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Speaker 1: This is the business of sports where in the situation

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Speaker 1: that we haven't dealt with in modern times, pandemic here

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Speaker 1: has really accelerated the investments that we've been advocating for

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Speaker 1: for years. From a macro standpoint, I think our sport

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Speaker 1: industry is really forced to look at the business a

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Speaker 1: little bit differently. In depth conversations with the leaders in

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Speaker 1: the sports industry. Who wants to be the sacrificial lambs

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Speaker 1: that shows up at the first big major sporting event,

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Speaker 1: were part of something much bigger than the sports right

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Speaker 1: now and the health and rapt of our stakeholders that

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Speaker 1: looks much important every moment. I think we're all from

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Speaker 1: the business respective thinking about the impact that the virus

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Speaker 1: is having across the country. In Bloomberg Business of Sports

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Speaker 1: from Bloomberg Radio Hiever One, I'm Jason Kelly, and I'm

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Speaker 1: Mike Lynch and I'm Michael Barr And this is the

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Speaker 1: Bloomberg Business of Sports podcast where we explore the big

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Speaker 1: money issues and the world of sports. And Jason Mike,

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Speaker 1: we got a lot to talk about. We've got a

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Speaker 1: ton to talk about because it was a big sporting weekend.

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Speaker 1: I'm going to sell you out Lynchy. Before we came

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Speaker 1: one board, I asked you how your weekend was, and

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Speaker 1: you said horizontal, because there was so much sports to watch.

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Speaker 1: I mean the NFL alone, let's start there. I mean

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Speaker 1: the business of broadcast had to benefit this weekend, a

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Speaker 1: super wild Card weekend, six games, three each day, and

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Speaker 1: they didn't disappoint in many ways, some upsets, and so

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Speaker 1: if I'm a network executive, I'm feeling pretty good about

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Speaker 1: this Lynch. I think it was a great idea by

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Speaker 1: the NFL. I said, you know, they're gonna water things

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Speaker 1: sound if they had two more playoff teams. I thought

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Speaker 1: it was ingenious. And they come up and they've already

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Speaker 1: branded it with Super Playoff Weekend, and it had me

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Speaker 1: hooked that I was interested in all the games. And

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Speaker 1: you know, one o'clock Saturday afternoon, color behind the head,

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Speaker 1: feet up on the couch and didn't move till almost

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Speaker 1: midnight both days and the only time I moved was

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Speaker 1: to go upstairs to bed and be Horrizontal again. A

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Speaker 1: lot of chores got done in the Lynch housel this weekend,

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Speaker 1: zero point zero zero. Good thing there wasn't a snowfall,

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Speaker 1: and uh so bar on on a weekend like this,

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Speaker 1: I mean, does it make you think about sort of

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Speaker 1: the season in a different way as a fan. I

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Speaker 1: mean it feels like, you know, we talked a lot

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Speaker 1: on this show about the NFL was sort of limping along,

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Speaker 1: but there wasn't a lot of limping along this weekend.

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Speaker 1: And you wonder if you know, they get some momentum

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Speaker 1: and some excitement which they need people to watch what's

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Speaker 1: going to be a very unusual super Bowl. Oh yeah,

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Speaker 1: And to tell you that usually during the season, you

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Speaker 1: you're rooting for your local team, more team, you've got

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Speaker 1: the affiliation that you enjoy. This is this is my team.

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Speaker 1: And of course since the Detroit Lions weren't there, so

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Speaker 1: now I had to deal with what was out there. Now,

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Speaker 1: the Bills played, and my father in law is a

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Speaker 1: huge Bills fan, and of course he always says that's

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Speaker 1: the only true New York team. So my you know,

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Speaker 1: this was a big NFL weekend because my wife, now

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Speaker 1: she's a football fans, but Mrs Linda was there for

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Speaker 1: all three games as well. So see, that's what you

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Speaker 1: need to do, Lynchi. You need to get your wife

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Speaker 1: to watch the games as well, and that way you

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Speaker 1: don't have to worry about the chores or anything. I

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Speaker 1: will I will say Linchi, just we gotta give bar

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Speaker 1: a little bit of a hard time, he said. You know,

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Speaker 1: the Lions weren't in the playoffs like they usually a

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Speaker 1: you know, like it was an unusual year. I had

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Speaker 1: to pick another team to root for because the Lions

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Speaker 1: Low and Behold didn't make the playoffs. I'm just gonna

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Speaker 1: we don't have to dwell on it. I just wanted to,

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Speaker 1: you know, like poke you a little bit. Yeah, yeah, listen,

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Speaker 1: I hear they didn't even have a coach or at

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Speaker 1: GM at this point. Although you're um so to to

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Speaker 1: get it back to Boston in a way, Uh Lynch,

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Speaker 1: you know your former star franchise quarterback, Mr Brady. He

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Speaker 1: continued on I had a little bit of a scare

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Speaker 1: there with the Washington football team. But if you're a

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Speaker 1: network executive, you gotta be happy about Brady versus Brees.

