much other things You're wasting so much money you're wasting i do i do these episodes i do it's it's it's not one for me one for them like they do in hollywood it's not that i care about all these things but every so often we do an episode where i'm like watch the bird watching episode and i'll investigate jeffrey epstein watch the tickling episode and i'll investigate jalen brunson okay if that's what it needs i will do it but you got to watch the tickling episode first all right you got me on the bird watching one you got me on the tickling one i'm getting to it uh paul thomas and i listened to the one the the Malik Beasley one, which was great.

And I texted you about it.

Yeah.

You know what?

You want congratulations?

No, but he thinks that I don't listen and watch, and I do.

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Don Lebatard.

To us residents.

wow.

That's pretty

better.

You think I haven't been practicing?

Stugats.

Oh, oh, I didn't realize we had a substitute complicated legacy passed by.

441 Powerline Road.

Second down to nine.

This is the Don Lebatar Show with the Stugats.

Paul Thomas Anderson, who made Boogie Nights in his 20s, says of Scorsese and other great directors, he's like, they're so selfish and selfish in the best ways because they're just trying to make themselves happy first.

That's what Pablo Torrey finds out is, just so that you know, he ain't doing it for you.

This ain't altruism, and he's not Brother Teresa.

He's absolutely doing this for himself selfishly.

Dan, one even better, I actually gave Pablo a source the other day.

So let's see what happens.

Hey, Tony, Tony, come on.

The number one rule of you becoming a PTFO correspondent is that you don't out your source.

Did you don't?

What are you saying?

I sent Pablo a source.

Just know, if you're worried about how far-reaching the range, the tentacles of Pablo Torrey finds out, a show that is fundamentally selfish, how far-reaching those tentacles go, they've gotten into Tony.

10-day Tony is now an agent for PTFO.

It seemed like Jeremy and Mike were both disgusted by Tony there.

I'm looking at Jeremy from Heat Media Day.

He just slumped and dropped his head in total defeat.

Mike, what is the nature of your disgust?

It's a useless nugget that whenever this source does poke its head up, can be tied directly to Tony.

It's just bad ball over there.

Not ideal.

Pablo, I have another question.

Do you think that people on Chapel Hill are just giving you overwhelming ratings on your Kawhi investigation, hoping that you just have closed the book on North Carolina?

The book of Bill Balichek, I hesitate to proclaim on September 29th, is very open.

That's all I'll say for now about that.

Jeremy Tashay joins us from Heat Media Day.

It's a bit inexplicable that he would be at Heat Media Day.

I don't understand why we didn't go to Panthers Media Day and report live from Panthers Media Day.

Can Jeremy ask some questions about aspiration at Heat Media Day?

Go ahead and ask him.

He's here.

Jeremy,

you're you're in an NBA building.

You have a giant story unfolding with tentacles all over the league.

Can you please ask some questions of the Heat about this story that Metalark Media has been reporting from day one?

Thank you, Pablo.

Well, I did speak exclusively with Eric Svolstra, and I can report that he did really enjoy seeing Nico Jovic and Pelo Larson in Eurobasket this summer.

He enjoyed going to Serbia in particular and learning from the Serbian national team, where several players walked up to him and said, hey, we got you in regard to mentoring Nico Jovic, a young Nico Jovic, who should factor into the Heat's front court rotation.

Should he not be able to live up to those minutes?

There is the young Vlad Golden who can step in and potentially provide a big physical presence that doesn't quite jump off the page, according to Spolstra, but does all the little things right and is learning to become a pro.

Of course, he also met during Eurobasket with Simone Fontecchio for the very first time, had a chance to meet him.

It was a really special moment for him.

He said that, of course, Fontecchio chose where they would go to break bread.

Pablo, back to you.

There's not a funnier name in the sport than Simone Fontecchio.

Fontecchio.

I defy all of you to come up with a funnier name in basketball than Simone Fontecchio.

Go ahead.

I'll give you the rest of time.

You will not achieve this.

Pablo, thank you for being on with us.

Thank you

for and with your reporting.

For it, actually.

Thank you, Dan, for your money, and thank you to Jeremy for just throwing so many syllables, all of which mean absolutely nothing to me.

