Speaker 1: This is cut to It with Steve Smith Senior at
Speaker 1: production of The Black Effect and I Heart Radio. I'm
Speaker 1: Steve Smith Senior and I'm Little John and this is
Speaker 1: cut to It. Good do It, Good do It. That's
Speaker 1: getting down to do it, Good do It. We asked
Speaker 1: the questions you always want to know, but no one
Speaker 1: ever asked, let's cut to it. You ain't heard am
Speaker 1: about it? Then we're about to let you know. It's
Speaker 1: all coming up to the cut to It podcast. Paige Demarcos.
Speaker 1: She's the chief operating officer of the Draft Network. She's
Speaker 1: a co host of the TV in Fantasy podcast, and
Speaker 1: she makes a mean Greek chicken, pays DeMarcus on cut
Speaker 1: to a Podcast. Were there any particular sports that you
Speaker 1: fell in love with and also, you know, fell in
Speaker 1: love with that you went out and participated in all
Speaker 1: sports rather than just being observer. Yeah. So I played
Speaker 1: basketball my whole life, and I grew up in a
Speaker 1: neighborhood with all boys, so we had like a little courtyard.
Speaker 1: I had a brother obviously my brotherhood mentioned um. And
Speaker 1: then I grew up in a neighborhood of all boys,
Speaker 1: so with this courtyard and in the courtyard it was
Speaker 1: kind of like the area that was Our parents were
Speaker 1: like cool with us going in there because it was
Speaker 1: safe and it was gated off from the regular street
Speaker 1: from one Row Street. So we would go there and
Speaker 1: we played every sport like I was all time QB.
Speaker 1: Like I'm still all time QB with my family, Like
Speaker 1: I could throw every route like I was jokingly over
Speaker 1: the weekend was like they're like, what's your favorite route
Speaker 1: to throw? And I was like a wheel route and
Speaker 1: they were like, oh that's awesome and freaking out about
Speaker 1: that on social media. But um, I played every sport
Speaker 1: growing up because I wanted to play with the boys.
Speaker 1: Yeah you could, what would you what would you throw
Speaker 1: to Steve Smith? Run on a wheel roud? I'm gonna
Speaker 1: tell you right, you know why? Why why are you
Speaker 1: not running a wheel out? It's such a lazy and
Speaker 1: sloppy route? Oh my god, here we go. Only if
Speaker 1: the wide receiver runs it lazy? Come on now, Like,
Speaker 1: what's your favorite route to run? Okay, well I'll break
Speaker 1: it down generally? Why sis don't? Yeah that's pretty generally ends?
Speaker 1: Yeah I was gonna say slow tight ends. Yeah. See
Speaker 1: that's why I'm I'm saying it more in their regards
Speaker 1: of if YO go to route as a wire was
Speaker 1: a wheel route. Yeah, like he didn't mind. I'm throwing
Speaker 1: the ball to a really really slow dad, right, So
Speaker 1: that's why it's fun for me because I'm like, my
Speaker 1: dad is the slow tight end, Like that's the dude
Speaker 1: that I'm throwing the ball too. So exactly right, who's
Speaker 1: covering slow dad? Slow uncle? Slow Dad's getting slow if
Speaker 1: I can't cover by slow uncle. So that's why this works.
Speaker 1: Guys like push dad into the good night to that,
Speaker 1: and I get excited too, because you sound like you
Speaker 1: will overthrow somebody. But it's not your faults. Quarterback, Oh,
Speaker 1: you better believe. I'm I'm I'm I'm looking. I'm looking.
Speaker 1: I'm Tom Brady. I'm looking at you and I'm going.
Speaker 1: I've got my hands out. I'm yelling at you. I'm going,
Speaker 1: that was the catchable ball? You just slow? He run
Speaker 1: four He's definitely, yeah, that might be. That might be kind.
Speaker 1: I don't even know if he's hitting that. So it's
Speaker 1: that's why he can run the wheel roud. He's not.
Speaker 1: I'm not throwing him a fade. He's not getting there fast.
Speaker 1: Like it's he's he's still no. Dad is definitely not
Speaker 1: running a slant. There is no chance that's happening. I'm not.
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, I think you're overestimating how athletic my brother. Yes, right,
Speaker 1: I can. That's that's I get the whole where the
Speaker 1: whole wheel, every route's in the tree for my brother
Speaker 1: because he's six six and super athletic, but not for
Speaker 1: not for especially not for my uncle. He's short and slow.
Speaker 1: My dad's at least semi tall and not that slow.
Speaker 1: He's just average, right, He's average. You go from Chicago Nebraska,
Speaker 1: that had to be a culture shock to some degree. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was a It was a huge culture shock, almost
Speaker 1: as so much of a culture shock that I transferred.
Speaker 1: So when I was a freshman my first weekend at school,
Speaker 1: I was way overwhelmed. I was like, this is so different.
Speaker 1: Everybody's for the most part, now Lincoln and Omaha has
Speaker 1: a lot of this is really cool, but like a
Speaker 1: lot of people were from small town. That started to
Speaker 1: freak me out a little bit. It was totally different.
Speaker 1: I was like, all right, I'm a city kid. I
Speaker 1: dressed different than everybody here. I'm walking around in Jordan's.
Speaker 1: These girls were making fun of me for wearing Jordan's
Speaker 1: I was like, this isn't cool. I don't like this,
Speaker 1: Like this is not this might not be my people,
Speaker 1: but I ended up loving it. I had my best
Speaker 1: friends in my whole life. Uh. Then I had an
Speaker 1: unbelievable college experience. But my my first quarter of the
Speaker 1: year of my freshman year almost almost took me out
Speaker 1: of there. But I ended up kind of my My
Speaker 1: dad was like, you gotta stick with it, you gotta scholarship, Like,
Speaker 1: you gotta stay there, do your thing, You'll be fine,
Speaker 1: And he was right, you know, and and change is different.
Speaker 1: And I was away from my family for the first
Speaker 1: time ever, so I got used to it. But uh,
Speaker 1: it was definitely a culture shock. Nebraska is not Chicago.
Speaker 1: So you at the University of Nebraska, You're nineteen years old,
Speaker 1: you start your first company, seeing an opportunity to cover
Speaker 1: sports using Twitter. Why decide to do that at at
Speaker 1: that young age? What what was in you too to
Speaker 1: want to want to build that up? Yeah, it was.
Speaker 1: It was very much. I'm sitting in a you know,
Speaker 1: kind of intro class. It's a journalism one on one
Speaker 1: and I'm sitting in a class and Joe Starrita is
Speaker 1: the one of my favorite professors. He's sitting up at
Speaker 1: the frontal class and he asked the class he goes
Speaker 1: who is currently on Twitter? And I raised my hand
Speaker 1: and I'm the only one you got. They're talking. There's
Speaker 1: at least two kids, probably more in this class. Nobody
Speaker 1: raises her hand. And at the time, I was like,
Speaker 1: I didn't care about Facebook, and that was like just
Speaker 1: two thousand nine, like everybody was on Facebook. It was
Speaker 1: that was the thing you got, you wanted to do.
Speaker 1: And I was like, no, no, no, I'm on Twitter
Speaker 1: and like I think it's a huge opportunity to cover sports.
Speaker 1: And about half the class kind of started laughing at me,
Speaker 1: and I was like, all right, all right, cool, Like
Speaker 1: I'm I'm that person. I like being the underdog. I
Speaker 1: like being told that I can't do something. So that
Speaker 1: was kind of the first thing was like, oh, you
Speaker 1: guys think this is a joke, I'll show you right
Speaker 1: like you'll see. And so I started meeting up with
Speaker 1: UM had a sorority sister who her boyfriend was a
Speaker 1: really really good UM was really into web development. So
Speaker 1: we just started meeting and we would have we have
Speaker 1: coffee meetings at this place called the Mill, and um,
Speaker 1: that's we just started talking about starting corn Fed Sports.
