Speaker 1: It's a podcast call twenty five WIST stuck in parts
Speaker 1: and they go a whizz.
Speaker 2: So, yeah, it's too.
Speaker 3: Bad, But what did you expect?
Speaker 4: It's a podcast call twenty five WIST.
Speaker 3: So twenty line. We've had some awesome guests sit down
Speaker 3: with us all through twenty twenty five. So let's look
Speaker 3: back at some of our favorite interviews that maybe you missed.
Speaker 3: First up, ESPN senior writer and New York Times best
Speaker 3: selling author Seth Wickersham. Set's one of the best long
Speaker 3: form NFL storytellers out there. He put out a book
Speaker 3: called American Kings, a Biography of the Quarterback, So we
Speaker 3: talked about a lot of quarterbacks. Big thanks to Seth.
Speaker 3: Here he is, Seth Wickersham. All right, Seth Wickersham is
Speaker 3: on with us.
Speaker 5: Great to see you, man, good to be here.
Speaker 3: Yeah, congratulations on the book. Let's talk about arch Manning
Speaker 3: for a second. And you know you write about how
Speaker 3: how ruthless the recruitment was, how did they settle on Texas?
Speaker 5: So go with the book. You know, what I wanted
Speaker 5: to do was show what it's like to do this
Speaker 5: very uniquely American job, very unique American responsibilities at like
Speaker 5: every level from current high school to college, pro retired
Speaker 5: Hall of Famer and Arch was interesting to me because,
Speaker 5: you know, it was a window into this entire iconic
Speaker 5: quarterback family, and so I was able to kind of
Speaker 5: like or I was hoping to try to tell the
Speaker 5: entire Manning story through Arch and specifically through Arch's recruitment,
Speaker 5: and it got so competitive. I think that, like even
Speaker 5: being there, it was interesting just to see, especially in
Speaker 5: the NIL era, how hot it got for Arch. You know,
Speaker 5: I think that it came down to Alabama, Georgia, and Texas.
Speaker 5: The reasons why he picked Texas were I think they
Speaker 5: were pretty wise. I mean, in no particular order. Number One,
Speaker 5: Steve Sarkigian he's the play caller and the head coach,
Speaker 5: so he's not going anywhere. He's not gonna be one
Speaker 5: of these guys who gets poached to be a head
Speaker 5: coach somewhere else. Number Two, he really liked that Texas
Speaker 5: might you know, was going to be a team on
Speaker 5: the upswing. Here's a chance to win a national championship there.
Speaker 5: It kind of helped elevate it.
Speaker 6: He liked that it was at school.
Speaker 5: That had a ton of talent, and I think after
Speaker 5: being at eastand or Newman which is obviously a pretty
Speaker 5: pretty small school in New Orleans. He wanted to be
Speaker 5: on a team that had, you know, other five star players.
Speaker 5: And then finally, and this is the one that I
Speaker 5: personally find the most interesting, is that, you know, Austin's
Speaker 5: a big enough city, you don't even call it a
Speaker 5: college town. It's a city that he thought he could
Speaker 5: be pretty anonymous there. And that, to me is the
Speaker 5: most interesting aspect of it all, because here you have
Speaker 5: arch Manning and you know, member of like you know,
Speaker 5: Football Royalty, and you know, part of the reason why
Speaker 5: he picked Texas was because he thought, and we'll see
Speaker 5: how well that works out, that you know, he could
Speaker 5: be anonymous there. And I think that, like even some
Speaker 5: of the reporting of my book, you know, shows that
Speaker 5: like that itself was was too difficult to ask for.
Speaker 3: How influential were Archie, Cooper, Peyton eli All in Archer's
Speaker 3: recruitment and actually helping him achieve his destination of Texas.
Speaker 2: He did it himself.
Speaker 5: And I think that like they're all really hyper aware
Speaker 5: of looking like they had a hidden hand. And Nelson Stewart,
Speaker 5: you know, so arch is sophomore year obviously they realized
Speaker 5: he was going to be a top prospect. So Nelson Stewart,
Speaker 5: the head coach at Newman, and Cooper Man to get
Speaker 5: together and they try to think about like how they
Speaker 5: want this recruitment to look like, and this is looking
Speaker 5: like staring at a tsunami from a distance, like there's
Speaker 5: no stopping this thing. And so Cooper said, I want
Speaker 5: this to be a nineteen seventy five recruitment and Coach
Speaker 5: Stewart was like, what do you mean? And Cooper was like,
Speaker 5: I want you to run point. I want you to
Speaker 5: be the gatekeeper. And we're not going to take offers.
Speaker 5: We're not going to be posting on social media every
Speaker 5: time a school offers to us how grateful we are.
Speaker 5: We're going to do things a little bit different to
Speaker 5: try to give Arch as semblance of a normal high
Speaker 5: school life and you know, maintain his love of the game.
Speaker 5: And I think that's really important. And so it was
Speaker 5: Arch striving things and obviously, like the family members, you know,
Speaker 5: could weigh in when they wanted. But you know, they
Speaker 5: went to University of Virginia, where Arch's older sister made goes,
Speaker 5: and as they were walking around campus, Cooper was like, look,
Speaker 5: you know, this isn't a bad choice. You know, it's
Speaker 5: a beautiful campus, great school. You know, it's not football crazy,
Speaker 5: and I think that like maybe your life could be
Speaker 5: more normal here. And you know, obviously Virginia wasn't a
Speaker 5: school that he you know, ended up considering. At the
Speaker 5: end of the day, it was him that was driving
Speaker 5: this and he's the one who decided on Texas really,
Speaker 5: just like Peyton did with Tennessee and even Eli. Did
Speaker 5: you know back in the day with ole.
Speaker 3: Mis, you're right about Joe Namath then before both of
Speaker 3: our time obviously, Joe Namath, I think about nineteen sixty
Speaker 3: nine h him guaranteeing him wearing the fur coats, him
Speaker 3: being like in New York. But it was an odd
Speaker 3: juxtaposition because he played at Alabama, like all of that.
