It’s that time again, folks, Fred and the Fantastic on BLEAV and on PodClips. We’ll talk about this, that, and anything in sports with Laura, with Art, with Mark, and with you. And you can email us at [email protected], [email protected]. We talk about this all the time, television and the fans, and this and that. Art was a professional golfer. He made a quarter of a million dollars on the PGA Tour many, many, many years ago because he’s 128 years of age. So on Thursday, I tried to watch the PGA opening day,

You tried to watch the Masters on seven different channels?

I tried to watch it, and this is no joke. I’m not putting you on now. I had to go to Paramount first,

Right.

Then I had to go to Anthem, Prime, Prime Video,

Right.

Then I had to go to ESPN.

ESPN+, too, they had it on.

So, wait a minute. So, I do a radio show, this one and others, so that’s my job to keep up with it. I don’t care if you’re an average fan or not of golf, how the blank blank can you possibly keep up with this blank blank, Art? Tell me what’s going on.

Well, here’s what’s going on. McIlroy’s winning the tournament. A lot of big, big-time players are in the house.

My pick.

Yeah, there you go. At 12-1, not a bad choice. But here’s what’s really going on. If you go to Masters.com, you can circumvent all this stuff.

You get it all?

Yep, you get it all. Masters.com, they cover, they just take the feeds from all the other seven different companies: Prime, ESPN+, ESPN, CBS Sports, and they just run it through. So, I mean, you know, the buffering part we’ve talked about, it’s a little funky with golf because the putt will be going toward the hole as it’s shuffling.

Isn’t it on the Golf Channel? Isn’t it on the Golf Channel now?

You can watch the Golf Channel during, prior to the ESPN actual telecast on Linear TV. But they don’t, they show highlights. It has to be 60 seconds after it happened, so you get a lot of highlights and stuff like that. But Fred, no, I feel for you, Fred, because, you know, it is the Rites of Spring, the Masters, the 90th Masters. It’s exciting, I mean, the place is just gorgeous. If you ever get a chance, friends, you gotta go there one time and see this beautiful former nursery. And Bobby Jones said it the best. When he saw the land 90 years ago, 100 years ago, he said, This place was made to have a golf course built here. And as we’ve seen over the years, politics aside, the Masters is a pretty incredible sports spectacle.

All right, Richard Nixon did very little right, in fact, almost nothing right, but his Prop 13, on a national basis, evening things up, or trying to even things up between women and men in sports, was a positive. There’s no question. When I was going to high school a long, long time ago, the women played six on six. I mentioned this before, but they didn’t play six on six; they really only played three on three, because only half of them could play defense and half of them could play offense, because they didn’t think women could play the entire court. Okay, then Nixon comes in and does nothing right except this, and he opened it up for women with Prop 13. On Sunday, I’m watching UCLA play basketball against South Carolina, and Cori Close has got this team playing about as well as you can play. And I got to congratulate her and, of course, you know, she’s got the advantage. The men’s coach is Mick Cronin, so she’s gonna definitely look better than him. But anyways, they had six veteran players, six senior players, and they’re all gonna graduate and be drafted by the WNBA, but Laura. Let’s go to Laura first. She was a former basketball star in high school. Laura, what do you think about Richard Nixon, Prop 13, and what’s going on now in 2026?

Well, I do think that, obviously, the reforms were great for women’s sports. You know, when I was growing up, as a kid, before I got to high school, I mean, there really wasn’t, even during high school, there wasn’t any support for women’s sports. And the women who did play sports were kind of looked down on, you know, by everybody. And I was such a tomboy growing up that it was kind of a whole avenue that was shut off for me, personally. And I didn’t really get back into playing sports until after I was out of college. So, you know, it’s a great thing. I agree with you, Fred, that that’s one of the few things that Richard Nixon did right. But yeah, that was a good thing. I loved watching UCLA, even though it was a rout, because they just played so well. All of them, the whole,

Laura. Can I ask you a question? What was the whole Geno Auriemma and the coach Staley? What was that whole fight all about in the semifinals? That was pretty scary to me.