Speaker 1: And that's why we started it because there wasn't really
Speaker 1: any coverage, um that we liked covering the Aska sports
Speaker 1: and Nebraska football, so we were like, why don't we
Speaker 1: just start our own thing. And I'm sure this doesn't
Speaker 1: surprise you guys, but like, obviously I wanted to cover football,
Speaker 1: but I also wanted to cover all the other sports,
Speaker 1: like Nebraska has a phenomenal volleyball team like the nineties.
Speaker 1: Nebraska football is the current Nebraska volleyball team like badass,
Speaker 1: really really good, so I wanted to cover them. I
Speaker 1: wanted to cover our basketball team. I wanted to like
Speaker 1: I wanted to cover every sport, like I literally love
Speaker 1: all sports. Enough people kept telling me that I either
Speaker 1: couldn't do it, or I shouldn't do it, or it
Speaker 1: was stupid. And then as that started to happen, it
Speaker 1: just sparked in me like if this is making people
Speaker 1: feel uncomfortable, especially older people, Like it was mostly older
Speaker 1: professors and older journalists that were like, that's not a
Speaker 1: thing newspapers, like you should go right for the newspaper
Speaker 1: and I was, like, nobody reads the newspaper that's eighteen
Speaker 1: or nineteen years old, Like there's an entire generation that's
Speaker 1: gonna make this obsolete. Like else me, it's social and
Speaker 1: it just they you know, I think they were afraid
Speaker 1: of the change, and so I just wanted to kind
Speaker 1: of embrace it and take the risk because I could.
Speaker 1: I was in college and I could take the risk,
Speaker 1: and I did and it and it definitely paid off.
Speaker 1: But it was it was people telling me that it
Speaker 1: wasn't a good idea over and over and over again
Speaker 1: that inspired me to think, if I'm making people uncomfortable,
Speaker 1: it's probably for a reason, and I should lean into
Speaker 1: this and pay attention to this. And that's that's why
Speaker 1: I did it. It's already hard to break into sports
Speaker 1: in general as general. Then you add on top whether
Speaker 1: you're a minority and whether you're you're a woman. Not
Speaker 1: only do you breaking into sports media, but you're also
Speaker 1: on an entrepreneurial journey. What are what's been some of
Speaker 1: the challenges you've had to face with with going down
Speaker 1: both of those paths. Yeah, being a woman in sports
Speaker 1: and stuff, guys like that, it takes a certain level
Speaker 1: of toughness to just be able to do it in general,
Speaker 1: like constantly. And it took toughness in two thousand in
Speaker 1: two thousand nine of the freshman in college, and it
Speaker 1: takes toughness now is an executive in sports media in
Speaker 1: like it's there's a lot of the same bs going
Speaker 1: on now that there was going on then. I'm just
Speaker 1: in a different position now and I've worked my way
Speaker 1: into a position where i can call the shots as
Speaker 1: far as who I'm hiring and who I'm bringing in
Speaker 1: and who's a part of the conversations. And I think
Speaker 1: that's that's how it changes. Like, that's how it changes
Speaker 1: is you get more diversity from minorities and from women
Speaker 1: in jobs where they can hire people and they can
Speaker 1: be focused on that and making sure that there are
Speaker 1: people that are like me that have a say in
Speaker 1: the rooms that matter, because that's what That's what sucks
Speaker 1: then and it sucks even now. But it's it's better
Speaker 1: now for me because of the because of what I've
Speaker 1: been able to achieve. But you know, having people call
Speaker 1: the shot for you and not believe in you, and
Speaker 1: even after you you do, I could have one mistake, right,
Speaker 1: I could make one mistake and it was still so
Speaker 1: like prolific the mistake to them, where I could watch
Speaker 1: my colleague make mistakes and it was like, well he
Speaker 1: played so like it doesn't matter right, like he knows
Speaker 1: the game like and it was like, no, he doesn't,
Speaker 1: Like he doesn't study like me, he doesn't talk to
Speaker 1: the coaches like me, he doesn't talk to the players
Speaker 1: like me, like I out hustle him NonStop. And I
Speaker 1: can remember that being so frustrating and just almost not
Speaker 1: pursuing sports because of that, but then just deciding. One day,
Speaker 1: I just had this total breakdown and I talked to
Speaker 1: my dad and my dad was like, listen, like you
Speaker 1: love sports, like this is your passion. You're not gonna
Speaker 1: give up because some jerk calls you sweet cheets in
Speaker 1: a locker room, like you're gonna get over it, Like
Speaker 1: you're gonna get over it. You're gonna get tough, and
Speaker 1: you're gonna realize like next time he said something like
Speaker 1: that to you, you better have something to say back.
Speaker 1: And I was like, all right, Dad, And that's that's
Speaker 1: pretty much like what I did from then on, Like
Speaker 1: I was like, Okay, dudes are gonna say stuff to
Speaker 1: me and I'm just gonna say something back and guess what,
Speaker 1: every time it happens, they're like totally checked themselves. They're
Speaker 1: like whoa, because they're not used to getting it back.
Speaker 1: They're used to just saying it's saying it's saying it
Speaker 1: and nobody checks them. So when you check them and
Speaker 1: it's like, oh, okay, I want them to do. For
Speaker 1: the most part, there's a couple, you know, extreme cases,
Speaker 1: but that's that's what it's like to be a woman
Speaker 1: in sports. Like it's and it's like, as I said,
Speaker 1: there's still a lot of challenges now that I face,
Speaker 1: but I'm in a different position. And that's why as
Speaker 1: an executive, I've I've been very conscientious of who I'm hiring,
Speaker 1: who I'm bringing in, what the culture is like within
Speaker 1: the company, to make sure that we have diverse voices
Speaker 1: and that that can change the game. Uh. If more
Speaker 1: people have that attitude, how do you not fall into
Speaker 1: the narrative of now being in charge of well, I'm
Speaker 1: only gonna hire women, or I'm only going to hire
Speaker 1: people who did not play right. Where you don't all
Speaker 1: of a sudden it spend it so far like to
Speaker 1: spend spirits are to where now you're instead of part
Speaker 1: of the solution, now you've just created a different narrative
Speaker 1: that you're part of the problem too. Listen, it's a
Speaker 1: really important question, guys, because it's I feel like this
Speaker 1: is where you can start to have that understanding of Okay,
Speaker 1: this is how you how you do things. And I'm not,
Speaker 1: by any means the person that's ever not going to
Speaker 1: make mistakes. But what I can say is I'm always
Speaker 1: gonna hire the best person for the job. The difference
Speaker 1: between what your guys are alluding to, and I get
Speaker 1: it all the time, like you're gonna look for women,
Speaker 1: you're gonna look for minorities, you're gonna look the I
Speaker 1: Every and I mean that in the nicest way I
Speaker 1: can possibly say it. Every Tom Dick and Harry White
Speaker 1: guy applies for a job that they do not deserve,
Speaker 1: they're not entitled to, they don't have the qualifications for.
Speaker 1: But they show up their nineteen years old, they're not
Speaker 1: in journalism school, and they hit me up and they
Speaker 1: think they deserve a full time writing job. Straight up.
Speaker 1: It happened all the time, you know who. I don't
Speaker 1: hear from women and minorities, but neither one. I have
Speaker 1: had to seek out every minority that I have hired,
Speaker 1: and I've had to seek out every female that I
Speaker 1: have hired. Why do you think that? Because I know
Speaker 1: for me, I'm I'm that's exactly right. I'm a black
Speaker 1: male that worked in sports for for quite some time,
Speaker 1: and from from my own personal experience, you have to
Speaker 1: be not even better than average, not even better, way
Speaker 1: better exceptional, And that's just to get a foot in
Speaker 1: the door, right. So to your point, every time Dack
Speaker 1: and Harry applies, but it is hard to stand out.