Speaker 3: We didn't get to experience it, but we're only catching
Speaker 3: it like through story like folklore even And so yeah,
Speaker 3: what did you think of Joe namath cultural impact once
Speaker 3: you started to really get into it at a deeper level.
Speaker 5: Well, I mean, look, all quarterbacks are cold archetypes of
Speaker 5: John Unitis and Joe Namath. I mean, like those two
Speaker 5: guys are huge pillars, and you know, as I show
Speaker 5: in the book, there are other guys who who helped
Speaker 5: set them up, especially Bob Waterfield. In the nineteen forties,
Speaker 5: he was married to Jane Russell. They were like the
Speaker 5: first couples first, you know, the country's first power couple.
Speaker 5: But really name it is, you know, a watershed moment
Speaker 5: in so many ways. And it was interesting because I've
Speaker 5: been with Joe Namath at events in New York and
Speaker 5: I've been with him at one event at the University
Speaker 5: of Alabama at the stadium, and just my personal opinion,
Speaker 5: I thought that he was way more revered, way more
Speaker 5: sought after, almost looked like with a type of reverence
Speaker 5: that was different when he was at Alabama rather than
Speaker 5: the events in New York. I think that like Alabama
Speaker 5: has such a a you know, a vast you know
Speaker 5: history throughout college football, and obviously name it has so
Speaker 5: much cultural template that he started once he was with
Speaker 5: the Jets and kind of blossomed into you know, this
Speaker 5: guy who first offered the idea of quarterback as like
Speaker 5: a lifestyle. But at Alabama, you know, he said that
Speaker 5: Barry Bryant said that he was the finest player he
Speaker 5: ever coached, and I think that, like you know, when
Speaker 5: you listen to Joamath talk about his career, I think
Speaker 5: in a lot of ways you hear him talking about
Speaker 5: more joy when he was at Alabama than even during
Speaker 5: his heyday in New York.
Speaker 3: I love your work just generally too, So good luck.
Speaker 3: I hope the book sells a ga billion copies and
Speaker 3: hopefully we'll talk to you again soon.
Speaker 6: Hey man, thank you.
Speaker 5: I love all the trinkets on your desk, and I
Speaker 5: really appreciate your time, and thank you very very much.
Speaker 3: I seth have a good day, man. Next up is
Speaker 3: Super Bowl MVP Joe Flacco. Joe has played in the
Speaker 3: NFL for close to twenty years, a lot of memorable moments.
Speaker 3: One of those moments came when the lights went out
Speaker 3: when he was playing in the Super Bowl against forty
Speaker 3: nine ers. It was crazy. And how his body's feeling
Speaker 3: playing in his forties, which we talk about here. Congrats
Speaker 3: to Joe on still being in the league playing in
Speaker 3: his forties. Here he is Joe Flacco, my partner that
Speaker 3: I work with a lot, as Matt Castle, who played
Speaker 3: in the league for a long time, and he talks
Speaker 3: about once he started to be a bit older and
Speaker 3: he had dealt with injuries that the hardest part was
Speaker 3: not not getting injured, it was bouncing back, because as
Speaker 3: you get older, it's harder to bounce back. At your
Speaker 3: stage right now, is that the hardest part is when
Speaker 3: something hurts, does it take longer to heal?
Speaker 7: I think you got to make sure that you get
Speaker 7: to the point where nothing you minimize the amount of
Speaker 7: build up that happens. Obviously, throughout the course of a game,
Speaker 7: you're going to deal with acute injuries that you have
Speaker 7: to try to heal from as quick as possible. But
Speaker 7: I think for me, as I get a little bit older,
Speaker 7: it's just that maintenance routine. It's getting a good routine
Speaker 7: so that little things don't turn into big things. And
Speaker 7: when I was younger, you kind of run through those
Speaker 7: little things in a week, and now that I've turned forty,
Speaker 7: they kind of build up, they don't go away, and
Speaker 7: before you know it, you're hurting a lot more than
Speaker 7: you want to.
Speaker 3: Does it hurt after every game or is there an
Speaker 3: occasional game where you're like you look down, You're like,
Speaker 3: I'm okay.
Speaker 7: That's the beauty about playing quarterback, is that, Yes, you
Speaker 7: do look down after some games and say, oh, wow,
Speaker 7: I came out of that one great, And you don't
Speaker 7: really deal with anything. The other ten eleven guys on
Speaker 7: the field, the other twenty one guys in the field,
Speaker 7: when you're out there, they are dealing with it week
Speaker 7: in and week out. I would say that I have
Speaker 7: it easy, as you know, as it comes to the
Speaker 7: NFL standard.
Speaker 3: Why are you still playing? You love it?
Speaker 7: I better love it if I'm doing this. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 7: I listen. I have one thing, maybe maybe hopefully a
Speaker 7: couple more than one thing, but one thing that I
Speaker 7: really really enjoy doing, one thing that I feel like
Speaker 7: I can really do at a high level, and I've
Speaker 7: never really thought about not doing it. I've been able
Speaker 7: to do it since I've been a kid, and I
Speaker 7: kind of just want to keep that dream alive. I
Speaker 7: still feel like I can do it at a high
Speaker 7: level and have a lot of fun doing it. So yeah,
Speaker 7: that's kind of why I still do it. It's kind
Speaker 7: of a weird question to talk about, but it's a
Speaker 7: lot of fun and I do love it. I love
Speaker 7: being in that locker room with all the players. I
Speaker 7: love being in the huddle, that feeling that you get
Speaker 7: before before game time. I wouldn't say that I'm totally
Speaker 7: in love with that, but when you don't have that
Speaker 7: for a few months, you realize that you miss it
Speaker 7: and it's just something that's pretty special.
Speaker 3: Can you give me a memory from when the lights
Speaker 3: went out in the super Bowl? Because that was weird
Speaker 3: for us. I can't imagine you're freaking playing in the
Speaker 3: Super Bowl and it all goes down, Like what are
Speaker 3: you guys even talking about when that happens.
Speaker 7: I remember sitting on the bench and kind of the
Speaker 7: lights go out and you kind of just look around, like,
Speaker 7: what the heck is going on? I wish I had
Speaker 7: more memories of it. It's funny because after the game,
Speaker 7: everybody kind of started expressing to me what they thought,
Speaker 7: and some people were scared.
