Paris Olympics_ Highlights and Takeaways

Welcome back. I'm Tiffany Meyer. Now for your sports news, we're joined by NTD's Dave Martin. Dave, the Olympics ended yesterday with plenty of highlight performances and records broken. What were some of your takeaways from the games? Well, you know, for one thing, there's got to be a resolution to what global organization is going to oversee boxing, especially women's boxing. Now, the IOC was in charge this time because they stripped the IBA from those powers. But of course, there was plenty of disagreement over what, if any, gender testing should take place at these games. Now, as far as highlights, you know, the Women's Gymnastics USA team was incredible, winning gold. I think we're all wondering, is Simone Biles going to compete again in four years at the 2028 games? Now, she'll be 31 then, but of course, she looked tremendous this time around, so we'll have to see in four years. Speaking of old, I thought a very underrated story is how Team USA's basketball team was led by two of the oldest players. That's LeBron James at 39, Steph Curry at 36. LeBron continues to defy age as just an all-around great player. Steph was incredible, especially the last two games in helping the US win gold. And of course, there's also breakdancing. Now, I thought this was an iffy sport to begin with, only because it's so unopened to interpretation. You know, you don't have people performing the same moves like you would in like figure skating or skateboarding. And of course, some of the performances were incredible, some not so much. So I'll be very interested to see if that's back in four years. Well, one Olympic sport that will be returning in 2028 is baseball, which has been an on-again, off-again Olympic sport. Has there been any certainty regarding whether Major League players will be allowed to play? That has not been agreed upon yet. You know, unfortunately for Major League Baseball, this disrupts their season. You know, the games are only 16 days long. We probably have to give players like, I don't know, at least a month off. And that's during the very crucial moments, or months of July and August. Now, would they continue to play without those players? That's a possibility. Or could you pause the season? But if you did that, you're either starting or you're ending in winter, and baseball is not a winter sport. Plus, of course, there's injury risk. Now, the best players generally have the most expensive contracts. No one wants these players coming back at less than 100%. Now, in 2021, the last time this is Olympic sport, Major League Baseball, they didn't allow anyone not on their 40-man roster. So, you had a whole bunch of unknown players. It didn't make for a very fan-friendly sport there. So, I'll be curious if there's a way to please everyone here. Looking at college football, the preseason AP poll was released today with Georgia at the top. But what did you make of Mighty Alabama being ranked fifth? I thought it was about right. You know, it's probably expected with the retirement of Nick Saban. What makes it noteworthy is that this is their lowest preseason ranking since 2009, which was when they won their first of six titles under Nick Saban. It just shows how dominant he was as a head coach. Now, interestingly, this poll is very close to the preseason coaches poll that was released that last week. Both polls are the same top seven teams. That's Georgia at number one, followed by Ohio State, Oregon, Texas, Alabama, Ole Miss, and Notre Dame at seven. The AP then is Penn State and Michigan at 8-9, while the coaches poll is those same two as well, but flip-flopped. And both have Florida State at 10. Now, Florida State is the first team that's not in Big Ten or SEC or independent like Notre Dame in the top 10. It really shows how those two super conferences have really consolidated the best football schools really into two power conferences, because that's where all the TV money is. All that said, though, the preseason rankings don't mean much. They're just things for you and I to talk about, really. Shifting gears to the NFL, your team, the New York Jets, finally addressed the situation with edge rusher Hassan Redick, who has yet to report for training camp, saying they won't trade him. How did they end up in this standoff? I'm wondering that, too. They just traded for him in March, gave up a future third round pick. I think we all presumed they had worked out whatever was wrong with his contract. Now, it was a popular belief that his negative feelings about his contract was the reason he was traded. Now, he's got one year left at 14 million. It's non-guaranteed, which is not very high for someone coming off consecutive Pro Bowl appearances. But he skipped all the Jets' offseason activities, some are mandatory, and he's yet to report for training camp. That's 21 days he's missed, and it's a $50,000 fine per day, and that is mandatory. That's over a million dollars in fines that he's already got at this point. But for players, I mean, holding out is usually their only way of leveraging these contract negotiations, but we haven't actually heard from him what his reason is. Whatever it is, it seems there was clear miscommunication between the Jets and him at the time of the trade. Hopefully, it gets resolved soon for us Jets fans. Well, Dave, as always, thanks for joining us. Well, thank you, Tiff.