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Speaker 1: Every every parent in the United States will dream to

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Speaker 1: have the lottery of having a kid like this. Every

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Speaker 1: dad wants to have a you know, oh my god,

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Speaker 1: I can't wait for my son to be six ten.

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Speaker 1: That opened us up the playbook. I can be basketball,

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Speaker 1: I can do football, I can do any sport. But

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Speaker 1: what happens if you're from a small town in the

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Speaker 1: middle of nowhere in southern Spain, three miles away from Africa, Like.

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Speaker 2: You know, what do you do?

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Speaker 3: What kind of sports do you do? So I never

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Speaker 3: had a chance.

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Speaker 2: Basically, what's up? Everybody on Peanut to him?

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Speaker 4: And this is the NFL Player's Second Acts podcast with

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Speaker 4: me as always as my trusty co host Roman. I

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Speaker 4: don't have my Pineapple T shirt on Harper.

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Speaker 5: Yes, you know, I'm just I'm still used to you

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Speaker 5: just shooting shots that everybody in the room, and I'm

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Speaker 5: really looking forward to our next guest. He's the biggest

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Speaker 5: man in the room, probably in every room he's been in.

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Speaker 4: He's a graduate at West Point, served in the US Army.

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Speaker 4: He didn't more towards in Afghanistan. He's got several awards,

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Speaker 4: He's a combat veteran. He's received a Bronze Star for Valor.

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Speaker 4: In his second act, he he played left tackle, played

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Speaker 4: seven seasons for the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Ravens. And

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Speaker 4: his third act, he is a farmer and he is

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Speaker 4: killing it in the homestead. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome

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Speaker 4: to the pod misster Alejandro Villanueva.

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Speaker 2: Did I say that right? I just bro I tried

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Speaker 2: so hard not to butcher the last part.

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Speaker 1: Villanueva like, outside of Miami, that's a that's a great,

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Speaker 1: that's a that's a that's a that's an A.

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Speaker 2: In Miami.

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Speaker 3: Now we can place you exactly where you're in the city.

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Speaker 4: Now, yeah, I will take what I can get. I

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Speaker 4: was like, Damn, I really ain't trying to butcher this

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Speaker 4: man's last name. So Alejandro, I like, I can. I

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Speaker 4: can mock that all day, but the last.

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Speaker 1: When I first came to the United States, Uh, there's

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Speaker 1: a lot of people from the South that in the army.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: So when they read my name is said Alejandro, Alejandro Alejandro,

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Speaker 1: and it got stuck as Ali. So I'm a Catholic

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Speaker 1: kid from Spain and his new name is Ali. My

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Speaker 1: name is Ali. For people in the Army still call

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Speaker 1: me Ali. Everybody in the army calls me Ali. And

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Speaker 1: then when I went to the NFL, I try to

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Speaker 1: introduce myself as Alejandro or Alejandro or they make you.

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Speaker 3: And then my coach said, not but your name is Al.

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Speaker 1: Somebody two names of Ali and now and then finally,

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Speaker 1: you know, I got in here the Miami people. People

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Speaker 1: are not can call me my name, but I understand

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Speaker 1: that it's one of the most difficult names to pronounce,

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Speaker 1: uh for the for the English names.

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Speaker 5: And of course, you know football, nobody likes. Everybody has

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Speaker 5: a nickname. Everybody's an Nobody's going like your whole name

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Speaker 5: all day long. I'm Charles, not Peanuts. Mine was either

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Speaker 5: Rome or Harp. It was yeah, easy, easy, That's what

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Speaker 5: everybody did. So I'm sure somebody called you Villa or Ali,

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Speaker 5: Ali and Al.

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Speaker 3: There have been not two my two names, Ali and

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Speaker 3: Al big Al.

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Speaker 2: I couldn't say it. Just don't don't it. Don't it's

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Speaker 2: too long.

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Speaker 4: I get a point across when I'm yeling with all

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Speaker 4: those damn syllables, So it don't really it don't really

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Speaker 4: hit like that. I want to talk about your upbringing

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Speaker 4: in the military, So my dad did twenty years in

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Speaker 4: the army. I'm a military brat. Your dad did he

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Speaker 4: served time in the Spanish Navy, If I'm not mistaken right,

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Speaker 4: he served time in the Spanish Navy. You guys moved

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Speaker 4: around different schools. I'm the same way. I like to say,

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Speaker 4: I'm from Chicago and then from you and all my

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Speaker 4: others Like, bro, you ain't from nowhere.

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Speaker 2: You from Texas.

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Speaker 4: You're from Chicago, You're from Louisiana, You're from Kansas, You're

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Speaker 4: from Like do you do your friends tease you about

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Speaker 4: that when you're like oh, they say, oh, yeah, where

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Speaker 4: you from?

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Speaker 2: And you'll be like, oh, well, do you pick up

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Speaker 2: a spot where you're from? Well, that's the same one.

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Speaker 3: I mean, I'm from Mississippi.

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Speaker 2: People laugh.

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Speaker 3: You know what I said, I'm Missisippi.

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Speaker 2: Sound like that, bro, Misissippi.

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Speaker 1: So like, you know, if to be from Mississippi is

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Speaker 1: a huge statement, you know what I mean. There's not

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Speaker 1: an Alejandro vi Illinois a sixth ten from Mississippi. But that's

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Speaker 1: where they teach all pilots how to fly, particularly if

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Speaker 1: the United States is selling what in systems to those

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Speaker 1: countries and so uh NATO is a is A is

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Speaker 1: a big organization one that is you know right now

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Speaker 1: and and and especially particularly with Spain is going through

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Speaker 1: some some some issues. But uh, but my father was

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Speaker 1: was stationed in Meridian, Mississippi, uh, when he was learning

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Speaker 1: how to fly, and so I was born in Mississippi.

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Speaker 1: But then after that I've lived you know, I've got

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Speaker 1: miamis the eighteenth city that I lived in. So I've

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Speaker 1: been living all around the world. I would say, like

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Speaker 1: my favorite, Savannah, Georgia is one of my favorite places.

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Speaker 2: The food, the food is incredible, food.

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Speaker 1: The culture is amazing, especially when you come from outside,

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Speaker 1: like I understand the South is complex for people from

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Speaker 1: the South, but for me coming from outside of the

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Speaker 1: United States, it's it's it's it's interesting, it's it's very

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Speaker 1: interesting to see the dynamics of how a city gets built.

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Speaker 1: The difference between Savannah and uh and Charleston, for example,

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Speaker 1: that are right.

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Speaker 2: Next to each other.

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Speaker 3: One is more British, one was more French.

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Speaker 1: The Savannah River, Like how how rivers are so crucial

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Speaker 1: in the United States for development. The Savannah Port is

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Speaker 1: one of the largest on the East coast United States.

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Speaker 1: I think it's the second largest.

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Speaker 2: So look at your little historian.

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Speaker 3: Oh yeah, yeah, I love this South.

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Speaker 1: I love Georgia, I love Savannah. I know where prov

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Speaker 1: Villa is very well.

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Speaker 2: Look at that eighty five to sixty five to eighty two.

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Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, you're not talking about where he from.

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Speaker 4: You just you just making Yeah, he's just like it's true.

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Speaker 2: True.

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Speaker 1: I used to we used to party and when I

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Speaker 1: was in the army, when I just graduated. You know,

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Speaker 1: for Benning Georgia, we used to go to Auburn in

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Speaker 1: negative fifteen minutes. Yes, because it's an hour away and

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Speaker 1: forty five minutes.

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Speaker 2: That is true.

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Speaker 1: So you can just take eighty two all the way,

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Speaker 1: you know, to the Auburn, or you can go to

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Speaker 1: the exclus if you feel a little more.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, love frog eighty two. That is like going through

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Speaker 2: my hometowl exactly. What do you know? That is nobody

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Speaker 2: pumping his head up right now. Nobody talk about my

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Speaker 2: hometown now one time ever, since it ain't nothing to

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Speaker 2: talk about. I drove through his hometown. I was like, hey, Roam,

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Speaker 2: I'm man your hometown. Hey room, I'm out of your hometown. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: that thing is so small.

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Speaker 4: So you didn't start playing football till you were in Belgium.

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Speaker 2: Yes, you know, but you had played rugby, rugby.

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Speaker 4: You had played some other sports your your parents had tried.

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Speaker 2: Swimming, swimming. I was a swimmer, Yeah, my whole life.

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Speaker 4: And so come on, talk to us about your whole

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Speaker 4: kind of upbringing. Yeah, so, like, what is the sport?

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Speaker 4: What is the activity that people are trying to push

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Speaker 4: you to do.

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Speaker 3: Yes, that's a great question.

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Speaker 1: So every every parent in the United States will dream

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Speaker 1: to have the lottery of having a kid like this.

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Speaker 1: Every dad wants to have a you know, oh my god,

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Speaker 1: I can't wait for my son to be six ten.

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Speaker 1: That opened us up the playbook. I can play basketball,

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Speaker 1: I can do football, I can do any sport. But

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Speaker 1: what happens if you're from a small town in the

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Speaker 1: middle of nowhere in southern Spain, three miles away from Africa, Like,

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Speaker 1: you know, what do you do? What kind of sports

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Speaker 1: do you do? So I never had a chance basically,

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Speaker 1: and in Spain, the only.

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Speaker 3: Sport is soccer. It's soccer or soccer. It's which one

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Speaker 3: do you want to choose? You know, there's there's no.

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Speaker 2: Football, like they call it soccer. Yeah, whatever, soccer.

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Speaker 1: It's the only chance to do anything in sports, and

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Speaker 1: you have to sacrifice your entire life to become a

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Speaker 1: soccer player. So it's not like in the United States

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Speaker 1: where you can go to college, you can receive an education.

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Speaker 1: There is a little bit more like hockey, like you

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Speaker 1: have to start putting your.

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Speaker 2: Kids in to follow their dreams.

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Speaker 1: And because my father was moving constantly all the time

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Speaker 1: and my parents are not soccer players, I was just

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Speaker 1: along for the ride with my parents with every single

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Speaker 1: base that we went to. Right, what do we do here?

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Speaker 1: You know, I want to try to put you in basketball. Okay,

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Speaker 1: I'll play a year of basketball. The level is never

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Speaker 1: really competitive, you know, but it's fun.

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: The only people that are going to be in the

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Speaker 1: stands watching and you're gonna be my parents. And so

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Speaker 1: swimming was a constant because I was in a naval basis,

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Speaker 1: so I became a swimmer. Swimming was my passion. But

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Speaker 1: then one day asked my dad, how much do you

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Speaker 1: make if I win the gold medal in the Olympics?

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Speaker 1: And I think you said, I think you made like

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Speaker 1: fifteen thousand dollars. I said that find me another sport,

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Speaker 1: get me out of this. This is this is not enough. Uh,

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Speaker 1: And It wasn't until I went to an American high

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Speaker 1: school in Belgium that I got the chance to play

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Speaker 1: American football.

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Speaker 2: How were I was sixteen?

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Speaker 3: Okay, and and and I mean I got that.

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Speaker 1: Not only did I did, I got a chance to

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Speaker 1: start playing football, but I got a chance to travel

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Speaker 1: and see Europe because I was seeing all the bases

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Speaker 1: or you know, whether the US. You know, US, I

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Speaker 1: think at one point had half a million troops in

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Speaker 1: West Germany. So we still had all the bases, and

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Speaker 1: so we would go to like Ramstein, we would go

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Speaker 1: to stutt.

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Speaker 3: Guard, we would go all around.

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Speaker 2: UH Shack used to play UH in Mannheim. I think.

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Speaker 1: So it's not that uncommon UH to have kids come

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Speaker 1: out and and and and have some level of competition.

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Speaker 1: So for me, you know, I fell in love with

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Speaker 1: the dynamics of a football team, fell in love with

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Speaker 1: the dynamics of of American high school, American culture, and

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Speaker 1: so ever since, I said, if I have the chance,

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Speaker 1: I'll play football. And so when I went to West Point,

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Speaker 1: I walked into the team I started playing. I never

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Speaker 1: really had a position, and I never really knew how

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Speaker 1: to play football in terms of the intensity. I mean

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Speaker 1: as a European you do everything a little.

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Speaker 3: Bit soft and gentle.

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Speaker 1: And then when you come to the United States, especially

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Speaker 1: when you're coming here to the South, if you see

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Speaker 1: kids out here in West prom with like the little kids,

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Speaker 1: you know, like the pouncy twins or another way there

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Speaker 1: raising these pipows, I mean, that's that's how you that's

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Speaker 1: how you raise somebody to play football. And I did

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Speaker 1: not have that in me. So any position that I play,

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Speaker 1: I was always I just looked like a soft, disinterested kid,

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Speaker 1: you know. Uh, until I started playing a wide receiver,

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Speaker 1: and I said, man, wide receiver was fun, like catching

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Speaker 1: the ball, getting yards, touchdowns, la la la la la

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Speaker 1: and so.

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Speaker 3: And I was a lot bigger than all the.

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Speaker 1: Other cornerbacks, so when I had to block, it was

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Speaker 1: it was the whole game became extremely fun. And uh

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Speaker 1: and then and then I said, okay, I understand footba

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Speaker 1: football is about being, you know, ripping people's heads off, violent,

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Speaker 1: having intense, just having the raging you and and and

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Speaker 1: and and doing it to impose.

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Speaker 3: Your will on the other person.

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Speaker 1: I mean, all those all those evil medieval concepts started

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Speaker 1: creeping into my head. And I loved American football from

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Speaker 1: that moment I was hooked, and so I was trying

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Speaker 1: to find any any position on the field.

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Speaker 3: I don't care what it is.

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Speaker 1: Tackle happened to be the position that fed my family,

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Speaker 1: and so I ended up playing tackle.

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Speaker 3: But if I could go back, I would I love

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Speaker 3: to play wide receiver.

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Speaker 2: Now when you played tackle, did it did it come natural?

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Speaker 2: Was it easy? Like with the footwork and everything? Being

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Speaker 2: a tall guy?

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Speaker 4: Because I know when my daughter, My daughter's like six feet,

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Speaker 4: so she's tall, but as she's a young pup getting

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Speaker 4: and growing into her body, trying to figure it out,

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Speaker 4: it's just like Scooby Doo, like they're tripping all over

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Speaker 4: the damn place and trying to.

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Speaker 1: I feel like, unless you're Joe Thomas, and I know

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Speaker 1: that you guys interviewed him recently, that's you're Joe Joe Thomas.

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Speaker 1: Playing offensive lineman just does not come natural. Especially tackle.

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Speaker 1: Your foot is all over the place. You're just you're

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Speaker 1: jiggling because you know it's true, and you're just trying

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Speaker 1: to do your best.

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Speaker 3: You're trying to do your best.

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Speaker 1: You try to do your best at getting you know,

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Speaker 1: I managing getting beat. You're trying to do your best

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Speaker 1: at you know, uh, firing off the ball in uncomfortable

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Speaker 1: situations and moving your body.

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Speaker 2: Wizard, you don't have to.

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Speaker 1: So I don't think anybody plays again unless you're Joe

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Speaker 1: Thomas and you have to get coiled up in that

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Speaker 1: you don't play comfortable. Offensive line is being comfortable at

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Speaker 1: being uncomfortable. And so for me, you know, from the army,

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Speaker 1: I said, you know what, I can play tackle. I

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Speaker 1: had an amazing teammates and uh, and the transition into

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Speaker 1: an O line room is easier than any other room

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Speaker 1: in an NFL lockera because offensive linemen thrive when everybody

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Speaker 1: When everybody plays well, that's when you that's when you

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Speaker 1: play well.

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Speaker 2: A true team that it is, you know what I mean.

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Speaker 1: The biggest competitor a on a wide receiver room is

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Speaker 1: not another wide receiver, another team. It's your teammates standing

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Speaker 1: next to you. That's the biggest that's the person you

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Speaker 1: have to try to beat. But in an offensive line room,

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Speaker 1: you're trying to If your guard plays well, then you're

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Speaker 1: gonna play well.

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Speaker 4: Now, how much time did you all actually spend at

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Speaker 4: or in practice? I know, military, Uh, military schools are

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Speaker 4: a lot different than in Alabama Louisana Lafiette, like y'all

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Speaker 4: got to do.

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Speaker 2: What you compare Alabama to Louisiana. Oh don't. First off,

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Speaker 2: first off.

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Speaker 3: We gonna get into I love it.

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Speaker 4: We're working on we're working on getting you a jersey

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Speaker 4: because you you and the wrong sport shirt right now.

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Speaker 2: But we'll get to that later. Anyway.

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Speaker 4: Louisiana Alabama all good schools, right, but when they practice

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Speaker 4: and they do things like, it's geared toward that program

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Speaker 4: you're at the you're at West Point right, So completely

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Speaker 4: different organization as far how how you guys tackle football? Yes,

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Speaker 4: you guys wake up and do pt and you got

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Speaker 4: to do other things that all the other soldiers or

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Speaker 4: cadet students, I don't know what they call cadets. Yeah,

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Speaker 4: y'all got to do something else. But then you got

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Speaker 4: to go do practice, do all your other stuff, and

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Speaker 4: then you have to do other stuff that whatever the school.

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Speaker 2: Requires you to do.

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Speaker 4: Yes, correct, So how much time did you actually spend

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Speaker 4: in football?

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Speaker 1: The thing is that I don't know because I know

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Speaker 1: I didn't go to Alabama, So I'm assuming that if

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Speaker 1: I mean meeting time is meeting time. There's only so

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Speaker 1: much information that the brain can process. Once you go

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Speaker 1: over an hour and a half, I don't care if

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Speaker 1: you're at Stanford or Alabama. You know, people just start

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Speaker 1: getting fried with information. You cannot process that much. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I do think that there's n cub A limitations when

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Speaker 1: you can.

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Speaker 2: So I don't think.

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Speaker 3: I don't think Army violated any of those. I'm sure

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Speaker 3: that Alabama might have, but I don't absolute. But I

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Speaker 3: don't think Army ever violated.

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Speaker 4: They did, like give us a give us a typical

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Speaker 4: date during football season, like on a Wednesday.

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Speaker 2: On a Wednesday at Army football and Army football. Okay,

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Speaker 2: so minute you get up.

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Speaker 3: The moment I get up.

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Speaker 1: So I don't want I mean, obviously this is pg's

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Speaker 1: I don't want to say, you know where where I

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Speaker 1: use the bathroom in the morning, But you're trying to

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Speaker 1: save time, if you know what I mean.

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Speaker 3: So I got up in the morning.

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Speaker 1: I always slept on top of my bed so I

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Speaker 1: wouldn't have to make my bed. You know, all this

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Speaker 1: time they always say, oh, the best thing you do

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Speaker 1: with do in life is make your bed in the morning.

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Speaker 3: Is like, but what did you sleep on top of you?

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Speaker 3: They never talked about that you know what I mean,

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Speaker 3: what size bed did you have?

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Speaker 2: No? The same.

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Speaker 1: I have to take the diagonal in my bed to

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Speaker 1: fit in and my arms will fall out. Yeah. So

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Speaker 1: I will get up in the morning, I will get ready,

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Speaker 1: I will not leave my room.

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Speaker 2: But everything dry shafe.

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Speaker 1: I mean waking up in the morning is hard for me,

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Speaker 1: very difficult for me Spanish in me difficult. And then

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Speaker 1: you go out the formation. You got to breakfast. Everything's

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Speaker 1: pump on, pumpum. You start class.

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Speaker 2: You do.

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Speaker 3: You have like insane amount of credit hours, so you

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Speaker 3: think you have like I don't.

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Speaker 1: I don't want exaggerate, but basically you have a class

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Speaker 1: all the way non stop until two thirty from the

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Speaker 1: moment you work up at seven. I was an engineer,

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Speaker 1: so I had engineering courses which you know obviously they

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Speaker 1: inteli in send amount of homework and whatnot. And then

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Speaker 1: you go to practice when two thirty, and then you

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Speaker 1: do the same thing. You work out, you lift, you

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Speaker 1: do your meetings, you have practice, same hours and then

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Speaker 1: you eat and then you just say, man, I gotta

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Speaker 1: go back to the academy and start doing homework. So

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Speaker 1: then you would prolonged the time that you will you

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Speaker 1: know that go I got to go back to the facility,

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Speaker 1: and you will just stay in the locker room. And

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Speaker 1: then that's when like prison like habits will come up

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Speaker 1: and we'll start messing around with each other and we'll

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Speaker 1: start got in trouble just because we did not want

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Speaker 1: to go back to the academy. Because inevitably, when you

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Speaker 1: go back to the academy, now you got to start

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Speaker 1: doing the homework for all the classes that you took

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Speaker 1: and so and so. Then either you have to go

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Speaker 1: to bed and not do your homework or stay.

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Speaker 2: Up until midnight and trying to finish.

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Speaker 1: Your homework and do it all over again, and do

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Speaker 1: it all over again the next day exactly.

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Speaker 2: And we're traveling and everything else.

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Speaker 4: That's why I think military colleges are way different. Have

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Speaker 4: nothing but the utmost respect for what you all, uh Navy, Army,

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Speaker 4: Coast Guard, Air Force, like it's it's a process.