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Speaker 1: I mean, this could be this could be the last

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Speaker 1: time we see these two face off. If the rumors

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Speaker 1: are to be believed that Drew Brees will retire after

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Speaker 1: this season, Well, it's a network executive's dream. It's the

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Speaker 1: Late Game on Sunday afternoon, you get to marquee players. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And you know basketball used to be like this. They

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Speaker 1: used to promote individual players like Michael Jordan, et cetera.

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Speaker 1: And the NFL is all about teams. But this is

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Speaker 1: a little bit like Manning and Brady. We had that

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Speaker 1: a lot in the a f C for a long

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Speaker 1: long time. Now that Brady has moved into the NFC,

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Speaker 1: this will be the third time that these two teams

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Speaker 1: have played this year. Remember they were in the same

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Speaker 1: division and both times, Uh, Tom struggled with that Saints defense.

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Speaker 1: So and I thought he's have to throwing two touchdown passes.

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Speaker 1: The other night against Washington. I think he's struggled a

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Speaker 1: little bit with the Washington defense. So I think, you know,

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Speaker 1: I know New Orleans is favorite going into this game,

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Speaker 1: and I think has got his work cut off for them.

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Speaker 1: His team is better than they were because they played

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Speaker 1: the Saints early in the season. He played him in

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Speaker 1: the season opener and then about about a month later.

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Speaker 1: But this is this is absolutely perfect. Uh, you know,

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Speaker 1: Brady and Breeze. I'm gonna be horizontal again, so it

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Speaker 1: won't be hard to find me. I mean, I will

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Speaker 1: say you know, Bar, one of the things that struck

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Speaker 1: me and I was sort of debating with with myself

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Speaker 1: you do wonder what some of these games would be

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Speaker 1: like if they had a robust fan presence. You know,

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Speaker 1: you've got a couple of thousand fans here and there

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Speaker 1: at most of the stadiums at this point, but you

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Speaker 1: know that maybe a little bit of an advantage for

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Speaker 1: a Tom Brady going into New Orleans. You have to

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Speaker 1: think that it may have played in with the pretty

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Speaker 1: shocking UH Steelers loss last night too to the Browns

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Speaker 1: that if you've got terrible towels going, especially late in

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Speaker 1: the third quarter there, maybe you see more of a comeback. Uh.

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Speaker 1: The lack of fans, I think is still I'm still

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Speaker 1: having a hard time like getting my head around it

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Speaker 1: and watching. Well. In the Buffalo game, you only had

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Speaker 1: about fans in the stands, and then you had they

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Speaker 1: would sweeten the crowd noise. In the Washington game, there

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Speaker 1: was nobody in the crowd, but you still had the

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Speaker 1: piped in crowd noise. And and my wife said this,

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Speaker 1: there was a point when you know the ref would

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Speaker 1: make a call against the Washington football team, and then

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Speaker 1: you to hear the boo boom, and my wife thought, well,

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Speaker 1: that's kind of rude. It's you know, it was kind

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Speaker 1: of you know, out of line because you know it's

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Speaker 1: against the visiting team. And and I was thinking, yeah,

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Speaker 1: but I kind of like it. Yeah, you need a

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Speaker 1: little bit of it, I mean, because it almost feels

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Speaker 1: like and and I listen, we've all gotten used to

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Speaker 1: life being different here in this pandemic. But you know,

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Speaker 1: it is weird when you see a controversial play and

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Speaker 1: you're just conditioned as a viewer to expect some sort

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Speaker 1: of reaction one way or another, and when there's not

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Speaker 1: that reaction, uh, it feels a little bit weird. Let's

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Speaker 1: stay on football for for just a minute before we

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Speaker 1: move onto another sport. You know the big money in

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Speaker 1: college sports, Lynchy, We know it's there. It comes to

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Speaker 1: ahead for the college football season tonight. Alabama versus Ohio State.

