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 and this is cut to it.
Speaker 1: Good do good? Do what they're getting down to? Do it?
Speaker 1: Good do it. We asked the questions you always want
Speaker 1: to know, but no one ever asked, let's cut to it.
Speaker 1: You ain't heard them about it, then we're about to
Speaker 1: let you know. It's all. Being a football player, I
Speaker 1: my task is as a while receiver. I look at
Speaker 1: the I look at the linebacker, look at the safety.
Speaker 1: Then I look at the corner. Already know what potentially
Speaker 1: what defenses they will play. They saw us your alignment,
Speaker 1: the route I have, and how I should do it.
Speaker 1: I am able to look at that, fix the problem
Speaker 1: and then run my route. I look at life like that,
Speaker 1: and it's so hard to do well. The strive for
Speaker 1: excellence that you put on yourself. Let me tell you
Speaker 1: something that you are undermining, you are undercutting, that you're
Speaker 1: using the wrong words. Do you want to know what
Speaker 1: I realized? I am. I am obsessed with perfection. I
Speaker 1: am obsessed with completing goals and getting tested up. It
Speaker 1: urged me because now I sit back and I go,
Speaker 1: I gotta slow down, I gotta stop. I gotta enjoy
Speaker 1: as we mentor each other that we do because of
Speaker 1: our friendship outside. We've had these discussions and we're getting
Speaker 1: better in perfection may not be able to be achieved,
Speaker 1: but one percent better every day. That's what you want
Speaker 1: to because I've been I was taught if you're not
Speaker 1: getting better, you're getting worse, getting worse. Do you know
Speaker 1: how tough that is? Can you imagine going into work
Speaker 1: in football that is the common thing. You are getting
Speaker 1: better each year or you're getting worse. Here's a you
Speaker 1: want to hear a funny story of how I took
Speaker 1: that to the intgree of but wholeness, but but holes
Speaker 1: because I got it right. So each year when coach
Speaker 1: Fox was the head coach, we used to do these
Speaker 1: things in the off season and you have to come
Speaker 1: in and work out and they didn't have a test.
Speaker 1: You have to run a forty, you have the bench press,
Speaker 1: you have the vertical jump, you have to do all
Speaker 1: that stuff. And eventually, because guys started getting hurt pulling hamstrings,
Speaker 1: so they just really did it to the weight room.
Speaker 1: I was into muscle and Derance I was not into
Speaker 1: lifting a whole bunch of weight, so we would have
Speaker 1: to bench. You have to test. So so the first
Speaker 1: year I did it, I begrudgingly did it begrudgingly. I
Speaker 1: begrudgingly did five one, two, three, four, five. Then my
Speaker 1: vertical whatever it is, did my run run. Okay, I'm
Speaker 1: out next year. So you gotta remember, you're either getting better,
Speaker 1: are you getting worse? Are you getting worse? And if
Speaker 1: you're getting worse, they will what replace you? They would
Speaker 1: draft your replacement. So, being a unique individual, I am
Speaker 1: I get under the bench for us again. Boom one, two, three,
Speaker 1: or I'm gonna get you all up? Push it four,
Speaker 1: got it? Five, boom, got up to five, about to
Speaker 1: hit six, stopped halfway and said, hey, how many high
Speaker 1: last year that's got? Looks at paper? He goes five, six, boom,
Speaker 1: getting better, bit and I got off. I went straight
Speaker 1: to the shower, got drafted, and I left. I got better.
Speaker 1: You cannot draft anybody to replace me because technically, yeah,
Speaker 1: I got showed improvement. Do you understand? I did that
Speaker 1: for like two more years. Every year the next year
Speaker 1: I did, and they finally said, don't even do it,
Speaker 1: bro is it you're good. That is how obsessed I
Speaker 1: am with perfection. Were I know you are saying you
Speaker 1: either getting better work? So how do I show you
Speaker 1: and show you my unique way? Oh I'm getting better
Speaker 1: not by your evaluation, because I already know your evaluation
Speaker 1: is gonna be skewed. So if it's all about numbers
Speaker 1: and it's all about seeing paper wise, when they put
Speaker 1: you on the chart and they go did you get better?
Speaker 1: So you said better? You don't say how much better?
Speaker 1: You just said better. So it's funny. You know my
Speaker 1: kids play, you know, played play station. I don't really
Speaker 1: play video games as much I used to, but my
Speaker 1: my name on my PlayStation. Guess what it is? Policy bender?
Speaker 1: Is that not a pretty accurate its super accurate statement.
Speaker 1: It's super accurate. What does this all go to? Man?
Speaker 1: It just all goes to. That's why I love this
Speaker 1: is my sanctuary. That's what I love about this podcast.
Speaker 1: And if you really verbalize what we all grow through
Speaker 1: in life, you gotta think about it. Man. It is hilarious,
Speaker 1: it's traumatic, it's funny, and it's also sometimes we just
Speaker 1: overcomplicate some of the simplest things. I gotta you're telling
Speaker 1: me we're a National Football League, and we're gonna tell
Speaker 1: you you're gonna evaluate a test to safetiest players getting better.
Speaker 1: But you watch all these films and you know if
Speaker 1: this young man could cover, run, jump, or past, you
Speaker 1: don't need a test to though, Hey man, he got burnt.
Speaker 1: As an analysts, if I look up and I say
Speaker 1: how many times is this player targeted as a corner?
Speaker 1: If I look at my prope Football Focus account and
Speaker 1: I look at and I find a research and grab
Speaker 1: my researcher, and they say, when this guy's targeted, the
Speaker 1: receiver is catching the ball six times. I don't need
Speaker 1: a test to tell me this brother needs to be replaced.
Speaker 1: Because if you're telling me right now for six six
Speaker 1: percent chance, if I buy a lot of tickets, I'm
Speaker 1: wanting a lot of Do you need a test to
Speaker 1: do that? No? You go, hell, I like my eyes
Speaker 1: because when you look at the test, you you look
Speaker 1: at the eyes of Normally they say one out of
Speaker 1: how many thousands of people? Well, you know, you know what,
Speaker 1: we don't know though he might have been getting caught
Speaker 1: on sixty eight percent at the time the year before.
Speaker 1: So you got better. M h right, Yeah, that's pretty good,
Speaker 1: depends on what probably a different team though, why coach
Speaker 1: probably won't get fired. Are we talking about the Detroit lines? Oh,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, I'm sorry that all I've been here to. Hey,
Speaker 1: who we got coming from the Cut to It Podcast.
Speaker 1: We've got Trey Wingo, a sports media veteran who formerly
Speaker 1: hosted Sports Center and NFL Live. He's now the chief
Speaker 1: NFL analysts for Pro Football Network and the chief trends
Speaker 1: officer for Caesar Sports Book. Tray Wingo on the Cut
Speaker 1: to It Podcast. Our first segment is called get iced Up.
Speaker 1: We have no idea what's coming, and you don't either,
Speaker 1: So SMITTHI ahead, get prified? All right? If you moved
Speaker 1: on to the block of Stesimy Street, Uh, who would
Speaker 1: you want to be your neighbor? And why old school
Speaker 1: Sesame Street not the new school old We were talking
Speaker 1: to Oscar the ground Big Bird concla have they changed?
Speaker 1: My kids don't really watch Sesame Street like that, so
Speaker 1: they've changed a little change new people. Yeah, they say
Speaker 1: street gentrified. I'm gonna I'm gonna go Elmo. I think
Speaker 1: why Elmo? I don't know. He just seems like he'd
Speaker 1: be an easy neighbor. You know, I think in that situation,
Speaker 1: definitely not Oscar the Grouch, because he'd he'd just be annoying. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think Elmo would be the easiest one to get
Speaker 1: along with it, just like he wouldn't bother you. You
Speaker 1: know what I mean. I'm going with Count Dracula. Oh
Speaker 1: that's a good one. Yeah, although all the time, yeah yeah,
Speaker 1: but that would get annoying. But you always gotta have
Speaker 1: a brother that can count. Though he knows his numbers,
Speaker 1: it's true. One. I don't know. I just always always
Speaker 1: loved him. I couldn't. I couldn't hang with big Bird.
Speaker 1: You just he just wrong day, wrong time, wrong hour.
Speaker 1: And nothing's worse than scaring you than a big old
Speaker 1: yellow bird talking about it up. Yeah, well you you
Speaker 1: always well I can see why that would be a
Speaker 1: problem for you because you were always one of the
Speaker 1: smaller guys on the field, right, So you don't want
Speaker 1: to do with that in your real life. No, that
Speaker 1: had nothing to do with it. Just had to do
Speaker 1: it a big old yellow bird just popping up on you.
