Speaker 1: The volume.
Speaker 2: What's up, everybody, Welcome back to the Draymond Green Show
Speaker 2: with my brother b D.
Speaker 1: What's hidening? What's uping, bro?
Speaker 2: What's going on? I feel I feel great, brother, I
Speaker 2: feel great. I'll be honest with y'all this next guest
Speaker 2: we have. I don't know how we pulled this off, wow,
Speaker 2: but in him being one of the best human beings
Speaker 2: to work in sports, wow, the absolute best.
Speaker 1: He has had an impact.
Speaker 2: On my career in media, He's had an impact on
Speaker 2: BD's career in media, and quite honestly, your favorite sports
Speaker 2: stars and when I sports media stars he's had an
Speaker 2: impact on and even if they haven't worked with him directly,
Speaker 2: he's had an impact on because he's shaped he's helped
Speaker 2: shape media being a part of the game the way
Speaker 2: it is in the NBA.
Speaker 1: And we are honored to have this next guest.
Speaker 2: He is a six time Sports Emmy Award winner, host,
Speaker 2: one Sports Emmy winner inside the NBA, a National Sports
Speaker 2: Caster of the Year, twenty twenty three Sports Broadcasting Hall
Speaker 2: of Fame inductee, and quite honestly, someone that I think
Speaker 2: is going to actually end up in the Nasmith Hall
Speaker 2: of Fame because of the impact that he's had on
Speaker 2: the game, and I am honored.
Speaker 3: I gotta just sprinkle some ism on top of that.
Speaker 3: You be talking about the Maestro and media, the host
Speaker 3: with the most the Nidos stat for brands, the orchestrator
Speaker 3: of entertainment where sports media entertainment connects. He is the
Speaker 3: godfather of knowing how to get it done, run the show,
Speaker 3: the man, the legend, Ernie er.
Speaker 1: Man.
Speaker 4: How can I possibly live bit? I can possibly live
Speaker 4: up to that introduction?
Speaker 1: Fellaws.
Speaker 4: It is so good to be with you all today.
Speaker 4: Thanks for thanks for asking.
Speaker 2: Absolutely as a honor. We appreciate you coming on the show.
Speaker 2: This has been one that I've been looking forward to
Speaker 2: for the longest. And I know as soon as Charles,
Speaker 2: our producer, mentioned your name, but he.
Speaker 1: Was like, what Ernie on the show? Let me go.
Speaker 1: We are excited by the way, Ernie. I recently saw
Speaker 1: a video for the Final Chamber the Wu Tang Forever Tour.
Speaker 1: The trailer, How did Wu Tang recruit you and get
Speaker 1: you narrating that video? That is amazing and that was.
Speaker 4: Totally out of the blue ray It was Uh, my
Speaker 4: my agent Bobby Height with the career sports and Entertainment
Speaker 4: c s E in Atlanta. He's he's the guy who
Speaker 4: comes to me with all requests, speaking engagements, et cetera,
Speaker 4: et cetera. So I get this email about ten days
Speaker 4: ago and he lays this out. He said, Huts and
Speaker 4: Klam would like you to voice the this announcement of
Speaker 4: their of their tour. And I'm like, this is this
Speaker 4: really coming to me? And I'm looking at this script
Speaker 4: and I was saying, listee, can I picture myself saying
Speaker 4: old dirty bastard? And I'm like, sure, if this is
Speaker 4: what they want, I'll be happy to do it.
Speaker 1: And so it just happened. I went into the studio
Speaker 1: when we.
Speaker 4: Were we were there to work on a Thursday night
Speaker 4: and I said, I just need to record something here
Speaker 4: and knocked it out, sent it on and then about
Speaker 4: three days later on my timeline, here it comes.
Speaker 2: It was.
Speaker 4: It was pretty it was pretty amazing, you know, But
Speaker 4: I guess, you know, where is the calls and asks?
Speaker 4: Then I'm gonna who am I to say?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 1: So h So there you go. That's kind of how
Speaker 1: that all came about.
Speaker 2: Doing those those different things like that that you've had
Speaker 2: the opportunity to do, like what are some of the
Speaker 2: cooler ones, like you know this Wu Tang, but what
Speaker 2: are some of the cooler things that you've come across desk?
Speaker 2: Not necessarily sports, but it's kind of sports adjacent because
Speaker 2: and sports has kind of led you to these platforms
Speaker 2: and doing these different things.
Speaker 1: What's some of the need was that you've done well?
Speaker 1: I mean one of the.
Speaker 4: Things is, you know, I've been doing the NBA two
Speaker 4: K for years and years with Kenny and Shack, which
Speaker 4: which after a while then you you come to under stand.
Speaker 4: But that's how like a lot of the younger viewers,
Speaker 4: that's how they know you. You know, It's not it's
Speaker 4: not that they look at you and say, oh yeah,
Speaker 4: it's they hear my voice. And so like I can
Speaker 4: be in the in the checkout line at the grocery
Speaker 4: store and say something back to the cashier and a
Speaker 4: kid behind me says, you're the two K guy.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 1: I said, yeah, I'm one.
Speaker 4: Of the two K guys. That's so it's been fun
Speaker 4: to do that and to see how that all works.
Speaker 4: It's kind of a drain on your brain by the
Speaker 4: end of the day, you know, because you've just been
Speaker 4: sitting there for hours and just a lot of times
Speaker 4: saying the same thing in different ways and and then
Speaker 4: when they put you in the MOCAP suit and it's
Speaker 4: you know, the whole bit. So that's been a lot
Speaker 4: of fun to do because of my longevity in this business.
Speaker 4: I mean I've been a turner for thirty five years.
Speaker 4: I actually the thing that I enjoy the most is
Speaker 4: telling my family's story. I mean that's I speak to
Speaker 4: corporations all the time about the things outside of basketball,
Speaker 4: the things in my life that matter, the things that
Speaker 4: I've learned by going through adversity, et cetera. And I
Speaker 4: really enjoyed that so much, just being able to share
Speaker 4: to prove the folks, look, yeah, NBA on TNT, that's
Speaker 4: what I do, but it's not who I am. And
Speaker 4: so I relish the opportunities to be able to talk
Speaker 4: to folks about getting through cancer, adoption, special needs kids,
Speaker 4: you name it. And so I kind of weave a
Speaker 4: story that way with a series of photographs. And I
Speaker 4: love those mornings, those those days where I can where
Speaker 4: I can share that.
Speaker 1: So those are the things.
Speaker 4: Aside from doing the NBA on T N T, those
Speaker 4: are the things to me that uh, you know, those
Speaker 4: are the things that matter.
Speaker 3: Those are real life that resonates with two and and
Speaker 3: and definitely resonates Uh, you know with me and Jay
Speaker 3: basketball in his life, but our life is bigger.
Speaker 1: Than basketball, right and who we are?
Speaker 3: Uh, this platform always gives us a great opportunity, you
Speaker 3: know to do such and you guys have done a
Speaker 3: great job.
Speaker 4: Brings a response. It's like if you if you pass
Speaker 4: that up, then you're then you're not doing your job
Speaker 4: because because just by virtue of what t n T
Speaker 4: and the NBA on t n T has meant in
Speaker 4: my career, that visibility tells the CEO somewhere, can we
Speaker 4: get that guy to talk to our group. You know,
Speaker 4: It's like and if you if you passed that up,
Speaker 4: then you are you're missing a boat. Mm hm that
Speaker 4: was percent man.
Speaker 3: It's sharing, it's sharing the platform, right, it's sharing the
Speaker 3: platform being responsible. I mean just in your journey in TNT,
Speaker 3: I would say as a viewer watching, you would think like, oh,
Speaker 3: you know, it's free flowing, like they can do whatever
Speaker 3: they want. Just one I want to know your.
Speaker 4: Baseball guy, right, how did you get does not want
Speaker 4: from birth?
Speaker 1: That's for sure?
Speaker 4: Yeah, when you're but to continue, Yeah, I'm okay, so
Speaker 4: I grew up a baseball guy. But but your point
Speaker 4: is like when did the transition, Like what made you like?
