Speaker 1: Kubbooms.
Speaker 2: If you thought four hours a day, twelve hundred minutes
Speaker 2: a week was enough, think again. He's the last remnants
Speaker 2: of the old Republic, a soul fashion of fairness. He
Speaker 2: treats crackheads in the ghetto cutter the same as the
Speaker 2: rich pill poppers in the penthouse.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: The clearing House of Hot takes break free for something special.
Speaker 2: The Fifth Hour with Ben Maller starts right now.
Speaker 1: In the air everywhere. The Fifth Hour with me, Ben
Speaker 1: Malor and Danny G Radio as we are together on
Speaker 1: this Friday, the tenth day of January, and I gotta
Speaker 1: tell you, I was on last night doing the Overnight.
Speaker 1: So Danny G by the way, is on assignment. He
Speaker 1: will produce this podcast and hopefully be with us over
Speaker 1: the next couple of days. On the weekend that Danny
Speaker 1: has been dealing with the fires and had to leave
Speaker 1: his home, there's some craziness out near him, and I
Speaker 1: didn't want to address that, but it is, by the way,
Speaker 1: National house Plant Appreciation Day to day before we get
Speaker 1: into the podcast, because we like these dopey holidays. It's
Speaker 1: appreciation Day, which is fogazy, but apparently houseplants were used
Speaker 1: by wealthy families back in five hundred BC. They go
Speaker 1: all the way back to five hundred BC to this day.
Speaker 1: I remember back in the I think it was like
Speaker 1: the eighties or the nineties, there was a fad of
Speaker 1: fake houseplants. But that's pretty much all I know. Those
Speaker 1: plastic houseplants were everywhere. But I don't have any other
Speaker 1: information other than its National house Plant Appreciation Day. Today
Speaker 1: it's also Quitter's Day, so big day there. Quitter's Day
Speaker 1: held the second Friday in January. It falls on January
Speaker 1: tenth today, and it is a new Year's resolution, which
Speaker 1: began four thousand years ago right the itching Babylon started
Speaker 1: the tradition of setting new Year's resolutions, and supposedly today
Speaker 1: Quitter's Day has set aside recognize those who set new
Speaker 1: goals and failed to achieve them. Yes, so if you
Speaker 1: planned on doing something and you're already doing the opposite,
Speaker 1: congratulations you are being honored today on National Quitter's Day.
Speaker 1: A wonderful day. So on this edition of the Fifth Hour,
Speaker 1: we've got scramble Drill, Scramble drill. We have that we
Speaker 1: also have on the Oregon Trail and the idiom of
Speaker 1: the day, the idiom of the day. But we'll start
Speaker 1: with this. So I wanted to mention and we do
Speaker 1: promote Benny versus the Penny. Some of you get annoyed
Speaker 1: by the Oh I used to like your podcast, but
Speaker 1: you spend so much time telling you about Benny versus
Speaker 1: the Penny. Yes, Guilty as charged, Guilty as charged. I
Speaker 1: have a TV show that I am trying to get
Speaker 1: people to watch. I will take every advantage I can
Speaker 1: to get people to watch said TV show. If you're
Speaker 1: annoyed by that, just fast forward in the podcast. But
Speaker 1: I actually have a good story to tell as I
Speaker 1: welcome you in to this edition of the Fifth Hour. Right,
Speaker 1: this is our happy place. We get to hang around.
Speaker 1: We can say bad words because it's only in the
Speaker 1: podcast format. We don't run into the roadblock of the FCC,
Speaker 1: where if we say a bad word we're in trouble.
Speaker 1: Podcasts are like the old West. You can say whatever
Speaker 1: you want, knock it out of the park. So the
Speaker 1: other day, it was a normal, normal week. It started
Speaker 1: out a long long time ago, which really wasn't that
Speaker 1: long ago. It was a few days ago. I start
Speaker 1: getting ready for the next episode of the TV show,
Speaker 1: pretty much when the games kick off on Thursday during
Speaker 1: the season. So I'm watching the game on Thursday seeing
Speaker 1: what I did wrong. It's kind of like that coward bit,
Speaker 1: what did Ben get right? What had been get wrong?
Speaker 1: This year, It's been a lot that I got wrong.
Speaker 1: Things that are supposed to happen haven't happened, and so
Speaker 1: I'm trying to outmaneuver the penny. And we've zoomed through
Speaker 1: the NFL regular season, so it's a constant thing watching football,
Speaker 1: looking at the numbers and all that, and it's a
Speaker 1: paralysis by analysis is generally what happens. I have too
Speaker 1: much information. Now I try to whittle that down. There's
Speaker 1: certain key indicators that I look for, and that's kind
Speaker 1: of how we make the Fedicini alfredo. So that's how
Speaker 1: that goes together. You gotta have the sauce, you gotta
Speaker 1: have the noodles, and put all those together. So the
Speaker 1: week started somewhat normal. I start putting stuff together on
Speaker 1: Sunday night, and then more on Monday night, and Tuesday
Speaker 1: is a big day to kind of get everything together,
Speaker 1: and then Wednesday is the day that we put the
Speaker 1: sausage into the two What becomes the sausage. We put
Speaker 1: our head down and then all of a sudden, so
Speaker 1: it was normal, and then all hell broke loose, Hot
Speaker 1: Diggity Dog, all hell broke loose. So I had put together.
