jalen hurts second round draft pick for
the philadelphia eagles
want to make his first start we can kind
of see this coming after the carson
wentz
debacle last week where he got pulled
against the green bay packers
i don't know if i could have seen this
coming at the start of the season
but maybe our next guest maybe he could
have the author of this piece
jason reed senior writer for espn's the
undefeated jay reid great to have you on
with us
i'll start you off with the question did
you see this coming
before the start of the season
no man i i actually did not
you know carson wentz signed a massive
contract not too long ago and
he had a great year last year leading
the eagles to the playoffs
when they were decimated the receiving
corps was just off but not awful but
the the guys that they were expecting
were injured and
he did it with guys off the practice
squad so i really was not expecting this
at all but wentz has had a horrible
season i mean it's well documented
and the eagles are trying something
different they drafted jalen hurts in
the second round so
with with the season they're having i
believe three eight and one right now
um even in the nfc east it doesn't look
like they're going to win the division
the nfc east is not very good as most
people know
so um they're trying to shake it up in
philly and jalen hurts is going to get a
shot
jason something i hadn't thought about
until i registered in the undefeated was
the eagles really have a tradition
probably a strong tradition as you find
in the nfl of black quarterbacks
randall cunningham donovan mcnabb rodney
pete
michael vick and now jalen hurts steps
into that that lineage
um was there a reason that you found
that that
they seem to be more prone to utilizing
black quarterbacks than most franchises
in the nfl
well you know jay i mean andy reed was
coming to the cookout for a while
uh you know andy andy drafted donald
mcnabb
you know back back in 99 he made him a
second overall pick in the draft
he had he had a great deal of success
with donovan
uh he he then donovan kind of helped
convince andy to bring in michael vick
after mike
had the the situation he had occurred
and he was uh in prison for
for 18 months and then michael vick
had a great deal of success succeeding
donovan was a comeback nfl comeback
player of the year
so i i think a lot of it has been andy
reid
when he was in philly determining that
not because of donovan's race or not
because of michael vick's race but he
looked at these guys as guys who could
help them win and and i think so those
two situations
really are directly related to andy reid
the randall cunningham situation or
randall was a second round draft pick
out of unlv nevada las vegas he came in
there
after ron jaworski and you know he they
he didn't start right away
but then he he because of his incredible
athleticism he showed
what he could do when he he was dubbed
the ultimate weapon and he had a good
run there
you know rodney p uh succeeded randall
when
randall's last year in philly before he
retired reynold
wasn't you know he wasn't at the same
level in terms of his athleticism
rodney pete took over the job he became
the starter
and led him to the playoffs and actually
led him to a playoff victory too so you
know that was in a different era but
but i think when you look at
philadelphia
has it has it been a conscious decision
to do this with black quarterbacks
no i i think in each case there the
talent
is what won out it wasn't like anybody
was trying to make any social
statement or whatever it just so
happened that this one franchise
has had a great run with
african-american quarterbacks
you mentioned uh rodney pete a former
detroit lion when i actually rooted for
the lions
and i think they beat the lions 56 to 37
uh in the playoffs in the game where
scott mitchell when he got pulled asked
the coach why
when they were down like 30 some points
but i've quit the lions as you can tell
i'm lions free i quit them in january of
1999.
i am curious though jay reid that when i
look at jalen hurts and i look at his
college career
he was at alabama and was poor futura he
was at oklahoma where he
it seemed like they were kind of held
back by his shortcomings
does he have the tools the arm strength
to really be able to maximize what
philadelphia does have to make himself a
viable starting quarterback
not just for now but in the long term
well you know what man i'll tell you he
he was the
he was a heisman trophy finalist at
oklahoma
he he had a very good run at at alabama
actually came off the bench to help them
get in the position to win the national
championship after relieving to us so
i think when you look at him and when
you look at what he did in college
clearly the eagles were hired i mean
taking somebody in the second round it
was the 53rd overall pick
when you know when you look at the at
all the rounds in the nfl draft
philadelphia identified him as a guy who
could play he wasn't a first round pick
but second round's still a high round
pick when you're a 53rd overall player
taken in the draft
so yeah i definitely think that the the
skill set is there for him to succeed
now
is he going to come in here in the last
four games and
and and just wow the eagles to the point
where they're going to take the cap hit
that they would incur to get rid of
carson wentz
after what carson wentz has done and
all the things that would go into making
that type of money on the ship
i don't know he's going to have to show
a lot to get that done
but he has to get started first and
that's what this sunday is let's start
all right jason i'm gonna ask you to to
switch hats for a moment and
go back in time to when me and you were
at the press box of dodgers stadium you
were you're a dodger beat rider i want
you to get in baseball mode for a moment
jason has experience jason covered the
l.a clippers he covered the dodgers
um moved to washington covered the
football team there so so jason has a
wide background sounds like he's
covering some losing franchises
i want to share with you yes
he's a winner though jason's a winner uh
but but
he this was my hot take of 2020 as i
watched it as i enjoyed watching
the dodgers win the championship um led
by mookie best believe it or not mookie
best represents what is wrong with
baseball
believe it or not and it has nothing to
do with him and it's not a negative
statement on him but a there should be
more of him
right there's no reason that we couldn't
have more african-americans playing