Speaker 1: What was that jump?
Speaker 4: Okay, So here's the deal. So my dad plays for
Speaker 4: the Milwaukee Braves back in the fifties. He's on those
Speaker 4: he's on those teams with Henry Aaron and Eddie Matthews
Speaker 4: and Warren Spawn and Luber Debt. He's a relief picture
Speaker 4: and he's as he as he likes to put it,
Speaker 4: or liked to put it, and was.
Speaker 1: You know, I was.
Speaker 4: I was middle relief, not good enough to start, not
Speaker 4: good enough to fit, and he's I was a middle
Speaker 4: reliever before they were cool.
Speaker 1: And so.
Speaker 4: You know, he got a World Series winging with Milwaukee
Speaker 4: when they beat the Yankees at fifty seven, and and
Speaker 4: you know, I was only you know, I was born
Speaker 4: at fifty six, so I don't remember. I've just seen
Speaker 4: videos of him pitching and that kind of thing. But
Speaker 4: but his career then became. He became a broadcaster and
Speaker 4: was doing play by play for the Braves for thirty
Speaker 4: years when they moved to Atlanta. So that was in
Speaker 4: my blood. So that's what I wanted to be. I
Speaker 4: want to be a big league ballplayer like my dad,
Speaker 4: and and that's all I played. You know, I played
Speaker 4: that growing up. I played a little bit of hoop,
Speaker 4: nothing above JV. I was on the bomb squad up
Speaker 4: thirty down, thirty.
Speaker 1: I was in and if you passed it to me,
Speaker 1: you are getting it back. I was just a shacket.
Speaker 4: And at that point too, you know, I was the
Speaker 4: guy who led the layup line because I was the
Speaker 4: smallest guy on the team. So I'm like, I'm six
Speaker 4: to two now. I mean, and people still because I
Speaker 4: stand next to Shack, they think I'm like five to two.
Speaker 4: But but that was that was my basketball career. I
Speaker 4: was a baseball guy.
Speaker 1: And I actually.
Speaker 4: Walked on at the University of Georgia. So I walked
Speaker 4: on as a freshman and was told to walk off
Speaker 4: as a sophomore one year, one year wearing the red
Speaker 4: and black man. But you know what, that freshman year unforgettable.
Speaker 4: And look, I'm not going to get into a conversation like, oh,
Speaker 4: just hey, there's just three players you're talking. No, look,
Speaker 4: you got have gone to the highest level. You know
Speaker 4: what all this is about. For folks who have never
Speaker 4: been part of that. I consider myself so blessed to
Speaker 4: have that one year of being a college ballplayer in
Speaker 4: the SEC and hanging out with teammates, guys who were
Speaker 4: older than I was, more mature than I was, who
Speaker 4: taught me a bunch who kind of took me under
Speaker 4: their wing and were kind of like, we got this
Speaker 4: freshman who doesn't know anything. Let's kind of, you know,
Speaker 4: look after him and take care of him. And I
Speaker 4: wasn't a great player. I was a backup first baseman,
Speaker 4: you know, on that one year I went to for eighteen.
Speaker 1: That's not funny.
Speaker 3: So I.
Speaker 4: With one career RBI f one career RBI which came
Speaker 4: at the University of Tennessee on a Thursday afternoon in April.
Speaker 4: Temperature was about sixty seven degrees. Remember, took a fast
Speaker 4: ball the other way, knocked in a RUNO looked like
Speaker 4: it was going to be the game winning run in
Speaker 4: a game that would give us the division in the SEC,
Speaker 4: give us the SEC East. And so I go back
Speaker 4: to take my position out there first, and I'm saying, man,
Speaker 4: I'm going to be all over the red and black
Speaker 4: the student newspaper for knocking in the run that gave
Speaker 4: us the division title. And this is this was a
Speaker 4: team Tennessee had Rick Honey cut the long time pitching
Speaker 4: comes Conridge Holloway, who was a great quarterback for Tennessee
Speaker 4: and had like a nine million game hitting streak. So
Speaker 4: this is a good Tennessee team. But I could just
Speaker 4: see it. I could just see the headline in the
Speaker 4: red and black. And then our shortstop made an air
Speaker 4: on it but should have been a game ending double
Speaker 4: play ball, and a couple hitters later, a guy hit
Speaker 4: a grand Slam and beat us.
Speaker 1: So there it went. So my my heroic one career
Speaker 1: went for nothing.
Speaker 4: And but again the experience everything that baseball, everything that
Speaker 4: sports teaches you about being a good teammate, you learn
Speaker 4: all that stuff in one year there. I will never
Speaker 4: forget it. But so so that's the long story on baseball.
Speaker 4: And then you know, I'm at Georgia and I got
Speaker 4: great journalism school, my dad being a broadcaster. I'd never
Speaker 4: really thought about doing it, and I just decided to
Speaker 4: give it a try one day. And then I discovered
Speaker 4: that man, they're letting you into the games for free.
Speaker 4: You're getting to hang out and get to go to
Speaker 4: any game you want to go to And so I
Speaker 4: started working at the campus radio station, then worked at
Speaker 4: a rock station in the in Athens, and then finally
Speaker 4: somebody hired me for TV a year after I graduated,
Speaker 4: and I was doing the news and making Georgia, which
Speaker 4: was which was an experience. And and but every step
Speaker 4: along the way, I don't care what profession you're in,
Speaker 4: every step along the way provides you with such a
Speaker 4: learning ground. And there were things that happened in making Georgia.
Speaker 4: Then I'll never forget that still play into what I
Speaker 4: do now.
Speaker 2: And so.
Speaker 4: It just goes that way. It's okay, so the baseball
Speaker 4: career is over, what are you going to do? And
Speaker 4: and so it was making Georgia to Spartanburg, South Carolina
Speaker 4: to Atlanta, you know, as a news reporter. And the
Speaker 4: thing that's crazy, And that's what I tell kids all
Speaker 4: the time in journalism schools. Things will happen that you
Speaker 4: don't see coming that will change the entire trajectory of
Speaker 4: your career. And for me, that was that you know,
Speaker 4: I'm in Atlanta, I'm your general assignment news reporter. I'm
Speaker 4: the guys like on the night beat Ernie Johnson Channel two,
Speaker 4: Action News and we get a new news director one
Speaker 4: day whose first day on the job, I'm just filling
Speaker 4: in for a sports guy who's on vacation. I'm doing
Speaker 4: a live I've shot at Atlanta Stadium before a Braves game.
Speaker 4: And I come into work the next day and his
Speaker 4: secretary comes in and says, Raven would like to see you.
Speaker 4: Raven Matthew is the new news director. And I'm thinking
Speaker 4: Jesus guy's cleaning house. He and wasting any time. New
Speaker 4: boss to come in and say, okay, you know, get
Speaker 4: a box and get your stuff. He's you ever thought
Speaker 4: about doing sports? And I love sports, you know, And
Speaker 4: he said, I'm going to make you the new weekend
Speaker 4: sports aiker. And that changed everything, changed everything about my
Speaker 4: life and about my career. And so I do that
Speaker 4: for seven years weekends for seven years at ws BE
Speaker 4: in Atlanta, and then here comes Turner comes knocking in
Speaker 4: nineteen eighty nine. Hey wow, we'd love to.
Speaker 1: Have you over here.
Speaker 4: And you know, I think geographically that helped, because you know,
Speaker 4: we're in Atlanta. Those guys are all watching the Atlanta
Speaker 4: stations all the time and they're like, hey, we got
Speaker 4: a guy right here in town. Who's I think we
Speaker 4: could use Thirty five years later you're talking to y'all amazing. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 4: you never know. You just never know what what the
Speaker 4: next day is.
Speaker 1: Going to bring. That's incredible. That's incredible story to watch
Speaker 1: your career.
Speaker 2: You've been on TV since I can remember, and you're
Speaker 2: saying you took the turn the job in nineteen eighty nine.
