This week we unpack Donald Trump’s wild return to the Oval Office—yep, we’re talking executive orders flying left and right and policy pivots that have us all trying to keep up. Then we break down the unexpected NFL Draft freefall of Shedeur Sanders and what his fifth-round slide says about pride, pressure, and perception.
Join as we talk about humility and the subtle dangers of pride—with a surprise twist: one listener’s cringe-worthy oil change story that might just be the sermon illustration of the year. Plus, quick hits on what’s brewing in Canada’s political scene and rising tensions between India and Pakistan.
It’s a full table—pull up a chair and take a listen.
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Topics
- (01:13): Trump’s first 100 days
- (17:31): NFL draft drama: Shedeur Sanders’ story
- (35:39): Listener mailbag: Oil change mishap
- (38:45): Global news updates
Resources
- Mailbag: [email protected]
- DenisonForum.org/subscribe
- Culture Brief on Instagram
- Trump’s first hundred days and Judge Hannah Dugan’s arrest
- Promises kept, broken and TBD: Defining Trump’s first 100 days – POLITICO
- All of the Trump Administration’s Major Moves in the First 100 Days – The New York Times
- Fox News Poll: The first 100 days of President Trump’s second term
- Trump steams ahead on these campaign promises as he reaches 100 days in office
- Deion Sanders’ advice to his son Shedeur after draft slide
- Deion Sanders cites ‘couple NFL teams’ Shedeur Sanders will not play for in 2025 draft
- Why did Shedeur Sanders fall to the 5th round? 3 reasons to explain his slide | FOX Sports
- Truth Social Post by Trump
- Adam Schefter on X
- NFL Network – Wikipedia
About Micah Tomasella
Micah Tomasella is the Advancement Officer at Denison Ministries and co-hosts Denison Forum’s “Culture Brief” podcast. A graduate of Dallas Baptist University, Micah is married to Emily, and together they are the proud parents of two daughters. With an extensive background in nonprofit work, finance, and real estate, Micah also brings experience from his years in pastoral church ministry.
About Conner Jones
Conner Jones is the Director of Performance Marketing at Denison Ministries and Co-Hosts Denison Forum’s “Culture Brief” podcast. He graduated from Dallas Baptist University in 2019 with a degree in Business Management. Conner passionately follows politics, sports, pop-culture, entertainment, and current events. He enjoys fishing, movie-going, and traveling the world with his wife and son.
About Denison Forum
Denison Forum exists to thoughtfully engage the issues of the day from a biblical perspective through The Daily Article email newsletter and podcast, The Denison Forum Podcast, as well as many books and additional resources.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
NOTE: This transcript was AI-generated and has not been fully edited.
Conner Jones: [00:00:00] Hi, I’m Connor Jones.
Micah Tomasella: I’m Micah Tomasella.
Conner Jones: And this is Culture Brief, a Denison Forum podcast where we navigate the constant stream of top stories and news, politics, sports, pop, culture, and technology. We’re doing it all from a Christian perspective. Micah, welcome back. We missed you last week here.
Micah Tomasella: Oh, thank you man.
You guys did a great job. It was great to have Josh on, but if anybody was concerned, I’m back, baby, I’m back. Fret, no more worry, no more cry, no more. There is joy today. I am back. So here’s what we’re gonna talk about, man.
Conner Jones: I can assure you, nobody was worried. I’m your co-host, and I wasn’t worried about it no, but we are, we are glad to have you back.
Micah Tomasella: I suppose. Okay, so we’re, we’re at least minimally happy that I am back. Okay. I, you know what, I’ll take that. I’ll take that. Alright, so Connor, here’s what we’re gonna talk about today. We’re gonna jump into Trump’s first 100 days. We’re gonna talk about the Shahir Sanders story, and we’re gonna talk about an embarrassing oil change story [00:01:00] that it is very, very interesting from one of our listeners that we want you guys to hear.
And we’re gonna talk about that and so much more. So let’s jump into the brief.
Conner Jones: The brief.
Micah Tomasella: Alright. So Trump’s first 100 days. Let’s jump into it. Let’s talk about it. So Donald Trump’s first 100 days of his second term have been among the most aggressive and controversial and American presidential history, without a doubt. With a focus on reshaping government, asserting executive power and fulfilling key campaign promises.
Trump has wasted no time, but it has deepened the country’s political and institutional divides and time will tell. How this pans out, right? Change was necessary and it still is. I think most people can say that. Some people might disagree, but change was necessary and I think change still is necessary.
But at what cost? Connor, right? Yeah. Like it, you know, when you look back at this 100 days change is necessary. He was elected for [00:02:00] change, but. And bringing about change in the manner at which it’s been brought about at what cost is, is the question that I ask the audience. I ask you, and I’m asking myself, and that’s the question floating in people’s minds, including my own.
So let’s talk about his executive actions and governing style. I’m just gonna try to do a quick run through. So Trump issued over 135 executive orders in his first 100 days. So think about that for a second. That is crazy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s, that is insane to me. That’s a lot of executive orders.
That’s a lot of signatures with that big black Sharpie pen. And he did it in just a hundred days. It’s, it’s an unprecedented pace even compared to his first term. So he was able to bypass a divided Congress. He moved swiftly to dismantle DEI initiatives across federal agencies. He declared a border emergency leading to mass deportation.