Speaker 1: What I do is I send ideas. I pitch ideas
Speaker 1: to Vinnie, who's the producer of Bennie Versus the Penny
Speaker 1: and the team in Boston. But Vinnie's the guy that
Speaker 1: producers the show. So I spend Monday and Tuesday mostly
Speaker 1: cooking up ideas, and then Wednesday, starting in the morning,
Speaker 1: is a production day. So that's the day on Wednesday
Speaker 1: where I throw all these eyes ideas down. I scribble
Speaker 1: them down with chicken scratch, and then I put some
Speaker 1: stats together, riveting stuff, right, riveting stuff. So I put
Speaker 1: all this stuff together, and I'm putting the show together,
Speaker 1: doing my thing. La la la la la la la
Speaker 1: la la la la la la. You know, nothing to
Speaker 1: see here, just putting the show together. And mentioned all
Speaker 1: hell broke loose because the fires actually started on Tuesday.
Speaker 1: But we have fires all the time. In southern California.
Speaker 1: Fires are a regular thing, so you figure, okay, there's fires,
Speaker 1: it's fire seasons pretty much year round. We don't get
Speaker 1: much rain here, so fine, nothing to see here. Well,
Speaker 1: the fires On Wednesday morning, it was getting pretty pretty nasty,
Speaker 1: pretty gnarly, and it just kept getting worse and worse
Speaker 1: and worse and worse. And by Wednesday afternoon I was
Speaker 1: getting emails from the people at Universal Studios saying, the
Speaker 1: lot is closed, the lot is closed today, We're not
Speaker 1: sure if the lot's going to be open on Thursday,
Speaker 1: which is the day that we record Benny Versus the Penny,
Speaker 1: and they were waiting for the next wave of fires,
Speaker 1: which they knew were apparently coming. I didn't know you
Speaker 1: could forecast fires. I guess there were a number of
Speaker 1: them that were started out, all of them, but a
Speaker 1: number of them were started by homeless people. So wonderful. Anyway,
Speaker 1: So Wednesday I start I start getting messages saying, you know,
Speaker 1: we're not sure if the lot's gonna be open. Let's
Speaker 1: have a contingency plan. So I didn't really think much
Speaker 1: of it. I thought, well, it seems like it's pretty bad,
Speaker 1: but the planes are back up, the helicopters are back
Speaker 1: up to put out the fire, and so since that's
Speaker 1: going on, it should be okay, right, you know, you
Speaker 1: know what happened, you assume it should be okay. So fine,
Speaker 1: that's that. And then about ninety minutes later, and don't
Speaker 1: hold me to that. I'd have to go back and
Speaker 1: check my my messages, but it felt like about ninety
Speaker 1: minutes later, they sent a message saying, all right, we've
Speaker 1: nailed down the contingency plan. If we can't do Thursday,
Speaker 1: we're we're gonna do. We're gonna do Friday. We'll do like,
Speaker 1: we'll do it Friday morning. We'll record many versus the Penny.
Speaker 1: And they asked me my availability, and then yeah, I
Speaker 1: don't I don't care. I'll record the show at any time,
Speaker 1: any place, anywhere. Let's do it. I'm down. So I
Speaker 1: text him back. I said, whatever you need me to do,
Speaker 1: I will do. The show must go on. So fine,
Speaker 1: So they said, thank you. That's great. It's very kind
Speaker 1: of you. We appreciate you doing that. Wonderful. All right, fine,
Speaker 1: So then another ninety minutes goes by and I'm getting
Speaker 1: ready for the radio show, right, I'm doubling down on
Speaker 1: the radio show. I'm like, all right, I'm getting ready.
Speaker 1: It's it's Wednesday. It's starting to be that time where
Speaker 1: I got to lock in on the on the radio
Speaker 1: show and figure out what I'm going to talk about,
Speaker 1: Mallard monologues and all that. And so now I get
Speaker 1: all right, lots closed contingency plan. We'll send a crew
Speaker 1: out from Universal Studios to where you are and we'll
Speaker 1: do your show remotely. So okay, And then there's some
Speaker 1: meetings going on in Boston. I mean, it's a total
Speaker 1: scramble scramble drill, people trying to figure out like what
Speaker 1: are we doing? What are we doing? And I'm like,
Speaker 1: I don't care. And then I'm like, there was this talk. Well,
Speaker 1: maybe we'll send a crew out and I'll meet Looney
Speaker 1: because Looney's closer to Universal Studios where he lives then
Speaker 1: I do out in the north Woods. And so we're
Speaker 1: going through all this anyway, we determine, because of the situation,
Speaker 1: we would just do the show from our home studios.
