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Seth and Luke hear some pettiness in the PettyCast. Today they hear a rule Larry Bird had, President Trump's drive-by on President Taft, what it's like being a Hornets fan, and some shade thrown at young QBs from a former GM.
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00:00Time for the PettyCast, though, nonetheless.
00:02It does happen every Tuesday here at this time at 8 a.m.
00:07So let's get Petty. Let's get to some audio.
00:10This first one is Jeff Teague, former NBA player.
00:15And I'm trying to pull up the source of where he was.
00:17This was on the Volume Network.
00:21That's Colin Coward's podcast network.
00:23Yeah.
00:23And so Jeff Teague was talking about Larry Bird has one rule
00:28when building a team.
00:29Here's that rule for Larry Bird.
00:32And he was talking about how good LeBron was.
00:35And I was like, LeBron better than you?
00:36He said, LeBron's the greatest player besides Michael.
00:39I was like, damn, he was like, I'll never pay anybody who played with LeBron.
00:42I would never pick him up on my team.
00:45Damn.
00:45And I said, why?
00:46He said, because he'd make them all look good.
00:48They're all really sad.
00:50He said, you go get them, and they're not going to be the same player you want.
00:55That's a, is that Petty by?
00:57You know what?
00:58That's impressive because it made the Petty cast.
01:00It's petty towards pretty much everybody who ever played with LeBron.
01:04And yet at the same time, it's Larry Bird saying that, oh, no, no,
01:07I'm not in that category.
01:08LeBron's way better than me.
01:10You don't necessarily hear that out of some of the guys that are in all-time
01:14great conversations, just casually giving up a spot on the list.
01:19Especially Bird, who's always very, at least confident.
01:23I was going to say arrogant.
01:24He was very confident, probably arrogant, too.
01:27So I'm surprised that Larry Bird said that.
01:29But, yeah, that stood out to me as well.
01:30Props to him.
01:31He's also, like, that was before the current age.
01:34I don't think you could ever caught, back in the day, I don't know if you would
01:37have caught most NBA players dead, like power ranking themselves or anything
01:42or getting into that debate.
01:43Things have just changed so much.
01:45And now the guys that are actually still in the media and everything will talk
01:49about it, and it's more standard.
01:51But I feel like that's a – it's hard to imagine a lot of the guys from the 70s,
01:5580s, and maybe early 90s or 90s talking all that much about it.
02:00By the way, is it petty?
02:01My favorite Larry Bird story was when he decided to play with only his left hand
02:06against the Trailblazers in 1986 and I think scored, like, 40 points in the game.
02:10You know, Larry Bird with a Twitter account might feel a little bit like a young
02:17Alex Bregman.
02:19You know, he would just – like a young Larry Bird I think would have been warring
02:23with people on Twitter.
02:25So it's not – I'm not saying that, you know, he's any different than modern
02:28athletes or anything other than the era that he grew up in.
02:30As far as not signing anybody that played with LeBron because you get an inaccurate
02:36gauge of how good they are, I guess that's the – that's always the question is,
02:40all right, how do you account for that?
02:42And it's not like – it's an exaggeration hearing it through Jeff Teague.
02:46I'm guessing that Larry Bird would more think, you know, you've got to be really
02:49careful about – it's like in football when you sign a guy who just won a Super Bowl
02:54and had a – you know, was the MVP of the Super Bowl or went through a really good
02:58playoff run.
02:59All right, what's he look like on a normal team in normal circumstances?
03:03Let's go with his career average more so than that.
03:05For me, for a long time, I never – I didn't want an offensive coordinator who had worked
03:13with Tom Brady because I felt like in the case of Bill O'Brien, it becomes too easy
03:18for those offensive coordinators to think that they had more to do with Tom Brady's
03:23success than they actually did.
03:24Or that anybody – because Tom Brady doesn't look all that impressive physically, I think
03:30there's a temptation for people to believe that, oh, all we have to do is teach this guy
03:35the system.