Speaker 1: I don't do scary movies, man, You ever watched a
Speaker 1: scary movie like back in the day and then had
Speaker 1: to go to the bathroom or something like later that
Speaker 1: night and you hit every light. Do you remember that
Speaker 1: movie The Blair Witch Project that came out I watched.
Speaker 1: I watched that movie, and I also had to end.
Speaker 1: I didn't see that when I saw the rigging that
Speaker 1: would miss me up. Well, well here's the thing about
Speaker 1: the Blair with that freaked me out. Okay, And then
Speaker 1: I went home to my house, which was backing up
Speaker 1: to the woods. I was the only one in the house,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, I'm legit terrified to walk into my
Speaker 1: house right and think about it, and if big Bird
Speaker 1: came out, what would your response? See, No, that's a
Speaker 1: hard pass for me. Hard, thank you? Hard Like ain't
Speaker 1: like big bird is armed anything like were you scared him?
Speaker 1: You know, you don't have time to process. I gotta
Speaker 1: I got a big yellow thing around me when I'm terrified.
Speaker 1: That's no, I don't need that. Life is hard enough,
Speaker 1: all right. What's your favorite time of the year. I
Speaker 1: love fall because well a football b I grew up
Speaker 1: in Connecticut. Okay, so my favorite time of the year
Speaker 1: was when it's like it's sunny and the and the
Speaker 1: sun hits your face. But the air is a little chili,
Speaker 1: and like you breathe in and that it gives you
Speaker 1: a little bite in the lungs, that low sort of
Speaker 1: combination of Okay, still warm outside, I can feel the
Speaker 1: sun on my face. But that little nip in the
Speaker 1: air and the leaves start to fall. That that's my
Speaker 1: favorite time of the year. I've never heard of a
Speaker 1: biting a long And I'm not sure that I want
Speaker 1: to in that conversation. Little chili, just a little chili
Speaker 1: when I don't know what where you pick that up from.
Speaker 1: But I don't I don't want to do. But you
Speaker 1: look like you're dressed for fall right now. So yeah,
Speaker 1: you know you're looking real skish. I like this skate
Speaker 1: real skish. Yeah, I like it. Um, this actually is
Speaker 1: a golf jacket. Okay, nice. A lot of people know,
Speaker 1: yeah I am. If you can instantly become an expert
Speaker 1: in something, what would it be, Well, I sure, as
Speaker 1: I like to figure out my driver, I'll tell you
Speaker 1: that much over the place that place, you know, Like
Speaker 1: I talked to some of these these golfers and like, well,
Speaker 1: I'm trying to move the ball left or right. So
Speaker 1: I did this and like I'm just trying to hit it, man,
Speaker 1: Like I'm trying to see it go that way. So yeah,
Speaker 1: there's nothing worse. Like I play a lot of golf,
Speaker 1: There's nothing worse than when your driver is not working right,
Speaker 1: because then you're just like you're scrambling, You're yeah, you're
Speaker 1: you're dead right like if you if you know, people
Speaker 1: say putting is the most important thing, maybe for for
Speaker 1: prose but for amateur players. I'm try. If you can't
Speaker 1: get off the t the game sucks and it's just like, well,
Speaker 1: I gotta pitch it out or I gotta work it
Speaker 1: around a tree, or I got to have a bunker.
Speaker 1: If you can't hit a fair way off the tea,
Speaker 1: you're it's like being down twenty points at the start
Speaker 1: of the first corpter. So if you're not good off
Speaker 1: the tea, are you one of those golfers where you
Speaker 1: find yourself explaining your gain for the next two or
Speaker 1: three holes. Here here's yes, that smile said, but usually
Speaker 1: it's not this bad. I don't know what he's Here's
Speaker 1: what what happened. What had happened was he told me
Speaker 1: that he said, once Trede, you're the best multitasker I've
Speaker 1: ever seen. I've seen you like do this while you're
Speaker 1: doing an interview and doing it. You can't do that
Speaker 1: when you play golf. You can't think when you play.
Speaker 1: That's why Dustin Johnson's a reight golfer. He doesn't think. Okay,
Speaker 1: So I think too much out there and I get
Speaker 1: in my own damn way and it drives me crazy.
Speaker 1: That's what you're telling yourself. Well, because well what else
Speaker 1: made it? Just say I suck at it. That's that's
Speaker 1: always a good one. I'm not great at it. I
Speaker 1: don't want to be that honest yet, Smithie. I enjoy
Speaker 1: I enjoy golf, whether I have a good game or
Speaker 1: bad game. I love getting on the course, removing myself
Speaker 1: from people. Right, just did oh hey this happened. Sorry,
Speaker 1: it's good for just nine right now. Even I'll just
Speaker 1: do nine just to get back to the day. But
Speaker 1: I enjoy it. What I really love some headphones and
Speaker 1: the driving range. Yeah, that that's interesting. You said that,
Speaker 1: because there's two kinds of golfers, right, there's the kind
Speaker 1: of golfers that just show up and play. I could
Speaker 1: be that sometimes, right doesn't mean anybody else, But but
Speaker 1: see what you're telling me is you're about the grind,
Speaker 1: because the guys that go to the range and want
Speaker 1: to put on the headphones, they're about the grind and
Speaker 1: they're about figuring that part of it out before you
Speaker 1: even step onto the golf course. You know, I'm not
Speaker 1: even gonna go there. You know what, I enjoy the piece. Man,
Speaker 1: there's sometimes you I'm I. I believe this weekend I
Speaker 1: maybe get on the course and somebody's new album is
Speaker 1: coming out too, So I'm really excited to go through,
Speaker 1: go through a Dale's album and get on the drive.
Speaker 1: On the on the driving heard her, heard her performance
Speaker 1: last night, was recorded it, I'm going recorded it, so
Speaker 1: all right? Last one, okay, favorite ice cream? Wow. Um.
Speaker 1: When I was a kid, there was a basket Robin's
Speaker 1: flavor called Golden Vanilla, which I thought was the greatest.
Speaker 1: It's just like extra vanilla. It was like extra vanilla vanilla. Um.
Speaker 1: But I sort of gravitated away from that. I like
Speaker 1: something with a little caramel in it and like something
Speaker 1: a little crunchy, whether it's Moose Moose tracks or some
Speaker 1: Oreo cookies. Give me a little, give me a little
Speaker 1: vanilla with carm on the inside A little texture. Yeah,
Speaker 1: a little texture. I'm about bringing things together. Okay, man,
Speaker 1: that's that the unity flavor. What you see the way
Speaker 1: my stomach is set up. I don't I don't do
Speaker 1: ice cream, so unfortunately, I just before you found out
Speaker 1: that your stomach don't really I mean I probably do,
Speaker 1: like a maybe cookies and cream, but I don't. There
Speaker 1: you go solid, Yeah, ice cream, get out the way
Speaker 1: you seriously, and this is very You're like the first
Speaker 1: person I've ever met who said he doesn't like ice cream. No,
Speaker 1: I think he likes ice cream. People around him don't, like,
Speaker 1: don't want me to have ice cream. I'm lactose. There's
Speaker 1: a thing that would happen, okay, black, he could have
Speaker 1: ice cread go well or when I do get it,
Speaker 1: like I gotta get like the super kids like my
Speaker 1: daughter me And she said, like my daughter just but
Speaker 1: even smaller than it, Like I just can't. I don't
Speaker 1: do a lot. Have you done the other kinds? You know,
Speaker 1: a coconut? I just don't venture because now my mind
Speaker 1: is to where like I just don't really do ice
Speaker 1: cream like this, So I just really don't know. We've
Speaker 1: been in different places, like I'll never I'll never get
Speaker 1: never get it, man. I got one is dairy free,
Speaker 1: is coconut, and it's a peanut colada with pineapples in.
Speaker 1: It's like peanut colada gruggle. It's not like Sherbert. It's
Speaker 1: with coconut milk. So like the others, like the old school,
Speaker 1: like your grandparents eat the Sherbet. Sherbet's awful, Subet, it's awful.
Speaker 1: You never saw your grandparents eat sherbet. Maybe it was
Speaker 1: just my slander. All right, mark that off the list.
Speaker 1: I don't think we're gonna get a Sherbet. What So Man,
Speaker 1: What's what's been going on? How's how's life been? Why?
Speaker 1: It's good, bro Um. You know, we're just keeping busy
Speaker 1: during football season doing a lot of stuff. And you know,
Speaker 1: this's my like, it's my favorite. Like I said, it's
Speaker 1: my favorite time of the year. I I don't know
Speaker 1: what I would do if I didn't watch football. So
Speaker 1: my favorite thing to do is sit my ass in
Speaker 1: my couch on Sunday and watch all the games and
Speaker 1: chop it up with people. I mean, do you watch
Speaker 1: it's every game. I watch as many of them as
Speaker 1: I can. Um. You know, obviously the red Zone is
Speaker 1: the greatest in the history of television, the greatest thing ever.