Well, if you are looking for Clippers' information, guys, I did have an opportunity to speak with head coach Eric Spolstro about Norman Powell, former Clipper.

And he said that when they met, it wasn't quite like the meeting he had with Dwayne Wade in 2008 where they got right to business.

This was more about, quote, shooting the business.

Thank you, please, just.

He had the open door there on the Clipper thing, and I thought you're too much for Pablo.

He's not asking for, he's not asking questions about aspiration.

I should say, by the way, happy 40th birthday to Pablo Torre.

And happy birthday to him.

I don't care.

Good luck.

Any highlights?

Any highlights from your birthday weekend?

I spent my birthday weekend reporting this episode that Mark Cuban's been shitting on.

So please allow me to go back into Twitter and continue to contemplate whether I'm doing anything meaningful with my life.

All right.

See you later.

That is not a good use of your time.

You have already won that story.

Enjoy some time, please, and please be with your family.

It's important.

I want to go out to Jeremy again from Heat Media Day just to get his baseball live stream promotion.

What are you doing tomorrow to celebrate the advent of the baseball playoffs?

Thanks, Dan.

Well, during Wild Card Tuesday, where there will be four different games happening at 1, 3, 6, and I believe 8.30 at 6 o'clock, Chris Cody and I will be live on our YouTube channel with anyone who's welcome to join us if I haven't run them off already with all of these heat reports for Yankees Red Sox.

That's a wild card game.

Yankees Red Sox.

It should be a lot of fun.

And it's going to be the casting crew from the pitch clock.

We'll have some trivia games.

It should be a great experience.

And potentially Jane Levy joining us as well after her appearance on the pitch clock last week.

And just so you guys know, I can exclusively report that Andrew Wiggins is wearing white socks with plain white shoes and no other color with his white heat uniform today.

Back to you.

All right.

Appreciate you joining us from Heat Media Day.

You should be asking questions about aspiration out there and trying to aspire.

I did ask Eric Svolstro about his aspirations for this group, and he said this year it is embracing the unknown.

That's something he's really enjoying.

Looking at the veterans, knowing the minutes they're going to get, whether that's waiting.

Jane Levy, though.

That's a hell of a get.

Jeremy had my curiosity, but now he has my attention.

You know what has my attention?

Because I think this got buried in the news of yesterday.

Did you guys see what happened between Liam Cohen and Robert Salah?

Did you?

I love this.

Oh, did I?

Fill me in because I just saw stills of a contentious back and forth.

Okay, so I will fill you in, but not until you basically play the only thing that I associate with Liam Cohen.

Duval.

So Liam Cohen during the post-game

told Salah, quote, keep my name out your bleeping mouth.

So he's quoting Will Smith yelling at Chris Rock.

And Salah responds with, look, because First of all, that was startling to me to just see a head coach say that to another head coach.

Not since Jim Schwartz and Jim Harbaugh met at midfield and tried to outgrip each other on the handshake, have I seen this kind of back and forth?

Because you would assume that Liam Cohen, play his famous sound again, if you don't mind,

because you would assume that Liam Cohen, once he says this, is saying the most aggressive thing.

Duval.

When he says, quote, keep my name out your bleeping mouth, you'd think that's the most aggressive thing.

But Salah responds with, I'll bleep your world up.

You don't want to bleep with me.

I will bleeping end your bleeping life, end quote.

That's the proper look.

Yes, that is the proper look.

I didn't know Bobby Salah had that in him.

Let's see if we go out to CBS 47 Jacksonville and see if we can hear that recreation because this isn't how they'll talk in front of the microphones, but this is how they talked on the field.

Salah is the defensive coordinator for the 49ers.

Jacksonville won that game, even though, again, for the fourth time this season, and in every game they've played since Trevor Lawrence was the quarterback.

Jacksonville tried very hard to lose this game.

San Francisco would not let them.

San Francisco, at the end of the game, Robert Salah gets into it with Liam Cohen.

Salah is accusing Jacksonville of stealing signs.

Legally, by the way.

That's the starting point.

Legally stealing signs, not illegally stealing signs.

You can steal signs these days.

It's okay to steal signs.

If you're not doing it illegally, you're fine.

And Liam Cohen has been known to maybe steal illegal legally, excuse me, allegedly, legally stealing signs.

