Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Season 4- Episode 38- MLR Chaos (Premiership Round 26 & Super Rugby QF)
29 Plays3 years ago
It is the latest and greatest from those American rugby knuckleheads. On this episode, we first address the very saddening news coming out of Leicester, our condolences to the entire Youngs family once again. Then we get into some real spice as the proverbial scat has hit the fan in the MLR has hit the fan with not just 1, but 2 teams being disqualified, both with the same owner, lots to get into with that. Then we have a trip around the Premiership as the final weekend of the regular season plays out and some teams had one final say on their rugby for the year. Then it's quarterfinal time in Super Rugby, with some results that really weren't that shocking, but of course some play that was absolutely brilliant. Of course, we dig in to the actual rugby being played by the MLR on the weekend, including the FJs finally being defeated in Quincy. This has some good bits to chew on so grab a cold one, kick back and enjoy!
Get the TFRY Patreon https://www.patreon.com/TheFantasyRugbyYanks , subscribe and start getting a leg up on your friends.
Ask us questions via Twitter: Jarrod- jdyke8man & Ben- admrablsnackbar, and #AskTFRY.
Send us your thoughts for the show and questions for upcoming shows via e-mail fantasyrugbypodcast@gmail.com. Of course we welcome feedback via e-mail, twitter or by rating/reviewing the pod on Apple Podcast.
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Episode Overview
00:00:08
Speaker
Hey, everybody. Welcome back. It is a fancy rugby game. My name is Jared Dyke. I'm Ben Glauser. Let's dive in. Despite the semi-limited number of games, we have a lot to talk about. So let's get right into it. No controversy or anything. Smoke them if you got them. Yeah. Thank you for giving us new stuff to talk about in the news cycle. Not that we haven't had anything to talk about in the news cycle, but this is something that we can't ignore either. God damn. You know. I have not had a bad storm along yet.
00:00:37
Speaker
Nice. By the way, so free jacks storm along. Thank you. Yeah, I was. I had a couple of those on Friday.
Fantasy Rugby and Supporting Creators
00:00:49
Speaker
Buy our good friend, George, the fantasy rugby geek coffee. Like we said last week, if you're anywhere near the top of any of your leagues, it's likely because of him. And if it's because of us, it's also because of him because that's just my proxy. So grab him, buy him a coffee so he can. And also just, you know, he's done a lot of work in the year. So give him, give him just rewards as it were. Right. Especially the last one this year. Give him one last. Give it to him. Give it to him.
00:01:17
Speaker
Grab your TRM upgrades. I don't know if they're going to carry over to next year, but if if not, then I understand if you don't want to do it this this year, but certainly next year, plant, you know, set it aside that you're going to that you're going to buy it because it's totally worth it. It is worth it. It's much more enjoyable. Yeah, I could not tell you how much better my life is having that fucking upgrade. So right. I'm in terms of playing TRM for both and considering that they have the two competitions, fingers crossed, they eventually get back to super rugby, please, please.
00:01:46
Speaker
But yeah, for the two competitions they're in. And then they did the woke up as well. That'll be not this coming fall, but the next one. There's that too. So, get those.
Societal Issues and Political Critique
00:02:01
Speaker
As always on this podcast, Black Lives Matter, and there is no room for racism or in life. We're at the point, and we were at this point a few weeks ago, but we're at that point where like,
00:02:16
Speaker
I don't know what to fucking do anymore. You know, I really don't. And I wish I did, but I don't. And it's really, there's so much to just like, it's, and I certainly understand why people are like, you know, they're just like, I'm tired, I'm exhausted. And you feel like you want to give up, but there are people that can't give up because you know, they don't have a choice.
00:02:45
Speaker
we can see the patterns and we can predict what's going to happen every single time. And it's like, nobody wants to break any kind of cycle. Like something terrible happens and we're all pissed, pissed. And then we're like, let's make some changes. And then Congress does this thing where they, like today that they brought in some Yuvaldi kids and it's like,
00:03:09
Speaker
It's obscene at this point for you to bring them in. You don't need to hear from them. And not do anything at that. Yeah, you already know what's going on. And we know that the Republicans don't want to do anything.
00:03:22
Speaker
because they're paid off by the NRA. And okay, that's what that is. But you never have Democrats who recognize that. They're always like, no, we got to do something bipartisan. And it's like, well, that's everything. It's a fucking joke. You're going to compromise with people who will never do anything anyway. So like, you're going to, all we get is the worst possible outcome, which is not really nothing. So it's just like, but we see it happening. Like, as soon as it happens, like, you know, that shooting, I was,
00:03:52
Speaker
the worst feeling because it's like we've seen this before. We saw Sandy Hook and nothing happened. And it's like, well, we know what's going to happen because we've seen it before. And that's the worst part is they're like, oh, we're doing this again. Like this is apparently acceptable to our leadership. So, yeah, on every front, it gets very it gets disheartening. Yep. Agreed. Agreed. And the worst part, the whole the whole stupid thing is never mind the fact that the Republicans won't do anything.
00:04:21
Speaker
majority of them, I would assume, if not all of them. It's like, we have these huge, like huge, you know, sweeping issues like gun control, like police violence, and then they come down and say, children shouldn't attend drag shows. I'm like, where did that come from? Like, fuck off.
00:04:43
Speaker
right like holy you could not be more dumb you could not be what year are we in really i mean really like that one's that guy's in 1980 i can at best at best it's like come on now i fucking lighten up and and it's it's yeah it's bullshit just
00:05:05
Speaker
I think when I said at one point was the funniest thing is how conservative men like to dress up in drag as a joke, like Halloween costumes and stuff like that. Oh, though they love cross dressing there. And that's that's fine. But they don't like it. So it's like if you took a party of conservatives and you said, look, we're going to do a Halloween party and it's going to be, you know,
00:05:30
Speaker
cross dress and we're going to have like a competition for funniest and like most times, you know, like all this stuff and they're like, Oh, okay. You do it. And then it's like, okay, well, congratulations. That's a drag show. Like that's it. It's just people dressing up and showing off. Are you fucking kidding me? It's for fun. The most bullshit thing ever. Oh boy. Oh yeah. So that sucks. Um,
00:05:56
Speaker
Meanwhile, back on the home front. Sorry about that. Well, not sorry about that, but that's our thing for this week. Sorry, not sorry. Grab our Patreon. Like I said, like we talked about last week, we'll probably make it free for the summer. We'll still try and put up maybe a little bit of bonus content here and there. Yeah, we'll have some contents. We'll have the goods back for the fall, as always.