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Speaker 1: But I didn't know that. I don't know what you're

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Speaker 1: doing in Alabama, so everything becomes relative. If you don't know,

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Speaker 1: it was almost like ignorance. It's bliss, you know what

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Speaker 1: I mean. So I don't know, it's amos.

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Speaker 2: You know, Like, yeah, I don't want to tell you

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Speaker 2: my colleges now.

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Speaker 1: I know, now, I know now after I want to

379
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Speaker 1: Clusa and I was hanging out for Banning. I was

380
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Speaker 1: the retreat and I was like watching all that. I

381
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Speaker 1: was like, oh man, these guys, it's crazy. They have

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Speaker 1: like twelve credit hours and one of them is like

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Speaker 1: multiple choice on yeah, yeah.

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Speaker 5: Yeah, you had to take like eighteen yeah yeah yeah,

385
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Speaker 5: middle like, yeah, you're good.

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Speaker 3: Eighteen is a light year.

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Speaker 2: I think too. Yes, it's crazy. Yeah.

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Speaker 5: I want to know this though, all the moving around

389
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Speaker 5: growing up as what Peanut calls the military brat, and

390
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Speaker 5: being in these different cities, on these different bases, getting

391
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Speaker 5: to meet so many different people. How much do you

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Speaker 5: think that lifestyle for you growing up? How much do

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Speaker 5: you think it benefited you later on in life becoming

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Speaker 5: a man.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a very tricky question.

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Speaker 1: I seem normal now, I seem like I'm accomplished and whatnot,

397
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Speaker 1: But it's moving around that much is not normal.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, and I and I don't understand why.

399
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Speaker 1: The military does it so much. I don't know if

400
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Speaker 1: I don't know if it's because you don't want to

401
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Speaker 1: develop true bonds and friendships between units, and then you

402
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Speaker 1: have rogue units. I have no idea why the military

403
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Speaker 1: does it, but I never I never lit me in.

404
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Speaker 1: Pittsburgh is the city that the longest in my life.

405
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Speaker 1: It was six months gone, a year gone, three months,

406
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Speaker 1: three years gone. You got a girl friend, your love her,

407
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Speaker 1: you want to marry her, fifteen gone, you know, and

408
00:17:09,080 --> 00:17:12,200
Speaker 1: you're like, no, I mean, and I don't have I'm

409
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Speaker 1: not from I'm from nowhere, So I have no identity.

410
00:17:14,440 --> 00:17:16,880
Speaker 1: I have no I mean, a lot of me is fake,

411
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Speaker 1: you know what I mean. A lot of me is

412
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Speaker 1: like me learning how Americans dress and be like O're

413
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Speaker 1: gonna wear kuby boots now, Like I don't have I

414
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Speaker 1: don't have a place to call home, you know. I

415
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Speaker 1: don't have any of that, and so very very difficult

416
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Speaker 1: when you're a teenager, very very I would never do

417
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Speaker 1: that to my kids. That's why I said, I'm going

418
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Speaker 1: to make a decision. I'm going to move somewhere and

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Speaker 1: that's it. I'm not going to be a coach and

420
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Speaker 1: move to another fifty thousand different cities. I'm done, you

421
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Speaker 1: know what I mean. I'm picking a city, I'm staying

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Speaker 1: with it, and that's it. Just because I think it

423
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Speaker 1: really did make it very difficult in my life. No,

424
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Speaker 1: I can't complain now. I mean, obviously I got to

425
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Speaker 1: meet so many people. I speak so many different languages.

426
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Speaker 1: I'm very socially fluid everywhere. You know, I can talk

427
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Speaker 1: about anything.

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Speaker 3: But it was not easy. I mean, it is the

429
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Speaker 3: thing that I resent a little bit from my past.

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Speaker 4: So I did the I think from kindergarten to twelfth grade.

431
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Speaker 4: I've been to twelve different schools. Right, it was difficult.

432
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Speaker 4: Some places were difficult at times. But to me, the

433
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Speaker 4: beauty of it was when I didn't like somewhere, I

434
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Speaker 4: was like, all right, I just we got six months

435
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Speaker 4: and we out. I got a year and we're gonna

436
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Speaker 4: be out, and I get to go to another space

437
00:18:17,440 --> 00:18:21,800
Speaker 4: or a new base or wherever, and I'll be good.

438
00:18:23,160 --> 00:18:25,560
Speaker 4: I would always tell people the last place I lived,

439
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Speaker 4: like that's where I'm from. It just made it. It

440
00:18:27,720 --> 00:18:29,840
Speaker 4: made it easier than trying to tell people, well, not

441
00:18:29,960 --> 00:18:32,359
Speaker 4: my dad's the army, but I'm moving to Germany, but

442
00:18:32,359 --> 00:18:35,440
Speaker 4: I'm not from Germany. Well we live in ram Sign,

443
00:18:35,520 --> 00:18:38,080
Speaker 4: but we don't. Hey man, I'm from ram Sign. I'm

444
00:18:38,119 --> 00:18:40,240
Speaker 4: just I just kept it. I just kept it somewhere

445
00:18:40,320 --> 00:18:41,719
Speaker 4: I'm from. I'm from Texas.

446
00:18:41,720 --> 00:18:43,159
Speaker 1: We got a big mall on Ramsteinn. You know you

447
00:18:43,160 --> 00:18:45,080
Speaker 1: should check out my mall and Ramstign. That's the only

448
00:18:45,080 --> 00:18:46,600
Speaker 1: thing I remember is just going to the mall on Ramsign.

449
00:18:47,400 --> 00:18:49,880
Speaker 2: I just got a commissary in the PX and ran

450
00:18:50,280 --> 00:18:50,879
Speaker 2: all the time.

451
00:18:51,040 --> 00:18:54,080
Speaker 1: I mean, I think for every success story, you do

452
00:18:54,160 --> 00:18:56,160
Speaker 1: have a lot of people that really that really did

453
00:18:56,280 --> 00:18:56,840
Speaker 1: get stuck.

454
00:18:57,040 --> 00:18:58,880
Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely absolutely, and.

455
00:18:58,840 --> 00:19:00,840
Speaker 1: I'm keeping those people in mind. I answer that question

456
00:19:00,880 --> 00:19:02,800
Speaker 1: because I don't think it's normal and natural.

457
00:19:03,200 --> 00:19:03,640
Speaker 2: It's not.

458
00:19:04,119 --> 00:19:08,240
Speaker 5: You guys both are the anomaly in the whole situation.

459
00:19:08,320 --> 00:19:09,080
Speaker 2: Probably, I don't know.

460
00:19:09,760 --> 00:19:10,760
Speaker 3: I mean, I hope not.

461
00:19:10,880 --> 00:19:14,040
Speaker 2: But yes, maybe you're a big guy, but I mean

462
00:19:14,080 --> 00:19:17,240
Speaker 2: you were a big guy like young. So you're six

463
00:19:17,440 --> 00:19:22,200
Speaker 2: nine when you're like fourteen. Yes, so how is that?

464
00:19:22,320 --> 00:19:25,280
Speaker 5: Because I always think about always joke, like, you know,

465
00:19:25,800 --> 00:19:27,040
Speaker 5: we think basketball.

466
00:19:26,600 --> 00:19:28,000
Speaker 2: Players are so cool in America.

467
00:19:28,080 --> 00:19:30,600
Speaker 5: Yeah, but I'm like, before they start dunking the ball,

468
00:19:30,640 --> 00:19:33,520
Speaker 5: they're probably not that cool. Like because you're way bigger

469
00:19:33,560 --> 00:19:35,639
Speaker 5: than everybody else in your whole class.

470
00:19:35,840 --> 00:19:37,160
Speaker 2: You're bigger than your teachers.

471
00:19:37,680 --> 00:19:40,240
Speaker 5: You're just and you're just kind of until you grow

472
00:19:40,280 --> 00:19:42,760
Speaker 5: into your body like, yeah, me that said, like, how is.

473
00:19:42,760 --> 00:19:46,320
Speaker 1: That so Spanish people are very short? Yeah, they're too,

474
00:19:46,440 --> 00:19:49,800
Speaker 1: They're very short. And I was the tallest. And so

475
00:19:50,960 --> 00:19:53,439
Speaker 1: in Spain you want everybody to be the same. You

476
00:19:53,480 --> 00:19:55,600
Speaker 1: want everybody to have the same money. Do you want

477
00:19:55,600 --> 00:19:58,280
Speaker 1: everybody to have the same clothes? You want every uniformity

478
00:19:58,359 --> 00:20:00,280
Speaker 1: is what you value. So when you have a get

479
00:20:00,359 --> 00:20:02,320
Speaker 1: that tall, it throws.

480
00:20:02,400 --> 00:20:04,760
Speaker 3: It's like a wrench in the glitch in the matrix.

481
00:20:04,840 --> 00:20:06,200
Speaker 3: It's just people.

482
00:20:05,920 --> 00:20:09,280
Speaker 1: Cannot compute that you being that tall, and so it

483
00:20:09,359 --> 00:20:11,720
Speaker 1: was not easy. I hate it being not tall. I

484
00:20:11,720 --> 00:20:16,000
Speaker 1: cannot if I'm I'm uncertain about the benefits of moving around,

485
00:20:16,000 --> 00:20:17,920
Speaker 1: but I am certain that I did not like being this.

486
00:20:17,880 --> 00:20:20,600
Speaker 2: Tall when I was a kid. Really no, it's not

487
00:20:20,640 --> 00:20:21,399
Speaker 2: like I was playing here.

488
00:20:21,440 --> 00:20:23,040
Speaker 1: If I was this tall in Miami, I'd be like,

489
00:20:23,160 --> 00:20:25,359
Speaker 1: I'm the king, I'm the best, I'm the man. But

490
00:20:25,480 --> 00:20:28,920
Speaker 1: in Europe there's not what there's nothing, being a toll

491
00:20:28,960 --> 00:20:31,000
Speaker 1: for what you know, you can't fit anywhere. I can't

492
00:20:31,000 --> 00:20:32,800
Speaker 1: find clothes, and if you can't find clothes, you don't

493
00:20:32,840 --> 00:20:33,680
Speaker 1: look like anybody else.

494
00:20:33,920 --> 00:20:35,879
Speaker 2: And there's no shoes, shoes.

495
00:20:35,920 --> 00:20:37,919
Speaker 1: I'm wearing flip stops and shorts in the winter everywhere

496
00:20:37,920 --> 00:20:39,879
Speaker 1: all you're around because I can't find clothes.

497
00:20:39,880 --> 00:20:41,960
Speaker 2: How did you get them?

498
00:20:42,280 --> 00:20:44,840
Speaker 1: That the PX at Ramstein it was the first time

499
00:20:44,840 --> 00:20:48,560
Speaker 1: that I found Jack Penny Jack Penny. It is like

500
00:20:48,600 --> 00:20:50,359
Speaker 1: a first time that I saw catalog from J. C.

501
00:20:50,480 --> 00:20:53,000
Speaker 1: Penny and they had thirty eight inc. The first time

502
00:20:53,040 --> 00:20:54,960
Speaker 1: that I have about jeans. It's crazy from J. C.

503
00:20:55,040 --> 00:20:55,880
Speaker 1: Penny and Ramstein.

504
00:20:56,000 --> 00:20:56,359
Speaker 2: That's why I.

505
00:20:56,359 --> 00:20:57,280
Speaker 3: Remember it graating my head.

506
00:20:57,480 --> 00:20:59,000
Speaker 2: At Ramstein, I'm like, just go to the the egg bro.

507
00:20:59,640 --> 00:20:59,840
Speaker 5: You know.

508
00:21:01,760 --> 00:21:02,919
Speaker 3: But it's not it's not It was not.

509
00:21:03,000 --> 00:21:04,080
Speaker 2: It was not normal. It's not easy.

510
00:21:04,160 --> 00:21:06,000
Speaker 1: Now again, you can make everything through trauma. You can

511
00:21:06,000 --> 00:21:07,800
Speaker 1: make I don't know what it's like to be maybe five.

512
00:21:07,640 --> 00:21:09,200
Speaker 2: To two, you know what I mean, so.

513
00:21:11,440 --> 00:21:13,360
Speaker 3: Definitely, I mean flying.

514
00:21:13,160 --> 00:21:15,640
Speaker 2: You know what it's like. You know what I mean, with.

515
00:21:15,680 --> 00:21:18,040
Speaker 1: Your ears on the bag, you know for eight hours,

516
00:21:18,080 --> 00:21:19,160
Speaker 1: you know, constantly.

517
00:21:18,720 --> 00:21:22,520
Speaker 2: Can fit anywhere. The cars are not big, cars are

518
00:21:22,560 --> 00:21:22,960
Speaker 2: not big.

519
00:21:23,000 --> 00:21:24,879
Speaker 1: I was tall in the teachers since I was like,

520
00:21:24,960 --> 00:21:26,600
Speaker 1: you know, a lot of times people thought I had

521
00:21:26,600 --> 00:21:29,399
Speaker 1: a problem, you know, they held me back like ten years.

522
00:21:32,760 --> 00:21:40,000
Speaker 4: Bill it had to be I was like, nobody's that tall,

523
00:21:40,080 --> 00:21:42,639
Speaker 4: that nobody, nobody like you.

524
00:21:42,640 --> 00:21:43,800
Speaker 2: No one in your family's tall.

525
00:21:44,480 --> 00:21:46,080
Speaker 1: My mom played tight end for the giants if she

526
00:21:46,119 --> 00:21:48,200
Speaker 1: wanted to. Okay, yeah, my mom's got that. My mom's

527
00:21:48,240 --> 00:21:52,600
Speaker 1: got the jeans nice, she's got the yeah's your pops,

528
00:21:53,240 --> 00:21:53,720
Speaker 1: they're both.

529
00:21:55,200 --> 00:21:56,479
Speaker 3: My dad's a sloppy six two.

530
00:21:56,560 --> 00:22:01,960
Speaker 2: My mom's uh six Yeah, Okay, I like it. I

531
00:22:02,080 --> 00:22:04,359
Speaker 2: like that. We're going to take a short break and

532
00:22:04,359 --> 00:22:05,560
Speaker 2: we'll be back in a minute.

533
00:22:07,560 --> 00:22:10,480
Speaker 4: So I want to show you a picture, mister Thomas,

534
00:22:10,560 --> 00:22:12,520
Speaker 4: can you help me out right here?

535
00:22:13,359 --> 00:22:16,159
Speaker 2: So when you see this picture, who do you see? Okay?

536
00:22:16,200 --> 00:22:18,520
Speaker 1: This is this is I'm not gonna say it's funny.

537
00:22:19,119 --> 00:22:21,199
Speaker 1: This is a picture that you have to take when

538
00:22:21,240 --> 00:22:23,919
Speaker 1: you're getting ready to deploy with a first Ranger regiment. Okay,

539
00:22:24,359 --> 00:22:26,080
Speaker 1: and when you get to play with the first Ranger regimen,

540
00:22:26,119 --> 00:22:28,760
Speaker 1: you have to take a picture in case you pass away.

541
00:22:28,800 --> 00:22:30,400
Speaker 1: This is the picture you want to show in case

542
00:22:30,440 --> 00:22:38,200
Speaker 1: you pass away. And culturally, I remember rangers looking very

543
00:22:38,240 --> 00:22:40,440
Speaker 1: tough in the picture. You try to look as tough

544
00:22:40,440 --> 00:22:43,600
Speaker 1: as you can. It's a thing and me being me,

545
00:22:43,720 --> 00:22:46,040
Speaker 1: and if you know me, you know why I said,

546
00:22:46,119 --> 00:22:49,320
Speaker 1: you know what? A smile on the picture I'm gonna

547
00:22:49,320 --> 00:22:50,919
Speaker 1: smile on this picture because this is you know, this

548
00:22:50,960 --> 00:22:51,840
Speaker 1: is because I can't.

549
00:22:52,119 --> 00:22:53,960
Speaker 3: It's weird for me to look at a picture. Seglement.

550
00:22:54,359 --> 00:22:56,480
Speaker 1: You always you when you look at takes the picture

551
00:22:56,640 --> 00:22:59,440
Speaker 1: say cheese. Yeah, they always smile. So I smile in

552
00:22:59,520 --> 00:23:01,280
Speaker 1: the picture. So this is the picture. I'm supposed to

553
00:23:01,280 --> 00:23:03,320
Speaker 1: look tough, but I don't look very tough. I look

554
00:23:03,400 --> 00:23:03,919
Speaker 1: very gentle.

555
00:23:04,240 --> 00:23:04,880
Speaker 2: Yeah I look like.

556
00:23:06,800 --> 00:23:08,960
Speaker 1: Maybe I look like a care bear in the picture.

557
00:23:09,000 --> 00:23:10,919
Speaker 1: But this is supposed to be like my wow, you

558
00:23:10,920 --> 00:23:12,280
Speaker 1: know that's never ranger O there.

559
00:23:12,920 --> 00:23:14,760
Speaker 2: I like that. That's a bit. I mean, I like

560
00:23:14,800 --> 00:23:15,399
Speaker 2: the thought of it.

561
00:23:15,520 --> 00:23:18,119
Speaker 4: Just like no, I'm smiling, man, I'm I'm doing something different.

562
00:23:19,240 --> 00:23:21,520
Speaker 4: So what does the army ranger do?

563
00:23:22,840 --> 00:23:26,000
Speaker 1: What does a range Army ranger do? Beautiful, great question. Okay,

564
00:23:26,000 --> 00:23:27,199
Speaker 1: So I'm gonna try to give you a little bit

565
00:23:27,200 --> 00:23:28,840
Speaker 1: of background of the United States.

566
00:23:30,160 --> 00:23:30,760
Speaker 2: World War Two.

567
00:23:30,800 --> 00:23:32,600
Speaker 1: We had one hundred and twenty divisions. I want to say,

568
00:23:32,720 --> 00:23:35,919
Speaker 1: so when you when you went when different types of needs.

569
00:23:35,920 --> 00:23:40,520
Speaker 1: So in World War two, major major operation, you need

570
00:23:40,560 --> 00:23:42,919
Speaker 1: to you need to go to Europe, then you need

571
00:23:42,960 --> 00:23:45,600
Speaker 1: to go to Asia. You need to deploy millions of people.

572
00:23:46,440 --> 00:23:52,760
Speaker 1: So within the army, they created volunteer units that would

573
00:23:52,800 --> 00:23:57,159
Speaker 1: do missions that were different than the rest. So the

574
00:23:57,280 --> 00:24:00,960
Speaker 1: Rangers were the first all volunteer army unit within the army.

575
00:24:01,040 --> 00:24:04,400
Speaker 1: So they were deployed in places like the Battle of Normandy'.

576
00:24:04,400 --> 00:24:06,960
Speaker 1: So if you see in the movie Saving Private Ryan,

577
00:24:07,440 --> 00:24:09,919
Speaker 1: those are the Rangers, you know, the Allmaha Beach, the

578
00:24:09,960 --> 00:24:11,800
Speaker 1: battles Cisterna, they got wiped out. I mean there were

579
00:24:11,840 --> 00:24:13,840
Speaker 1: units where they were. There were battalions that got completely

580
00:24:13,880 --> 00:24:17,480
Speaker 1: wiped out over time. The military does not like to

581
00:24:17,480 --> 00:24:20,399
Speaker 1: get rid of units just because. And so if you

582
00:24:20,400 --> 00:24:21,600
Speaker 1: look at the units that we have right now, the

583
00:24:21,640 --> 00:24:25,160
Speaker 1: one hundred and first, for example, and for Campbell, it's

584
00:24:25,240 --> 00:24:27,399
Speaker 1: it's a unit that's it's a legacy unit. You know,

585
00:24:27,480 --> 00:24:30,640
Speaker 1: it comes from you know, if you've seen Band of Brothers,

586
00:24:31,040 --> 00:24:32,439
Speaker 1: that's the hundred and first. So we still have one

587
00:24:32,520 --> 00:24:34,960
Speaker 1: hundred first, eighty second. There are units that out of

588
00:24:34,960 --> 00:24:36,760
Speaker 1: the out of those one hundred and twenty hundred and nine, however,

589
00:24:36,800 --> 00:24:38,840
Speaker 1: many divisions we had, we boiled it down, and I

590
00:24:38,880 --> 00:24:40,879
Speaker 1: think we have nine now and a lot of them

591
00:24:40,880 --> 00:24:42,720
Speaker 1: are legacy. So we still want to keep a lot

592
00:24:42,720 --> 00:24:46,600
Speaker 1: of the tradition So the Rangers have become a unit

593
00:24:46,960 --> 00:24:49,600
Speaker 1: in the Special Operations you know, a realm of things.

594
00:24:49,600 --> 00:24:52,040
Speaker 1: So basically you have to you have to be you

595
00:24:52,080 --> 00:24:53,520
Speaker 1: have to want to be in that unit. You don't

596
00:24:53,560 --> 00:24:56,560
Speaker 1: get randomly assigned. You have to try out being the unit.