Well, I think they’ve had animosity between them. Obviously, the two best in the last,

I would say, yeah, yeah.

In the last decade. South Carolina and obviously Connecticut, probably the two best schools as far as women’s basketball,

Women’s programs, yeah.

And so they’re very competitive. And, I guess he wouldn’t shake her hand.

Oh, he did not want to shake her hand. Well, that’s not right. Did he apologize for that later?

A couple of days later, yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

A prediction, not a spoiler. And I covered the NBA for three years when they had the Sue Birds and all these guys in it. Becky Hammond. But let me tell you, with the little help from the NBA that gave them that push, the WNBA is now expanding to 18 teams. I mean, you got Angela Reese now playing for Atlanta from Chicago. I’m telling you right now, guys, the WNBA is gonna pass up the NBA for popularity.

Wow, that’s a big statement.

Well, here’s the thing in the States, in the States, really. What’s the percentage of people watching the NBA compared to? They’re making their money from the foreign countries?

Sure, they are.

So the WNBA, the people in the States are really watching this. I mean, you’re getting crowds. And that’s why I’m saying the decline of the NBA is gonna be the boom for the WNBA. Could be wrong, but just throwing it out there,

I agree with that statement. But to say they’re gonna surpass,

Hey, you don’t think, okay, you don’t think the NHL right now is passing the NBA in attendance and everything?

Mark, Mark, let’s go by this. The women, the highest paid now, they make money through advertising.

Somebody just got a million-dollar contract.

Right? advertising, commercial. So some women will make a million or two, or $4 million. If it’s Caitlin Clark, whatever the case might be,

They make it 50, though the NBA, they’re making 50, so how can you say that, Mark?

Seriously, I need to go because I’m talking to the viewership, I’m talking to the decline of the sport.

You’re talking future, like 10, 12, 15 years from now, I’m talking about down the line. Unless they bring in a Kobe Bryant type that can take this, and maybe Wembanyama’s the guy. But unless they take us into the future with somebody that can be the face of the NBA, I think it’s gonna go off a cliff.

All right, what if I told you that sports itself is in big trouble? Laura’s an attorney, let’s make her the judge.

Okay, I love Laura. Fifty years from now, is the women’s game gonna top the men’s game, yay or nay?

Come on, Laura.

Well, that’s not really a judge’s obligation; it’s more like a gambling thing.

Give us your opinion.

You know, I don’t know. I wouldn’t even venture to say that, but I would say that the men’s college final surpassed the women’s college final because it was so competitive.

And their ratings were booming up 20%.

It was so,

That was awesome; it was an incredible game. I mean, it was like watching old-school basketball, every play. There was no zone. I don’t think either team played a zone defense once in that entire game. I mean, it was.

It was fun to watch,

It was fascinating. And I have, speaking of defense, I love defense, and I have a, when we used to watch, when we used to listen to Vince Scully call games in the old days, he would always say what the defense was doing, he’d say the defense is shaded to the left. Or they’re playing double play depth or whatever. They never talk about defense anymore on the broadcasts, and I’d like to know kind of what their defenses are.

Well, that’s painting the word’s eye view, which is what the great radio broadcasters of the ’50s, ’60s, ’70s, ’80s, and ’90s. That’s what they did. I mean, he digs in there from the left side,

Yeah.

He feels the bat. You’re putting it in the mind’s eye, and that’s why baseball was,

But they don’t even show you the defense on TV, not like they even show it.

That’s why TV does nothing for baseball. I like radio baseball. I think you’re right, Mark, you got the serious package.

$5.99.

You can’t beat that for the whole season.

I mean, I listened to a game on the radio the other day, or last season, I think, and it was really fun to listen to it on the radio. I’d forgotten how much fun it is.

What about, what about? Guys? Here’s something. What about these City Connect jerseys, man?

Oh God,

They’re like $200. Did you see the Giants one with the poop stain on it? I was like, Oh my God, that is so bad.

Fred, it’s a money purge the Dodgers have come up with one with. I think it’s a blue with L.A. across it.