03:36And he's even – he's got more impressive physical traits than Tom Brady, so he can
03:41be just as good as long as he just learns the system without recognizing that, okay,
03:46Tom Brady's ability to learn and execute that system is a skill.
03:52It's just – you can't see it or measure it.
03:54Sometimes people delude themselves into thinking Brian Hoyer can do it or Ryan Fitzpatrick can
04:00do it or somebody else can do it.
04:01It's kind of an insult to Tom Brady.
04:03I'm with you.
04:04Like, look, for any – yeah, any coordinators working with good quarterbacks, Adam Gase
04:08got head coaching jobs because he was Peyton Manning's offensive coordinator.
04:11Yeah.
04:12I think as we found out, it was more about Peyton Manning than it was Adam Gase.
04:16Nathaniel Hackett is another one who's gotten opportunities because, like, he was Adam – Aaron
04:21Rogers' quarterback coach or whatever.
04:22You know, like, I think it was more about the – I think it was more about the quarterback
04:25than it was the coach.
04:26Well, like, Bruce Arians being the quarterback whisperer, I mean, like, all right, I mean,
04:30it kind of helps when you work with Roethlisberger and Andrew Luck and ultimately Tom Brady.
04:36Like, there's a little bit of the skill of the actual quarterback there, the guys that
04:42were good without Bruce Arians as well.
04:45But that's part of where Bruce Arians is really smart.
04:49Choosing your – choosing the tools you have to work with is part of being a good coach.
04:53Absolutely.
04:54Yeah.
04:54By the way, last thing on this, I actually ran into Larry Bird while we're talking about
04:59pettiness.
04:59I ran into Larry Bird in Boston years ago.
05:01This was, like, 20 years ago, and he was a jerk.
05:04Was he?
05:04What did he do?
05:05He just blew us off.
05:07And it was in Boston.
05:08It's the city that made him.
05:09You ran into him just on the street?
05:11No, so it's a whole story.
05:13So we were actually there for the Celtics-Indiana Pacers playoff game.
05:17And at the time, Bird was running the – he was with the Pacers.
05:20He was in the front office of the Pacers.
05:21So he was the quote-unquote enemy.
05:22But still, it was Boston.
05:24And we just happened to be walking down the street during the day, and we stumbled upon
05:27the Pacers team hotel.
05:29And so we saw the players just hanging out in the lot.
05:32They had purity, but we, like, snuck in, and my mother claimed she had to use the
05:37bathroom.
05:37She just, like, stood in the bathroom for, like, 20 minutes.
05:40And I got to –
05:41I'm thinking Mrs. Morrow.
05:42That's right.
05:42And we met Jermaine O'Neal, Jamal Tinsley.
05:45I hung out with Scott Pollard for a while.
05:47Great guy.
05:49Reggie Miller was on that team.
05:50All the guys.
05:51They were just in the lobby.
05:52And Larry Bird was there.
05:53And I get it.
05:55It's a quote-unquote business trip, whatever.
05:57But he just – he gave us the cold shoulder.
05:59He was a – he walked off.
06:00He was a jerk.
06:01He might have never known.
06:02He might have been running away from his daughter or something, too.
06:04You know, it's – who knows what was going on in his life at that point.
06:07Yeah, that's right.
06:08Any time somebody – you never know what they have going on, and I'm probably the
06:11obnoxious one.
06:12But any time somebody doesn't reciprocate my excitement, I just call him a jerk.
06:16Was he wearing sneakers with his suit?
06:17He might have been.
06:19That's what really pissed you off.
06:20I could see that being a Larry Bird thing before it's become cool.
06:23He was wearing, like, Skechers with a suit back then.
06:25Classic Bird.
06:26This next one, God bless the text line, but here's the president reading to kids and couldn't
06:35help himself but to take shots at another former president.
06:38Others, like President William Taft, throw out the first pitch of baseball.
06:43He was a large man, very large, and he loved baseball.
06:48He'd go to baseball games, loved the hot dogs at the baseball games.
06:53He was our heaviest president, and I have to be careful, because I don't want to supersede
06:57his record.
06:58And a thing like that would be possible if I allowed it to happen.