Speaker 1: I think I've told you this before. I was born
Speaker 1: in ninety, so actually that.
Speaker 4: I'm constantly looking for reminders about the old there's a
Speaker 4: very well played one right there. I let you know, Ernie,
Speaker 4: we all know you Sharper's attack, but.
Speaker 2: So you know we had My birthday was yesterday and
Speaker 2: a friend of mine bought a great bottle of wine
Speaker 2: to dinner last night, and he's like, well, it's eighty nine,
Speaker 2: though it's not ninety. He's born in eighty nine, so
Speaker 2: he got a bunch of eighty nine ones. He's like,
Speaker 2: it's eighty nine, it's not ninety, but eighty nine is
Speaker 2: a better year.
Speaker 1: Anyway. I was like, it's cool, Danny, I was eighty nine.
Speaker 1: It's all right. It's probably a really good ball right there.
Speaker 1: As he knows all about this one I'm feeling it
Speaker 1: right now.
Speaker 3: From that, let's get into some NBA news. A major
Speaker 3: topic today facing the NBA. Lebron and Channing Fry discussed
Speaker 3: why players are reluctant to take the face of the
Speaker 3: league role. After thirty five years of covering the NBA
Speaker 3: on TNT, what is your perspective of why players will
Speaker 3: resist being the face of the league.
Speaker 4: Well, you know, we we're talking this on the air
Speaker 4: the other night too about can can somebody dictate who
Speaker 4: the face of the of the league is? Or is
Speaker 4: that something you grab, you want and you seize it.
Speaker 4: Sometimes you can't help but be the face of the league.
Speaker 4: Sometimes that's all talent driven, but I think it does
Speaker 4: go hand in hand with reputation, how you carry yourself.
Speaker 4: And these days, obviously nothing goes unchecked from one day
Speaker 4: to the next, so you might you might have the
Speaker 4: talent to be the face of the league or the
Speaker 4: guy that everybody thinks of when they think, oh NBA,
Speaker 4: Oh I think Lebron James, or NBA I think Michael
Speaker 4: you know, back then, that kind of thing. But I
Speaker 4: think there is some validity to that that they would say, look,
Speaker 4: I don't want that pressure. I don't want every every
Speaker 4: step I take to be scrutinized, and so yeah, there's
Speaker 4: something to that. But I also I also think that
Speaker 4: for some maybe.
Speaker 1: I want that. I want to be that guy. I
Speaker 1: want you know, I want to carry the flag for
Speaker 1: the league. Uh.
Speaker 4: And with that comes the responsibility to do right. Okay,
Speaker 4: we'll be in the headlines for the wrong things. That
Speaker 4: all goes That all goes with it, because you you
Speaker 4: annoint somebody as the face of the NBA, then what
Speaker 4: happens when they slip up and do X or y? Yeah,
Speaker 4: you know the face anymore? Again, It's one of those
Speaker 4: nebulous things. And I and I think we're always in
Speaker 4: such a hurry these days to quantify everything that everything
Speaker 4: needs to be the best. This as he's got to
Speaker 4: be the goat, she's got to be the goat. How
Speaker 4: can he be the goat if she's a goat? You know,
Speaker 4: camp can we just not appreciate.
Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, a better?
Speaker 2: Um?
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, there's just this rush.
Speaker 4: And I think part of that is is isn't the
Speaker 4: media thing and whether it's sports talk or whether it's
Speaker 4: pods or whether whatever it is. But if I'm a
Speaker 4: sports talk shore you got four hours to fill. Well,
Speaker 4: we're going to spend an hour talking about who's the
Speaker 4: somebody just won a game last night with a three
Speaker 4: pointer at the buzzer. Is he the greatest fluck shooter
Speaker 4: of all time?
Speaker 1: Well? How can he be? And we want to argue
Speaker 1: for come on, just appreciate the moment, appreciate if we
Speaker 1: can do that.
Speaker 4: But apparently that's that's not the way things are done anymore.
Speaker 1: That is indeed true. I think you're spot on with
Speaker 1: everything you said.
Speaker 2: Do you see someone that you say, I think that's
Speaker 2: who it's going to be, because there's been this interesting
Speaker 2: landscape Boek like, for I just feel like for the
Speaker 2: last seven years, everyone has been trying to move.
Speaker 1: On from Brown, and you know, for the last.
Speaker 2: Four years, everybody's been trying to move on from Steph,
Speaker 2: thinking like, oh we got it now, like this young
Speaker 2: guy's coming, that young guy's coming, and it's like every
Speaker 2: year it's reverting right back.
Speaker 1: To those those guys Branhan, Steph and everything they're doing.
Speaker 2: When you look around the landscape, is there someone that
Speaker 2: you see that it's like, no, I think it's going
Speaker 2: to be that person.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think.
Speaker 4: I mean, you look at the young guys in the league.
Speaker 4: You look at the teams that are doing well. You
Speaker 4: look at the opportunity for what do you call it
Speaker 4: pr or high more visibility. Then you say, well, hey,
Speaker 4: how about Luca in LA for years? Yeah, he becomes
Speaker 4: the face of the NBA. Hey, here's Shake Gildes Alexander
Speaker 4: leading the league in score with a team that has
Speaker 4: the best record. Could he be the guy? Webamo, this
Speaker 4: freak be the guy? You know that We've never seen
Speaker 4: anybody that size do the things he does. Could he
Speaker 4: be that guy? So there are a bunch of candidates
Speaker 4: out there. But the thing to remember is this isn't
Speaker 4: an election, all right, This is not this is not like, okay,
Speaker 4: everybody have you know I've been a voter for years
Speaker 4: on these on the regular season awards. Not like you're
Speaker 4: going to add a category that says face of the league,
Speaker 4: give us you know, this is who is going to
Speaker 4: buy their play and by their character and by their leaders,
Speaker 4: by their persauna and there, yeah, exactly be the Who's
Speaker 4: that guy? And it's not like you apply for it.
Speaker 4: It's just like, well he's the face, you know what,
Speaker 4: We can see it and so so that's I think
Speaker 4: that's the way. That's the way it is. But please,
Speaker 4: let's not. Let's not put this up for a vote. Now,
Speaker 4: you know that's not the way that.
Speaker 1: Who's scoring big in the NBA this season?
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Speaker 1: Man.
Speaker 2: Last night, Bron reached fifty thousand points regular season and postseason.
Speaker 2: You obviously saw Bron come into the league from high
Speaker 2: school and obviously become one of the greatest players, if
Speaker 2: not the greatest player we've ever seen play this game.
Speaker 2: Is there some moment with Bron that stands out? We
Speaker 2: do more than others and watching his man?
Speaker 4: What is it twenty two years now, twenty one, twenty
Speaker 4: two years, forty years old, that night in Detroit or
Speaker 4: the night at the Palace of Auburn Hills. Because as
Speaker 4: a playoff night, and we got the show on the
Speaker 4: road us to what twenty five street and twenty nine
Speaker 4: out of thirty lay down the stretch And the thing
Speaker 4: that you know, and here's the great thing about the
Speaker 4: job that I have is being able to sit around
Speaker 4: and Watchroo with the guys. I watch, you know, you know,
Speaker 4: Kenny and Shack and Chuck and you know, Magic's been
Speaker 4: in there for a time before that. But when you
Speaker 4: watch a performance like that and then you glance over
Speaker 4: at these dudes and they're all like, then, you know
Speaker 4: you've seem something special.
Speaker 1: And so I think I think that was the night.
Speaker 4: That I'll never forget. I mean, that's it's amazing. And again,
Speaker 4: those are one of those nights that defied description. And
Speaker 4: on another front, obviously the fact that Space Jam and
Speaker 4: New Legacy in.
Speaker 1: That in that film, uh.
Speaker 4: Obvious and so and so you know, I'm still looking
Speaker 4: and still I'm still guys disappointed that the Best Supporting
Speaker 4: Actor nomination for real did not. Yeah, I'm figuring it's
Speaker 4: probably like when they had the NBA's fifty Greatest and
Speaker 4: I was working with Reggie Theis at the time, and
Speaker 4: Reggie said I was number fifty one, So I feel
Speaker 4: like that year at the Oscars there was probably seven
Speaker 4: nominees for Best Supporting I was eight.