Speaker 1: So because you know why a lot of the times
Speaker 1: and Harrys get the job, that's true. But then also
Speaker 1: how do you how do you make the opportunities not
Speaker 1: even just available, but just highlighted in awareness to to
Speaker 1: other people. You can make the opportunities available, you have
Speaker 1: to be consciential of of making this a part of
Speaker 1: what you're doing as you're hiring it. Because I mean,
Speaker 1: it's it's like it is if you sat in a room,
Speaker 1: I would venture to say that the white guys in
Speaker 1: the room are more often than not going to think
Speaker 1: they deserve the opportunity, whereas the girls are going to
Speaker 1: talk themselves out of it. They're gonna give you ten
Speaker 1: reasons why they don't deserve it. And the black guys
Speaker 1: don't are going to talk themselves out of it as well,
Speaker 1: or they're just not going to speak up because it's
Speaker 1: it's a conditional thing, like we've been conditioned to think
Speaker 1: that we don't deserve these things because we haven't seen it,
Speaker 1: Whereas if you're a white guy in this country, you've
Speaker 1: seen you can think you think you walked it, and
Speaker 1: that's the that is the time. That is you're talking
Speaker 1: about a lot of learned behavior, a lot of watching
Speaker 1: and seeing and and not thinking that you deserve it.
Speaker 1: And that that only changes when people that have the
Speaker 1: ability to hire people are conscientious of that and say, okay,
Speaker 1: if I have a job name right at the end
Speaker 1: of the day. You guys talked about it earlier. Sports
Speaker 1: is so competitive that if I don't have a reference
Speaker 1: that I know about you, you're not going to get
Speaker 1: the job because I know enough people in sports that
Speaker 1: I can call and say, hey, tell me about this person. Right.
Speaker 1: So that's the first part, is the networking part, and
Speaker 1: how that plays a part in this, and and reaching
Speaker 1: out to people and saying, Hey, I want to hire somebody,
Speaker 1: and I'm looking for you know this, these are the qualifications.
Speaker 1: Do you have anybody that you can send my way? Right?
Speaker 1: Do you know anybody? Have you heard from anybody? Because
Speaker 1: that's what that's what's happening. Like, that's what you have
Speaker 1: to do. Because the guys who send me their resumes
Speaker 1: all the time. I mean it, If I went through
Speaker 1: and I probably have four hundred resumes saved in my email,
Speaker 1: I would venture to say three nine, if not all
Speaker 1: four hundred are all white guys, and and most of
Speaker 1: them are not qualified, and they all ask for jobs.
Speaker 1: And it's because they've been conditioned to think that they
Speaker 1: can have it and and I don't. There's there's only
Speaker 1: so much one individual can do, right, Like what can
Speaker 1: I do for my company? I can make I can
Speaker 1: make sure that I am present in how I am hiring,
Speaker 1: who I am hiring, and making sure I'm doing my
Speaker 1: due diligence to reach out and try and find people,
Speaker 1: versus just sitting back and saying, well the best people
Speaker 1: will find me. Um, that's just I think my attitude.
Speaker 1: I can't speak to what anybody else is doing, but
Speaker 1: that's that's how I've approached it. Let's talk ball, all right,
Speaker 1: So you've done you're doing Draft Network, you've done fantasy
Speaker 1: you do a little bit of fantasy football, correct, yep,
Speaker 1: As a former athlete, I hate fantasy football. Why you
Speaker 1: hate fantasy man, I hate fantasy football because fantasy football
Speaker 1: has financially has been great. But now for everybody involved
Speaker 1: in fantasy and football, right, fantasy love it, football, love it.
Speaker 1: You come by on a fantasy football and it brings
Speaker 1: in more revenue dollars. But now you have the fan
Speaker 1: who may not necessarily watch the games, but now they're
Speaker 1: only watching because the impacts fantasy football. But sometimes you
Speaker 1: have people they can look at a guy. Let's just say, hypothetically,
Speaker 1: guy has ten thousand yards, a billion I'm exaggera and
Speaker 1: a billion touchdowns, but if he doesn't perform that week
Speaker 1: on fantasy, you trash you trashy. Never I've never I
Speaker 1: have never met a guy who's played in the league
Speaker 1: that like fantasy football. I don't because I and I
Speaker 1: totally understand why you would feel that way. Because if
Speaker 1: I'm Steve or if I'm I've seen it in an
Speaker 1: interview in a post game right where you've got Travis
Speaker 1: Kelsey getting interviewed post game and he's he didn't have
Speaker 1: a big game, and somebody's yelling at him from the stands, like, dude,
Speaker 1: your trash, You're terrible today. You're tweeting at somebody and
Speaker 1: you're telling them that you you know, you've lost me
Speaker 1: my fantasy matchup. Like I can imagine that as a competitor,
Speaker 1: especially if you win the football game. Like if you
Speaker 1: go out there and you win the game and then
Speaker 1: people are tweeting at you about how you didn't win fantasy,
Speaker 1: You've gotta be like, who the hell cares? Right, Like
Speaker 1: I tell I tell people that all the time that
Speaker 1: play fantasy, Like you have what you want to happen
Speaker 1: in your head, and then here's what reality is. Because
Speaker 1: the head coach doesn't care about giving Clyde Edwards Hilaire
Speaker 1: that's many touches because that's what's good for your fantasy team,
Speaker 1: Like he's gonna do what's best for the matchup to
Speaker 1: play that in the game, and that's what he's gonna do.
Speaker 1: So you might want this to happen, but it ain't
Speaker 1: gonna happen because that's not the game plan. And if
Speaker 1: you don't. That's why. That's why I can see why
Speaker 1: you hate it. So I understand why you hate it.
Speaker 1: It's not like I woke up today and said, Gerard
Speaker 1: starting me on this fantasy team, I gotta show out
Speaker 1: screw him, Like that's not what you're doing. You don't
Speaker 1: get the call your own play yes, to the point
Speaker 1: of where when you hear that, you're like, really and
Speaker 1: then now and then I play fantasy a little bit
Speaker 1: when I was done. You don't know the game plan, right,
Speaker 1: you really don't. You don't understand or the matchups' not.
Speaker 1: Just like this is terrible, right, So I literally hate
Speaker 1: fancy football. If everybody could just chill and be nice,
Speaker 1: then we'll be fine, right, because then you wouldn't have
Speaker 1: fans screaming at you or tweeting at You're like, yo, bro,
Speaker 1: you suck your garbage because you didn't have three catches
Speaker 1: for him, and you're like, yeah, okay, cool, Like if
Speaker 1: people just didn't. People doing that to athletes in general
Speaker 1: has always made me upset, Like whether it's fantasy related
Speaker 1: or it's like you have a bad game and the
Speaker 1: team loses, and people feel this sense of ownership where
Speaker 1: they can come over and tell you like like you
Speaker 1: guys are saying, like you don't walk up to somebody,
Speaker 1: you don't go outside to the garbage man and you
Speaker 1: yell at the garbage man because there's one piece of
Speaker 1: garbage that fell out, and you're like, you stuck at
Speaker 1: your job, like nobody does that, Like people you got
Speaker 1: in sport. We have to take a break and the
Speaker 1: morning thing. We gotta pay some bills. You got checks.
Speaker 1: I love cut to It, and I love it even
Speaker 1: more when you download us and subscribe and you can
Speaker 1: follow us on social media too, Smithie where where at?
