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Speaker 1: The volume. The Colin Coward Podcast presented by FanDuel Sports Book.

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Speaker 1: Get started now, sign up promo code Colin so they

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Speaker 1: know we and I sent you. The Colin Coward Podcast

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Speaker 1: presented by the Fan Duel Sports Book. Hi, everybody, welcome

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Speaker 1: into the Thursday Morning Podcast. I think you're gonna love it.

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Speaker 1: Chuck claw Sterman is a brilliant writer. He's got a

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Speaker 1: new book. It's called The Nineties Fascinating. He re examines

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Speaker 1: a crazy decade politically, pop culture, in sports. But first,

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Speaker 1: fake questions, real answers. I have stuff I want to

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Speaker 1: talk about. Don't want to wait for people to ask

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Speaker 1: me fake questions, real answers. Here we go, Colin, You've

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Speaker 1: been very critical of the NBA. This week On your show,

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Speaker 1: Adam Silver had some talking points that bothered you. Why

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Speaker 1: because I love the NBA and they've got an optics problem.

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Speaker 1: There's this belief that young people run Silicon Valley. No,

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Speaker 1: they don't. Silicon Valley is run by fifty year olds.

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Speaker 1: Larry Ellison is seventy seven. Mark Zuckerberg's one of the

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Speaker 1: kids he's bumping up against. Forty kids can't run an industry.

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Speaker 1: You think tech Silicon Valley's twenty year olds, it's not

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Speaker 1: the average age of founders his mid forties. You can't

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Speaker 1: let players run the NBA. They're twenty year olds, many

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Speaker 1: of them for the first time in their life, becoming

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Speaker 1: mega rich. In fact, in most cases, most athletes becoming

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Speaker 1: mega rich in baseball, the front offices control the sport.

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Speaker 1: In football, the GM and coach does. In basketball, the

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Speaker 1: players do. Think about the NBA's optics right now, Kyrie

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Speaker 1: quit on his team, KDS quitting on Brooklyn, Harden quit

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Speaker 1: on Philadelphia and Houston. Ben Simmons refuses to play. These

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Speaker 1: are four of the biggest names in the sport. It's

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Speaker 1: bad optics. Adam Silver held another press conference this week,

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Speaker 1: and he's got two issues. He's got to convinced players

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Speaker 1: to actually want to play games and to honor their contracts.

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Speaker 1: You don't think that's bad optics, it's embarrassing for a sport.

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Speaker 1: I love, dear Colin. I saw you got worked up

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Speaker 1: that andre Iguodala said if Rashid Wallace played today, he

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Speaker 1: would be better than us. Go into it more. I

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Speaker 1: found it amusing, so did I. I covered Rashid Wallace.

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Speaker 1: You know, it is interesting how some things, like we

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Speaker 1: know with art and line, they obviously get better with age, right,

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Speaker 1: But it's like Boschem Beckler. Boschem Beckler is viewed today

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Speaker 1: as a football coach greater than I think he was

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Speaker 1: viewed while he was a football coach. He lost eight

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Speaker 1: Rose Bowls. Whenever they played Ohio State, I thought he

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Speaker 1: was the second best coach on the field. Every time

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Speaker 1: he played in a Rose Bowl against my Huskies, I

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Speaker 1: thought to Don James, he was clearly the second best

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Speaker 1: coach on the field. The Big Ten was never easier

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Speaker 1: to win. Wisconsin was a joke during Bo's run. Now

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Speaker 1: they're a top fifteen program. Penn State wasn't in the conference.

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Speaker 1: Now it's one of the five six hardest places to

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Speaker 1: play in college football. Jim Harbaugh is winning as many games.

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Speaker 1: The Big Ten's never been better. Hardball succeeded at the

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Speaker 1: professional level, got to was Super Bowl. Harbaugh is dismissed, mocked,

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Speaker 1: I rolled by the Michigan faithful. He's a better coach

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Speaker 1: in a much tougher Big Ten than Bosche Meckler ever was.

