Hour 1: Jim Duquette

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A good Wednesday afternoon, everybody, and a happy July to one and all. And grasa sitting in for Michael because the Yankees have to play another baseball game today in the hot old sun at Yankee Stadium. Stay cool wherever you are. Regardless, keep it cool. We're going through it here the next few days. I mean, that's to be expected here in summer as we begin the month of July 2026 But we'll have some fun for you here in the next couple of hours. Ray Dinahan and Tom Bauer are hanging out with us as well. They are producing the program. Jim Duquette, the former Mets general manager, going to join us a little bit later on this hour, I think a little after 1.3 to talk all things New York baseball. I thought that was going to be our jumping off point today with the Yankees continuing to scuffle.
Kam Schlitler gets blasted last night by the Detroit Tigers. Mets actually found somewhat of a pot of gold, at least by their standards, by winning a baseball game up in Toronto as Nolan McClain looked the part of the guy that you thought you were going to see during the season and they'll try to win the series this afternoon a little bit later on. That will be the rubber match of that series on Canada Day north of the border. The Blue Jays are going to wear the red uniforms and all that stuff as they do per custom. So our coverage here on Espn 880 is going to begin, I think around 2, guys, is it 240, 245, somewhere around there? I think 245 is when we're going to transition over to the Mets baseball coverage, but the show will continue on, of course, on the Espn New York app. And it also, as of now, and then way past Mets baseball, can always be on YouTube, and the Kay Show on Espn New York, and always you can watch it on YouTube, and it's presented by the Parisman firm. So I thought that baseball was going to be like our lead today, come out heavy, despite the fact we have a huge soccer game a little bit later on tonight in the World Cup between the United States and Bosnia-Herzegovina, the round of 32 See if we can punch our way to the round of 16 England right now, you talk about potential upsets brewing, this has been a tournament full of them, at least once we've gotten to the knockout round. England trailing the Democratic Republic of Congo, one nothing at half time down in Atlanta. And it should very easily be two nothing Congo right now, as they missed a chippy on a nice cross there. But nevertheless, we'll see if England can come back here in the second half. And that's what worries you about these knockout round games, is that there's no more tomorrow, you're not in group stage anymore. If you don't have your best, you're on a plane and you're going home. Even though the United States is favorite in this game tonight, and excited as hell to watch it, got my US soccer shirt on courtesy of our friends at Homage there, we thank them for that. But nevertheless, big one tonight, and we'll have some thoughts on it a little bit later on. So the baseball, the soccer, and of course July 1st meeting NBA free agency. And if you're a Nick fan, your worst fears kind of came true just a little while ago. Not so much that you heard the news that Mitchell Robinson is departing Gotham for greener pastures, which as soon as Landry Shamett put pen to paper, you kind of had the idea that they were not going to be able to re-sign Mitchell Robinson. But then you find out it's to the Boston Celtics of all teams, right? The hated Boston Celtics, the rival to the North, the team that is probably one of the ones in the Eastern Conference that you look to is having a pretty decent chance of trying to take away what you now have, and that is an NBA championship. And then you see the dollar figures, three years, $47.5 million, or $47.5 million, give or take. And you realize that the Knicks were not going to be able to swim in those waters. They just weren't. You knew that the owner did not want to exceed the second apron when it came to the penalties and everything that you would have to incur because of that. And so you knew that Mitch was probably going to be playing elsewhere, unless he was going to take a significant, significant haircut and give the Knicks a hometown discount, which let's face it was not really realistic. You know, and for a Knicks team that went into the day, somewhere in the neighborhood of about $9 million under the second apron, they were not going to be able to retain a guy of Mitchell Robinson services. And, you know, throughout this whole process, and it's only been a couple of weeks, you know, since the Knicks season ended, the parade, and then we segued into free agency and the draft and, you know, what was going to shape up after that.