Speaker 6: I mean a lot.
Speaker 7: I had a lot of friends and family that were
Speaker 7: nervous as what was going on, and thankfully for me,
Speaker 7: that never really crossed my mind. I kind of just
Speaker 7: took it for what it was, sat on the ground,
Speaker 7: stretched out a little bit. You know, you think it's
Speaker 7: going to be two or three minutes. You don't realize
Speaker 7: it's going to be twenty or thirty or however long
Speaker 7: it was, so I think if I had to guess
Speaker 7: how my mindset was, it was probably taking it like
Speaker 7: every two or three minutes, thinking it was going to
Speaker 7: they were going to come back on and we were
Speaker 7: going to get right back to it.
Speaker 3: Playing at Pittsburgh and College and then Delaware. Like, to me,
Speaker 3: that's cold weather sounds terrible, But you've played in cold
Speaker 3: weather places in the NFL for the most part, too.
Speaker 3: Is that even a thing? Do you even get cold?
Speaker 3: Or is that just normal?
Speaker 7: There's definitely things about that that are not ideal. I
Speaker 7: think you just you put that big coat on, you
Speaker 7: sit on the heated bench, and you deal with it
Speaker 7: for the five ten minutes that you're not sitting on
Speaker 7: that bench. But we got it. We got it pretty easy.
Speaker 7: The fact that we got guys waiting for us on
Speaker 7: the sideline to throw a big coat over us and
Speaker 7: sit on a you know, one hundred degree warming bench.
Speaker 6: When you're out there playing, you're honestly not thinking about it.
Speaker 7: It's like the first thirty seconds that you take that
Speaker 7: code off that you're thinking what the hell am I doing?
Speaker 7: Or pre pregame warm ups are actually probably more miserable
Speaker 7: in the game, because you're like, do I want to
Speaker 7: even go out there and warm up? Or do I
Speaker 7: just want to kind of hang out in the locker
Speaker 7: room and say say, I'm good, I'll be ready to
Speaker 7: go once the game starts.
Speaker 3: And warmups probably no adrenaline, right.
Speaker 7: Yeah, exactly, you're not. You're just like, I'm not playing
Speaker 7: the game. Why am I going to go out there
Speaker 7: and do it to myself? And I don't have to,
Speaker 7: So it's a little bit harder mental hurdle to get
Speaker 7: a ticket out there for pregame.
Speaker 3: At the height of your career or when you will
Speaker 3: say that your arm was the healthiest it may even
Speaker 3: be now. You ever just chunk a ball to see
Speaker 3: how far you could throw a ball?
Speaker 7: You know, I used to when I was in college,
Speaker 7: but like when I was in late college, early part
Speaker 7: of my career in the NFL, I was probably more
Speaker 7: interested in seeing how far I could throw it and
Speaker 7: doing some long casts. These days, I just kind of
Speaker 7: do it to keep my arm in shape. I'm not
Speaker 7: necessarily super wired about where I can throw the ball
Speaker 7: through the uprights from uh. When people ask me, I
Speaker 7: always to say I can probably I could throw it
Speaker 7: around seventy five yards.
Speaker 6: I don't. I don't know, maybe give or take a
Speaker 6: few yards here and there, so.
Speaker 3: Eighty eighty five.
Speaker 7: I honestly, if I could touch eighty, I would probably
Speaker 7: say eighty. I don't think I've ever thrown a football
Speaker 7: eighty yards unless I would unless I was down on
Speaker 7: the Jersey shore on the beach with a forty mile
Speaker 7: an hour winds.
Speaker 6: I wasn't throwing the ball eighty yards.
Speaker 3: So that's a good point, because if I'm lying about
Speaker 3: driving a golf ball, I never lie short. I always
Speaker 3: or I always estimate a little long. It's like, what
Speaker 3: do you do? Yeah, I got to sixty five average,
Speaker 3: and really it's not that so I guess right, Yeah,
Speaker 3: that's a good point. When did you realize in your
Speaker 3: youth that you had a really strong arm?
Speaker 7: Oh, I guess growing up on the schoolyard, just kind
Speaker 7: of playing two hand touch. I could always throw that
Speaker 7: little ball that you know, the little pee wee ball
Speaker 7: that kind of everybody plays with.
Speaker 6: I think, you know, we might have had a Minnesota.
Speaker 7: Vikings or probably a Philadelphia Eagles rubber football that we
Speaker 7: could kind of I could throw the length of a
Speaker 7: schoolyard and nobody else could really do that. So you
Speaker 7: kind of figure, all right, nybe, I could throw the
Speaker 7: ball a little.
Speaker 3: Bit when these guys are getting ready for draft day,
Speaker 3: draft night, if it's night one or second round or
Speaker 3: third night, like, what was your draft night like?
Speaker 7: So I was sitting on my couch in my parents' house.
Speaker 7: I really didn't want to let cameras in because I
Speaker 7: was unsure about where I was going to be picked,
Speaker 7: and just kind of wanted to be more private in general.
Speaker 7: But obviously I got talked into, you know, allowing them
Speaker 7: to come into the house. And I was just kind
Speaker 7: of sitting on the couch and waiting to see what happens.
Speaker 7: And we were all watching the draft, excited and kind
Speaker 7: of eager to see what was going to happen. But
Speaker 7: coming from Delaware, I didn't know if I was going
Speaker 7: to be There was a lot of momentum probably behind
Speaker 7: where I was going.
Speaker 6: To be picked.
Speaker 7: I felt like I was probably going to be picked
Speaker 7: decently high. But I could have been a first round pick.
Speaker 7: I could have been a third round pick. I had
Speaker 7: no idea. So I was a little bit I was excited, obviously,
Speaker 7: because at that point I didn't really care where I.
Speaker 6: Was going to be picked.