00:06:21
Speaker
All right. Let's move on to actual things that matter, not Patreons. Really, unfortunately, we have to start off with the worst of the worst. And it's just absolutely awful
Tribute to Tiffany Young
00:06:35
Speaker
news. And it's that Tiffany Young's has succumbed to her illness and has passed away. And that is just, oh, your heart breaks so much. And you know, you
00:06:47
Speaker
The level of care is clear with Tom Young's. It's not a question because he's like, I have to take this time off. I have to take this time off in my life to be with my wife. And so that's clear. And to me, that says a lot about his character. Even if he was a dick on the field, that says a lot about his character as a person. So that
00:07:12
Speaker
I can appreciate very, very much so. And, you know, sympathies and condolences to the entire young family. I can't even imagine. Seriously, right now, you know, I know he has young kids. I know. And they're just so they're, they're young. I mean, fuck. Yep. It's just absolutely terrible. So it's, yeah. Yeah. I can imagine.
00:07:34
Speaker
So definitely our condolences to them and the entire Lester community because they were, you know, the youngs, we kind of joke about it, but the youngs are our Lester in so many ways and true and vice versa. So it's a whole family affair on this one. Yeah. So like it always is. But this is a pretty, pretty big fucking family. So yeah. Yeah. So it's it'll be.
00:08:00
Speaker
They'll they'll they'll never be a dry eye in the house on at welfare grow on Saturday. No, no. So very, very, very sad news. So we hope we hope we hope they can get through this tough time. And yeah, they can find a way through.
00:08:20
Speaker
All right.
MLR Playoffs Chaos and Ownership Issues
00:08:22
Speaker
Speaking of finding a way through. Yeah, no fucking shit. What the fuck is going on in the MLR? The chaos that has become the MLR. And there are so many ways to slice and dice this. So let's just deal with what are the current facts that we know. The Austin Go-Gronies have been disqualified from the Western Conference playoffs. The Los Angeles-Gill teammates have also been disqualified from the Western Conference playoffs in the MLR, which means
00:08:47
Speaker
The Houston Sabre Cats will host the final. San Diego and Seattle are playing the semifinal or whatever you want to call it. So those are the facts as it stands. Right now, I don't... We don't really have a whole lot of information on what the fuck happened. There's rumors left and right. We can speculate and all that stuff. The most popular rumor right now that I've seen is, one, that Galgronis broke the salary cap.
00:09:17
Speaker
And then two, from that, Gilchrist went to the owners meeting and basically threatened to pull LA from the playoffs because his other team got disqualified. And that's what the most popular thing is. So if that's the case,
00:09:41
Speaker
There's nobody that comes out good on this either way. It doesn't matter if it's MLR or Gilchrist, honestly. Right. And let me just start by saying that before we dive into any of this, I am not a Gilchrist fan. I fucking hate the guy. Right. But it's very easy for me. Yeah, I'm trying to see this down the middle as best I can. But MLR doesn't seem to be
00:10:06
Speaker
I have not seen a single red flag from MLR before this. So I factor that into the fact that they've been doing this the right way. The only concern that I have had with MLR is the speed of their expansion. Other than that, they have a great product. It's becoming a legit league. But the thing is, it's becoming a legit league. So they still have to, they cannot
00:10:34
Speaker
afford to look the other way on things like this. First off, no matter what the fuck happened with the Gilgronies, if Gilchrist, and I have no reason to disbelieve this because he is a complete piece of shit from everything I've heard,
00:10:57
Speaker
I could, if he went and said, you know, I'm pulling LA, then yeah, you have to enforce the, it's like, well, sorry, dude, you're done. Like, yeah, I don't care if they fold both of those guild teams. Well, he wants to sell, he wants to sell Austin and keep Los Angeles. That's what I know. Okay. We'll move Austin to Philly because Philly needs a team. We don't need three Texas teams. Yeah, we don't need that many Texas teams. I agree with that statement.
00:11:26
Speaker
But yeah, whatever, get him out of the league. I'm fine with it. I think, I don't think he should, first off, the having that him owning two teams is, is. Yeah, that's sketched. Especially they're in the same conference. I don't like that the free Jack's ownership is kind of similar with like, but it's not the, they have different, you know, clearly defined management and whatnot. It's like, yeah, we kind of own them too, but it's not. Yeah. Like Max is the CEO of the free Jack's. He's not, he has nothing to do with Atlanta. That's a known fact.
00:11:53
Speaker
Right. Whereas Gilchrist is like heavily in with both his teams and he named them after him. Yeah. I mean, here's the thing. Like the things that you need to know about who he is, he has made, he has named two fake cocktails, made up two cocktails, named them after himself, named his two professional rugby teams after himself. Oh, and one of their main sponsors is a beer that is named after himself. Right.
00:12:17
Speaker
there you go, as far as, you know, who he is as a person that that says a lot. Right. I think that says a lot for a lot of people, at least let's put it that way. Sounds like certain people we used to be have as president. Yeah, exactly. So fuck that guy. I agree. And so and then there's so there's the other thing of
00:12:38
Speaker
There's a couple of things surrounding like the whole punishment and why would you do this this way, whatever. So here's the thing. Number one, this is not NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB, whatever. MLB doesn't have a cap, but you know what I mean. These are not those leagues.
