00:00Something's happening in Chicago right now that's beyond thinkable, and we've experienced it here in New York, so I can relate to it, depending on how old you are.
00:08So they're trying to build a new stadium in Chicago, some suburb of Chicago.
00:13It's going to be like a retractable domed stadium, and that way if they want to let the cold weather come in for Bears games, they can.
00:20If they want to do concerts in February, they could by closing the roof and all that stuff.
00:24But they apparently don't have the money to do it.
00:26And whatever local officials that are in charge of tax revenue also won't earmark the type of money that the Bears ownership wants to build the damn thing, right?
00:36Now, just for the record, years ago, before this current people were in charge, they did buy the land where they wanted to put it.
00:42Yeah, so it was a racetrack.
00:43Yeah, they bought all of the land. Apparently there was now tax issues that held it up.
00:47Yeah, Chicago. It's a beautiful city. I love Chicago. It's just run by complete morons.
00:52It's another story for another day. But they're actually dealing now with the reality that, you know, New Yorkers dealt with many years ago with the New York Giants.
01:02Where are the New York Giants going to play? Well, are we going to build the New York Giants a stadium in New York?
01:07No, we're not going to do that. We're going to let them go to New Jersey.
01:09But we're not going to change the name. They're going to stay New York Giants.
01:13If you go way back in time, the New York Jets used to play games at Shea Stadium in Queens.
01:18Are we going to build a stadium for the New York Jets? Well, we came close to building one on the West Side Highway where the Jacob Javits Center is in New York City.
01:28I think that would have been cool, by the way.
01:29Also was going to house a Summer Olympics at the time.
01:31That would have been awesome.
01:32And local politicians who had money coming in illegally in their back pocket, they shut it down.
01:37So the New York Jets play New Jersey and the New York Giants play New Jersey.
01:40And while we grew up that way, so for us, a lot of us generationally never knew about the Polo Grounds or Yankee Stadium for football.
01:50Right.
01:50Because, you know, it's a baseball stadium, right?
01:52Polo Grounds is something our grandparents talked about or maybe our dads talked about when they were little.
01:57We've only known Giants and Jets football as something that takes place in the state of New Jersey.
02:03All right. Now, we're not changing the name because as much as I love New Jersey and you love New Jersey,
02:08it doesn't carry the same gravitas. You want to be the New York Giants and you make a lot more money in merch being the New York Giants
02:16than you would being the New Jersey Giants. It just doesn't ring, right?
02:19People from Queens aren't buying New Jersey anything.
02:21But imagine if you were old enough when the Giants left New York to go to New Jersey.
02:28Imagine if you were old enough when the New York Jets followed suit and wound up going to New Jersey.
02:34You would have been apoplectic about it, rightfully so.
02:36And the thing I think of with the best example for you, Tyrone, is that when the Sixers were trying to build a new arena
02:43in the Chinatown part of Center City and it got squashed, they then pivoted and said,
02:50all right, fine, we're going to go to Camden, New Jersey.
02:53And while Camden literally is a mile and a half away from where you currently play in South Philadelphia,
03:02that would have been a problem. If you're a diehard Sixers fan, your team would have been playing in another state.
03:08I don't care how close it is via the Ben Franklin Bridge, it's another state and you guys would have been livid about it.
03:15Absolutely.
03:16And by the way, rightfully so.
03:17That's what a practice facility is, but not games.
03:20So the flex now from the Chicago Bears ownership, and this is a flex, this is all this is,
03:26it's trying to force the hand of local politicians and get an army of Bears fans upset
03:31so that they'll call into talk radio, write letters to their state senators and congressmen and women
03:37and try to convince them this can't happen, all right?
03:40But the threat is, for those of you that don't know geography, and I went through this with my son
03:45who's driving through there right now, coming home from Iowa in college,
03:49is that Illinois borders Indiana.
03:52It's right there. It ain't that far away.
03:55It's right there.
03:56And Indiana would love to have the Chicago Bears playing their games in Indiana
04:04to the point where they've got all the money ready.
04:07They've got the land ready.
04:09They've got the permits ready.
04:11They've got shovels ready.
04:13They're ready to go today.
04:15And it's going to be interesting.
04:17Like, could you imagine an image of Mike Ditka running out of the tunnel,
04:22and instead of it saying Chicago Bears on his sweater, bang right there,
04:28the Indianapolis Bears.
04:30Now, part of the rub is they're still going to be called, I would think,
04:33the Chicago Bears because it's a legacy franchise.
04:36You know, one of the ones that started it.
04:38You know, due respect to the ownership group, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
04:42But if I'm a Chicago Bear fan, and for the first time in forever,
04:47it appears that I've got a good football team.
04:51It appears that I've got a really good coach in Ben Johnson.
04:54It appears that Caleb Williams is going to be a franchise quarterback.
04:58He's figuring it out.
04:59It seems like we're going to be good for a minimum of a good five to seven run,
05:04year run, right, which they have not had in a long time.
05:07They've never had in their career, in their history, a 4,000-yard passer.
05:13They might get one.
05:14They've never had a 30-touchdown guy.
05:16They might have one.
05:17All right?
05:18They've not been good since 85 or that one time where Jay Cutler took them
05:23to the playoffs.
05:24And I guess Grossman actually went to the Super Bowl.
05:25Grossman got them to a Super Bowl, but they had no chance of actually winning.
05:28There's no chance of winning that game.
05:30So if I'm a Bears fan, you're telling me we finally got things right on the field,
05:36and now you're threatening to move the team to Indiana?
05:41I don't care how close Indiana is to a Chicago suburb.
05:45It's not Chicago.
05:47It's not Illinois, as some of my friends say, right?
05:51Right.
05:51Well, the S should be said.
05:53It's Indiana.
05:53And I'm excited to put my feet up by the fireplace, get me some popcorn,
05:59and watch how this unfolds because in my head, the only time it's ever unfolded
06:05the wrong way was when the Giants and Jets both left New York.
06:09Every other team that's threatened it has gotten their stadium.