Speaker 1: That excellent job. You know, that excellent job. We need
Speaker 1: Moore you on the big screen.
Speaker 2: You know. You know what the.
Speaker 4: Greatest thrill about being about doing that was we went
Speaker 4: to a theater to see it and took the grandkids
Speaker 4: and didn't really tell them what was going on, and
Speaker 4: then all of a sudden, I pop up and they're
Speaker 4: like poppy. So that was that was worth every second.
Speaker 1: That's amazing.
Speaker 2: Last calendar year, a little before the season started, we
Speaker 2: obviously learned the fate of TNT Sports and the landscape
Speaker 2: of what the lands, the media landscape will be.
Speaker 1: In the NBA.
Speaker 2: Absolutely thrilled that inside the NBA won't won't be going away,
Speaker 2: as TNT Sports will continue to produce it independently. The
Speaker 2: new addition will be that ESPN will feature the show
Speaker 2: at high profile NBA events next season, such as the
Speaker 2: NBA Finals, which is also a different thing for you guys.
Speaker 2: How excited are you to finally get a chance to
Speaker 2: cover the NBA Finals next season after all of these years.
Speaker 4: That's that's going to be a very cool part of
Speaker 4: this thing. Because there's always a feeling at the end
Speaker 4: of our playoff run. And I've been fortunate, you know,
Speaker 4: I'm always part of that trophy presentation with you know,
Speaker 4: to the Eastern Western Conference champions and it's and then
Speaker 4: you and then all of a sudden you go back
Speaker 4: and do the postgame show and then it's over, and
Speaker 4: we've done all the gone fishing pictures and it's done.
Speaker 4: I mean it's it's Jeff flat done, and it's and
Speaker 4: and then you go back and you watch the finals
Speaker 4: and and you're like, wow, it would be great to
Speaker 4: be there for that. So to to to be part
Speaker 4: of that next year, uh, is really cool. You know,
Speaker 4: we look forward to that very much. But the but
Speaker 4: the biggest thing about this won't change. Look, it's not easy.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 4: This NBA on TNT brand has been around since before
Speaker 4: you were born, Dray uh, you know, and and it
Speaker 4: was you know, we've had games on TBS or TNT
Speaker 4: for better than forty years. And so there there have
Speaker 4: been these these these moments this year that give you
Speaker 4: calls for reflection. I mean, I remember being in Boston
Speaker 4: for Opening Night and standing there and saying, Wow, this
Speaker 4: is this is really the last year of the NBA
Speaker 4: on TNT, and I felt the same thing at All
Speaker 4: Star Weekend. That was our last All Star game. Our
Speaker 4: first was two thousand and three in Atlanta and looked
Speaker 4: like Michael and his last All Star games the MVP
Speaker 4: and and there was foul light and Kobe hit free
Speaker 4: throws and Kevin Garnett was the MVP and and man,
Speaker 4: it's a blink. All of a sudden, we're sitting there
Speaker 4: in San Francisco and saying, this is the last one.
Speaker 4: It's the last one of these All Star games that
Speaker 4: we're gonna do. So that part's been difficult, and I'm
Speaker 4: glad that we're able to salvage the show even though
Speaker 4: it's not going to be on TNT. And as many
Speaker 4: times as I've tried to explain to folks how this works,
Speaker 4: it's I was like, huh, what what are you talking about?
Speaker 4: You're going to keep doing the show, but it's not
Speaker 4: going to be on TNA. Well where's it going to be.
Speaker 4: Well when you tune into some of these nights on
Speaker 4: ABC or ESPN, the pregame show is going to be us.
Speaker 4: We're gonna still be doing in Atlanta. We're just not
Speaker 4: going to be saying the NBA on T n T.
Speaker 4: You know, I'll see how many. I don't know what
Speaker 4: the over under it will be for me on times
Speaker 4: that I speak, but but yeah, to to stay together
Speaker 4: with those guys, to stay together with our production crew,
Speaker 4: that's really important. Yeah, you know, it's the I guess,
Speaker 4: the business of basketball. You know, these things, and sometimes
Speaker 4: it happens. You know, we've been I've been part of
Speaker 4: you know, we had the NFL for a while, then
Speaker 4: we lost it. You know, I did the PGA Championship forever,
Speaker 4: and then we you know, when the rights were up,
Speaker 4: we didn't get and you know the RERADI show. It happens,
Speaker 4: and we've been through it. But I'm just glad that
Speaker 4: that that core, not just the guys on the air,
Speaker 4: but that whole production crew. We'll still you know, we'll
Speaker 4: just do it. We'll just we'll just see it in
Speaker 4: a different place.
Speaker 2: Funny story, I've had the opportune and they obviously to
Speaker 2: work with Ernie on inside the NBA, and my first
Speaker 2: time working with the group, I get this rundown of
Speaker 2: everything that's going on, and this is during the time
Speaker 2: where everything's on zoom, you know, and So the production
Speaker 2: meeting is all these things on zoom.
Speaker 1: And so I log into the zoom. I'm a new guy.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to be laid for a meeting. I
Speaker 1: log into the zoom. I log in looking for Shack,
Speaker 1: looking for Chuck, looking looking for Kenny.
Speaker 2: The only person I see from the show is Ernie
Speaker 2: outside of the production crew's Ernie, and I'm like, I
Speaker 2: sit there. Ernie goes, Dray, mind, what the hell are
Speaker 2: you doing here? I'm going to mister production media, get
Speaker 2: out of here?
Speaker 1: How long off?
Speaker 2: And I said all of that to say, Ernie, can
Speaker 2: you explain to people a day we go live at?
Speaker 2: Say and I say we when I'm on the show,
Speaker 2: say we start at six thirty six o'clock, will say
Speaker 2: we go live at six o'clock, seven o'clock. Can you
Speaker 2: explain to people what your day is like when you
Speaker 2: arrive at the at Studio Jay on campus and then
Speaker 2: what you're doing preparing for a day, Because I don't
Speaker 2: think people really truly understand everything that you do. Like
Speaker 2: they see you obviously be the point guard and orchestrate,
Speaker 2: they don't know everything you explaining the day to us
Speaker 2: of a seven o'clock start time that's not ending until
Speaker 2: one thirty in the morning. Can you explain the day
Speaker 2: of Ernie Johnson to myself and the fans who love
Speaker 2: the show?
Speaker 4: The spoilers answer may may bore some folks. They may say, hey,
Speaker 4: you know, clip that piece of that Draymond and BD
Speaker 4: podcast where Ernie's talking about his preparation because I need
Speaker 4: that for like a sleep meditation tonight. But here's the deal.
Speaker 4: It's like it's it's like on those game days. Yeah,
Speaker 4: so you say the pregame shows out at seven o'clock,
Speaker 4: I'm in there. I'm in there between ten and eleven
Speaker 4: in the morning because I've also got to do the
Speaker 4: steam Room podcast with Charles, which is available wherever you
Speaker 4: get your podcasts. And I think, in a way, I'm
Speaker 4: like you guys. I mean, you think about, in the
Speaker 4: course of an NBA season or in the course of
Speaker 4: your basketball careers, you can become a creature of habit.
Speaker 1: You can become Look, this is my game.
Speaker 4: Day ritual, this is my game before you know, day
Speaker 4: before day off ritual. And I had the exact same thing.
Speaker 4: So there are certain things that I know I need
Speaker 4: to do. And the thing to remember about it is
Speaker 4: that my preparation for that night show has been going
Speaker 4: on all week. I keep a daily log of every
Speaker 4: game played in the league from beginning to end. So
Speaker 4: every game that's been played, I could, hey, here it is. Look,
Speaker 4: so this is let's see. Let's see. Now I'm just
Speaker 4: open enough. So that's so, there's February. This is February.