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Speaker 1: That's my take on shed. Rashid Wallace's career average was

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Speaker 1: fourteen and a half points. He was a walking technical foul.

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Speaker 1: He was a child who had a sweet jumper for

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Speaker 1: a big guy. Jannis is the face of the league.

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Speaker 1: When Jannis wakes up and then goes to bed for

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Speaker 1: those eighteen to fifteen hours, he is an adult. His disposition,

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Speaker 1: his maturity. Rashid Wallace was a talented kid, Folks. He

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Speaker 1: never averaged twenty a game. He was the third or

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Speaker 1: fourth best power forward in the West. Carl Malone was better,

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Speaker 1: Duncan was better, Kevin Garnett was better. I liked him,

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Speaker 1: but he was a kid. He wasn't even the face

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Speaker 1: of the Blazers even though he was the most talented.

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Speaker 1: Jannie is the face of the league. Dear Colin, zach

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Speaker 1: Wilson story is intriguing. If your mom's best friend hit

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Speaker 1: on you, what would you do. My mom's best friend

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Speaker 1: was heavy set. Shall we say? But if my mom's

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Speaker 1: best friend was a smoke show and I was no

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Speaker 1: longer living in the house, I wasn't married, and she

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Speaker 1: wasn't married, I'd give it a run. But let's be honest.

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Speaker 1: Most of our mom's best friends are using a walker

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Speaker 1: and eat candy for dinner. My mom's best friend thought

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Speaker 1: crocheting was a physical activity, I'd pass. Dear Colin, I

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Speaker 1: always feel like your anti Dallas Cowboys and anti Dak. Recently,

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Speaker 1: you had a top ten quarterback poll and didn't put

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Speaker 1: Dak in it. The executives did what say you? Yeah?

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Speaker 1: The executives put him at number ten. It's a top

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Speaker 1: ten list. I had him like twelve. Here's all you

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Speaker 1: need to know about the Cowboys. Let's talk reality. Tom

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Speaker 1: Brady has more playoff wins as a Tampa Bay buccaneer,

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Speaker 1: and he's been there two years than the Dallas Cowboys

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Speaker 1: do since nineteen ninety six. What do you want me

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Speaker 1: to say about the Cowboys. They're an underachieving mega brand,

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Speaker 1: that's what they are. They're right now the Lakers. They're

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Speaker 1: sort of Kentucky basketball double check on who the Wildcats

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Speaker 1: and John Calipari lost to in the tournament this year.

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Speaker 1: Saint Peter's the Cowboys fewer wins than Tom Brady as

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Speaker 1: a buccaneer in the playoffs in the last twenty six

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Speaker 1: years to who they are. He's a best selling author,

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Speaker 1: a writer for The New York Times, Washington Post, Esquire, GQ,

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Speaker 1: a magazine I'll never appear in. His name is Chuck Closterman.

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Speaker 1: He's got a book called The Nineties, a fascinating look

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Speaker 1: back at a wild decade. So, Chuck, one of the

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Speaker 1: things you discuss of the many topics is the Michael

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Speaker 1: Jordan baseball career, And it's fascinating to me because you

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Speaker 1: touch on something that I've talked about with friends all

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Speaker 1: the time, how something is perceived later compared to how

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Speaker 1: it was perceived at the time. So you know, Jordan's

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Speaker 1: baseball career is considered largely a whiff. I don't know

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Speaker 1: how I thought about it in the mid nineties. Take

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Speaker 1: me back, Chuck, what was the reporting and the coverage

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Speaker 1: on it? Were we bewildered, were we disappointed? Were we

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Speaker 1: kind of impressed that he gave it a run? What

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Speaker 1: was the coverage on MJ's baseball career back then. Well,

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Speaker 1: you know, what you're mentioning is very true. It's interesting

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Speaker 1: to me how this period of his career now has

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Speaker 1: sort of been reconsidered as charming. Like I think, I

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Speaker 1: think that people now look at as sort of a

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Speaker 1: like an interesting detail in this person's kind of trajectory.

