Utah Jazz Team Building with Ryen Russillo | Roundball Roundup

0:00Brian Rusillo on the podcast today to talk about the jazz leadership front office. The team after the trade deadline. It is round bow round up on Utah jazz.com. I'm JP Chung on the Utah jazz podcast network. Start off the interview talking about Justin Zanick. Now, Zanick is the one that actually connected Rusillo with Adrian Wojczynowski. It was a roundabout way to get into what he's seen with the jazz overseeing a couple of rebuilds, being a part of it in the front office. We get there. I think I landed the plane, but bear with me at the beginning talking about how Zanick connected Woj with Rusillo five stars. Nice of you. That's all I ask of you. Let others know that you're listening to the podcast. Let's get to it. It's Ryan Rusillo on the Utah jazz podcast network.

1:17Jazz general manager Justin Zanick was able to connect you with Adrian Wojczynowski. If you could give a little background to how he led to that meet cute between you two. Yeah. I used to go to the sportsmith invitation tournament on my own back when I first first got started in Boston, so that was the end of 03, 04. I love the draft. It was always like my favorite thing, it still is my favorite thing on the calendar, and I would read, I would religiously read Chad Ford stuff. I felt like Chad Ford was speaking this language back in the year old ESPN insider days. There was a little graphic of him, but like a phone next to his face, so those old orange, orange, bright orange pages. There was a shift of college. It wasn't as obsessed with sports after growing up with it, maybe a little burnt out and realizing after college, I'm like, man, I really care about sports again. It's like the draft. I would teap track of stupid stuff that was pointless with these legal paths.

2:21Before I even had, I was like bartending, right? And so then I get into the business, and then I'm reading about Oval Pitkozine and Macha Lampi and just all these guys are doing, like, they seemed like mythical creatures, mythical beings, and I reached out to Chad. I was super aggressive back then. I just found his number and called him, and I was on the air in Boston, and he would come on all the time, and he was kind of like a really mentor for me. And so he was like, if you really into this and then building contacts around the league and all this different stuff that you'd want to do, because I'd be harassing the Boston guys, that was actually like in the gap year of Patino leaving, and then Chris Wallace, the Leo Papil, who were terrific to me before Danny came on. But right as I've gotten to Boston, it's kind of like when the new ownership was there, and then Danny came on to run everything. But Chad was like, go to Portsmouth. So Portsmouth invitationals, Portsmouth's Virginia, it's a high school gym. It's a hilarious roster construction where it's local businesses that draft the players. Like I'd think after a few drinks at a country club. And then the basketball isn't great.

3:22There's barely ever any first rounders there. I think it might even be worse now, but it's this traditional thing on the draft timeline. And I met Justin Zannick at it, and that's when Zannick was doing the agent thing in a ton of international guys, but it was all kind of coming together where it was like we had no information on the interview in the actual guys. I couldn't watch anything. There was nothing online. I used to ask D1 schools to send me DVDs of players. I remember Syracuse actually asked for the DVD back after I was done one year, which it still was very surprising to me. I didn't send it back, and it just wasn't good at mailing stuff. And so early on Zannick became somebody that was a friend more than he was. It would be rarely ever talk about the Milwaukee box. Or we wouldn't really talk about what's going on with the Utah Jazz. He was just somebody that became way more than a source. And not even a source is not a reporter, but just like, hey, what the hell's going on here? What have you heard there? Like Zannick seemed to have a real interest in like my life.

4:23And so as things got bigger and better for me, throughout all the SPN years, Lodge comes on the scene. I don't know Lodge at all. Like I don't only knew Lodge is like the guy that kind of hated the SPN. People forget about that. But people, that's what it seemed like. And not that I was, you know, there's plenty of stuff when you work at ESPN. There's all these voices. So it doesn't mean like it's actually kind of the opposite of politics. Like just because of another guy's on the air at ESPN, doesn't mean I'm just going to agree to him all the time about everything that he says. There's a lot of voices. There's a lot of opinions. There's plenty of people that I love to death. And there's plenty of people that I work with that I was like, I cannot believe that this is what you, your final conclusion of these things, or this is your opinion, all this different stuff. So it wasn't that I was like a prideful ESPN guy, being like this Widge guy better watch a step, but I just didn't really know anything about him other than I was reading him. And then he was just destroying everybody in the insider game.