00:12:53
Speaker
So, no, you're not going to get away with overpaying your players as much as they deserve it. And let's just be clear. I wish the salary cap could be bigger, but it's a fine balance of sustainability and being able to pay the players. I wish we could pay these players all the money in the world so they could live off, have a living wage, and they could be professional rugby players full-time. Let's just establish that there. And I can't wait for that day. But for now,
Salary Cap Enforcement in MLR
00:13:18
Speaker
we do. And as much as it sucks, money's part of it, and you got to make it sustainable.
00:13:23
Speaker
And that's true in every competition, right? They will doc you. You know, in the NFL, it's generally like draft picks or something like that. They will find a way to... I hate the draft. I don't want to hear about getting rid of draft picks, but that's not on the table for me. Right. So, yes, you have to have punishment for this because if they continue to do it, and it's like, oh, well, I have all this money, so I'll just pay the fine. That's not good enough.
00:13:51
Speaker
That's not good enough. That is just a shrug off and whatever. That's a slap on the wrist at best. His L.A. last year was a little shady anyway, too. That was the other thing. How many ridiculous pros did they have? And you're like, there's no way they're under the salary gap. Yeah. And again, the salary gap is a little fishy from the from the Yamaha. But, you know, and so number two is why would they do it before playoffs? And it's here's the thing. You either do it before playoffs, before you even go through with the whole thing.
00:14:18
Speaker
Or you do it afterwards, and then you have to vacate the championship. And then you have two out of your first five years as a league that don't have a champion. And one of which is through no fault of anybody else. But this one, it's still not a good look either way. Yep. That's why I'm perfectly for that. Because it's not. I like what they did.
00:14:42
Speaker
to the point where I kind of understand that people are like, ooh, the MLR is shady, but I don't get it because it's like, look at the, look at, you know, if you look at the two sides, just on the smell test, which one of them passes, MLR passes the smell test for me, Gilchrist doesn't. So I'm not, I have no reason to think something shady is up with MLR other than Gilchrist is,
00:15:06
Speaker
fucking with it. And here's, and here's the final thing. Like, and I think good thing, right? Like if it's, if they didn't go, if they went easy on them, like you said, everybody'd be like, Oh, well, you know, we all know we will take it seriously. Yeah. And then that's it.
00:15:21
Speaker
So this is definite. I don't see how this is looking shady on the MLR. They fucking dropped the hammer. They said, we're setting the standard. This is not acceptable. That is a huge thing as well. What the fuck? Why would you be like, oh, I don't know what they're doing. They were out of control. No, they're in control. That's what this is. This is control. I mean, maybe it's because I work in a heavily regulated industry and for good reason, because it's healthcare. It's literally life and death.
00:15:47
Speaker
Yeah, no, I have no problem with it. If you're a fucking professional, you can live in that and thrive in that circumstance. And the other part of it is down to the whole ownership and the owners themselves. Let's talk just a little bit about the owners and what the decision that was made, supposedly. I think it was Drew Mitchell that brought up on Twitter and he just, I think that was the tweet that our boy Duncan had sent us. Listen,
00:16:16
Speaker
They're not, like, they're not going to vote the Los Angeles field teams out just because they want to eliminate the champion. They had not, they had never done it. They had not done it with Seattle the previous two years, despite the fact that Seattle shit-tonked everybody. They could easily say, yes, Seattle, you don't get to play this year because we want a new champion. No, that you're not doing that because it does, it does have a damaging effect on the league. They're not doing this just to get their jollies off. But on the ownership front itself, think about it this way, like,
00:16:43
Speaker
You can be known as an owner in a league like this that's very not above water at this point for two reasons. You can be a fantastic, amazing person, or you could be a piece of shit. And right now, there's only one owner in this entire league that's known, and it's Gilchrist. And that's because he's a dirtbag. So that's not speaking well. Apart from Max, nobody has any idea who the frig's at the top with the freejacks.
00:17:13
Speaker
and nobody has a freaking clue who's at the top for rugby in New York and you know the other team. And I say this objectively because I'm genuinely impressed with the job he does as not just as a fan but like because I'm a fan but also just
Leadership in MLR: Praising Mags
00:17:29
Speaker
Mags is the best. If you've got a problem with Mags, you've got a problem with me. I love Mags. I really do. I really do. It's fucking awesome. Yeah. And I mean, above all else, no matter how much I might bitch here and there about the free jacks with other things, let's just make it clear. When push comes to shove, I love Mags. You will never hear me say otherwise. Even if I'm upset at him about one thing or another,
00:17:53
Speaker
I love Mackleby. That is the bottom line. Just rewind this tape if you hear me complain about the freejacks a little bit here and there. Trust me, I do it with love and I do love Matt. We want them to be the best and he's such a good
00:18:10
Speaker
face of the organization. He's good with local businesses. He's obviously getting a bunch of sponsors. He's excellent with that because he's so fucking personable. He's also just friendly. He recognizes, I don't think he knows my name to have seen my face, but
00:18:29
Speaker
He's super, he's always super friendly. He's like, I know. He always says hi. He always says hi to you. He always says hi to you. Shake your hands and yeah, no, he's always says hi. He is, he is, yeah, he is one of the best things about the Free Jacks organization at the top without a doubt. He always asks if there's anything he can do for us.
00:18:46
Speaker
Like he wants to, he wants to hear stuff. Like now he's not gonna be like, oh yeah, I'll get you a fucking like hot dog. No, he's like, you know, he wants to know how things are and how the staff is doing and all that. So I'm serious about what he does. Yeah. In the end of this.
00:19:02
Speaker
It's not good for either. Gilchrist looks bad. And on the whole, the YAMLR does look bad. Yeah. Not for the decision, but just because of what happened. And here's the thing, like the obvious answer is, well, why don't they have like an auditor at each club? That's a lot of money that the YAMLR doesn't have right now, I need to tell you. Could you do it where you're auditing throughout the season somehow? I'm sure.