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Speaker 1: You know, uh that in some ways has humanizes him,

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Speaker 1: although that doesn't really make a lot of sense. I mean,

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Speaker 1: at the time, it was very strange. Um. You know,

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Speaker 1: we were in this period where there were people like

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Speaker 1: Bo Jackson and Dean Sanders who were playing multiple sports,

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Speaker 1: but that was those were very different situations. Not only

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Speaker 1: had they played in college, but they seem to have

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Speaker 1: this sort of physical imposing quality that would transcend to

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Speaker 1: any sport, whereas Jordan is this guy who's six six,

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Speaker 1: pretty wiry. I mean, I guess you'd argue you could

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Speaker 1: play volleyball, but it doesn't. He doesn't really the body

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Speaker 1: that's made to play baseball. So then the thinking was, well,

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Speaker 1: why is he doing this, Like is it because of

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Speaker 1: the death of his father? And his father had loved baseball,

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Speaker 1: which is sort of what Jordan implied. You know, there

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Speaker 1: were the conspiracies about this idea of gambling, that he

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Speaker 1: was secretly suspended by David Stern and this was some

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Speaker 1: way for him to keep earning his money, like it

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Speaker 1: had been some kind of compromise. There was this idea

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Speaker 1: that maybe he perceived himself as invincible and that there

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Speaker 1: wasn't really a sport that he could not excel at.

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Speaker 1: It was very strange, and you know, his profile at

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Speaker 1: the time was larger than any player in Major League Baseball.

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Speaker 1: So during spring training of those years, you know, it

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Speaker 1: was sort of the main story surrounding baseball, and then

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Speaker 1: the season would start he was relegated, you know, to

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Speaker 1: the minor leagues, and then we kind of go back

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Speaker 1: to our normal coverage. I guess what I find interesting

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Speaker 1: about it is, to me, it sort of illustrates the

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Speaker 1: last period in American history where baseball was still seen

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Speaker 1: as different than other sports and some was desired to play.

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Speaker 1: Baseball did not seem as maybe paradoxical as it would

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Speaker 1: seem now. I mean, we were thinking about this time when,

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Speaker 1: like you know, Ken Burns's baseball was on PBS, and

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Speaker 1: there was this idea that baseball was just different than

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Speaker 1: other sports. And I would guess when you were a

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Speaker 1: younger person, particularly for like your father, there was this

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Speaker 1: idea that baseball had the separation from football and basketball,

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Speaker 1: even as it lost its kind of popularity. And I

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Speaker 1: look at Jordan's attempt to play baseball is sort of

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Speaker 1: the last time when this thinking was still so common

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Speaker 1: that the greatest basketball player in the world would somehow

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Speaker 1: seem see logic and trying to play the sport that

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Speaker 1: was really receding from the cultural conversation. There's two people

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Speaker 1: in my life that I consider had a force field

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Speaker 1: around them. Reagan, who once laughed and joked about bombing

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Speaker 1: Russia and it was a story for like a day,

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Speaker 1: and and MJ that MJ a lot of vagaries here, selfish,

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Speaker 1: punched a teammate, quit twice, hard to coach, tough on teammates,

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Speaker 1: failed at baseball, was divorced gambling controversies. Lebron James big

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Speaker 1: knock is he really didn't criticize China much when he

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Speaker 1: had an opportunity too. Oh yeah, once as a free

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Speaker 1: agent he left. Is that I think history would be

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Speaker 1: much more favorable to Lebron. Not that he'll be criticized,

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Speaker 1: but he would be far less criticized. If he played

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Speaker 1: when Jordan did, and Jordan played now, Jordan would be pummeled.