5:25Like I think peak Widge is unassailable. I don't think there's ever been an insider in any other sport that can match what his peak years were. And so I asked Zannock, I was like, what is up? Because I guess the story that John Skipper was in the president of ESPN and finally like pitched a Widge, like will you come to ESPN? And he's like, I'm sick of seeing you kick our ass in your name on the bottom line every single time there's a new NBA trade or some sort of announcement. And the funniest thing too is that like Widge grew up not that far away from all of this stuff. I think he's in the Bristol Hall of Fame before ESPN. And I'm giving you the full back stories that I do as a podcaster here. But I just like taught to Danik was like, what's up with this Widge guy? Like that I just was probably as a as a mass fall like predetermined and probably not like him. And Zannock was like, you guys are going to love each other. He's like, you guys are going to love each other. And we were at the combine in Chicago. And it was very like kind of standoffish and not that I'm competing with Widge.

6:25Like Widge is at such a different level of what I'm doing in the NBA world. But Zannock's like, hey, this is Widge, you're going to need for Sillo and we're like, hey. And then it was like auto. It just was it clicked. And Widge is probably one of my closest friends now still. But it's all because of Zannock just knowing us as well as he did that he was like, you guys are actually going to hit it off perfectly. And Widge that level of friendship, there have been times where it surprises me how much Widge is, you know, in a private way is hit me up. And I, you know, if it doesn't happen without Zannock, so it lends itself to what Zannock does, which is be a connector him taking that agent background, jumping to the front office, be the general manager of the jazz and having that experience with Milwaukee him using that skill to connect you to in that moment.

7:26Yeah, I love all the things that Zannock is great at. I think he's maybe one of the most comfortable human beings that I've ever run into that he is. I mean, look, let's just, let's just say what it is. Like, age is arguably one of the most popular and Danny is one of the most popular people in this. So there's other people in Zannock's position that would probably find that dynamic to be like challenging. Or am I going to get enough credit or does anyone know, because like as soon as any of those bigger deals, which Zannock had its own to do with the happen, it's, it's like, oh, look at Danny age. Danny, you have to be an incredibly secure person who is unemotional in a very emotional game. To continue to, I think it just makes up all these things like he's successful because of all of his talents, but he's also successful because of the demeanor that he has.

8:30And it was, it was a good dance scouting by Zannock on, on both myself and Boge. When you look at the way that he's gone about this rebuild alongside Danny age, alongside now Austin age, he's seen two rebuilds here in Utah when you look back to even the mid 2010s days. How is this rebuild grading out as they're starting to see the end of it with this Jiren Jackson junior trade? Yeah, I don't know that we are ready to give it a grade though, you know, because prior to the Jiren Jackson, I think you're saying that, right? Yeah, like I don't know that we're going in the next year being like, okay, are they a four seed and then how far are we from a title contender? Exactly. I actually, I'm going to talk about Danny here because after I had met like the guys that were keeping the seat warm in Wallace and Pepeel and Boston for Danny, and then Danny came in. Danny and I had a really good relationship. I used to work out at the Celtic facility in Waltham, and he would be nice enough to invite me up and, you know,

9:31granity probably didn't, wasn't all that impressed with that basketball I came in at the time, but he would kind of speak to me about like philosophical differences of like building a team, right? And so I remember when they did the Ricky Davis trade, right? And everybody's like, well, why would they do the Ricky Davis trade? And angels like this talent, this roster is so bad, like I'm just trying to make this roster more talented. I need to figure out a way to do that, whether it's defining the right draft picks or these incremental trades where maybe I'm taking somebody that's in a situation that's contractually or maybe a little damage goods, but if this player is a little bit better, like I have to, from the start, I have to make this roster a little more talented. And the other thing that he taught me is that we were so obsessed back then, and I've told the story plenty of times, so with listeners of Myrlist, that's probably like, oh, here we go again, this angel lesson, but I want to share with your audience is that we were like obsessed with cap space back in the day, 20 years ago, obsessed with it. And cap space has never been less valuable because now the player just signs that if he wants out, he's

