Why Sports Podcast 05222024 - NBA Playoffs, WNBA, NFL Schedule Release

The main ideas from this information are: - Kaitlyn Clark made her debut in the WNBA and has had a good start to her career so far. - The WNBA season has kicked off and there is a lot of excitement around the league. - The NBA playoffs are in the conference finals stage. - The Indiana Pacers had a tough loss in the Eastern Conference finals, but it's not over yet. - The New York Knicks fan base showed dedication and loyalty to their team despite a tough loss. And now Clark comes up with a steal. Clark, thought about pulling up from three, will dip inside and land! There are the first points in the WNBA career of Kaitlyn Clark. Take it at the rim here. Hesitation. What was the ugly? The Steelers. The Steelers' second half is brutal. All six of their division games are in the last eight weeks of the season. And the two that aren't are at Philadelphia and home to Kansas City. They have three short weeks over the second half of the season. You look at this. At Cleveland, four days after playing Baltimore, they got a short week there to go at Baltimore, and then they got another short week to play on Christmas against the Chiefs. This is going to be a real test of Mike Tomlin's ability to lug the team into the playoffs as he seems to be able to. Okay, I have not been to Minnesota in probably 20 years. Bring it. Hey, hey, bring it. Send me a list of good restaurants. We're going to be there for like five days. I want you to send me a list of some good restaurants. Oh, what is good, everyone? It's the Wild Sports Podcast. It's your boy, Alvin Spain. And credit for the Kaitlyn Clark debut to ESPN. Credit again to ESPN for the talk of the Steelers schedule. And inside the NBA, talking about Charles Barkley and Anthony Edwards. Bring your ass to the Wild Sports Podcast. It's your boy, Alvin Spain. It's been a while since we got a chance to talk. It's been a crazy, crazy weekend sports. We'll do our best to catch you all up. A lot of exciting things have happened. We have the NBA playoffs that are now going in the final four. The WNBA, their season has kicked off. And the NFL schedule release happened. And, boy, I don't know who the Steelers upset to get this schedule. But it's going to be an interesting season for the black and gold as they make their run to their seventh world championship. Oh, man, I think we will start with the WNBA. One of the most hyped draft classes that has come across the WNBA in quite some time. Angel Reese and Carmella Cardoso are doing their thing out in Chicago. And, of course, all eyes are on the Indiana Fever and Kaitlyn Clark. They're still looking to win their first game of the WNBA. But Kaitlyn's had a pretty good start to the start of her career so far. Right now they're 0-4. They're playing the Seattle Storm today. Everything is still a work in progress. And, you know, you have all these trolls that will come out and say, oh, well, she's not that good or she's overrated or what have you. It's still four games. And one thing that I really look at, especially with the WNBA rookies compared to the other rookies of the NFL, the NBA, and Major League Baseball, the little time that these ladies have to adjust and get ready to play. When you just talk this time last month, we were looking at Kaitlyn Clark playing in the national championship game, Carmela Tordosa winning the national championship game, Angel Reese playing in the final four, and then having to go from there graduating, then having the draft, then having your preseason, and then here you are a month later starting the games where the NFL rookies just got drafted in April. They still have their whole minicamp before the schedule starts with preseason in August and the regular season in September. So for the WNBA, it's still going to take their time for the ladies to adjust to everything around them, the physicality, their teammates, still to make sure they still got their legs going strong as, again, they just finished competing in their postseason as well in March Madness. So I'm very happy, very excited for the start for Kaitlyn Clark and the Chicago Sky. Chicago is entering their season one and one right now, but again, some of the big teams that looked out this year, the New York Liberty, they of course have the defending league MVP in Sabine Inescu. She is a dog, man. She is absolutely amazing. Of course, the Las Vegas Aces, you really can't have a conversation in the WNBA without mentioning the defending two-time world champions. And Aja Wilson, she looks like she's going to have another stellar year this year. But it's just so exciting to talk about the WNBA and seeing how everybody else is getting involved in it as well. Just recently, I just listened to ESPN's morning show, and now they're getting excited. They're getting WNBA jerseys. Now, Chris Canty, being the funny man he is, he said, you know, WNBA, I'm going to need a bigger size than 2X, and I'll sell the WNBA too. I want to rock my Mystics jersey. I want to rock my Washington Mystics. You've got to hook a brother up with at least a 3 to 4X. But again, it's just so exciting to see people get involved and getting invested in the WNBA. And, of course, they'll have their break later on in the year when the Olympics come to town, or not come to town, but when they're played in France in July. And that's when you, I think, will get a full exposure of the greatness that is women's basketball now. Tamela playing for Brazil, Kaitlyn Clark rocking the United States. And I think you're just going to have a really, you're