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Speaker 1: It's almost as if Sports Center never ran any of

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Speaker 1: his misses and there was there was a bubble around

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Speaker 1: Jordan and Chuck I always felt a lot of it

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Speaker 1: was he had the first, He was the first on

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Speaker 1: the big shoe deal that Nike surrounded him with an

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Speaker 1: impenetrable shield, a bubble, and Reagan felt a little bit

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Speaker 1: like that. Now, with Twitter and social media and the polarization,

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Speaker 1: Reagan would get crushed as doddering, old goofy actor, vacuous,

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Speaker 1: and they had his critics. So that my takeaway on

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Speaker 1: Michael is he was kind of fortunate. You could have

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Speaker 1: a lot of flaws in the nineties. Am I wrong

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Speaker 1: on that? Well? No, I mean in terms of one's

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Speaker 1: ability to sort of go through life and have huge

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Speaker 1: parts of it in. Everybody prior to the social media

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Speaker 1: universe benefited from that. I mean, going back to the

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Speaker 1: idea of the FDR being paralyzed, essentially was something that

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Speaker 1: you could sort of keep out of the public conversation.

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Speaker 1: I mean, the thing you say about Lebron it's pretty

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Speaker 1: fascinating in the sense that I can't think of many

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Speaker 1: other examples of a situation where somebody was very young

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Speaker 1: and before they had done anything, was sort of deemed

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Speaker 1: as this individual is going to become, you know, the

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Speaker 1: apex of his sport, and then it actually worked out.

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Speaker 1: I mean Tiger Woods sort of had that, but then

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Speaker 1: that all sort of dissolved, you know, you know it

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Speaker 1: once we move into like two thousand and six and

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Speaker 1: two thousand and seven, Lebron's the fact that he's never

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Speaker 1: had a cataclismic failure is surprising. Now you look at Jordan,

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Speaker 1: it is interesting. I often think that, you know that

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Speaker 1: we remember these guys for their their great achievements, but

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Speaker 1: they're sort of defined by their greatest failure. And you know,

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Speaker 1: Jordan's greatest failure, if you really boil it down, was

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Speaker 1: his inability to control his competitive nature that at times

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Speaker 1: made him uh misread both like his ability to play baseball,

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Speaker 1: his ability to come back with the Wizards and be

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Speaker 1: the same although the two years he spent with the

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Speaker 1: Wizards probably isn't as bad as we now seem to

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Speaker 1: sort of remember it. But um, you know, Jordan going

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Speaker 1: to say gamble when they're playing the Knicks and disappearing

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Speaker 1: all night with his dad and coming back and they're

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Speaker 1: down two. Now, it is pretty obvious to say, like

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Speaker 1: in the social media era, that would be very different.

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Speaker 1: There would be there would have been attempts to argue

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Speaker 1: that he didn't really care about winning, but all those

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Speaker 1: things were removed from the equation to the point where

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Speaker 1: we now look at Jordan's kind of almost sociopathic competition

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Speaker 1: as our favorite thing about him. The idea that he

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Speaker 1: would cheat, you know, Buzz Peterson's grandma at you know, Goldfish,

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Speaker 1: when he goes gold Fish, when they goes home with

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Speaker 1: him at Christmas. The idea that, like he would keep

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Speaker 1: Isaiah Thomas off the Olympic team. All these things that

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Speaker 1: in truth are sort of signs of somebody who is

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Speaker 1: unable to sort of to turn off this desire to dominate.

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Speaker 1: We love that, and maybe if he had been punished

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Speaker 1: at time for it, we would think differently. But because

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Speaker 1: he wasn't punished for that in the nineties, we forgive

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Speaker 1: it now retroactively. Yeah, It's almost like when Oliver Stone

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Speaker 1: made Gordon Gecko, he did not make him to be

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Speaker 1: a beloved character, and it just so happens he was

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Speaker 1: right well, I mean that's all. I mean, you look

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Speaker 1: at a character like Archie Bunker the same way, where

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Speaker 1: it's like when someone tries to do satire in a

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Speaker 1: way that is so close to reality that a lot

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Speaker 1: of times people will enjoy it at face value. You know,

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Speaker 1: like like Jordan's sort of overheated competition. We enjoyed that

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Speaker 1: at face value. It was the idea that it meant

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Speaker 1: something else wasn't really part of it. I mean, now,

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Speaker 1: when you look at an athlete in the spotlight, whether

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Speaker 1: it's you know, Lebron or Kyrie Irving or you know

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Speaker 1: Aaron Rodgers, any of these guys, all their decisions that

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Speaker 1: they make that are ancillary to the sport they play

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Speaker 1: are sort of injected back into the view of them

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Speaker 1: as an athlete. So if we look at, say, you know,

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Speaker 1: Aaron Rodgers, and we say to ourselves, well, there are

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Speaker 1: all these issues that I have with sort of his worldview.