10:33just going to ask out. And everybody can kind of keep their own, well, I can't say everybody can keep their own players, but the new restrictions in the first decade, but the cap keeps going up so much because business has been so good and it's happening in football too, that there's just a lot, there isn't that handcuffed seven-year max contract where you go, oh my god, did we screw up, and then you have like five years to go. So, age was always about, hey, I want to know what I'm getting. I don't want to go into free agency in July being like, I hope somebody picks me, and then it's the guy picks the one team, then 19 sporting cap space are incredibly disappointed, and then you go to your own or your fan base, you're like, what happened? Well, it's awesome cap space that we're going to have. It's like, well, now we're sending branded Jennings, 15 million bucks. Um, this, this deal, and you know, look, Austin is, is terrific. I, I've known him, obviously, listen to any, but this deal, I think speaks to that philosophy of, okay, look, we have something

11:36here in Kionte, all right? Like, there's something here. The A stuff through this year, I think, is a win. You know, and it was such, um, like this, this traffic made a lot of sense, like before the draft, I was like, I wonder if they just go like, hey, let's take the six seven guy, you know, like, they talent, good talent. Right. Right. Right. And you also realize too, like, all the guys in front of them look like they're going to be really, really good too. So, you know, maybe he ended up going where he was supposed to. Uh, in the, obviously, like the Kessler part of it, I think the Kionte jumped to go from like a smaller guard that's a score first guard that looks a little lost the first couple of years, and you're like, okay, I know what his high school resume is. I know what he did in like one half, like, you know, there's some of those games, um, when I was watching a college where I'm like, oh my god, like, this guy looks unstoppable. And then he looks like a complete mess. And then these, these smaller guards are like, I don't know where this is going. And then an increase in usage volume shots, he actually becomes way more efficient. So, you know, okay, so we now we have, we have a couple things here on top of the collection of guards

12:37who might all be backups. But there's, there's like a lot of sifting through the decisions. And so when the Jaron Jackson Jr. thing becomes available, I was like, of course, they did this. Of course, they did this because they know, and look, sure, I wish he rebounded more and fouled less. I wish he wasn't 50 plus million a year. But I know how special he is and how much of a nightmare he is as a matchup. And I also think the creativity of like the stuff they could do with him at center and then playing and with Kessler, depending on how they want to roll some of those lineups out there, they are in a market that is not a destination, which is its own topic that I'd love to get to. But they are in control of the acquisition. And that's what I think this deal was all about. And is he a top seven guy? No. Is he even a top two? Like he's not thought of as a top 10 guy right now. But when you start waiting around for like the player that doesn't have any flaws, then you're going to be waiting forever. Unless you have it all figured out at time, you're one of three major markets. So, you know, I know what you're saying is like, where's the grade on the rebuild? I just love that there now feels like, okay, we'll see what the pick here is in 26 and 26. And like,

13:41what are our three best guys going to look like? And clearly, you know, we haven't even talked about Larry because of what's going on with the substitutions and not playing and everything. It is going in the next year of feeling like, all right, there's an identity of like who the main guys are with this team. And I love the Jared Jackson thing. Even as expensive as this. And who knows if he's hurt, then I'll regret saying that and they'll regret trading for. But even you bring up Lowry, everybody's trying to trade him every season off season. And for a front office to realize, I mean, are we supposed to have zero good players on this team? Is that the direction that that this is supposed to go? Keeping good players ends up being a win once you make this trade in. And now you have different things to do around it. It's another great point. And it's another thing that I'll go back like almost 20 years now is that when the Celtics were leaned after Doc comes in and oh, four, and they're not great. It's like, okay, well, you have to trade Paul Pierce to go full rebuild here. And Danny would be like, I want to add to Paul Pierce. Paul Pierce