going to really enjoy watching these women. And, again, it feels like we haven't had this kind of excitement since all the way back in 96 with the initial women's dream team. So this is, again, very exciting times for the WNBA, and I hope they can just keep it moving. So that takes us to the NBA. And as we talked about earlier, the conference finals are set. The Denver Nuggets were eliminated by the Minnesota Timberwolves, and now they will get to host the Dallas Mavericks for the right to represent the Western Conference and the NBA finals. And then last night was the start of the Eastern Conference finals where Boston somehow got a win from Indiana. And Indiana, I know they're looking at themselves. I watched that game yesterday, and I know they know they blew one an opportunity. And it's always so funny when I watch the national media and I watch all these shows, they're talking about, oh, my God, the series is over. And, oh, my God. And it's so funny. These are the same people that weren't sure if Boston was really that team. But now all of a sudden, Indiana blows a series, and then, oh, my God, the series is over. Look, this is a playoff. And if there's anything about the playoffs, they normally follow this rhythm. Home team will take the first two, and it'll end. Game three will be the pivotal game. Boston comes and wins, and probably it'll be a sweep or a gentleman sweep in five games. I expect Indiana to still make this a series. I still expect them to make this game six or seven, like six games. Again, that loss yesterday, I think they missed an opportunity to truly set the tone for the playoffs, for the Eastern Conference finals. And I will say this, though, too. Indiana does need to be able to take these wins when they can, especially when on the road and especially with Porzingis out. And it is expected Porzingis will come back in this series, and I think he will change quite a bit of things for the Boston Celtics once he gets back in. So for Indiana, there's many reasons to get upset and frustrated, but I still love the way they played. I liked how they finished out the New York Knicks series, and I think they will be just fine. And I would not be surprised if they came back one game two and then make this a series again. But I just love how people are tripping out and saying, oh, my God, it's over. It's a bad loss. Let us not dispute that. But it's not over by any means or stretch. It was good to see Jason Tatum ball out and have some big shots laid, Jalen Brown having big shots laid, including that three-pointer that sent the game into overtime. And also, side note, I was watching the ESPN Plus coverage of the Sky Camp. Oh, my God, ESPN Plus. Please get another cam, or please get another view. Now, I shouldn't complain, because I still got to see the game. But it was time that's tough to follow, because they had this big red box on top of it, and it just created very confusing. And then also, another note, if you guys can somehow put the score there. I know, I know, it's not the TV thing, but I was waiting to see when they panned it to one of those big LED screens to see the score. But just somebody watching the game, it would have just been nice to get a better track of the score. But all in all, it was still a great game. It was still a – it's still going to be – I still think it's going to be a great series. Rick Carlisle said it best yesterday. He felt like he let this one slip away. He put the loss on him. But I think what great teams do, they take games like this, and they build from it, and they'll come back in the next game. So I'm not too worried about the Indiana Pacers. I still think they'll make this a series against the Celtics. The team the Pacers beat are the New York Knicks. And I'm going to – I'm actually going to say this now. My why sports moment of the week was the New York Knicks fan base. Let me make this very clear. I am not a Knicks fan. I don't like – I don't even like any teams out of New York. The only thing that I love about New York is my beautiful wife, Kashea. Shout out to Kashea's fame. Outside of that, I'm not the biggest fan of New York teams or anything else like that. Let me say this. That fan base on Sunday, you get my respect and you get my love. That team was like the walking wounded. And when that game was talked down to zero, they had been blown out. Not a fan left that stadium. And they gave their Knicks love. And that's why we love sports. That's why it's our why sports moment of the week. And it's funny. I was watching the Celtics game yesterday. And the Celtics were only down by three in regulation in 15 seconds. But I already saw people walking out the door. I'm like, are you serious? And I bet you they wish they could have came back in through the door afterwards. But when you got that fan base, and, again, everybody wants to win. That's obvious. Everybody wants to win. Everybody, you know, puts their money out because they want to see their team come out with the victory. And you don't. And, you know, how do you still respond? How do you still feel about that team? That New York team showed those Knicks a lot of love. The Guardians showed them so much love. And it was just so fun to see that as a sports fan, you know, especially because when you knew the game was going to be over early, because the Indiana just came and just blew them out the water. But that fan base was there. Even when they got the game all the way as close to six and the Pacers went again on their big run and eventually put the series away, that fan base was there. So, why Sports Moment of the