597
00:24:57,080 --> 00:25:02,359
Speaker 1: And their main mission, their core mission has in seasoned

598
00:25:02,400 --> 00:25:05,680
Speaker 1: airfields to go into a country. But if you wanted

599
00:25:05,720 --> 00:25:08,879
Speaker 1: to invade a country and you wanted to take the airfield,

600
00:25:09,400 --> 00:25:12,160
Speaker 1: you would say you would send the Rangers.

601
00:25:12,200 --> 00:25:14,680
Speaker 3: That's like the that's like the main mission. That's the mission.

602
00:25:14,680 --> 00:25:16,959
Speaker 1: Why why taxpayers paid to have a unit that can

603
00:25:17,000 --> 00:25:19,560
Speaker 1: take an airfield? Same thing as the Navy Seals are

604
00:25:19,600 --> 00:25:23,040
Speaker 1: for hijacked boats and Delta Forces for hijacked planes. Their

605
00:25:23,080 --> 00:25:26,560
Speaker 1: core mission is that. But in reality, the Rangers have

606
00:25:26,560 --> 00:25:27,800
Speaker 1: been a mission that has been you know, they've been

607
00:25:27,800 --> 00:25:30,679
Speaker 1: doing everything they've been doing. They called the premier raid

608
00:25:30,880 --> 00:25:33,160
Speaker 1: uh units. So if you have to raid a building,

609
00:25:33,240 --> 00:25:35,520
Speaker 1: you have to raid a village, then the Rangers are

610
00:25:35,520 --> 00:25:37,119
Speaker 1: one of the units out of the many units of

611
00:25:37,160 --> 00:25:39,680
Speaker 1: the United States, you know, join Special Operations Command has

612
00:25:39,920 --> 00:25:41,399
Speaker 1: that can go out and perform that mission.

613
00:25:42,160 --> 00:25:44,879
Speaker 2: That's a great description, very descriptive.

614
00:25:44,880 --> 00:25:48,320
Speaker 5: Actually, I can tell you have a lot of knowledge

615
00:25:48,359 --> 00:25:49,880
Speaker 5: in that area.

616
00:25:50,000 --> 00:25:50,399
Speaker 2: I knew a.

617
00:25:50,400 --> 00:25:52,000
Speaker 4: Little bit about it because my dad was in the

618
00:25:52,040 --> 00:25:54,480
Speaker 4: one thing. So I remember asking my dad and this

619
00:25:54,560 --> 00:25:59,679
Speaker 4: is old school army where the rangers green berets. They

620
00:25:59,680 --> 00:26:01,399
Speaker 4: are all or their beret and all that other stuff.

621
00:26:01,400 --> 00:26:03,400
Speaker 4: And I used to ask, but I was like, why

622
00:26:03,440 --> 00:26:05,480
Speaker 4: don't you want to do something like that? He goes, man,

623
00:26:06,280 --> 00:26:08,639
Speaker 4: I like food, he was like, when you were arranged

624
00:26:08,640 --> 00:26:11,639
Speaker 4: it they starview. He was like, I like, I like food.

625
00:26:11,880 --> 00:26:13,080
Speaker 4: I ain't trying to run that far.

626
00:26:13,240 --> 00:26:16,320
Speaker 1: So like, yeah, it's good, it's it is. It is

627
00:26:16,320 --> 00:26:19,680
Speaker 1: a unit that you have to create the illusion. Maybe

628
00:26:19,680 --> 00:26:21,240
Speaker 1: you don't starve. I mean I was stuff in my

629
00:26:21,240 --> 00:26:22,959
Speaker 1: face every day, but you have to create the illusion

630
00:26:23,000 --> 00:26:25,200
Speaker 1: that is hard. You have to create. It's like almost

631
00:26:25,200 --> 00:26:27,080
Speaker 1: like saying you're gonna play for saving you're gonna play

632
00:26:27,119 --> 00:26:29,080
Speaker 1: for You have to create the illusion to fear that

633
00:26:29,119 --> 00:26:31,439
Speaker 1: it's going to be harder. And maybe it's not harder,

634
00:26:32,119 --> 00:26:33,920
Speaker 1: you know, maybe maybe it's not. But you have to

635
00:26:33,960 --> 00:26:36,159
Speaker 1: create the illusion that the fear of respect so that

636
00:26:36,200 --> 00:26:37,240
Speaker 1: you get those volunteers to.

637
00:26:37,280 --> 00:26:39,560
Speaker 2: Say, oh you start, is heart a volunteer to go there?

638
00:26:40,040 --> 00:26:41,760
Speaker 2: So why did you choose that rough.

639
00:26:42,840 --> 00:26:44,680
Speaker 1: I chose that right because I was so insecure about

640
00:26:44,760 --> 00:26:48,360
Speaker 1: not being American when I first came into the United States.

641
00:26:48,520 --> 00:26:49,600
Speaker 2: Really, oh my god.

642
00:26:49,640 --> 00:26:50,879
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean thinking about like about it. You know,

643
00:26:51,000 --> 00:26:53,760
Speaker 1: I was not very I have no family, no no

644
00:26:53,760 --> 00:26:54,320
Speaker 1: nobody here.

645
00:26:55,080 --> 00:26:56,080
Speaker 3: My accent was a lot.

646
00:26:56,280 --> 00:26:56,439
Speaker 2: You know.

647
00:26:56,560 --> 00:26:59,720
Speaker 1: I did not speak to you English very well. I

648
00:27:00,119 --> 00:27:03,520
Speaker 1: was always trying to prove myself as being an American,

649
00:27:03,560 --> 00:27:04,520
Speaker 1: always constantly, all the time.

650
00:27:04,560 --> 00:27:05,560
Speaker 3: But I was asking myself.

651
00:27:05,840 --> 00:27:08,400
Speaker 1: You know, one of the things I tell people, if

652
00:27:08,400 --> 00:27:10,000
Speaker 1: you want to learn a language, and you want to

653
00:27:10,000 --> 00:27:11,640
Speaker 1: be really good at it, you don't have to think

654
00:27:11,640 --> 00:27:14,120
Speaker 1: about studying the words. You have to start about acting

655
00:27:14,160 --> 00:27:16,919
Speaker 1: like someone. You have to act American. You have to

656
00:27:16,960 --> 00:27:20,439
Speaker 1: instead of saying you know, no way, you have to

657
00:27:20,440 --> 00:27:23,600
Speaker 1: think of of someone in California, you know, laying on

658
00:27:23,640 --> 00:27:26,280
Speaker 1: the beach and somebody's saying, dude, they got amazing free

659
00:27:26,280 --> 00:27:28,560
Speaker 1: food over there, and you got to say, like, no way.

660
00:27:28,760 --> 00:27:31,520
Speaker 1: And that's that's how you start learning the language. You

661
00:27:31,520 --> 00:27:34,000
Speaker 1: start learning the language by pretending to be American. So

662
00:27:34,720 --> 00:27:37,200
Speaker 1: when you go to West Point, especially during the time

663
00:27:37,359 --> 00:27:40,800
Speaker 1: of two thousand and six twenty ten, which is when

664
00:27:40,840 --> 00:27:45,160
Speaker 1: I went, they brainwashed every single person into being that

665
00:27:45,200 --> 00:27:48,679
Speaker 1: person that runs to danger one hundred thousand percent. So

666
00:27:48,720 --> 00:27:51,320
Speaker 1: I wasn't alone in the fact that we all wanted

667
00:27:51,359 --> 00:27:54,920
Speaker 1: to be the most American soldier version that we could.

668
00:27:55,359 --> 00:27:56,840
Speaker 1: And so for me, I saw it as a challenge.

669
00:27:56,840 --> 00:27:57,959
Speaker 1: It's the same thing as like why did you want

670
00:27:57,960 --> 00:28:01,960
Speaker 1: to play football of Alabama not Lafayette Because you want

671
00:28:01,960 --> 00:28:03,439
Speaker 1: to be with the best. You want to be with

672
00:28:03,480 --> 00:28:04,760
Speaker 1: the best, you want to do with the best do

673
00:28:05,320 --> 00:28:07,960
Speaker 1: And so for me, Airborne Ranger is like it's a

674
00:28:07,960 --> 00:28:09,600
Speaker 1: cultural thing that you have in the Army. It's a

675
00:28:09,600 --> 00:28:13,320
Speaker 1: culture thing you have at West Point, and they have

676
00:28:13,400 --> 00:28:16,520
Speaker 1: a charter that as a ranger, you serve in the

677
00:28:16,560 --> 00:28:18,800
Speaker 1: Ranger Regiment. Especially as an officer, you serve some years

678
00:28:18,800 --> 00:28:20,560
Speaker 1: in the Ranger Regiment, but then you go back into

679
00:28:20,600 --> 00:28:23,080
Speaker 1: the regular Army and you set the standards for everybody else.

680
00:28:23,320 --> 00:28:24,040
Speaker 3: It's almost like if you.

681
00:28:24,040 --> 00:28:26,199
Speaker 1: Went to Alabama, you played for a few years, and

682
00:28:26,200 --> 00:28:28,040
Speaker 1: then you went to West Point and you say, like, guys,

683
00:28:28,040 --> 00:28:30,359
Speaker 1: this is how we practice, this is how it's done.

684
00:28:30,600 --> 00:28:32,360
Speaker 1: And so I looked at those guys that came from

685
00:28:32,400 --> 00:28:33,480
Speaker 1: Ranger Regiment and I said.

686
00:28:33,320 --> 00:28:34,880
Speaker 3: Like that that's OUs me right there.

687
00:28:35,080 --> 00:28:36,919
Speaker 1: Yeah, I want to be just like them, you know,

688
00:28:37,640 --> 00:28:40,040
Speaker 1: the special operations. I was a little bit longer. Maybe

689
00:28:40,040 --> 00:28:41,600
Speaker 1: I would have been a better fit because they do

690
00:28:41,720 --> 00:28:44,480
Speaker 1: have like the language thing, but it's a longer process.

691
00:28:44,600 --> 00:28:46,400
Speaker 1: In when I was in I wanted to get back

692
00:28:46,400 --> 00:28:48,440
Speaker 1: to Afghanistan as quickly as I could, and so the

693
00:28:48,520 --> 00:28:51,240
Speaker 1: rangers they deploy every four months. You got four months,

694
00:28:51,280 --> 00:28:53,320
Speaker 1: six months, four months, and you always constantly ploying.

695
00:28:53,480 --> 00:28:55,880
Speaker 2: You you said you want to get back multiple times.

696
00:28:56,000 --> 00:28:59,160
Speaker 1: Why because you go a little crazy, because you just

697
00:28:59,200 --> 00:29:02,120
Speaker 1: you can't make sense of it all. You know, the

698
00:29:02,160 --> 00:29:05,560
Speaker 1: first time you go. You've romanticized war for so long,

699
00:29:06,120 --> 00:29:09,360
Speaker 1: You've watched movies, you had an idea in your head.

700
00:29:10,080 --> 00:29:12,360
Speaker 1: You really don't know, you know what I mean. It's

701
00:29:12,440 --> 00:29:15,800
Speaker 1: like you don't know what happened, and then you kind

702
00:29:15,800 --> 00:29:17,400
Speaker 1: of just want to you know. For me, it's like

703
00:29:17,560 --> 00:29:19,880
Speaker 1: I can't get stuck in the past of what just happened.

704
00:29:20,120 --> 00:29:21,560
Speaker 1: Let me let me try it again, let me go

705
00:29:21,640 --> 00:29:22,080
Speaker 1: back again.

706
00:29:22,160 --> 00:29:24,360
Speaker 2: You know, it's crazy because you use the word romanticized.

707
00:29:24,520 --> 00:29:27,880
Speaker 5: Yeah, everybody, we have this vision of what war or

708
00:29:27,920 --> 00:29:29,200
Speaker 5: what whatever these things are.

709
00:29:29,240 --> 00:29:31,120
Speaker 2: Of course, it's the most romanticized thing in the world.

710
00:29:31,320 --> 00:29:34,600
Speaker 4: But it's also but you know, it's it's also like

711
00:29:35,480 --> 00:29:38,800
Speaker 4: it's your super Bowl. It's like what do you what

712
00:29:38,800 --> 00:29:40,959
Speaker 4: do you train for? Like we do all this work up,

713
00:29:40,960 --> 00:29:43,320
Speaker 4: we do this build up, right, I'm doing all this

714
00:29:43,480 --> 00:29:46,080
Speaker 4: training like I want to I want to go to war.

715
00:29:46,280 --> 00:29:48,000
Speaker 4: Like I don't think that the goal is like I

716
00:29:48,000 --> 00:29:49,120
Speaker 4: want to go to war, and now I want to

717
00:29:49,160 --> 00:29:50,040
Speaker 4: be like no, no, no, no no.

718
00:29:50,480 --> 00:29:52,200
Speaker 2: But but there's but there is manipula.

719
00:29:52,240 --> 00:29:55,160
Speaker 1: I mean there's a lot of manipulation, mental manipulation, and

720
00:29:55,600 --> 00:29:56,840
Speaker 1: is how do you build an army?

721
00:29:57,120 --> 00:29:59,000
Speaker 3: And the same thing happens in the NFL. You know,

722
00:29:59,040 --> 00:29:59,440
Speaker 3: with a war.

723
00:29:59,480 --> 00:30:01,720
Speaker 2: It's like all pro not a you know what I mean.

724
00:30:01,760 --> 00:30:04,400
Speaker 1: Like those those little things, those those little sparkles that

725
00:30:04,440 --> 00:30:05,040
Speaker 1: you throw.

726
00:30:05,360 --> 00:30:07,440
Speaker 6: They make people fight, you know what I mean? Yeah,

727
00:30:07,560 --> 00:30:10,480
Speaker 6: they really make people. My mindset in the NFL like R,

728
00:30:11,040 --> 00:30:12,880
Speaker 6: I'm want to get drafted. I gotta take a Pro Bowl.

729
00:30:13,040 --> 00:30:15,920
Speaker 6: You gotta d It's like this is all you know.

730
00:30:15,960 --> 00:30:16,480
Speaker 2: It's all you know.

731
00:30:16,480 --> 00:30:18,920
Speaker 1: It's hilarious when you watch Tom Brady in tears crying.

732
00:30:19,000 --> 00:30:20,400
Speaker 1: He was a seventh round pick and he wanted to

733
00:30:20,400 --> 00:30:23,040
Speaker 1: be I was like, bro, you were the great because

734
00:30:23,080 --> 00:30:25,320
Speaker 1: that's what it created, like that, having the status of

735
00:30:25,440 --> 00:30:27,320
Speaker 1: drafting number one is the one thing you care about

736
00:30:27,320 --> 00:30:29,640
Speaker 1: the most in the army. It was the same way

737
00:30:30,400 --> 00:30:32,200
Speaker 1: now i'm speaking. You know, I'm mayor of kids that

738
00:30:32,240 --> 00:30:34,840
Speaker 1: one Afghanistan is over. I've had time to think about this.

739
00:30:35,440 --> 00:30:38,040
Speaker 1: When I was twenty one years old and I was

740
00:30:38,040 --> 00:30:40,120
Speaker 1: hanging out of parties at Universal, I could care less

741
00:30:40,120 --> 00:30:42,320
Speaker 1: about the draft, I could care less about the NFL,

742
00:30:42,920 --> 00:30:45,120
Speaker 1: I could see nothing. The only thing I wanted to

743
00:30:45,120 --> 00:30:46,800
Speaker 1: do was be an everone ranger. There was nothing in

744
00:30:46,840 --> 00:30:49,239
Speaker 1: the world mattered to me most right. I will do

745
00:30:49,360 --> 00:30:52,440
Speaker 1: anything I will, I will sell my mother to Uncle

746
00:30:52,600 --> 00:30:55,400
Speaker 1: s Sam anything. I just wanted to be an airbone

747
00:30:55,480 --> 00:30:57,960
Speaker 1: ranger because I thought that the possibility of not being

748
00:30:58,000 --> 00:31:01,880
Speaker 1: one will crush me for life. And the Army is

749
00:31:02,000 --> 00:31:04,920
Speaker 1: very smart. I mean, the largest award that you can

750
00:31:04,960 --> 00:31:07,880
Speaker 1: wear on your chest is the Combat Infantry Back and

751
00:31:07,960 --> 00:31:10,320
Speaker 1: they did it for a reason. It's twice the size

752
00:31:10,400 --> 00:31:12,480
Speaker 1: is any other award you can wear, and it's for

753
00:31:12,640 --> 00:31:15,840
Speaker 1: infantrymen who face combat. So how hard is it to

754
00:31:15,880 --> 00:31:18,200
Speaker 1: motivate somebody as a soldier at the prayer a rifle

755
00:31:18,280 --> 00:31:20,480
Speaker 1: and go face the enemy? So the army said, okay,

756
00:31:20,520 --> 00:31:23,440
Speaker 1: let's create an award for that, and the awards that

757
00:31:23,520 --> 00:31:26,400
Speaker 1: you wear and all that. Subconsciously, they have an effect.

758
00:31:26,720 --> 00:31:29,120
Speaker 1: I mean, Napoleons say, give men a small piece of

759
00:31:29,200 --> 00:31:30,960
Speaker 1: ribbon and they'll go die for you. So I do

760
00:31:31,040 --> 00:31:33,400
Speaker 1: think that when you're that young, it did have a huge,

761
00:31:33,480 --> 00:31:35,920
Speaker 1: huge effect on me, and being an everyone ranger was

762
00:31:35,920 --> 00:31:37,400
Speaker 1: one thousand percent out of that.

763
00:31:37,600 --> 00:31:39,240
Speaker 4: It's one of the first things I noticed when I

764
00:31:39,240 --> 00:31:41,760
Speaker 4: look at someone's uniform and you see it was like, oh, okay,

765
00:31:41,960 --> 00:31:44,920
Speaker 4: he's got his he's got his combat ribbon. Okay, I

766
00:31:44,960 --> 00:31:48,719
Speaker 4: see you. Yeah, it's something I noticed. Yes, okay, they

767
00:31:48,720 --> 00:31:51,040
Speaker 4: got some combat, they see some acc and a they

768
00:31:51,040 --> 00:31:51,560
Speaker 4: are real deal.

769
00:31:51,680 --> 00:31:52,880
Speaker 3: Yeah, dog sniff the tails.

770
00:31:53,000 --> 00:31:54,640
Speaker 2: Would you see two minute uniform? The first thing to

771
00:31:54,640 --> 00:31:55,840
Speaker 2: do is ding ding ding ding dinging.

772
00:31:57,320 --> 00:31:57,960
Speaker 3: Continue to have the.

773
00:31:57,920 --> 00:32:00,000
Speaker 2: Conversation absolutely absolutely, Who am I talking to?

774
00:32:00,040 --> 00:32:00,080
Speaker 5: You?

775
00:32:00,200 --> 00:32:02,880
Speaker 2: Know what I mean? What was your welcome to the

776
00:32:03,240 --> 00:32:04,200
Speaker 2: military moment?

777
00:32:04,920 --> 00:32:08,200
Speaker 1: My welcome to the military moment. I had a lot

778
00:32:08,200 --> 00:32:09,920
Speaker 1: of moments of humility. I had a lot of moments

779
00:32:09,920 --> 00:32:11,600
Speaker 1: where I thought I was invincible. I had a lot

780
00:32:11,600 --> 00:32:13,480
Speaker 1: of crazy nights in Ilanda. For example, when I was

781
00:32:13,480 --> 00:32:15,560
Speaker 1: staying in Columbus and I will get back, and I

782
00:32:15,800 --> 00:32:18,160
Speaker 1: realized that I was not a kid anymore. You know,

783
00:32:18,520 --> 00:32:22,920
Speaker 1: I can't talk about those welcome moments here and I think,

784
00:32:22,960 --> 00:32:26,080
Speaker 1: but I did there. There's an incredible amount of humility

785
00:32:26,600 --> 00:32:28,800
Speaker 1: that goes into being a lieutenant in the United States

786
00:32:28,920 --> 00:32:30,800
Speaker 1: Army because you're the youngest person. I was twenty one,

787
00:32:30,880 --> 00:32:33,440
Speaker 1: twenty two years old, and you're in charge of thirty

788
00:32:33,520 --> 00:32:34,720
Speaker 1: nine You.

789
00:32:34,600 --> 00:32:37,000
Speaker 2: Know, men better men women?

790
00:32:37,320 --> 00:32:39,920
Speaker 1: Yeah, oh yeah, yeah, for sure, especially in the infantry.

791
00:32:39,920 --> 00:32:42,320
Speaker 1: I mean, I didn't have a chance to serve with women,

792
00:32:42,360 --> 00:32:45,080
Speaker 1: but in the man's world. You know what the man's

793
00:32:45,080 --> 00:32:47,160
Speaker 1: world is like when you sit in front and to

794
00:32:47,160 --> 00:32:49,520
Speaker 1: get that credibility. So a lot of humility, a lot

795
00:32:49,520 --> 00:32:52,480
Speaker 1: of welcome to the Army moments. But thankfully I had

796
00:32:52,680 --> 00:32:55,680
Speaker 1: incredible soldiers that I served with, and they carry me through.