baseball more african-americans of him
who he's not lebron james he's
he's not a unique physical specimen
right he's just maximized his talents
but he's not one of the most gifted
athletes that we've seen so we could
replicate that
there should be more of him and there
should be more um
teams that could afford him it's a shame
that the dodgers were really the only
team that could afford him even though
they had a great roster
mvp on the roster as it existed young
award winners
but um the boston red sox said we can't
afford them as as
as lucrative and franchise as that's
been so the fact that there's only one
mookie bets
that there's only maybe one or two
franchises that can afford a mookie bets
it's just a bad reflection of baseball
to me that represents everything
that is bad about baseball what do you
see when you see mookie bets
well you know jay there's been a problem
in major league baseball
with you know attracting
african-american
talent for for quite some time now you
know we we look at
you know we talked about the uh the rbi
program reviving baseball in inner
cities
you know and and the idea was you know
start building fields in inner cities
and getting more
black kids playing the sport because i
mean you know back in the
back in the day you know back after
jackie robinson broke the color barrier
in baseball i mean african americans you
know flocked to baseball in the 50s and
the 60s and the 70s and
you know people talked about the
population in the 70s
exactly exactly now people talk about
the popularity of the nba
coinciding with with the with the
decline
of american interest in baseball you
know when i when i see mookie betts i
see a very talented athlete i see a a
great baseball player
but it's it it's not like you look at
mookie betts and
mookie betts is not lebron james like
you know
when i look at lebron james if i try to
draw a comparison with the nba
lebron james is is a physical freak
that he can do the things at 250 pounds
and 6-8
with his with his ability to handle the
ball in his vision so like
mookie betts is a great athlete don't
get me wrong but there are
it's not like mookie betts is such an
outlier
that you can't find a guy like this he's
not the greek freak
you know another another basketball
comparison so
you know baseball still has a problem
with with attracting african americans
to want to play that
game you know the nfl doesn't have that
problem the nba doesn't have that
problem
and as far as affording him look i i uh
tweeted during the
world series people can someone please
explain to me
why the red sox couldn't afford rookie
bets i don't buy that i mean i don't buy
that they could not
have found a way to retain him now they
they made a business decision not to do
it and you know
you know benefited the dodgers obviously
but yeah there's a lot going on what you
just said there but i think the core of
it is
baseball can has to continue to do a
better job of attracting
young african-american athletes to want
to play that game and want to invest in
that game
over the nba and over the nfl and you
know it's so specialized now fellas
as you know i mean like my son plays
plays travel baseball
and like i don't we don't see black kids
on any other
teams when we're going to these
tournaments in pennsylvania and around
so and you have to invest in in
basically one sport it's not like when
you know jay when you and i were you
know kids i mean i know vinnie's a
little younger than us but it's not like
when you and i were kids
now you invest in one sport you got to
get the hitting coaching you got to be
down with doing that non-stop so there's
a lot to what you said i agree with what
you said
i don't know the answer but i do know
this much the core of it is
baseball has to do a better job
attracting black athletes
i don't know if they will i don't know
if that's you know what you look at the
mlb academies and everything else like
they're putting their money in other
places
so i'm not sure if it's as much of a
priority for them like like you said
it's not
to me it's not so much about what
they're not bringing to football i think
football especially with cte
and some of these other things like
there's an opening there and it's not
just going to be the nba
that's going to take advantage of that
because not everybody can grow to be six
three six
four you know baseball you can be a
little bit on i would say mike newt but
you can be
under six feet around six feet and have
a greater chance of success there
and i think it just has to be to me i
think you pointed out jay it has to be
to end the specialization
yeah i mean the reality of it is is that
that it's so specialized now that kids
you know if you're a youth basketball
player
and you know you got a shot to get
recruited and and i'm not talking like
you know going straight from you know
one you know one and done but just
recruited and and playing college ball
then yeah you're going to focus on that
i remember j.a
real quick years ago we were talking
about this jay saw ryan howard somewhere
i don't know if i remember was ryan
howard he was a
power hitting first baseman for the
philadelphia phillies and i'll never
forget this
jay he either called me or texted me
he's like man i just saw ryan howard man
like
he's like not like any massive you know
physical special
you know no shade or disrespect but the
point he was making to me was that
you look at you know jay covered those
laker runs you got
you got shaq you got the diesel you got
kobe and
the point he was making to me and it's
always stuck with me is that you look at
ryan howard man
this dude like there's something though
there's a difference here
and that difference is playing itself
out more and more
well j with jay reid the the point of
spike it was like
howard's contract oh yeah i was gonna
say that yeah that
that house contract of mookie betsy's
contract right
mookie bets is getting like a third of a
billion dollars so
if wait if more maybe african-american
youth sports
participants saw those contracts saw
what could lie on the other end maybe
they'd be more interested
and more invested well jay reed despite
your asinine lebron michael jordan
opinions
i'm glad to have you all we are glad to
have you all here today man we
appreciate you
thanks brother appreciate you guys too
we're going we're going to bring you
back home for a different conversation
because lebron wants all that 2016 2020
you know extra credit all right
[Laughter]
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