00:19:25
Speaker
Are they trying to? Probably. Are they doing their perfect job of it? Fuck no. No. Well, that just shows that they're doing a good job. They're at least kidding. I mean, they got to Austin before this going round. Right. This past round. So, you know, and then obviously Los Angeles shortly after that. So assuming that it's one for salary cap and one for being a dickhead, that's where we're at right now, unless I hear otherwise. That's what I'm going to go with until there's more details that come to light.
00:19:52
Speaker
Right. Alright, so let's go to the final weekend of the premiership. Lots to play for for some, less so for others. Yeah. Let's just kind of go through stuff that didn't necessarily have a huge impact. Worcester and Bath. Okay. Good for Worcester. Like, here's the one thing that I want to say about this match, and we don't need to get into much more beyond it.
00:20:21
Speaker
And somebody pointed it out in like that stadium would have been packed if Worcester was being threatened with relegation. And because there's ring fencing, it was not a hot ticket by any means whatsoever down there. That was just not good.
00:20:42
Speaker
I will say, even with Steve Diamond in the mix, Finn Smith and Gareth, not Jareth Simpson, there's a lot of good shit in the future there. Yep, there is. Shildick got a hat. He was, yeah, yep.
00:21:01
Speaker
the past that he got, I think it was either on a second or his third, from Ashley Beck. Wow. I was like, okay, that's what you can do. Now I understand. I get it. Dude, entertaining match for those that wanted to go to it. Credit to Worcester for fronting up.
00:21:22
Speaker
And I'll say this, people, I've seen people on the Twitter being like, Eddie, you got to snap up Finn Smith. You'll regret it if you don't. No, no, no, that's not right for Finn. It's not right. Like Finn should go to Scotland if he's, you know, if he wants to, if they get the call there.
00:21:39
Speaker
Agreed. Like you should play where you can play. Yeah. Yeah. You want to play for England, but like you'll get a cap. And then, you know, would you rather have one cap and that's really it? Or would you rather have the potential to because who's, you know, without Finn Russell, who else really is there? Tasting's right now. I think things is OK. Finn's not far away from that already. So, right. You know, why do you think Finn Smith's going to surpass? Marcus Smith, it may be, but come on.
00:22:09
Speaker
Mm, not likely. And Orlando Bailey still there too, so. Right. I'm not taking, I'm not gambling like that if I'm thin, but that's me.
00:22:15
Speaker
No, no, I think you can. And it would be wrong. It would be wrong of any to do that to lock him in. Agreed. Yeah, because they stuck for three years minimum. Right. All right. Let's jump over to AJ Bell. A farewell for the sale sharks to a couple of their guys leave in and it was worthy of it.
Sale Sharks' Farewell Match
00:22:34
Speaker
No doubt. It certainly was. That was a Yeah, they put on a show. No doubt.
00:22:43
Speaker
Although Nathan Hughes, you know, he kind of showed up to Tom the other side just to. Yeah, I did. I was talking to the right. He had to. That was the good Nathan Hughes. Yeah, that's the that's the good one. He's on my eight of the year. Yeah, he's he's up to Japan. Right. He was going to be going to France, but then Japan said we'll pay you more. And he is not going to turn that down.
00:23:09
Speaker
I don't blame them at all. I did not have Cobus Lee scoring a double on my bingo board. No, I didn't either. But yeah, so go buy a lottery ticket, Cobus. Not sure you're going to get that again. But overall, just kind of a meh from Bristol and sale came to play. That's really what it was. Bristol kind of put their final real good performance in at home with the Chiefs in town. And this was kind of a meh for them, unfortunately.
00:23:39
Speaker
Right. And they played like it. Yeah, they kind of played like last week was their last week. It happens. I think they just every, you know, this is a team that just wants the year to end. And it's like that that was a performance. What's already on the beach. Yeah, right. Like, this has been a, we're gonna need, we've already started therapy for this year. So, it's just ended. Yeah, no shit, right. No kidding.
00:24:04
Speaker
Um, again, another one didn't have a ton of impact. Although champions cup would say otherwise, but still Exeter and Quinn's, um, you know, if you stop the match, when, when Quinn's pulled everyone, then the quiz win, but they don't, they pulled everyone. So when did, when did gel time come in? He came in pretty early. Like 45, I think maybe 40 on the nose. Yep.
00:24:34
Speaker
So thank God that they took Ian Witten off. Thank God. Although I think he came back on. Yeah, he did. Okay. He came back on. He came back on. He scored a try. Jesus. Oh, that was a walk-in. Jesus. I could score that one. Good God. I could score that one. I mean, I could score that one drunk. You know, we talk about these kinds of games. When Ian Witten's scoring a try, when Jack Noble's scoring a try, it's...
00:25:01
Speaker
And it's because the other team is either, you know, um, not any kind of quality or they're kind of also, you know, don't really care about the outcome of this match, which really was where Harlequin's with. Yeah. I mean, they, they pulled Smith and care and, you know, they were, they were just like, yeah, nope, you're done.
00:25:21
Speaker
Like, out, out, out, out. You're done. This is not, this is, we no longer give a shit about this. You're done. Yeah. You know, they pulled Walker for fucking Gray, who's the... Right. Yeah. So, you know, we'll have... They pulled off Marler and Marcus. Yeah. Right. Nope. So, yeah. Yeah. And, you know, Exeter didn't go away. They kept playing. So, good for them. But at the same time, meh. Oh, I'm meh. Right.
00:25:49
Speaker
Now you can change your stupid fucking logo. Right. Yeah. And Lester was, this was, this match was all kinds of meh. Jesus. Yeah. I mean, apart from Guy Porter was great. That's really the only thing I have to say. That's really odd. Oh, and the, and the Atkinson, that was brilliant. Yes. Great, but a great, but a great bit of play from Charlie Atkinson. Well done, sir.
00:26:15
Speaker
So yeah, it's so but really, you know, we talk about guys that are young in England, like Charlie Atkinson is another name that's everybody's on everybody's lips, like, right? Yeah. It's a crowded room up there, no doubt. Yeah. And it's like, and even he can look across the locker room and see, um,
00:26:34
Speaker
Umaga, who is like supposed to be Marcus Smith and it just hasn't materialized for him at all. So it's like, yeah, you can be hot shit potentially, but potential doesn't really cut it. And Marcus, I mean, and, and I don't know if, uh, Umaga has any other options at this point.