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Speaker 1: Maybe somebody has they try to kind of fit these

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Speaker 1: into our perception of him as a quarterback. And there

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Speaker 1: was less of that in the past. I mean, the

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Speaker 1: idea of looking at an athlete seriously for his political

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Speaker 1: views outside of you know, Muhammad Ali and he's kind of,

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Speaker 1: you know, Jim Brown to a degree, kareem to a degree,

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Speaker 1: there wasn't an expectation where now that expectation is sort

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Speaker 1: of applied across the board that every person who kind

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Speaker 1: as a on the field or on the court performer,

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Speaker 1: we also are considering what we think their moral worldview is,

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Speaker 1: you know, and that's something that does seem to have

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Speaker 1: have a footnote about Buddhism and the zen Master. Phil Jackson,

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Speaker 1: who I thought came across really well on the MJA

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Speaker 1: documentary as a level headed um, not stoic, but um

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Speaker 1: in a sea of intensity and toxicity. He came across

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Speaker 1: so sort of a stable, uh thirty thousand feet arms

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Speaker 1: around the juggling all the weird personalities. But you you

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Speaker 1: talk about this in your book the nineties about how

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Speaker 1: he is viewed more favorably now, the zen Master stuff.

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Speaker 1: Then probably it would be viewed today, maybe he be

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Speaker 1: viewed as weird or quirky. Well, there was a strange

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Speaker 1: period kind of starting with the late eighties but moving

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Speaker 1: through really the middle to late nineties where the idea

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Speaker 1: of say new age thinking or what we call new

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Speaker 1: age thinking. What Phil Jackson was doing isn't like he's

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Speaker 1: not staring at crystals or something, but he was part

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Speaker 1: of this world. Right Well, this is something that you know,

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Speaker 1: kind of emerges in the late sixties and early seventies,

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Speaker 1: and this scene as sort of like the fringe of

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Speaker 1: the leftist world. Right now, we live in a period

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Speaker 1: where we look back on that and it's kind of

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Speaker 1: quaint and it seems almost like like what those silly

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Speaker 1: hippies what they were into. But there was this one

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Speaker 1: period where a lot of the people who had been

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Speaker 1: involved with New Age thinking at its inception had moved

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Speaker 1: into these positions of kind of fiscal and financial power

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Speaker 1: and you know, the things like the Biosphere project that

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Speaker 1: was an extension of New Age thinking. So when Phil

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Speaker 1: Jackson was you know, having you know, his players read

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Speaker 1: these books about like you know, Native American taboos and

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Speaker 1: all these things, like, it was like that was a strange,

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Speaker 1: interesting thing, but it was like, I mean, certainly bracketed

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Speaker 1: with his success, it sort of made that seem reasonable.

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Speaker 1: You know. Many years later, I interviewed Kobe Bryant, and

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Speaker 1: I was surprised by how much animosity towards Phil Jackson,

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Speaker 1: along with the respect he had for him, that Kobe

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Speaker 1: still felt, and that Kobe really felt that, you know,

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Speaker 1: Phil Jackson presented himself in the media as this reasonable

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Speaker 1: person and then would use that position to pit him

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Speaker 1: against Shack or to tell Shack things through his criticism

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Speaker 1: of Kobe and all these It is an interesting deal.