I want to go back to Dan Hurley of Connecticut, he did the right thing. I mean, he played, they actually won the game in that they stopped Michigan, who was scoring 80, 90, and 100 points a game. He held them to 69 points. They just couldn’t hit outside shots when it mattered.

They were three for 17 from three.

Yeah, but,

If they hit three of those shots, they win the game.

Yeah, Dan Hurley, he had things going his way. I think I have to give him credit for that.

Those outside shots were really well defended, really well defended.

Do you think he wants that big man back from Michigan?

Oh, okay, because that’s been my next question. So if you’re Mick Cronin and Mara is actually the most important player for Michigan, I wonder what he was thinking as Michigan wins 69-63. And he’s screaming, he needs more NIL money. Art, what do you think?

Maybe you gotta keep the players that you have,

You know, I think that’s the biggest part of sports. In college, I was not just going and recruiting guys in the NIL, but keeping the great players that you have. Because, you know, we were talking about it on Sports Overnight America. The amount of money, Mick Cronin says, I need more NIL money. Well, how much do you need? I mean, my God. The new contract for the Big Ten is gonna give every team a hundred million. And they’re already screaming poverty. At a certain point,

I don’t think that’s why Mara left. Mara didn’t leave because there wasn’t enough NIL money.

So why did he leave?

Because of Cronin. Because of Cronin, he wasn’t playing.

Yeah, Cronin wasn’t playing.

There you go.

He scored a game, he played a game, I don’t remember against who, where Mara scored like 23 points and had like 12 rebounds. And of the next three games, I think he played a total of 23 minutes.

Yeah, that’s just bad coaching.

He wants to play.

Well, if you’re willing to pay a guy like Mick Cronin $8 to $10 million to be a basketball coach, and all he does is alienate the fan base. I mean, how many people go to UCLA games at Pauley Pavilion? Let’s get honest, here,

A lot of empty seats.

A lot of empty seats.

A lot of people dressed like empty seats, I love that.

Well, they figure it’s probably cheaper to keep him, you know?

Let me throw you this, let me throw you this: UCLA wins the women’s basketball. They’ve now won 125 national championships. The men’s baseball team, and we’re taping this Friday at 1 o’clock,

Average is good.

They’ve won 24 straight games; they are the favorites to win the NCAA Baseball Championship. All right, so if you’re Martin Jarmond, the UCLA Athletic Director, do you get credit for that or discredit for Cronin? What takes priority? And you gave Cronin a five-year extension.

You need to be competitive in football and basketball, too, right, don’t you?

Okay?

I mean, it’s wonderful, wonderful what the women accomplished, wonderful what coach Savage has accomplished. Let me tell you, but your football team, if you’re in the Big Ten, you need to win eight, nine, 10 games for UCLA. And their basketball team needs to get to the Sweet 16 minimum,

Right.

The future of baseball is gonna be some of these college coaches coming out. And Savage would be a nice, yeah, Savage would be the next guy coming through.

How about the kid for USC? Stankiewicz?

Yeah,

But Stankiewicz, he turned that team from nothing. I think. They won 21 straight games to start the season.

Savage can fit right into a major league clubhouse.

All right, let’s take a break and come back; more Fred and the Fantastics. You can email us at [email protected]. Back, right after this.

Hey, welcome back, everybody. Fred and the Fantastics with Mark, with Laura, with Art, and with you. You can email us at [email protected], [email protected]. As we know, Mark Mancini is a major league Pittsburgh Pirates fan and Pittsburgh Penguins fan; of course, he was born in Pittsburgh. And Mr. Griffin has signed a new contract: rookie, 19 years of age, 15 years, or was it nine years, with $140 million, $15 million a year. I think both sides, basically, are taking a chance here. He’s taking a chance that, if he plays as well as I think he will and baseball thinks he will, he would be making $50 million a year instead of $15.

He’ll be 28 at the end of this contract, so I mean, he’s still gonna have some years in him.

But Pittsburgh is taking a shot that he gets injured tomorrow and never plays again. So Mark, what do you think? Who won in this 9-year, $140 million contract for your shortstop?