00:26:53
Speaker
Yeah, I have no idea. So we'll see what happens. He hasn't been capped though, so. Oh, he hasn't? I thought he was. Maybe he was this summer, but that would be the only time otherwise he'd been capped. Okay. If he was, then sorry buddy, you're kind of shafted. Right. Kind of shaft.
00:27:15
Speaker
So let's talk about we can, we'll go to the match that made the other match a little bit more meaningful. Gloucester and Saris, you know, it's, it's not great for the Saracen's sake in a lot of ways, but at the same time, like,
00:27:31
Speaker
You have a team that's playing for, you know, they have to go full noise and go gung-ho. And you have a team that's, you know, Mark McCall has decided, you know what, let's get some young blood out there and keep the older bodies a little bit fresh for this coming week. The one thing I'm very pissed about, and there's a lot of guys that didn't get served justice on the Saracens, and we'll talk about Gloucester in a second,
00:27:55
Speaker
Yeah. I'm so fucking pissed with Mark McCall and the way he's handled the scrum half situation. Like, Ella Davies is meh. He's just a guy. And we know that. Vince Ale is going to be as good as he is. That is just bottom line. He's, and he's not that good. Ruben de Haas is a young player that still has a lot of talent and a lot of growth to do. And this is the most extensive playing time he's got apart from the Irish match, which he got forced into because of injury. And you wonder why these guys don't look like they're prepared.
00:28:24
Speaker
You've played him for like two minutes at a whack right like no wonder he doesn't feel like he's prepared like This guy's got to get game time and you know maybe he's not doing everything right in training but you got to throw him on the pitch and see what what actually shakes out because Some some some players practice like a fucking donkey. That is just how it is. Don't call day boys But that's that's like
00:28:49
Speaker
and they play better and they just play and they end up playing brilliantly. So you gotta see what's on the pitch. You gotta learn by like some players learn by failure and learn by trying stuff that's new and sort out how to do it. And it doesn't look good in training, but that doesn't mean they don't know how to do it. They can click it on for the matches. The house needed more than 20 minutes in this match. That was like, you're not playing for anything. Yeah, probably should have started.
00:29:16
Speaker
Honestly. So, um, yeah, there's that, but then the bright spots that I liked, Theo Dan. All right. Yeah. All right. Oh, I like, I like a lot. You know, I really, I really like, you know, I know, you know, night didn't show well. He's very, very young. He is a baby. And he got better. He just didn't know where the fuck he was on the pitch. No, it's a little faster out there, Toby. Just FYI.
00:29:44
Speaker
And the other guy that has been very good for the team this year, that's kind of gone a little under the rail is Maui. I really have enjoyed the way he's developed as a loose head. And, you know, we're sad we're losing Baz, but man, he's making, he's going to make him forgotten very quickly. Nothing, nothing against Baz. But as far as what's going on on the pitch, Maui's going to replace him without a doubt. So I'm looking forward to that. And, um,
00:30:12
Speaker
Yeah, Duncan Taylor, a very fine farewell from him. He deserved better than this result. Actually, I thought there were a couple of series that did. Manu had a pretty damn good match. Duncan Taylor, again, played ridiculous for Duncan Taylor. This was a fitting...
00:30:33
Speaker
Yeah, I was actually, you know, really impressed with the way he played. He definitely, you know, saved his best performance. Like, that was one of those, like, you know, he had one of these in him. He has one of these in him every year. And that was a good way to go from Saris. But Gloucester, man. Yeah, on the other side of it, like Gloucester did the job and they did it extraordinarily well.
00:30:56
Speaker
Mm hmm. No question about it. And I think anybody that says otherwise was not watching the right match. It was hard not to include ruin Ackerman in my. Yeah, he's performed so well for this. He's one that we didn't mention him. And that's that's that's wrong. Can we go back and edit that? Yeah, yeah, no, I agree.
00:31:18
Speaker
And Val Rapava Ruskin, behave. Behave, sir. That was proper sevenry from a from a one. Like he had a good fucking. Yeah, there's there's loose forwards out there who would kill to have a match like Val Rapava Ruskin had. It hit three turnovers, one damn fuck. Yeah, pretty good for a pretty goddamn good for a loose head. And yeah. Yep. I get a few kicking ears to go with it. Like, yeah. Yeah.
00:31:46
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. So another, another good loose head in the frigging proud shocker of the day. Right. Yeah. It's hard. And Ollie Thorley played way better than we've seen him play for a bit.
00:31:59
Speaker
Corrada is really their only like meh back everyone else and he wasn't bad. They were just all firing. Yeah, they don't have a key. Santi Corrada is going to potentially play 10 for Argentina this summer. But yeah, you can see why they like him as a player in general. No doubt.
00:32:21
Speaker
like playing 15 back there as, as the second distributor has kind of become the fashionable spot to put them as the, as the 15 instead of the 12. But right to say that neither, not to say that you can't do both, but he's been, yeah, great for the team this year. Great, great in this game. Unquestionably. Um,
00:32:41
Speaker
Yeah, and this is just a team that left themselves a little too much to do. Because over at Franklin's Gardens, Saints took care of business.
Saints vs Falcons Match Highlights
00:32:53
Speaker
Wow. It was not squeaky bum time ever, but it was close until about half and then. Yeah, well at half they were up. They had that last try right before the half.
00:33:09
Speaker
Yeah, that's right. It was like right around halftime. It was close. And then and then it was. Yeah, Tommy Freeman on the edge there. Right. Yeah, after Peterson got his yellow. Yeah. So it's like, you know, before the yellow, everything was going actually pretty well. I will say I'm not going to come to Greg Peterson's defense on this necessarily because he can be a helmet sometimes, as we've talked about. He's avoided these moments more often than not lately, which makes me like him a lot more.