So again, we talked about this before him declaring that emergency allowed him to do. Different things that maybe previous administrations hadn’t done or didn’t really have the motivation to do. And then he appointed Elon Musk to head Doge the Department of [00:03:00] Government Efficiency, which has caused a major restructure aimed at cutting federal red tape, bureaucracy overhead, all that stuff.
Conner Jones: Yeah. And it, it kind of feels like Doge has just fallen out of the news too. Like Elon’s somewhat been like distanced from the White House. They said you need to probably back off a little bit. So just interesting to see how rapidly. Something can be the top story and then all of a sudden it’s like, what happened to Doge?
Micah Tomasella: I think Elon was just somewhat of an easy target for the left, right? Just kind of the way that he communicates and comes off. My goodness. He’s incredibly brilliant and has accomplished so much, but doesn’t always necessarily, and I think it’s fair to say this doesn’t always necessarily have the highest eq, right?
And so I think the way that he communicated about certain things, I think that he was just kind of an easy target. And then, you know, he saw the way that his company, Tesla. Was being affected through this whole thing as well. And so I think it’s probably good for him and for the White House for there to continue to be cuts and there continue to be these different things, but maybe Elon not be the head of it anymore.
So I mean, that’s a good point. So [00:04:00] Congress meanwhile passed five bills during this period. The fewest in Modern American history in, in that time span among the most notable was the Lake and Riley Act mandating detention of certain immigrants charged with crimes. And the bipartisan Take it Down act, which was actually spearheaded by the First Lady, Melania Trump.
Aimed at stopping the spread of deep fake pornography. Yet overall, Trump’s reliance on executive authority over legislative negotiation has raised concerns. And this is where a lot of this debate comes about because, you know, constitutional experts or people you know from all across the aisle, it’s like you know, what is this causing, is this causing long-term erosion of certain democratic institutions and checks and balances?
Just kind of depends on who you ask. But let’s, let’s talk about Trump’s promises made and promises kept. There were several, I’m just gonna highlight a few. Yeah. Trump entered his second term with a bolt set of promises in several key areas, and he, he’s delivered fully on these that I’m about to mention.
Border security. Trump has significantly [00:05:00] reduced illegal border crossings, fulfilling one of his major pledges. One of the biggest things that he ran on it is at historically low numbers.
Conner Jones: I would say it’s probably his most. Yeah. Accomplished thing so far, and I, yes, and that’s, even Democrats recognize that.
They’re like, yeah. I mean, there’s nobody coming across the border illegally
Micah Tomasella: at this point. Yeah. And that’s. That’s what they’re harping on. And then that’s when you know, you kind of hear these ancillary few stories of the wrong person being deported or a minor gets deported, whatever it might be that’s trying to pull holes in it.
But overall, this is kind of the one thing he continues to pull well on is the border. Right now, you know, you see the White House. Pushing that DEI program elimination. He successfully dismantled federal DEI programs aligning with conservative demands to strip identity-based initiatives from government operations.
I mean, that was kind of the goal of it. And then finally, government restructuring. He said he was going to change things up, shape things up, restructure the government, eliminate overhead through Doge. A lot of that has happened. He’s initiated deep cuts to federal [00:06:00] agencies. Another promise aimed at shrinking the size of government.
It’s not as much as, as they’ve projected it to be, but just the overall promise of cutting the red tape. Eliminating overhead. He absolutely has delivered on that promise so far. We’ll see how that lands and, you know, as his term continues. But those are, those are just a few of the, the promises made, promises kept that came to mind.
Conner Jones: Yeah, man, that it, it’s, it’s been a crazy a hundred days. There are definitely things that we can look at and be like, man, this was probably not the way to go about that with Doge cuts, with even just almost the. Recklessness of announcements at times. Yeah. With either cutting things or even tariffs. Some people would say that was reckless the way that that was all announced.
But then there’s also just the things that we’re like, this is what was voted for. Yeah. Yeah. We don’t want women having to play against men in their sports. We don’t want people coming across the border and massive caravans of, of masses coming across and, and causing issues down there and ultimately [00:07:00] throughout the country.
But we also want. The ability to say this is not okay, slow down, stop. Within a hundred days, I can confidently probably say, no president has done as much in the first hundred days of their presidency, which is an accomplishment in and of itself. But the thing is, when when you move that fast, when you have that much going on, there will always be misses at the same time.
So
Micah Tomasella: yeah, I mean, it’s a good point, Connor. I, I think it’s really easy to kind of poke holes in some of the things that. That Trump has done and you know, Connor and I always try to be that, for lack of a better term, like fair and balanced, give credit to both sides, call out both sides. But there are some things that Trump is doing specifically with maybe DEI initiatives in the border.
I’ll, I’ll give for example. It kind of needed to have an aggressive approach to it. Mm-hmm. It, you know, it, it needed to be something pretty drastic because people have promised to change these things for years and really it hasn’t [00:08:00] changed and attention hasn’t been given to these things that it needed to.
And so we’ll give Ms. Props for that. Absolutely. Alright. However, some promises remain unfulfilled. Lowering grocery prices, inflation remains stubbornly high. The grocery costs have not meaningfully declined despite Trump’s assurances during his campaign and then ending the war in Ukraine, he said, mm-hmm ammo.
End it it First day I’m in. You know, that’s a tough one to keep, right? It’s still going on. You know, and we’ll talk a little bit more about that later in the episode. He has made some headway that the former administration didn’t really at all, but it hasn’t ended yet. Okay. But while Trump has reduced the American aid to Ukraine and shifted rhetoric around it, the conflict continues falling short of his big pledge.