Week? The New York Knicks fan base. I think the Knicks had a tremendous season. It'll be interesting to see how they add for next year. But kudos to you guys showing the love to those New York Knicks players. So, we go from the east. Let's go to the west. Again, we have Minnesota and Dallas playing tonight, game one. So, a couple of shout-outs to the teams that were eliminated this past weekend, to the Oklahoma City Thunder. We mentioned this on our last show. They're a team in progress. They were the number one seed this year, and it feels like they've got a story to tell. They've got so many great young players behind SGA, Shea Gilgis-Alexander, their big center Chet Holmgren, Lou Dort. They've done such a great job building, and this was a big year for them. And I anticipate them next year with experience, they will come and contest with anybody else. But the thing I love about the playoffs, especially in the NBA, when you have a team and you're invested in that team, you can literally follow their path and literally follow them to see where they are last year. I don't even think they were still a young team, didn't make the playoffs. So, now they're the number one seed, and I think they're a team that we're going to continue to watch moving forward. As far as the Denver Nuggets, they're the defending world champions. They are out, which will now guarantee a new NBA champion for the seventh straight year. Hey, look, tough loss for them, but they responded like champions. They were down 2-0. They lost their first two games at home, but boy, did they respond back. And it was back and forth. They had the big lead in Game 7, but Minnesota came in, Edwards beasted out, Carl Anthony Towns had a big game. Denver didn't make it. I still put good money on Denver to be back here next year as one of the top two or three seeds in the Western Conference. I know this was a bit of a setback. I think if they were able to stay in the tournament, I think they would have probably been the favorite to repeat as champions. But I think, as we said on our show the other day, the winner of that Minnesota-Denver series, I really like them to potentially win the NBA finals. So with that being said, let's look at, let's do a quick preview of the Western Conference finals. We have the Dallas Mavericks. Luka Doncic, Donka Chin, Kyrie Irving have been amazing together. A stat that I didn't even know about Kyrie Irving. He is now 14-0 when his teams are in closeout games. That dude is clutch. For whatever we say about Kyrie, when it comes to those moments, he show up and show out. They defeated the Clippers in the first round. He just took out the number one seed, Oklahoma City Thunder, and now they get to take on the hottest player in the NBA, an Anthony Edwards, for the right to play in the NBA finals. I'm not going to be sad either way if I get a Luka Doncic or Anthony Edwards in the final. I'm going to still ride the hot horse that is Minnesota. I really love how they're playing. I cannot wait for the matchups of Anthony Edwards versus Kyrie Irving. See how well Anthony can play on him and to see if Luka has that big playoff moment. He leads the league in playoff scoring and it just feels like he is due for a big series. He's due for that series. I'm going to be interested to see how well he does here. I think our NBA finals selections are going to be the Minnesota Timberwolves and the Boston Celtics. I cannot wait for Kevin Garnett to be on every show known to man as he is a legendary Timberwolves and a legendary Celtics. I just want that final because I want KG. I love Kevin Garnett. He, probably next to Akeem Olajuwon, might be my favorite basketball player. I love his energy. I love everything about him and I cannot wait to see him. Should those two teams get to the finals, like I said, I think he will be everywhere. I can only imagine how sad he would be if the Dallas Mavericks and the Indiana Pacers played. We may not see that brother again. I think it's going to be the favorite teams. I think it's going to be Boston and Minnesota that will play on. Either way, we'll continue to follow that and we'll look towards those great series. We'll follow more next week when we'll do our updates and we'll go from there. That takes us to now the NFL schedule release. It came out last week and some key highlights of the schedule. The Cowboys, 49ers, and Jets have six primetime games. The Jets had their primetime games pretty early and I think they're hedging bets because they want to make sure Aaron Rodgers will be there and playing. Again, the last time Aaron Rodgers played, he didn't make it out of the first quarter. But we don't wish no ill will on nobody, especially the Jets and especially Aaron Rodgers. I think he'll have a great bounce back year. But it is interesting to see the Cowboys having so many games. This is a team that did not make a lot of updates and changes to their team, but yet they are still valued very highly by the NFL to be featured in quite a bit. And the 49ers, it's just always great to see San Francisco at an elite level again. That's what I remember growing up in the 80s and 90s, how great that franchise was. So it's just great to see them again led by Brock Purdy and that great defense, Christian McCaffrey. They deserve all of their primetime games. They're going to be a great watch again this year as San Francisco looks to tie the Pittsburgh Steelers and the New England Patriots with their sixth Super Bowl championship. But again, some of the key games of interest for us, got to show the love for the Kansas City Chiefs and the