And by the way, Robert Salah, definitely the guy that you think has all that stuff inside.

I think Salah's out of line.

He got in front of a microphone, you know, before the game and just straight up said Liam Cohen's one of the best at stealing signs.

I mean, you don't expect Liam Cohen to be annoyed with that.

I think Salah's out of line in that spot.

You don't think he's out of line with saying, I will bleeping end your life?

Well, yeah, then he said that, too.

It is

something that I think

constitutes a threat of murder.

Like, what?

Come on.

What are you doing?

Yeah, but Mark Cuban would tell you it only matters if you carry it out.

That's the difference between murder and manslaughter.

It is still a threat to murder Liam Cohen, which is a bit strong.

And yeah, you're right that he did accuse Liam Cohen.

He says that he's got a legal signal stealing system to give their offense an edge, an edge I have not noticed because Trevor Lawrence is their quarterback.

Dan Jackson's frisky and you know that.

They are frisky.

They are frisky.

He's admitting it.

Look, Trevor Lawrence, all they do is keep getting him talent.

All they do is keep getting him position players.

And last week they had five drops.

And in this game, I don't trust Jacksonville at all.

Like,

I bet them to win that game.

Brock Purdy turned the ball over.

We had the conversation, Mike, last week about

whether turnovers are something that someone can do, whether that would have a value to you if you had someone who had the recreatable talent of causing turnovers.

It will not be surprising to you that Fred Warner is now the leader in 49ers history of causing fumbles.

He caused 17, he's caused 17 fumbles because he runs around there.

Landman with the Rams does this too.

He's just punching everybody.

Love Landman.

Landman is just running around punching everybody.

I'm telling you, they're going to outlaw that rule.

I saw it again last night.

They're just punching players.

You can't punch guys during the game.

Of course you can.

To the ball.

What?

Oh, is punching too violent?

Punching the ball is too violent?

Do you see what they do?

Softs.

And what if you miss the ball?

Then you punch.

You're punching out.

You tackled the guy.

What doesn't matter?

Why are you just punching me?

You tackled the full force.

Get out of here.

They don't change.

Keep my name out your mouth.

Exactly right.

That's so dumb.

You can't punch a guy, but you can run at him full force.

Is this sport not for you

well is it

it is for me no it's not no it's not the way you're talking is you like what if he misses the ball and hits his forearm who cares you like a 3-3 game yeah i do that's right if i wanted punching i would watch mma did you see what happened to wanderlay silver this week yeah that was aim the video afterwards it's fast did you see his eye after yeah dude i didn't like it that's a legend of the game right there don't like it respect the axe murderer is football for you football's for me no it's not no it's not the way you're talking no it's not punch a forearm get out of here don't ever question my love for football oh

will you end their bleeping life

if you question my love for football

you're done that's it hey jeremy old buddy old pal hey mike i want to talk to you about miller light you and i have bonded over these last few weeks talking about our shared love of miller light that's right a great partner of our show for practically its entire existence it's been a partner of this show since i was 10 years old.

And it's been around for 50 years, and they've been a part of our show for almost 20.

We're approaching incredible partner status with Miller Light.

I mean, to think that people were celebrating at my bar mitzvah with Miller Light as they were a partner of this show is pretty incredible.

You're talking about the moments that are made better by making those times, those special times, Miller time.

Jeremy, there's nothing like cracking open Miller Light with your crew.

This football season, it's especially true.

Whether it's a touchdown you didn't see coming or just arguing about fantasy lineups you you already know you're gonna lose, Miller Light has been the taste you can depend on for 50 years, brewed for flavor with simple ingredients, rich toffee notes, that iconic golden color.

And here's a kicker, Jeremy.

What's hell?

It's just 96 calories.

I still can't believe that.

We say it every week.

I can't believe it.

It's just 3.2 carbs per 12 ounces.

It's the original light beer since 1975 and still hitting different five decades later.

Miller Light, great taste, 96 calories.

Go to millerlight.com slash Dan to find delivery options near you, or you can pick up some Miller Light pretty much anywhere.

They sell beer.

It's Miller time.

Celebrate responsibly.

Miller Brewing Company, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 96 calories and 3.2 carbs per 12 ounces.