And then we have some foreign policy ships on the global stage. Trump’s America first agenda has. You know, caused some issues with some longstanding alliances. He reintroduced widespread tariffs. [00:09:00] He’s threatened NATO obligations, and he’s publicly floated some ideas like annex in Greenland, which we talked about before, and inviting Canada to be the 51st state.
Y. Yeah, I mean, again, it’s funny. I know it frustrates those in the north and I get it. It’s just, it’s just funny sometimes. Sometimes. So allies in Europe and Asia are increasingly reassessing their ties to the us. You know, specifically you’ve got these two world powers, the first and second largest GDPs America and China, and everybody’s kind of having to rush around to pick their sides.
We’re really gonna have to see how this plays out. And then there’s some institutional and cultural battles that have come about domestically. Trump has targeted democratic institutions, political opponents in the media with some renewed vigor, you know, like back to his first term. But you know, in a new way, in a fresh way.
In his second term, he’s moved to fire some prosecutors. He’s downsized the Department of Education and he is rolled back environmental regulations. So let’s talk about public opinion and then I’m gonna wrap it up here. [00:10:00] So according to a Fox News poll, so I’m giving. A very right wing perspective here.
Trump’s approval rating sits at 44%, one of the, you know, one of the most gracious news outlets towards Trump is saying his approval rating’s 44% with 55% disapproving specifically of his leadership. His hard line stance on immigration remains popular amongst his base, but his economic management, particularly around inflation and tariffs, continues to draw widespread criticism.
And so Politico more left-leaning. Here’s their review of Trump’s promises. Nine promises kept. Four promises broken, six promises partially fulfilled. So this is the thing. He’s doing what he said he was gonna do, I think some people just weren’t taking him seriously. You know, in a lot of ways he’s doing some of the things he said he was gonna do.
Either people didn’t think he was gonna do it or they didn’t think he was gonna. Go about doing it the way that he did it.
Conner Jones: So dismiss. Yeah. A lot of people would say he went too far on [00:11:00] certain things. Specifically, I’m thinking of like tariffs, right? Mm-hmm. Like he said he was gonna do the tariff thing, but the way that he went about it and then the, the just size of the tariffs.
Yeah. That threw a lot of people off.
Micah Tomasella: Yeah. So this mixed bag of record reflects the aggressive start of his second term and the deep structural challenges he faces. Again, time will tell how this turns out. You know, I, I, I keep coming back to what. You know, let’s just see how this looks in the next 100 days.
I mean, this is the first three months of his presidency. He’s doing this thing for four years. So there is a lot of ups and downs we will experience. So Trump’s first a hundred days have defined the power of the presidency and accelerated major shifts in American governance For supporters, these first 100 days represent a bold return to conservative type governance and a decisive break from bureaucratic gridlock for his critics, his methods.
The wreak of authoritarianism and are leading to democratic erosion. So it, it’s just kind of extreme on both sides right now, [00:12:00] even amid fierce criticism. Trump’s ability to reshape the political landscape so quickly underscores his ability to do what he said he was going to do. But again, we can continue to question and argue about the methods.
So as the country moves forward in the coming months, Connor. Time will tell and determine whether the momentum he has built can be sustained if some of the things he’s put in place can actually stay in place, and whether the changes he set in motion will ultimately strengthen the nation or just deepen the divisions within the nation.
So let’s see what happens. Connor, any thoughts on this before I move to the spiritual part of it?
Conner Jones: No, it’s just, yeah, I’m very eager to see what plays out the next three months. I mean, I think if you asked us in on January 20th when Trump came into office. What will it look like by day 100? Yeah, I think we all would’ve said a few of the things that have happened, some of those promises kept, and some of the things he’s gone about.
I, I would’ve definitely thought the border was gonna be closed up the way that it is, but I also would’ve had the thought Ukraine’s war would probably be wrapped up by this [00:13:00] point. At least. At least scaled
Micah Tomasella: down. I mean, yeah. I mean, based off, off the way he was talking.
Conner Jones: Yeah. The way he was talking, he was like, I’m gonna be able to negotiate this.
By day one we’ll be negotiating. And we did get close a couple months ago, but then. You know, the Oval Office showdown that happened?
Micah Tomasella: Yeah. It, it all came down and there’s some real opportunity happening right now too. Yeah, there is.
Conner Jones: And honestly, over the weekend when I saw Trump speaking to Zelensky at the Pope’s funeral, did you see those images I did.
Where you’re in like the, the chapel just almost artistic and like unreal and there’s almost a spiritual application you can make to that about peace in God’s church or whatnot. But anyways, things like that, I, I, I think when we look the next a hundred days down the road, we’ll be able to look back and say.
Hopefully this has reached the next step with Ukraine or whatever the issue is with tariffs with Canada, with China, the trade war there. There’s just a lot that can happen in a short time span, as we’ve seen over the last 100 days.
Micah Tomasella: Yep. So the daily article that Dr. Ryan Denison wrote this past Tuesday on April [00:14:00] 29th really summed this up well and really kind of gave some.
Some real words. Put pen to paper on what I’ve been feeling. This, this tension I, I’ve been feeling during these first 100 days of Trump’s presidency. So the daily article that Dr. Ryan Dennison wrote up, it struck me, it reminded me how easy it is to get caught up in political sides instead of keeping my focus on biblical truth.
So you’re intaking. I mean, Connor, you and I, we intake a lot of news and we intentionally take in a lot of left and right-leaning news. Yep. It’s, it’s increasingly difficult to find centers, so we’ve tried to find that center, but for the most part, we’re trying to balance it out by listening to both sides in order to prepare and be able to speak well, and, you know, be up to date on all the topics that we’re covering.