Speaker 4: So and it's all kind of in my own shorthand
Speaker 4: for what I for, what I can for what I
Speaker 4: can understand. So I mean, I can look at last night.
Speaker 4: I could look at last night's Golden State game as
Speaker 4: I go through the box scores every night, and so
Speaker 4: Buddy Heal had it was one nineteen. Well, the Charlotte
Speaker 4: game was one nineteen one oh one, made Golden State
Speaker 4: thirty three and twenty eight. It was the hornets seventh
Speaker 4: straight loss. Buddy Heeld had twenty two, Curry twenty one
Speaker 4: and Tennissist Pajemski nineteen, Drey had sixteen, twelve and seven,
Speaker 4: Butler had thirteen. They never trailed and led by nineteen
Speaker 4: thirty five and nine for Miles Bridges on the other side.
Speaker 4: But it's those details on it every game that is played,
Speaker 4: because then I can anytime. Then when I see teams
Speaker 4: playing again, I can refer back to that day. Okay,
Speaker 4: here's what happened in that game. So that's one of
Speaker 4: the things I do on a daily basis, and then
Speaker 4: keeping these these files on every team. So here's tomorrow night,
Speaker 4: because Golden State and Brooklyn are playing tomorrow night. That's
Speaker 4: one of six games on the schedule. Neither of them
Speaker 4: play tonight, so I can I can get through. I've
Speaker 4: got this as the wow as the Golden State Brooklyn breakdown,
Speaker 4: and I see I update those those team profiles every day.
Speaker 4: So with the Warriors. So your last post was the
Speaker 4: twenty three Western Conference Semis knocked out in the play
Speaker 4: in in twenty four twenty two champs over Boston four
Speaker 4: too your home. Your record on the road is seventeen
Speaker 4: and fifteen, six and one since the break with Jimmy Butler,
Speaker 4: you're twenty two and four. When you lead at the half,
Speaker 4: you're seven and one. When you allow under one hundred,
Speaker 4: you're one and eleven when you score under one hundred,
Speaker 4: and I don't know, and it's overkill, fellas, but you
Speaker 4: and you go into every show realizing ninety five percent
Speaker 4: of the stuff you got never going to make there,
Speaker 4: but on the but on the off chance that there
Speaker 4: is something in here that's that's relevant, then you've got it.
Speaker 4: And you just feel like you're into the game and
Speaker 4: you know exactly what's what's going on. So that goes
Speaker 4: on all week, and so really just the finishing touches
Speaker 4: are put on on a game day, you know, I'll
Speaker 4: read articles from around the league, you know, I'll look
Speaker 4: at the production format that Tim Kiley has put in. Okay,
Speaker 4: let's see what we need to and then really just
Speaker 4: do just doing facts and that kind of thing.
Speaker 1: And so that's it.
Speaker 4: So the preparation never ends. It's look, doing the show's
Speaker 4: the easy part. The work is all a prep yeah,
Speaker 4: and so, and so that's why, like I mean last night,
Speaker 4: I didn't work last night, but I worked here in
Speaker 4: my office at home because I'm flipping around from game
Speaker 4: to game and from nine to thirty until one thirty,
Speaker 4: I'm doing this stuff.
Speaker 1: But that's it. And it's not like I show up
Speaker 1: on Thursday and say, hey, what happened in the league
Speaker 1: this week?
Speaker 4: You know, that's it's like it's just an ongoing process.
Speaker 4: But it's what makes me comfortable. It may it's not
Speaker 4: for everybody. There are a million guys out here doing
Speaker 4: what I do, and they have their own ways of
Speaker 4: doing it. But for me, that's what makes me comfortable.
Speaker 4: And what I discovered long ago is when you're comfortable
Speaker 4: and when you're prepared, you don't get rattled. Right, So
Speaker 4: somebody can break a backboard and throw it back to
Speaker 4: the studio for twenty minutes while they're fixing.
Speaker 1: Shoot, I can fill for two hours what you need.
Speaker 1: I love that.
Speaker 3: I love that you know the preparation, everything going into it.
Speaker 3: And then like he said, the show is easy, right
Speaker 3: once you get to the show is easy. But like
Speaker 3: I went one, how fun is it? And how easy
Speaker 3: is it to.
Speaker 1: Keep those dudes on? Garrael, Kenny Sack shut?
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: In there with me, you know what it is. And
Speaker 1: every show is somewhere between a walk on the beach
Speaker 1: and a train wreck.
Speaker 4: And the time, you don't know which it's going to
Speaker 4: be until you get the younger and and and you
Speaker 4: don't because because part of the deal is, look, we
Speaker 4: all have lives. We all have some days are good
Speaker 4: and some days are a little rocky. And so somebody
Speaker 4: you may be bringing that to the chair when you
Speaker 4: sit down. You had a bad day, Shack, you had
Speaker 4: a bad day, and he doesn't know, doesn't feel like
Speaker 4: taking anything, and you can tell right from the car
Speaker 4: that's gonna happen. So really it's just kind of a
Speaker 4: feeling out process, and it's like, Okay, how's this gonna
Speaker 4: Is the energy good in here? Geez, he's Shack's on
Speaker 4: fire tonight. This is going to be a long or chucky,
Speaker 4: subdued I don't know Auburn law, you know. So so
Speaker 4: you you're constantly kind of reading the room and then
Speaker 4: kind of figuring out which direction you want to go.
Speaker 4: And it's like it's like, I'm people call me so
Speaker 4: many different things in that role.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 4: It's hey, he's the ring master. Hey he's the point guard,
Speaker 4: he's the traffic cop. I'm actually that traffic cop who's
Speaker 4: not very good at his job because instead of end
Speaker 4: of trying to wave people through the intersection with no
Speaker 4: fender benders, I'm like waving Kenny this way because I
Speaker 4: know Shack is going to broadside.
Speaker 1: And so and so. In that way, I'm a little, uh,
Speaker 1: a little bit of a rogue traffic cop. But that's
Speaker 1: that's how that's how it goes. Man. And if folks
Speaker 1: at home or and.
Speaker 4: You're saying, I have no idea what is going to
Speaker 4: happen next on this show, join the club man, because
Speaker 4: I got no idea either. And again, you guys have
Speaker 4: both seen it. You know the show can go a
Speaker 4: million different directions, and sometimes you just let it go,
Speaker 4: and sometimes you need to try to rain the guys
Speaker 4: in and maybey okay good because you know Chuck has
Speaker 4: a bad habit of repeating himself. You know, he'll make it,
Speaker 4: he'll make a point and then repeat it three more
Speaker 4: times before and like the other night he was doing,
Speaker 4: I said, look, man, you're just making laps on this thing,
Speaker 4: and we stop and move on, okay, And so sometimes
Speaker 4: I guess I just need to let him know that
Speaker 4: I know you've just said that four times. You know
Speaker 4: I'm not going to let you say it five times.
Speaker 4: But yeah, that's that's the way it goes. It's just
Speaker 4: it's all feel, it's like and and Tim Kyley gets
Speaker 4: a lot of credit for that too, the producer, because
Speaker 4: you know, we'll get in my years sometimes say let's
Speaker 4: move on, or he'll say let it go.
Speaker 1: This is good.
Speaker 4: You know, like like we can continue to if it's
Speaker 4: a really good discussion. So but yeah, it's all feel
Speaker 4: it's like, okay, this is trying to run its course, phone,
Speaker 4: let's change let's change direction and do something else.
Speaker 1: I've had so much fun on the show.
Speaker 2: You know, it's unlike anything that I've ever done, and
Speaker 2: I'm not sure in media that you can ever do
Speaker 2: anything else that's like no, like it's it's I'm not
Speaker 2: sure how you can recreate it, Like I'm not sure,
Speaker 2: like I don't think it can be recreated. But it's
Speaker 2: so free flowing. But yet and still it's not just
Speaker 2: like Haywire though. It's not just like anything goes like
Speaker 2: it's very much so like, hey, we want to talk
Speaker 2: about these things, and then if it goes somewhere else, great,
Speaker 2: But for me to have the opportunity to be on
Speaker 2: that show with you guys and just watch and learn and.