Speaker 1: Looney has a studio he does some work at KBC,
Speaker 1: and I have the studio for Fox Sports Radio and
Speaker 1: this podcast. I'm actually in the studio right now. So
Speaker 1: we're like, all right, we'll just do it on Thursday,
Speaker 1: but we'll just do it from the home studio and
Speaker 1: we'll figure it out and all that. So I said,
Speaker 1: all right, this will be different, and I'm curious how
Speaker 1: this is going to go. Never done a national TV
Speaker 1: show from my podcast studio, but here we were. We
Speaker 1: had no other option because Universal Studios has been closed
Speaker 1: because the fires and the fires pretty close. The studios
Speaker 1: have had major fires over these Universal Studios. They've had
Speaker 1: some serious, serious fires that have caused tremendous damage to
Speaker 1: the back lot where we like to walk around and
Speaker 1: all that. So whatever it takes to keep Universal Studios
Speaker 1: in tech, I know they have some of their own
Speaker 1: fire crews out that way. So we ended up yesterday
Speaker 1: doing the TV show from our homes and if you
Speaker 1: watch it it already. The reason we had to do
Speaker 1: it on Thursday was because it starts airing Thursday evening.
Speaker 1: So we needed a show because the show was scheduled
Speaker 1: to be broadcast in some markets on Thursday evening, and
Speaker 1: so we had to get the show out. People needed
Speaker 1: to show. People agreed to carry the show, and they
Speaker 1: had programming they needed to do the program. So we
Speaker 1: did the show and it was it was interesting. There
Speaker 1: were there were some obviously issues we had to work through,
Speaker 1: some technical stuff. I had a pretty good setup, though,
Speaker 1: I got to tell you, I don't think I don't
Speaker 1: think it looked that bad. It looked pretty similar I
Speaker 1: think to the way the show does look on a
Speaker 1: normal weekly basis. There were some audio issues we had
Speaker 1: to work out. The great thing about NBC, and it's
Speaker 1: out of NBC Boston, they have all the bells and
Speaker 1: whistles that you need to do a show from your home.
Speaker 1: Considering that during COVID that's all they did. So they
Speaker 1: figured out during that pandemic, how can we have television
Speaker 1: from people's homes, And so they figured it all out
Speaker 1: and it was it was great. Everything worked out, and
Speaker 1: so they had everything that we needed. The IFB hookup
Speaker 1: with the headphones, the way that we did the video
Speaker 1: and the backdrop and the lighting and everything was good
Speaker 1: to go. It was a chef's kiss. So I do
Speaker 1: want to thank Vinnie and the people over there at
Speaker 1: NBC Sports in Boston for making that a very smooth,
Speaker 1: very smooth transition. There was one snaffo that we just
Speaker 1: got burned by because we were doing the show and
Speaker 1: about an hour after the show was put to bed
Speaker 1: and then sent out to the affiliates, the NFL stumbled
Speaker 1: through an announcement. There's a segment if you watch this
Speaker 1: week's episode of Benni Versus Penny, there's a segment where
Speaker 1: we stumbled through a portion of the show. We're talking
Speaker 1: about the Rams and the Vikings, and the Vikings fans
Speaker 1: were planning a hostile takeover, so we talked about that
Speaker 1: during the show. Well, at the time we were talking
Speaker 1: about that. The NFL was scheduled to play the Ram
Speaker 1: Viking game on Monday night in Los Angeles in Inglewood,
Speaker 1: in the hood in Inglewood, and then out of an
Speaker 1: abundance of caution, okay, they decided to move the game.
Speaker 1: They didn't have to move the game. The game could
Speaker 1: have been played there. They chose to to move the game.
Speaker 1: So it's the it's only the second playoff game Playoffs
Speaker 1: in the history of the NFL where they've moved a
Speaker 1: playoff game. The story behind that, the other one is fascinating,
Speaker 1: Like this one is just Hey, it's twenty twenty five,
Speaker 1: you know, we've we've got to let everyone know that
Speaker 1: we're more concerned about people than everyone else and and
Speaker 1: all that. Like, you could easily have played the game
Speaker 1: on Monday night and it would have actually been been fine.
Speaker 1: But I bring this up because the NFL has been
Speaker 1: in existence for over one hundred years. It's been a minute, right,
Speaker 1: it's been a minute. And through all of the different
Speaker 1: events that have taken place in the history of America
Speaker 1: that have been intertwined, wrapped around, wrapped around the NFL
Speaker 1: like simultaneously, right, the NFL is being played, life goes on.
Speaker 1: There was the President Kennedy being assassinated. There's been shuttles
Speaker 1: that have exploded, There's been different events that have happened
Speaker 1: nine to eleven, and so the NFL's pawster and things.
Speaker 1: But as far as the playoffs are concerned, incredibly, the
Speaker 1: Ram Viking game this weekend is only the second playoff
Speaker 1: game in the history of the one hundred plus year
Speaker 1: NFL to be moved to a different city. So I
Speaker 1: wanted to give you the first one. The first one
Speaker 1: was the nineteen thirty six NFL championship matchup between the
Speaker 1: Boston Redskins and the Green Bay Packers. Have you heard
Speaker 1: this story before? You have not? Okay, good. I actually
Speaker 1: was going to use this on the Overnight Show, and
Speaker 1: for some reason I never got to it. Bad job.