14:46is awesome. I don't want to trade Paul Pierce. Not to say that Utah wouldn't trade Lowry. But I think you brought up a great point in that the bad teams, the second you have somebody good, you're supposed to just give them away at all the other teams. And clearly the pricing in Utah with Austin as well here, like they're not the prices are high and good for them. The prices should be high on a player of, you know, I think maybe two years ago when he first comes down the scene, you're like, oh my god, like this guy's incredible. Like what happened in Chicago? What happened in Cleveland? Like, even if they were a little burst of it, it's this steady, like almost all star level play from from marketing. But they weren't so concerned with the rebuild because we really are so annoying about these like structures and the timeline conversation of rebuilding teams. It's like, oh, okay. So now we're kind of rebuilding even if we want to get into semantics debate about it or rebuilding or whatever. It's like, all your players will be like 18 or 19. It's like, yeah, but what about our 23 year old? That's really good. It's like, no, you can't have him.

15:47He's not on the same timeline. Like what? Not on the same timeline is like guys that may be in the G league in two years. So I'm not swearing because it's a Utah podcast. But I, I, you know, what I think is the best thing about this front office and their ownership. And I am, you know, I sat next to Ryan for two games during that homestand. And you can't help a people on a way by the sincerity and then how impressive he is. And I have a relationship with will already not that we're winning on the summer vacation together. So there is definitely some inherent bias that I will admit to here because I just like so many of the people with this organization. But they are exactly what you would want in the face of all the lack of patience decisions that we see in sports. It's not even the NBA. Like I love that they're like, you know, but the amount of time that goes by that's actually pretty insignificant. But in the moment, you lose sight of like you start making these decisions that don't really make any sense. Because it's like,

16:48hey, how come we're not going to do this or this is taking too long or this guy's too good or this guy isn't good enough and all this different stuff. So I just think that they are the epitome of patience in an impatient world. How much of what they've done is incumbent on Keonte taking this step because I don't think that you would have the same view of Keonte year two into what he's shown this season and the steps that he's taken. Yeah, I mean, that's a tough one too because then you start going like, all right, well, you know, how much are we paying him? Because then you can get into the like, do we really want to pay the small guard this much that's to this point more of a one-way player? You know, I just think that the biggest positive is that it went from, I have no idea how this is going to end. Like I didn't know what the Keonte George conversation was going to be year four and now that's completely flipped in that. I know I expect him to get a ton of buckets. I know

17:50that he's going to get paid a really big contract. And I guess what you're asking is like how much is it change what they're seeing is like, I have no idea if I'm going in the next year going like, all right, they're 100% like a top 18 in the West. In the West is ridiculous right now. You know, Portland's is going to be getting better. I don't really want to project all the depth charts on all these teams for the 26, 27 team, but it's going to be really, really competitive even with a healthy group for all this. So I think it can get lost a little bit like, hey, Keonte, he's taking the steps. So now what do you think is possible? Well, I think them just being in that conversation say the bottom four of the top eight in the West without that, without that, I don't really know what I think of this team. You know, I probably as much as I like Triple J and Lowry, there's the rest of the guards. I do not see his like long term starting guards in this league. So maybe they're they're playing Collier of ton of minutes, you know, maybe they're playing

18:52in sense about 100 minutes, you know, maybe they're they're doing some stuff where you're like, yeah, I think we're playing a third guard at point guard. And instead of with Keonte, like, he's clearly going to be a one is just a matter of how much of a one is he on a winning team. What stands out when you watch Will Hardy coaching this team? As I think it has to lend to the watchability factor of the jazz when you see in those two games, Will's throwing up stuff that is incredible. I think my favorite thing about him is that generally he's going into an outman. And then when you talk to other coaches, they're like, God, he's so good. Like other teams point out like the stack deck that's going up against him every night, which I'm sure is like it's great to get paid. It's great to be an NBA head coach. It's great to be way ahead of schedule and a profession where guys that young don't usually get this opportunity. But getting your ass kicked every night now for a while, I'm sure is really tough. And I think the part that I