Speaker 1: Like when Tom Brady was suspended for those four games
Speaker 1: in sixteen, that was the first time you watched the
Speaker 1: red zone. He was like, Oh my god, how did
Speaker 1: I How did I live without knowing that this exists?
Speaker 1: You still you haven't? Oh, it's awesome. I mean it
Speaker 1: shows all your scoring plays. Yeah, it's it's football on
Speaker 1: every drug you can possibly manage it. But that's the
Speaker 1: only way to describe it. Just like rapid fire, bam
Speaker 1: bam bam. If it's great, if if a network, if
Speaker 1: a network took pre work out, that's what red zone is. Yeah,
Speaker 1: exactly right. It's like wa, wa yet a third and six?
Speaker 1: So fare wait we gotta passare wait? They blocked the
Speaker 1: kick in Dallas? How did that happen? Anytime you cross
Speaker 1: over into the t once you're in literally once you're
Speaker 1: in the red zone, it will break to or if
Speaker 1: there's like someone's immediately in the score and play. So
Speaker 1: let's just say you know it's first and go from
Speaker 1: the two and in the seas. But it's I have
Speaker 1: the channel, I've never watched it before. I think I
Speaker 1: think you would like it, well, I think your internet.
Speaker 1: Here's the only problem. I have to know some of
Speaker 1: the small details that other people don't pay attention to.
Speaker 1: So I that won't show me a red zone like
Speaker 1: it's I was gonna say, just so if you're looking
Speaker 1: for that, then you're gonna hate it. But yeah, for
Speaker 1: the for the person who's following their fantasy football team,
Speaker 1: like that's what people, I think, just I just learned something.
Speaker 1: There you go. Yeah, I'm trying to help doing doing
Speaker 1: a fantastic job. But way before we go any for
Speaker 1: the can I tell you something about the guy you
Speaker 1: do the podcast with? What you tell you something about him?
Speaker 1: You will tell you. I want to tell your co
Speaker 1: workers saying, how do you know g what did Joe? No? No, no,
Speaker 1: just just so you know. Like when it was when
Speaker 1: I was at the end of my time at ESPN
Speaker 1: and there was a lot of off out there, some
Speaker 1: of the true something not true. I got a call
Speaker 1: and one of my calls, one of the first calls
Speaker 1: I got was from Steve Smith and he said, Hey,
Speaker 1: I'm just checking to make sure you're okay. How much
Speaker 1: checking to make sure you're good? And I was like,
Speaker 1: I appreciate you I was, you've been somewhere for such
Speaker 1: a long time, and Staple, I've gotten to you know,
Speaker 1: learn and grow from you as well. And I just,
Speaker 1: you know, I knew when I saw that news. I'm
Speaker 1: I didn't want any you know, I did, I said it.
Speaker 1: I didn't want any skinny. I didn't want to know
Speaker 1: anything that was a part of the business. Just wanted
Speaker 1: to make sure that man was okay. I was appreciated.
Speaker 1: How rare is that, Trey for I mean, you've been
Speaker 1: in sports media for a long time, You're you're that
Speaker 1: you're doing. We'll get into a lot of the things
Speaker 1: you're doing right now, but but how rare is that
Speaker 1: in this media industry? Um, it meant a lot to
Speaker 1: me because obviously he was a guy that I respected
Speaker 1: and watched and played and we developed a relationship you know,
Speaker 1: over over email and tax and whatever. So oh, you
Speaker 1: know it. To me, it made me feel like what
Speaker 1: I did when he has been all those years, I
Speaker 1: did it the right way. You know, I always I
Speaker 1: was never a guy and this is probably good that
Speaker 1: I'm not there. I'm not a hot take guy, like
Speaker 1: I'm gonna say something crazy just to see how many
Speaker 1: clicks I can get, you know, And that's not how
Speaker 1: I did it. That's not how I wanted to do it.
Speaker 1: When we were doing the show, you know, we would
Speaker 1: it was with herm and Darren Woodson and Mark Slayreth
Speaker 1: and Teddy Bruski. We would we would break down film
Speaker 1: and we would try to put reason to things, you know,
Speaker 1: and so the why why is this happening? Like I'll
Speaker 1: tell you one of my favorite episodes of NFL Live
Speaker 1: Monday night game the Chiefs welcome to the Patriots and
Speaker 1: they kicked their ass. I think it was like fourteen.
Speaker 1: It was one of the worst beatings in the Bill
Speaker 1: Belichick Brady era. And after that game, everyone was saying,
Speaker 1: that's it, that's the end of Brady. He looks terrible.
Speaker 1: I had a buddy of mine that I trusted, said,
Speaker 1: Helf he looked like Joe Namath for the Rams. That's
Speaker 1: how bad Brady look Okay, so every show was just
Speaker 1: saying this is the end of the dynasty. We went
Speaker 1: on NFL Live that day and I said, let's pump
Speaker 1: the brakes. Okay, I'm not gonna judge a Belichick Brady
Speaker 1: team in September. I'm gonna judge him in December January,
Speaker 1: you know, by the way, they went on to win
Speaker 1: the Super Bowl that year and went on to win
Speaker 1: a few more and make a few more appearances. So
Speaker 1: that was always my the way I approached it. Let's
Speaker 1: not just throw gasoline on a fire. Let's look at
Speaker 1: what happened. Is it fixable? And I always try and
Speaker 1: play the long game, Always try and play the long
Speaker 1: game here. Like when people were going crazy after three
Speaker 1: bad games from Patrick Mahomes this season, I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 1: let's just let's just pump the brakes. You know, we've
Speaker 1: seen what he's done for three years, and the first
Speaker 1: six games of this year where they were scoring more
Speaker 1: points per game, more yards per game, at a better
Speaker 1: third down conversion rate and a better red zone touchdown
Speaker 1: conversion rate than either the past two years, and we
Speaker 1: went to two straight Super Bowls. So I don't think
Speaker 1: the offense is broken. Everybody calm down. I'll love cut
Speaker 1: to It, and I love it even more when you
Speaker 1: download us and subscribe and you can follow us on
Speaker 1: social media too. Smithie, where where at that's at? Cut
Speaker 1: to It on Instagram? What about Twitter? At? Cut to It? Facebook?
Speaker 1: Cut to It featuring Steve Smith singr what about online?
Speaker 1: And you can follow us at cut to It podcast
Speaker 1: dot com where you can buy merch and you can
Speaker 1: subscribe to us wherever you listen to podcasts. I got
Speaker 1: all my answers questions. Um, yeah, I got all my
Speaker 1: questions answered. That's what I'm here for, a brother, Cut
Speaker 1: to a Podcast dot com. One thing I get caught
Speaker 1: up on, I think for myself is in our production
Speaker 1: meetings and all that stuff, and I get caught on
Speaker 1: the um, how we want to crown everybody's great? Everybody
Speaker 1: everybody's done in fattash Me and Earth have have very
Speaker 1: great conversations on their be like, oh that guy is great,
Speaker 1: all right, he can't be great if if you're saying, well,
Speaker 1: we're paying him, you know, giving an individual I won't
Speaker 1: say his name. We're paying him twenty two million dollars
Speaker 1: a year. He has four years left and eighty seven
Speaker 1: million dollars and we have and we have to limit
Speaker 1: his throws. And he's a quarterback. How is that great?
Speaker 1: That's not great to me if you're getting paid eighty
Speaker 1: seven million dollars and we have to limit your throws. Hm, hmmm, No,
Speaker 1: I'm not sure if we consider that great. But yet
Speaker 1: we talk about all these other guys, Patrick Mahomes, they're great,
Speaker 1: and so we just say the word great so much
Speaker 1: that now, right, I'll watch they talk about players, whether
Speaker 1: they're get in trouble or do something. They go NFL
Speaker 1: Star and then you look at him, go, man, I
Speaker 1: do be in the league three years. Right. We're throwing
Speaker 1: around these names so much, the flowering language. We're given
Speaker 1: everybody roses so much that the guys who have not
Speaker 1: earned their roses yet believe now that they're great. Great example,
Speaker 1: DK Metcalf, here's my question. He's tired of losing that
Speaker 1: I heard, But catch that ball going across the metal,
Speaker 1: son with your hands instead of with your instead of
Speaker 1: the nice pectorials, you might might not be frustrated. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The thing that comes to round too as y'all are
Speaker 1: talking about the sports media landscape. And I remember I
Speaker 1: worked in pr in the NBA for a couple of
Speaker 1: years right out of college, and I remember my director
Speaker 1: at the time said, people have it all twisted. People
Speaker 1: want to be first instead of being right. And that
Speaker 1: was man, that was oh eight. And it seems like
Speaker 1: this and all social media has done it's probably boosted
Speaker 1: that steroids. But it's it's clearly like, what's more important?