Speaker 7: I knew that I was going to be an NFL
Speaker 7: draft pick, and I think that was the most exciting thing. Yeah,
Speaker 7: there was probably a little bit of uncertainty in my
Speaker 7: mind too, because you just don't know where you're going
Speaker 7: to go and where you're going to spend the next
Speaker 7: you know, you plan on spending the next fifteen years
Speaker 7: of your life probably wherever.
Speaker 6: You end up getting picked.
Speaker 7: So it was, yeah, definitely definitely a little bit of
Speaker 7: a mixed feelings about where that could be.
Speaker 6: Who called you, Ozzie called me.
Speaker 7: Ozzie called me, and I think they were I think
Speaker 7: they traded up with Houston, I want to say. And
Speaker 7: he said, hey, Joe, we're about to you know, we're
Speaker 7: about to trade up here with Houston into the eighteenth
Speaker 7: pick and and select you to become a Baltimore Raven.
Speaker 6: And you know, obviously, like the whole.
Speaker 7: Room that I was sitting in kind of went nuts
Speaker 7: because they were, you know, they realized I was on
Speaker 7: the phone call and I was kind of giving them
Speaker 7: a head nod or whatever I was doing to let
Speaker 7: them know, like, hey, it's about to happen.
Speaker 3: How much sleep do you try to get a night.
Speaker 6: Right now.
Speaker 7: Yeah, we're going to pivot into health.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 7: I got to tell you there was a time where,
Speaker 7: like my kids were younger, and we could actually enjoy
Speaker 7: three hours on the couch being my wife by ourselves
Speaker 7: from like seven thirty to ten thirty or eleven o'clock
Speaker 7: eleven thirty, whatever we wanted to do. You know, we
Speaker 7: could put those kids to bed. But now my kids
Speaker 7: are getting older, they complain about bedtime every night. It's
Speaker 7: getting pushed, you know, further and further back, and I'm
Speaker 7: usually knocked out on the couch at nine o'clock and
Speaker 7: then at ten fifteen I'm waking up with my wife
Speaker 7: going back to bed, and I'm.
Speaker 6: Sleeping till six thirty, six forty five every day.
Speaker 3: So is there a you get to a game, because
Speaker 3: there are mornings if I'm either doing the show or
Speaker 3: if i'm even if I'm on touring doing stand up
Speaker 3: my bra I just have brain fog some days and
Speaker 3: if I sleep maybe something my eight. You ever get
Speaker 3: to the game day and you're like, man, like I'm
Speaker 3: just not fully there and you have to go all right, guys,
Speaker 3: my brain's not clicking the right way and need you
Speaker 3: to help me out a little bit.
Speaker 7: Listen, there's times, Yeah, I don't know about my brain,
Speaker 7: but your body definitely wakes up a little bit tired sometimes,
Speaker 7: And listen, it's not ideal for us. We're waking up
Speaker 7: even if most of the time, even if you're at home,
Speaker 7: you're waking up in a hotel, you don't get to
Speaker 7: sleep in your own bed. And definitely if you're on
Speaker 7: the road. And honestly, I'm not great at at falling
Speaker 7: asleep and sleeping well. In a hotel, I usually can
Speaker 7: kind of turn my mind off and not worry about anything,
Speaker 7: and that I'm the same way the night before the game.
Speaker 7: I'm not really thinking about it. I feel like if
Speaker 7: I do have things on my mind, I can actually
Speaker 7: relax and go to bed and kind of put it
Speaker 7: out of my mind. But just a night's sleep in
Speaker 7: a hotel, I've never quite gotten used to it. So
Speaker 7: there's always probably a little bit of that.
Speaker 3: Three final questions that leads me to that. So do
Speaker 3: you stay at home? Do you stay in the same
Speaker 3: hotel room, in the same bed to at least have
Speaker 3: some sort of consistency.
Speaker 6: Man, I've been all over the place the last few years.
Speaker 6: I have no idea.
Speaker 7: It's been I think typically, Yes, you're in the same
Speaker 7: room all year.
Speaker 3: Like in Baltimore's same room, Saints, same room, same room. Joe,
Speaker 3: we appreciate the time, and I thank you for spending
Speaker 3: some time with us.
Speaker 6: No, I appreciate it. You guys have a good one,
Speaker 6: all right, Thanks Joe.
Speaker 3: Now we'll get to former NFL and current college head
Speaker 3: coach Jim Mora. Coach. Moro was the head coach in
Speaker 3: Atlanta when Michael Vick was our quarterback. So I asked
Speaker 3: him what it's like to coach Michael Vick, especially during
Speaker 3: that time. Here's what he said.
Speaker 8: He was unbelievable. Number one, he was a really good person.
Speaker 8: He is a really good person. We stay in touch.
Speaker 8: I'm happy he's coaching. He's going to have a great
Speaker 8: impact on Norfolk State and all those student athletes. But
Speaker 8: every single day, every single day on practice, on the
Speaker 8: practice field, he would do something that you would just
Speaker 8: let go.
Speaker 2: Did he just do that?
Speaker 8: I mean, the most unbelievable athlete I've ever been around.
Speaker 8: We're playing the Carolina Panthers. We win the game, I
Speaker 8: think we win the division or I don't know something,
Speaker 8: and it's a fourth down and goal, and you know,
Speaker 8: if we don't score a touchdown, the game's over. Our
Speaker 8: coordinator we call time out. Coordinator comes over and gives him,
Speaker 8: you know, all these instructions, like, you know, you got
Speaker 8: to look here, you gotta look at this guy. You
Speaker 8: gotta look at that guy this year number one read.
Speaker 8: Mike starts to run on the field. I bring him
Speaker 8: back and I go, hey, Mike, I go listen. Man,
Speaker 8: if you don't like it, just frigging run, Just take
Speaker 8: off and go. And that's that that. You can find
Speaker 8: it on YouTube, a picture of him diving into the
Speaker 8: end zone against Carolina, his knees about an inch off
Speaker 8: the ground. And that was the kind of guy. He was,
Speaker 8: like you just like I tell him every every week,
Speaker 8: just go be you. You know, like we've worked hard
Speaker 8: all week. Your skill set's improving, your understanding of the
Speaker 8: concepts are improving. But at the end of the day,
Speaker 8: don't be paralyzed by trying to do things that you're
Speaker 8: not comfortable doing. Just go be you. And he was man,
Speaker 8: he was fun to be around.