Speaker 1: That's at? Cut to It on Instagram? What about Twitter? At?
Speaker 1: Cut to It Facebook? Cut to It featuring Steve Smith singr?
Speaker 1: What about online? And you can follow us at cut
Speaker 1: to It podcast dot com where you can buy merch
Speaker 1: and you can subscribe to us wherever you listen to podcasts.
Speaker 1: I got all my answers questions. Um, yeah, I got
Speaker 1: all my questions answered. That's what I'm here for, a brother,
Speaker 1: cut to a Podcast dot Com. Coming up on the
Speaker 1: cut to It Podcast, We've got Odessa Jenkins, CEO of
Speaker 1: the Women's National Football Conference, a former NFL coaching intern
Speaker 1: with Atlanta Falcons, and she's a two time USA National
Speaker 1: Women's football champion. Odesse and Jenkins coming up and cut
Speaker 1: to a podcast playing football with the boys in the league,
Speaker 1: growing up in middle school where your coach told you
Speaker 1: that you had to quit because there was no place
Speaker 1: for you to play in high school? Now the word
Speaker 1: I highlighted, and I've just been sitting on for the
Speaker 1: last couple of days prepping for this is no place.
Speaker 1: And as a dad of one daughter and then I
Speaker 1: was as a father of four and two bos three boys,
Speaker 1: I cannot imagine someone else telling my children that you
Speaker 1: you don't have a place here. H What was going
Speaker 1: when you heard that? How did that sit with you?
Speaker 1: And and now hearing that so many years later, walk
Speaker 1: us through that. Yeah, it's still a chip on my
Speaker 1: shoulder that I carried today. Um and and unfortunately it's
Speaker 1: it's a it's a story that a lot of girls
Speaker 1: and women are still being told by their coaches, fathers, brothers, sisters, moms. Um.
Speaker 1: But for me, sports was the one is I shouldn't
Speaker 1: say it was, but at that time in my life, Um,
Speaker 1: you know, I was about thirteen. I lost my brother
Speaker 1: a couple of years before my family had been through
Speaker 1: a lot. My parents were on the board on the
Speaker 1: verge of the divorce. UM. Sports was my refuge. Football
Speaker 1: was the place that I was going to on a
Speaker 1: consistent basis, UM to be outside of my mind and
Speaker 1: inside of my heart. And I was on fire for it. Um.
Speaker 1: It was my safe space at the time, and that
Speaker 1: that family that I had with the boys who were
Speaker 1: on my team was so important to me, and my
Speaker 1: coaches were so important to me. So for my coach,
Speaker 1: who I trusted, who I believed, who told me I
Speaker 1: was exceptional. You know, I was a running back, so
Speaker 1: he he it broke my heart. I don't know how
Speaker 1: else to put it. To have him come to me
Speaker 1: and say, hey, you're great. You you you you. You
Speaker 1: know the boys are getting bigger. Um, there is no
Speaker 1: option for you. And if you want to be a
Speaker 1: serious athlete, which he knew I wanted to be, he
Speaker 1: limited my options and he said, here are your options.
Speaker 1: And it was one of the few times in life
Speaker 1: where I let somebody else give me the options. UM,
Speaker 1: because I couldn't see past the people who influenced me.
Speaker 1: And I think that's a huge lesson, particularly for women,
Speaker 1: because the world guide so much of who we are
Speaker 1: and how we're supposed to be in dress and who
Speaker 1: we love and all those things, and so I think
Speaker 1: that it was heartbreaking. So I went on and I
Speaker 1: carried a fire probably into basketball. UM. I carried a
Speaker 1: little bit of anger. And the way I played ball.
Speaker 1: If you watch me play, UM, I played a lot
Speaker 1: like a dB out there or running back out there
Speaker 1: going to the hoop. Like I had all of that
Speaker 1: same fire that I carried from from middle school to
Speaker 1: high school and to college playing basketball. And so in
Speaker 1: that moment, I felt heartbreak. UM. I felt like the
Speaker 1: world was telling me what my possibilities were as a
Speaker 1: woman and I and I like it. I really I
Speaker 1: really didn't like it. I will say that frankly, that
Speaker 1: coach was just making the right decision for me. Right.
Speaker 1: I wanted to go to college. I wanted college to
Speaker 1: be paid for UM, and so focusing on basketball helped
Speaker 1: me get that. For me, it was the right path.
Speaker 1: But at the time, UM, I think that the way
Speaker 1: I think now is if you have somebody who you
Speaker 1: think is exceptional, maybe I wouldn't have been able to
Speaker 1: play running back at the varsity level. Maybe I wouldn't
Speaker 1: have been able to um even play in high school.
Speaker 1: Who knows, but I think totally eliminating that that was
Speaker 1: a possibility for me period, For somebody I trusted meant
Speaker 1: that I shouldn't even try. And that that's where I
Speaker 1: think the miss was, like, you don't even try to
Speaker 1: do this because the path doesn't exist. Just because you
Speaker 1: come to a forking road, is that's telling you to
Speaker 1: go left or go right? Well, how soft is the
Speaker 1: is the dirt in the middle or until you go
Speaker 1: straight right? Like how hard is this brick in front
Speaker 1: of me or what? Uh? So I think that that
Speaker 1: and and you know, the world happens exactly the way
Speaker 1: it's supposed to. But I think if you want to
Speaker 1: be a creator, if you want to advance something, then
Speaker 1: sometimes you gotta go against the grain. And I think
Speaker 1: we should do more encouraging, particularly our girls um to
Speaker 1: make pass for themselves. And you know, for me, I
Speaker 1: use it as a chip And now I got this
Speaker 1: league that I'm developing and creating opportunities for other women.
Speaker 1: So it worked out, but I would have loved for
Speaker 1: somebody to challenge me, to challenge the system at that time.
Speaker 1: What would you tell yourself back then? To maybe stand
Speaker 1: up to those coaches or just kind of say hey,
Speaker 1: I want a place or to create that space for you.
Speaker 1: If I could have went back and done that again,
Speaker 1: would have winn and tried out for our freshman football
Speaker 1: team at Bellflower High School. Oh hold, you could have
Speaker 1: played exactly Bellflowers still Google right now, let's give the
Speaker 1: world a context. Compare them Cincinnati Bengals. Oh, doctor was
Speaker 1: like that, don't do the bu communities like that. We
Speaker 1: weren't that bad. We weren't We weren't Arizona Cardinals bad.
Speaker 1: We were before fits. I mean, which Arizona car are
Speaker 1: you're talking about when they was in Arizona or I'm
Speaker 1: just trying to figure out when you say bell Flower,
Speaker 1: that just I'm like, that just debunked our whole story
Speaker 1: right there. Team bell Flowers stank. I put it like this.
Speaker 1: When bell Flower has a good team, they got a
Speaker 1: good team, it's a shocker when they don't bell Flower.
Speaker 1: This is how bad Bell Flowers. You either play at
Speaker 1: night or during the day. If you cannot play at
Speaker 1: night is because gang affiliated or your team is awful.
Speaker 1: But most of the time, even at night when it's
Speaker 1: a big game and it's gang affiliated. They just have
Speaker 1: a ton of police. I don't think bell Flower had
Speaker 1: a night game. Bell Flower is an offsite tink game
Speaker 1: for a big school. How about the just keep talking
Speaker 1: about my team, my school, am I and my Lyne
Speaker 1: though you you I Detechno lize you were not and
Speaker 1: I felt like, um, like I could have I could
Speaker 1: have played in Actually now they're gonna be three years
Speaker 1: later playing at UM playing at Wilson High School, which
Speaker 1: was in the same division. So she she was alignment
Speaker 1: and so it was a little different for her. But
Speaker 1: I definitely could have got could have got a couple
Speaker 1: of years in on jay V for sure. How was
Speaker 1: your support system through all of this? What did they
Speaker 1: ingrain in you? What how did they hold your hand?