Speaker 1: By me. So the Redskins and the Packers, we're going
Speaker 1: to play the NFL Championship game nineteen thirty six, but
Speaker 1: the game was moved out of Boston to New York.
Speaker 1: The reason the game was moved get to the point please.
Speaker 1: The reason is because the Redskins, the Boston Redskins, they
Speaker 1: were the one schedule to host the NFL Championship at
Speaker 1: Finnway Park, that was their home stadium. But the owner
Speaker 1: a guy that is notorious for being a bit of
Speaker 1: a douche, George Preston Marshall. Now I never met him.
Speaker 1: Maybe he was a nice guy, but the history books,
Speaker 1: the people that write history have not been very kind
Speaker 1: to George Preston Marshall. So the owner of the Redskins decided,
Speaker 1: you know what, I don't want to play the game
Speaker 1: at Finnway Park. I want to move the game to
Speaker 1: the Polo Grounds in New York City. So a team
Speaker 1: from Boston played a team from Wisconsin at the Polo
Speaker 1: Grounds in New York City. And the reason that George
Speaker 1: Preston Marshall did that is he was annoyed because the
Speaker 1: sports fans in Boston were not in they were not
Speaker 1: invested in that type of American football. In nineteen thirty six,
Speaker 1: baseball was popular, horse racing, boxing, and he didn't want
Speaker 1: the game to be played there because he was worried
Speaker 1: about he wanted to make money, he was worried about
Speaker 1: not selling enough tickets in Boston. So he's like, I
Speaker 1: got to get out of here now. It is interesting
Speaker 1: to note that there's more to the story. As Paul
Speaker 1: Harvey would say, you know the news, but now you're
Speaker 1: about to find the found out the rest of the story.
Speaker 1: You're going to find out the rest of the story.
Speaker 1: So Marshall was planning on relocating what was the Boston Redskins,
Speaker 1: and in nineteen thirty seven. The following year, he took
Speaker 1: the Boston Redskins. He said bye bye to Boston and
Speaker 1: moved them to Washington, DC and they became the Washington
Speaker 1: Redskins starting in nineteen thirty seven. That had They later
Speaker 1: around and played football for years and years, and then
Speaker 1: the Wolkesters got involved and couldn't say that anymore. I
Speaker 1: had to change the name of the team, and very
Speaker 1: offensive to say that, and the NFL completely gen reflected
Speaker 1: a few years back and got rid of the nickname.
Speaker 1: Now the team really didn't have a nickname. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: look at the team formerly know as the Redskins, I'm like,
Speaker 1: it's just kind of faceless team. It's like the Memphis
Speaker 1: Grizzlies or the New Orleans Pelicans. They're just these teams
Speaker 1: that are just kind of there. They're filler teams. They
Speaker 1: don't really move the needle at all. The names are blah,
Speaker 1: the uniforms are blah. That's pretty much where I am
Speaker 1: on the Washington Commanders, if you will. Now turning the
Speaker 1: page on that. There was a moment about a week
Speaker 1: ago that I thought I would be doing this podcast
Speaker 1: from another state. I was convinced I was going to
Speaker 1: figure out a way to get it done. Unfortunately, much
Speaker 1: to my dismay, I could not do it. We're talking
Speaker 1: about going on the Oregon Trail. Now, what is that
Speaker 1: all about? Let me explain. So I learned after the fact. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: after the fact, I learned that somebody that I had
Speaker 1: been a friend with for a number of years passed
Speaker 1: away at the end of twenty twenty four. It actually
Speaker 1: happened in November November of twenty twenty four, and I
Speaker 1: didn't find out about it at the time, and I
Speaker 1: actually found out about it a little later than that.
Speaker 1: But I got a text from some number I didn't recognize. No,
Speaker 1: normally I don't pay any attention to the text messages.
Speaker 1: I'm like, this is somebody, this is probably spam. It's
Speaker 1: probably spam. What am I doing? But this one had
Speaker 1: information where only certain people would know the information? You know.
Speaker 1: So and so I'm, you know, regarding the person I'm
Speaker 1: about to talk about, and he said, there will be
Speaker 1: another email coming. You have been invited to a celebration
Speaker 1: of life for this particular person. So the person that
Speaker 1: died is former Portland Trailblazers broadcaster Brian Wheeler was the
Speaker 1: radio voice of the Portland Trailblazers from nineteen ninety eight
Speaker 1: to twenty nineteen and had become a good friend of
Speaker 1: mine for years. I met him shortly after he took
Speaker 1: over in nineteen ninety eight. Now, back in those days,
Speaker 1: I covered the NBA. I was there every night Clippers
Speaker 1: Lakers games. I lived the NBA life. I probably went
Speaker 1: to eighty plus NBA games including the playoffs per year
Speaker 1: combined Clippers and even the Lakers, which I covered back
Speaker 1: in those days. And so I was friends with this guy, Tony,
Speaker 1: who was the engineer. He did the visiting teams, and
Speaker 1: Tony was a buddy of mine, and he introduced me
Speaker 1: to a lot of the play by play guys. He's like, hey, Ben,
Speaker 1: you got to meet this guy. And Wheels had just
Speaker 1: started out as the play by play guy for the Blazers.