So it’s easy. To think about picking political sides as opposed to biblical truth, right? And so one big takeaway for me was the reminder that sometimes multiple things can be true at once. As Christians, we have to be willing to hold that [00:15:00] tension and respond with discernment, not just political talking points.
I. You know, actually, okay, this is happening. This is happening. What’s the truth? And again, two things. You know, two issues can be happening at once. Two truths can be true at once. The article also called believers to prioritize Truth over Partisan Loyalty. And that hit home for me, it’s not as simple as picking a political side.
It’s about. Staying faithful to what God says is right and what God says is true even when it doesn’t fit into a neat political box. We have a two party system in this country. It’s okay to not agree with either side sometimes. Yeah. Or to agree with the side that you wouldn’t typically agree with.
That’s okay. We have two systems, two, two political parties that are supposed to represent. The right way. I don’t know. I don’t know, right? So sometimes that might make us feel politically homeless, but it’s better to stand for God’s truth than it is to compromise just to fit in. So finally it challenged me to to, to [00:16:00] have courage and be willing to uphold biblical convictions.
Even if it costs something, the culture around us might be shifting. It is shifting, but we’re still called to be faithful witnesses no matter the pressure. So in short. Connor, in a chaotic and polarized world, our our highest loyalty must stay with Christ and must stay with truth, courage, and faithfulness leading the way.
So let me leave you with two verses from Romans eight. Romans eight verses 38 through 39 says, for I am sure that either death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.
Lord, stand on truth. Stand on what’s everlasting. And remember, it’s okay to feel tension, and it’s okay to feel politically homeless sometimes. I would argue if you’re feeling that sometimes, that’s the spirit working in you to to [00:17:00] remind yourself of what truth is and not just what the political party you prefer says.
That’s great.
Conner Jones: You’re so right. We focus here on culture brief, but specifically also at Denison Forum on Biblical truth, not Political truth or a certain. Perspective from the right or left. It’s always gonna come back to scripture. What does scripture say about this? So thank you for that, Micah. That’s a great, just refreshing reminder and a great word.
We’ll just keep up with what’s going on in the next a hundred days. Maybe we’ll give another update of a summary of what’s going on now. Okay. But I do wanna jump into a sports story.
Micah over the weekend, as we know, was the NFL draft. You and I actually were together on Thursday night when round one was going on, and one of the big storylines mm-hmm that we were following was Shado Sanders. A name that many people listening will know a name that others may not know, but I do have a feeling most of you will know the last name Sanders.
And that’s because of Dion. A k, [00:18:00] a primetime, prime, whatever you wanna call him. He’s the current head coach at the University of Colorado. But obviously NFL, hall of Famer, cowboy Superstar, 49 ERs, legend, the whole just an absolute legend, not just leader of men. Play on the field. Yeah. Leader of men. His personality is something to just be amazed by.
He is made for tv, essentially, like he’s just. Bold and proud. That does drip down into his kids and has over the years with multiple different things. But specifically right now, his son Shado, the quarterback from Colorado, who played for his dad for the last few years in college, was expected to be a top draft pick.
But here’s the deal. He’s got a similar personality to his dad, which is, one could say confident another could say cocky, another could say prideful. However you wanna take it. The difference between Shado and his dad, though. His, his dad was just a top, top player, a generational talent. Shado is a really good player, but he may not be that.
And [00:19:00] so when you look at a guy who wants to be a starting quarterback in the NFL, you have to have the play to back that up. Yeah. And if your personality turns people off, it can affect you. And that’s. What we’re gonna talk about here, because that’s pretty much what happened over the weekend. Mm-hmm. And of course Chador is getting extra attention because of who his dad is.
I think if he was just any other normal quarterback, it wouldn’t be that big of a deal, but it’s just the Sanders family and they are one of the big families in the football world. Anyways, Thursday night round one, everybody expected chador to go to a team That night, potentially even in the top 10, back in January, he was being projected as a top 10 pick.
Yeah. Potentially even top five pick if a team turned up to get him. Micah, he did not get drafted on Thursday night. It was a, it was a big storyline that he was not taken in round one. In fact, he was expected to be the second quarterback taken. He was not. Another quarterback was taken in round one, and I should mention that the first quarterback was Cam Ward who was taken by the Tennessee Titans [00:20:00] and the first pick of the draft overall.
Anyways, all that to say, we moved into Friday night. Meanwhile, he’s also hosting a big draft party at his house in Texas. I think his dad’s, his dad’s like ranch out there. They’ve got all his branding out there. They’ve got this whole setup. They’ve spent a lot of money. They’ve got camera crews, they’ve got live streamers following him all with the expectation that they’re creating content and all of that for him, essentially for his personal branding.
Yeah. To show what’s going to happen and what it’s gonna be like when he gets drafted. It, it’s, you know, it was a little, almost cringe-worthy just with, it was like, who does this for themselves for a draft party? Yeah. It was
Micah Tomasella: a weird look and then it was increasingly weird as see continued to fall, you know, to to, to have that type of party, to have that type of branding, to host that type of thing.
They, you know, they didn’t expect it to last three days. No, they definitely didn’t. That was a 72 hour party, man. That was a rager
Conner Jones: man. They didn’t expect it to last three hours. Yeah, it was supposed to [00:21:00] be, and it had his branding everywhere. It just felt like a big commercial stunt, which I think is one of the reasons he ends up sliding, because yeah, it’s not a focus on football, it’s a focus on self, which we, that’s kind of the gist of where I’m going with all of this.