Speaker 1: And what were those dialogues like, yeah, you know, nothing
Speaker 1: was more important than going to college. To my mom,
Speaker 1: like she going and getting a college education. She knew,
Speaker 1: she had the foresight that sports was going to equal
Speaker 1: in education. Education was going to equal up good jobs,
Speaker 1: seeing more of the world, and then the possibilities were endless.
Speaker 1: So for my mom, she was she was all about listening.
Speaker 1: You know, you're a great athlete, You're a great ball
Speaker 1: player focused on that, so she wanted me to focus
Speaker 1: on bad I think she actually liked seeing me play
Speaker 1: basketball too, so that was her preference. Um. So when
Speaker 1: I got home, there were no, um, you know, cry
Speaker 1: on my shoulder. It's just like I told her before,
Speaker 1: there was really no cry on my shoulder. It was
Speaker 1: either hey, are you gonna listen to them and not
Speaker 1: play football, or you're gonna focus on basketball. Whichever one
Speaker 1: you're going to do, you need to go be exceptional
Speaker 1: at it. Um. I had a lot of love for basketball,
Speaker 1: so I saw, um, you know, at the time, I
Speaker 1: had friends who were going off to college who were
Speaker 1: older than me, and so I really saw that path
Speaker 1: and focused on that path. And then I had a cousin.
Speaker 1: His name is Lonnie, and he was on his way
Speaker 1: um to college. He played It's crazy, he played volleyball
Speaker 1: at Lock. This dude got a volleyball scholarship. This is yeah,
Speaker 1: at Lock High School. He got My mom and dad
Speaker 1: went to Lock. Yeah, so he got a volleyball scholarship.
Speaker 1: And he was like, oh, j look, I don't care
Speaker 1: what these people are saying. You can ball. You go
Speaker 1: focus on basketball. And that dude end up coming to
Speaker 1: like every one of my games all through high school,
Speaker 1: all through college. When you're playing basketball, now where is
Speaker 1: your heart? I know you possibly like our You're over
Speaker 1: there peeking over at football practice, like going, man, that
Speaker 1: could be me. I dug one in the basketball why one?
Speaker 1: I jumped When I decided that that was the focus.
Speaker 1: I jumped on and I completely focused on getting a
Speaker 1: Division one basketball scholarship. That was the goal, and I
Speaker 1: didn't look back until I signed my letter of intent.
Speaker 1: The first thing I did on my visit was go
Speaker 1: to the football It was so weird, um um, on
Speaker 1: my visit to the college and they were showing me
Speaker 1: all this stuff, the locker room and everything, and I
Speaker 1: just was obsessed and it was it retriggered my love
Speaker 1: um for for football. Um. I couldn't imagine what I
Speaker 1: would have done if I would have went to a big,
Speaker 1: old powerhouse SEC football school. I probably would have not
Speaker 1: been able to focus at all of basketball. Um. But
Speaker 1: that's what changed for me. And so I think I played,
Speaker 1: you know, my seasons of basketball. But I immediately met
Speaker 1: this guy named David Kellogg. He was an entrepreneur and
Speaker 1: he played dB. He was a dB UH for the
Speaker 1: football team. In a couple of years into my college career,
Speaker 1: he was like, oh, Jay, I'm gonna start. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: start a women's football league. Oh. He started telling me that.
Speaker 1: It was like people, He's like, He's like, I'm telling you,
Speaker 1: when you've done with basketball, I'm gonna start this sleeve.
Speaker 1: Hot girls are gonna play. It's gonna be eight on age.
Speaker 1: Give her high's he whispering breath, stink, no tea, whispering
Speaker 1: sweet nothings, and don't know that. And she over there,
Speaker 1: she taking it all in too. I dream. Oh he's
Speaker 1: so hard dreaming. Hey, I got this bridge that it's over.
Speaker 1: They call it over at the pond. Don't worry about that.
Speaker 1: It's not over at the pond. I got the I
Speaker 1: got the title to it. Man, it ain't in my pocket.
Speaker 1: I got the title to give me a hundred dollars
Speaker 1: and it's yours. She was like, do you accept cord?
Speaker 1: Everything in my pocket right now? Can I lay away?
Speaker 1: Do you take bikes? I got a bike. So So
Speaker 1: David Kellaw comes in and tells you about this women's
Speaker 1: football team that he that he wants to start. So
Speaker 1: what's your what's your reaction? Does that start to spur
Speaker 1: up your It sounds like it starts to spur up
Speaker 1: that level football again. And how did you transition into that?
Speaker 1: It was wild because yes, so David, and David was
Speaker 1: actually the best friend of my college boyfriend, right so.
Speaker 1: Um and now that y'all made me think about this.
Speaker 1: Every guy every dated back in the day. Um, we're
Speaker 1: all football players. So there was something I was trying.
Speaker 1: I was trying to stay close to the game and
Speaker 1: every where I couldn't. Um, you can kiss, but I
Speaker 1: just want your clicks. Poor guys like they they really
Speaker 1: didn't they really they had no chance, but um, but
Speaker 1: they can ballow. Heading into my senior year, he completely
Speaker 1: tore up my focus in basketball because he stood up this.
Speaker 1: He went and did it. It was just eight on
Speaker 1: eight women's football, tackle football, and he had all the
Speaker 1: little teams around all of the little cities. It was
Speaker 1: like six teams and it was all of these athletes,
Speaker 1: girls from the soccer team, from the intramural teams, and
Speaker 1: David mestand put me at running back at one of
Speaker 1: the on one of these teams, and I was, I was,
Speaker 1: I could not there was I was so overloaded with um,
Speaker 1: happiness and fulfillment. UM the idea because it was the
Speaker 1: first time I played football with women, and I never
Speaker 1: thought of the concept like, yo, I don't have to
Speaker 1: play against boys. I can actually play with girls, which
Speaker 1: was always my preference, like play against other women, and
Speaker 1: so UM we ended up doing that for a couple
Speaker 1: of years, and once I got a taste of that,
Speaker 1: I never looked back. We hear people say, man, we
Speaker 1: want equal opportunity, we want this, we want that, But
Speaker 1: what this really equal opportunity from Odess's perspective, really me,
Speaker 1: I don't have a dream of women playing in the NFL.
Speaker 1: I have a dream of the w NFC UM standing alone,
Speaker 1: UM having an opportunity to bring in sponsorship dollars, build
Speaker 1: a strong revenue stream. UM work with universities and colleges
Speaker 1: and the government UM to build a pipeline for girls
Speaker 1: to play football against other girls. So if me equity
Speaker 1: looks like developing a professional women's tackle football league UM
Speaker 1: that has its UH support from professional men's football, but
Speaker 1: that we will wake up and no girl will ever
Speaker 1: be told that her time in football is over because
Speaker 1: no opportunity exists for her. And see that is an
Speaker 1: answer that I love you want other women to have
Speaker 1: that opportunity that not to hear what you heard, which
Speaker 1: is you have no place because this world is big
Speaker 1: enough with the right leadership in every area, right and
Speaker 1: we're just talking about football. With the right leadership, there's
Speaker 1: enough football fields to go around, there's enough footballs to
Speaker 1: go around, and there's enough cliques and listen, it sounds
Speaker 1: like there's enough bodies that want to get punished, like
Speaker 1: the game of football is right, and who are willing
Speaker 1: to put themselves through it? Yea. And also to just personally,
Speaker 1: you know, I know you guys are looking and with
Speaker 1: with with the pandemic and all all of that stuff.