Speaker 3: He was something just to watch like his old YouTube
Speaker 3: because obviously I watched it as a kid, but to
Speaker 3: watch it now and to just see the separation at
Speaker 3: almost at will. It's crazy to watch now that far
Speaker 3: remove from it, just how athletically superior he was.
Speaker 6: His burst.
Speaker 8: Yeah, you know you remember that that that game against
Speaker 8: the Vikings where he split the two defenders.
Speaker 2: And you'd see that every day. But his arm was
Speaker 2: like a whip.
Speaker 8: I mean, there was that commercial who was throwing it
Speaker 8: out of the stadium and I know that was you know,
Speaker 8: it wasn't real, but I think he could probably do that.
Speaker 6: It was.
Speaker 8: I mean, he was a cultural icon and he made
Speaker 8: a huge impact on this league. I think he changed
Speaker 8: the direction of how people look at quarterbacks. And yeah,
Speaker 8: he was really fun and just funded to know as
Speaker 8: a person.
Speaker 3: Next up, our interview with Kansas City Chiefs chairman and
Speaker 3: CEO Clark Hunt. Clark grew up around the league, with
Speaker 3: his family being a huge part of NFL history, and
Speaker 3: now he's leading one of the most successful franchises in
Speaker 3: all of sports. Big thanks to Clark for coming on
Speaker 3: with us here. He is Clark Hunt. First of all,
Speaker 3: mister Hunt, I would like to say that I cannot
Speaker 3: wait for you to be in the Hall of Fame.
Speaker 3: I want to say what I've seen from your organization.
Speaker 3: I'm ready whenever you're on television and that jacket, I'll
Speaker 3: be like, that's my guy right there. So congratulations on
Speaker 3: just massive success over the past decade.
Speaker 9: Yeah, well, I sure appreciate it. It's absolutely been a
Speaker 9: very special time to be a Kansas City Chiefs fan.
Speaker 9: You know, really, from the day that Andy Reid walked
Speaker 9: into the building in twenty thirteen, we've been building for
Speaker 9: this moment. We've had an incredible amount of success over
Speaker 9: the last six years, and hopefully we'll be able to
Speaker 9: carry that forward.
Speaker 3: The legend of the Andy Reid interview is nine hours.
Speaker 3: Is that accurate?
Speaker 9: That is accurate, and it's hard to believe in retrospect.
Speaker 9: I'm not sure what we talked about for nine hours,
Speaker 9: but it was a great opportunity to really get to
Speaker 9: know each other, and I think we just realized that
Speaker 9: we had tremendous chemistry and that relationship was going to
Speaker 9: be a good fit. I also had a lot of
Speaker 9: my staff there who got to spend time with Andy,
Speaker 9: which I think was good for them and as well
Speaker 9: as good for Andy. And there was just a lot
Speaker 9: of comfort all the way around, and we were able
Speaker 9: to get him to Kansas City later that week and
Speaker 9: he's been there ever since.
Speaker 3: How important was culture versus X's and O's when making
Speaker 3: that decision.
Speaker 9: Well, we've been through a very challenging couple of seasons
Speaker 9: leading up to that hiring in twenty thirteen, and I
Speaker 9: felt that we needed a very experienced leader, somebody who
Speaker 9: had experience in championship games, which Andy certainly did. Interestingly,
Speaker 9: our twenty twelve team had I believe six Pro Bowl
Speaker 9: players on it, and that was a team that won
Speaker 9: only two games, so it wasn't like we didn't have
Speaker 9: some talent on the roster. And I think what Andy
Speaker 9: did when he arrived in Kannessee was he really changed
Speaker 9: the culture. He changed the expectations, he changed the relationship
Speaker 9: between the coaching staff and the players, and he was
Speaker 9: able to immediately get off on a great start. The
Speaker 9: team won nine straight games at the beginning of that
Speaker 9: twenty thirteen season, and I just think it shows what
Speaker 9: a great coach he is, both from a culture standpoint
Speaker 9: as well as from the next.
Speaker 6: AS and o's.
Speaker 3: If I was the owner, I don't want to do
Speaker 3: like player stuff. Do you ever go work out with
Speaker 3: the players like cut off a shirt and hop in.
Speaker 9: So during training camp, when I, you know, spend a
Speaker 9: more time around the team, I will occasionally end up
Speaker 9: in the gym with the players, and I have to
Speaker 9: say it's very humbling or maybe even humiliating.
Speaker 3: That's awesome. I feel like I would be doing that
Speaker 3: all the time. The folklore of the mister Clark Hunt
Speaker 3: graduating first as class at SMU true or false.
Speaker 9: It's hard to believe, but but it's true. I have
Speaker 9: several children who are at SMU recently graduated from SMU,
Speaker 9: and it's it's it's a great university, and I had
Speaker 9: an amazing experience there. I'm not sure how I pulled
Speaker 9: that off.
Speaker 3: Patrick Mahomes as a person. What's he like? What's your
Speaker 3: relationship like with him? As people?
Speaker 9: Yeah, he's just an awesome human being. As good a
Speaker 9: football player as he is, he's an even better person.
Speaker 9: Of course. Everyone knows about his leadership ability in the
Speaker 9: locker room, but he's a guy that really cares about
Speaker 9: the people around him, and I think that's part of
Speaker 9: the reason why his teammates love playing with him, is
Speaker 9: that they know that he cares about them both on
Speaker 9: and off the field. He's a terrific guy, you know,
Speaker 9: lots of fun, loves to play golf, He's a tremendous
Speaker 9: family man, and it's you know, so much fun to
Speaker 9: get to see him be a dad.
Speaker 3: I want to make a comparison, and you're definitely way
Speaker 3: more successful, way smarter, and better looking than me. But
Speaker 3: when I started to have a bit of success and
Speaker 3: I was like touring, I'd have all this people come
Speaker 3: up like, I'm your cousin, let me get tickets. When
Speaker 3: you guys started to crush it, did you have more
Speaker 3: friends all of a sudden that wanted to be like,
Speaker 3: you know, on the field, Oh Clark, it's me, your
Speaker 3: buddy from my school.