I think the Pirates won, because the Pirates, if you noticed over the last few years, and you can correct me if you want, they’re building it like the Astros did. They were downtrodden for years,

Farm system, you’re right.

They built the farm system up, and then bring all these kids up. And now you’ve got, if you can get Skenes in the loop there, you’ve got Keller launching,

And now they’ve figured out a way how to keep him.

Yeah, and that’s why they’re launching him up,

Can they pull that off with Skenes? Is he worth $500 million, for like, maybe six-seven years?

You see, sometimes, Artie, you gotta get guys that fit the city, the grit. You can’t bring,

You don’t think Skenes fits the city?

Well, that’s what I’m saying. You get guys that buy into the system, that fit that grit mentality that’s in Pittsburgh, you can’t bring out outsiders that don’t fit. And Griffin’s happy to sign the contract. You haven’t seen a guy like this since Juan Soto or Bryce Harper. He’s a five-tool guy.

Laura, you’re a Dodger fan,

Yeah, she’s a Pirate fan.

I was surprised, I was surprised.

Ninety-eight was the total a couple days into the season. I think they’ll win more than 100. Laura, your comments.

The Dodgers are playing great baseball, no question about it. But they’ve got a formidable lineup; I mean, it’s incredible. But I was really surprised that Konnor Griffin signed that contract. I thought he’d play a little bit, kinda see where things are, see if Pittsburgh’s gonna open up their wallets, which they haven’t done in the past.

Isn’t this like the fourth player now that’s done this? That’s a young guy, the guy from Milwaukee kinda started the whole process off, Chourio?

Yeah,

I mean, to me, it makes a lot of sense because it locks up a young guy for, you know, because at the end of the day, you develop a guy for four years.

It makes sense for Pittsburgh, but I don’t know that it makes sense for the player. That’s all I’m saying. I think it definitely makes sense for Pittsburgh. They’ve got this guy locked in there. But for Konnor Griffin, I thought he’d see where things end up.

Maybe not nine years, but like five years or something like that.

But what if he breaks his ankle and can’t play again? Or Meniscus, or whatever the case might be?

I don’t think the players really think that way. I mean, you tell me, Art, you were a player, but I don’t really think the players,

If you start thinking that way, weird things are gonna happen.

Yeah, I just don’t think that comes, I don’t think that,

But I do understand what you’re saying, you know? I mean, in three years from now, if he’s the National League All-Star shortstop, hitting 25 home runs with 130 RBIs and .290, he’s gonna be worth 50, 60 million, which is probably gonna be 25 million or 30 million less than what he’s making.

Yeah, I was surprised that he signed that deal, I was.

We lost a guy the other day, and I know it’s in our backyard.

Davey Lopes,

Davey Lopes was probably one of the best second basemen I’ve ever seen in Dodger history. I’m going back six decades.

Wait a minute; was he a better defensive second baseman than my favorite player, Steve Sachs? Come on.

Well, how about Jeff Kent?

Let’s put it this way: if Jeff Kent is in the Hall of Fame, Davey Lopes should be in the Hall of Fame.

Yeah, how can you put Jeff Kent in there and not Davey Lopes?

Exactly, yeah, I don’t think Davey Lopes is in the Hall of Fame, is he?

I wish he was.

No, I don’t think he is.

I will say this, you guys. He got a really bad rap as a manager, and I liked him as a manager.

Yeah.

I liked his aggressiveness. He and Larry Boa. I would never have a problem with either one of those guys in the dugout leading my,

Hey, will – have we lost Art for a second?

Yeah,

Okay, I think we’ve lost, I think Art at 128 years of age has gone.

Frozen.

Frozen.

Silence is a weapon.

At 128 years of age,

Team, they’re going to froze me. They froze me out. It was the Prevagen.

So what do you have to take now? Do you take Prevagen to unfroze you? To unfreeze you?

Unfreeze myself? This stuff helps to be able to pour some on my computer brain and memory.

Where’s Jackie?

She’s taking care of a multi-billion-dollar corporation right now. She doesn’t care about us.