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Speaker 1: These are two of the most winning franchises in the

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Speaker 1: history of college football. Uh Saban looking for yet another title.

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Speaker 1: On the other side, you have Justin Fields, you know,

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Speaker 1: who improved his draft prospects pretty dramatically, but he is

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Speaker 1: hurt to some extent. We don't know the extent. I

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Speaker 1: do think a lot of people are gonna be tuning

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Speaker 1: in though, Yeah, I think that the there's a great

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Speaker 1: deal of interest because you have two known quantities as

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Speaker 1: as you mentioned, UM, I think the college football playoff

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Speaker 1: system is pretty solid financially. UM doing a little bit

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Speaker 1: of research, ticket revenue only accounts for about five of

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Speaker 1: the four and seventy nine million they narrated last year,

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Speaker 1: which kind of surprised me. The rest is broadcast right, Well,

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Speaker 1: it's in big sponsorships like A T and T Capital One,

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Speaker 1: Dr Pepper. You know that. You know, you can't get

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Speaker 1: escape them when you when you watch any of them.

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Speaker 1: But this is gonna be fun eight o'clock kickoff, which

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Speaker 1: isn't too bad. The game probably over about and you

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Speaker 1: know a lot of people don't like Alabama, so by

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Speaker 1: default they might be rooting for Ohio State. Who knows. Yeah. Well,

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Speaker 1: and it's interesting, you know, bar One of the aspects

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Speaker 1: of this for from a business and money perspective is,

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Speaker 1: you know, for Justin Fields, it is a very tough

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Speaker 1: position to be in because obviously he's a competitor. He

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Speaker 1: also wants to improve his position in the draft. He's

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Speaker 1: gonna go high by all accounts, by all the mock

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Speaker 1: draft that that I've been seeing, So that will be

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Speaker 1: a good contract for him. At the same time, he's

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Speaker 1: putting a lot on the line if he is in

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Speaker 1: fact playing hurt. You know, he suffered that massive hit.

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Speaker 1: He finished the game, the semifinal game, but he clearly

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Speaker 1: was not uh not, And we don't really know that

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Speaker 1: the rules are unlike they are in professional sports, so

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Speaker 1: we don't know how he's gonna be tonight in terms

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Speaker 1: of his his health and well being. Well, that's the

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Speaker 1: pressure because you want to be now on the field

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Speaker 1: because of that exposure. You want all of the thirty

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Speaker 1: two teams to see you. It's like, this is what

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Speaker 1: I can do now. You know. Again, all the scouts know, yeah,

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Speaker 1: the young man is hurt, But at the same time,

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Speaker 1: if he steps out there on the field, they're saying, well, hey,

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Speaker 1: that young young man is tough and and he's out

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Speaker 1: there now. Again, we don't know to the extent of

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Speaker 1: the injury of what it is. But at the same

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Speaker 1: time too, that's the pressure these college athletes have. And

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Speaker 1: by the way, you were wondering about you know, many

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Speaker 1: people hate Alabama are going to root for Ohio State.

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Speaker 1: Remember I'm a Michigan guy, so you will not be.

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Speaker 1: I love Columbus, I love you, but roll time and

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Speaker 1: bar do you do you refer to um of the

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Speaker 1: Ohio State University as that school down south? You know

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Speaker 1: some people have that's true. We we we have said that.

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Speaker 1: And it's again listen the buck Eyes that they're an

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Speaker 1: excellent football team. But I remember those Woody Hayes moments.

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Speaker 1: Oh yeah, and I can't get that out of my

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Speaker 1: head against him Beckler, and I remember one time when

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Speaker 1: Woody went and watching the game when he just went

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Speaker 1: ballistic on a football player. Uh, and I'm like, what

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Speaker 1: are you doing? And it's that stuff can't get out

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Speaker 1: of my head. He punched Charlie Vallman of Clemson. Remember

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Speaker 1: that intercepted the past. I went as as when I

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Speaker 1: first got out of college, I took a road trip

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Speaker 1: with a buddy to the Ann Arbor to the Michigan

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Speaker 1: Ohio State game and I was in awe that was

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Speaker 1: selling toilet paper with the image of Woody Hayes on

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Speaker 1: every sheet, and then they had bumper stickers that said

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Speaker 1: safe fuel burn Woody. It is what I mean, it

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Speaker 1: is seen as one of the great rivalries of all time.