Speaker 9: You know, that's one of the blessings that comes with
Speaker 9: having a little bit of success. And I have a
Speaker 9: great group of friends and I love having them around
Speaker 9: for these championship opportunities. That's something when I look back
Speaker 9: on this time period that I'm going to remember getting
Speaker 9: to celebrate it with my family and friends. So that's
Speaker 9: totally a positive that I've got some guys that have
Speaker 9: reached out that I haven't seen.
Speaker 6: In a little while.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I had people on twenty three and meters like
Speaker 3: like one percent match, They're like, I'm your cousin, let
Speaker 3: me get in see I'd be afraid with the Chiefs,
Speaker 3: they'd be a lot worse than that, mister Hunt. I'm
Speaker 3: always super curious about successful people and driven people, like
Speaker 3: what they read. Like I would imagine you're a studious person, Like,
Speaker 3: what are your favorite books?
Speaker 9: Yeah, so I don't have a lot of time to
Speaker 9: read books. I spend a lot of time reading literature
Speaker 9: that's related to the sports business and just sort of
Speaker 9: staying up on what's going on both in the National
Speaker 9: Football League and you probably know that we're also involved
Speaker 9: in Major League Soccer. So it's really more focused on
Speaker 9: newspapers and magazines. You of course access online today that really,
Speaker 9: you know, helped me stay up to speed on what's
Speaker 9: going on.
Speaker 3: What about listening to people that have opinions that have
Speaker 3: no idea what they're talking about. Do you ever come
Speaker 3: across that, like on social media or anybody like this
Speaker 3: guy thinks he knows everything, but he doesn't.
Speaker 9: Certainly, social media has changed how we consume news, and
Speaker 9: it's opened up the ability to have a lot of
Speaker 9: other people that are commenting on sports, and so you've
Speaker 9: got a lot more perspectives out there. Not everybody's going
Speaker 9: to agree, and that's okay.
Speaker 3: When you were growing up, who was your favorite player?
Speaker 6: It was Lynn Dawson.
Speaker 9: You know, I grew up during that era where the
Speaker 9: Chiefs went to Super Bowl, won and lost, and then
Speaker 9: made it back in Super Bowl four and beat the
Speaker 9: Minnesota Vikings. I got to spend some time around around
Speaker 9: the team as a kid with my dad, and you know,
Speaker 9: Lynn was definitely a hero for me. I was also
Speaker 9: a big fan of your on Stin Rude because I
Speaker 9: was a soccer player and Johan, of course was one
Speaker 9: of the first soccer style placekickers in the National Football League,
Speaker 9: and so I love getting to hang out with him
Speaker 9: as well.
Speaker 3: We have three more questions for you, mister Hunt. And
Speaker 3: you're sitting in front of a wall of accolades, a
Speaker 3: team accolades for sure, a lot of balls. Which ball
Speaker 3: behind you brings up the quickest, greatest memory.
Speaker 9: Well, I'm not going to stand up and you know,
Speaker 9: pick one of the balls. But one of them back
Speaker 9: there has the signatures of our Super Bowl team from
Speaker 9: twenty nineteen and that was obviously special because it was
Speaker 9: our first trip back to the Big Game in fifty
Speaker 9: years and you know, being able to get across the
Speaker 9: finish line there and win that game that was so special.
Speaker 3: There he is mister Clark Hunt Chiefs. That's all see yeah,
Speaker 3: all right. Final interview is with former Georgia All American
Speaker 3: and longtime college football analyst David Pollock. David was one
Speaker 3: of the most dominant David was one of the most
Speaker 3: dominant defensive players in the country during his playing days,
Speaker 3: and then he became one of the most recognizable voices
Speaker 3: breaking down the sport every single Saturday. Thanks to David
Speaker 3: for hopping on all with us. Here he is David Pollack. David,
Speaker 3: good to see you man.
Speaker 2: Great to see brother.
Speaker 3: Thanks for having me out a couple things. What does
Speaker 3: Saturday like at your house?
Speaker 2: Probably the laziest human in the world.
Speaker 4: I always wake up and make sure that I get
Speaker 4: my workout in, you know, get some steps in because
Speaker 4: the rest of the day is going to consist of
Speaker 4: watching football, multiple screens and multiple games going.
Speaker 2: I got my laptop in front of me taking.
Speaker 4: Notes of everything that I see in the observations, and
Speaker 4: it's literally it's a quick grind from twelve o'clock to
Speaker 4: night time. It's like what just happened. It was fast
Speaker 4: and furious. But it's so much dagga fun too. It's
Speaker 4: not like it's really working. And think about this, man
Speaker 4: if says, like, what do you want to do?
Speaker 3: Something you want to do?
Speaker 2: Like, sorry, bet, I gotta work.
Speaker 4: Like I got to sit here right on the couch
Speaker 4: and work. So it's a lot of consuming for sure.
Speaker 3: Do you still catch the West Coast games too? Or
Speaker 3: is it bedtime?
Speaker 4: Oh god, no, we're catching them all, brother, Like, we're
Speaker 4: not going to bed till, you know, till one or two.
Speaker 4: I mean it's you know, I was up watching by
Speaker 4: you late, you know, this past after this past Saturday,
Speaker 4: after everything was commencing. Actually I'm sorry Sunday morning. So no,
Speaker 4: you definitely stay up and watch as much as you
Speaker 4: can to to make sure you're educated. There's some good
Speaker 4: football out west man, Like, it's fun to it's fun
Speaker 4: to watch that and consume that as well.
Speaker 3: Can you watch NFL though recreationally because you're watching college obviously,
Speaker 3: because you're an expert. Can you watch NFL with a
Speaker 3: little less attention?
Speaker 2: Man, I just try to. I tried not to on Sundays.
Speaker 4: I try to just get away from it, and we've
Speaker 4: got church, and we've got you know, a small group,
Speaker 4: and we've got other things.
Speaker 2: So it'll be on like during the day at the
Speaker 2: end of the day. But now we.