797
00:32:55,760 --> 00:32:57,880
Speaker 1: They made up for my mistakes, they allowed me to lead,

798
00:32:58,360 --> 00:33:00,520
Speaker 1: and my experience as a platoon leader. I just can't

799
00:33:00,520 --> 00:33:03,280
Speaker 1: I can't speak a high enough of how incredible my

800
00:33:03,320 --> 00:33:05,320
Speaker 1: journey was and how thankful I am for the United

801
00:33:05,320 --> 00:33:05,760
Speaker 1: States Army.

802
00:33:05,800 --> 00:33:07,800
Speaker 4: Do you feel like you were prepared leaving once you

803
00:33:07,880 --> 00:33:10,240
Speaker 4: left West Point to be a twenty one year old

804
00:33:10,280 --> 00:33:15,480
Speaker 4: lieutenant being in charge of a group of thirty forty men.

805
00:33:15,760 --> 00:33:18,160
Speaker 4: Do you think you were really truly prepared at twenty two.

806
00:33:18,560 --> 00:33:21,440
Speaker 1: Yes, because I wanted it so bad. I wanted it

807
00:33:21,560 --> 00:33:25,960
Speaker 1: so bad. I did impossible things to be this next

808
00:33:25,960 --> 00:33:28,320
Speaker 1: person to be sent to Afghanistan. I waved all my

809
00:33:28,440 --> 00:33:29,560
Speaker 1: leave after West Point.

810
00:33:30,040 --> 00:33:30,560
Speaker 3: I did it.

811
00:33:30,640 --> 00:33:34,160
Speaker 1: I mean I was so obsessed. I mean I couldn't

812
00:33:34,160 --> 00:33:35,880
Speaker 1: stop thinking about it. It was night and day.

813
00:33:36,000 --> 00:33:37,840
Speaker 2: But not just me. Don't think I'm like, oh, we're.

814
00:33:37,720 --> 00:33:39,960
Speaker 1: Looking at no, No, no, it was every single person that

815
00:33:40,000 --> 00:33:42,280
Speaker 1: you talked to from my class was exactly the same way.

816
00:33:42,720 --> 00:33:43,920
Speaker 2: Twenty graduation.

817
00:33:43,960 --> 00:33:47,360
Speaker 1: In twenty ten West Point Infantry, it was a rat

818
00:33:47,440 --> 00:33:49,480
Speaker 1: race to get to a unit that was going to Afghanistan.

819
00:33:49,520 --> 00:33:51,000
Speaker 1: So for me, it was like, Okay, I need to

820
00:33:51,000 --> 00:33:52,440
Speaker 1: go to for Drum, New York, which is not the

821
00:33:52,520 --> 00:33:54,560
Speaker 1: unit that everybody wants. I'm gonna go to a unit

822
00:33:54,560 --> 00:33:56,239
Speaker 1: that nobody wants to go to so I can get

823
00:33:56,240 --> 00:33:57,280
Speaker 1: there as soon as possible.

824
00:33:57,400 --> 00:33:58,440
Speaker 2: I'm gonna wave everything.

825
00:33:58,480 --> 00:34:00,840
Speaker 1: And I wanted it so bad that I think now

826
00:34:00,880 --> 00:34:03,600
Speaker 1: looking back, it wouldn't have mattered because I was willing

827
00:34:03,640 --> 00:34:04,840
Speaker 1: to do anything to be prepared.

828
00:34:05,000 --> 00:34:07,960
Speaker 4: So when you when you got there, was it what

829
00:34:08,000 --> 00:34:14,920
Speaker 4: you expected? No, no, no, no, it was there like

830
00:34:14,920 --> 00:34:16,759
Speaker 4: a letdown and was like, oh yeah, this is this is.

831
00:34:16,760 --> 00:34:19,879
Speaker 1: A now that letdown is now I it's it's it's

832
00:34:20,000 --> 00:34:21,640
Speaker 1: it's great. I mean, this is like a super deep

833
00:34:21,640 --> 00:34:23,960
Speaker 1: conversation is great. It's far greater than that. I mean,

834
00:34:24,719 --> 00:34:28,239
Speaker 1: you romanticize it for years. You want to be you

835
00:34:28,239 --> 00:34:31,799
Speaker 1: want to liberate the people from Afghanistan. You feel that

836
00:34:31,800 --> 00:34:34,400
Speaker 1: the talent that that the Taliban are oppressing this people

837
00:34:35,080 --> 00:34:37,560
Speaker 1: and that you're going there to liberate them and you're

838
00:34:37,560 --> 00:34:39,440
Speaker 1: going to build a great nation that is going to

839
00:34:39,800 --> 00:34:41,200
Speaker 1: And then you go there and it's not like that

840
00:34:41,280 --> 00:34:41,600
Speaker 1: at all.

841
00:34:42,320 --> 00:34:43,799
Speaker 2: But it takes you a couple of times to go

842
00:34:43,840 --> 00:34:46,480
Speaker 2: there and be like what you said. The first time,

843
00:34:47,000 --> 00:34:49,080
Speaker 2: you're like, I gotta go back because it's not.

844
00:34:49,320 --> 00:34:52,040
Speaker 1: Right, because I'm like, Okay, I didn't come. Why did

845
00:34:52,040 --> 00:34:54,520
Speaker 1: I not solve the war? I came here to be

846
00:34:54,560 --> 00:34:56,680
Speaker 1: the hero and you know, why did it not happen?

847
00:34:56,719 --> 00:34:58,040
Speaker 1: You know, let me go back at one more time.

848
00:34:58,239 --> 00:35:00,799
Speaker 1: And then you realize like hold on, hold on, hold on, yeah,

849
00:35:00,800 --> 00:35:01,960
Speaker 1: I got me, you know, I mean, this is not

850
00:35:02,400 --> 00:35:03,919
Speaker 1: it is not what I thought it was. The world

851
00:35:04,000 --> 00:35:06,600
Speaker 1: is a lot more complicated. I don't understand things. I

852
00:35:06,600 --> 00:35:09,680
Speaker 1: cannot simplify things into saying is like this or like that.

853
00:35:10,320 --> 00:35:14,600
Speaker 1: I'm very humble in my intentions and what I'm trying

854
00:35:14,640 --> 00:35:14,960
Speaker 1: to do.

855
00:35:15,280 --> 00:35:17,200
Speaker 2: I have to just take the little truth.

856
00:35:16,920 --> 00:35:18,719
Speaker 1: In my heart of how much I care about being

857
00:35:18,719 --> 00:35:20,840
Speaker 1: a soldier, how much I love being a soldier, how

858
00:35:20,920 --> 00:35:23,319
Speaker 1: much I love the army, what is given me by

859
00:35:23,400 --> 00:35:26,400
Speaker 1: Outside of those things, forget about it. I don't know anything.

860
00:35:26,400 --> 00:35:28,160
Speaker 1: I don't know anything about Afghanistan. I don't know what

861
00:35:28,200 --> 00:35:30,840
Speaker 1: we were doing. I can't can't pinpoint exactly where we

862
00:35:30,920 --> 00:35:34,320
Speaker 1: missed up. At what point I stopped trying.

863
00:35:34,080 --> 00:35:34,719
Speaker 2: To figure it out?

864
00:35:35,440 --> 00:35:38,000
Speaker 5: When did you decide, you know what? I'm done with

865
00:35:38,080 --> 00:35:40,280
Speaker 5: the war. I want to try and play football.

866
00:35:40,880 --> 00:35:42,640
Speaker 1: My last deployment, I said, I don't know if I

867
00:35:42,640 --> 00:35:43,759
Speaker 1: I don't know, if I don't know, I don't know

868
00:35:43,800 --> 00:35:45,440
Speaker 1: if this is this is what my life is supposed

869
00:35:45,440 --> 00:35:45,520
Speaker 1: to be.

870
00:35:45,560 --> 00:35:46,520
Speaker 3: I don't know, I don't know, if I don't know

871
00:35:46,560 --> 00:35:48,160
Speaker 3: if I can do this. I got married.

872
00:35:49,440 --> 00:35:51,439
Speaker 1: I don't want to start a dicycle of moving over

873
00:35:51,480 --> 00:35:58,680
Speaker 1: and over again, and then I have this crazy, delusional

874
00:35:58,719 --> 00:36:00,640
Speaker 1: idea that I complaining on a felt because I was

875
00:36:00,719 --> 00:36:03,399
Speaker 1: this big and tall, Like I still have to face

876
00:36:03,440 --> 00:36:05,239
Speaker 1: myself in the mirror every single day and be like, bro,

877
00:36:05,320 --> 00:36:07,839
Speaker 1: you're this tall, you're six ten, and you're out here

878
00:36:07,880 --> 00:36:10,040
Speaker 1: doing PowerPoint presentations right now, like.

879
00:36:09,960 --> 00:36:12,000
Speaker 2: What are your well, hey, Okay.

880
00:36:12,000 --> 00:36:13,759
Speaker 1: In the Army, sometimes you're a patuon leader and you're

881
00:36:13,760 --> 00:36:16,719
Speaker 1: doing you know, you're leading and you're doing PT and

882
00:36:16,760 --> 00:36:19,319
Speaker 1: you're you're doing maneuvers. But then sometimes they take you

883
00:36:19,320 --> 00:36:20,919
Speaker 1: out of that role to give it to someone else,

884
00:36:21,239 --> 00:36:23,200
Speaker 1: and then they put you in a staff role and

885
00:36:23,160 --> 00:36:26,240
Speaker 1: then they say, okay, my guy here read this thousand

886
00:36:26,280 --> 00:36:29,080
Speaker 1: emails and put a presentation for this. So you're in

887
00:36:29,120 --> 00:36:31,400
Speaker 1: a computer that hunched over like this, you know, and

888
00:36:31,400 --> 00:36:32,160
Speaker 1: then you go to the gym.

889
00:36:32,160 --> 00:36:34,160
Speaker 2: Incredible, Yeah, exactly.

890
00:36:34,360 --> 00:36:36,359
Speaker 1: Everybody has to go through a staff job in the Army.

891
00:36:36,880 --> 00:36:38,200
Speaker 1: And so I would go to the gym in the

892
00:36:38,239 --> 00:36:42,480
Speaker 1: afternoons and I would play football with a sustaining brigade,

893
00:36:42,480 --> 00:36:44,759
Speaker 1: which usually they love playing sports, and we'll play flag

894
00:36:44,800 --> 00:36:48,719
Speaker 1: football and I was like, I'm dominating this game, like

895
00:36:48,800 --> 00:36:51,200
Speaker 1: I'm I'm I'm jumping and in my mind I was

896
00:36:51,239 --> 00:36:54,399
Speaker 1: thinking I'm six ten, like, how can you? How can

897
00:36:54,440 --> 00:36:56,960
Speaker 1: you if I can catch the ball. Now that I

898
00:36:57,000 --> 00:36:58,360
Speaker 1: look at you, guys, I'm like, yeah, you got You know,

899
00:36:58,400 --> 00:37:00,200
Speaker 1: there's no way on a jump ball if I can't

900
00:37:00,239 --> 00:37:01,640
Speaker 1: jump that, I'm going to take the ball away from you.

901
00:37:01,680 --> 00:37:03,680
Speaker 1: But in my mind, I thought all corners were five

902
00:37:03,719 --> 00:37:06,080
Speaker 1: two five five, because that's what the level of corners

903
00:37:06,080 --> 00:37:09,000
Speaker 1: that I faced in college. So I I you know,

904
00:37:09,480 --> 00:37:11,879
Speaker 1: I was thinking to myself very in a very delusional way.

905
00:37:11,920 --> 00:37:13,200
Speaker 1: I can plain in the NFL. There's no way I

906
00:37:13,239 --> 00:37:15,239
Speaker 1: can't play it. There's no way I cannot play. There's

907
00:37:15,239 --> 00:37:17,360
Speaker 1: no way I cannot play. And so when it was

908
00:37:17,360 --> 00:37:19,080
Speaker 1: time for me to get out of the army, I

909
00:37:19,120 --> 00:37:21,640
Speaker 1: wanted to go into the NFL just so I can

910
00:37:21,719 --> 00:37:25,240
Speaker 1: have one year and they could pay for my business school.

911
00:37:25,280 --> 00:37:28,320
Speaker 1: Because everybody at West Point goes from you know, the academy.

912
00:37:28,520 --> 00:37:30,160
Speaker 1: They get out and they go to business school. It's

913
00:37:30,239 --> 00:37:31,759
Speaker 1: kind of like you do it because everybody else is

914
00:37:31,800 --> 00:37:33,799
Speaker 1: doing it, same thing as the airborne Ranger. When you

915
00:37:33,840 --> 00:37:36,719
Speaker 1: get out, it's go to business school. So I was like, man,

916
00:37:36,760 --> 00:37:39,719
Speaker 1: the NFL loves the army in the military so much.

917
00:37:39,800 --> 00:37:43,279
Speaker 1: Every third, you know, every quarter aff. They always honor

918
00:37:43,280 --> 00:37:44,799
Speaker 1: in the troops, like, maybe they'll give me a chance,

919
00:37:44,800 --> 00:37:47,360
Speaker 1: you know. And so that's when I started thinking. You know,

920
00:37:47,400 --> 00:37:50,040
Speaker 1: they had the super Regional Combine and Flowery Branch. I said,

921
00:37:50,040 --> 00:37:53,120
Speaker 1: maybe if I drive out there around my forty, I

922
00:37:53,160 --> 00:37:55,040
Speaker 1: catch the ball in front of the scouts, maybe they'll

923
00:37:55,040 --> 00:37:55,600
Speaker 1: give me a chance.

924
00:37:55,640 --> 00:37:57,440
Speaker 3: Maybe it's maybe it's possible.

925
00:37:57,160 --> 00:37:59,359
Speaker 2: You know. I don't know how, but man, I look

926
00:37:59,440 --> 00:37:59,719
Speaker 2: so good.

927
00:37:59,800 --> 00:38:00,359
Speaker 3: There's no way they.

928
00:38:00,280 --> 00:38:02,840
Speaker 2: Don't give me a chance. I love your confidence.

929
00:38:03,040 --> 00:38:05,279
Speaker 1: It was it was a very now looking back, it

930
00:38:05,320 --> 00:38:07,600
Speaker 1: was it was. It was I was the only person

931
00:38:07,600 --> 00:38:08,160
Speaker 1: that was confident.

932
00:38:08,560 --> 00:38:13,440
Speaker 2: That's all that matters. Though. What makes it beautiful. It's

933
00:38:13,440 --> 00:38:17,000
Speaker 2: gonna be a wide receiver too. Yes, don't put me

934
00:38:17,000 --> 00:38:20,319
Speaker 2: a tight end. Put me a wide receiver, BROI yeah,

935
00:38:20,320 --> 00:38:20,759
Speaker 2: put me the X.

936
00:38:20,880 --> 00:38:21,960
Speaker 3: Put me out there on myself.

937
00:38:23,400 --> 00:38:26,239
Speaker 5: That's the funniest thing to it is no confident, but

938
00:38:26,360 --> 00:38:27,520
Speaker 5: everybody else that was okay.

939
00:38:27,560 --> 00:38:29,840
Speaker 3: So I don't think they do the super Regional Combine.

940
00:38:29,840 --> 00:38:30,000
Speaker 2: Now.

941
00:38:30,080 --> 00:38:31,600
Speaker 1: I don't know if I'm bad mouthed in the NFL

942
00:38:31,640 --> 00:38:34,279
Speaker 1: by exposing the fact that maybe they stopped doing it

943
00:38:34,320 --> 00:38:38,440
Speaker 1: because you knows. Okay, So people that were showing up

944
00:38:38,440 --> 00:38:41,560
Speaker 1: to these super regional combines. They were characters, but like

945
00:38:41,640 --> 00:38:45,000
Speaker 1: forty year old bartenders and teachers, people that played one

946
00:38:45,080 --> 00:38:47,360
Speaker 1: year in sophomore high school and they got hurt and

947
00:38:47,360 --> 00:38:49,640
Speaker 1: they're like, yeah, you know, we were we were all.

948
00:38:49,719 --> 00:38:51,440
Speaker 1: It was like a like an American idol.

949
00:38:53,120 --> 00:38:53,880
Speaker 2: That's how it was.

950
00:38:54,440 --> 00:38:56,239
Speaker 1: You know, there was no there was no It was

951
00:38:56,280 --> 00:38:57,960
Speaker 1: not like a I don't think it was like a

952
00:38:58,000 --> 00:38:59,839
Speaker 1: serious thing. But people had the dreams of going through

953
00:38:59,840 --> 00:39:02,040
Speaker 1: the end, you know, and I think out of my class,

954
00:39:02,040 --> 00:39:03,799
Speaker 1: I think like two three players, what they get out.

955
00:39:03,840 --> 00:39:06,000
Speaker 4: The beautiful thing about that it was the forty year

956
00:39:06,000 --> 00:39:08,640
Speaker 4: old bartender. He was the only one who thought he

957
00:39:08,680 --> 00:39:11,520
Speaker 4: could have a chance, Yeah, making an NFL roster. Yes, so,

958
00:39:11,600 --> 00:39:14,840
Speaker 4: And it doesn't sound delusional because in his mind he

959
00:39:14,920 --> 00:39:17,600
Speaker 4: is out there catching touchdowns on me and you that

960
00:39:17,680 --> 00:39:18,800
Speaker 4: whole sunday.

961
00:39:18,520 --> 00:39:20,600
Speaker 2: He watches on the cast. He's like, bro, I could

962
00:39:20,600 --> 00:39:23,360
Speaker 2: do It's exactly what it was. That's exactly what I was.

963
00:39:24,120 --> 00:39:24,440
Speaker 2: You know.

964
00:39:24,520 --> 00:39:26,080
Speaker 1: You know, you have a lot of people that just

965
00:39:26,080 --> 00:39:27,680
Speaker 1: criticize players and they think they can do it.

966
00:39:27,680 --> 00:39:30,080
Speaker 3: It was a collection of all of us, you know. Yes,

967
00:39:30,320 --> 00:39:31,239
Speaker 3: and when you put a.

968
00:39:31,200 --> 00:39:32,719
Speaker 1: Little bit of under army, you know, the under arm

969
00:39:32,880 --> 00:39:34,400
Speaker 1: was coming up with like the long sleeve stuff.

970
00:39:34,480 --> 00:39:36,239
Speaker 3: Yeah, come on, man, I looked just like them.

971
00:39:36,280 --> 00:39:37,799
Speaker 2: You know what I mean? Thirty seven?

972
00:39:38,280 --> 00:39:41,680
Speaker 4: Yeah, thirty seven is the thing. It is a vibe

973
00:39:42,080 --> 00:39:45,319
Speaker 4: something that I don't want. So you went to this

974
00:39:45,680 --> 00:39:48,960
Speaker 4: regional combine. So how did you get from this regional

975
00:39:48,960 --> 00:39:51,600
Speaker 4: combine to Pittsburgh.

976
00:39:52,080 --> 00:39:55,160
Speaker 1: So when I went to the regional combine, I signed

977
00:39:55,239 --> 00:39:58,799
Speaker 1: up because one of my teammates from Army told me

978
00:39:58,840 --> 00:40:01,560
Speaker 1: that they have a an open tryout. I was like, hey,

979
00:40:01,640 --> 00:40:03,839
Speaker 1: check it out, check it out. Look at this, Look

980
00:40:03,840 --> 00:40:05,560
Speaker 1: at this pamphlet. You know wow, you know, I mean

981
00:40:05,600 --> 00:40:07,839
Speaker 1: three hundred and fifty dollars and I get to run

982
00:40:07,880 --> 00:40:09,320
Speaker 1: the forty and maybe I can go to the NFL.

983
00:40:09,880 --> 00:40:12,279
Speaker 1: So I was so enamored with the idea of being

984
00:40:12,320 --> 00:40:15,000
Speaker 1: able to have a chance to put it to bed,

985
00:40:15,080 --> 00:40:17,200
Speaker 1: put it to rest as to whether I belong to

986
00:40:17,200 --> 00:40:19,600
Speaker 1: the NFL or not, that I signed up. I drove

987
00:40:19,640 --> 00:40:22,239
Speaker 1: an hour to go to or a couple hours to

988
00:40:22,280 --> 00:40:24,520
Speaker 1: go to Flowery Branch. And then when I did my

989
00:40:24,520 --> 00:40:27,920
Speaker 1: my regional combine, they invited me to go into the

990
00:40:27,960 --> 00:40:31,000
Speaker 1: super regional combine, and so I went to Detroit where

991
00:40:31,080 --> 00:40:33,719
Speaker 1: they they did a did your friend get invited to

992
00:40:34,320 --> 00:40:37,120
Speaker 1: my friend? My friend was already in the NFL. My friend,

993
00:40:37,239 --> 00:40:39,120
Speaker 1: my friend was able to get in the year before.

994
00:40:39,400 --> 00:40:42,880
Speaker 1: And I saw him as Saint Patrick's Day in Savannah, Georgia.