07:03For all of you out there watching, keep yourself in good shape, right?
07:06Like you.
07:07You're in such good shape.
07:12It was a dubby kid.
07:14Like you.
07:15You've got to watch it.
07:20You know what?
07:23I hadn't heard or seen that, and I've got to give him credit for conceding.
07:27Like, hey, whoa, I'm not going to throw this out.
07:31Let's address the elephant in the room here.
07:36I could have some tendencies, too.
07:38Yeah, at least I acknowledge that.
07:40Taft knew he was fat, you know?
07:42Yeah, I suppose.
07:42Taft saw the political cartoonist back in the day.
07:45This wouldn't be some news or anything that he was pointing out that he had some weight
07:49troubles.
07:49I think he was reading a baseball book, though.
07:51It was just the idea, like, I think he went out of his way to talk about how fat Taft
07:57is,
07:57and then even mention, like, not just that he was a baseball fan, but he loved eating hot
08:01dogs and popcorn at the baseball game.
08:03It was just catching strays.
08:06It was great.
08:06Taft weighed around 330 to 350, according to my Google search.
08:11And that was, like, the early 1900s, right?
08:14Guys weren't as big back then, I think.
08:17You had asked about the bathtub story.
08:21I think there was a massive...
08:23They had to bring in a custom bathtub to handle his massive frame, which, I mean, let's be
08:30fair.
08:30You know, back in the day, yeah, 330 or 350 was something that was pretty rare.
08:35You had to be a rich man to get that fat, where nowadays that's probably a standard bathtub.
08:42It's probably the bathtub that remains in the White House today, because they're like,
08:45oh, yeah, this is the standard American bathtub now.
08:47He was an innovator.
08:48He called the Taft.
08:49Yeah.
08:49He was ahead of his time.
08:53The story is a myth that he got stuck in the bathtub.
08:56That part's the myth.
08:57Oh, okay.
08:58But it does stink that that's...
08:59He was a president, and that's his legacy.
09:01Whenever I hear Howard Taft...
09:02I don't know what he did in office, but I do know this now made-up story, I guess, that
09:07he got stuck in a bathtub.
09:09It stinks that that's your legacy 100 years after you passed away, that people are laughing
09:13about how you got stuck in a bathtub, because you were so fat.
09:16The heaviest president, according to Statista, was William Howard Taft, followed by Grover
09:22Cleveland.
09:23Oh, yeah.
09:24He was a big boy.
09:24Grover Cleveland is the best.
09:26I always think of him when I think of overweight presidents, just because he...
09:31Grover.
09:31That sounds like a big fella, doesn't it?
09:33Right.
09:33And Cleveland, not a very glamorous last name.
09:36And then tied...
09:38Tied at 237, Donald Trump and Theodore Roosevelt.
09:42I was surprised, because Theodore Roosevelt wasn't as tall as Trump.
09:46That's impressive.
09:47I'm surprised that Roosevelt was that heavy by his later years, I guess.
09:51Yeah.
09:52And Grover Cleveland also has the Andy Reid, like, walrus mustache.
09:56So, it just fits.
09:57That fits the big guys.
09:59It makes them look even bigger or heftier.
10:02And that was the late 1800s, too.
10:04Bill Clinton's sixth on the list, just behind Zachary Taylor.
10:07Bill Clinton?
10:08Yeah.
10:09I didn't realize he was...
10:10The 20th, it feels like the...
10:11You know what?
10:12I gotta give it credit.
10:13I thought this would be more heavily weighted into the 20th century, in the 21st century.
10:18But, I guess part of it, too, is that, even though Americans have gotten bigger, the...
10:28How...
10:28Your appearances mattered more, I guess, as we've got...
10:33So, maybe back in the day, it didn't hurt you as much to be a William McKinley or something,
10:36or James Garfield, like a portly fella by the day.
10:40That's true.
10:41Hey, on the Twitter line...
10:42The text line, I should say, says, they weren't called fat cats for no reason.
10:46So, maybe it was, like you said, like only the rich people were fat.