00:33:37
Speaker
But there is a point where it's like, and I think Ben Kay made the point, like, Loveham's doing a bit of shithouse there and should be penalized. The frequency of that occurrence is low, like very, very low in those situations. And did Peterson do it a little bit wrong? Yeah, like, that's not what you do. You just freaking try and bash his wrist off of him so you can freaking get free. Don't punch the guy into the freaking gutter or the ribs or anything like that. Like, that's dumb.
00:34:04
Speaker
But you do need to try and break free. And usually it is up to the players to try and just free themselves. And it can get a little violent sometimes. I've done it before where I almost broke a guy's thumb because he was holding on to me like that. Let's just tell you, no referee calls that whether they have extra eyes on it or not. The only reason that this one's been drawn attention to is because Pearson threw the punch into the ribs.
00:34:30
Speaker
Can they avoid that situation? Yes, and it doesn't need to be a penalty that on love them. You can just have Dixon say, let him go and problems done. You don't have those instances where somebody's trying to swing fist to get free. That sucks. So yeah, Peterson was dumb. But at the same time, I think just referees can just look out that a little bit and just say, let him go please and be done. And then we don't have to address that ever, ever, ever again. That'd be nice.
00:34:59
Speaker
And I had my timing wrong. It wasn't just before half. It was after half. So after that, it was when, oddly enough, it was when Alex Mitchell got his yellow card. Can't imagine why that would be a problem. And yeah, the Falcons scored three straight tries with Bowdoin, Lemire and Radlan.
00:35:16
Speaker
And that's when the game got like, oh, this could be something. And then Hutchinson scores and Robinson gets the red simultaneously. Yeah. And then it's just like the floodgates open. Everybody at King's Home is thinking, oh, we might get, they might do it. Nope. Just a floodgate. So here's my problem with that red card, because
00:35:45
Speaker
There's a way to do what Robinson, like, I feel like Robinson did the best he could in the situation and kind of just got assholed. And so here's the way it should work. And then you play this when you're a lock, when you're in that position, you can't drive through the 10, right, after he's kicked it, because if he went and lowered it, you know, that's a yellow card easily. So he's got to pull up.
00:36:16
Speaker
And not only that, but the best way to pull up is then you run behind the tent, you run the angle just behind him, because he's going to chip it and then run. You don't want to get in his way. You just step in right behind where he is. You change your angle to just behind him. Robinson did all that and he pulls up, he stands up because he's no longer seeking contact and he's trying to just sneak behind bigger.
00:36:40
Speaker
And what does Bigger do? He ships, and then he steps right back into him. And it's like, well, he steps into the lane where Robinson's trying to run behind him. And that's when the contact happens, and that's when that happens. That sucks. And I'm not saying it doesn't, like, what happened happened. That's a red card. But it sucks, because he was legit trying to not
00:37:09
Speaker
do anything to be trying to play, make the safest play possible. And that, that just, that sucks. Yup. Agreed. Yeah, it just sucks. It really does. Yeah. It really does. It really does. So sets up our, our playoff for this coming weekend with a, it's a double derby today. What you, what more could you ask for? It's series and Quinn's Lester and North Hampton stone X and welfare drove being the host, those spots.
00:37:38
Speaker
going to be a dandy and comes out the other. I mean, whoever comes out the other side of this, it's going to make a great finally the way. Honestly, like any of these combinations are going to be fantastic.
00:37:50
Speaker
Yeah, I agree. It'll be great. Any of them don't care. I mean, I would prefer Saracen's. I prefer Saracen's. It would be in the one. But, you know, there's a preference there. But at the same time, it won't be a bad finally the way. No, it won't. I will still tune in. Yeah, definitely. Definitely. Definitely.
00:38:08
Speaker
more finals being determined down under, um, semi-finals to be exact, because quarter-finals were being played.
Super Rugby Quarter-finals: Crusaders and Chiefs Dominate
00:38:14
Speaker
Um, Crusaders, Queensland opening up the round, uh, different week, same result, unfortunately. And you know, you have,
00:38:25
Speaker
Crusaders back to full noise with Richie Moe and I know Black would have left. Matera shouldn't have been in there, but that's a different story for a different day. Christie did come in and play a damn good game as well. Yeah, it's just, I, sorry guys, I have no idea what you do with that team. Sorry. Well, one team has George Bridge on the bench.
00:38:47
Speaker
Yeah, it's kind of like, uh-oh, weird. And Braden and her. And Tom Christie. So much deep shit. And you don't have James O'Connor. No. And there was a point where the Reds actually were playing this well. And... Of course. And they reached that limit of a tipping point where it's like, all right, we're reaching that, call it the 55, 60 minute mark somewhere in that neighborhood, where it's going to tip one way or the other.
00:39:16
Speaker
And it's usually the other team that determines that in those situations. Unfortunately, unless one of your guys can really step up and make a huge play and they didn't have anybody to really do that. So no, I know Tupo either. It's not a, it's not helpful. You're missing your, basically your two best players, you know, and that's not to dismiss any of the other guys, but, um,
00:39:34
Speaker
Yeah, they then they have some good players here. But right, you know, that was the best game we've seen. I can do play for a long time. And that doesn't say a whole lot right now. So, yeah, so shock of the day Crusaders in the semi final, who knew? Wow. Over to Chiefs and Moiretas. And I heard them I heard somebody else say this, and I think it's kind of accurate.
00:39:59
Speaker
inaccuracies or what did the toss in because they did have chances. Yep. But man, the chiefs are deadly. They are. And that was just it. It's like
00:40:09
Speaker
that same thing, can you keep up with us? And I did realize while I was watching this, and I think I texted you about it, the Chiefs play a lot like the free jacks. Free jacks give up opportunities. There's line breaks, there's that, but then they're good at turning the ball over real quick off of the, like, okay, great, you've run 30 meters up the pitch, but we now have the ball and we have some fast guys and we're going to score.