Laura, give us a 30-second close on Fred and the Fantastics.

Well, I’m looking forward to watching the Masters this weekend if I can figure out where it is to watch.

CBS Sports has it at three o’clock.

He’s going to the Dodger game,

Noon on the West Coast. But it’s preceded by two hours of pre-coverage on ESPN, which will be the other guys going off, which I like to watch because then it sets you up for the guys that are in the lead. You’ll know where the holes are and what’s going on.

I was happy that only one Fred’s, Art’s not going to like this, probably, but I was happy that only one LIV player got, shot, under par.

Well, you know what happened today? Terrell Hatton, who I call, you know, Grumpy, because he’s always got, you know, he’s like, who was the cartoon character, the dog when we were kids?

Oh yeah.

It’s like raga, fraga, ruh ruh, remember?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So he reminds me of. He wound up shooting seven under par. So he’s in the hunt now, and Koepke had a big round. So I don’t know if Jon Rahm and DeChambeau, they might be down the road motors, but it’s going to be awesome. I mean, it is.

I’m supposed to go to the Dodger game on Saturday, but it’s supposed to rain out, so we’ll see.

Rain in April, huh, you guys? That’s amazing.

That hard, you really think it’ll be that hard?

I think, guys, there’s only been 11 rainouts in Dodger Stadium history since they’ve opened.

That’s nice trivia.

It doesn’t rain in the summer here,

It never rains in Southern California.

I know, but I think there’s only been 11 rainouts.

But Laura, here’s your key question. Now that we know that Dodger Stadium does have matzah, are you going to sit where you can get the matzah, or are you going to pass on the matzah?

Passover’s over. So I don’t need to worry about, I don’t need to worry about how I’m going to eat my dog.

No matzah for you.

Chicken liver.

Whatever happened to my Dodger Dogs, you guys?

I don’t know.

Big log foot-long ones.

Well, you know what? For those of us who are a little observant, I’m glad they’re not pork anymore, so,

Farmer John, the Easternmost in quality and the Westernmost in flavor.

I don’t know, but Brian Reynolds just hit a two-run homer, so we’re up two-nothing.

We, huh?

There’s one stadium, that for one game, maybe it was the Nationals, because it was the 250th anniversary of the United States, 76 cents for a hot dog.

Wow.

Today, currently?

If they were to do 76-cent beers, it’s going to be a tough night in the nation’s capital.

So if it was 76 for a beer and 76 for a hot dog, there are some sick people that came home.

Okay, Fred? How about the Angels deal, where you get four tickets, you get four sodas, four hot dogs for $40? You can’t even get parking at Dodger Stadium for $40.

No.

Unless you park at the police academy.

But they’re still booing, Artie.

But you know what, you know what, Art? You can take the train, which costs very, I think it’s like $2 or something, and there’s a free shuttle bus to Dodger Stadium from Union Station.

So Metro, Metro, right to, that’s a smart way to go.

Okay, I gotta stop you, though. We had Jim Alexander on Sports Overnight America. He wrote an article about the fans. A couple of the fans said they’ll never take that train again. They had to wait more than an hour after the game to find the train.

Oh, to get back.

So it’s already 11 o’clock. Well, that’s really how long it takes for me for the parking lot to clear out, so I remember where I parked my car.

All right for Mario, he’s gotta pick up his youngster. For Art, who is 128 years of age. For Laura, who’s going to the Dodger game tomorrow night, if it doesn’t rain out. And Mark is gonna watch all the Pittsburgh Pirates games or listen to all that radio. I am Fred, who is going to do absolutely nothing the rest of the day, as we had to do our taxes yesterday.

Do it well, do it well, Fred.

Mario, thank you very much,

Fred. I’ll come out there. I’m a stone’s throw from you. I’ll help you do some gardening.

By the way, we had a water leak in the house. We got a hose in the bathroom; we don’t have a sink in the bathroom anymore. We’ve got a hose on the wall in the living room. Other than that,

We’ll move in with Laura,

Everything is going perfectly well.

We’ve got a spare room.

Fred and the Fantastics. Bye everybody.