Anyways, he ended up having to wait till Friday, and then on Friday here, here’s one of the big just storylines of the whole weekend. Sador finally gets a call in the second round on Friday, and he believes he is talking to the general manager of the New Orleans Saints that has called him to say they are going to pick him.
But then at the very end of the call, he says, you’re gonna have to wait a little longer and hangs up. This is all live streamed because Sador has somebody live streaming and everyone thinks he just got the call. His family comes around, all the cameras come rushing over. Everybody’s it’s happening.
As it turns out, that was a prank call, which is actually pretty unfortunate and I, I don’t think that’s a very funny prank call to make. Anyways, those clips from the live stream quickly went viral as if Shado wasn’t already having a bad enough time dropping down. He now has a prank call. [00:22:00] He’s dealing with this viral clip going everywhere.
Then the next day on Saturday morning, the other side of the phone call went viral, showing that some, it looks like basically kids in a dorm room making the call. Playing this joke and it quickly just spread out into a big thing. NFL says, we’re launching an investigation that all panned out on Sunday when the NFL announced and the Atlanta Falcons announced.
That the prank call was made by the 21-year-old son of the Atlanta Falcons defensive coordinator. Jeff Ulbrich, his son Jax, had managed to get the phone number of Shado from his dad’s open iPad, and he wrote it down and decided to do this stupid joke. That, of course, was embarrassing for Shado, but it was also now embarrassing for the Berg family, his dad, the Atlanta Falcons, even the NFL.
And the NFL had a data breach here, and it ended up being the son of the defensive coordinator. I, oh man. Dude. I don’t even want to know what the house was like that week when his dad found out. [00:23:00] Yep. What do you think about the spring call?
Micah Tomasella: I, you know. When you make a decision like that, I mean, he’s 21.
I mean, we were all, you know, we made dumb decisions, but at the same time, I’d like to think a lot of the dumb decisions I made most negatively impacted me. But what I think about is this is the type of situation that jeopardizes his father’s career and the organization that his father works for.
This is the type of thing that people can get penalized and lose draft picks, can lose jobs. This is not. Prank Colin, a local pizzeria like I did when I was 12. Sorry, not sorry. This is different, man. You know what I mean? So this is there’s just a lot riding on making a mistake like this. There are just so many mistakes you can make that more negatively impact you.
But this mistake really impacted, you know, far more than just Jacks.
Conner Jones: Yeah. And typically our mistakes I do not think are seen by millions upon millions of Americans. That’s right, ma. That’s right. You know, this was just a, it’s tough.
Micah Tomasella: He posted the video of doing it. I mean, he, I mean, he incriminated himself.
He posted the video of him prank calling [00:24:00] Shado. So it’s it’s one thing to, to prank call somebody. This was on a bigger stage, but you, you posted it, you got lots of views, but at what cost? Stupid.
Conner Jones: It really was. I mean, and just immature, you’re right there. It just is. I don’t know. I mean, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Definitely. And honestly, he wasn’t the only one to do print calls. Apparently several other players print calls. It’s true. But when you’re doing the biggest name in the draft and, and you post a video yourself doing it two cameras and then you post your own video, yeah. It just, it, it quickly blew up and it just added to the storyline.
The storyline just kept going into Saturday because ultimately Shado slid, man. He went all the way down. To the fifth round and was finally taken at pick 1 44 by the Cleveland Browns,
Micah Tomasella: which
Conner Jones: I mean, yeah. Oh, it’s, that’s just not just, it just
Micah Tomasella: keeps getting worse, doesn’t it? It gets worse, man. You slide in the fifth round and then he get dropped by the browns
Conner Jones: and then adding salt to the wound.
Micah, he ended up being the sixth quarterback, taken, not the second, as expected by a lot of people, and obviously by [00:25:00] himself. He was the sixth quarterback taken and by a team that is just notorious. For messing up quarterback careers. Yeah. Oh, and also he wasn’t even the first quarterback taken by the Browns.
They’d already taken Dylan Gabriel earlier in the draft. He was the second quarterback. And he now gets added to a draft room with four other quarterbacks and he’s gonna have to fight first spot on the roster. Mm-hmm. And when you drop that far down in the draft, it also cost you typically tens of millions of dollars.
Yeah. ’cause those first round picks make tens of millions more than guys who get drafted later in the round. On their first initial rookie contracts. That being said, he has a chance to prove himself. He can make the roster. He can prove everybody wrong here and say, you should have drafted me.
That happens all the time with players. We’ve seen plenty of players be successful like Tom Brady and Dak Prescott and Brock party from later rounds. Anyways, when you think about all of this, you can’t forget that Dionne Sanders once said. In 2018, if I’m a young quarterback, ain’t no way I’m going to Cleveland.
I would [00:26:00] pull an Eli Manning if possible. What does that mean? Eli Manning, of course, the two time Super Bowl champion with the New York Giants was drafted number one back in 2004 by the San Diego Chargers. Who were a really bad organization at the time, and he had the ability because he was such a good player and such a highly sought after prospect to say, I’m not going there.
So they traded him to the Giants and then obviously he had his whole career there. Dion has been threatening that with Chador this whole time, saying he’s not gonna play for certain teams. That is what I would call overplaying your hand, because his son was not as talented, I think, as he thought, and not as sought after.