19:57found most most impressive being right up next to him for those couple games is how hard, you know, we can get into the dynamic of like a generational thing of like why do players have to tell you that you're allowed to coach them? But that's what it is. You know, if you don't want to worry about people's feelings in the dynamic and how people are different in which button is to push with people that you can't push with others, then get into a different profession. So I was even surprised a few times. Again, this because of the seat that I had. So it wasn't like he was telling me the stuff. I'm just watching it. He was on his guys for a team that's been losing games in a way where I was like, whoa, like that's that's pretty pointed or like he's going at one of his best guys here. And what I realized when I learned after those two days is that his guys want him to coach them like that. And that's that's hard to do. You know, normally it's like a younger guy. I'm like to start tune you. I think all these coaches get tuned out eventually. This is kind

20:59of the way the sport works. So yeah, other coaches are always impressed with how hard the guys play. How he's had to utilize a million different lineups. So it feels like depending on who your number one option is going to be for five minutes stretches, knowing that some guys are just way more comfortable. You know, I sewing get out of the way versus some of the creative ways that they get lower involved. And you know, not just making him feel like if it's six, 10 or seven feet tall that he's going to like bring the ball to court and all that kind of different stuff. So there's an on-port stuff that the other teams get, but but having that and I don't feel like I'm giving away anything here, but just seeing the conversation during those two nights of like, hey, this guy's going up against I think at the time it was still like the clippers were rolling and he's going into it being like I expect to win this game. Not the many of these guys never like think they're going to lose or like a couple of balances, a couple of threes go our way. We can win this basketball game. But he he has to

21:59be somebody that the team really respects for a losing team to still be coached that hard, which is I think what every coach at their core would hope from their team. So that's the thing that jumps out the most. The alignment. I mean, and you spoke to this earlier, the alignment from ownership to front office to head coaches lockstep that really helps and enables him to coach the way that he does it. Yeah, I think other I think other owners would go, hey, let's just change the coach. You know, and instead he's got Zannick, Danny, Ange, and Austin, H probably going that would be there's other owners that would make it harder on the front office, especially a new owner, okay? Like I talked about it. I've written about it where there was another group that I was talking to you that was like a minority partner or a team and they wanted to get involved and I was like if you do this, like I'm going to give you, I wrote out like a timeline of every new owner of the

22:59last 20 years, the huge mistake they made within the first 12, 18 months on the job, like they cannot help themselves. Like, hey, I finally own a team as any of us would ever dream of being able to pull that off and like you grow up with it and you think it can't be that much of a difference between me and these these front office guys. And look, I think most people would tell you that ultimately the owner is the GM, but there's probably enough respect equity from age and Utah. You would think with Ryan, where it's like, hey, Ryan, I think you might be wrong about it, but I don't see Ryan as as as a meddler in because he isn't. He no one's ever said anything about that to me at all. Like you need an ownership that, you know, you can sit there and I'm not even talking about Ryan right now, but like you can vision the guy like has his Ted talk and he's getting out there with the earpiece and he's all fired up. He's like, this is how I'm going to do it. It's how I'm going to do it. And then that guy comes in with his billions to the NBA world and he just thinks he's going to do the exact same thing. And it's like, you can like, that's really going to matter here.