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Speaker 1: I mean, it'll be interesting to see, you know, if

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Speaker 1: Ohio State is able to pull it out, and maybe

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Speaker 1: even if they're not. You know, I don't know if

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Speaker 1: you guys read the really very incisive I think New

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Speaker 1: York Times magazine piece about Big ten football. You know,

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Speaker 1: Ohio State was the driving force of getting Big ten football,

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Speaker 1: according to this report, back on the field, and and

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Speaker 1: you understand why. There's a lot of money at stake.

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Speaker 1: There are a lot of careers really at stake. And

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Speaker 1: the fact of the matter is just going back to

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Speaker 1: Justin Fields for a second, I don't think he is

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Speaker 1: where he is in the draft if you don't have

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Speaker 1: that performance against Clemson, if he's not on the field,

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Speaker 1: if Big ten football doesn't happen. So you know, a

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Speaker 1: lot of the economics play into this in in a

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Speaker 1: pretty big way. So I'm not sure we thought, certainly

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Speaker 1: back in July and August, that we would see a

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Speaker 1: college football title game. But we will see when. We

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Speaker 1: will see when tonight, as Lynch said, kick off at

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Speaker 1: eight p m. What we didn't see last night was

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Speaker 1: the Sunday Night NBA game the Heat and your Lynch

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Speaker 1: e uh, Boston Celtics postponed and uh, I think we're

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Speaker 1: going to see more of this in the NBA. Well,

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Speaker 1: this went right down to the wire. The game wasn't

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Speaker 1: postponed until five o'clock in the afternoon. I was unaware

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Speaker 1: of the problems with the Miami Heat. I knew the

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Speaker 1: Celtics were only gonna be able to address the minimum

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Speaker 1: of eight players because of COVID Jason Tatum testing positive,

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Speaker 1: Robert Williams testing positive, and then the other one's contract

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Speaker 1: contact tracing, and then all of a sudden, here comes

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Speaker 1: to Miami. They can't field the eight people, so they

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Speaker 1: got a postpone in the game. Now remember, um, you know,

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Speaker 1: we had this a great discussion with the Deputy Commissioner

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Speaker 1: of the of the NBA, and he said that they

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Speaker 1: had learned a lot from the NFL and more specifically

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Speaker 1: Major League Baseball, building in a little flexibility in the

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Speaker 1: schedule so they can make up games like this rather

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Speaker 1: than force a team to forfeit if they don't have

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Speaker 1: a certain number. But you know, the NBA played in

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Speaker 1: the bubble when they resumed last year, they went ninety

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Speaker 1: one days without one positive case and now they're back

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Speaker 1: like baseball was when it started, football was when it started,

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Speaker 1: and they're going to have to deal with this. This

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Speaker 1: is the first of many of these stories who are

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Speaker 1: gonna be reporting over the next couple of months. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's interesting too, Bar because you think about the lessons learned,

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Speaker 1: which is very fair and and as you said, Lynch,

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Speaker 1: Mark Tatum did talk about that to us, the CEO

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Speaker 1: and the Deputy commissioner about that, and the flexibility built in.

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Speaker 1: The problem is a is one of large numbers when

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Speaker 1: it comes to the pandemic itself. Neither of those other

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Speaker 1: leagues were playing baseball certainly and and even football early

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Speaker 1: in the fall against a backdrop of the record number

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Speaker 1: of cases, and so the numbers just become really difficult.

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Speaker 1: And not to mention the fact, not to get too

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Speaker 1: wonky about it, but you're also talking about many, many

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Speaker 1: fewer players, you know, so if if you're if you're

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Speaker 1: talking about the margin for error, it is really really

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Speaker 1: small when it comes to to the NBA. So I

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Speaker 1: don't know exactly what's going to happen with this season,

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Speaker 1: I confess him a little worried. Well, I brought this

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Speaker 1: up We talked about this several months ago. The bubble itself. Yes,

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Speaker 1: when you see it in sports and the success the

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Speaker 1: NBA had the previous season with the bubble, you're thinking, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I want to see the bubble because I want to

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Speaker 1: see sports and this and that whatever. But you got

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Speaker 1: to remember, these are human beings and they're away from

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Speaker 1: their families. Uh. You know, it's and i'd say that

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Speaker 1: to anybody. You try being away from your family for

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Speaker 1: several months and and let's see how you like it. Uh,

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Speaker 1: you know, away from your kids, away from your spouse.