Micah Tomasella: He’s very talented. But is he? Is he? Is he that can’t miss Prospect? And he’s, he’s gotta be that generational star. And a team has to think that in order to overcome the obstacles that Shadur himself and his family would present to an organization if Shadur were to be drafted early on, like they were hoping I.
Conner Jones: Yeah, definitely. And obviously sports media, man, they were flabbergasted all weekend. ’cause like I said, everybody thought he was [00:27:00] going in the first potentially second round TV analysts were even. Were getting angry. We saw Stephen A. Smith call out a conspiracy in the NFL to not draft Sanders. The third day of the draft actually ended up having its highest view trip ever because everybody just wanted to see what happened with this guy.
Where’s he gonna go? Trump, who we just talked about, talked about his first a hundred days. Maybe this is. One of the big important things was he posted on truth social. He called all the NFL’s owners stupid for not drafting shado yet. Yeah, this whole thing started to really just unravel and felt unreal.
I, I don’t know. It became bigger than
Micah Tomasella: football. You know, this story became bigger than football. I mean, and that’s why we’re talking about it. It’s not just football. It’s so much more, it
Conner Jones: became a big cultural talking point, you know, just a few months ago, we all thought he was a surefire starter and first rounder.
So what happened here? Like, why did he slide? I want to clarify that what I’m about to say is not supposed to be a hit piece on Shaad Door. I think what I’m gonna say is just stuff we can glean from this story and from even his own attitude and personality, [00:28:00] and then we can take that and hopefully he can take lessons from this too.
I would say first and foremost, he was probably over projected from the Be beginning. Yeah, he was talented at Colorado. But as one guy said, and you’ve already kind of said this too, Micah, this analyst said he is not a generational talent like his father was. And if you’re not a generational talent, you better ace the other parts, the intangible parts of the process.
And by all accounts, he did not ace those intangible aspects. What does that mean? It’s his personality, essentially. He acts like a celebrity. And Colin Coward even said nobody wants a celebrity back quarterback when he started to slide down in the draft. It’s true. And he even had his number retired at Colorado last week for a very mediocre career, which threw a lot of people off and disturbed a lot of people.
I do think the biggest obstacle, aside from just maybe his talent wasn’t up to par with what’s needed for a starting quarterback in the NFL, is just his self. Like he, he stepped on his own toes here, especially with a lot of analysts coming out and saying they’re hearing from [00:29:00] NFL teams and executives and people who were around him during this whole draft process, that it had to do with his pride and arrogance and his personality off the field.
Sometimes on the field, but how does he act in the locker room? And then also his own interest with his own like brand and celebrity. He wants to do music. That’s not what NFL teams want. They want you to come in, get paid millions of dollars to focus fully on football. I. He’s gonna have to change his priorities there.
He also opted to skip a bunch of pro days on field draft, combine drills, and that was either probably to avoid poor performance he was worried about, or he just thought he was good enough. He didn’t need to do it. So yeah, NFL teams don’t like that. They want you to perform in front of them at their decision points.
And then an anonymous NFL assistant coach was quoted by the NFL network. This was the week of the draft that maybe was the last just nail in the coffin forum. They assessed that Sanders takes unnecessary sacks. He never plays on time. He has horrible body language. He blames teammates, but the biggest thing is he’s not that good and [00:30:00] he called him entitled.
And that the formal interview with him where they sit down, where the coaches sit down with this player in a, in a room, and they go through a whole formal interview, like a normal job interview. They said it was the worst that they have ever been a part of, and that another executive said it didn’t go great in our interview either.
He wants to dictate what he’s going to do and what’s best for him. He makes you feel small. So Micah, what? What can we learn from this whole saga? I would just start off and say confidence and cockiness are not the same thing. Yeah. It is one thing to know when you have been equipped by the Lord to accomplish something.
It’s a whole nother thing to attribute success to yourself and believe others should accommodate you. I, I would point out Proverbs here. Proverbs has a lot to say about this just in general, but specifically two verses verses 1618 in Proverbs, pride goes before destruction in a haughty spirit before fall.
A lot of people sum that up by saying, pride comes before the fall. Verse 1215 [00:31:00] says, the way of a fool is right in his own eyes. But a wise man listens to advice. Mm-hmm. I think if we compare chador to the first pick of the draft, Kim Ward, who I said went to the Tennessee Titans, Kim Ward, is a quieter guy.
He’s less flashy. He wasn’t even dressed up nearly as nice as a lot of the guys taken below him the other night, and he is said to be a leader in the locker room. He credits God and his family with his success, not himself. He did put in the work and he said that he’s I put in the work to get here, and he came from a zero star high school recruit.
No one wanted him coming out of high school to now being the number one pick in the NFL draft. I think Kim Ward is an example of Proverbs 29 23 that says One’s pride will bring him low, but he who is lowly in spirit will obtain honor. Yeah. I, I just think it’s a, it’s an interesting comparison. Compare and contrast.
What do you think?
Micah Tomasella: I, it definitely is, I mean, I think, I think the two players operate differently. They come from different. Backgrounds. Like [00:32:00] you look at Dion Sanders story, he came from nothing, kind of like Cam Ward did. And then Dionne is raising his kids up in his success. I mean, that would be difficult.