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Speaker 1: I there was a I think a point where like

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Speaker 1: Phil Jackson almost seemed teflon like he had had so

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Speaker 1: much success, and he seemed so much smarter than the

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Speaker 1: people around him, or so different than the kind of

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Speaker 1: person who had that job. You didn't really hear him criticize,

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Speaker 1: and now you do. I mean, his tenure with Nicks

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Speaker 1: was weird, and I think just his inability sort of

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Speaker 1: to disappear from public life in a way has changed

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Speaker 1: the way we think about him. You know, I think

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Speaker 1: as a nineties figure, Phil Jackson was almost untouchable, right

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Speaker 1: you know, you touch on something else, the steroid era,

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Speaker 1: And this is my memory. I lived at the time.

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Speaker 1: I can recall this anyway where you do now Portland

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Speaker 1: and I was a local sportscaster, and I remember during

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Speaker 1: the Sosa McGuire chase, we would turn into this special

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Speaker 1: feed NBC. I worked at an NBC affiliate would have

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Speaker 1: a special feed, so McGuire and Sosa, but mostly McGuire

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Speaker 1: would talk after every game. And I remember McGuire would

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Speaker 1: come in and these sleeveless shirts, and we used to

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Speaker 1: always joke in our sports office were like, his arms

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Speaker 1: are bigger than our legs. He's on steroids. It's so obvious,

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Speaker 1: and I don't remember being bothered by it. The sport

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Speaker 1: didn't seem to care, so I didn't care. Baseball was fun.

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Speaker 1: Let's go back and re examine that as your book

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Speaker 1: does the nineties. This is Chuck Closterman. Um, we kind

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Speaker 1: of I'm just gonna I'm gonna lay it out there

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Speaker 1: for you because I'm not I'm just getting into your book.

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Speaker 1: My view from outside the perimeter is, yeah, it saved

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Speaker 1: the game. How was it viewed when it was happening. Well,

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Speaker 1: you know, even as you're saying with your memory of

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Speaker 1: this is of like seeing Maguire and seeing like his

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Speaker 1: arms and things like those look like legs or you know,

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Speaker 1: it would be interesting, I think, to go back and

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Speaker 1: and sort of maybe watch footage of what you were

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Speaker 1: saying at the time. Because what Here's what I have

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Speaker 1: kind of come to include about this period of time

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Speaker 1: that it's very difficult for people to think about that

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Speaker 1: period without sort of pulling in the way they think

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Speaker 1: about it in sort of a modern context. So there

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Speaker 1: was this idea in retrospect that well, some people saw

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Speaker 1: this and they were like, it's it's obvious that these

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Speaker 1: guys are on steroids. It's it's it's completely clear. Everyone

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Speaker 1: knows it. But nobody cares because we liked the result.

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Speaker 1: And there's also people who say, like, oh, well, we

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Speaker 1: were just naive. We didn't understand it at the time.

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Speaker 1: As far as I can tell from both the combination

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Speaker 1: of my memory but specifically going back and sort of

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Speaker 1: rereading stories at the time, the real answer was much

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Speaker 1: more in the middle of those two ideas, which is

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Speaker 1: that it wasn't as though people had no idea that

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Speaker 1: steroids were out there. I mean, Ben Johnson had had

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Speaker 1: his situation years before it was it was, you know,

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Speaker 1: it was definitely in the public conversation, but there was

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Speaker 1: a lack of information about how steroids worked, specifically the

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Speaker 1: idea that there was almost a belief that steroids were

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Speaker 1: some you know, a magic bullet that you injected and

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Speaker 1: your muscles get big, and every rational person was like,

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Speaker 1: that's not how the world works. So it's like it

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Speaker 1: seemed unlikely that guys were just taking steroids and suddenly

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Speaker 1: becoming these, you know, these colossal sluggers. There was also

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Speaker 1: I think a lack of information about the psychological upside

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Speaker 1: to steroids. I mean, what really happened. And I this

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Speaker 1: was mentioned with Barry Bonds more than anyone which is

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Speaker 1: that because there was this belief that he was on steroids,

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Speaker 1: an opposing picture was then afraid to challenge him, seeing