Ravens. They kick off this season. I love this matchup. It is becoming one of my favorite matchups to watch as a fan. Obviously, I'm not a fan of either of these teams, but as football goes, I cannot wait. Last year, Kansas City hosted Detroit. Detroit stunned the world and it carried on to an amazing season for them. But also for Kansas City too because they won the Super Bowl. You don't win the Super Bowl in week one, but you can set the tone. And I think for Lamar Jackson, he will be the hungriest player I think in the league because I know he knows last year they had everything set for them for their road to the Super Bowl, but they got stopped by that guy. They got stopped by their arch nemesis, who's everybody's arch nemesis, in Patrick Mahomes. I cannot wait to see how they respond at the start of this season. And you almost felt like this was going to be the week one schedule, week one game, basically when the AFC championship game ended. So now let's kick the season off. Let's get it started right between these two teams that will feature heavily when looking at the AFC top teams throughout the year this year. Looking at the NFL.com, there are some key games they highlighted. I'm not sure if I agree with how they rank their teams, so we'll just kind of identify some of their key games this year. We, of course, have Detroit and San Francisco. That's going to be a Monday, December 30th game. It's a rematch of the NFC championship game. Everything I said about Baltimore being hungry and upset, put that on Detroit. Even more so on Detroit because Detroit hacked San Francisco. They were dominating San Francisco. That's one they are going to all day. They are kicking themselves. They let them go. So it will be interesting to see that game not being so late in the year. I think ESPN is thinking, too, that could be a game that could determine that number one seed in the NFC. Again, I really love Detroit and everything they've got going on this year. Green Bay and Philadelphia, that actually starts off the first Friday game in the NFL. That will be in Sao Paulo, Brazil, Friday, September 6th. Jordan Love versus Jalen Hurts. Something tells me this could be the rivalry we get for a while in the NFC. I love what the Green Bay Packers have been doing, and Jordan Love is turning the corner and is becoming a great quarterback. Philly, of course, they had their legendary drop last year. They were number one seed, and they just fell off the face of the earth all the way to the fifth seed and out of week one. So it will be interesting to see how Jalen Hurts responds, and, of course, Saquon Barkley to see how he plays with the Eagles. That's going to be a very good matchup. I'm looking forward to that as well. The Jets and the 49ers, that will be a key game to look at this year. That will be the first Monday night game of the year. All credit to Robert Sadler. No, he didn't have Aaron Rodgers. He went out within the first quarter. This is still a team that went 7-10. This was a team that you still had to be mindful of because of that great defense. Now they have Aaron Rodgers. They are that team. I think them and the Pittsburgh Steelers are that team. It's like, okay, you didn't have your quarterback. You still played well. Now you've got your quarterback. Let's see how you do. I think the New York Jets, sneakily, and we'll look to do our prediction show in August as we'll go through the divisions and pick the teams that we expect to win the divisions, and we'll predict the playoffs, look for that special in August. But I think the Jets can be sneakily good this year because, again, their biggest addition is basically out of injury, and that's Aaron Rodgers. So it'll be interesting to see what that team can do now and how well they will be invested. So now I've talked about the key games. Now I've got to talk about my team. I've got to talk about my Pittsburgh Steelers. You know, I look at their schedule, and it is literally a schedule of two halves. You have the first half, Atlanta, Denver, the Chargers, Indianapolis, Dallas, which is a great game. It's always a great game to watch. It is going to be on Sunday night football this year. Dallas does come to Pittsburgh. They go back to Vegas, and then they will host both the Jets and the Giants at the Shore Stadium. That's half one. Obviously, Arthur Smith, he goes back to Atlanta. That's the big revenge game. Russell Wilson, who I anticipate starting the season, they go to Denver in week two. I expect Russell Wilson. I don't expect no handshake between him and Sean Payton, and I'm hoping Russell Wilson just comes and beats the brakes off the Broncos. Because I really don't like how he got treated, and I know Sean Payton is going to look to upset them as well. So it's going to be an interesting game. But they're winnable games here. They're still, I mean, the Chargers are going to be a tough team to play. Indianapolis, of course, beat the brakes off them last year, and I never thought I'd say that thing so loud. And, of course, the Jets, they'll have Aaron Rodgers playing. But there's some winnable games here. It's going to be so important for the Steelers to take at least by their bye week, which is week nine. I'm looking at this, and I'm hoping I'm praying for at least five in three. Because then you have the second half. If you notice, in that first half of the schedule, I did not mention Baltimore, Cleveland, or Cincinnati. They are the AFC North opponents. Starting from week 10, at Washington, home to Baltimore, at Cleveland, at Cincinnati, home to Cleveland, at Philadelphia, at Baltimore, Christmas