995
00:40:43,000 --> 00:40:44,120
Speaker 1: And when I cut up to him, I was like, man,

996
00:40:44,160 --> 00:40:46,120
Speaker 1: what are you doing? Man, I'm in the NFL. I

997
00:40:46,160 --> 00:40:48,239
Speaker 1: was like, no, hey, he'say, yeah, man. All you got

998
00:40:48,360 --> 00:40:49,880
Speaker 1: to do is get in the system. Once you're in,

999
00:40:49,960 --> 00:40:50,399
Speaker 1: you're good.

1000
00:40:50,560 --> 00:40:51,080
Speaker 2: You know what I mean?

1001
00:40:51,480 --> 00:40:53,040
Speaker 1: You know how NFL players talking about like, you know,

1002
00:40:53,040 --> 00:40:54,279
Speaker 1: when you talk to the guys in the outside that

1003
00:40:54,360 --> 00:40:56,160
Speaker 1: really want to come in and encourage them, you know,

1004
00:40:56,760 --> 00:40:59,120
Speaker 1: try out. Man, Once you get into the system of

1005
00:40:59,200 --> 00:41:00,680
Speaker 1: training camp though, bounce you around.

1006
00:41:00,719 --> 00:41:01,120
Speaker 3: You good.

1007
00:41:01,640 --> 00:41:03,600
Speaker 1: I mean obviously I knew that he was over selling it,

1008
00:41:04,040 --> 00:41:06,799
Speaker 1: but I didn't know that that that that there was

1009
00:41:06,920 --> 00:41:10,200
Speaker 1: an opportunity to at least showcase your talents in front

1010
00:41:10,239 --> 00:41:12,560
Speaker 1: of scouts. That's what you want to know, I mean,

1011
00:41:12,600 --> 00:41:14,279
Speaker 1: I want to know that there's a scout you know,

1012
00:41:14,280 --> 00:41:16,440
Speaker 1: there's gonna be there. And when I went to the

1013
00:41:16,480 --> 00:41:21,960
Speaker 1: Super Regional Combine, then they sent maybe like fifteen twenty

1014
00:41:21,960 --> 00:41:24,799
Speaker 1: scouts from from the NFL or.

1015
00:41:24,719 --> 00:41:25,520
Speaker 3: Maybe all of them.

1016
00:41:25,360 --> 00:41:27,759
Speaker 1: I'm not sure how many they sent out, but they

1017
00:41:27,760 --> 00:41:32,279
Speaker 1: sent scouts from from from the NFL and and and

1018
00:41:32,360 --> 00:41:34,520
Speaker 1: then obviously I became an intriguing prospect because I was

1019
00:41:34,520 --> 00:41:37,480
Speaker 1: so large, so tall. I had the story the Army,

1020
00:41:37,560 --> 00:41:39,480
Speaker 1: you know, we had we talked about a connection between

1021
00:41:39,480 --> 00:41:41,839
Speaker 1: the NFL and Army and service. And so I got

1022
00:41:41,960 --> 00:41:44,400
Speaker 1: I got an invite to go to try out to

1023
00:41:44,520 --> 00:41:48,120
Speaker 1: do with with the Philadelphia Eagles, and so I went

1024
00:41:48,160 --> 00:41:49,719
Speaker 1: to Philadelphia the week after that.

1025
00:41:50,040 --> 00:41:51,160
Speaker 3: I did the same exam.

1026
00:41:51,200 --> 00:41:53,240
Speaker 1: I mean, I started, I brought my tight end gloves

1027
00:41:53,719 --> 00:41:56,320
Speaker 1: and they ended up doing an alllne workout and I

1028
00:41:56,400 --> 00:41:57,680
Speaker 1: ended up starting as a D line.

1029
00:41:58,040 --> 00:41:59,879
Speaker 2: So I was a D line.

1030
00:42:00,080 --> 00:42:01,200
Speaker 3: Yeah, I was a D line.

1031
00:42:01,440 --> 00:42:08,560
Speaker 2: Never gave up on I love the guy Sticky.

1032
00:42:08,719 --> 00:42:12,560
Speaker 1: I put away sound you're not gonna need him. But

1033
00:42:12,960 --> 00:42:14,960
Speaker 1: that that so I was in the D line room

1034
00:42:14,960 --> 00:42:16,759
Speaker 1: with you know, with the with the amazing you know,

1035
00:42:16,800 --> 00:42:19,960
Speaker 1: I've been in your grand Graham and Fletcher Cox, Connor Borrowings.

1036
00:42:19,960 --> 00:42:21,399
Speaker 1: So I knew right off the battle was not gonna

1037
00:42:21,400 --> 00:42:24,120
Speaker 1: make the team. But I was hoping that I would

1038
00:42:24,160 --> 00:42:27,080
Speaker 1: do good enough. Like my buddy said, in the system,

1039
00:42:27,120 --> 00:42:28,840
Speaker 1: you know that I would do preseason that I that

1040
00:42:28,840 --> 00:42:31,560
Speaker 1: I would be able to end up somewhere else. So

1041
00:42:31,920 --> 00:42:33,399
Speaker 1: you know, from there, I got a call call from

1042
00:42:33,440 --> 00:42:36,040
Speaker 1: coach Tomlin and we hit it off, had of bromance

1043
00:42:36,080 --> 00:42:37,440
Speaker 1: and then the rest is Sister.

1044
00:42:38,640 --> 00:42:40,120
Speaker 2: When did they tell you, like, all right, you're not

1045
00:42:40,200 --> 00:42:43,240
Speaker 2: a d You're really good. I understand now how it works.

1046
00:42:43,800 --> 00:42:46,319
Speaker 1: You want to you set up your fifty three, and

1047
00:42:46,320 --> 00:42:48,400
Speaker 1: then you have to create your your your your practice

1048
00:42:48,400 --> 00:42:51,359
Speaker 1: squad roster. And with the practice squad roster, you want

1049
00:42:51,400 --> 00:42:54,000
Speaker 1: to keep a certain things in mind. One is obviously

1050
00:42:54,080 --> 00:42:56,000
Speaker 1: the most urgent one is do you are you gonna

1051
00:42:56,000 --> 00:42:56,799
Speaker 1: need that player.

1052
00:42:56,600 --> 00:42:57,240
Speaker 2: During the season.

1053
00:42:57,360 --> 00:42:59,520
Speaker 1: Yes, and if you're gonna need especially I know that

1054
00:42:59,560 --> 00:43:02,000
Speaker 1: towards at the end of my career, they expanded the

1055
00:43:02,480 --> 00:43:05,640
Speaker 1: roster to maybe ten players or something like that. So

1056
00:43:06,280 --> 00:43:07,960
Speaker 1: and you can protect them to you can give them

1057
00:43:08,000 --> 00:43:11,080
Speaker 1: like specific tags, and then there's all the ones where

1058
00:43:11,080 --> 00:43:13,839
Speaker 1: you can develop them. So I think they looked at

1059
00:43:13,840 --> 00:43:16,400
Speaker 1: me in mind with the idea of developing me. You

1060
00:43:16,440 --> 00:43:19,000
Speaker 1: want to have a practice squad player, especially in the

1061
00:43:19,000 --> 00:43:21,120
Speaker 1: on line, because if your online players start getting hurt

1062
00:43:21,440 --> 00:43:24,600
Speaker 1: and you have to put the start, you know, the backups,

1063
00:43:24,600 --> 00:43:26,120
Speaker 1: the starters, they're not gonna be able to take the

1064
00:43:26,160 --> 00:43:28,640
Speaker 1: scout reps. So I took all the scout reps, you know,

1065
00:43:28,840 --> 00:43:31,360
Speaker 1: and obviously I was I was very very happy with

1066
00:43:31,480 --> 00:43:35,279
Speaker 1: doing that job. But now Coach Thalman saw me do

1067
00:43:35,440 --> 00:43:39,000
Speaker 1: my O line, my deal, my D line tryout. I

1068
00:43:39,080 --> 00:43:41,920
Speaker 1: look good, but I think, and this is so important

1069
00:43:41,920 --> 00:43:44,839
Speaker 1: about playing D line, is you cannot be laid off

1070
00:43:44,840 --> 00:43:47,160
Speaker 1: the ball. You just can't be laid off the ball.

1071
00:43:47,520 --> 00:43:48,960
Speaker 2: Unacceptable. That is a great point.

1072
00:43:49,560 --> 00:43:51,319
Speaker 1: That is not the only thing that matters about playing

1073
00:43:51,360 --> 00:43:53,200
Speaker 1: D line. Nothing else matters. If you don't have the

1074
00:43:53,280 --> 00:43:56,560
Speaker 1: reacting that the fast twitch of coming off the ball

1075
00:43:56,600 --> 00:44:00,200
Speaker 1: and reacting, it doesn't matter how good you look can

1076
00:44:00,200 --> 00:44:01,640
Speaker 1: be as big, as strong as whatever.

1077
00:44:01,760 --> 00:44:03,759
Speaker 2: You'll never get there. You'll never get there, you know.

1078
00:44:03,920 --> 00:44:06,759
Speaker 1: But if I know that snapcount, I can operate. And

1079
00:44:06,840 --> 00:44:09,000
Speaker 1: I've always liked, you know, again, because wide receivers, the

1080
00:44:09,000 --> 00:44:11,680
Speaker 1: position that I had to play, I always I always

1081
00:44:11,719 --> 00:44:13,439
Speaker 1: like to know that snapcount in the play. I feel

1082
00:44:13,440 --> 00:44:15,759
Speaker 1: more comfortable that way. Both of you feel comfortable with

1083
00:44:15,840 --> 00:44:20,840
Speaker 1: whatever reactors you know, double two la la la, Robert Thief,

1084
00:44:20,840 --> 00:44:22,520
Speaker 1: you know whatever. But for me, it's like I watched

1085
00:44:22,520 --> 00:44:24,040
Speaker 1: the play. Where's it going, Who's getting the vault?

1086
00:44:24,120 --> 00:44:24,319
Speaker 2: You know?

1087
00:44:24,760 --> 00:44:26,600
Speaker 1: And then from there, the you know, the the the

1088
00:44:26,719 --> 00:44:30,480
Speaker 1: the journey of practice squad to the starting and to

1089
00:44:30,560 --> 00:44:33,319
Speaker 1: eventually playing in the NFL was it was just hard

1090
00:44:33,360 --> 00:44:34,319
Speaker 1: work and sacrifice.

1091
00:44:34,880 --> 00:44:38,839
Speaker 2: We'll be back in a minute, all right.

1092
00:44:38,880 --> 00:44:41,320
Speaker 4: So you go from this amazing career in the army,

1093
00:44:42,080 --> 00:44:46,160
Speaker 4: you go to war, you come out, you make it back,

1094
00:44:46,640 --> 00:44:50,919
Speaker 4: and you're a rookie all over again when you get

1095
00:44:50,960 --> 00:44:52,279
Speaker 4: picked up by Pittsburgh.

1096
00:44:53,040 --> 00:44:54,040
Speaker 2: What was that like?

1097
00:44:56,920 --> 00:45:00,000
Speaker 1: I mean, it's very difficult to describe because I wasn't

1098
00:45:00,000 --> 00:45:02,120
Speaker 1: I was not work. I was in practice squad. I

1099
00:45:02,160 --> 00:45:05,359
Speaker 1: was a practice squad player of the Pittsburgh Steelers. I'm

1100
00:45:05,360 --> 00:45:09,000
Speaker 1: twenty six years old. They just they just re signed

1101
00:45:09,360 --> 00:45:12,319
Speaker 1: James Harrison to be on the team. So I got

1102
00:45:12,360 --> 00:45:15,120
Speaker 1: to go against James Harrison every single day. And I

1103
00:45:15,160 --> 00:45:18,560
Speaker 1: don't think a single person that was in the locker room,

1104
00:45:18,840 --> 00:45:20,880
Speaker 1: to include the coaches, knew what I was doing in

1105
00:45:20,920 --> 00:45:23,399
Speaker 1: the service. They didn't know that I was going into

1106
00:45:23,880 --> 00:45:26,600
Speaker 1: valleys just a couple of months ago, and I was like,

1107
00:45:26,960 --> 00:45:29,080
Speaker 1: you know, or was coming into.

1108
00:45:29,040 --> 00:45:29,960
Speaker 2: That gets you?

1109
00:45:30,120 --> 00:45:35,719
Speaker 1: Yeah, and now I'm picking up the pads, you know,

1110
00:45:36,040 --> 00:45:38,480
Speaker 1: and I'm and I'm giving a look to James Harrison,

1111
00:45:38,520 --> 00:45:40,160
Speaker 1: so you can tear my arm apart, you know for

1112
00:45:40,280 --> 00:45:44,319
Speaker 1: my torso. Uh so that part was very humbling, but

1113
00:45:44,600 --> 00:45:46,080
Speaker 1: you know, at the end of the day is it's

1114
00:45:46,120 --> 00:45:47,719
Speaker 1: what you have to you have to you have to do.

1115
00:45:47,960 --> 00:45:50,160
Speaker 1: There's no story that you can write in America where

1116
00:45:50,200 --> 00:45:52,719
Speaker 1: you don't have that part. You know, you have to

1117
00:45:52,719 --> 00:45:54,640
Speaker 1: go through that. You have to go through the the

1118
00:45:54,719 --> 00:45:56,799
Speaker 1: humbling part of yeah, you're a practice squad.

1119
00:45:56,880 --> 00:45:58,160
Speaker 3: Be thankful. This is how it is.

1120
00:45:58,400 --> 00:46:00,360
Speaker 1: Who do you think you are that you to be,

1121
00:46:00,920 --> 00:46:04,040
Speaker 1: you know, playing football in Kanahar Airfield and then you're

1122
00:46:04,040 --> 00:46:05,360
Speaker 1: gonna come to the NFL, Like what are you?

1123
00:46:05,440 --> 00:46:05,480
Speaker 2: What?

1124
00:46:05,520 --> 00:46:06,040
Speaker 3: Are you crazy?

1125
00:46:06,040 --> 00:46:06,160
Speaker 1: You know?

1126
00:46:06,200 --> 00:46:07,239
Speaker 3: I mean, you know how many people want to play

1127
00:46:07,239 --> 00:46:07,640
Speaker 3: in the NFL.

1128
00:46:07,680 --> 00:46:12,120
Speaker 1: This is the most sought after position in football for

1129
00:46:12,120 --> 00:46:13,600
Speaker 1: the guys that are your your height, you know, play

1130
00:46:13,680 --> 00:46:16,960
Speaker 1: left tack in the NFL. So yeah, I was, you know,

1131
00:46:17,360 --> 00:46:21,400
Speaker 1: it was it was crazy, you know, but but you know, thankfully,

1132
00:46:21,440 --> 00:46:24,520
Speaker 1: the Pittsburgh Steels were an incredible organization and I had

1133
00:46:24,560 --> 00:46:27,080
Speaker 1: a Hall of Fame coach who did not care, could

1134
00:46:27,120 --> 00:46:30,239
Speaker 1: care less if you were into Alabama Lefayette or if

1135
00:46:30,239 --> 00:46:31,799
Speaker 1: you went the army. He could care less. He just

1136
00:46:31,840 --> 00:46:35,280
Speaker 1: wanted the principles of football, and so that played huge

1137
00:46:35,640 --> 00:46:36,440
Speaker 1: in my development.

1138
00:46:36,680 --> 00:46:40,040
Speaker 4: Now, when your teammates found out what you did, were

1139
00:46:40,080 --> 00:46:41,840
Speaker 4: they shocked. It's like, wait, what, I just.

1140
00:46:41,840 --> 00:46:44,040
Speaker 1: Don't think they understood. I still don't know. I still

1141
00:46:44,040 --> 00:46:46,319
Speaker 1: don't think they understand. Now they don't have told them

1142
00:46:46,360 --> 00:46:49,920
Speaker 1: thousands of time, because you can't until you see a

1143
00:46:50,080 --> 00:46:53,279
Speaker 1: chinook in the middle of the night on a value.

1144
00:46:54,040 --> 00:46:57,000
Speaker 2: It's a helicopter. Thought I would have guessed it's someone

1145
00:46:57,080 --> 00:46:58,160
Speaker 2: that the backdrops the.

1146
00:46:58,200 --> 00:47:04,040
Speaker 1: Backdrops and it's got two two right, until you.

1147
00:47:03,960 --> 00:47:06,480
Speaker 3: See what it's like to be with night vision goggles.

1148
00:47:07,000 --> 00:47:10,160
Speaker 1: Everybody in inside you know what I mean, like me

1149
00:47:10,320 --> 00:47:12,560
Speaker 1: giving the brief You know what I mean, like me

1150
00:47:12,640 --> 00:47:14,680
Speaker 1: giving the briefers, like, hey, this is what we're doing tonight.

1151
00:47:14,760 --> 00:47:17,120
Speaker 1: This is like, you know, with the precise language, with

1152
00:47:17,200 --> 00:47:20,399
Speaker 1: the everybody's paying attention of professional If you don't see that,

1153
00:47:20,920 --> 00:47:23,600
Speaker 1: you don't know. You just think that all the jobs

1154
00:47:23,600 --> 00:47:24,719
Speaker 1: in the military are sort of the same.

1155
00:47:24,800 --> 00:47:26,319
Speaker 2: You know that you were just you.

1156
00:47:26,360 --> 00:47:29,839
Speaker 1: Know, it's very difficult to portray what an arm because

1157
00:47:29,840 --> 00:47:31,360
Speaker 1: the Rangers also don't have a lot of movies and

1158
00:47:31,360 --> 00:47:32,879
Speaker 1: they don't have a lot of I mean, say Private

1159
00:47:32,920 --> 00:47:34,400
Speaker 1: Ryans the only but they don't have a lot of

1160
00:47:34,760 --> 00:47:36,600
Speaker 1: And I'm very media wise, they're not.

1161
00:47:36,800 --> 00:47:37,120
Speaker 2: They don't.

1162
00:47:37,120 --> 00:47:39,000
Speaker 1: They do not like being on the media at all.

1163
00:47:39,520 --> 00:47:41,200
Speaker 1: So if I would have said Navy Seal, they would

1164
00:47:41,200 --> 00:47:43,560
Speaker 1: have been like, well, Navy Seal. Who it's the Navy

1165
00:47:43,600 --> 00:47:46,200
Speaker 1: Seals that can stop making podcasting books. But for the art,

1166
00:47:46,200 --> 00:47:47,960
Speaker 1: for the Rangers, it's different, you know, you try to

1167
00:47:47,960 --> 00:47:50,759
Speaker 1: be at a little more low key and so yeah,

1168
00:47:50,800 --> 00:47:52,880
Speaker 1: they had no idea that they just they could understand it.

1169
00:47:52,920 --> 00:47:56,560
Speaker 4: I just remember when we were in Carolina. I'm familiar

1170
00:47:56,600 --> 00:47:59,239
Speaker 4: with everything, what y'all do? My dad, And then I

1171
00:47:59,239 --> 00:48:01,800
Speaker 4: got a bunch of Navy friends, so me and military

1172
00:48:01,840 --> 00:48:04,920
Speaker 4: guys and team guys and operators like I get it.

1173
00:48:05,880 --> 00:48:07,480
Speaker 2: We were in Carolina.

1174
00:48:07,680 --> 00:48:12,480
Speaker 4: And they had a Team six guy, a deaf grew

1175
00:48:12,520 --> 00:48:14,879
Speaker 4: guy came and he spoke to us and he gave

1176
00:48:14,920 --> 00:48:17,160
Speaker 4: this great presentation about, oh, we know we do this,

1177
00:48:17,239 --> 00:48:20,640
Speaker 4: we do that, leadership team, we gotta be one work

1178
00:48:20,680 --> 00:48:23,719
Speaker 4: as one unit, we vote on everything, trust blah blah

1179
00:48:23,760 --> 00:48:26,000
Speaker 4: blah blah blah. And then somebody was like, I think

1180
00:48:26,000 --> 00:48:29,440
Speaker 4: it was Chuck. He goes, hey, I got a question.

1181
00:48:29,680 --> 00:48:31,760
Speaker 4: Do y'all get to pick y'all guns for y'all missions?

1182
00:48:33,400 --> 00:48:36,080
Speaker 4: And I could see when the guy was speaking. When

1183
00:48:36,160 --> 00:48:38,960
Speaker 4: Chuck asked that question, the guy was like, that's the

1184
00:48:39,000 --> 00:48:42,880
Speaker 4: only thing he worried about out of every just said,

1185
00:48:43,280 --> 00:48:45,200
Speaker 4: you weren't about what gun I could pick? And then

1186
00:48:45,239 --> 00:48:47,480
Speaker 4: he made a reference to like call of duties, like

1187
00:48:47,680 --> 00:48:49,000
Speaker 4: can y'all do y'all got scars?

1188
00:48:50,360 --> 00:48:53,040
Speaker 1: And I'm just like, yeah, if people were if people

1189
00:48:53,040 --> 00:48:55,040
Speaker 1: were interested, they want to know how many be about killed?

1190
00:48:55,040 --> 00:48:55,200
Speaker 2: You know.

1191
00:48:56,840 --> 00:48:57,200
Speaker 3: Questions?

1192
00:48:57,280 --> 00:49:00,440
Speaker 2: Yeah, of course it was I thought it was hills.