I mean, these, you know, yeah. De Sanders kids grew up with everything. I mean, that’s, that would be incredibly difficult. And Cam seems like he didn’t grow up with much. And so it’s easier to remember how far you’ve come and how far God’s brought you. And I mean. It’s one of those things where, yes, it’s easy to cast judgment on somebody like Shado, but it’s also a little bit harder to take this concept and apply it to ourselves and say, how often are we reminding ourselves and how many people are we inviting in our lives to remind us, Hey, it’s God who’s gifted you and placed you in this position.
It’s God who’s blessed. You remember that? Remember that you’ve been blessed and you’ve been put in this position as opposed to you yourself have put in the work and that’s it. And you yourself deserve all the credit. [00:33:00] Glory and honor. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. God’s in more control and he’s more providential than that.
Conner Jones: Yeah, you’re absolutely right. In fact, I was talking to a, a guy this weekend at one of the people at my church, and he grew up. Near the Sanders family and used to play on the side of a soccer field with Shado Sanders and some of Hi his siblings because it, there’s his sister and Chad’s sister. Were both on the same soccer team.
Anyways, he said that. Shado and the brothers really actually liked playing with him and his friends because they treated them like normal kids, not just like Dionne Sanders kid. Yeah,
Micah Tomasella: that’s, it would be hard. It would be hard. It’s gotta be hard, you know what I mean? Anyways, I’m, I’m not sitting here judging the Sanders family, you know?
It’s no. Yeah. It’s, it’s difficult. I mean, and Shado, you know, still a kid, like a lot of people would say he’s, he’s still a kid. Yeah, you still got a lot to learn.
Conner Jones: And, and to clarify this, these lessons that I’m talking about here apply to the same kid who made the print call on the other end of the line.
That’s right. That kid’s entire like operation there was to embarrass and humiliate shado and maybe he succeeded. I don’t know fully how Shado feels about [00:34:00] all that. Yeah. But it was just immature and destructive and had impacts, you know, beyond themselves. And I, I, I think there’s just a lot of lessons we can take from the whole thing.
I will say Dion had one good quote the other day afterwards, after this whole draft saga. When he obviously knew his son was probably kind of down about the whole thing. He said, everybody’s worried about what happened yesterday and fear the possibilities of what will happen tomorrow when we should be focused on now.
What we do with our now is what matters the most. Let’s make the most of our now. Amen.
Micah Tomasella: Amen to that. Yeah, that’s actually, I was like, that’s actually pretty good. That’s incredibly profound actually,
Conner Jones: Micah, it, it causes us to look at ourselves and say, where are we finding pride in our own hearts today?
What’s making us believe more in ourself than in God? Yeah. And is your behavior, is my behavior an attitude, a turn off to others? Or are we inviting others and making ourselves humble and humbling ourselves before other people serving them and recognizing that we can’t do anything on our own? I would say take Colossians three 12 to heart as you go [00:35:00] about your day and your week, it says, put on then as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness.
Humility, meekness and patience. These are attributes we should all strive for.
Micah Tomasella: Amen. Amen. Connor, thank you for that. That was, that took a really good turn. We were just, you know, just talking about ur and then that’s a very good concept that I, I believe every single person can take something and apply it to their lives.
All right.
Conner Jones: Let, yeah, and I, I actually clarify. I want, I, I, I hope Shadur learns from this and is humbled by it, and that he can become something great in the N-F-L-I-I. I wish nothing but the best for him, and I would love to see him learn a lot of lessons here and, and become a great player.
Micah Tomasella: Yep. All right, let’s jump into the mailbag.
So we have an interesting listener story that we wanna share. We’re, we’re gonna let Connor share that one, but we wanna continue to hear from you all. Please keep sending in your topic ideas, your stories. Send us your questions, thoughts, stories, topic, ideas to culture [00:36:00] [email protected] and follow us on Instagram at Culture Brief.
Podcast and look out for the polls that we post on X and on Spotify and all of those places. We’re doing our best to engage with you guys. Thank you for continuing to engage with us. So as I teased earlier, we have a listener oil change story. Connor, do you wanna share that story?
Conner Jones: Yeah. Just to set this up, this is coming from a, I would honestly say about two months ago we talked about oil changes on this show.
Yeah. And Micah, I know you were like, I don’t like to do oil changes. I don’t like to get dirty and all of that. So I don’t think I said it that
Micah Tomasella: way. I, I don’t think that that was my reason for it. It’s just more about saving money and time. Yeah. Anyway, go ahead. I,
Conner Jones: I took it that way. This guy, this guy wanted to let us know why he no longer changes his own oil.
Yes. And I, I gotta tell you, it’s, it’s pretty, it’s pretty funny. He was explaining that his girlfriend at the time needed an oil change on her car, and he’s oh, I wanna prove myself. He’s college aged. Yeah. He wanna prove myself, you know? Yeah. And I want to show her that I can do this for her. So he sets out to do the [00:37:00] oil change.
He actually does it, and he realized a few days later he forgot to put the oil cap back on that keeps the oil from leaking out of the car. So a few days later, she’s driving on the highway and her car starts to shut down. Yeah. And she breaks down on the side of the highway. That’s when it gets taken to a shop and they realize that that cap was not put on Micah.
He did the oil change for his girlfriend’s car. The car was totaled. Totaled, yeah. Totaled. Yeah. That is brutal.
Micah Tomasella: Mm-hmm. This guy ruined her car. Oh my gosh. I can’t even imagine. And the punchline, I’m not saying this is why they broke up, but him and his girlfriend, they did. They did not make it. They did not stay together.
This might have been the straw that broke the camel’s back. Thank you for sharing that embarrassing story with us all listener so that we can share it with everyone else. Think twice before you change oil. Watch more than one YouTube video and make sure that you put the cap back on.