Speaker 1: He had replaced a gentleman who had been there for
Speaker 1: seemingly ever, the longtime play by play guy the Blazers.
Speaker 1: I forget his name. I forget his name right now, Shanelle,
Speaker 1: I believe his name, but he had been there a
Speaker 1: long time. So I immediately bonded with Brian Wheeler. He
Speaker 1: was kind of a bigger guy, and I was a
Speaker 1: much bigger guy at the time, and he was the
Speaker 1: radio voice of the Portland Trailblazers. The Blazers are some
Speaker 1: really good teams. Early on, they were in the Western
Speaker 1: Conference Finals. They played the Lakers in the postseason one year,
Speaker 1: and I saw wheel a couple times a year. They
Speaker 1: probably four times a year. I would see him when
Speaker 1: the Blazers would come to La to play the Clippers,
Speaker 1: and likes always made sure I was out there when
Speaker 1: the Blazers were in town and Over the years we
Speaker 1: became friends. We talk on the phone. Sometimes we send
Speaker 1: text messages to each other. Occasionally, Wheels had an afternoon
Speaker 1: drive radio show in Portland and I would be a
Speaker 1: guest on there. Occasionally called me up to fill in. Actually,
Speaker 1: I auditioned when I was out of work one of
Speaker 1: the jobs I lost years ago. I auditioned for the
Speaker 1: radio station. I got offered the afternoon drive show in Portland,
Speaker 1: and I turned it down. I was I couldn't do
Speaker 1: it because the a the money wasn't good enough, and
Speaker 1: it just felt like the wrong move in my career
Speaker 1: at that time. So I didn't do it. But our
Speaker 1: friendship continued, and Wheels and I we talked quite a bit.
Speaker 1: And there's some stories. I don't know if it's appropriate
Speaker 1: to tell them right now. I might wait until after
Speaker 1: the celebration of life. I did want to thank that
Speaker 1: the Trailblazers and the people who were involved in Wheel's
Speaker 1: life for inviting me. I was honored to be invited.
Speaker 1: I really wanted to make it. The event is on Sunday.
Speaker 1: I was planning on trying to fly up. Actually today,
Speaker 1: I was gonna fly up today, and then my plan
Speaker 1: was to kind of hang out. I've never been to Portland.
Speaker 1: I've flown over to go to Seattle. I was gonna
Speaker 1: come to port I'm gonna go to Portland. I'll hang out.
Speaker 1: My wife has a friend there. She'll visit her friend,
Speaker 1: and then maybe I'll do a mallor meet and greet
Speaker 1: on Saturday, and then I'll go to the event on
Speaker 1: Sunday and then I'll fly back. The problem was the logistics.
Speaker 1: I found out about this at the last minute, so
Speaker 1: it pretty expensive to fly up there. But I could
Speaker 1: spend the money and I wouldn't really have an issue
Speaker 1: with that, but I would have had to miss a show.
Speaker 1: There were no flights out after the event. I would
Speaker 1: have to wait until Monday morning, so I would have
Speaker 1: missed the radio show. But it's like, yeah, I could
Speaker 1: have done that. But anyway, the flight thing, it just
Speaker 1: didn't work out. So I was pretty bummed out when
Speaker 1: I found out of it. I didn't find out right away.
Speaker 1: There are some stories I want to tell. I feel
Speaker 1: like it's inappropriate to tell them right at this minute,
Speaker 1: but let's just say me and Wheels had a very
Speaker 1: good friendship and I'd made some moves. There was one
Speaker 1: moment and remind me on this. I'll get into it
Speaker 1: in the future podcast. If I forget remind me. I
Speaker 1: want to wait till after Sunday. But there was one
Speaker 1: situation that would have changed NBA broadcasting and would have
Speaker 1: been absolutely amazing. But I was involved in it. I
Speaker 1: was helping Brian Wheeler. There was a job that was
Speaker 1: open and I knew some people and I attempted to
Speaker 1: help and then at the very last minute, somebody from
Speaker 1: the outside stepped in and messed everything up. And so
Speaker 1: it's unfortunate. But if you never heard Brian wheel he
Speaker 1: was the radio voice of the Trailblazers, and he was
Speaker 1: he was the guy that had a lot of catchphrases.
Speaker 1: The one that he was most famous for NBA Entertainment
Speaker 1: on their vignette shows. Remember nineteen ninety eight, this is
Speaker 1: before social media, and really social media took off probably
Speaker 1: about twenty ten, So the last nine years Wheels was
Speaker 1: the voice of the Trailblazers, there was a lot of
Speaker 1: social media, but early on there was not. But he
Speaker 1: had all these catchphrase. The one that he was most
Speaker 1: recognized for was boom shacka laca. A lot of people say, well,
Speaker 1: boom shacka locke. He just took that from the video
Speaker 1: game NBA Jam. But no, Wheels was not a video
Speaker 1: game player. He used to say that he only played
Speaker 1: like pac Man or Miss pac Man or something like that.