Speaker 1: Is it being first or is it being right? I
Speaker 1: think gets Can you say something outlandish that people react to,
Speaker 1: whether or not it's whether you're absolutely convicted of it.
Speaker 1: It's about the response more than about the substance. You
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying. I think I think that. I
Speaker 1: think that's a big part of it. Oh, this went
Speaker 1: viral is almost a sound bite thing, right, You want
Speaker 1: to look look yeah, yeah, look at look at the
Speaker 1: number of clicks or the likes or whatever. And that's fine,
Speaker 1: and people get paid a lot of money that way.
Speaker 1: But at the end of the day, shouldn't it be
Speaker 1: about something like I wanted to be about something? It
Speaker 1: was an oatmeal take yeah, yeah, exactly, Pour some water
Speaker 1: on it, watch the steam come up. You know, I
Speaker 1: grew up. It's pretty good. All right, let's get into it.
Speaker 1: Man Trey, Where are you from in a place you
Speaker 1: call your hometown? I was born in New York City, Um,
Speaker 1: but I grew up. We traveled a lot when I
Speaker 1: was a kid. My dad was a reporter. Um he
Speaker 1: we it was born in New York than we moved
Speaker 1: out to l A and then we moved to Hong
Speaker 1: Kong and my dad covered the Vietnam War for Life magazine.
Speaker 1: He was a bureau chief for the Vietnam War. So
Speaker 1: we lived in Hong Kong for three years and uh,
Speaker 1: then we moved back to the States and I grew
Speaker 1: up in a little town called Greenwich, Connecticut, which was
Speaker 1: right outside New York City. My dad took the train
Speaker 1: into Grand Central Terminal uh every day for twenty six
Speaker 1: years ago to work. And we grew up in in
Speaker 1: a little sort of bedroom community New York City called Greenwich, Connecticut.
Speaker 1: Did you take advantage of, you know, the way you
Speaker 1: were raised or there any disadvantages. There's no right or
Speaker 1: wrong answer, but I just love asking. Well, one thing
Speaker 1: I'm it's really that's a great question. One thing I
Speaker 1: noticed when I was a kid because Greenwich was, you know, Greenwich.
Speaker 1: Just I've never been there, so I don't know. So
Speaker 1: it's Greenwich, you know, it's it's a it's a pretty
Speaker 1: upper crust okay. And uh, you know, having lived overseas,
Speaker 1: he's even as a little kid, lived overseas for a
Speaker 1: few years. And when we came back, we did a
Speaker 1: lot of traveling and went to India and a bunch
Speaker 1: of different places. It was easier for me to accept
Speaker 1: people that didn't look like me and maybe some other people,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. Like, I was very appreciative
Speaker 1: exposed the fact that I, yeah, I was exposed to
Speaker 1: different things, different cultures instead of just this is this,
Speaker 1: you know, And I think that was very I wish
Speaker 1: I had taken my kids and lived overseas somewhere when
Speaker 1: they were little to have that sort of same experience,
Speaker 1: because you do sometimes find yourself in a box, if
Speaker 1: you like. I have a buddy of mine who went
Speaker 1: to high school and went to two hours down the
Speaker 1: road to college. After when college, went back to a
Speaker 1: law school in the same town, and he lives literally
Speaker 1: seven exactly. He's moved up to a bigger city, correct,
Speaker 1: and he's great, dude. I love him all the time,
Speaker 1: But like his whole world is in this little laria,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. Like, I'm appreciative the fact
Speaker 1: that I've yeah, I've been to a bunch of different
Speaker 1: places and seeing a bunch of different things, and I
Speaker 1: think it helps round you as a person. I really
Speaker 1: believe that, yeah, exactly, Like, for example, you know, we
Speaker 1: where we live now and where our kids with high
Speaker 1: school is also a fairly homogeneous place, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. One of my hous well, yeah, I can
Speaker 1: people keep us most most most people look the same,
Speaker 1: look like me. One of the things that I was
Speaker 1: most proud of was that when my son went to
Speaker 1: play college football, all of his friends did Most of
Speaker 1: his friends didn't look like talking about And you know,
Speaker 1: to this day there's still there's still some of my
Speaker 1: favorite people that I get to see whenever we get
Speaker 1: together somewhere. So you know, being in a locker room,
Speaker 1: you can't overestimate that. You can't run away from it,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Like you're gonna have to
Speaker 1: look and deal with people that grew up in a
Speaker 1: different place from you, that have a different background from you,
Speaker 1: and you gotta find a way to co exist. And
Speaker 1: I think that was that was that was one of
Speaker 1: the best things about him playing college ball. And to
Speaker 1: you know, to this day, he still hangs out where
Speaker 1: he plays played at Georgetown, Georgetown University in Washington, d C.
Speaker 1: So here's here's a great thing. And this may you know,
Speaker 1: in the context of it, non context, it can come
Speaker 1: off the wrong way. But in the context of it,
Speaker 1: when you when you happen to be black and you're
Speaker 1: around people or you have not been exposed, it's always
Speaker 1: enlightening to have someone that does not look like you
Speaker 1: come to the party because they bring something that is missing. Yeah, right,
Speaker 1: and the vice versa. So basically what you're saying is
Speaker 1: when you have a barbecue, right, you gotta bring some
Speaker 1: black friends because they're just gonna bring some food that
Speaker 1: you're just not used to, right, and it ain't gonna
Speaker 1: be raising. But I don't do potato salad anyway. But
Speaker 1: I don't understand the raising things. Get that, Like why
Speaker 1: you want to throw those little turds in there, I
Speaker 1: don't understand. I just say that. You know, I was
Speaker 1: raised in l a And and at the time being
Speaker 1: raised there there was there was all types of folk.
Speaker 1: But when you're talking about being at home, being comfortable
Speaker 1: being around other people, the people that are interacted with
Speaker 1: them look like me, same complexion, same thought, same mindset.
Speaker 1: And I think you now that I look back, I
Speaker 1: think that was a disadvantage because sometimes if you're if
Speaker 1: you are around people that all you all think the same,
Speaker 1: then no one thinks outside of the box. And that's
Speaker 1: where the skew perspectives be be begin to be cultive.
Speaker 1: Wad it began to look a certain way. And what
Speaker 1: do I mean by that is then all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: I go to Utah and like the back black population
Speaker 1: is like five in the whole state. You're talking polar Yes,
Speaker 1: from where you grew up going to you're going to
Speaker 1: provole and and so one of the toughest things is
Speaker 1: when I first got there, man, I was homesick. I
Speaker 1: wanted to go home so bad. I did not have
Speaker 1: any thing outside of football that was familiar to me.
Speaker 1: You didn't have that transition, like he said, it was
Speaker 1: so polar opposite. You go from l A to Salt
Speaker 1: to to Utah. Yeah, there's no there. There was no
Speaker 1: buffer zone, and it was no and and all the
Speaker 1: people that that looked like me. I was also too.
Speaker 1: I was a new kid on the block. I was
Speaker 1: there competition, So they didn't welcome They welcome me with
Speaker 1: open arms, but it was kind of like it was
Speaker 1: like the you know, the side hug right and and
Speaker 1: that in that place, especially when you're nineteen years old,
Speaker 1: he's just trying to figure it out. So I think
Speaker 1: it's you brought it up, and it just triggered me
Speaker 1: to think about it, you know, Um, and so let's
Speaker 1: let's unpack. You know, I read this great story about
Speaker 1: you didn't know it, uh one Nickel for the insult,
Speaker 1: didn't realize your father who he was Life Magazine. Um,
Speaker 1: he was there in the Vietnam War. To cover of
Speaker 1: the Vietnam War. Several times he would head into the
Speaker 1: bush for weeks at a time, and you just assumed
Speaker 1: you'll see him later. But clearly your mother knew they
Speaker 1: were greater risk. In fact, in the photo of his
Speaker 1: days in Vietnam, the man to his left of the
Speaker 1: photo was killed when his helicopter was shot down no
Speaker 1: longer after the picture was taken. I pulled that out
Speaker 1: because I think it's really something that really shows, you know,
Speaker 1: the true essence of the word ignorance, of you know,
Speaker 1: lack of knowledge of understanding your dad, what's who he was.
Speaker 1: Yet he was bigger than just how weingo your father.
Speaker 1: He meant something to a lot of people. He brought
Speaker 1: a lot of things to the table, but also too,
Speaker 1: he brought a lot of nervousness to your mom. R.