Speaker 1: I think you'll be good as Steve Smith uh senior
Speaker 1: Um comes along. We you know, whatever stuff you guys
Speaker 1: have haven't going on, email us and we'll give you
Speaker 1: a thousand dollars um. And then my foundation also do
Speaker 1: a thousand dollars just just to say, you know. And
Speaker 1: and the reason I say all of that is I
Speaker 1: can't fix all of the issues. But if if you
Speaker 1: get enough of enough people that's right behind y'all, that
Speaker 1: that's what it counts. And so that you know, so
Speaker 1: just hearing your answering and why really encouraged me. And
Speaker 1: I loved it because it wasn't a It wasn't an
Speaker 1: extravagant you ask or thought it was a through. It
Speaker 1: was a kiss for me. I believe in that there's
Speaker 1: things that will happen and will exist that I can't see. Um,
Speaker 1: But I've been in I've been at this for a decade.
Speaker 1: This ain't new, right, Like I I'm working my ass
Speaker 1: off to build this. I'm not asking for anybody to
Speaker 1: give me or hand me anything. I've been working at
Speaker 1: it for a decade. So it's not like, um, this
Speaker 1: is happening overnight or I see what's been built over
Speaker 1: a hundred years and think that I can build it
Speaker 1: into what. What I'm asking for is that to your point,
Speaker 1: there are people like you there. There are brands out there,
Speaker 1: you know, shout out to Adidas and Rebel Sports who
Speaker 1: have already jumped on board with us. But there are people, um,
Speaker 1: that could literally change the trajectory of the opportunity that
Speaker 1: women have in women's sports. And I think it just
Speaker 1: takes um some unity, uh and some support. You know.
Speaker 1: I think that there's billions and billions of dollars like
Speaker 1: I was on one. I don't know if you have
Speaker 1: all the sides, but there's one of the things that
Speaker 1: my presentation that I always present that says that five
Speaker 1: hundred million dollars has been invested over the last seven
Speaker 1: years and the failed professional men's football leagues five million dollars, girl,
Speaker 1: and what I what I would do with one percent
Speaker 1: of that would blow somebody's mind. I think it's about
Speaker 1: that type of breathing that getting out. Hey, Gerard, why
Speaker 1: did you get that T shirt? Oh? Yes, I got
Speaker 1: it from cut to a podcast dot com where we
Speaker 1: have exclusive merchandise. Shout out to our guys at seven
Speaker 1: or four shot. But yeah, you can go on, buy
Speaker 1: you a T shirt, subscribe to us wherever you listen
Speaker 1: to podcasts. Coming up on the Cut to It podcast,
Speaker 1: we've got Jennifer King, the first black woman to become
Speaker 1: a full time coach in the NFL. A former football
Speaker 1: player herself, she also coached women's basketball. Jennifer King on
Speaker 1: the Cut to It Podcast. I think this is a
Speaker 1: unique question because I'm a dad. What's the dynamic when
Speaker 1: you wanted to play and obviously your girl, so we
Speaker 1: I want to highlight that and also talk about to
Speaker 1: some degree, talk about the stigma of girls playing guy sports,
Speaker 1: especially at a young age, because us I've used to do.
Speaker 1: I used to do football camps when I did play,
Speaker 1: and I and I. One thing that I always noticed
Speaker 1: that was really cool is you always got two or
Speaker 1: three girls. But these two or three girls were always
Speaker 1: excellent players because they most most young men playing sports,
Speaker 1: they lacked the details. But that that girls that played
Speaker 1: they always knew that they had to have the fundamentals
Speaker 1: because some girls were just physically not as strong or
Speaker 1: not as fast as the counterparts as the counterparts, and
Speaker 1: so what was the dynamic between mom seeing you play
Speaker 1: football and dad seeing you play football? Yeah, that was
Speaker 1: that was funny because you know when I got to
Speaker 1: like middle school even high school, you know, the coaches
Speaker 1: were like, you know, like I think she can help us.
Speaker 1: You know, so I was I was trying. I was trying,
Speaker 1: but you know that was like nah, like they printed.
Speaker 1: My parents trum was let me do anything else and
Speaker 1: supported me except for playing football that they were worried about,
Speaker 1: you know, me get injured, so I didn't get to
Speaker 1: do it. So I still just played in like pe
Speaker 1: and you know, in class but that was it pretty
Speaker 1: much until I was an adult. So did they ever
Speaker 1: tell you that you that you can't. No, they never
Speaker 1: told me I couldn't. They just didn't sign me up
Speaker 1: for allowing me to do it because you know, they
Speaker 1: were worried about me get injured. So that was pretty
Speaker 1: much it. Not that I couldn't do it, it was
Speaker 1: just they were concerned. And I like that because obviously
Speaker 1: I'm a dad and I played football, and you know,
Speaker 1: I remember I wasn't working on Thursday night and I
Speaker 1: was watching, but I was watching Thursday night because I
Speaker 1: had to take notes and I had a show to
Speaker 1: do the next that following weekend, and because of that,
Speaker 1: I was watching the Thursday night and I remember sitting
Speaker 1: there watching Ryan Sayeser he got his injury, and I
Speaker 1: can remember, like yesterday, my wife goes, My wife Angie goes,
Speaker 1: that's why I won't bammim playing football, and I got sold.
Speaker 1: I was a little bit irritated because I had to walk.
Speaker 1: I paused it and I walked Boston through what happened
Speaker 1: and why it happened. Not the sport, her natural reaction,
Speaker 1: which I agree with. It's a brutal sport. That's why
Speaker 1: I wanted to play, but as a dad, I had
Speaker 1: to go, No, it's not the sport necessarily, it's the
Speaker 1: participant in that sport that increased the chances of his
Speaker 1: probability of getting hurt. On the way he did something
Speaker 1: and we went back through it and I walked him
Speaker 1: through it, and from that moment on, I had told
Speaker 1: my son, for you to play this game. If you
Speaker 1: can't see, if you don't see you what you hit,
Speaker 1: you don't hit it. And on that particular play, and
Speaker 1: I played against Ryan, he's a hell of a football player,
Speaker 1: but also like anybody else, you can have that centimeter
Speaker 1: of air put your head down and it can cost
Speaker 1: you something. I broke my neck in college. I put
Speaker 1: my head down, the two people hit me exactly on
Speaker 1: the same shoulders, and I had a C four burst fracture.
Speaker 1: And I was in a neck harness for about seven
Speaker 1: or eight months, to the point of where I had
Speaker 1: to lift. When I got out of neck harners, I
Speaker 1: had to lift and improve my support around my shoulders.
Speaker 1: I didn't have a fusion surgery, but I had to
Speaker 1: left every time until a long time. And I never
Speaker 1: told anybody what I'm saying that now is probably for
Speaker 1: the first three or four years of my career. Any
Speaker 1: time I would turn abruptly writer left, or if I
Speaker 1: didn't left that week, I would get a stinger that
Speaker 1: would go up my neck. Wow, And I had to,
Speaker 1: but I that's all I did. I wouldn't left much,
Speaker 1: but I get them tracks right right, and and and
Speaker 1: and the reason I got injured, Here's why I got injured.
Speaker 1: Rob Morris was a linebacker for b y U. We
Speaker 1: had to win that game and go off to the
Speaker 1: Vegas Bowl to play eventually a team led by Freshno
Speaker 1: State by David Carr. And I was playing proper return
Speaker 1: and Rob Morris was a potential first round draft pick.
Speaker 1: He end up getting drafted I think UH in the
Speaker 1: first round, fourteenth or something pick. And Rob Morris played
Speaker 1: on special teams and I saw him, so I was
Speaker 1: gonna dip on them. And the same way I played,
Speaker 1: I tried dip on Rob Morrison, the same way I
Speaker 1: tried to beat New Mexico. When I played against UH
Speaker 1: Brian Orlaer. I wanted to show this little kid from
Speaker 1: l a complaining only it was my It was my
Speaker 1: opportunity to showcase what I could do for scouts because
Speaker 1: I was not getting looked at as much after things giving.