Speaker 1: He took boom shacka loca from He borrowed it from
Speaker 1: the movie Stripes with Bill Murray. He took boom shacka
Speaker 1: loaca from that. There was a yeah. He had a
Speaker 1: bunch of catchphrases. He had do it till You're satisfied,
Speaker 1: which he took out from from a funk song by
Speaker 1: DT Express. It's a great day to be a Blazer.
Speaker 1: It was one of his catchphrases, and that was from
Speaker 1: John Rooney, the old White Sox broadcaster back in the day.
Speaker 1: That's a White Sox winner. So he took that and
Speaker 1: twisted around and you know, once again and then we
Speaker 1: can say it's a great day to be a Blazer.
Speaker 1: He said that after every Trailblazer victory. And I really
Speaker 1: appreciated what Wheels did. I told him this. You know,
Speaker 1: he died pretty young. He was sixty t too. But
Speaker 1: I told Wheels, I said, I love words, and I
Speaker 1: love how you are able to work words. And in fact,
Speaker 1: I know Alf and some of the guys that have
Speaker 1: been listening a long time to the radio show. You know,
Speaker 1: from time to time I will quote Brian Wheeler and
Speaker 1: he would go on these rants this he would use
Speaker 1: a three word I don't know how to describe it,
Speaker 1: you know, adjectives, literation to describe the emotions of the
Speaker 1: opposing team. When the Blazers would go on a run
Speaker 1: and the other team would call it time out, it
Speaker 1: would be like time out San Antonio. Greg Popovich is mystified,
Speaker 1: mesmerized and mortified. And it was so good to listen to.
Speaker 1: It was so awesome to listen to that, and I
Speaker 1: just I loved it. And you know, that's just just
Speaker 1: one example. There were a bunch. I mean I've quoted
Speaker 1: Wheels doing that from time to time because I think
Speaker 1: it's just just the alliterations of Brian Wheeler simply outstanding. Right.
Speaker 1: The the Blazers are amazing, astonishing and astounding. You know,
Speaker 1: it's let's see, like the Clippers coach Bill Fitch, time out.
Speaker 1: Clippers Bill Fitch has bemused, bewildered, and bedeviled. Things like that.
Speaker 1: Just just great, absolutely great, And if somebody was doing
Speaker 1: very well, you know, certified, classified, gratified. Boom boom boom
Speaker 1: boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom.
Speaker 1: So that was his style. There were a bunch of
Speaker 1: other catchphrases. When somebody would have a hammered dunk, he'd say, oh,
Speaker 1: that was nasty. And they're dancing in the aisles at
Speaker 1: the Rose Garden if something went great for the where
Speaker 1: the Troublazers. But I love Wheels. He was very kind
Speaker 1: to me. We would go out to lunch sometimes in
Speaker 1: the offseason. He was adopted. He grew up in southern California.
Speaker 1: He was adopted at birth, and he had a tough
Speaker 1: child that he stepfather was an asshole and had a
Speaker 1: tough tough time growing up. But he loved Vince Scully.
Speaker 1: He loved chick Hern, Bob Miller, the great La play
Speaker 1: by play guys, and he told me stories about you
Speaker 1: wanted to be just like them. He planned on attending
Speaker 1: school at USC. He ended up going to college in Chicago,
Speaker 1: which it is interesting to note his he found his
Speaker 1: birth mother. And you know, it's always one of those
Speaker 1: weird things when you're adopted. You know, some people that
Speaker 1: are adopted, they want to find their birth parents. Other
Speaker 1: people that are adopted want nothing to do with their
Speaker 1: birth parents. So it's a weird dynamic. But Brian wanted
Speaker 1: to meet his birth mother. He did end up meeting
Speaker 1: her a few years back and learned about what she
Speaker 1: was like and why she made the decision that she
Speaker 1: made and whatnot. And so anyway, Wheels grew up in
Speaker 1: southern California, but he went to college in Chicago. He
Speaker 1: did some like studio work for the Bulls. He worked
Speaker 1: for the old Seattle SuperSonics back in the He bounced around,
Speaker 1: He lived the nomad life, and I just loved him,
Speaker 1: just loved the way he did the play by play.
Speaker 1: And he had stints with the Sacramento Kings and the Sonics.
Speaker 1: As I said, the Bulls, and he was the Oregon
Speaker 1: sportscaster of the Year in twenty oh seven. He had
Speaker 1: battled his weight his entire adult life. And I remember
Speaker 1: when I lost my weight, which was probably probably around
Speaker 1: twenty twenty ten. Wheels and I had many conversations. He's
Speaker 1: trying to figure out how can he lose the weight,
Speaker 1: and what can you do? And he tried every fad
Speaker 1: diet and some of them worked. I remember he did
Speaker 1: my Man Wheels, did the Oprah winfree like liquid diet,
Speaker 1: and he lost a ton of weight. He was lost
Speaker 1: more weight than I lost. He was lean, mean, and
Speaker 1: a wrecking machine. The problem was traveling with an NBA team.