Speaker 1: I mean that that was the job, you know, and
Speaker 1: we were limited an apartment, and you know she would
Speaker 1: always get you know, upset when he would leave. And
Speaker 1: again like I did, assumed, you know, i'll see when
Speaker 1: you get back. But you know, we didn't have cell phones.
Speaker 1: There was no there was no internet. You know, he
Speaker 1: was going into the he was going into the ship,
Speaker 1: you know. And and you're right at that picture was
Speaker 1: with him and his friend John Star and the guy
Speaker 1: in the glasses was the photographer and I think a
Speaker 1: couple of weeks after that photo was taking the photographs.
Speaker 1: I can't remember his name, but his helicopter shut down. Um,
Speaker 1: and you know, my dad's still friends with the other
Speaker 1: guy in that photo. But yeah, it was. And you know,
Speaker 1: the other thing was like like a lot of kids,
Speaker 1: I played with army toys, as you know. And remember
Speaker 1: one day, yeah, one day, I was setting up my
Speaker 1: little plastic army men all over for a bad all
Speaker 1: and my dad had just come back and obviously seen
Speaker 1: some ship. And you know, he wasn't scolding me, but
Speaker 1: he was like, I just want you to understand, like
Speaker 1: war is not a toy, you know, it's not a
Speaker 1: thing to play with. So I mean, just be a
Speaker 1: you know, I was six. You know, at the time,
Speaker 1: you didn't understand, you didn't understand the adult he was.
Speaker 1: He was applying to it, right, but he was trying
Speaker 1: to instill in me at a very young age that
Speaker 1: you know, there are toys and then there's war. Maybe
Speaker 1: the two don't always mix. How much did your dad
Speaker 1: his career influence you, whether it was directly or indirectly
Speaker 1: A lot um Like a lot of my friends where
Speaker 1: I grew up, you know, their dads were businessmen or bankers,
Speaker 1: or doctors or lawyers, you know, and my dad had
Speaker 1: a different job. Like after we got back from Vietnam. Uh,
Speaker 1: he Life magazine folded and they said they kept my
Speaker 1: dad and three of the guys and that come up
Speaker 1: with a different magazine and they founded People Magazine. And
Speaker 1: I would always go when he had school, those teacher
Speaker 1: in service days, you know, I mean where the teachers
Speaker 1: had to meet and you had the dad oft from school.
Speaker 1: I would hop on the train with my dad and
Speaker 1: I'd go into New York City and uh, you know,
Speaker 1: his office was right across from Radio City Music Hall
Speaker 1: what was then the Time Life Building on Sixth Avenue,
Speaker 1: and uh, you know, I would go up there and
Speaker 1: he'd say, hey, run this photo down to the photo
Speaker 1: department for me, and I'd get those little office chairs
Speaker 1: as a kid, and I wheeled myself down the hall
Speaker 1: and drop something off over there and come back. And
Speaker 1: it was fun. It was different. It was interesting. My
Speaker 1: dad did something that was different then all my other
Speaker 1: friends dad's were doing, and I thought it was cool.
Speaker 1: And so, you know, I I have to think that
Speaker 1: sort of indirectly, just seeing how how much fun he
Speaker 1: had at the job and how different it was, it
Speaker 1: I think it inspired me to want to try and
Speaker 1: do something different than just you know, I'll go get
Speaker 1: an NBA and have an office job and all that
Speaker 1: kind of stuff. And it's certainly sort of been the
Speaker 1: way it worked out growing up as a kid. I
Speaker 1: never heard dialogue and say, you know, I just go
Speaker 1: to school to get my n B A and go
Speaker 1: try to do what my dad does. So one another
Speaker 1: thing is, um, I was reading a book and I
Speaker 1: heard this, and we've talked about it before. It was
Speaker 1: something that said that he was a gentleman. I was
Speaker 1: reading a book and he said that he inherited his
Speaker 1: family heirlooms, He inherited something and man that you know
Speaker 1: obviously in my you know, playing football. And as I've
Speaker 1: gotten noted, I started to realize, like other than playing ball,
Speaker 1: Like what am I gonna what are my kids gonna
Speaker 1: inherit from me? The more and more I do, these
Speaker 1: have these great guests like you, starting to realize as
Speaker 1: the sports world, sometimes as athletes, were such at a
Speaker 1: disadvantage because we focus so much on the skill of
Speaker 1: the sport. There's so many other areas outside the skills sport, right, um,
Speaker 1: whether it's reading books or getting gathering information that has
Speaker 1: nothing to do with sports. And so just listening to you,
Speaker 1: like hearing you you were a kid wheeling down the hallways,
Speaker 1: radio City music and just bring your kids to work.
Speaker 1: They for Tray was man that on everybody else. He's
Speaker 1: going downtown on the subway and getting off in there
Speaker 1: is all of this stuff and I'm not trying to
Speaker 1: you know, like you said, It's like I remember taking
Speaker 1: my boys into the locker room. I remember my son,
Speaker 1: my oldest son, he was a ball boy for the Panthers,
Speaker 1: and then one of my other boys he was a
Speaker 1: ball boy for the Ravens, and that was awesome for them, right,
Speaker 1: But it's just that cool, that that part that we
Speaker 1: just sometimes we don't realize, and I'm realizing, like outside
Speaker 1: of sports, like what is really going on right if
Speaker 1: you're a sports guy and we just kind of get
Speaker 1: balled down with the of of the game, that there's
Speaker 1: so many other things going on. Well, I think that's
Speaker 1: why a lot of a lot of guys that played
Speaker 1: like you sometimes struggle when ball is done, you know,
Speaker 1: because everything you did was such a time commitment and
Speaker 1: and required such a focus for you to be as
Speaker 1: good as you needed to be to keep getting a paycheck,
Speaker 1: you know. And I like, there's a do you remember
Speaker 1: the center Nick Hardwick who played for the Chargers forever. Um,
Speaker 1: he the first year he stopped playing, he was he
Speaker 1: was lost. He was like, wait a minute, I don't
Speaker 1: have to be here like I've always my whole life
Speaker 1: was Okay, you know this, you got to be here
Speaker 1: at this time, here at this time, and you know
Speaker 1: this is the off season to do this. It almost
Speaker 1: overwhelmed him, you know. He talked about it like I
Speaker 1: didn't know how to plan a day. I didn't know
Speaker 1: what to do, and it really got to him. And
Speaker 1: I think that's a struggle a lot of athletes have,
Speaker 1: especially in football, because it's such a mental thing as
Speaker 1: well as physical that you know, everything you did was
Speaker 1: about preparing yourself to be the best you could be
Speaker 1: to play. The season was all about getting your body
Speaker 1: and shaped it with stand the riggers of the season.
Speaker 1: That suddenly when you have to decide to do something
Speaker 1: else and you have time, you can kind of freak
Speaker 1: you out. You know, well, I agree, I agree with you.
Speaker 1: Nick Harwick Center for the Charger. He was also I
Speaker 1: believe color blind, lost a lot of weight, had a
Speaker 1: great has great sleeve work. Oh, he one of the
Speaker 1: best sleeves. But I do believe he's color blind. I
Speaker 1: think that's the joke with the sleeve work that he
Speaker 1: can't even hedn't even know. I don't know, right, Good,
Speaker 1: good do get down to do it. Good? Hey Gerard,
Speaker 1: why did you get that T shirt? You mean, oh, yes,
Speaker 1: I got it from cut to a podcast that where
Speaker 1: we have exclusive merchandise. Shout out to our guys at
Speaker 1: seven oh four shot. But yeah, you can go on,
Speaker 1: buy you a T shirt, subscribe to us whatever you
Speaker 1: listen to podcasts. Serry, what got you involved in? I mean,
Speaker 1: you've told us about your dad and being you know,
Speaker 1: um working with people. What got you involved in sports?
Speaker 1: I was an awful football player and I didn't play
Speaker 1: for very long, but I I listen. I can't explain
Speaker 1: why I've always loved football better than any other sport.
Speaker 1: I just I gravitated to it. Um, I I wanted
Speaker 1: to be. I so wanted to be a football player
Speaker 1: like I want I would have. I wanted would have
Speaker 1: made me happier. But I you know, I just I
Speaker 1: wanted to do it like I was. I'd love football.
Speaker 1: I think the only way I can describe it is
Speaker 1: to me, it's the ultimate team game. Like baseball is
Speaker 1: basically a picture in a batter, Right, that's the confrontation,
Speaker 1: and if the balls in play, somebody else gets a
Speaker 1: chance to participate. Right. Basketball, if you have one or
Speaker 1: two you're good. The best players, you're good. Right, you're good.
Speaker 1: Hockey or soccer, a goalie changes everything like you could have.