00:40:34
Speaker
It's weird like that. They do have some fast guys. And they just do. Once they're behind the other team's defense, there's almost no stopping them. They're going to score that phaser like the next one. And that's what it was. They just kept finding opportunities and putting them in the tri-zone. And the Taz had opportunities outside of Nawakan and Owasi. Who is? On pace, yeah. Yeah.
00:41:02
Speaker
Yeah, but it's like they didn't they weren't really it wasn't happening. Yeah, I mean the will the will Harris try was fun though. Yes, it was Yeah, it was fun. He's so fair. What the fuck? Yeah, he's a big boy like you know
00:41:24
Speaker
fuck, who was it? In the prep, the Lewis Liner, right? The little line off of Marcus Smith, that he's just going at a pace that nobody, you know, he's just passed the defense and gone. Like, okay, Lewis Liner is a wing. That was there was an eight doing that business. Right. That was a
00:41:49
Speaker
Pretty good. I was super like, okay, good. Tip of the hat. That was much more you can do. Yeah. And of course the otherworldly Brad Weber, just fantastic once again for the chiefs. Yeah. Can't say enough about that guy. It is a pretty, it's just a,
00:42:09
Speaker
Look, if you're going to be Spiderman, your alter ego can't be Webber. It's too fucking obvious. Go to Parker. Right. Right. Parker Parker. We'll move forward with that because, yeah, he's just, you know, he spots the gaps and he's through and he's got the Peter Tingle. Yeah. Those tingles. He's like, oh, hey, there's one.
00:42:34
Speaker
Oh, shit.
Blues Triumph Over Highlanders
00:42:35
Speaker
Over to Eden Park. Highlanders really got cramped. They just got hampered by number one. They scored the first six points of the match, I'll have you know. Yeah, but that was it. And they also had a French card that came shortly after that six points. Michael Leo, 100% of red card all day. I don't understand why he was like laughing about it.
00:42:57
Speaker
Yeah, I don't get it. It's just like a bad. That's a bad look. Like, dude, you you just threw your shoulder. Your arm is like hanging down limp. Yeah, you clearly show shoulder charging. Right. I'm smiling. What are you laughing about? Yeah. And unfortunately, like.
00:43:12
Speaker
Fuckatob is not a big drop off, but it is Aaron Smith. So that's the thing with that. And then Marty Banks says you're fucking 10. I'm sorry. That's never going to go well. End of story. Then on the other side, we talked about how good the blues have been all year and you know, shit. Steven Parafetta is taking over the kicking dudes from Bodhi. What does that tell you? Everybody needs to be afraid. That's all I know. But Bodhi had two tries.
00:43:37
Speaker
He did. They were actually trying to keep up with the points. They were beautiful tries. They were. And that, oh man, that here you want to try was fantastic. Yes, it was. Got it from his brother and it was just, oh, that was beautiful. I was like, that's awesome. And that's we bought the check. Try was excellent. I mean, there's a good angle. Yeah. Yeah.
00:43:57
Speaker
And I do want to, I want to give credit to AG Lam who came in and is kind of a, he's just a squad player for the most part, came in for Bryce Heem, also kind of a squad player at this point as well, but he's done good work, just the same. And he played a really, really good game, noticeably good, AG Lam did. So credit to him. Yeah, really, really good spot to step up, step in and put in one of your better performances of the year, unquestionably so. Was his, was his call back or did he? No, he got one. He got, okay. Oh yeah, he got one.
00:44:27
Speaker
You got one. Yeah. And then this was just disheartening in so many ways. Oh, how? How did it wait? No, no, no. How did it end with this final score? I don't get it. I don't know. I'm, you know, I was watching this question. I was like, the last 20 minutes, I'm like in shock. I'm like, wait, no, this can't be. And it was the final 20 minutes that things just kind of turned. And the sad part is,
Hurricanes' Disappointing Exit
00:44:54
Speaker
And I credited Artie Sevilla for being a certain type of player, but he's just, nobody in the Hurricanes seniority group took the team by the scruff of the net and shook them and said, hey, we are panicking at the worst possible fucking moment right now. Can we just pull our shit together and get this thing over the line in the next 20 minutes? Because you've done, you know,
00:45:16
Speaker
60% of the works, every 5% of the work at this point, just pull it over the line, even if it's ugly, and then we can move on and fix everything. And they just couldn't. And it was really, and as a hurricane fan, it was annoying to watch for me, like, all the dumb things that were happening. I'm like, why did we do that? And why like, Curiosity? Why did we do that? And like, just
00:45:38
Speaker
good God in heaven. And you know, Frank's is probably lucky to still be on the pitch. But you know, that's how that's how that goes. She's telling Frank's. Nicky towels are red all day. But then there's a there's this guy named Josh Morby that stepped up that we talked about before pretty good. And then but then the Tom stick over as well. And that was that was unhelpful in a lot of ways. And yeah, it's
00:46:06
Speaker
It, and I don't, and I won't pretend to know the system that the hurricanes are trying to work with. I'm sure he buried at 12, but it's. Yeah. Yeah. You know, this is the bad part of that. I will say that. Yeah. This is the, we talked about the good a couple of weeks ago and what I see in the good. This is the bad unquestionably.
00:46:30
Speaker
Yeah, I guess this is, for some reason, this was a match. Like even while I was watching it, I was just like, this is the, well, the, the Keynes are going to win. There's no question about it. And then it was like all of a sudden, you know, that last 10 or so when you're like, this is just, this is out of reach. Yep. Like, I think it was when they, um, hold on. Let me, I, I haven't looked at the timeline in a bit. I can't remember when that last, the last try was for 74 for right.
00:46:58
Speaker
Yeah, and it was like, it was right after the yellow card. Yeah, and it was just like, wait, like, that's when that's when I started to do the math in my head. And I was like, fuck, yeah, this is this is not happening. Like, how, how is this just, how is it going this way? This is supposed to go the other way. And
00:47:21
Speaker
I'm not wanting to necessarily sit there and, and, and shoot this shot, but I'm starting to question Jason Holland at this point. We've had very talented teams and I understand we've had some, some things that have kind of threw, thrown things off, but we've had a lot of very talented teams that haven't got beyond this point for a while. We haven't seen a semi-final for a while and it's really starting to annoy the fuck out of me. Like you have Jordy Barrett.