1193
00:49:00,560 --> 00:49:03,040
Speaker 4: But and even so, we had a we had a

1194
00:49:03,480 --> 00:49:07,880
Speaker 4: I had a foundation event in twenty fifteen and General

1195
00:49:08,080 --> 00:49:12,320
Speaker 4: Raymond Ordierno, of course was at my uh I know

1196
00:49:12,440 --> 00:49:15,279
Speaker 4: him person I knew him personally pass away r ip coach.

1197
00:49:15,640 --> 00:49:15,960
Speaker 2: General.

1198
00:49:15,960 --> 00:49:22,520
Speaker 4: Oh, my father in law was his warrant officer. So family, rural,

1199
00:49:22,920 --> 00:49:26,319
Speaker 4: connected with each other, whatnot. So I had him come

1200
00:49:26,400 --> 00:49:29,160
Speaker 4: to this charity event I had, right and I had

1201
00:49:29,200 --> 00:49:29,960
Speaker 4: all my dbs, and.

1202
00:49:29,960 --> 00:49:31,839
Speaker 2: I'm like, yeah, what else. I was like, yoh, man,

1203
00:49:31,880 --> 00:49:34,560
Speaker 2: that's that's General. Oh. Like, dude's a he's a rock star.

1204
00:49:34,640 --> 00:49:38,000
Speaker 4: He's like Don Shula of the army and they were

1205
00:49:38,080 --> 00:49:41,600
Speaker 4: just like yeah, and no one got him like he's

1206
00:49:41,640 --> 00:49:44,279
Speaker 4: responsible for Saddam Hushane when they called him into create

1207
00:49:44,400 --> 00:49:46,719
Speaker 4: like that's that's general over like y'all and they were

1208
00:49:46,800 --> 00:49:48,120
Speaker 4: just like what.

1209
00:49:48,880 --> 00:49:51,520
Speaker 1: I had the same issue in Pittsburgh. So coach Toman

1210
00:49:51,520 --> 00:49:52,719
Speaker 1: came up to me one day and said, hey, we

1211
00:49:52,760 --> 00:49:55,880
Speaker 1: have an army unit that's coming over. I don't know

1212
00:49:55,880 --> 00:49:59,720
Speaker 1: any like, you know, he's asking me. And I said, okay,

1213
00:49:59,760 --> 00:50:02,200
Speaker 1: you know, I was probably you know, whatever listed the

1214
00:50:02,280 --> 00:50:04,400
Speaker 1: national goal or whatever. And and then I saw the

1215
00:50:04,520 --> 00:50:07,080
Speaker 1: unit and it was a it was a CAG unit

1216
00:50:07,120 --> 00:50:09,480
Speaker 1: from for Bragg, you know comment actions me with Delta

1217
00:50:10,080 --> 00:50:11,680
Speaker 1: and they were doing some training out there, and I

1218
00:50:11,719 --> 00:50:15,360
Speaker 1: started shaking, you have no idea, you have no idea.

1219
00:50:15,840 --> 00:50:18,400
Speaker 1: And then I introduced them, you know, to the team

1220
00:50:18,920 --> 00:50:20,760
Speaker 1: and and then you know they were they were mainly

1221
00:50:20,800 --> 00:50:23,160
Speaker 1: wing up but the players just the players had no

1222
00:50:23,320 --> 00:50:24,640
Speaker 1: idea who these people were.

1223
00:50:24,880 --> 00:50:28,560
Speaker 2: Just the head right, right? Are you guys not? How

1224
00:50:28,560 --> 00:50:29,719
Speaker 2: do you not know?

1225
00:50:29,760 --> 00:50:32,680
Speaker 1: But you have to understand also that you know, it's

1226
00:50:32,680 --> 00:50:35,399
Speaker 1: a voluntary force. It's not it's better to be that way.

1227
00:50:35,520 --> 00:50:37,239
Speaker 1: It's better that we're not obsessed with the military. We're

1228
00:50:37,239 --> 00:50:39,960
Speaker 1: not in a military nation. You know, we praise our

1229
00:50:40,000 --> 00:50:44,240
Speaker 1: generals and whynot? No, no, no, no, military is America is perfect

1230
00:50:44,239 --> 00:50:45,440
Speaker 1: the way it is. And if we have to have

1231
00:50:45,480 --> 00:50:47,760
Speaker 1: that ignorance, then that we're still very blessed.

1232
00:50:48,520 --> 00:50:50,120
Speaker 2: That's amazing for you to say. I want to come

1233
00:50:50,160 --> 00:50:52,880
Speaker 2: back to that because.

1234
00:50:54,040 --> 00:50:58,439
Speaker 5: That's good because you have this unique perspective where most

1235
00:50:58,440 --> 00:51:00,880
Speaker 5: people do not. Peanut has a really great perspective, but

1236
00:51:00,920 --> 00:51:03,799
Speaker 5: he's still was not in it as you are. And

1237
00:51:03,880 --> 00:51:06,600
Speaker 5: I'm sure when you were coming down in the what

1238
00:51:06,600 --> 00:51:09,279
Speaker 5: what kind of plane was that? What did we you

1239
00:51:09,480 --> 00:51:14,400
Speaker 5: just the helicopter was Dude, you probably looked like a

1240
00:51:14,480 --> 00:51:17,000
Speaker 5: nightmare from hell. Bro, you're six nine coming out with

1241
00:51:17,040 --> 00:51:19,360
Speaker 5: a what are your night vision and stuff? You're probably

1242
00:51:19,400 --> 00:51:20,040
Speaker 5: the scariest dude.

1243
00:51:21,760 --> 00:51:27,480
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's got to be. It's got to be the

1244
00:51:27,680 --> 00:51:32,040
Speaker 2: scarious person ever see. Be it that tall sight to see?

1245
00:51:32,160 --> 00:51:34,760
Speaker 4: Yeah, dude, I just got the whole like people in front,

1246
00:51:34,800 --> 00:51:36,000
Speaker 4: he's in the back, just leading by.

1247
00:51:36,000 --> 00:51:42,040
Speaker 2: Bro. Who is that? Anyways? What was your first welcome

1248
00:51:42,040 --> 00:51:44,680
Speaker 2: to the NFL moment? Okay, so.

1249
00:51:46,320 --> 00:51:49,560
Speaker 1: I did other things right, I was I was a

1250
00:51:49,680 --> 00:51:52,040
Speaker 1: teacher's pet when I was in the NFL. There was

1251
00:51:52,080 --> 00:51:55,160
Speaker 1: not a single time that you ask me what my

1252
00:51:55,239 --> 00:51:57,680
Speaker 1: assignment was and I didn't know it. There wasn't a

1253
00:51:57,760 --> 00:52:00,640
Speaker 1: drill that I didn't do a one hundred percent there wasn't.

1254
00:52:01,239 --> 00:52:04,279
Speaker 1: And I try to do everything absolutely right in order

1255
00:52:04,320 --> 00:52:06,000
Speaker 1: to get a chance to make the roster because I

1256
00:52:06,080 --> 00:52:07,600
Speaker 1: knew that. I mean, I was like, man, I gotta

1257
00:52:07,600 --> 00:52:08,920
Speaker 1: make a ruster. So I made the ruster and I

1258
00:52:08,960 --> 00:52:11,880
Speaker 1: was a backup. A lot of things happened for me

1259
00:52:12,000 --> 00:52:14,680
Speaker 1: to start. The starter who was one of my biggest mentors,

1260
00:52:14,760 --> 00:52:17,719
Speaker 1: Kevin Beacha, who goes down with an ACL injury. The

1261
00:52:17,760 --> 00:52:20,520
Speaker 1: other backup it was a first round pick injury with

1262
00:52:20,560 --> 00:52:21,520
Speaker 1: a back injury.

1263
00:52:21,239 --> 00:52:21,600
Speaker 2: For the other.

1264
00:52:21,760 --> 00:52:24,000
Speaker 3: So I'm the third string. I mean, I'm like like a.

1265
00:52:24,160 --> 00:52:27,600
Speaker 1: Big time fringe guy. And two people get hurt and

1266
00:52:27,640 --> 00:52:29,880
Speaker 1: now I'm going in. So now this is no longer

1267
00:52:30,680 --> 00:52:32,480
Speaker 1: you know a teacher's pet tie. This is like, now,

1268
00:52:32,600 --> 00:52:35,120
Speaker 1: now you out there and you're performing for your teacher.

1269
00:52:35,600 --> 00:52:38,640
Speaker 1: And I was going against Dwight Freeney. My first start

1270
00:52:38,680 --> 00:52:41,400
Speaker 1: was against the Arizona Cardinals, and I had to go

1271
00:52:41,400 --> 00:52:46,200
Speaker 1: against Dwight Freeney, Las Campbell, lamar Woodley I mean, there

1272
00:52:46,239 --> 00:52:48,920
Speaker 1: were a bunch of old, you know, NFL legends that

1273
00:52:48,960 --> 00:52:49,760
Speaker 1: I had to go against.

1274
00:52:50,600 --> 00:52:52,359
Speaker 2: And I remember.

1275
00:52:53,520 --> 00:52:55,440
Speaker 1: My coach was a head coach for the time, so

1276
00:52:55,480 --> 00:52:57,359
Speaker 1: he had gone against Dwight Freeney for many many years

1277
00:52:57,360 --> 00:53:00,839
Speaker 1: when he was playing with Indianapolis. Coach and he said, listen,

1278
00:53:01,200 --> 00:53:04,200
Speaker 1: be very careful with the spin move. The spin move,

1279
00:53:04,719 --> 00:53:06,279
Speaker 1: the spin He's got a crazy spin move.

1280
00:53:06,320 --> 00:53:07,800
Speaker 3: And I was like, I got it, I got it,

1281
00:53:08,080 --> 00:53:08,520
Speaker 3: spin move.

1282
00:53:08,600 --> 00:53:09,680
Speaker 1: I got the spin was like no, no, no, no,

1283
00:53:09,920 --> 00:53:12,200
Speaker 1: Like a third third and Long's he's gonna look like

1284
00:53:12,239 --> 00:53:13,200
Speaker 1: he's not doing the spin move.

1285
00:53:13,600 --> 00:53:15,080
Speaker 2: He's gonna look like he's gonna look like he's going

1286
00:53:15,160 --> 00:53:15,479
Speaker 2: on field.

1287
00:53:15,520 --> 00:53:17,799
Speaker 1: Trust me, the spin move. So I remember the first

1288
00:53:17,880 --> 00:53:21,839
Speaker 1: third and ten, I could hear Coach Haley screaming from

1289
00:53:21,920 --> 00:53:23,560
Speaker 1: the from the sidelights.

1290
00:53:23,120 --> 00:53:25,120
Speaker 2: That spin move, out, spin move.

1291
00:53:25,440 --> 00:53:27,200
Speaker 1: I got a coach, you know what I mean, I

1292
00:53:27,239 --> 00:53:29,960
Speaker 1: got to spin mind knows, I relax. I'm gonna say

1293
00:53:29,960 --> 00:53:32,840
Speaker 1: it heavy inside. But man, when you watch an NFL

1294
00:53:32,960 --> 00:53:36,960
Speaker 1: VET who's been doing a move for years and it

1295
00:53:36,960 --> 00:53:38,799
Speaker 1: has made a career, I mean, one of the all

1296
00:53:38,920 --> 00:53:42,000
Speaker 1: time sack leaders in the NFL with a spin move,

1297
00:53:42,120 --> 00:53:45,320
Speaker 1: you understand why it is so effective. I mean because

1298
00:53:45,320 --> 00:53:47,360
Speaker 1: you just can't see the end of the move coming.

1299
00:53:47,840 --> 00:53:49,680
Speaker 1: You don't think he's gonna do the spin. You're heavy,

1300
00:53:49,920 --> 00:53:53,520
Speaker 1: you're setting so heavy inside only a crazy person would

1301
00:53:53,560 --> 00:53:54,640
Speaker 1: do the spin move.

1302
00:53:55,200 --> 00:53:57,879
Speaker 2: Sure again, Bing did the spin move. Beat me clean.

1303
00:53:58,520 --> 00:54:01,319
Speaker 3: The guard was not looking, and thankfully the quarterback got

1304
00:54:01,360 --> 00:54:01,799
Speaker 3: the ball out.

1305
00:54:02,520 --> 00:54:02,640
Speaker 4: Uh.

1306
00:54:02,719 --> 00:54:04,680
Speaker 1: But that's when I started realizing that even if you prepare,

1307
00:54:04,719 --> 00:54:07,440
Speaker 1: you have to give incredible amounts. You have to almost

1308
00:54:08,040 --> 00:54:11,280
Speaker 1: you have to almost become the hero and beat the legend.

1309
00:54:11,520 --> 00:54:13,120
Speaker 1: In order for you to thrive in the NFL. You

1310
00:54:13,160 --> 00:54:15,840
Speaker 1: have to get these old NFL legends and you have

1311
00:54:15,920 --> 00:54:19,000
Speaker 1: to be able to beat them somehow. By you proven

1312
00:54:19,080 --> 00:54:20,960
Speaker 1: that that you can also think, just like that, that

1313
00:54:21,040 --> 00:54:23,040
Speaker 1: you can also think outside the box and come up

1314
00:54:23,080 --> 00:54:25,400
Speaker 1: with something he's never seen before, and for him to

1315
00:54:25,480 --> 00:54:27,640
Speaker 1: reconsider whether he should be playing in the NFL.

1316
00:54:27,880 --> 00:54:30,759
Speaker 2: Then not do that that game he continued to play.

1317
00:54:31,719 --> 00:54:32,360
Speaker 2: You're very happily.

1318
00:54:33,480 --> 00:54:36,520
Speaker 4: I want you to expand upon something real quick. You

1319
00:54:36,640 --> 00:54:40,000
Speaker 4: had mentioned that you don't think you would have played

1320
00:54:40,440 --> 00:54:42,680
Speaker 4: or had a longer career if you would have played

1321
00:54:42,760 --> 00:54:44,600
Speaker 4: for another team in the NFL. If you would have

1322
00:54:44,600 --> 00:54:47,520
Speaker 4: played for all the Pittsburgh Steelers. Why do you think

1323
00:54:47,600 --> 00:54:47,920
Speaker 4: that is.

1324
00:54:48,200 --> 00:54:51,440
Speaker 1: I think the Pittsburgh Steelers are first of all the

1325
00:54:51,480 --> 00:54:53,439
Speaker 1: Pittsburgh Steelers. I think that they did have a little

1326
00:54:53,480 --> 00:54:55,120
Speaker 1: bit of a superstitious thing.

1327
00:54:55,360 --> 00:54:57,640
Speaker 3: Everybody. Everybody in the world of sports.

1328
00:54:57,440 --> 00:54:59,959
Speaker 2: Is a little superstian. Absolutely, it's not. It's not kid ourself.

1329
00:55:00,680 --> 00:55:02,640
Speaker 1: So the Pittsburgh Steels won a lot of Super Bowls

1330
00:55:02,640 --> 00:55:05,600
Speaker 1: when they had Rocky Blyier. It was a soldier that

1331
00:55:05,680 --> 00:55:09,080
Speaker 1: came from Vietnam. So I think the Pittsburgh Steelers in

1332
00:55:09,200 --> 00:55:11,800
Speaker 1: there in, they're in, They're in their in, their in

1333
00:55:11,800 --> 00:55:14,120
Speaker 1: their juju sort of mantra. They want they always want

1334
00:55:14,120 --> 00:55:15,560
Speaker 1: to have somebody from from the army, you know what

1335
00:55:15,600 --> 00:55:18,040
Speaker 1: I mean, maybe so they can give them that little boost.

1336
00:55:18,080 --> 00:55:19,040
Speaker 3: I thought it was that great.

1337
00:55:19,560 --> 00:55:22,280
Speaker 1: I have a team that cares about having a soldier

1338
00:55:22,360 --> 00:55:24,960
Speaker 1: on the team for whatever reason, but they care about

1339
00:55:25,840 --> 00:55:28,400
Speaker 1: having me in here. When I was with the Philadelphia Eagles,

1340
00:55:28,440 --> 00:55:31,279
Speaker 1: I thought they like it because it does give great

1341
00:55:31,280 --> 00:55:35,000
Speaker 1: publicity to the team because the coach loves the military.

1342
00:55:35,239 --> 00:55:37,480
Speaker 1: But they were not seriously consider me as a player.

1343
00:55:38,080 --> 00:55:39,759
Speaker 1: They looked at me like all NFL teams that looked

1344
00:55:39,760 --> 00:55:41,160
Speaker 1: at me before like, there's no way if you didn't

1345
00:55:41,160 --> 00:55:43,600
Speaker 1: go to Alabama. I'm not drafting you, I'm not playing you.

1346
00:55:43,640 --> 00:55:46,319
Speaker 1: I want SEC players only on my team. That's how

1347
00:55:46,360 --> 00:55:49,120
Speaker 1: I can go to sleep by night. You know, by

1348
00:55:49,200 --> 00:55:51,440
Speaker 1: knowing that you played in one hundred thousand dollars stadiums

1349
00:55:51,440 --> 00:55:53,600
Speaker 1: and you got boosters, you know.

1350
00:55:54,040 --> 00:55:56,360
Speaker 2: Paying you under the table, and you're not about like

1351
00:55:56,440 --> 00:55:57,919
Speaker 2: put in pressure form.

1352
00:55:58,239 --> 00:56:01,080
Speaker 1: You know what, what's it like when you're University of

1353
00:56:01,120 --> 00:56:03,400
Speaker 1: Miami and you lose a big game against Louisville you

1354
00:56:03,480 --> 00:56:06,279
Speaker 1: have all this excitement. I think that coaches want to

1355
00:56:06,320 --> 00:56:08,640
Speaker 1: know that players need to feel the responsibility of the

1356
00:56:08,719 --> 00:56:11,080
Speaker 1: city in terms of you need to perform, because there's

1357
00:56:11,080 --> 00:56:12,880
Speaker 1: a lot of stick, you know, with you here, son,

1358
00:56:12,920 --> 00:56:15,080
Speaker 1: And I don't think there's a better example than Tutcalusive

1359
00:56:15,080 --> 00:56:15,239
Speaker 1: for that.

1360
00:56:15,960 --> 00:56:16,239
Speaker 2: Thank you.

1361
00:56:16,480 --> 00:56:20,880
Speaker 1: So I thought that nobody gave me a chance until

1362
00:56:21,000 --> 00:56:24,480
Speaker 1: I met coach Munchak. It was a Hall of Fame guard,

1363
00:56:25,560 --> 00:56:28,560
Speaker 1: and I think he had had so much experience with

1364
00:56:29,200 --> 00:56:33,440
Speaker 1: how to evaluate NFL allline talent that he said, I

1365
00:56:33,560 --> 00:56:36,920
Speaker 1: just don't I don't care about a player being from

1366
00:56:37,000 --> 00:56:39,160
Speaker 1: the SEC. I don't care about a player having these

1367
00:56:39,239 --> 00:56:41,680
Speaker 1: measurements or having this experience and teach them.

1368
00:56:41,800 --> 00:56:44,040
Speaker 2: Maybe it was his ego. Maybe his ego was so

1369
00:56:44,320 --> 00:56:46,080
Speaker 2: he's one of the greatest. Though he is the greatest.

1370
00:56:46,239 --> 00:56:49,920
Speaker 1: He's amazing that he's the goat. And I think he

1371
00:56:50,320 --> 00:56:52,440
Speaker 1: was that confident he said, do you give me this

1372
00:56:52,640 --> 00:56:54,080
Speaker 1: kid and I'll turn them into.

1373
00:56:53,960 --> 00:56:57,920
Speaker 2: It because he played like every Like how many positions

1374
00:56:57,960 --> 00:56:58,359
Speaker 2: did he play?

1375
00:56:58,400 --> 00:57:00,320
Speaker 3: No, I think he played right guard and played for

1376
00:57:00,360 --> 00:57:00,960
Speaker 3: many many years.

1377
00:57:01,080 --> 00:57:02,440
Speaker 2: Yes, forever, right forever.

1378
00:57:02,600 --> 00:57:02,799
Speaker 3: Yeah.

1379
00:57:03,360 --> 00:57:06,080
Speaker 1: I think he retired right before the free agency opened

1380
00:57:06,120 --> 00:57:08,080
Speaker 1: up in the eighties. You know, we're like DN the coach.

1381
00:57:08,120 --> 00:57:10,000
Speaker 1: You couldn't you couldn't get the trains, you know, you

1382
00:57:10,040 --> 00:57:12,160
Speaker 1: couldn't get there, the legs going for one more year.