Speaker 1: You can have the greatest attack, but if a goalie
Speaker 1: is hot, or if the goalie is terrible, that just
Speaker 1: basically decides the game. Absolutely. Football is eleven guys in
Speaker 1: a huddle. They got to be on the same page.
Speaker 1: And if one guy epps it up odds, the whole
Speaker 1: thing goes to ship. That's what I that's what I
Speaker 1: love about it, Like it's the ultimate team game. And
Speaker 1: you know the thing that I always say about football too,
Speaker 1: and and this is the thing that is lost in
Speaker 1: the days of fantasy football. Football as its essence comes
Speaker 1: down to this, there's one wall of men offensive lineman
Speaker 1: is going to try and dominate the other wall of
Speaker 1: men defensive lineman. That allows everything else to happen, everything
Speaker 1: else to happen, because if that that point of attack
Speaker 1: don't work, you don't have anything. And that's what I
Speaker 1: love about it. That's what I love about it. Take
Speaker 1: us through the process in your journey to become true
Speaker 1: qing go because I first I'd say, come on and
Speaker 1: take the you gotta take the flowers while we give
Speaker 1: it all right, throw the bookcase. Um, what's funny. It's
Speaker 1: it's funny you say that because a buddy of mine
Speaker 1: just asked me to do something and it's it's out now.
Speaker 1: We didn't we A bunch of us wrote little snippets
Speaker 1: of our story in a book. It's called Where They
Speaker 1: Were Then. It's available on Amazon now and it's me
Speaker 1: Kenny Mayne, uh, Scott Reese, Bilpito, Heidi Wattney, just uh
Speaker 1: Scott Van Pelt, a bunch of us talking about how
Speaker 1: we got to where we are. Like I knew I
Speaker 1: wanted to, Like give me an example. One of my
Speaker 1: first jobs, my first job out of college, I was
Speaker 1: an account executive at a PR VERM and d C.
Speaker 1: I had a really nice apartment. It was fun jobs,
Speaker 1: sort of. I lived in Washington, d C. It was great,
Speaker 1: and I hated it. I hated it one of the
Speaker 1: office every day. This was before the Internet. And you know,
Speaker 1: I just read the sports pages and I quit before
Speaker 1: I could get fired because I know it was getting fired.
Speaker 1: I wasn't doing anything. So I went back and moved
Speaker 1: into my parents basement and I got a job at
Speaker 1: thirty Rock, uh giving guided tours of the building at
Speaker 1: NBC and all that kind of stuff. And so I
Speaker 1: made a demo tape and sent out wait wait wait,
Speaker 1: wait wait wait, wait, your your name dropping and just
Speaker 1: talk first I get it. I get a job out
Speaker 1: of college and be a county firm quit am And
Speaker 1: I'm still I don't know how you do PR before
Speaker 1: the internet. I don't know how that does not wrap
Speaker 1: around how you did, Like where'd you get? Tell you
Speaker 1: how bad it was? Like I just in the press release? No, no,
Speaker 1: it was worth I don't know. I'm young. I'll I'll
Speaker 1: own it, I'll own it, but I don't. It doesn't
Speaker 1: make any sense to me. It doesn't. It's not even millennial.
Speaker 1: It's it's really how we communicate today, yeah, exactly, and
Speaker 1: how you would communicate back then. We had to call Like,
Speaker 1: for example, one of our clients was Ford Motor Company
Speaker 1: and they were sponsoring this muralist. His name was Diego Rivera,
Speaker 1: who was very famous Mexican muralist, and the exhibit was
Speaker 1: coming through. It was my job to call all the
Speaker 1: newspapers and say, hey, you gotta check out this, uh,
Speaker 1: this exhibition of Diego Rivera's murals. They're incredible, but please
Speaker 1: mention that they're sponsored by Ford Motor Company. Like that
Speaker 1: was like that was the thing that I had to do,
Speaker 1: you know, and it was just and you didn't do
Speaker 1: it what you didn't do it with excitement? I well,
Speaker 1: I couldn't fake it comes you gotta think, it becomes
Speaker 1: RUDIMENTI like you you're you're it becomes a monotonous you
Speaker 1: gotta do it everything, Young Young, the worst man, Young
Speaker 1: Trey Young, try wringle. I think his his caremeter was
Speaker 1: really low. It was not great, Bob, it was not good.
Speaker 1: I was like, this sucks, man, I gotta find something
Speaker 1: else to do. We turned a Tito about the day again.
Speaker 1: So I actually was offered a really nice job by
Speaker 1: a guy named Mark McCormick, who founded the company called
Speaker 1: IMG International Media created sports market. We're gonna have to
Speaker 1: get a name drop count. I'm episode, I don't know,
Speaker 1: but he wrote, he wrote these two famous books Everything
Speaker 1: the Harvest Harvard Business School didn't teach you, blah blah
Speaker 1: blah blah blah. So he offered me a job, and
Speaker 1: I was gonna like travel and go to the Wimbledon
Speaker 1: and help them sell their Wimbledon clothing line. And they
Speaker 1: had these very famous pens. Cross pens were a big
Speaker 1: deal and they also licensed them and all that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff. And it was good. It's gonna be a
Speaker 1: good job. But I didn't want to do it, you know,
Speaker 1: I was like, I have to try. Like whether or
Speaker 1: not I succeeded in doing the sportscaster thing almost was irrelevant.
Speaker 1: If I didn't try, I couldn't live with myself, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean. I had to try. If I failed,
Speaker 1: I failed, no big deal. I took a shot. I
Speaker 1: didn't want to be that guy twenty years down the
Speaker 1: road sitting in an office, you know, calling people to
Speaker 1: talk about Ford Motor Company sponsorship of an art museum,
Speaker 1: thinking what if I had What if I had done this?
Speaker 1: So I had to try. So I turned him down,
Speaker 1: and I always tell the story because it was a
Speaker 1: long road to get there. But you know, twenty years later,
Speaker 1: after I was at at ESPN, I AMG called me
Speaker 1: and they wanted to represent me, and so it kind
Speaker 1: of came full circle, you know. It was they offered
Speaker 1: me a job and I said no because I wanted
Speaker 1: to try this thing, and apparently it worked out so
Speaker 1: well that they called me back and said, we'd like
Speaker 1: to represent you. Take us through the process. How do
Speaker 1: you become? And let me pause before I say that,
Speaker 1: because today, being a SportsCenter anchor is I I think
Speaker 1: it's okay. But back in the day, yeah, I didn't
Speaker 1: know for a long time that it was not live.
Speaker 1: It's it's it's a lot of work. I thought it
Speaker 1: would lives. Some of them were live, and I'm talking
Speaker 1: about just how it always when he always repeated, were
Speaker 1: follow you know me and my bootleg cable. You know
Speaker 1: I'm watching it right. We didn't pay for the cable
Speaker 1: every chance you thought they would, just just doing over
Speaker 1: and over and over again. I show he did that
Speaker 1: was on show like when you got to ESPN like that,
Speaker 1: if you did the it was called the one Am Show,
Speaker 1: the one A because it went on there at one
Speaker 1: am and it it was before we had studios in
Speaker 1: l A and that stuff. You were there like until
Speaker 1: all the games were done. You know, like the worst
Speaker 1: thing you can hear is a rain delay at at
Speaker 1: Chevez Ravine and at Dodger Stadium. You're like, ship, we're
Speaker 1: gonna be here atill four o'clock in the morning, extra
Speaker 1: innings in San Francisco. Um So, like one of the
Speaker 1: first times, you love this, one of the first times
Speaker 1: I got to do that show because you know, you're
Speaker 1: like you said, you're on for twelve hours, like people
Speaker 1: will watch and they'll see who you are. Um. It
Speaker 1: was when John Daley was going through his first about
Speaker 1: with Booze and everything. He had gone the year before
Speaker 1: the Player's Championship and like gotten hand, Murden messed up
Speaker 1: the condo and there's just a bad scene. So he
Speaker 1: came back the next year and he was trying to
Speaker 1: be sober, and I wrote this poignant lead in about oh,
Speaker 1: this is gonna be his his struggle and all this
Speaker 1: kind of stuff. And at the line I was trying
Speaker 1: to say was right before he teed off, he got
Speaker 1: his coin signifying he'd been you know, sober, booze free
Speaker 1: for a year. He's been sober, right, But I typed
Speaker 1: it in. I said he received his coin signifying one
Speaker 1: year of alcohol free living, which was a really clumsy,
Speaker 1: stupid way to say it. So when I got on camera,
Speaker 1: I said, right before he teed off, he received his
Speaker 1: coin signifying one year of free alcohol. And I could
Speaker 1: just feel the blood like rushing out of my face.
