LAlright, the World Series starts tomorrow in Tampa, and I've got one stat that's gonna make you stop and think, Marcus.
MHit me. I'm already fired up for Game 1.
LBen Johnson — the Lions offensive coordinator — busted out a trick play that is, and I quote, 'per se illegal under NFL rules.' Chris Hayes on Bluesky flagged it.
MWait. Ben Johnson, the genius who invented the 'Motor City Special'? Draws up an illegal play?
LThat's what Hayes is saying. A cool trick play that Hayes says is literally not allowed in the rulebook. Not 'should be illegal' — he says it IS illegal.
MHold on. I need to see this. What was the play? A guy lined up on the moon? Fifteen laterals and a flea flicker off the mascot?
LNobody's posted the actual clip yet. It's all just the quote and people going nuts. Knowing Johnson, it probably involved a lineman reporting as a quarterback.
MOh, so just another Tuesday in Detroit. But look — I can't confirm the play is actually illegal. Nobody's got the rulebook page on screen yet.
LCome on, Marcus. Chris Hayes is a smart guy. He wouldn't post that without seeing something.
MSmart guys post dumb things all the time! Show me the flag, show me the referee's grin. Until then, it's a rumor with good hair.
LFine. Fine. But if this play exists and it's illegal, it's the most Ben Johnson thing ever. He's so far ahead of the league, he's off the map.
MOff the map or out of bounds. Same line. Anyway, different world entirely — forty-eight years ago today, Reggie Jackson did something that's still the gold standard.
LOctober 18th, 1977. Game 6 of the World Series at Yankee Stadium. Reggie Jackson steps up and hits three home runs. On three pitches. Three different Dodgers pitchers.
MThree swings, three bombs, and he's forever Mr. October. The Yankees win it 8-4, bedlam, fans storm the field. Baseball by B-Smile posted the whole thing.
LAnd I'll say it right now — nobody will ever do that again. Not in a World Series game. Not on three consecutive pitches. The concentration required is borderline inhumane.
MIt's the greatest single-game World Series performance in history, and I don't think it's close. But let's talk about those fans storming the field. They had three hundred fifty security guards down there and it didn't matter.
LThat's New York for you. A little fence isn't stopping anybody in the Bronx in '77. They wanted the grass, they took the grass.
MAnd Howard Cosell, Keith Jackson, and Tom Seaver were in the booth! Seaver's pitching career isn't even over yet and he's calling the game. What a booth.
LSeaver, Cosell, and Keith Jackson in one broadcast. That's like having your grandpa, your weird uncle, and your professor all at Thanksgiving, and somehow it works.
MAnd the best reply to the whole thing? Some guy says, 'Why speed it up? The game was never meant to be on a clock.'
LExactly! That's the whole tension in baseball right now. Manfred's out here putting in pitch clocks like we're all late for a meeting, and the core of the sport says: there's no clock. Reggie's three swings were the clock.
MBut can I push back? The pitch clock saved baseball. Ratings are up, attendance is up, games are twenty-five minutes shorter.
LYou're giving the stopwatch credit for a product that was always good! People came back because the game was never the problem — the pace was. And pace isn't a clock, it's tension.
MYou can't sit there and tell me a four-and-a-half-hour Yankees-Red Sox game in July was 'the product.' That's not tension, that's hostage negotiation.
LSo what? Sometimes the game breathes! Sometimes the pitcher steps off and millions of people hold their breath. You take that away, you get... a fireworks show with a curfew.
MOh, so now it's a curfew. Next you'll tell me baseball was perfected in 1927 and every rule since is a war crime.
LI'm saying the soul of the sport is 'no clock.' You don't rush the last at-bat of the World Series when a guy's trying to hit three homers on three pitches.
MOkay. If the pitch clock touched Reggie's at-bat in '77, I'd riot. But it didn't. The game changed, and it changed for the better. I'll die on that.
LAnd I'll die on the other hill. But we can agree on this: Mr. October is the most earned nickname in sports. Three swings, three bombs, championship.
MNo debate there. Speaking of championships — the World Series is set, and a Cleveland podcast is already melting down about what's next for the Guardians.
LThe Guardians fell, the Dodgers are done, and now it's Brewers-Rays. Somebody in Cleveland is recording an entire episode about a team that's already on vacation.
MAnd they're making offseason predictions! It's October! We haven't even crowned a champion yet, and they're already building next year's roster.
LThat's fandom, baby. Hope springs eternal, even in a podcast with zero likes and zero retweets. The microphone still works.
MAlright, one more thing from the NFL world that's been bugging me. Ben Johnson's illegal play isn't the only thing that had people raising eyebrows this week.
LWhat's the thing? Give me the details.
MA trick play in a game that supposedly shouldn't have counted, and the NFL's explanation was... nothing. No statement. No clarification. Just vibes.
LAnd that's the thing about today's NFL. The rulebook is thicker than a phone book from 1995, and half of it is written in invisible ink. What's legal? What's not? Flip a coin.
MThe league office is like a magician. 'Look over here at the new celebration rules, ignore the illegal formation happening in plain sight.'
LAnd that's exactly why fans are cynical! When a team loses by three points and there's an illegal play in the fourth quarter that didn't get flagged, you're not watching football anymore, you're watching a referee audition tape.
MBut let me ask you this. If Ben Johnson really drew up an illegal play, isn't that on him? He knows the rules. He's been in the league long enough.
LSure, he knows the rules. But sometimes you push the envelope so hard it tears. That's what great coordinators do — they make the league write a new check.
MAnd until I see that play with my own eyes, I'm treating it like a missing Bigfoot photo. Intriguing, but not evidence.
LBigfoot in a Lions hoodie drawing up plays on a whiteboard in the woods. Now that's a trick play.
MThat's the show for now. Keep it locked on Primetime Sports — we'll have full World Series coverage tomorrow and all the NFL fallout from this weekend.
LAnd if that Ben Johnson clip ever surfaces, trust me, we're breaking it down frame by frame. Go Rays.
MGo Brewers. See you tomorrow.