1383
00:57:13,040 --> 00:57:14,760
Speaker 1: But he went right into coaching, you know, with Houston

1384
00:57:14,800 --> 00:57:16,520
Speaker 1: Oilers and then he went to the Tennessee became the

1385
00:57:16,560 --> 00:57:20,680
Speaker 1: head coach. When a man dedicates that much to the

1386
00:57:20,760 --> 00:57:23,720
Speaker 1: position of all line, I mean that coman is dedicated

1387
00:57:23,760 --> 00:57:27,560
Speaker 1: as an entire life to playing allline, then that gives

1388
00:57:27,600 --> 00:57:30,160
Speaker 1: you a chance. When you have a coach for another

1389
00:57:30,280 --> 00:57:33,440
Speaker 1: team and I saw this that evaluates you and he says,

1390
00:57:33,680 --> 00:57:35,800
Speaker 1: I don't like it, give me another one. I would

1391
00:57:35,840 --> 00:57:37,360
Speaker 1: have I would have been a victim of that, because

1392
00:57:37,920 --> 00:57:41,000
Speaker 1: being this tall is not perfect, per is not It's

1393
00:57:41,040 --> 00:57:43,440
Speaker 1: not ideal to be this tall when you're playing official

1394
00:57:43,440 --> 00:57:46,120
Speaker 1: alignment because you have so much height, you know your

1395
00:57:46,200 --> 00:57:48,520
Speaker 1: leverage and you do get you do you know you're playing.

1396
00:57:48,280 --> 00:57:48,840
Speaker 3: A little high.

1397
00:57:49,560 --> 00:57:52,120
Speaker 1: And if you don't have the knowledge and the understanding

1398
00:57:52,600 --> 00:57:55,080
Speaker 1: of how to anticipate plays based on the fact that

1399
00:57:55,120 --> 00:57:57,200
Speaker 1: you play with a legendary coach in college, then it

1400
00:57:57,240 --> 00:57:58,920
Speaker 1: becomes a little bit difficult. I don't understand a lot

1401
00:57:58,920 --> 00:58:02,360
Speaker 1: of concepts like trap pulling and stuff, no triple option,

1402
00:58:02,480 --> 00:58:04,680
Speaker 1: but I don't know how to play in the pro

1403
00:58:04,840 --> 00:58:05,760
Speaker 1: style offense.

1404
00:58:06,200 --> 00:58:07,000
Speaker 3: But he did not care.

1405
00:58:07,440 --> 00:58:08,400
Speaker 2: I think he enjoyed it.

1406
00:58:08,720 --> 00:58:10,160
Speaker 1: I think he saw me as a good match and

1407
00:58:10,240 --> 00:58:12,560
Speaker 1: a good fit, maybe based on the fact that I've

1408
00:58:12,560 --> 00:58:14,720
Speaker 1: lived all around the world and I've been with people

1409
00:58:14,760 --> 00:58:18,080
Speaker 1: from all around the you know the place, uh, and

1410
00:58:18,200 --> 00:58:19,840
Speaker 1: he liked me having in the room, and so because

1411
00:58:19,840 --> 00:58:21,560
Speaker 1: of that I was able to have So all those

1412
00:58:21,600 --> 00:58:23,320
Speaker 1: things had to happen. The fact that two players got

1413
00:58:23,400 --> 00:58:26,439
Speaker 1: hurted from me, that's the biggest one. Then the fact

1414
00:58:26,480 --> 00:58:28,440
Speaker 1: that I went to a team that valued having a

1415
00:58:29,640 --> 00:58:32,760
Speaker 1: veteran on the team somebody from the army for historical

1416
00:58:32,840 --> 00:58:36,880
Speaker 1: reasons or not. And also because Pittsburgh does have a

1417
00:58:37,000 --> 00:58:39,480
Speaker 1: very special connection with the veteran community, and I thought

1418
00:58:39,480 --> 00:58:42,120
Speaker 1: that being a veteran in Pittsburgh was the most the

1419
00:58:42,480 --> 00:58:44,960
Speaker 1: special transition that I could ever had. It really, the

1420
00:58:45,080 --> 00:58:49,120
Speaker 1: city of Pittsburgh and the war in Vietnam were two

1421
00:58:49,200 --> 00:58:51,840
Speaker 1: concepts that really really helped me cope through all the

1422
00:58:51,920 --> 00:58:53,840
Speaker 1: things that I went because it was almost very very

1423
00:58:53,920 --> 00:58:57,880
Speaker 1: eerily familiar to what Vinam vets went through. And then lastly,

1424
00:58:57,920 --> 00:59:00,000
Speaker 1: having a whole fam coach an incredible teammates.

1425
00:59:00,440 --> 00:59:04,480
Speaker 5: You're probably so right, and just because every time Pittsburgh

1426
00:59:04,720 --> 00:59:06,880
Speaker 5: was on TV, they always mentioned you and what you

1427
00:59:07,040 --> 00:59:09,840
Speaker 5: meant to so many more and your service and all

1428
00:59:09,960 --> 00:59:11,920
Speaker 5: like it was always mentioned like that was the one

1429
00:59:12,000 --> 00:59:13,080
Speaker 5: thing that always stood out.

1430
00:59:13,400 --> 00:59:14,560
Speaker 3: The NFL did that a lot.

1431
00:59:14,760 --> 00:59:15,080
Speaker 2: They did.

1432
00:59:15,480 --> 00:59:15,600
Speaker 5: Now.

1433
00:59:15,680 --> 00:59:17,360
Speaker 3: I don't think a veteran could do that because I

1434
00:59:17,440 --> 00:59:18,800
Speaker 3: think the shifts.

1435
00:59:19,360 --> 00:59:21,400
Speaker 1: They're not trying to bring like all that is now

1436
00:59:21,760 --> 00:59:24,840
Speaker 1: if you're a firefighter or first or a nurse, for sure,

1437
00:59:24,920 --> 00:59:27,720
Speaker 1: you know to complain the team. But it really was

1438
00:59:27,960 --> 00:59:30,000
Speaker 1: a time in place, I mean right to have an

1439
00:59:30,000 --> 00:59:34,400
Speaker 1: all volunteer force serving the longest war in our history,

1440
00:59:35,040 --> 00:59:39,000
Speaker 1: in a fight that was so unknown to the American public.

1441
00:59:39,040 --> 00:59:41,840
Speaker 1: I mean, we talked about all those three themes. It's difficult,

1442
00:59:41,840 --> 00:59:43,960
Speaker 1: it's not easy, it's not easy. And so I do

1443
00:59:44,080 --> 00:59:47,000
Speaker 1: think that the NFL is embedded in the NFL and

1444
00:59:47,080 --> 00:59:50,320
Speaker 1: the army that have big strategy, big national strategies to

1445
00:59:50,400 --> 00:59:54,320
Speaker 1: try to cheer up and bring morale of the population,

1446
00:59:54,440 --> 00:59:56,600
Speaker 1: because if morale goes down, like could happened in Vietnam

1447
00:59:56,600 --> 00:59:59,240
Speaker 1: for example, like like we can, we can enter situations

1448
00:59:59,280 --> 01:00:01,680
Speaker 1: where you know, all of a sudden, people people just

1449
01:00:01,760 --> 01:00:03,600
Speaker 1: don't have the urge to be an airbe ranger.

1450
01:00:03,600 --> 01:00:05,080
Speaker 3: I mean, that's that's when you can get in trouble.

1451
01:00:05,120 --> 01:00:06,760
Speaker 3: So I think everybody kind of works together.

1452
01:00:07,360 --> 01:00:09,040
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a quick break.

1453
01:00:11,520 --> 01:00:14,080
Speaker 5: Early on in your career, you block for a traditional

1454
01:00:14,160 --> 01:00:16,800
Speaker 5: quarterback like Ben Roethlisberger. Yeah, but then by the end

1455
01:00:16,840 --> 01:00:18,800
Speaker 5: you got somebody like Lamar Jackson.

1456
01:00:18,920 --> 01:00:19,120
Speaker 2: Yeah.

1457
01:00:19,400 --> 01:00:23,320
Speaker 5: We're the biggest two differences besides the athlete that's playing quarterback.

1458
01:00:23,560 --> 01:00:24,720
Speaker 2: But block them for these guys.

1459
01:00:24,920 --> 01:00:29,000
Speaker 1: I mean, I'll go in specifics of what it's like

1460
01:00:29,080 --> 01:00:31,640
Speaker 1: the block for for different quarterbacks. Ben is very limited

1461
01:00:31,640 --> 01:00:33,880
Speaker 1: in as move. It was very limited as move. So

1462
01:00:34,760 --> 01:00:37,480
Speaker 1: he knew that the best, the safest spot in the

1463
01:00:37,520 --> 01:00:40,919
Speaker 1: pocket for a quarterback, it's six years behind the center.

1464
01:00:41,560 --> 01:00:42,280
Speaker 3: That's the safest.

1465
01:00:42,640 --> 01:00:44,800
Speaker 1: If you go further than six yards behind the center.

1466
01:00:45,200 --> 01:00:48,800
Speaker 1: Now you're telling a person to run backward. When a

1467
01:00:48,880 --> 01:00:50,960
Speaker 1: person is going forward and you want to beat him

1468
01:00:51,040 --> 01:00:53,960
Speaker 1: ten yards, it's impossible.

1469
01:00:54,000 --> 01:00:54,400
Speaker 3: You cannot.

1470
01:00:54,400 --> 01:00:56,800
Speaker 1: I mean it's just mathematically you cannot kick slide back.

1471
01:00:56,960 --> 01:00:58,880
Speaker 1: But the person's going forward and you can beat him

1472
01:00:58,880 --> 01:01:01,600
Speaker 1: at ten yards on the loop, but you cannot be

1473
01:01:01,680 --> 01:01:05,320
Speaker 1: a ten yard So Ben Roethlisberger was very wise, obviously

1474
01:01:05,440 --> 01:01:07,560
Speaker 1: had a very long career, and he knew that at

1475
01:01:07,560 --> 01:01:10,080
Speaker 1: six yards he was gonna sit in his pocket. He was,

1476
01:01:10,400 --> 01:01:12,440
Speaker 1: and he could care less. They could care less if

1477
01:01:12,440 --> 01:01:15,920
Speaker 1: he threw the ball, and then Suggs just decleted him.

1478
01:01:16,080 --> 01:01:18,960
Speaker 1: You know, as that he understood that that's how you

1479
01:01:18,960 --> 01:01:22,960
Speaker 1: played the position. Lamar does not like being trapped because

1480
01:01:23,000 --> 01:01:27,080
Speaker 1: he's magical with his legs and he's such an inspiring athlete.

1481
01:01:28,400 --> 01:01:31,720
Speaker 1: Both of them were such competitors and so inspiring in

1482
01:01:31,800 --> 01:01:33,240
Speaker 1: the huddle. I mean, when you're in the hoddle with

1483
01:01:33,280 --> 01:01:35,360
Speaker 1: Ben Roethlisberger, I mean I think about like how lucky

1484
01:01:35,400 --> 01:01:37,600
Speaker 1: I got I got to play football with Michael Vick,

1485
01:01:38,280 --> 01:01:41,320
Speaker 1: Lamar Jackson, Ben Roethlisberger. You know what I mean, Like,

1486
01:01:42,240 --> 01:01:45,840
Speaker 1: that's incredible, that's insane. I like that from Spain, you

1487
01:01:45,880 --> 01:01:49,479
Speaker 1: know what I mean, It's incredible. They transmit an aura.

1488
01:01:49,560 --> 01:01:52,040
Speaker 1: Another kids now saying aura aora farmer. My kids are

1489
01:01:52,040 --> 01:01:52,960
Speaker 1: saying ooral a time they do.

1490
01:01:53,600 --> 01:01:54,160
Speaker 2: The aura.

1491
01:01:54,320 --> 01:01:56,880
Speaker 1: That that that a quarterback like like like Lamar and

1492
01:01:57,000 --> 01:01:59,360
Speaker 1: Ben have in the huddle is amazing. It makes you

1493
01:01:59,400 --> 01:02:04,760
Speaker 1: play better, It definitely does. But you know, Lamar does

1494
01:02:05,400 --> 01:02:08,040
Speaker 1: not mind putting himself in harm's way. You know, he

1495
01:02:08,120 --> 01:02:09,840
Speaker 1: does not mind putt himself in harms way. He doesn't

1496
01:02:09,880 --> 01:02:13,000
Speaker 1: mind going ten twelve yards being a little deeper. And

1497
01:02:13,120 --> 01:02:15,280
Speaker 1: if it doesn't, you know, if he cannot find the throat,

1498
01:02:15,440 --> 01:02:19,440
Speaker 1: I think he just he glides, you know it is

1499
01:02:20,160 --> 01:02:20,880
Speaker 1: I feel like that.

1500
01:02:21,360 --> 01:02:23,920
Speaker 4: All right, let's get into the third act. All right,

1501
01:02:24,040 --> 01:02:27,360
Speaker 4: you get out of the military and you get into farming.

1502
01:02:27,960 --> 01:02:29,880
Speaker 4: How did you get into a farming fruit?

1503
01:02:30,960 --> 01:02:33,680
Speaker 3: So my mom's out of the family. They're all fruit farmers.

1504
01:02:34,400 --> 01:02:37,560
Speaker 1: So they all farm avocados and a very specific fruit

1505
01:02:37,640 --> 01:02:40,360
Speaker 1: that only Spanish people know. All in Spanish countries and

1506
01:02:40,400 --> 01:02:44,840
Speaker 1: not America's called Cherimoya. So if you're not from a

1507
01:02:44,880 --> 01:02:49,480
Speaker 1: Spanish speaking country, you've probably never heard of this. Americans

1508
01:02:49,560 --> 01:02:53,280
Speaker 1: have a very conservative palate. They do not like to

1509
01:02:53,360 --> 01:02:55,520
Speaker 1: try different things. They're like what they want. That's the

1510
01:02:55,560 --> 01:02:57,720
Speaker 1: reason what we talk about. Food in America is very.

1511
01:02:58,440 --> 01:03:01,520
Speaker 2: Very average at best worldwide.

1512
01:03:02,560 --> 01:03:04,920
Speaker 3: But we do have incredible fruits in America. We do

1513
01:03:05,080 --> 01:03:06,160
Speaker 3: have the Americas.

1514
01:03:06,160 --> 01:03:08,640
Speaker 1: And I'm obviously you know, when we talk about, you know, biology,

1515
01:03:08,680 --> 01:03:12,400
Speaker 1: we're not just speaking about the frontiers of nation in

1516
01:03:12,480 --> 01:03:16,600
Speaker 1: the Americas has The Americans have incredible biodiversity, and we're

1517
01:03:16,720 --> 01:03:19,800
Speaker 1: very blessed to be in a climate zone here in

1518
01:03:19,880 --> 01:03:23,320
Speaker 1: South Florida where it doesn't freeze and you have subtropical climate,

1519
01:03:24,000 --> 01:03:26,360
Speaker 1: so you can't grow some of these fruits that are

1520
01:03:26,600 --> 01:03:30,480
Speaker 1: very very unique only to the Americas.

1521
01:03:30,920 --> 01:03:33,120
Speaker 3: And so when I got done playing.

1522
01:03:34,480 --> 01:03:36,600
Speaker 1: From my house, I can make a right and I

1523
01:03:36,640 --> 01:03:39,480
Speaker 1: can go to Brickel and I'm in the financial district

1524
01:03:39,520 --> 01:03:42,360
Speaker 1: of Miami and where the action is happening, and every

1525
01:03:42,440 --> 01:03:46,880
Speaker 1: single person is talking about private equity and crypto and

1526
01:03:47,080 --> 01:03:51,480
Speaker 1: things that are like wow, sounds amazing, ten x twenty x,

1527
01:03:51,920 --> 01:03:54,560
Speaker 1: you know, you're gonna quadruple could do. And all I

1528
01:03:54,600 --> 01:03:58,080
Speaker 1: can think about the entire time was seventy percent of

1529
01:03:58,200 --> 01:04:01,080
Speaker 1: NFL players lose their money. Seventy of NFL players lose

1530
01:04:01,120 --> 01:04:03,160
Speaker 1: their money. Seventy eight percent of NFL players lose their money.

1531
01:04:03,200 --> 01:04:06,640
Speaker 1: I mean, what if you cannot understand what is it

1532
01:04:07,000 --> 01:04:11,080
Speaker 1: that you're doing with this new mean coin or whatever?

1533
01:04:11,280 --> 01:04:13,720
Speaker 1: Are you going to be part of that seventy eight percent?

1534
01:04:13,920 --> 01:04:14,080
Speaker 2: You know?

1535
01:04:14,840 --> 01:04:16,360
Speaker 1: And then I started making a left out of my

1536
01:04:16,440 --> 01:04:19,160
Speaker 1: house and I started going towards homestead, you know, just

1537
01:04:19,800 --> 01:04:21,440
Speaker 1: you know, I had to go pick up plans, nurses

1538
01:04:21,480 --> 01:04:23,240
Speaker 1: or whatever. And when I went to the homestead, I

1539
01:04:23,360 --> 01:04:25,720
Speaker 1: realized the leaf of the trees were the same as

1540
01:04:25,760 --> 01:04:27,400
Speaker 1: the ones that I had in my hometown. And I

1541
01:04:27,480 --> 01:04:29,080
Speaker 1: started investing as a hole in a minute, like what

1542
01:04:29,360 --> 01:04:30,200
Speaker 1: are you guys growing here?

1543
01:04:30,480 --> 01:04:32,400
Speaker 3: What is it that you grow? And I realized that

1544
01:04:32,440 --> 01:04:33,000
Speaker 3: you're growing.

1545
01:04:33,000 --> 01:04:37,760
Speaker 1: All the subtropicals that make Spanish cuisine, particularly the America

1546
01:04:37,880 --> 01:04:39,920
Speaker 1: is very very special. And I became in love with

1547
01:04:39,960 --> 01:04:43,400
Speaker 1: I mean, I was obsessed. So I started looking into

1548
01:04:43,400 --> 01:04:46,720
Speaker 1: the idea of buying land, and I bought a farm,

1549
01:04:46,800 --> 01:04:49,040
Speaker 1: and then after that came the investment opportunity of doing

1550
01:04:49,080 --> 01:04:50,520
Speaker 1: another one and another one, And so I said, okay,

1551
01:04:50,560 --> 01:04:53,440
Speaker 1: this is it. You know that I understand the fact

1552
01:04:53,840 --> 01:04:55,640
Speaker 1: that if you do speak Spanish, you're going to love

1553
01:04:56,120 --> 01:04:57,880
Speaker 1: chair mooyas. I can sell them to you.

1554
01:04:58,800 --> 01:04:59,440
Speaker 3: It is value.

1555
01:05:00,200 --> 01:05:04,080
Speaker 1: Maybe maybe I can go to a place like Pittsburgh

1556
01:05:04,240 --> 01:05:06,760
Speaker 1: or Prattville or Chicago, and I can put it in

1557
01:05:06,800 --> 01:05:09,200
Speaker 1: front of an American and maybe his conservative palette is

1558
01:05:09,240 --> 01:05:11,800
Speaker 1: going to open up the deliciousness of eating a mango

1559
01:05:12,080 --> 01:05:14,080
Speaker 1: and sub tropical fruit because it is the only thing

1560
01:05:14,120 --> 01:05:16,520
Speaker 1: that we do have special outside of that, you know,

1561
01:05:16,680 --> 01:05:20,760
Speaker 1: our or our diet is very sus.

1562
01:05:20,680 --> 01:05:25,360
Speaker 2: Like, look at you don't still crash on you? Boy,

1563
01:05:27,920 --> 01:05:28,360
Speaker 2: there we go.

1564
01:05:29,960 --> 01:05:33,760
Speaker 5: You said something earlier that I was like, man, I

1565
01:05:33,880 --> 01:05:36,320
Speaker 5: think I think that's awesome and it seems very personal

1566
01:05:36,400 --> 01:05:38,640
Speaker 5: that I feel like you can only answer.

1567
01:05:38,520 --> 01:05:40,280
Speaker 2: To all of our crowd.

1568
01:05:40,960 --> 01:05:43,880
Speaker 5: And you talked about how well you know anybody that's

1569
01:05:43,920 --> 01:05:47,560
Speaker 5: from America, if they've made any type of success, they

1570
01:05:47,640 --> 01:05:50,320
Speaker 5: come from the story we're about hard work and how

1571
01:05:50,480 --> 01:05:53,280
Speaker 5: nothing's just given like that, you like think everybody knows that.

1572
01:05:54,600 --> 01:05:55,520
Speaker 2: I think opposite.

1573
01:05:55,880 --> 01:05:58,080
Speaker 5: I think a lot of people in America don't think

1574
01:05:58,200 --> 01:06:00,240
Speaker 5: that that a lot of people are in things are

1575
01:06:00,360 --> 01:06:01,920
Speaker 5: just kind of just like, oh well, you just kind

1576
01:06:01,960 --> 01:06:03,960
Speaker 5: of made it or you're lucky. And I want to

1577
01:06:04,040 --> 01:06:08,680
Speaker 5: know if because you weren't American born, you look at

1578
01:06:08,720 --> 01:06:11,080
Speaker 5: it in a different way and sometimes you have this

1579
01:06:11,200 --> 01:06:14,360
Speaker 5: different appreciation for so many things that a lot of

1580
01:06:14,480 --> 01:06:16,400
Speaker 5: us don't appreciate it all.