Speaker 1: To watch you guys help me.
Speaker 2: You know, when I'm sitting there and can't really get
Speaker 2: a word in and you're like, Drake, mind what about this?
Speaker 2: You know, or you know, early when I first started,
Speaker 2: you know, we're on the break and Chuck's asking me like, hey,
Speaker 2: so what are your thoughts on NIL? And I tell
Speaker 2: them my thoughts on NIL. We come back from the break,
Speaker 2: starts talking and Chuck goes, you know, Draymond has some
Speaker 2: thoughts on and like.
Speaker 1: Just throw me alive and I go on it.
Speaker 2: And just to like have that experience and really my
Speaker 2: first experience in media and like really doing TV. I
Speaker 2: feel like it's set me up so well for the future,
Speaker 2: just being able to work next to stars to greats,
Speaker 2: and I just want to say thank you for helping
Speaker 2: me move into that field, but just making it so
Speaker 2: easy for me to just go up there and speak
Speaker 2: and try to build my brand in that space. I
Speaker 2: just want to say thank you because I couldn't ask
Speaker 2: for a better experience.
Speaker 4: Right's the first thing, Right, What's the first thing I
Speaker 4: said to you after your first show with us? I said, Man,
Speaker 4: are you in a great spot? Because I don't know
Speaker 4: how much longer you're going to play. But when it's done,
Speaker 4: you can write your ticket because everybody's going to launch you.
Speaker 1: It is.
Speaker 4: It's true, man, And there's look some guys.
Speaker 1: Half it.
Speaker 4: You know, we knew right away.
Speaker 1: Kenny had it. You know, Kenny was you know, Kenny
Speaker 1: just had this way about him. This great like street Wise,
Speaker 1: you know, you can't throw me off my game in
Speaker 1: any way.
Speaker 4: You asked me anything out and he was great, and
Speaker 4: we said, oh man, when he's done, he's got to
Speaker 4: be part of the show. And that's always been the
Speaker 4: key to any to any player who's tried to venture
Speaker 4: out and branch out, and a lot of times their
Speaker 4: agents are like, I'm going to try to get my
Speaker 4: guy on.
Speaker 1: TV because I think, you know, this is the avenue.
Speaker 4: And there are some guys who you would see them
Speaker 4: interviewed post game or see their personality on the floor
Speaker 4: and say, he might be really good on TV, but
Speaker 4: there's about that red light going on. There's something there's
Speaker 4: something about that red light going on, and suddenly the
Speaker 4: topic of conversation is this guy's is this guy's buddy?
Speaker 1: What am I going to say? Am I going to
Speaker 1: be honest?
Speaker 4: Or am I going to say what my buddy wants
Speaker 4: me to say or to say about his team? And
Speaker 4: there can be that oh, I don't know if I
Speaker 4: want to go there. To our guys credit, they have
Speaker 4: never shied away despite what you despite what players in
Speaker 4: the league might say, and b D the same way
Speaker 4: you know I say I talk about this, you know,
Speaker 4: with when Dray was on the show a few years
Speaker 4: ago for the first time. But it's the same way
Speaker 4: with you when you're on the air with us, we're
Speaker 4: like gets he's.
Speaker 1: Just being him.
Speaker 4: He's not like all got to be TV I now,
Speaker 4: you know. It's just like what you guys had me
Speaker 4: on the show, And this is what I am. And
Speaker 4: that's all you can ask for is somebody to be
Speaker 4: authentic and genuine and be themselves and not hold back.
Speaker 4: And for a guy like Chuck, who was the most
Speaker 4: quotable guy in the world on every topic when he
Speaker 4: was a player, who was always sought out for his opinion,
Speaker 4: he never shied away from that. And that's what may
Speaker 4: and that's what makes it work so And it also
Speaker 4: goes back when you talk about the free flowing conversation.
Speaker 4: It goes back to the fact that these guys are
Speaker 4: not in the production meeting because people we don't want
Speaker 4: the show laid out, so they're thinking about, well, what
Speaker 4: am I going to say about that? What am I
Speaker 4: going to say about the Bucks, What am I going
Speaker 4: to say about the Clippers? What am I going to
Speaker 4: say about Kawhi it's gonna come up, and what do
Speaker 4: you think right there? Not with not with a bunch
Speaker 4: of of oh, I'm trying to remember what I said,
Speaker 4: and not with a rehearsed kind of But we've seen
Speaker 4: enough shows that are so over that are so rehearsed
Speaker 4: the opinions and the things that are happening are happening.
Speaker 1: Like boom boom boom.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Like okay, now you're supposed to talk to I'm
Speaker 4: supposed to talk to Hans, but now we're supposed to
Speaker 4: get to commercial with us. It's like, geez, who knows
Speaker 4: how it's going to go, you know, with all this
Speaker 4: stuff flying back and forth. And that's what I think
Speaker 4: that's why it resonates. I think that's that gives you
Speaker 4: more of that feel like you're sitting in the living
Speaker 4: room with your with your fellas watching nobody's asking for
Speaker 4: permission to talk, you know, nobody's You don't go to
Speaker 4: commercial break and say when we come back, you say this,
Speaker 4: and then you say this, and I'll laugh and you
Speaker 4: say this. No, we're just letting it fly and then
Speaker 4: eventually we got to get back to the game, and
Speaker 4: then we'll pick it up when the game's over. So
Speaker 4: that's that's how it works.
Speaker 2: Opinions sometimes can get heat it. You know, you're talking
Speaker 2: about basketball, which off for guys on that dage long
Speaker 2: you go through life, you start to show us seven o'clock,
Speaker 2: it could be twelve fifteen's been there for four and
Speaker 2: a half hours. Well you've been there for thirteen and
Speaker 2: a half hours, but everyone else has been there for
Speaker 2: like call it five five and a half hours. You
Speaker 2: get a little grawl, you get a little tired u
Speaker 2: pee and start to clash. Have there ever been moments
Speaker 2: on a set where you felt like, man, this could
Speaker 2: this could really lean the other way, like and like
Speaker 2: go somewhere.
Speaker 1: We really don't want it to go amongst.
Speaker 4: The guys, no be And a lot of times the
Speaker 4: talk from people who watch and they've asked me this thing.
Speaker 4: You're afraid that Shaq and Charles are really gonna you know,
Speaker 4: throw hands some night, And I said, no, no, no,
Speaker 4: they look these guys are tight. Their moms were tight.
Speaker 4: You know there is their families were tight. No, but
Speaker 4: they but here's the deal. They realized that every everybody
Speaker 4: on that show comes at the game from a different angle,
Speaker 4: and so they are gonna be you know, you know,
Speaker 4: Shaq is going to give you the big Man got
Speaker 4: to give you thirty and fifteen. You know, that's just
Speaker 4: it's a solution to everything, you know, and knowing the
Speaker 4: Charles and Jenny will point.
Speaker 1: Out, look, you were Shack, you're Shack.
Speaker 4: Okay, you can do that, but not everybody is you
Speaker 4: doesn't matter, you know, And so I think because of that,
Speaker 4: you can have these differences of opinion, and a lot
Speaker 4: of times that comes down to, like, you know, Shack
Speaker 4: saying the coaching doesn't matter. You know, here's a guy
Speaker 4: who's played with some of the greatest coaches of all time,
Speaker 4: but he's saying he'd you know, And then you get
Speaker 4: a Chuck and the man you must have been enjoyed
Speaker 4: a coach and then they say you're going to be
Speaker 4: some furniture movement. I mean, but no, I don't think
Speaker 4: I don't think that that's ever been an issue of thinking, oh, yeah,
Speaker 4: these guys are really these guys are really mad at
Speaker 4: each other. I mean, look, there was one time, in particular,
Speaker 4: the clip has gone viral about a billion times of
Speaker 4: the you know, the night that Charles took all of
Speaker 4: Shack's time on a sponsored only you know, I finally
Speaker 4: get finding you know, they were twenty five seconds okay,
Speaker 4: Shack then, you know, because Charles had answered, and then
Speaker 4: I was about to throw it to Shack, and then
Speaker 4: Charles took it back because he had something else to
Speaker 4: add for the fourth time.