Speaker 1: I was about, you know, in in in college, and
Speaker 1: I remember I tried to dip on them. I was
Speaker 1: on the sideline on our sidelight going down and in
Speaker 1: pro vote, going down the sideline, and I was like,
Speaker 1: I went to dip on them, dip my head. The
Speaker 1: other guy did not see hit. They both hit both
Speaker 1: shoulders simultaneously bang back in the day. I'm like, man,
Speaker 1: my neck is tight. So he took me out for
Speaker 1: a few plays, put some big gay on it, some
Speaker 1: frees bio. Freese wasn't in the ring. That old man
Speaker 1: smell put that on there and finished the game. It's
Speaker 1: called that bio that uh that that bio stuff. Cream
Speaker 1: of Jesus left the cream of Jesus on. So I
Speaker 1: go on there, man, and we finished the game. And
Speaker 1: it's called the Holy War. In Utah, they always play
Speaker 1: by you and b y U and Utah always play
Speaker 1: around thanksgiveing. Mom was in town. We won the game.
Speaker 1: We're going to the Vegas Bowl. And I'm a self
Speaker 1: adjuster self. Just here is somebody to try to adjust.
Speaker 1: I don't go to Kyra practice. I'm Kyra practor so
Speaker 1: I'm trying to adjust my neck. Man, I gotta cricket
Speaker 1: is getting stiffer and stiffer. We go to the doctor.
Speaker 1: I go. Doctor said, man, my neck is stiff, is
Speaker 1: getting worse and worse. They do an X ray. We're
Speaker 1: just gonna do a routine. Next way. Man, before I
Speaker 1: get ten minutes down down the street, you need to
Speaker 1: come back, you guys. Before a birth fracture broke my neck,
Speaker 1: put me in the harness, didn't get to play. If
Speaker 1: you go back and see the Vegas Bowl, you'll see me.
Speaker 1: I'm holding up trophy and I was in the neck brace.
Speaker 1: You know, career and in in in question. So are
Speaker 1: you saying then that you believe you got injured because
Speaker 1: you had just a decrease in the fundamentals. You forgot
Speaker 1: the fundamentals at that point? Is that what you're saying? Absolutely,
Speaker 1: I got, I forgot. I didn't not have the fundamentals.
Speaker 1: I knew the fundamentals, but I reach, I reacted and
Speaker 1: I did. I did not see what I I hit,
Speaker 1: and so it that's what happened. And so when you
Speaker 1: have these camps, typically these these young women that are playing,
Speaker 1: they don't miss the building the fundamentals. They have so
Speaker 1: much fundamentals they they hone in and every I did.
Speaker 1: I did three or four camps every year for eight years.
Speaker 1: I did them all and not this isn't a brag.
Speaker 1: I did them. I had the honor of doing them
Speaker 1: on military brick basis. So I've done camps in Hawaii, Frankfurt, Germany,
Speaker 1: Camp Humphreys in South Korea, down to Fort Bragg, and
Speaker 1: it's still a constant, and it does not I don't
Speaker 1: care where I go. There's always three or four girls
Speaker 1: who who have the fundamentals, and I just think that's awesome,
Speaker 1: because yes, they may be not all. Some are more.
Speaker 1: There's a few girls. I remember I was in the
Speaker 1: Element Sico and I saw a girl named Felicia, just Molly.
Speaker 1: Woppa dude. So Park put them polls on, put the
Speaker 1: whole eight piece right bucket coach law too with the
Speaker 1: side with what's prew punch. And I've seen some of
Speaker 1: the you know, some girls who are bigger than guys.
Speaker 1: What the fundamentals? Man Some some young men just they
Speaker 1: athletically gifted, but they lacked the fundamentals. Jennifer, would you
Speaker 1: add that in terms of fundamentals and young women in sports. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think he's absolutely right. I mean, you looking basketball,
Speaker 1: you know it's not it's not a lot of dunking
Speaker 1: going on, but the fundies is big and women's basketball
Speaker 1: and just how the game is played. It's it's two
Speaker 1: different games. But I do think, you know, women are
Speaker 1: really good at the fundamentals of sport. What was your
Speaker 1: playing for college? Oh? Man, it was. It was kind
Speaker 1: of crazy because, um, you know at that time, I
Speaker 1: was playing a bunch of sports in high school and
Speaker 1: um decided to play basketball and hopefully softball in college.
Speaker 1: So and there was it was some bigger schools like
Speaker 1: men majors that wanted me for either, but neither wanted
Speaker 1: me for like both, like basketball, didn't want me to
Speaker 1: play softball softball didn't want to play basketball. So I
Speaker 1: end up going to it like a D three school both, right.
Speaker 1: I had a great visit. Uh, it's a really good,
Speaker 1: you know, high academic school. So I went there and
Speaker 1: played both good career guilt for college. You had the
Speaker 1: opportunity to play both. So that leads me to believe
Speaker 1: the academic workload and playing two sports, how did you
Speaker 1: manage that? I always been a busy person, you know.
Speaker 1: Growing up. Sometimes I would have three different practice say
Speaker 1: it's like after school for different sports. So I wasn't
Speaker 1: always doing the most so to have that, it wasn't
Speaker 1: that big of a deal for me to play two
Speaker 1: sports in college as an unpaid uber driver myself speak
Speaker 1: on it for the rest of the pea is riduculous.
Speaker 1: And sometimes I don't even I don't even get it. Thanks,
Speaker 1: It's like go here. Yeah, that's exactly how it was. Now.
Speaker 1: Jennifer called out your place a little bit earlier, and
Speaker 1: I gotta I gotta pull her. Call bull. She's second
Speaker 1: all time and points scored for Guilford College women's basketball,
Speaker 1: so she had all these practices, but she was still
Speaker 1: put in the work. Oh for sure. I mean I was.
Speaker 1: I mean I didn't put in all that work to
Speaker 1: go out there and score, you know, five points a game, man,
Speaker 1: So I was. I was lucky to always be able
Speaker 1: to score the ball. So um, I had a good
Speaker 1: time at Guilford, was fun while getting her bachelor's Sons
Speaker 1: and Sports management, and she got her masters from Liberty,
Speaker 1: So she's as athletic as academic, best of both worlds
Speaker 1: to shame. I see it. And yet all of that
Speaker 1: you decided to go because a journey. But it's a
Speaker 1: journey that I just mean, I just mean that is
Speaker 1: because you have all this information. You also coached. I
Speaker 1: want to go down that path you were coaching. Also
Speaker 1: was a police officer, you know, as as they say,
Speaker 1: and you know back in the day old in Living Color, right,
Speaker 1: she got she's a layah. I get that all the time. Man,
Speaker 1: My friends are savages. So she'll take us through that.
Speaker 1: You you you you end up being you know, playing
Speaker 1: balling out a guilt for college, and then you start
Speaker 1: coaching the basketball team, you know, started the basketball team,
Speaker 1: and then you coach that Greensboro College, you know, Lou
Speaker 1: Lou cool ten years, ten years and also doing what else?