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Speaker 1: That's a tough thing to do. It's it's a tough

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Speaker 1: mental thing. Uh So that's why I'm kind of torn

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Speaker 1: about it. But right now, now that they're not in

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Speaker 1: the bubble, we can see what's happening and there are

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Speaker 1: many more cases. Absolutely. All right, Well, before we go,

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Speaker 1: we got to touch on politics just briefly, because obviously

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Speaker 1: that was the overwhelming story over the past week, and

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Speaker 1: you know, we always wonder how sports is going to

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Speaker 1: enter into it. Last year, of course, we saw politics

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Speaker 1: really invade sports and vice versa in many ways. We

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Speaker 1: talked last week about the Georgia election and the role

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Speaker 1: that athletes played well the first league, as it were

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Speaker 1: the first sport to really come out. In response to

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Speaker 1: the stormy of Capitol Hill last week is the p

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Speaker 1: G A lynch saying that the PGA Championship will not

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Speaker 1: be played at the Trump Course I believe in New

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Speaker 1: Jersey is where it was scheduled for. This feels notable

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Speaker 1: to me, it does. It wasn't slated for two and

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Speaker 1: Ben Winston, New Jersey at Trump National. This is a

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Speaker 1: little bit to me like what the NBA sort of

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Speaker 1: they started nudging Donald Sterling before they eventually forced him

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Speaker 1: to sell. And this is this is a statement right here, Uh,

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Speaker 1: to Donald Trump, we don't want to have anything to

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Speaker 1: do with you. You're radioactive. Anything you touch and own

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Speaker 1: is radioactive to us, and we're getting away from it now. Naturally,

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Speaker 1: the Trump camp responded, like, you broke a contract and

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Speaker 1: it's not fair and it's not right, and and you

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Speaker 1: know he'll probably try to take the PGA to court,

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Speaker 1: but uh, forget about it. The PGA did absolutely positively

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Speaker 1: the right thing. Yeah, it's hard to argue with this,

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Speaker 1: and you do wonder about you know, this brand going

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Speaker 1: forward and in a post presidency which has been you know,

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Speaker 1: strongly affiliated, especially with golf. I mean the President himself

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Speaker 1: obviously a very active golfer. We know that from his schedule. Um.

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Speaker 1: And we also know that about a third I believe

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Speaker 1: of the global revenue that comes to the Trump organization

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Speaker 1: comes through its golf holdings. There was a controversy involving

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Speaker 1: another sports figure, Woody Johnson, who was the owner of

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Speaker 1: the New York Jets and became the US ambassador to

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Speaker 1: the U k UH. There were reports months ago that

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Speaker 1: the President had pressured him to try and get a

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Speaker 1: tournament played at Turnberry I believe at a Trump Turnberry

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Speaker 1: golf course. So, um, this is important we know to

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Speaker 1: the soon t BX president and uh it'll be interesting

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Speaker 1: to see from a money perspective. It may be the

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Speaker 1: opposite of what he had hoped would happen, which is

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Speaker 1: in terms of burnishing the reputation of his properties. This

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Speaker 1: is the Bloomberg Business of Sports podcast on Michael Barr.

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Speaker 1: You can follow me on Twitter at Big Bar Sports

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Speaker 1: and I'm Mike Lynch. You can follow me at Lynch

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Speaker 1: e w CVB and I'm Jason Kelly. Can find me

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Speaker 1: on Twitter at Jason Kelly News We're here each and

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Speaker 1: every Monday, Wednesday and Thursday exploring the world of money

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Speaker 1: in sports. We got a big week, uh coming up.

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Speaker 1: We're gonna check in with John Burns. He's the CEO

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Speaker 1: of t B twelve. That t B is familiar to

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Speaker 1: Lynchy and the rest of us sands for Tom Brady.

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Speaker 1: He has worked with him for a long time. We're

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Speaker 1: going to talk about the business of fitness and much more.

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Speaker 1: We're also going to catch up speaking of the business

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Speaker 1: of with Rich Kleiman. He's the head of thirty five Ventures. That,

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Speaker 1: of course, is Kevin Durant's investment company. They have been

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Speaker 1: increasingly active and with k D now in New York

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Speaker 1: playing for Brooklyn, their ambitions are only growing. You're listening

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Speaker 1: to Bloomberg Business of Sports on Bloomberg Radio around the

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Speaker 1: world and online wherever you get your podcasts.