Speaker 1: You're getting in late. You're getting in late, right. Things
Speaker 1: are not necessarily open. Good restaurants are not open, so
Speaker 1: you're eating late. You're not eating good food. You're drinking
Speaker 1: a fair amount because you're going out to bars and
Speaker 1: restaurants and you're having a social cocktail or whatever. So
Speaker 1: eventually he could not keep up with the liquid diet.
Speaker 1: He had to start eating solid food, and he put
Speaker 1: all of the weight back and then some. And it
Speaker 1: was just devastating when that happened. And so I tried
Speaker 1: to give him some advice. I said, do the intimute fasting.
Speaker 1: He actually tried it for a while, but it was
Speaker 1: very difficult for him because again because of the schedule
Speaker 1: and being around food, traveling to different NBA cities and
Speaker 1: there's always like big piles of food all over the place,
Speaker 1: and it's not good food. It was either the end
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty three or early twenty twenty four. He
Speaker 1: was with the Blazers till twenty nineteen. We spoke probably
Speaker 1: once a year. After that, I didn't see him, obviously
Speaker 1: because he was no longer traveling with the Trail Blazers.
Speaker 1: He did come to LA. Big Dodger fan, Wheels and
Speaker 1: so he would come down to La usually in the
Speaker 1: middle of the summer, catch a Dodger game game or two.
Speaker 1: But just a sweetheart of a guy and just really
Speaker 1: enjoyed enjoyers coming on bummed out. I was unable to
Speaker 1: make it. I hope to. I hope to get up
Speaker 1: to Portland at some point. I think there's gonna be
Speaker 1: some tributes that will be there for Wheels, and hope
Speaker 1: to see some of that stuff. But again, I was
Speaker 1: honored to be invited. I had a casual friendship with
Speaker 1: Brian Wheeler, but I really appreciated his work. He was
Speaker 1: so good, and you know, from Boomshaka Laca to my
Speaker 1: eyes don't deceive. So I have to believe, and I
Speaker 1: hope to honor Wheels. And this is something that I've
Speaker 1: done a lot. Over the years. I've gotten older, more
Speaker 1: and more people have died, which is unfortunate, but that's
Speaker 1: part of life. Our number is going to come up,
Speaker 1: all of us at some point. So I'm going to
Speaker 1: try to work into the monologue some of the catchphrases
Speaker 1: from Brian Wheeler as a tribute to Wheels, and so
Speaker 1: that that's my plan. That's my plan. Now whether whether
Speaker 1: that works, I'm not going to do it all the time,
Speaker 1: but I'll do it occasionally, just a small, small tribute
Speaker 1: to the great Brian Wheeler and Blazer fans were very
Speaker 1: lucky to have him. He was so good. It is
Speaker 1: such a art that very few do well. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of people that can do play by play, and
Speaker 1: I watch a bunch of different TV broadcasts, I hear
Speaker 1: some radio broadcasts. A lot of these guys are just
Speaker 1: their jabs, just another broadcaster, their jabs, nothing special. But
Speaker 1: Wheels was special. He had whatever that is, the rasthma taz,
Speaker 1: he had it. And I was lucky to be able
Speaker 1: to hear some of his work. I was lucky enough
Speaker 1: to know him. And he left this world. He should
Speaker 1: still be doing the Trailblazer games, and he had some
Speaker 1: health problems and he had to leave the Trailblazers, and
Speaker 1: you know, it's sad, but you know, that's a job
Speaker 1: he could have had. He'd still be doing it. He's
Speaker 1: probably doing another eight nine years still his seventies, but
Speaker 1: unfortunately he leaves this world at the age of sixty two.
Speaker 1: So rest in peace. Brian Wheeler, one of the great
Speaker 1: play by play guys. I was so lucky to come
Speaker 1: across him and befriend him and have him as a
Speaker 1: guy in my circle over the years. Now, I was
Speaker 1: gonna do foodie fun, but there's not a lot of
Speaker 1: food news, and there's no really good transition from that,
Speaker 1: and it's kind of a slow week in foody fund
Speaker 1: so I think I'll skip that. I did want to
Speaker 1: mention the idiom of the day. We'll get out on
Speaker 1: this the idiom of the day on the fifth hour.
Speaker 1: So it's a phrase we've all used, man's best friend.
Speaker 1: A dog is man's best friend. But is it true?
Speaker 1: Is it true that that phrase actually goes back back back, back, back, back,
Speaker 1: back back only to eighteen seventy, roughly eighteen seventy. Say what, yeah,
Speaker 1: let me explain this is a matter fascinating. Now, I
Speaker 1: love dogs. I'm a dog person. I'm not a cat person.
Speaker 1: My dog Moxie. I spend pretty much every day getting
Speaker 1: ready with the radio show with Moxie, my English bulldog,
Speaker 1: laying on my legs, snoring and farting while I'm watching
Speaker 1: games and getting ready for the show. And it's just
Speaker 1: such a She's a sixty or fifty pound lap dog
Speaker 1: or whatever, fifty five pounds. So anyway, have you ever
Speaker 1: heard the phrase a dog is a man's best friend?
Speaker 1: Of course you have.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: It seems like it goes back to the ancient times.