Conner Jones: Yes. One other thing real fast is Isabelle wrote us a few weeks ago [00:38:00] about Black Mirror coming out.
I’m sure many of the listeners have watched the most recent episodes of Black Mirror that came out. Of course, they’re each, each episodes its own story, so they’re kind of interesting. I watched the whole season. I found it to be rather interesting. Some of the episodes were hits, some of them were misses.
I would just say this, if you are a Black Mirror fan or if you’re planning to watch this season. And just remember that it is sometimes intending to instill some anxiety and fear about where technology could be going in the world. But remember, we have the Lord on our side. It is an entertaining prospect on that show, not.
Abject truth, right? And so keep that in mind. Some of the stories are a little bit darker. Some of them are actually a little bit hopeful, so I found it to be a pretty good season and great television. Just remember that as you go into that season, if you are going to watch that. Yeah. Okay. Let’s hit on a few things that are coming up and let’s check in on one thing real fast.
Last week we talked about the Pope, his death. What happens now including the conclave, which is where the cardinals from around the world come in to elect a new pope. That conclave will begin on May 7th, so [00:39:00] maybe by the end of May we will have a new pope. Maybe by mid-May we’ll have a new pope. Just depends on how long the conclave goes.
Yep. Yep. That being said, we’ll just watch out for that. And then we’ve got a Russia potential ceasefire here slated for May 8th through 10th for Victory Day, as Putin is putting it, which is a celebration I believe, of when they won their side of World War ii. And so Putin wants to do this three day ceasefire.
We’ll see what happens. I guess Ukraine has rejected it and is called it manipulative and is demanding a full unconditional ceasefire instead of just a little three day ceasefire. Anyways, we’re now hearing and we’re recording on Wednesday, so this may be signed by the time you’re listening to this on Thursday or afterwards, we’re hearing that Ukraine is ready to sign the mineral rights deal that the US has been trying to get them to sign for over two months, and that zelinsky came to the Oval Office to sign before it all fell apart.
If that gets signed, this may be the actual first step to a real full ceasefire, but [00:40:00] we will see
Micah Tomasella: Yes. Yes. Because if that mineral right deal gets signed, then that really does solidify that I. Support for Ukraine, that Ukraine so desperately wants from the us. And if that gets signed, there’s probably gonna be some verbiage in that mineral rights deal that forces the US to take a stronger hand with Russia to end this war.
So we’ll see. Okay, so Canada held elections on Monday. To choose Justin Trudeau’s successor as Prime Minister. So Mark Carney, the leader of the Liberal Party who had been serving as Prime Minister since Trudeau resigned on March 14th. And we’ve talked about this kind of extensively. Again, who knew we’d be talking so much about Canadian politics.
He was made the permanent Prime Minister and so the conservative party was thought to be a shoe-in. Pollier to replace the relatively unpopular Trudeau and his liberal policies back in January. But Trump’s tariffs and his threats of making Canada the 51st state really turned around the liberal party’s fortunes.
And so with a heightened sense of Canadian pride and frustration with the more Trump aligned conservative party, I wouldn’t say the [00:41:00] conservative party Canada was necessarily Trump aligned, but seen as more Trump aligned voters elected Kearney with a mandate to assert Canada’s. Sovereignty and to seek more opportunities passed, just trade deals with the US and hopefully build a better relationship back with the us.
So there you go. Like a
Conner Jones: can do, can you, can you give us a little preview on that Canadian national anthem one more time?
Micah Tomasella: Oh no, man. We stand on guard for the Canada, our home and native land, and then it’s, we stand on guard for the. What did you say? The first time we stand on God for the, I was thinking, man, this is a really, you know, biblically based national anthem?
No, no, no, no, no, no, no. They’re standing on guard for the, you know, to protect Canada.
Conner Jones: Yeah, there’s, they’re guarded from those tariffs and from Right, being the 51st state right now. There you go. Okay. Another thing to watch out for India and Pakistan have tensions. India is mad because there was like an attack by Pakistani militants [00:42:00] in an Indian controlled area that has been conflicted over for a while.
There were 26 tourists killed there. Anyways, all this to say, Pakistan claims to have credible intelligence that India will do military strikes on Pakistan over the next few days at some point. So just keep an eye out for that. Both those countries are, interestingly enough, nuclear powers, so there’s just a lot to watch there.
Micah Tomasella: It could, it could spill over. Yeah, absolutely. Okay, so last thing that we want you to tune into is Amazon briefly considered displaying tariff costs on its budget platform. Amazon Hall, but ultimately decided against it. So Bezos and Trump had a call. The White House criticized the idea as hostile and political, but after Trump and Jeff Bezos had a conversation, Amazon clarified the plan was just an idea, and they were never going to implement it, and it’s not going to proceed.
Conner Jones: Yeah, that plan was definitely getting implemented and it was only gonna be implemented. For about two hours before the Trump to Bezos phone call. Mm-hmm. That’s my theory. Is that, yeah, probably that was, [00:43:00] that was the plan. Then Trump called out Bezos and it about two hours later was taken out. So yeah.
Just interesting how these companies are responding to tariffs. We are so glad that you tuned in this week. Thank you for joining us on the Culture Brief, a Dentist Forum podcast. All the articles and videos that we mentioned will be linked in the show notes. If you enjoyed today’s episode, please subscribe, rate and review the show and share it with a friend, and we will see you next Thursday.
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