Speaker 1: I'm like, well, that's it. That's the last thing I'll
Speaker 1: ever do at ESPN. I'm done. Uh. And that we
Speaker 1: got to the highlights and the producer says, yeah, we're
Speaker 1: gonna be to fix that for the re air. I
Speaker 1: was like, new ship. I thought I was done. I
Speaker 1: thought I was done. So how take a student process
Speaker 1: become a sports sinner anchor. You know, it's funny. There
Speaker 1: is no there's no like, there's no blueprint for that,
Speaker 1: Like I can't tell you, Like, for example, I never
Speaker 1: sent a tape to ESPN. I was working in St.
Speaker 1: Louis on local TV station at the time, and I
Speaker 1: got a call from the guy who at that point's
Speaker 1: name was Al Jaffee, who ran the talent recruiter for ESPN.
Speaker 1: He's like, ye, we'd like to bring in for an audition.
Speaker 1: I'm like, how did you find I didn't send you
Speaker 1: a tape? And he said, oh, I don't know. You know,
Speaker 1: someone sent us a tape. But I didn't have an agent,
Speaker 1: so someone else had sent him a tape, like Kenny
Speaker 1: Maine infamously tells the story like he sent ESPN like
Speaker 1: a million tapes and they were like no, no, nopen.
Speaker 1: Eventually they said, yes, I got a call out of
Speaker 1: the blue. I have no idea how this guy heard
Speaker 1: of me, who say on the tape or whatever, but
Speaker 1: that that's how it got started. And then I got
Speaker 1: up there and I did some shows and some people
Speaker 1: liked it, and they moved me on to another show.
Speaker 1: And there's no that's the weird part about the business,
Speaker 1: like there's no I can't tell people if you do this, this, this,
Speaker 1: and this. It doesn't work that way. Like you know,
Speaker 1: if you if you want to be an accountantor you
Speaker 1: want to be a doctor or civil engineer or whatever,
Speaker 1: you know, well you do this, you go to your
Speaker 1: grad school or you go to law school, and then
Speaker 1: you you know, you do your internship as I'm that
Speaker 1: a whole assistant somewhere, and then you get you past
Speaker 1: your MCATs or whatever. There's none of that. Either they
Speaker 1: like you or you don't. And you never know what
Speaker 1: someone will like and someone won't like. So that's the
Speaker 1: hardest part about it. You know, I loved him, respected
Speaker 1: him great. Tell us what was it like to work
Speaker 1: next to him? With Stewart Scott? Yeah, Um, I always
Speaker 1: tell the story and it's sort of, um, sort of
Speaker 1: defines who Stewart was for me, and he's obviously a
Speaker 1: very different thing to a lot of different people. Um.
Speaker 1: When I when I first started espn uh make a
Speaker 1: really long story short, some guy wrote an article about
Speaker 1: me and he sort of transposed some things and it
Speaker 1: made me sound like a total jackass, which didn't but
Speaker 1: there was a line there he said, I guess it's
Speaker 1: the new guy. You're gonna have to get Dan Patrick's coffee.
Speaker 1: And I was like, well, I hope not to be
Speaker 1: the towelboy too long. And he put in the article
Speaker 1: Windo hopes to arise and not be a towelboy at ESPN,
Speaker 1: and so like it was insulting to everybody that was there,
Speaker 1: which was not my intent at all. It was a
Speaker 1: it was a it was a misplaced headline. But anyway,
Speaker 1: so everybody was giving me like tons of ship when
Speaker 1: I first got there, and I actually signed a towel
Speaker 1: and with nasty comments on it said they pick up
Speaker 1: my laundry, all this kind of stuff. The only thing
Speaker 1: Stewarts said on the towel was welcome. M That was
Speaker 1: the only thing he said was welcome. And everyone else
Speaker 1: was sort of like, hey, screw you, new guy, you know.
Speaker 1: And he was very cool about it. And so we
Speaker 1: did a few shows together. And but like I want
Speaker 1: to be clear, Stewart I were not like best friends.
Speaker 1: We were acquaintances. We got along, but there was remember
Speaker 1: we used to do this thing called ESPN the weekend
Speaker 1: They did you ever go to one of those in Florida?
Speaker 1: Disney World used to bring everybody down for Disney World
Speaker 1: Esping the weekend. How used to go to that? Yeah,
Speaker 1: so anyway, that's one year. That's when I used to
Speaker 1: give us, uh the tour guide and all that stuff. Yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 1: actually it was. It was the first year was I
Speaker 1: think two thousand to two thousand three when we lost
Speaker 1: Super Bowl. So yeah, I started. So we we did
Speaker 1: that for like ten years in a row. And one
Speaker 1: year Stewart and I got down there early before anybody
Speaker 1: else and we didn't have anything to do. So I
Speaker 1: was like, you wanna go play golfs go play golf.
Speaker 1: So it was just Stewart and I and uh, you know,
Speaker 1: we we just started talking and having a great time,
Speaker 1: and you know, cart Girl came around, had a few cocktails,
Speaker 1: had a little more fun, game got worse, got more fun,
Speaker 1: and by the end of the day we were rolling
Speaker 1: literally and just having a blast. And you know, we
Speaker 1: did our whatever we did that weekend, and we came
Speaker 1: back and I saw him hallways at Bristol and said, hey,
Speaker 1: that was really fun. Let's let's do that again. He
Speaker 1: was absolutely, let's do that again. Like two months later
Speaker 1: he got sick and that started it, and we never
Speaker 1: we never had that second round of golf. And I
Speaker 1: always say I would have given anything to have another
Speaker 1: day like that with Stewart on the golf course. And
Speaker 1: you know, I say that to just tell people when
Speaker 1: you say you want to do something, do it, you know,
Speaker 1: don't put it off because you never know, like you
Speaker 1: never know. I take nothing for granted anymore. Um, And
Speaker 1: that's that's sort of where I whenever, whenever someone asked
Speaker 1: me about Stewart, I tell him those two stories that
Speaker 1: he was couldn't have been nicer to me when I
Speaker 1: got here, and we had so much fun and we
Speaker 1: saw each other in the hall and we're like, hey,
Speaker 1: that was great, let's do it again. That he got busy,
Speaker 1: I got busy, and then but I went to ship.
Speaker 1: You know, take the time. You're in an always on profession.
Speaker 1: You talked about the one am sports centers. How do
Speaker 1: you unplug in an industry this quote unquote always on?
Speaker 1: That's hard, you know. Um, I'm a big believer in
Speaker 1: work life separation, you know, balance of church and state,
Speaker 1: for lack of a better term. I tried to when
Speaker 1: I wasn't working. And this is when the kids were younger,
Speaker 1: and obviously, you know, it was important, um to make
Speaker 1: sure that I when I wasn't working, I was present,
Speaker 1: you know, with with the family. And that was that
Speaker 1: was hard. That's why NFL Live to me was the
Speaker 1: greatest gig of all time because it was Monday through
Speaker 1: Friday and it was my favorite sport ever. And I
Speaker 1: got to talk to people like Smitty all the time
Speaker 1: would come on the show and you know, and then
Speaker 1: but I was, I was there. I was able to
Speaker 1: get to the games. I didn't I didn't miss a
Speaker 1: concert for my daughter. I didn't miss uh. I didn't
Speaker 1: miss my son's games, whether sixth grade, seventh grade, high school, college,
Speaker 1: I went to all of them. You know, Um, that
Speaker 1: meant something to me. You have to have something away,
Speaker 1: Like you can't just be about work. If it's always
Speaker 1: about work, you're missing something. So I always wanted to
Speaker 1: make sure there was something else that I was putting
Speaker 1: my my time and effort into. Who was tray Wingo
Speaker 1: off air? Sadly he's just as stupid, like I couldn't
Speaker 1: fake it if I tried, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Like that they give you an example, like one year
Speaker 1: they had me do the NBA tonight and I was like, hey, man,
Speaker 1: I create this is not what I want to do.
Speaker 1: You know, I don't want to do this. I really
Speaker 1: I wanted to do something different. And then they said, okay,
Speaker 1: well we'll move you at NFL Live and it worked out.
Speaker 1: It was great. For fifteen years. I had the best
Speaker 1: gig in the world. I did the draft, all those
Speaker 1: things I love, I didn't. I never tried to be
Speaker 1: something on camera that I wasn't off, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, Like people will tell you you're kind of stupid,
Speaker 1: but all the time, you know, so, uh, it doesn't
Speaker 1: really change. I don't. I didn't want to be something
Speaker 1: different or portray something different when I was doing the
Speaker 1: job and how I would have done it, you know, Uh,
Speaker 1: away from the job. It's just a little a little
Speaker 1: podcast shop talk. Let's do it. You know what, what
Speaker 1: do you think about podcasts? I think they're a waste
Speaker 1: of time, to be honest. But what do you think
Speaker 1: I love it because it allows me to do the
Speaker 1: thing that I want to do, which is to me.