24:01Like a lot of this is how lucky do we get the year we have lottery picks, to be honest with you. But that's a very short interview, which wouldn't be all that impressive with an owner, but that's really, that's unfortunately kind of what dictates who's good and who isn't. Jazz are going to see the nuggets tonight. When you look at the West, I mean, Denver is really impressive. They have the best player in the world with Yokech. But are they going to be healthy? I sometimes just count on them not being healthy at the end of it, but they're still a pretty damn good team. What is the Western conference heading into this playoff run? It's, it's really all over the place. Like I love to see at least like six weeks of continuity from a team closing the regular season so that I feel like you have a better sense of who they are. Like there's been some next matchups against the pistons where I go. Like we can talk about the

25:02next mix because we're in 60 games and I just don't think they can be Detroit with the way they match up against them. And then they beat San Antonio, the hottest team in the league and undefeated February. And it was funny because then I was watching it. And I try not to play the results, although it's really hard to ignore at times as you go, okay, so now they beat San Antonio. So now you like the next again if you basically wrote them off after the last Detroit loss, which was again another Detroit loss. But there was something to the continuity of the next. Like the only argument that they seem to have right now is DOR and so hand, which is a good spot to be in because first of all, it shouldn't be an argument. And it wasn't an argument in that game against San Antonio. So the reason I say all that is that like I think we know what Houston looks like now with the read shepherd minutes where he's clearly email is given in. It's like, okay, he's going to be the guard. He's playing over 30 minutes of game more often in February than he has in any other point in season. So there's there's something there that I like even if I haven't liked their closing offense very much, right? Okay, see, it seems to not matter. They didn't play SGN the overtime win against Denver. And Jay William still isn't playing. AJ Mitchell's myth of ton of games,

26:07Karuso just kind of came back recently. So he did play made some great defensive plays in that one. So it's like, okay, see isn't even necessarily fully formed. Minnesota feels fully formed. I want to go see him in the Clippers. They beat the Clippers who've done a great job on the margins with some of these later picks. But I don't know, like I just I'm like, are they going to win the West? Like that seems, that seems hard to predict even if we feel like there's some continuity to them. So that brings us to Denver. Alright, so Denver, Gordon hasn't played in forever. Watson hasn't played recently, which may be one of the most remarkable NBA player of the week awards in the history of me ever watching the game. If you would ever told me at any point, Peyton Watson's going to win NBA player of the week, I'd be like, what happened to the rest of the players? Like, is there, is there, is there a shortage? Yeah, he, yeah, a bunch of guys volunteer for something. He was like, I'll run game. Um, I know this sounds like it's a nasty Peyton Watson commentary, but it really has way more to do with like a skill that he wasn't ever allowed to, to show. And then it was like, oh, so these are going to be working dudes on the ball 30 feet away

27:11from the loop. Like, oh, my God. So he hasn't been playing, right? And, and I know the Gordon baseline stuff is like super important for what they want to do with Yoke, because if Gordon's hit in threes, although I think they're from more specific areas, as opposed to like some of these going to be coming off of curls, full speed, catch the shoot stuff. Um, it just kind of opens up everything I want to do. But Denver, I did this this morning, because I was watching both Denver games really closely, the Friday game, okay, C's, you know, if you're not watching that game, what are you doing? And then of course against, right, walls, like, again, I want to go see Aunt live, and I still seem to have this like slight problem in Minnesota. And that's only through the lens of, can they with the whole thing and not have it be a surprise to you? So how about this for Denver? They're four and eight in their last 12. They have two wins against teams that are 500 or better as of today, their records since January 7th. It's Boston, both times. January 7th, on Boston. And then more recently against Boston, Boston was ending up a long stretch kind of brutal. They lost by 20 points. So let's two wins now. We're almost two months and it's only two wins

28:15against teams. I've heard. So if you look at their home record, they're 16 and 12, which is unheard of for Denver. And I think the most alarming thing that keeps coming up with Yokech or without Yokech in the clutch, they have a net rating of 27. They're last three years. They were first in the NBA, third in the NBA, first in the NBA, which makes sense because Yokech is going to get you an awesome look. They're going to be good enough defensively. They're going to be fantastic on offense. They'll figure it out. There's always some clutch stuff like you can point, you can present you with any number. If you give me a long enough time, I can probably find a way to pick it apart. But there is no way in the world the nuggets should be 27th net rating with the best player in the world on their team. And so that has to be corrected. I don't even know that it's necessary. Like, why are we doing wrong? What are we not like? Are we just having a brutal stretch of shooting? Because there's some times where I'll see a clutch number for a team where I go, oh, that number is really good, but I actually don't like you. That's fun. You know, like, I think we should still be allowed to do some of that stuff. So general was my pick to win the Westman. And I don't know how I make that argument after two months of this. And you could talk about,