Speaker 1: But is it true that it's actually from eighteen seventy
Speaker 1: from America, the Missouri Supreme Court case of Burden versus
Speaker 1: Hornsby in September of eighteen seventy. This is considered the
Speaker 1: origin of the phrase, at least in the modern world.
Speaker 1: In September of eighteen seventy. This is in Johnson County, Missouri,
Speaker 1: in a courtroom. There there was a setting for what
Speaker 1: was called the most celebrated dog case in the world,
Speaker 1: big news in eighteen seventy. So this is the story.
Speaker 1: I won't give you the whole story, but there was
Speaker 1: this a person named Lee ownedas Hornsby. Fortunately we don't
Speaker 1: use the name Lee owned us anymore. Really, it's an
Speaker 1: old name. So this guy shot his neighbor and brother
Speaker 1: in law, Charles Burden's hunting dog, the top hunting dog
Speaker 1: dog named Old Drum Old Drum. So Burden was very upset.
Speaker 1: Charles Burton's like, wait a minute, you a hole, what's
Speaker 1: wrong with you? And threatened to kill Hornsby, but instead realized, well,
Speaker 1: I probably shouldn't kill him, so instead I'll sue this
Speaker 1: guy Hornsby for one hundred dollars. Well, Hornsby had been
Speaker 1: employing his nephew to guard his flock of sheep, denied
Speaker 1: giving any instruction to shoot the dog, Old Drum, so
Speaker 1: they went to court. Now, one hundred bucks in eighteen
Speaker 1: seventy was a lot of money. You want to play
Speaker 1: the game? How much money? How much money was one
Speaker 1: hundred dollars in eighteen seventy money versus today? You want
Speaker 1: to play that game, Let's play that game. How much
Speaker 1: do you think one hundred bucks in eighteen seventy versus today?
Speaker 1: Here we are in twenty twenty five. So what would
Speaker 1: the map? They don't even go back to eighteen seventy.
Speaker 1: You know that they don't go back to eighteen seventy.
Speaker 1: Let's see. Let me let me tump, let me let
Speaker 1: me see last you. Maybe let me let me click
Speaker 1: on this year. Hold on sake, listening to our live
Speaker 1: coverage on the fifth hour, and as we try to
Speaker 1: figure this out, No, it only goes back to the
Speaker 1: inflation calculator. It only goes back to like nineteen nineteen thirteen,
Speaker 1: nineteen thirteen, So there's no other information before. So we
Speaker 1: can't even play the game. Why it was a lot
Speaker 1: of money, I get to the point. So they went
Speaker 1: to court and the lawsuit one hundred dollars. Hornsby had
Speaker 1: been employing the nephew to guard the flock, but again
Speaker 1: said I didn't tell this person to shoot Old Drum.
Speaker 1: So they had two trials. The jury found Hornsby guilty
Speaker 1: of ordering his nephew to kill Old Drum, awarded the
Speaker 1: guy Burden, twenty five dollars. The judgment, though, was later reversed,
Speaker 1: so they had a third trial, and Burden's lawyer, George
Speaker 1: graham Vest George Graham Vest, delivered a tear jerking closing argument,
Speaker 1: considered one of the great closing arguments at that time
Speaker 1: and still talked about. Here we are one hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty years later one hundred and fifty five years later
Speaker 1: and it's still talked about. The closing argument was called
Speaker 1: Eulogy for a Dog, and when this lawyer, George Graham
Speaker 1: Vest finished, the jurors were in tears. They were they
Speaker 1: awarded burden fifty dollars, so you didn't get the one
Speaker 1: hundred dollars, you got the fifty dollars. Hornsby appealed to
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court of Missouri, but the decision stood. But
Speaker 1: best closing argument was so popular it became famous. It
Speaker 1: was printed in newspapers and saved because there was no
Speaker 1: internet in eighteen seventy and that is believed to be
Speaker 1: where the modern version of a dog is a Man's
Speaker 1: Best Friend came from from a closing argument in a
Speaker 1: Missouri courthouse called Eulogy for a Dog, and it is
Speaker 1: still available. You can read it. If you're interested in that,
Speaker 1: check it out. We'll get out on that note. Hopefully
Speaker 1: Danny g will be okay and these fires will go away,
Speaker 1: and we will have a brand new episode of the
Speaker 1: Fifth Hour podcast tomorrow Wildcard Weekend, Wildcard Saturday, we'll have
Speaker 1: a brand new episode. Also tonight, we've got college football,
Speaker 1: so it's a good sports weekend. Got college football tonight
Speaker 1: Ohio State and Texas. The winner gets Notre Dome in
Speaker 1: the championship game of college football. Have a wonderful rest
Speaker 1: of your Friday. Thank you for listening to the podcast.
Speaker 1: Tell a friend, tell a friend, spread the gospel of
Speaker 1: the Fifth Hour Podcast, and we will talk to you tomorrow. Tomorrow.
Speaker 1: Is it later, Skater Danny? Is that how it goes? Later? Skater?
Speaker 1: I think so wrong. Gotta murder, I gotta go