Welcome to the Bill Barnwell Show. I am Bill Barnwell. Today, it is a slightly different topic and a slightly different conversation here on the show. I know yesterday I saw Austin Nivers came out and said, I can take 30 players right now in the NBA and throw them in the NFL. So this should really be more of an NBA podcast now that we're missing out on all these NBA players. It should be in the NFL. So joining me to list all 30 of those players. Okay, no, joining me today to talk about his new book,

Who Battles, my old friend from Grantland, Kirk Goldsbury. Kirk, let's start, before we get

to the book, let's start with this. Have you, we worked in the NBA, you cover the NBA closely

for SADSPN. Have you given thoughts of this? Are you listing your 30 players who could just walk into the NFL?

I have got a given thought to this, Bill. Thanks for having me on. In fact, there's a part of the hoop atless book, not to just plug it right away, where I talk a lot about Alan Iverson.

And Alan Iverson was one of the best athletes to ever play in the NBA.

But he was also one of the best high school football players in America in his junior and senior years, I believe, in Virginia Beach.

They won the state football championship.

And he was a punt returner.

He scored a punt return touchdown.

He had interceptions. And he was a punt returner. He scored a punt return touchdown. He had interceptions and he was the star quarterback. So I have thought about this very recently as I was doing

research for this book. And it's out of great respect for how freaking hard football is that I used

Iverson's high school football stats and performances to justify the case that he was one of the

best athletes to ever play

in the NBA. But I also think he might be the best example of somebody, aside from the obvious

Charlie Ward or something, that could have actually made the NFL from the NBA. And I think

it's a very high standard. But I've thought about it a lot. What about you, dude?

I looked at the Alan

Iverson chapter in this book, and my only note is actually stats are bad.

Okay, let me put you on the spot. Which NFL player could play in the NBA?

Which NFL player could play in the NBA? I would say Randall Cunningham could play in the NBA. I think you just get a 99th percentile athlete who basically like had to fight his coaches to play football consistently, I think would be pretty good at basketball, is my instinct.

But I know someone's going to come out there and be like, oh, this player was a high school star,

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