Speaker 4: Definitely try to do more as a family and get
Speaker 4: up and move a little bit more and do like
Speaker 4: I love to play golf in the afternoon if I can,
Speaker 4: if I can stink that in. But now I can't
Speaker 4: watch any game like a normal like just sit back
Speaker 4: and relax and watch like I'm definitely always looking at
Speaker 4: the game from an analytical view, probably one of the
Speaker 4: only things that won't turn my brain off. But NFL
Speaker 4: football is fun and different. And I've played fantasy for
Speaker 4: years and that's kind of changes the way you look
Speaker 4: at the game. But this year I told I committed.
Speaker 4: I said, I'm not watching for fantasy.
Speaker 2: I'm not doing it. I'm not getting upset, like I'm
Speaker 2: just cheering my guy on.
Speaker 3: So I try to decompress a little bit on Sundays
Speaker 3: after you finished playing after your injury. And I have
Speaker 3: different friends that played different positions and their bodies did
Speaker 3: different things after they retired. Some of them put on
Speaker 3: a bunch of weight, some of them lost a bunch
Speaker 3: of weight. You played a position nowhere, I'm not sure
Speaker 3: if you had to keep your weight up or down
Speaker 3: because you played a very athletic position, but it was
Speaker 3: on the line. What happened to you physically after you
Speaker 3: stopped playing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I was a chunky. I was a chunky monkey.
Speaker 4: I always was growing up. And it's funny your identity
Speaker 4: gets you know, it's okay when you're a football player
Speaker 4: to be thicker and be bigger and so defensive lineman.
Speaker 4: I was two ninety two at my heaviest, and you do,
Speaker 4: you're you're absolutely right.
Speaker 2: You go one or two ways.
Speaker 4: You either keep the habits you had and if you do,
Speaker 4: you're going to keep growing, or you start.
Speaker 2: To change the eating habits.
Speaker 4: And so I've definitely lost like fifty sixty pounds from
Speaker 4: my top playing weight, and it's a different look. I
Speaker 4: eat to survive. I'm not one of those persons that
Speaker 4: has a lot of these like temptations and food like
Speaker 4: I don't care where we go eat.
Speaker 2: I just I want to eat the same thing.
Speaker 4: I want to know what I'm eating, and definitely me
Speaker 4: and my buddies. When you go back to reunions, it's
Speaker 4: it's you're a one hundred percent right.
Speaker 2: It's one or the other.
Speaker 4: It's get really skinny and trim, or it's put on
Speaker 4: a little bit of weight and you look like you
Speaker 4: played a totally different position.
Speaker 3: You said you work out every day before, or you
Speaker 3: try to work out every day, same with me, But
Speaker 3: I assume our workouts are a bit different. Just looking
Speaker 3: at us, I would think visually, Uh so are you
Speaker 3: still a guy who does heavy weight or how have
Speaker 3: you changed your workouts?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm done with heavyweight, man, Like heavyweight does nothing
Speaker 4: for me. I'm not trying to have any more surgeries
Speaker 4: or put my body through anything I don't need to.
Speaker 4: Like I squatted almost seven hundred pounds in college, but like,
Speaker 4: I'm not going over you know, two seventy five on
Speaker 4: a squad now, and I'll just do twenty five reps bench.
Speaker 4: I'm not going to do over two twenty five. I'll
Speaker 4: do twenty five to thirty reps if I need to
Speaker 4: do twenty five to thirty reps, or I'll slow it
Speaker 4: down big time. Like the other day, we did sets
Speaker 4: of ten and I did you know, five count down
Speaker 4: with two twenty five hesitate and then come up, Well,
Speaker 4: you do ten reps like that it'll hurt, like you
Speaker 4: can make the weight hurt. So to me, it's more
Speaker 4: about moving fast. We're big on the row machine. We're
Speaker 4: big on the bike, especially assault bike, because that thing
Speaker 4: will whip your Heini like.
Speaker 2: But it's definitely a different way of training.
Speaker 4: I'm not trying to get big and to have all
Speaker 4: this mass, you know as we get older, trying to
Speaker 4: fight father time and continue to be able to do
Speaker 4: some explosive things, but not be like a big corn
Speaker 4: fed mule. I've had those days. Those days are gone.
Speaker 3: Was there ever a game where they rushed it either
Speaker 3: where you lost and it's just awkward and you're like,
Speaker 3: oh man, these fans are everywhere or the opposite where
Speaker 3: it happened, and you're like, man, this is crazy, Like
Speaker 3: we won and the fans are all down on top
Speaker 3: of us.
Speaker 4: When you're a player that loses, you're pissed off and
Speaker 4: you got all these people that they're not meaning to,
Speaker 4: but they're running into you like they're running on the
Speaker 4: field and they're they're kind of bumping with you, and
Speaker 4: you literally want to lower your shoulder and eliminate a
Speaker 4: human being out of your way cause you're you're upset,
Speaker 4: right like you're you want to take it out, but
Speaker 4: you know, you know you can't do that, but it
Speaker 4: is it's hard to keep your composure when that's when
Speaker 4: that's happening. But when you're a student and that's happened
Speaker 4: for you, like the passion and energy because because you
Speaker 4: get so much like the dog walk at Georgia when
Speaker 4: I was there, man, like to go through and watch
Speaker 4: these people's eyes and to watch how much like passion
Speaker 4: they have. Like, man, if it doesn't get you excited
Speaker 4: to play, I don't know what does.
Speaker 2: If they're that excited, you dang sure better be.
Speaker 4: And and the thing I always loved about Georgia, like
Speaker 4: you can bark it another human being, like a grown
Speaker 4: adult can bark engine. That's and that's socially acceptable. Like
Speaker 4: I'm all in for that kind of culture, but I
Speaker 4: can see how it could lead to some bad I'm
Speaker 4: surprised we haven't had more of the other like people
Speaker 4: getting upset, people getting ran over, you know, because you're
Speaker 4: you're literally running on the field with a bunch of
Speaker 4: folks that are you know, not in the greatest of spirits,
Speaker 4: that are sometimes angry and upset because they just lost.