Speaker 1: And then when I get it back to Shack, No, no,
Speaker 1: I know.
Speaker 4: He wants to talk me thing all the time about
Speaker 4: him supposed to you know, I was supposed to be
Speaker 4: one to two to three, not one to two and
Speaker 4: back to one, which which that's when he which when
Speaker 4: he said, it was the funniest thing I'd ever heard of.
Speaker 4: And I couldn't stop and so but what you didn't
Speaker 4: realize he was it was it was so many Shack
Speaker 4: was Shaq was running fuck.
Speaker 1: P D B D.
Speaker 4: This was during the playoffs, and he came minute, he
Speaker 4: came in the next night. He was he was quiet,
Speaker 4: He wouldn't talk.
Speaker 1: He was in the show stars and he's just sitting
Speaker 1: here like this, straight ahead and I'm having to beg
Speaker 1: him to talk. You know, come on, hey, big fella,
Speaker 1: come on, this good matchup. You know they don't want
Speaker 1: to fall down three to one in the series. No,
Speaker 1: they don't.
Speaker 7: He's still he is still hot, and so really that's
Speaker 7: that's one of the That's one of the few times
Speaker 7: I've ever seen any kind of a carryover from one
Speaker 7: show to the next where somebody where somebody they got
Speaker 7: got their feelings hurt a little bit and was not
Speaker 7: going to take part.
Speaker 4: In And I remember, I remember that pregame show ended
Speaker 4: and Shock immediately got up and went to the green
Speaker 4: room and Kenny and Chuck and I looked at the other.
Speaker 1: Somebody said, work with a big fellow in this arena.
Speaker 3: Oh man, that seems like a great, great fun And
Speaker 3: then I wanted to, you know, share a moment uh
Speaker 3: in the career that she did something uh on basketball related.
Speaker 1: I remember we made burritos.
Speaker 3: Uh, we did the uh indie race where everybody kept
Speaker 3: calling me a getaway driver. And Charlotte, what are some
Speaker 3: of those moments that you enjoy, you know from the
Speaker 3: show that you guys do you know off campus or activities.
Speaker 1: What are one of those moments That was one?
Speaker 4: The one in Charlotte was really fun because we went
Speaker 4: to the drag went to the drag strip up there
Speaker 4: and and got to have those. And I'm still picked
Speaker 4: off because I had because I had Candas Parker beat
Speaker 4: and then something happened to our car. But uh, but
Speaker 4: we we had those We had that big race at
Speaker 4: Georgia Tech. All of this based on Kenny running to
Speaker 4: the board all the time, you know, and and by
Speaker 4: the way, he never he never challenges Draymond on that
Speaker 4: race to the board when when dra comes visits us,
Speaker 4: because they get just to the board in about two
Speaker 4: and a half steps. And but so that led to
Speaker 4: this big We're gonna have one hundred meter dash at
Speaker 4: Georgia Tech. And it's me and Weber, Chuck, Shaq and Kenny.
Speaker 4: Again this also probably available online somewhere, but it was,
Speaker 4: you know, everybody's wolfing, everybody's saying why they're gonna win.
Speaker 1: And it was such a bogus start me, I'm the
Speaker 1: idiot who says I'm just I'm waiting on the gun.
Speaker 4: And I was the only guy on the gun start
Speaker 4: that hundred meters. So I immediately sat up and I say,
Speaker 4: fall start, fall start name.
Speaker 1: Nobody listening to me. They're going and.
Speaker 4: Chuck, I mean, I know I would have beaten Chuck
Speaker 4: because he hasn't finished it yet. And and Shaq pulls
Speaker 4: a Hammy or with about forty yards to go and
Speaker 4: he's actually winning and is coasting to the finish line
Speaker 4: and then Weber passes him right at the line and
Speaker 4: breaks the tongue and that was the hole you got
Speaker 4: to run through the tape. But it was it was again,
Speaker 4: it was one of those things where it was like
Speaker 4: who who thinks this up?
Speaker 1: You know who? And who pulls it off?
Speaker 4: And because we were using this is years ago before
Speaker 4: drones even became that big a thing, and we're looking
Speaker 4: around and these things are buzzing around, they're shooting this
Speaker 4: with drones. They're dead, and it was. It was tremendous.
Speaker 4: I just those are the things that those are the
Speaker 4: things that set us apart. I think those are the
Speaker 4: things that's like, we'll do anything and some of it
Speaker 4: will be great and some of it might not be
Speaker 4: funny at all and might not work, but man, we're
Speaker 4: going to shoot our shot and we'll see. So I think, yeah,
Speaker 4: I think that that historical dash that was certainly one
Speaker 4: of them. We spoke about it. You've had a long career.
Speaker 4: Is there one thing out there doesn't have to be
Speaker 4: a sports or anything.
Speaker 2: Is there one thing out there that you look at it,
Speaker 2: you say, I still, I haven't done that, but I
Speaker 2: want to do that thing before I'm done.
Speaker 4: You know what I have been able to condition myself, Draymond,
Speaker 4: to appreciate what I have been able to do and
Speaker 4: not what I haven't been able to do. So no,
Speaker 4: I've never given that a thought. I'd never say, boy,
Speaker 4: this has been great, but I really want to do this.
Speaker 4: I have what I call it get to job, not
Speaker 4: a got to job. We've all seen folks at the
Speaker 4: traffic light who are driving to got two jobs. I'm
Speaker 4: doing this because I've got to go to this. I
Speaker 4: got to get to job, to go down there and
Speaker 4: hang out with these four, with these three guys, and
Speaker 4: have been able to do that for thirty five years.
Speaker 4: So I've always been been focused on what I get
Speaker 4: to do, and never a regret, and never a boy, Michael,
Speaker 4: my career could be complete if I could just do this.
Speaker 1: That's not the way it works for me. You go
Speaker 1: from March Madness to the NBA playoffs.
Speaker 3: I would like to know which one is more intense,
Speaker 3: which one is more interesting for you?
Speaker 4: The prep for March Madness is so much more than
Speaker 4: for the NBA. Look, I got this NBA thing down,
Speaker 4: you know, on a nightly basis, doing the things that
Speaker 4: I have to do and I know to get ready.
Speaker 4: But every college basketball season, it's like, hey, how many
Speaker 4: teams might make the tournament? And that's kind of where
Speaker 4: I start, you know, It's like I'll start really paying
Speaker 4: attention in December and just before they start getting into
Speaker 4: conference schedules and that kind of thing. And since we've
Speaker 4: been doing that for thirteen years, thirteen fourteen years, now
Speaker 4: I have a like this database on my computer where
Speaker 4: I've got profiles on probably two hundred and something teams.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 4: So right, just because over just because over the years,
Speaker 4: that's how many you know, starting with that first year,
Speaker 4: it's like I got one hundred teams here that might
Speaker 4: make the tournament, you know, depending on all these conference tournaments.
Speaker 4: And then it just increases and then every year you're
Speaker 4: updating this. Okay, now it's this guy's eighteenth year as
Speaker 4: the head coach, and their March Madness history is this,
Speaker 4: and here are their top guys. And now you add
Speaker 4: to that equation. Okay, got to take it to the
Speaker 4: next level. Where else has this guy been? Okay, So
Speaker 4: we transferred this year from here, but the previous two
Speaker 4: years he was here and before that here, and now
Speaker 4: he's playing in his eighth year in college, so that's fall.
Speaker 4: So that's all added to the preparation there. So that's
Speaker 4: where again the amount of preparation for the compared to
Speaker 4: the length of the event. You're doing all this because
Speaker 4: in two three weeks it's all going to be over.
Speaker 2: It.