00:47:49
Speaker
you have TJ Paranar, both of which played the good majority of this season. You have Artie Sevilla, and I understand other teams have players that are of that caliber, but like, you know, TJ, Jordy, and Artie, Artie and Jordy are starters in most All Blacks teams. You know, TJ is obviously coming off the bench behind Aaron Smith, but could start on like 90% of the international teams out there. So what the fuck, Yips? So it's now,
00:48:19
Speaker
Yeah, I hope the review is harsh in Wellington this offseason. I really hope it does. I'm just saying Ryan Martin is a, you know, he might be worth promoting. He's over with the Rebels right now. He might want a coach job. Yeah, and really it speaks a little bit more to,
00:48:43
Speaker
the job that Plum Tree and Boyd were doing before they left as well. And because the team was consistently in semi-finals, they were consistently, you know, seeing finals and stuff like, you know, we're on the edge of finals. They won in 16, you know? So yeah, Jason Holland, I'm calling you into question, buddy. Sorry. Fair. All right. Um, do, do, do, do.
00:49:07
Speaker
to the MLR.
Free Jacks vs New York Recap
00:49:10
Speaker
And we're going to talk about just the matches, not the fucking shit house that happened before. Right. Um, well, the food jacks master was a shit house, so we can just go right past. That was definitely a shit house. Whatever. I don't give a shit house. Insomnia was shite.
00:49:24
Speaker
But whatever that was, yeah, I, I was, I was kind of a dick and pointed out that they were, that the, that New York was still in third after the end of the match, Atlanta shit house fricking New Orleans. And there were a lot of people that did not get in the stands out from New York that did not like me for that. So.
00:49:40
Speaker
Sorry, but also at the same time, not sorry. Right. You still have to go on the road in the playoffs. Yeah. And they pulled... There was a lot that was going on in this match. They pulled dice early and... Right. So, whatever. I'm okay with it. There was some shit house we're going on from Tuoloma that should have been friggin' binned along... How he escaped the bin, I have no idea. He was starting shit left, left, right, and center.
00:50:04
Speaker
If that happens next week, you better be fucking going to the, going to the bin unquestionably. Um, I'm, I was, so a guy that, uh, what's his name? Uh, Villa Lova, um, Jevon. I was, I was actually kind of glad to see him. Cause he was, some of you and I were kind of watching the other week, um, warm up, but he didn't obviously didn't suit up. So good for him for getting to start. Um, the big unit. Yeah. He's a large, large human being.
00:50:32
Speaker
And he played fairly well. He played the whole game, played fairly well. So I'll give him that, um, that set that center combination. Doesn't matter if it's vendor bank, Reeves, Milan, all three of them are absolutely fantastic still. Yeah. I really enjoy watching those guys. Right there. It's like, who, which, which one do you want?
00:50:50
Speaker
Yeah. They all played fantastic. Yeah. And then you got it. You got to have a tug of the heart strings for Terrell pied to get one over everything he's been through. I saw that it was him on the outside. I was just like, please give it to him. Give it to him. And he got it. I was like, thank God.
00:51:08
Speaker
Yeah. So, uh, good on him. Yes. The free Jack's fall at Fort Quincy, but let's be real. It wasn't really the 18 that fell. It was, you know, and they still had a fucking shot at the end. He probably still should have scored. So at least draw it. So
00:51:23
Speaker
Oh, well, we'll live with it. We'll see y'all in two weeks. We'll play with that there. Uh, rugby, ATL did win. So they were able to secure themselves the home, the home semi-final coming up here. Austin, even after their news, they want, they beat Houston. Houston gets the host this weekend after all the debauchery that went on elsewhere. Um,
00:51:41
Speaker
Utah, they won. They beat Dallas. Dallas was very bad this year. The team that had to play Dallas three times, fuck you. Like I don't know who you are, but I don't like you. If the alleged reality or the rumors are true, Dallas may
00:52:01
Speaker
maybe facing an influx of talent this coming year. So that is true. We'll see. We'll see all that. We'll see all that plays out from the, from the prem, maybe, maybe crossing the pond another. Yeah. That is the rumor as it were. I think Seattle's the team that played them three times. Maybe not. I don't know. I'll have to check out to do my math. That would make sense as to why they're in the playoffs right now. Right. Um, so yeah, Seattle and Seattle beat, um,
00:52:29
Speaker
what's there, but Los Angeles, cause LA put out a crap team because they had already secured the West. Right. So though they didn't. So you thought, um,
00:52:39
Speaker
So that means we're going to have semi-finals this weekend, one on Saturday, one on Sunday. Atlanta gets to host New York. Seattle is hosting San Diego. One of those goes to Houston and comes here respectively or inverse, whatever you want to call it. And then I think it's top seed host, right, for the following weekend.
00:53:00
Speaker
Yes. Sweet. Oh, that's on Saturday, too. Sweet. Okay, it won't be a new time game. That's a new time game. Bullshit. No, it's not a new time game. No, no, no, no, silly you. All right. So there's that. So if you want to catch something fun in the
00:53:21
Speaker
the pod, we're going to have the 15s in there. So check that out over there. Obviously, we're going to talk about what happened in this past weekend for Champions League. And then we'll talk about ranking some of the players for this weekend, semi final match for TRM in the prem. But yeah, it's going to be a fairly short and sweet pod for the most part, apart from our
00:53:42
Speaker
you know, are babbling about 15, but that's a different story for a different day. Um, so if you want to catch that over there, that's, will that be, if you're not going to join us over there, we'll catch you next week. Everybody go, go watch all the great rugby that's going to be out there, semi-finals and all over the place. So just enjoy and have, have a good one. Everyone.