Speaker 1: Stories and people are interesting, like games are good, but
Speaker 1: story like when why had you on? And how do
Speaker 1: I episode did very well? Did very well, by the
Speaker 1: way t Kio Spike's episode, I don't know why it's
Speaker 1: going through the roof, but oh it's insane. Um. That
Speaker 1: just the story that I loved about you. The story
Speaker 1: that I loved about you is when you when you
Speaker 1: told me that your mom gave you tough love and
Speaker 1: you told her you were thirsty and she said, well
Speaker 1: can you spit? And you said, yes, well you're not thirsty, right.
Speaker 1: I love those are good stories, you know why? Yeah, man,
Speaker 1: that just hurts a little guy. Yeah that's a wound.
Speaker 1: But we'll talk about that. But you know, and then
Speaker 1: you also, you still we talked about your draft and
Speaker 1: you still you brought out the receipt. You still had
Speaker 1: what people said about you going into the draft, all
Speaker 1: these years later, all these years later, you still had it. Well.
Speaker 1: Part of it is my agent said that when I
Speaker 1: tore my achilles, so he was trying to say, hey,
Speaker 1: if we're gonna do this, if you're gonna do this,
Speaker 1: you get better do it. Don't sit out there and
Speaker 1: just kind of have to do it. The other part
Speaker 1: is I still bring a lot of stuff out and
Speaker 1: I keep it in my office. It gives me a
Speaker 1: great perspective when I'm doing television right to kind of
Speaker 1: see and see how like, there's so many fans that
Speaker 1: don't realize how much stuff is said about players in
Speaker 1: the evaluation process that when they come to the draft
Speaker 1: or they leave the draft they're not drafted. There's so
Speaker 1: many things said that you don't really know how and
Speaker 1: what and when and where, what's true, what's fabricated, what's
Speaker 1: here say? And so I just love the fact that
Speaker 1: I was able to read it and how so much.
Speaker 1: One scout said this, Another scout said that, and is like,
Speaker 1: but I'm still five nine and this is what I
Speaker 1: present that, that's it, this is who I am. And
Speaker 1: so I just it's a great reminder. Sometimes I don't
Speaker 1: say it on team, it just kind of really shows me.
Speaker 1: Thirty two teams, thirty two different UH general managers, ten
Speaker 1: plus scouts pro in college on each team, and they
Speaker 1: all have different evaluation processes that we would say when
Speaker 1: we're sitting there looking at it. You you you can say,
Speaker 1: right now, what is the process that the Detroit lines
Speaker 1: have gone through to get where they are today? And
Speaker 1: how come they can't get out of their way? Right?
Speaker 1: But how come New England understands exactly how to get
Speaker 1: the best out of everybody. Why why is this team
Speaker 1: so much smarter than this other team? Right, they profit shared,
Speaker 1: they do all this stuff, but and they can't get
Speaker 1: themselves out of their own way. Well, it's interesting you
Speaker 1: said that, right, because the NFL runs itself like socialism. Right,
Speaker 1: they're all capitalists, but they all run out like socialism
Speaker 1: because they all split the money evenly. And that's the
Speaker 1: only way the league could survive. Like, there's no way
Speaker 1: the NFL could have a team in Green Bay. If
Speaker 1: cities like New York and Los Angeles and Washington or
Speaker 1: Philadelphia and you know, Baltimore, we'll be willing to share
Speaker 1: their profits because Green Bay couldn't couldn't function, they couldn't
Speaker 1: keep up, they wouldn't be able to exist. So but
Speaker 1: when you said profit sharing, like, for some teams, that's enough, right,
Speaker 1: We're making money. We're good, you know. And other teams
Speaker 1: have different agendas. They want to win, Yeah, winning at
Speaker 1: all costs. Will to hire whoever they need to hire? Correct?
Speaker 1: T Is that a Is that an Emmy over here shoulder? Fortunate? Yeah?
Speaker 1: So you you you've gotten Emmy's You've had this successful
Speaker 1: on your career. What are you most excited about creating
Speaker 1: in this new chapter. You're you're doing podcasting. I know
Speaker 1: you were Caesar's Sports Book. What are you excited about
Speaker 1: in this new chapter? Well, again, like for me, it's
Speaker 1: the ability and this is like going forward forever like
Speaker 1: it used to be had to be on TV, like
Speaker 1: you had to be a thing. Now you know, you
Speaker 1: can put your content wherever you want to put it
Speaker 1: and people either will consume it or they won't. Um.
Speaker 1: And we've been very fortunate. You know, We've we've had
Speaker 1: over five million views on the YouTube channel and we're
Speaker 1: closing in on five and a half million in less
Speaker 1: than a year, which is great. Um. Subtle flex um,
Speaker 1: just a little bit, a little bit, little bit. I like,
Speaker 1: I like telling stories. I like having conversations with people.
Speaker 1: Just I mean, like getting stuff out of my eye.
Speaker 1: That's okay, it's all good. I like I like the
Speaker 1: ability to decide who I want to talk to, when
Speaker 1: I want to talk to him, and what I want
Speaker 1: to talk to him about. Like I like, I just
Speaker 1: told you, you know, we got some Hall of Famers
Speaker 1: coming up in the next few weeks. Jason Taylor, great
Speaker 1: story about him and and how he learned how he
Speaker 1: needed to put on some weight when he finally got
Speaker 1: to college because he was always this skinny kid out
Speaker 1: of Western Pennsylvania. Um, but I just I enjoyed the
Speaker 1: conversations and that's the fun part of it for me.
Speaker 1: Now I got to do a commercial with Halle Berry
Speaker 1: that was not terrible. I'm not gonna lie to you.
Speaker 1: Not terrible, not a terrible experience. Okay, you keep not terrible.
Speaker 1: You got two married men told, and I'll tell what
Speaker 1: you want to say. Oh yeah, I understand. I'm not
Speaker 1: getting in trouble. Good for you, brother, Good it wasn't it.
Speaker 1: It was a it was a fun day. I bet
Speaker 1: it was. I bet it was good for you. Will flexibility.
Speaker 1: I like the flexibility more than anything. Man, It's it's
Speaker 1: it's been a pleasure. And then just just enjoy talking
Speaker 1: to you. It's fun, respect you. It's been on a
Speaker 1: privilege for you to come on my podcast, um and
Speaker 1: just just a rock with you. And to be able
Speaker 1: to know when you're sitting around and you say, man,
Speaker 1: I want to check in with somebody. You know, uh,
Speaker 1: when your when your phone is not getting uh you know,
Speaker 1: stolen and hijacked while you're on vacation, Hawaiians. It's great,
Speaker 1: it's true. Still, it's true. Someone stolen tried to steal
Speaker 1: my phone, an identity theft the top and he's like see,
Speaker 1: was like, why don't you responding my text? And like
Speaker 1: let me explain it, and he told me, because I'll
Speaker 1: check in, Like there's some guys I try to check
Speaker 1: in when a lot of guys not you know, have
Speaker 1: a full on blown conversation, which just like, hey, I
Speaker 1: just want to make sure there's still your number. Hope
Speaker 1: all is well, you know, especially during the pandemic, and
Speaker 1: it was good and and you know, and then obviously
Speaker 1: when things happen. So it was cool. So appreciate. Someone
Speaker 1: once told me and a player once sent this to
Speaker 1: me a d M. And I thought it was cool.
Speaker 1: He said, really recognizes real And uh, I think I
Speaker 1: feel the same way about you, my friend. You are
Speaker 1: a unique person. You are well worth it, you are competent,
Speaker 1: and most of all, your lovable. I'm Steve Smith Senior.
Speaker 1: I'm Gerard Little John And this is cut to It
Speaker 1: cut to It with Steve Smith Senior. That is me
Speaker 1: is a production of Cut to It LLC Baltol, created
Speaker 1: of Media, The Black Effect and I Heart Radio. For
Speaker 1: more podcast from I Heart Radio, visit the I Heart
Speaker 1: Radio Apple Apple Podcast or wherever you listen to your
Speaker 1: favorite shows from Cut to It. Executive producer Steve Smith,
Speaker 1: singer co host Gerard Little John, talent in booking manager
Speaker 1: Joe Fusci, Social media team Wesley Robinson and John Show
Speaker 1: from Balto Creative Media. Cut to It is produced by
Speaker 1: Brian Falka Chevic and Meredith Carter, with production assistance by
Speaker 1: Alex Lebrec. Production coordinator Taylor Robinson. Theme music by Alex Johnson,
Speaker 1: lyrics and vocals by Anthony Hamilton. You ain't heard about it,
Speaker 1: then we're about to let you know. It's all