10:49It was almost a positive.
10:50No, we're living in a crazy time in human history.
10:53Like, this is the first time where obesity has been an issue for the poor, you know?
11:00Like, mass starvation tends to be the problem, more so throughout history.
11:05And now we're in an era where, like, it's actually the exact opposite, which, I mean,
11:10I don't know if we should be somehow grateful for that.
11:12I know it doesn't feel like the appropriate feel, but maybe a little attaboy to ourselves.
11:17But, you know, like all these other countries make fun of how fat we are.
11:20Like, yeah, we got excess calories floating around all over the place.
11:24What do you expect us to do?
11:25Yeah, everyone from the World Cup, well, everyone's finding out why and how.
11:29They're getting pretty fat in other countries, too.
11:32It's a lot of these countries.
11:34You ever...
11:34You seen an Englishman lately?
11:35Some portly fellas over there.
11:37They're still wearing their tiny little t-shirts and everything.
11:39Bill Burr does a good bit on this when he's over in England.
11:42He's like, wait, you guys are fat like us.
11:45I'm not going to sit around and get shamed for being fat when you guys are just as chubby.
11:49Little James Corden-looking bloated pigs.
11:52Oh, yeah.
11:52Yeah.
11:53Well, that's because they're most known for, like, fried fish and French fries.
11:58Hey, as we continue on the PettyCast, Bill Simmons was reading some fan mail on his podcast.
12:05He got this email from a Charlotte Hornets fan describing what it's like to be a Hornets fan.
12:11Here's Bill Simmons.
12:14Imagine you're dating an absolute smoke show in college.
12:16It was tons of fun, but completely insane.
12:19She's amazing in bed and at parties, but she also goes to her phone when you're not looking.
12:23Also, she's a horrible driver.
12:25You know it's not going to last.
12:26And that she isn't the kind of girl to introduce to your parents.
12:28You break up.
12:29Deep down, you know she was a long-term solution.
12:31But when she's gone, you just feel alone, and that sucks.
12:34That's how it feels to be a Hornets fan right now.
12:37Josh really went deep.
12:38I was wondering.
12:39Almost tied in obsession.
12:40I was trying to figure out where that was going.
12:43And then you figured it out.
12:45It landed in a good NBA place, actually.
12:48Good email.
12:50Zach Lowe was that second voice that, I don't know, wasn't really having fun with it.
12:55But that's an email from a Hornets fan describing what it's like to be a Hornets fan right now.
12:59Is that, what's the closest team in recent Houston memory that's felt like that?
13:04Would it be the 2020 Texans?
13:09Yeah, I think so.
13:10Just because they did have so much talent on paper.
13:13Right.
13:14And you had Deshaun Watson.
13:16And that was before we knew anything about the allegations that would come.
13:19It was just such a mess in so many ways.
13:22And they had made all these crazy, they had made a bunch of crazy off-season moves.
13:26They had done, they kind of operated like a psycho.
13:29And it was all unraveling right in front of us.
13:33Yeah, I think that's the best one because, yeah, it crumbled.
13:36And similar to the Hornets where they were a playoff team and won like one of the playing games last
13:40year.
13:40And they, or this past season, there was excitement.
13:43And then this off-season they just go and trade away like they're two best players.
13:46And it's like, well, what the heck?
13:47I thought we were a playoff team.
13:49So, yeah, the fact that, like, you had that excitement and then it quickly comes apart, I think your Texans
13:54example probably is the best.
13:56I'm going to go to the roster rankings because right now that's what we get is a whole bunch of
14:00stuff about, you know, roster rankings and everything headed into the season.
14:04Texans are, okay, so going into that year, the Texans were a 23rd-ranked roster.
14:08So not as much of a, yeah, I was thinking they might be mid-ranked more so.
14:13But they had issues all over the place.
14:16Wow, would you say 23rd?
14:17Yeah, going into that season.
14:19I'm surprised by that.
14:21Here's on.
14:22Well, they had, you know, they had collapsed defensively in the playoffs the year before.