Speaker 3: I mean, I think Aligarrett Blunt, that was not a
Speaker 3: positive one. When they ran down and punched them. I
Speaker 3: mean that that was a bad one. But yeah, I
Speaker 3: think I would. That's why I would react to fans
Speaker 3: ran down and I lost. I do not think. I
Speaker 3: think i'muld be so triggered from losing that it would
Speaker 3: not be a positive environment for me.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, you're the emotions are not fun. Like
Speaker 4: you're trying your best to be a good sport and
Speaker 4: like shake hands and do that part, and then but
Speaker 4: now you've got people running and bumping into you left
Speaker 4: and right, like, yeah, that's not going to bring out
Speaker 4: the best most of the time in a human being.
Speaker 3: In high school, for you, when did you become dominant?
Speaker 3: Ninth tenth grade? When was it for you physically and
Speaker 3: mentally that the game was very easy?
Speaker 4: So so my freshman year was okay. I was an
Speaker 4: offensive lineman, a little bit chubby, still hadn't grown into
Speaker 4: my body. Actually, they asked me the first day, like
Speaker 4: what position do you play? I was like, you know,
Speaker 4: full back in the linebacker. They're like, not with the
Speaker 4: six flat forty you play offensive line. And then my
Speaker 4: second year I got a little bit better, but I
Speaker 4: was stuck between JV and varsity and I actually quit.
Speaker 4: I was like, bro, this sucks. Like football is hard
Speaker 4: enough and not playing isn't cool. And then between my
Speaker 4: sophomore and junior year, I grew six inches and gain
Speaker 4: sixty pounds. And I don't know if you know this,
Speaker 4: but like football is a lot more fun when you're
Speaker 4: the hammer and not the nail.
Speaker 2: Like it just makes a lot more sense.
Speaker 4: But like, obviously, my junior year started to have success,
Speaker 4: started to get recruited a little bit. But I'll never
Speaker 4: forget man. Before my senior year, my coach, I had
Speaker 4: a brand new coach. He calls me into his office
Speaker 4: and he's like, hey, man, and I had offers from Georgia, Clemson,
Speaker 4: like Ohio State and company going into my senior year.
Speaker 4: He's like, if we're going to be a great team,
Speaker 4: I need you to be the best player on the
Speaker 4: field every single play. And I'm like, I'm your best player,
Speaker 4: like you know, a cocky punk at that age. And
Speaker 4: and he put on like six clips in a row
Speaker 4: of me kind of jogging to the football and I
Speaker 4: was like, oh my gosh, Like he's not wrong. Like,
Speaker 4: that's really that's lazy. And I started practicing like an animal.
Speaker 4: I started flying around and he helped me see something
Speaker 4: in myself that I didn't see, and it took away
Speaker 4: that blind spot and showed me I needed to really
Speaker 4: really work. And then I became a really, really good
Speaker 4: football player. You know, my senior year of.
Speaker 3: High school, why Georgia? What was it?
Speaker 4: This is the simplest answer that you've asked yet. My
Speaker 4: baby doll, Lendsay Pollack, that was that was that was
Speaker 4: their best. That was the feather in the cap of Georgia.
Speaker 4: My dad grew up My dad grew up up north.
Speaker 2: He was a Giants fan. We didn't pay attention to
Speaker 2: much college football.
Speaker 4: Moved down south when I was four, so we watched NFL,
Speaker 4: not college. But when I started getting recruited, I started
Speaker 4: seeing all the atmospheres.
Speaker 2: I was like, this is dope.
Speaker 4: But my baby doll, Lindsay Pollack, my only girlfriend, the
Speaker 4: only girlfriend I've ever had now my wife.
Speaker 2: Like, I drove to Gainesville, Florida with Steve.
Speaker 4: Spurrier and I was like, oh my gosh, that's forever away,
Speaker 4: you know, from her, And so being fifty five minutes
Speaker 4: down the road right there in Athens.
Speaker 2: Was like, yeah, that'll work.
Speaker 3: You have your seatball, get ball signed behind you. So
Speaker 3: and you do a couple of podcasts, and we're always
Speaker 3: finding and recommend a good podcast to our listeners. So
Speaker 3: what are we gonna hear on that podcast?
Speaker 6: Man?
Speaker 4: I love college football with everything in me and right
Speaker 4: now with our season of life and my wife, like
Speaker 4: a lot of people know, she's she got diagnosed with
Speaker 4: brain cancer, and like, so your your priorities and your
Speaker 4: travel and your schedule is a lot different. So like
Speaker 4: television absolutely not going to be a thing, but like
Speaker 4: football is so fantastic and so great and that's literally
Speaker 4: what you're gonna do. I have my buddy, that's my
Speaker 4: neighbor on the podcast with me, who works for Pro
Speaker 4: Football Focus and has all the numbers.
Speaker 2: But like we come to you, you.
Speaker 4: Know, four days a week and just talk football, unbiased,
Speaker 4: strong opinions that are not like everybody else's. We're going
Speaker 4: to watch a lot of tape and just I mean,
Speaker 4: it's football, it's college football. It's the best there is
Speaker 4: and so just having that and being able to follow
Speaker 4: it talk about it is something that I enjoy and
Speaker 4: I just can't imagine life without it, and that's what
Speaker 4: you'll get several days a week on YouTube and on
Speaker 4: all the platforms for podcasts.
Speaker 3: Hew you guys. Check it out Sea Ball, Get Ball
Speaker 3: with David Pollock. Hey, big fan. Hated you at Georgia
Speaker 3: when you played us, but loved you all the other times.
Speaker 3: And then I was with a bank. I love watching
Speaker 3: with the Bengals too, So yeah, big fan of you,
Speaker 3: especially on television. So thank you for the time. Man,
Speaker 3: really appreciate it and hope the podcast is killing it well.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much, Man, appreciate you having me on.
Speaker 3: Hey, thanks for listening to this episode of some of
Speaker 3: your favorites from twenty twenty five. We hope you have
Speaker 3: an awesome new year. Be sure to give us a
Speaker 3: follow on socials at twenty five Whistle Sports. Also leave
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