29:17again, lack of continuity, Yokech being out for such a long stretch, thinking they get going back, they don't get them back. I think it was a nice reminder of what Murray is capable of doing. And just like back to that Laker series, when they won the whole thing and you go, like, do you realize how nasty this guy can be sometimes? And so we get to see some of that. We got to see some of the depth that Malone never seemed to really buy into. So there's enough there. The Cam Johnson minutes this weekend were brutal, but there's still enough there for me to go, okay, I'm not writing you off, but this has to, like, you can't finish the regular season with the same kind of run with or without Gordon and have me think that you can beat OKC. It just, you know, even with OKC, taking a step back from the 24 and one pace and going like, what's the Jalen Williams situation going to be? That was a night at their place. Brandon was overtime, but to lose that one with no SGA playing, they chose not to play him. That's just kind of one of those losses that feels like it's more than one loss. I was reading Schumann and he brought up that

30:23they had not won two straight games since January. And that was very concerning for this stage of the season where you're playing teams who have different incentives at the end. Not that I, I mean, I bet you could look through their schedule and see how tough it is, but that being a pretty glaring issue to look at. Look, I'll tell you though, the schedule hasn't really, I mean, up until the last little stretch here, I mean, yeah, I guess it has been a little tougher here because it's, it's like Clippers right into OKC, which was another loss. You know, so they, they have hit some of these teams, but then there was this other stretch in January, but they were winning all these games, but that was out, without Yokeich, but I mean, other than the Charlotte and LA games in here, but like, you know, it's funny. Even the year they won the whole thing, if I go back to the standings, right? They were a 53 win one seed. So that's pretty

31:25low. They were 19 and 22 on the road. So it's a below 500 team on the road, and it's a 53 win one seed, which again is, is lower historically. So even as they were going into the playoffs, that year, there wasn't like some foregone conclusion. I mean, that's a section strange year. This was almost like the 2007 AP rankings in college football, which almost none of your audience is going to remember, but it was like my first year really covering it, and it was just absurd, Boston College was number two at one point in the country in football. Memphis was a two seed, which I think they have a banner for because they're so proud of it. They were a two seed with 51 wins, and then Sacramento was the three seed at 48 wins. All right, Sacramento. This is not even three years ago in real time on a calendar. The Sacramento Kings were a three seed in the NBA. So why am I bringing up all this stuff? Probably because it's a podcast and there's no hard out. But

32:26if you look at Denver this year, there's 16 and 12 at home. I mean, you want to keep crying about injuries. The Lakers are 17 and 12. But goal state workers are 19 and 12 at home. So clutch, dumpy resume here, and not even close to being the team, they have always been at home, even when they were bad on the road, winning a championship three years ago. People care about college football here, so give the audience a little credit for 2007-8 people. I mean, I get it was before Utah won undefeated, but still. That's right. Utah did go to undefeated. BAML wasn't super interested. I'm just kidding. That was, I worked with a BAML guy. He's like, we didn't care about that, okay? Like, you didn't care. It seemed pretty competitive. Seemed pretty competitive that one. Like, God, BAML, we play for national championships. Like, you guys Sabin just got there. It's the sugar ball. Yeah. Like, pretty important.

33:29Well, they were in front of back-to-back Florida, Alabama, SEC title games. So, I could understand the disappointment at it, but it was just a little, and that's the part of, you know, the non SEC part of me that's like, yeah, that's annoying. Like every time you lose but you didn't care. Didn't care. Be awesome. I love to have that. Anything that happens to me, let's go. I didn't care that day. He's Ryan Rusillo of the Ryan Rusillo show. Ryan, thank you so much for joining. Roundball Roundup on Utah Jazz.com. Thanks so much for having me. Can't wait to do that.