against Kansas City, at home, to close out the year, I'm sorry, Christmas hosting Christmas against Kansas City, and the last game of the year is hosting the Cincinnati Bengals. Who the hell did the Steelers upset to get that schedule in the second half? I mean, are you serious? You have – I have not seen a murderous role like that, ironically, since their 2008 season when they went 12-4 and won the Super Bowl and had an unbelievably tough stretch of games, including Baltimore, Tennessee. They had to win the Baltimore game to – I will never forget that. It's still one of my favorite games of all time. At M&T Bank Stadium, the Steelers won that game 13-9. That's the one where Santonio Holmes caught the ball, you could argue, in front of the goal line and won that game. But that was a very tough stretch for the Steelers, too. They also played the NFC East that year, sir. They also played the Cowboys. They also played the Redskins. There were some tough games in that stretch. The only thing that gives me hope is I look at that team. They were led by Ben Roethlisberger, had that great defense, and they were able to push through, and that was Mike Tomlin's, I think, still his finest coaching job. Now we go fast forward 16 years later. I look at this, and I expect them to beat Washington. I always expect them to split against Baltimore. They've beaten Baltimore now the last six times, so I expect them to win at least one of those games. I expect them to win one against Cleveland. I expect them to win one against Cincinnati. Philadelphia is going to be a tough one. The last time Philly played Pittsburgh, it was in Philadelphia. It was my birthday weekend of two years ago, and Philadelphia just straight-up humiliated the Pittsburgh Steelers. Kenny Pickett was the quarterback. I couldn't tell you nothing else about that game. I watched that game. Actually, my wife and I, we traveled to PA to watch that, and it was a sad game. It was a very sad game. Kansas City, Christmas, last time the Steelers played on Christmas at home, that it was the immaculate reception by Antonio Brown winning that game, and, of course, they won the division on that same game as well. This is a tough – I've never seen a second half like this. I've never seen a schedule where all the division games are on this back half. I would be worried if anybody else was leading this team outside of Mike Tomlin and outside of Bill Cowan. Mike Tomlin has said it best, and I'm trying to actually put my life around these words, to be comfortable with the uncomfortable. Mike Tomlin might be in hog heaven when he saw this schedule because he knows now he's got to keep this team sharp and focused. And if this team can still come out sharp and focused, it will be like they will have played playoff games from week 11 on. And if they somehow come out of the fire on this, I don't care where they're seated. They're going to be my favorite to go to the Super Bowl because nobody will have been more tested, more ready than the Pittsburgh Steelers. That's the optimist. The pessimist side, boy, there's a lot of tough games, and there could be a thing of collapse. We talked about this a couple of weeks ago. The Pittsburgh Steelers are entering this season on a coach that's on the last year of the deal, quarterbacks that are on their last year of the deal, and a defense that is on the verge of aging, an offensive weapon that we don't know what their status is going to be. These last games of the season from week 11 on could be an indication of where the Steelers franchise goes. I look at these last seven, eight games, and I'm thinking to myself, as a Steeler fan, it'll be so interesting to see what that record's going to be and how the franchise gets ready because, again, we could be on the precipice of something very special, or we could be on the precipice of starting all over again. And that's the beauty of watching the NFL, and especially for the Steelers just thinking about that. I look at this schedule. They could be on the verge of something special, or they could be at the verge of potentially an end of a dynasty. So I can't wait to watch these games. I'm looking at the October 28th game. That is my wedding anniversary. My wife and I were actually going to see that, and the Giants, she's a Giants fan as well, so it's a very special game for us, and that's another moment why I love sports because it has really helped my wife and I continue to bond with each other. Our first game that we saw together was in a bar, and the opponents were the New York Giants against the Pittsburgh Steelers. So I cannot wait to watch that game live at Acreshore Stadium in the upcoming month. Well, I want to thank you all so much for listening to the WISports Podcast. There's a lot to cover this week, and there'll be a lot more when we talk more about it next week. In the words of Anthony Edwards, bring your ass next week, and we can talk some more about it. It's the WISports Podcast. It's your boy, Alvin Sainz, and when they ask you why sports, you just answer why not. We'll holler at y'all later, and also before we go, final shout-out to all of our college graduates out there. Congratulations to you. We value education so much on this show. I can't wait to celebrate the high school graduates next month, but for our high school graduates, congratulations to my boy, Darin Goberdanson, my brother. It has been 23 years since we graduated from George Mason University. Special shout-out to you, and happy belated birthday to you. Love you all. Let's talk again next week on the WISports Podcast. Peace out.