Speaker 1: Why are your coaching? I was, I was a cop man, yeah,
Speaker 1: on the on the south side of hot Point to
Speaker 1: see you know what it was my wife point, So
Speaker 1: I definitely knowing, And I explained it all because m
Speaker 1: is about that action. A bunch of hot people in
Speaker 1: hot Point are about that action. And I'm sure Jennifer
Speaker 1: could tell us. But when when did you start getting
Speaker 1: the I guess to back all of it when did
Speaker 1: you know as you were finishing your career at UH
Speaker 1: at Guildford, when did you know you want to become
Speaker 1: a coach? I mean, you know we started to leave
Speaker 1: finished college. You gotta do something, you know, So I
Speaker 1: knew it went to be in sport, and I had
Speaker 1: some contacts already and I one of my guys to
Speaker 1: end up being a mentor for me, offered me a
Speaker 1: job at Greensboro. So that's how I ended up coaching
Speaker 1: and got into it. So, um, just to stay in sports,
Speaker 1: you know, keep that that competition, you know, as an athlete,
Speaker 1: you know when you've done sometimes you have to find
Speaker 1: a way for that to find that drive, that rush.
Speaker 1: So that was the next best thing for me. Tell
Speaker 1: us and walk us through some of the things with
Speaker 1: everything going on, because I want you to speak about
Speaker 1: some of your experiences as a police officer, also as
Speaker 1: a woman of color that serving the community and what
Speaker 1: you experienced, because I don't know what you experience. I
Speaker 1: don't know what it was like for you as a
Speaker 1: police officer, how you handle people, what you what you saw,
Speaker 1: what you didn't see, what you can identify with now
Speaker 1: being out of you know, being out of the of
Speaker 1: the role of being a police officer, and I just
Speaker 1: want to give you that platform, that opportunity because I
Speaker 1: don't know what you experience. Only you do, but you
Speaker 1: also know a lot of things about your role that
Speaker 1: I have no idea about. Yeah, I mean it was
Speaker 1: crazy working on the on the south side of our Point,
Speaker 1: you know, we it was a lot and on Um
Speaker 1: you know, heroin was big at the time, so we
Speaker 1: had a bunch of heroin problems with overdoses almost every day. Um,
Speaker 1: you would go to and just stuff in general. You
Speaker 1: know that the gangs and the the drug game was crazy,
Speaker 1: and UM, I think I definitely now see things from
Speaker 1: both sides, um because I've been profiled before, but I
Speaker 1: also you know, been a police officer at the same time.
Speaker 1: So um, you know it was it was a good
Speaker 1: experience for me. One thing I'm thankful for. I think
Speaker 1: our training and high Point was as good as it gets,
Speaker 1: you know, like we went above and beyond the required
Speaker 1: States training, which is not much, you know, and I
Speaker 1: think a lot of people, if they did that or
Speaker 1: had the resources to do that, they could be a
Speaker 1: lot better. Because you know, sometimes I see things happen
Speaker 1: and I'm just like, oh, man, I can't believe they
Speaker 1: did that or like we never would they did it
Speaker 1: that way. But you know, everybody's trained differently, so you
Speaker 1: can't you can't really uh you know, look at every
Speaker 1: situation they're saying this because it's different people, Um, different
Speaker 1: training and involved. So um, you know, I was definitely
Speaker 1: thankful for our training and you know, you learned a
Speaker 1: lot of since you know, those streets, man, stuff you
Speaker 1: can carry on in life, and like you said, you
Speaker 1: deal with people sometimes that they're worse, so it's how
Speaker 1: to deal with different kind of people. And um, you know,
Speaker 1: we see it all and I did a lot, did
Speaker 1: a lot, you know, and how poor experienced a lot
Speaker 1: and it's definitely helped me, you know, moving forward and
Speaker 1: just you know in life. So um, definitely thankful for
Speaker 1: the person responders out there. But you know, at the
Speaker 1: same time, some people need to do better and you know,
Speaker 1: we need some things to change. Is it fair to say?
Speaker 1: And I'm assuming with you moonlighting as a basketball coach
Speaker 1: and working full time job as a police officer, I'm imagining.
Speaker 1: I'm assuming and I hope I'm assuming a good way. Now.
Speaker 1: When you were coaching these kids that you were instilling
Speaker 1: things in them because you were seeing the difference between
Speaker 1: the right response and the wrong response. Yeah. Absolutely, I
Speaker 1: mean it literally felt like sometimes I was in a
Speaker 1: double life because you know, say if I was working
Speaker 1: on first shift and you know things, I would do
Speaker 1: expirits during the daytime. Um, I mean just be insane
Speaker 1: like a movie, and then I go to basketball practice
Speaker 1: and you know, it was like a totally different world.
Speaker 1: But definitely trying to you know, instill those values and
Speaker 1: things that I learned, you know, for the kids because
Speaker 1: they were in college, so it was important for them
Speaker 1: to learn some of those lessons. So what was the
Speaker 1: moment when you were both a police officer and you
Speaker 1: were coaching? What was that moment when you knew you
Speaker 1: had to choose. Yeah, that was when I got my
Speaker 1: head coaching job at Johnson Welles and Charlotte. So, um,
Speaker 1: you know, when she moved a chair over to the
Speaker 1: head spot, you can't really be doing a bunch of
Speaker 1: other jobs. So when I moved to Charlotte, that's when
Speaker 1: I left the police force. How do you handle some
Speaker 1: of the labels in coaching? Now you're female coach in
Speaker 1: the National Football League? Congratulations, first Africa, African America put
Speaker 1: that label on it, African American time coach, you get
Speaker 1: you got a W two. First of all, do you
Speaker 1: like the label of being first black female coach? I
Speaker 1: mean that's something that I can't escape because it kind
Speaker 1: of is what it is. So I mean, whether I
Speaker 1: like it or not, just gonna be there. So, UM,
Speaker 1: I don't know, I think right now, I don't really
Speaker 1: think that much of it, but something you know down
Speaker 1: the road, definitely something to look back on and you know,
Speaker 1: be thankful and happy for the accomplishment. Well, it's it's
Speaker 1: knocking down barriers. I can truly say as the father
Speaker 1: of an African American woman in a year where I
Speaker 1: think there are a lot of first you have politics aside,
Speaker 1: you have the first African American woman to be vice president,
Speaker 1: you have an African woman, African American woman who's now
Speaker 1: the CEO of Walgreens the first time a fortune fifty company. Um,
Speaker 1: and then yourself the first African American woman coach in
Speaker 1: NFL representation matters. My daughter looks at TV a lot
Speaker 1: of times says, oh Dash, she looks like me, and
Speaker 1: that look her being six me and being six that's
Speaker 1: big for her to see people. So I know it
Speaker 1: made process at as if I don't know how to
Speaker 1: feel right now, but you're knocking down the barriers to
Speaker 1: where she doesn't have to worry about being the first
Speaker 1: in certain instances. So it's really big. So I do
Speaker 1: want to say where it proudly because as a father
Speaker 1: being in the house with black you know, being married
Speaker 1: to a black woman, raising a young African American woman,
Speaker 1: it is very big. So thank you. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1: I appreciate that it's big. You are a unique person,
Speaker 1: you are well worth it, you are competent, and most
Speaker 1: of all, your lovable. I'm Steve Smith Singer, I'm Gerald
Speaker 1: Little John and this is cut to It. Cut to
Speaker 1: It with Steve Smith Senior. That Is Me is a
Speaker 1: production of Cut to It, LLC, Baltol Creative Media, The
Speaker 1: Black Effect and I Heart Radio. For more podcast from
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Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows from Cut
Speaker 1: to It. Executive producer Steve Smith Singer, co host Gerard
Speaker 1: Little John, talent and booking manager Joe Fusci, social media
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Speaker 1: Cut to It is produced by Brian Baltaschevitch and Meredith Carter,
Speaker 1: with production assistance by Alex Lebrek. Production Coordinator Taylor Robinson.
Speaker 1: Theme music by Alex Johnson, lyrics and vocals by Anthony Hamilton.
Speaker 1: You ain't heard about it, then we're about to let you.
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