1581
01:06:16,920 --> 01:06:21,640
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I've I've had a unique experience, and

1582
01:06:21,720 --> 01:06:24,560
Speaker 1: I do have the fact that I am coming from

1583
01:06:24,600 --> 01:06:28,560
Speaker 1: a place like Europe, that is that is a very

1584
01:06:28,640 --> 01:06:30,800
Speaker 1: interesting place to come from because Europe. There's a lot

1585
01:06:30,800 --> 01:06:32,520
Speaker 1: of stuff going on in Europe, and it always has.

1586
01:06:33,920 --> 01:06:35,200
Speaker 1: But I've had what you know, one of my biggest

1587
01:06:35,240 --> 01:06:38,120
Speaker 1: teams that I always told my classmates, especially in my classmates,

1588
01:06:38,160 --> 01:06:39,760
Speaker 1: my teammates, you know, we always you always get into

1589
01:06:39,760 --> 01:06:43,080
Speaker 1: these arguments, especially the on line. Don't call arguments calling discussions. Yes,

1590
01:06:43,240 --> 01:06:46,640
Speaker 1: you're discussing things, discuss in life politics. I said, man,

1591
01:06:46,760 --> 01:06:48,840
Speaker 1: you know, the like we were talking about Earli about

1592
01:06:48,880 --> 01:06:53,000
Speaker 1: Alabama and an army. Things become revelative and you just

1593
01:06:53,040 --> 01:06:54,800
Speaker 1: don't know anything else. You know, when you live in

1594
01:06:54,880 --> 01:06:56,919
Speaker 1: your town, do you live in your town, that's your town.

1595
01:06:57,560 --> 01:07:01,320
Speaker 1: So in Europe, discrimination happens not because of the color

1596
01:07:01,360 --> 01:07:04,080
Speaker 1: of your skin, not because it happens because your last name.

1597
01:07:04,600 --> 01:07:07,080
Speaker 1: It happens because of the way you speak, and because

1598
01:07:07,120 --> 01:07:07,840
Speaker 1: the way you speak in.

1599
01:07:07,840 --> 01:07:11,000
Speaker 3: Your last name. You will never have access to a life.

1600
01:07:12,040 --> 01:07:12,800
Speaker 3: This is your spot.

1601
01:07:13,480 --> 01:07:16,720
Speaker 1: You start creating aristocracies and you start creating classes that

1602
01:07:16,800 --> 01:07:17,800
Speaker 1: you cannot access.

1603
01:07:18,560 --> 01:07:20,840
Speaker 2: But this is Miami, this is new money.

1604
01:07:21,600 --> 01:07:22,880
Speaker 1: I don't care who you are. You could be in

1605
01:07:22,880 --> 01:07:26,600
Speaker 1: a yacht going up and down the Miami River. We

1606
01:07:26,760 --> 01:07:29,800
Speaker 1: all recognize that as being the American dream. It does

1607
01:07:29,880 --> 01:07:32,680
Speaker 1: not matter who you are. You come from anywhere, you

1608
01:07:32,760 --> 01:07:35,800
Speaker 1: can think whatever. If you're in a yacht in Miami,

1609
01:07:36,640 --> 01:07:40,240
Speaker 1: people go like this. And what is understood is that

1610
01:07:40,320 --> 01:07:43,400
Speaker 1: in order to beat that, you have to disintegrate any

1611
01:07:43,600 --> 01:07:46,040
Speaker 1: social concerts that you might have as to what makes

1612
01:07:46,080 --> 01:07:48,720
Speaker 1: you successful. And it is understood in the United States

1613
01:07:48,840 --> 01:07:52,480
Speaker 1: and especially in football, that if you sacrifice and you

1614
01:07:52,640 --> 01:07:57,040
Speaker 1: work harder than anybody else around you, you sacrifice. You

1615
01:07:57,080 --> 01:08:00,880
Speaker 1: sacrifice your family, you sacrifice your healthy you sacrifice your

1616
01:08:01,680 --> 01:08:04,640
Speaker 1: your friendships, you sacrifice your values, you believes your religion.

1617
01:08:04,920 --> 01:08:07,160
Speaker 1: If you if you give up everything, if you make

1618
01:08:07,200 --> 01:08:10,320
Speaker 1: a deal with the devil and you work harder to

1619
01:08:10,440 --> 01:08:13,800
Speaker 1: get your goals, you will be successful. But if you

1620
01:08:13,880 --> 01:08:16,520
Speaker 1: do that in Europe, you're not going to get your success.

1621
01:08:16,800 --> 01:08:19,519
Speaker 2: Because of ah Man. You know what I mean.

1622
01:08:20,280 --> 01:08:22,880
Speaker 1: Your last name is now doesn't rhyme with you know whatever,

1623
01:08:23,439 --> 01:08:25,679
Speaker 1: it's now. You just you just were not born into wealth,

1624
01:08:25,880 --> 01:08:28,000
Speaker 1: you know, or you just you know. This is not

1625
01:08:28,160 --> 01:08:30,360
Speaker 1: like a It's not a thing that you could ever

1626
01:08:30,479 --> 01:08:33,439
Speaker 1: dream to become by here in the United States, especially

1627
01:08:33,439 --> 01:08:34,160
Speaker 1: in the city like Miami.

1628
01:08:34,200 --> 01:08:35,880
Speaker 3: That's why I feel so good in Miami. Miami is the.

1629
01:08:35,840 --> 01:08:39,240
Speaker 1: City of individual stories, just like my story is crazy.

1630
01:08:39,240 --> 01:08:40,840
Speaker 1: He talked to a Cuban that came out here, you

1631
01:08:40,920 --> 01:08:43,040
Speaker 1: know what I mean, on a boat a raft landed

1632
01:08:43,120 --> 01:08:46,639
Speaker 1: in Key Largo, and he started doing you know, medical sales,

1633
01:08:46,800 --> 01:08:49,920
Speaker 1: and now he sold a multi billion dollar company. You know,

1634
01:08:50,160 --> 01:08:52,960
Speaker 1: that's the story that we all say in America. That's America.

1635
01:08:53,000 --> 01:08:56,160
Speaker 1: That happens in America doesn't happen anywhere else. When you say,

1636
01:08:56,240 --> 01:08:58,080
Speaker 1: when you come in America and you're and you're dealing,

1637
01:08:58,200 --> 01:09:01,200
Speaker 1: like I imagine that this place gets crazy doing the

1638
01:09:01,240 --> 01:09:03,160
Speaker 1: formula one, you know what I mean. And it's such

1639
01:09:03,160 --> 01:09:04,840
Speaker 1: an interesting thing because from the one is truly a

1640
01:09:04,880 --> 01:09:07,000
Speaker 1: European sort of thing it is, But how much would

1641
01:09:07,000 --> 01:09:09,360
Speaker 1: you love being here right in this thing? Listen to

1642
01:09:09,439 --> 01:09:12,200
Speaker 1: conversations talking to people about how they made their money.

1643
01:09:12,720 --> 01:09:14,760
Speaker 1: When you talk to an American, if they say like,

1644
01:09:14,840 --> 01:09:17,600
Speaker 1: oh my daddy this, and I like next, yeah, and

1645
01:09:17,640 --> 01:09:19,920
Speaker 1: I don't want to hear you, well, you tell me

1646
01:09:20,000 --> 01:09:22,519
Speaker 1: that you failed and you failed and you failed, and

1647
01:09:22,640 --> 01:09:24,920
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, you just you know, your wife

1648
01:09:25,040 --> 01:09:27,559
Speaker 1: left you, your kids to your dad. You're the addiction,

1649
01:09:27,720 --> 01:09:29,519
Speaker 1: and that in one day, boom, you know what I mean,

1650
01:09:29,760 --> 01:09:30,559
Speaker 1: You hit the lottery.

1651
01:09:30,600 --> 01:09:31,280
Speaker 2: It just happened.

1652
01:09:31,800 --> 01:09:33,800
Speaker 1: Listen, I was watching the Jerry Jones documentary. You know

1653
01:09:33,840 --> 01:09:36,600
Speaker 1: what I mean, the oil with the oil field. What

1654
01:09:36,720 --> 01:09:39,839
Speaker 1: is every American thing? You're like, roll, yes, that's America.

1655
01:09:40,000 --> 01:09:42,599
Speaker 1: Like you'd waited everything. He became the dead. He took

1656
01:09:42,640 --> 01:09:46,280
Speaker 1: the risk. Americans take a lot of risk and then

1657
01:09:46,439 --> 01:09:49,400
Speaker 1: it paid off. The European mine cannot comprehend that. It's

1658
01:09:49,439 --> 01:09:51,760
Speaker 1: not it's not it's not structured to be that way,

1659
01:09:52,200 --> 01:09:54,400
Speaker 1: you know. So in this paragraph, it would be amazing

1660
01:09:54,520 --> 01:09:57,679
Speaker 1: to see which conversations you like it, you find yourself

1661
01:09:57,720 --> 01:09:59,840
Speaker 1: more interested in it. You want new money, new money's

1662
01:09:59,840 --> 01:10:01,760
Speaker 1: fu you know what I mean? Yeah, New Money brings

1663
01:10:01,800 --> 01:10:03,320
Speaker 1: salt together, and that's why people like hip hop.

1664
01:10:03,360 --> 01:10:03,720
Speaker 3: You know what I mean.

1665
01:10:03,840 --> 01:10:05,840
Speaker 2: You think in Ala and you have like new money

1666
01:10:05,960 --> 01:10:07,519
Speaker 2: is like, yeah it is. It is an amazing thing.

1667
01:10:07,560 --> 01:10:08,600
Speaker 2: When I come to the United States and.

1668
01:10:08,600 --> 01:10:10,400
Speaker 1: Lil Wayne is crushing it, you know what I mean,

1669
01:10:10,920 --> 01:10:13,720
Speaker 1: anybody can identify with that, with the ambitions of a

1670
01:10:13,800 --> 01:10:17,200
Speaker 1: young American who just was willing to risk, sacrifice and

1671
01:10:17,240 --> 01:10:18,240
Speaker 1: work harder than everybody else.

1672
01:10:18,479 --> 01:10:20,320
Speaker 3: So I mean, that is what makes America number one.

1673
01:10:20,400 --> 01:10:21,720
Speaker 1: You know, as long as you can keep that and

1674
01:10:21,800 --> 01:10:24,960
Speaker 1: that expectation people think that way, then I think it

1675
01:10:25,000 --> 01:10:25,719
Speaker 1: will always be Okay.

1676
01:10:26,240 --> 01:10:28,479
Speaker 2: This is why I love that conversation. I love it.

1677
01:10:28,600 --> 01:10:30,680
Speaker 2: I love it. I got one more question for you.

1678
01:10:30,920 --> 01:10:31,679
Speaker 2: Mount Rushmore.

1679
01:10:32,240 --> 01:10:34,800
Speaker 4: It's a mountain full of for presidents, but yeah, we're

1680
01:10:34,880 --> 01:10:37,479
Speaker 4: just gonna call it a Mount Rushmore of greatness. And

1681
01:10:37,680 --> 01:10:40,280
Speaker 4: you get to pick four people that have had an

1682
01:10:40,400 --> 01:10:44,960
Speaker 4: influence on you in your life, that have helped shape you, sir,

1683
01:10:45,240 --> 01:10:46,200
Speaker 4: and becoming.

1684
01:10:45,960 --> 01:10:47,080
Speaker 2: The man you are today.

1685
01:10:47,120 --> 01:10:51,639
Speaker 4: It can be a very large man, football related, faith related, religion,

1686
01:10:52,120 --> 01:10:55,400
Speaker 4: family cousins, whatever. You just get four people you get

1687
01:10:55,439 --> 01:10:56,759
Speaker 4: to pick and put on this mountain.

1688
01:10:57,080 --> 01:10:58,800
Speaker 1: I was sitting here when you guys asked, you have

1689
01:10:58,920 --> 01:11:00,880
Speaker 1: even out the same question. So I'm gonna make it.

1690
01:11:00,920 --> 01:11:02,800
Speaker 1: I'm gonna make it funny. I'm a creatures beat.

1691
01:11:03,320 --> 01:11:04,040
Speaker 2: So I'll say.

1692
01:11:05,479 --> 01:11:09,200
Speaker 1: Joe Dallasandris all Right who passed away. All I coach

1693
01:11:09,240 --> 01:11:12,360
Speaker 1: of the the Baltimore Ravens, loved them to death, Rest

1694
01:11:12,400 --> 01:11:12,719
Speaker 1: in peace.

1695
01:11:13,200 --> 01:11:15,920
Speaker 2: Mike Munchak I talked about him. Ha such a huge

1696
01:11:15,960 --> 01:11:16,479
Speaker 2: effect on me.

1697
01:11:17,280 --> 01:11:20,760
Speaker 1: And then you know the Will Smith and Fulton Jones

1698
01:11:20,800 --> 01:11:23,680
Speaker 1: of the NFL, Mike Tomlin and John Harbaugh. I put

1699
01:11:23,720 --> 01:11:26,280
Speaker 1: them all the same. They've had a huge I mean,

1700
01:11:26,880 --> 01:11:29,600
Speaker 1: if you take away the NFL from my story is

1701
01:11:29,720 --> 01:11:32,439
Speaker 1: not it's not that incredible, just you know, somebody who

1702
01:11:32,479 --> 01:11:33,760
Speaker 1: came me here and serve. But the fact that I

1703
01:11:33,840 --> 01:11:35,120
Speaker 1: was able to make it in the NFL doesn't make

1704
01:11:35,120 --> 01:11:38,160
Speaker 1: it very special. I'm very grateful for the NFL. It's

1705
01:11:38,240 --> 01:11:40,160
Speaker 1: very difficult to define what the NFL is and it.

1706
01:11:40,200 --> 01:11:41,120
Speaker 3: Isn't you know what I mean?

1707
01:11:41,320 --> 01:11:41,960
Speaker 2: Is it the fans?

1708
01:11:42,040 --> 01:11:42,799
Speaker 3: Is it not the fans?

1709
01:11:43,080 --> 01:11:45,519
Speaker 1: The cities and not the city? Is it the brotherhood

1710
01:11:45,520 --> 01:11:49,800
Speaker 1: of players who've played beforehand? For me, those four have

1711
01:11:49,920 --> 01:11:54,160
Speaker 1: had an amazing, incredible impact. And uh and yeah, I

1712
01:11:54,200 --> 01:11:55,040
Speaker 1: guess I'll put him in there.

1713
01:11:55,080 --> 01:11:57,360
Speaker 2: You know, I like it. It's a good little list.

1714
01:11:57,520 --> 01:12:00,800
Speaker 4: Alejandro, hey man, I appreciate you. Thank you for your time.

1715
01:12:01,000 --> 01:12:05,479
Speaker 4: More importantly, thank forre your service. You blessed us with

1716
01:12:05,920 --> 01:12:09,120
Speaker 4: some amazing stories. I kind of knew what you're about

1717
01:12:09,360 --> 01:12:11,479
Speaker 4: when I did my little research and read upon you.

1718
01:12:12,080 --> 01:12:17,040
Speaker 4: I wanted to be you, meaning no, no, seriously, So

1719
01:12:17,800 --> 01:12:20,479
Speaker 4: having grown up in the military or being around it

1720
01:12:20,560 --> 01:12:22,560
Speaker 4: so much like that was what I wanted to do

1721
01:12:22,680 --> 01:12:24,280
Speaker 4: coming out of high school. I don't know if you

1722
01:12:24,320 --> 01:12:25,960
Speaker 4: want to call it. I want to use the word brainwash,

1723
01:12:26,040 --> 01:12:27,439
Speaker 4: but like it was just what I knew. So I

1724
01:12:27,520 --> 01:12:30,120
Speaker 4: was just like, all right, I'm joining the army. And

1725
01:12:30,160 --> 01:12:31,800
Speaker 4: then I got a scholarship and I was like, okay,

1726
01:12:31,840 --> 01:12:33,120
Speaker 4: I just want to join the army. I'll just go

1727
01:12:33,240 --> 01:12:35,559
Speaker 4: play football. And then after I was like, all right,

1728
01:12:35,560 --> 01:12:37,880
Speaker 4: if I get draft. If I don't get drafted, I'm

1729
01:12:37,920 --> 01:12:41,120
Speaker 4: still joining the Army. I'm gonna do some ranger whatever.

1730
01:12:41,400 --> 01:12:43,760
Speaker 4: That's what I'm gonna do. And then I just kept

1731
01:12:43,800 --> 01:12:45,920
Speaker 4: playing football. I was like, oh, I guess I'm not

1732
01:12:46,080 --> 01:12:47,000
Speaker 4: joining the army anymore.

1733
01:12:47,080 --> 01:12:48,640
Speaker 1: Worst I could be dismissive, but I would tell you

1734
01:12:48,680 --> 01:12:50,880
Speaker 1: that between the two the now obviously I can say

1735
01:12:50,920 --> 01:12:53,479
Speaker 1: that now, but the Army was the highlight of my life.

1736
01:12:53,840 --> 01:12:55,200
Speaker 1: I do feel I do feel like being in the

1737
01:12:55,320 --> 01:12:57,280
Speaker 1: Army was kind of like being an actor for the office.

1738
01:12:57,360 --> 01:13:00,080
Speaker 1: You know that nothing else after that is you know,

1739
01:13:00,160 --> 01:13:02,160
Speaker 1: like that image of the Shino coming out with my man,

1740
01:13:02,560 --> 01:13:03,400
Speaker 1: that that is.

1741
01:13:04,000 --> 01:13:05,640
Speaker 2: That is the peak, and everything else after that is

1742
01:13:05,920 --> 01:13:08,400
Speaker 2: absolutely I get it. I get it.

1743
01:13:08,560 --> 01:13:10,040
Speaker 3: I'm very thankful for the United States Army.

1744
01:13:10,080 --> 01:13:13,080
Speaker 4: I can never say yeah, but I appreciate you. Thank

1745
01:13:13,120 --> 01:13:15,160
Speaker 4: you for your time service and telling us all these

1746
01:13:15,960 --> 01:13:21,240
Speaker 4: amazing stories. Truly, you are, sir, one of one. You truly,

1747
01:13:21,280 --> 01:13:21,680
Speaker 4: you really are.

1748
01:13:21,680 --> 01:13:23,360
Speaker 3: I don't think everybody everybody's in one on one you

1749
01:13:23,400 --> 01:13:24,240
Speaker 3: know where in Miami, So.

1750
01:13:26,400 --> 01:13:28,960
Speaker 2: No, man, I mean Peanuts said it all. Man, it

1751
01:13:29,040 --> 01:13:29,360
Speaker 2: was great.

1752
01:13:29,439 --> 01:13:32,200
Speaker 5: This was one of the more unique stories we've got

1753
01:13:32,280 --> 01:13:34,920
Speaker 5: to hear, and I'm really thankful for it was great.

1754
01:13:35,000 --> 01:13:37,479
Speaker 5: And uh this you two just falling over each other

1755
01:13:37,680 --> 01:13:40,640
Speaker 5: is It's awesome. So congrats man, Well, thank you some

1756
01:13:40,760 --> 01:13:41,479
Speaker 5: amazing career.

1757
01:13:41,720 --> 01:13:43,800
Speaker 1: I've heard so much about you throughout your whole careers

1758
01:13:43,800 --> 01:13:47,280
Speaker 1: when I started watching football talking to NFL VET, you

1759
01:13:47,320 --> 01:13:50,479
Speaker 1: get you get you drift away from the NFL when

1760
01:13:50,520 --> 01:13:52,320
Speaker 1: you retired, But you guys have an amazing job right

1761
01:13:52,320 --> 01:13:56,439
Speaker 1: now being able to keep the veteran community together and

1762
01:13:56,520 --> 01:13:58,559
Speaker 1: continue to talk and highlight, you know, what the NFL

1763
01:13:58,640 --> 01:14:00,439
Speaker 1: is all about. So thank you so much for the

1764
01:14:00,520 --> 01:14:02,800
Speaker 1: program that you guys have. Congratulations to your success. It's

1765
01:14:02,800 --> 01:14:03,960
Speaker 1: been an amazing pleasure.

1766
01:14:04,240 --> 01:14:06,840
Speaker 2: Thank gus. Man appreciated Baby, appreciate it. Man. That's awesome.

1767
01:14:07,560 --> 01:14:09,320
Speaker 5: So forever you pick up your podcast, make sure you

1768
01:14:09,320 --> 01:14:11,960
Speaker 5: continue to check in and give us a like, subscribe, follow,

1769
01:14:12,320 --> 01:14:16,920
Speaker 5: whether it's iHeartRadio, Apple podcasts, continue to check us out.

1770
01:14:16,960 --> 01:14:18,679
Speaker 2: Man, tell a friend to tell a friend of what Peanut,

1771
01:14:18,840 --> 01:14:19,320
Speaker 2: tell a friend.

1772
01:14:19,400 --> 01:14:21,120
Speaker 4: There we go, Man, get us up out of here. Peanut,

1773
01:14:21,360 --> 01:14:25,200
Speaker 4: I'm Peanut. That's wrong. That's Alexandro And this is the

1774
01:14:25,400 --> 01:14:27,439
Speaker 4: NFL Player's Second Acts podcast.

1775
01:14:27,760 --> 01:14:28,160
Speaker 2: We Out