14:26And they did nothing about it other than let DJ Reader go and sign Eric Murray and pay him like
14:32a starting cornerback in the league.
14:34That was their solution on defense going into 2020.
14:39Yeah, for sure.
14:40This other piece of audio here on the PettyCast.
14:44This is former, when they were called the Redskins, former Redskins GM Scott McLuhan.
14:51Yeah, that's how he says it.
14:53This was McLuhan making a radio appearance in the D.C. area over the weekend.
14:58And the reason why I put this on here, he's talking about Ty Simpson, but a couple other guys also
15:04get hit with strays, which is why we included it.
15:07Here's the former GM.
15:08Is there a player in that first round that you thought was overdrafted?
15:13I think the quarterback from Alabama was overdrafted.
15:17Okay, Ty Simpson.
15:18But it's the position alone, I think, not being a guru, but he's like J.J. McCarthy.
15:26He's like Mac Jones.
15:27He's a career backup.
15:29Ideally, ideally, he might start with that because of where his pick was and they want to prove everybody right
15:38type of thing.
15:39And that's not the way you should build a roster.
15:42Not at all.
15:44Yeah, so J.J. McCarthy is 100% that guy where it just feels like, man, especially because of the
15:55Sam Darnold scenario.
15:56Like when you had Sam Darnold in the building, and it's so weird to talk about this like this, but
16:02that, all right, he's a viable NFL quarterback.
16:04No matter what he does in his career afterwards, like you can't take away what he did last year, and
16:09that you just so casually tossed him aside to the point now where you're trying to do with Kyler Murray
16:16what maybe you could have done with Sam Darnold.
16:21That's a big misstep.
16:23Scott McLuhan.
16:24Scott McLuhan was the one that was alleged by his ex-wife or his wife at the time to have
16:30been having an affair with Rossini, right?
16:31Yeah, it was his wife at the time.
16:33I don't know if they're still together or not, but yeah, she's the one that put it out there.
16:37That was really, I think, the initial, the first rumblings of Rossini, you know, doing some of this nefarious stuff.
16:43But yeah, he was the one.
16:44So that's what, I guess it's just a coincidence, but it is funny that last week we had the Rossini
16:49video where she's taking a shot at J.J. McCarthy while talking to the police.
16:54And then we get this audio where now Scott's taking a shot at J.J. McCarthy.
16:59And as you mentioned, there's that connection from the past between Scott and Rossini.
17:04Not saying, just saying.
17:05But also, I feel bad for J.J. McCarthy.
17:07He's just trying to, like, enjoy his offseason.
17:10And everywhere he looks, people are just making a hard time telling him he sucks.
17:14And he's like, man, I'm just, it's the offseason.
17:16I'm just trying to get better and enjoy my off time.
17:18I'm just going to add fuel to the fire for nine to do what nine does, man.
17:22That's what nine does.
17:24He takes all the haters' energy and turns it into really mediocre football.
17:30Yeah, I guess so.
17:32There's no audio, but we talked about it yesterday.
17:34Maybe on the petty cast we can include Mike Vrabel's wife dragging him to the Taylor Swift wedding on Friday.
17:41I don't know if that counts.
17:43Because we also got the video that came out from over the weekend of Diana Rossini and her family on
17:48a cruise for July 4th.
17:50We did have that.
17:51You know the one thing that Vrabel does have, though, now, which is kind of nice, is that he's got
17:56the, for the rest of his life, he won't have to explain why he brought his wife with him.
18:02You know?
18:03Like, guys' camping trip or whatever.
18:05Guys, I'm bringing my wife.
18:06And they're like, yeah, get it.
18:08Yep.
18:09Okay, cool.
18:10There's always a guy who's always got his wife with him and that you kind of realize there's a reason
18:16for it.
18:17It's not necessarily that she's not controlling, like, naturally.
18:23It's just that it got to a point in the relationship where it's, okay, you're not allowed out of your
18:28wife's sight, and I kind of get it.
18:29All right.
18:30We understand the situation.
18:32Yeah, it's the case with Vrabel now.
18:33They're a joint deal from here on out.
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