Speaker 4: It's not like an eighty two game season. It's like
Speaker 4: this thing is going to start in mid March and
Speaker 4: be over in early April. Yeah, why there is this
Speaker 4: much work getting into it? So there's still something about
Speaker 4: that tournament BD. To answer your question, that is something
Speaker 4: no other sport heads that I've seen. There's just that hole,
Speaker 4: that whole vibe around the tournament, which you know, you
Speaker 4: don't have to be a sportsman to have a bracket, right,
Speaker 4: you just you know that's it's one of the great
Speaker 4: uniting things in our country. It is March madness. It
Speaker 4: gets everybody together.
Speaker 1: It gets people.
Speaker 4: I don't even know if there are water coolers anymore,
Speaker 4: but if you have a water cooler in your office,
Speaker 4: that's where you would gather to talk about. Wow, you
Speaker 4: really think South Dakota State can beat so and say
Speaker 4: you know that, and so it would bring people together,
Speaker 4: even for a short time, for some common ground. And
Speaker 4: and again and the one and done nature of that,
Speaker 4: you know, leads to these you know, these iconic buzzer
Speaker 4: beating moments that that live forever. And that's what Yeah,
Speaker 4: So that's what's really really special about that. So yeah,
Speaker 4: and the fact that I you know, get to go
Speaker 4: to New York with Kenny and Chuck and and Clark
Speaker 4: kellog up there again, that's that's it's so much fun.
Speaker 1: And but those days you guys.
Speaker 4: Have been in the NBA studio, you talk about, you know,
Speaker 4: getting in there and walking out at two o'clock in
Speaker 4: the morning. Yeah, I mean you're talking about games noon
Speaker 4: to one, noon to one. Those first two days are
Speaker 4: so crazy. You're sitting around and and it's like, Okay,
Speaker 4: I'm doing a CBS halftime show that I'm going to
Speaker 4: bring TNT on the air, and we're doing a true
Speaker 4: TV halftime and all these are happening like boom boom boom. Okay,
Speaker 4: this true true TV halftime is which game?
Speaker 1: Good?
Speaker 4: Okay, I've seen eight seconds of that. But luckily Clark
Speaker 4: has a good handle on it, so we'll go to him.
Speaker 4: So it's that kind of a thing. It's non stop
Speaker 4: and the hours are long. But as I've always told
Speaker 4: Kenny and Chuck, when those days start getting long and
Speaker 4: we're kind of getting a little bit bleary eyed, Look
Speaker 4: if your boss told you at your job, hey, all
Speaker 4: I want you to do for the next four days
Speaker 4: is watch the tournament.
Speaker 1: You probably sign up for that. And that's how we're doing.
Speaker 1: And a heartbeat. I watched. I love the tournament, so
Speaker 1: I get it. Marchin on differently before we get out
Speaker 1: of here. We love to make a good list.
Speaker 2: Could you do your top five inside the NBA moments
Speaker 2: that you've in your thirty five years.
Speaker 4: Yeah, let's see. Some of them will be, uh, this
Speaker 4: is tough to do, but some of them will be
Speaker 4: like just clowning on the guys and that kind of thing.
Speaker 4: Probably the Champions Club ranks up there where we locked
Speaker 4: Charles out of the studio for halftime because he didn't
Speaker 4: ever ring.
Speaker 1: Only champions could get in.
Speaker 4: I think I think the Kenny Kenny against Charles diaper
Speaker 4: changing contest where we melted when we melted a little butterfinger,
Speaker 4: uh microwave and put it inside the diaper and Charles
Speaker 4: nearly fainted. Let's see retiring Kenny's jersey. Retiring it was
Speaker 4: so funny.
Speaker 1: On the clothes line. I would say he was so
Speaker 1: upset about that, he was I'm getting out of here.
Speaker 4: I remember, Yeah, I would think Shack, whether he's falling
Speaker 4: or being pushed into Christmas trees or the night the
Speaker 4: night that he actually got his foot wrapped around the
Speaker 4: cable and pulled the monitor out of.
Speaker 1: The set that goats up there.
Speaker 4: But here's here's the deal, and I'll bring it back
Speaker 4: to I'll be real. The show I'll never forget is
Speaker 4: the one we did in La after Kobe died because
Speaker 4: they canceled the game. But we went out there and
Speaker 4: did the show mid court, nobody in the nobody in
Speaker 4: the arena, and just talk about him. And for like Shack,
Speaker 4: it was the first time he had a chance to
Speaker 4: talk about Kobe. You know, we bring Jerry west On
Speaker 4: and he's balling, you know.
Speaker 2: It was.
Speaker 4: It was the most powerful show I've ever been a
Speaker 4: part of. And it was just so real and so raw,
Speaker 4: and it was and it just I think it was
Speaker 4: just a demonstration of the fact that yeah, we can
Speaker 4: have some really ridiculous times on our show, and we
Speaker 4: can make your laugh and you can go to work
Speaker 4: the next day and talk about you see what those
Speaker 4: clowns did. But also they'll say, man, did you see
Speaker 4: did you see that tribute to Kobe last night? And
Speaker 4: that was you know, probably that's the thing. If I
Speaker 4: had to look at it right now and say, the
Speaker 4: thing I will never forget about that show is that night.
Speaker 1: That's incredible. I don't know how. I don't know how
Speaker 1: we can go past that. Such a great note to
Speaker 1: end on.
Speaker 2: I think, you know, when we look around the basketball landscape,
Speaker 2: obviously all of us are big Kobe fans.
Speaker 1: You know, we all miss him, and so to end
Speaker 1: on that is incredible.
Speaker 2: But more importantly, Ernie, we can't thank you enough for
Speaker 2: coming on the show, sharing your stories, your backstory going
Speaker 2: all the way back to childhood, but more importantly just
Speaker 2: sharing your energy and your life on this show. Obviously
Speaker 2: we're all big fans of you, as we said earlier,
Speaker 2: for us, both of us, to have the opportunity to
Speaker 2: work next to you and catch some of them assist
Speaker 2: you be throwing out.
Speaker 1: One of.
Speaker 2: My TV career, Man, tell me about it. So I
Speaker 2: just want to say thank you for really coming on.
Speaker 2: I've been a complete honor and just hearing these stories,
Speaker 2: it's been a special one for me.
Speaker 4: I appreciate you, fellows, thank you so much for having
Speaker 4: me on. And I am no, hey, it's a it's
Speaker 4: a get to your job.
Speaker 1: Man. I'm glad I could share some of.
Speaker 2: It with you.
Speaker 1: Yes, really appreciate you. Thank you.
Speaker 3: Ejmch Love. We can't wait for the next book too.
Speaker 3: I scripted the first one. Amazing.
Speaker 1: I can't wait. I can't wait and wait for the
Speaker 1: next one. Yeah, I got a few. I got a
Speaker 1: few of them up here, man, I got one for us.
Speaker 3: Uh n right book, Yeah, I know, I got you
Speaker 3: got bars and he got bars right. He was sitting
Speaker 3: the bars at the at the legends.
Speaker 1: Bruh.
Speaker 3: That was man, the way he was doing the INSS
Speaker 3: asked car we need a whole Silsan's book.
Speaker 1: Well, Ernie Bars b d you and me. I would
Speaker 1: love to do that, you know it. I would count
Speaker 1: me in. I'll get to work. I got you as
Speaker 1: I feel like I broke it. That all right, already
Speaker 1: start weekend J Executive producer.
Speaker 4: All right, thank you, all right, thank you thank you
Speaker 4: so much, Big Dome, the Ghost, good luckdown the stretch man.
Speaker 1: Thank you really appreciate it. I'll see you soon. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you got it.
Speaker 4: And it's been hey great being your teammates, both of you.
Speaker 4: Thank you, thank you on and uh, that's been a
Speaker 4: great thing about that show man. I'm getting to meet
Speaker 4: folks like you. Appreciate your time. Man likewise, thank you.
Speaker 2: Hi.
Speaker 1: Sona to be a part of it, all right, Arnie
Speaker 1: the volume
Speaker 3: Mm hmm