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Speaker 1: that this guy had this, you know, assuming this guy

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Speaker 1: had this advantage that they did not have. We didn't,

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Speaker 1: you know. And the third thing being that the biggest

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Speaker 1: thing that steroids did was allowed guys to train harder

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Speaker 1: and recover faster. So in some ways it did seem

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Speaker 1: as though the people who would have succeeded anyways just

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Speaker 1: succeeded more. Um As far as what, like, what did

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Speaker 1: people think at the time, well, of course that was varied,

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Speaker 1: but I think it is much more varied than we

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Speaker 1: want to believe. That we like to accept that there

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Speaker 1: were straightforward ideas about this, and they were not. But

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Speaker 1: that's the case with most history. I mean, we're always

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Speaker 1: looking back at time and coming to these conclusions that

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Speaker 1: this was the normative way to think, or that this

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Speaker 1: was the overwhelming perception of an event, and of course

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Speaker 1: when you go back and look, it's never like that.

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Speaker 1: You know. If nothing else, there's almost a desire, particularly

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Speaker 1: by the media, to always sort of inject the opposing view,

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Speaker 1: which gives this kind of weird illusion of a multiplicity

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Speaker 1: of thought. You know, you also look at college football

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Speaker 1: in the BCS era, and Chuck, I've really been hitting

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Speaker 1: on this for the last couple of weeks. With a

421
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Speaker 1: Big ten expansion, is that political and sports pundents often

422
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Speaker 1: throw topics into an outrage blender. That if you gives

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Speaker 1: them some thought and you give them some time, there's

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Speaker 1: more normalcy to a lot of this expansion than we think.

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Speaker 1: But we live in a twenty four seven news cycle

426
00:26:12,560 --> 00:26:15,080
Speaker 1: and I have to have a strong opinion tomorrow. And

427
00:26:15,240 --> 00:26:18,480
Speaker 1: I think the expanding Big Ten, the emerging Big twelve,

428
00:26:18,680 --> 00:26:22,640
Speaker 1: combined with the Pac twelve, that with an expanded playoff,

429
00:26:22,920 --> 00:26:25,359
Speaker 1: it's going to look more like college basketball. We won't

430
00:26:25,400 --> 00:26:27,920
Speaker 1: care how people get in the tournament. The teams that

431
00:26:27,960 --> 00:26:30,479
Speaker 1: should get in will get in, be at the SEC,

432
00:26:31,000 --> 00:26:34,120
Speaker 1: the ACC, there'll be one from the Mountain West. We'll

433
00:26:34,160 --> 00:26:37,680
Speaker 1: have sixteen teams. And that we just live in a

434
00:26:37,760 --> 00:26:40,880
Speaker 1: world of cable news getting clicks a lot of outrage,

435
00:26:40,960 --> 00:26:43,760
Speaker 1: and that most things are layered. And also, Chuck, I

436
00:26:43,840 --> 00:26:47,280
Speaker 1: believe though, when anything new happens, it's a bit of

437
00:26:47,320 --> 00:26:51,760
Speaker 1: an avalanche, and that over time, whether it's tech, everything

438
00:26:51,840 --> 00:26:57,119
Speaker 1: has a gold rush quality, right everybody's in bitcoin. It

439
00:26:57,320 --> 00:27:01,080
Speaker 1: explodes now it pulls back. The truth is coin will survive,

440
00:27:01,880 --> 00:27:04,600
Speaker 1: and in one year from now it will have survived.

441
00:27:05,440 --> 00:27:09,119
Speaker 1: It's great depression, right, but we don't the right of

442
00:27:09,200 --> 00:27:12,040
Speaker 1: media covers things. It's very in the moment and very urgent.

443
00:27:12,480 --> 00:27:14,680
Speaker 1: So let me let me roll into your argument about

444
00:27:14,680 --> 00:27:17,960
Speaker 1: college football. There is this sense that college football now

445
00:27:18,080 --> 00:27:21,639
Speaker 1: is a bit of a mess. And my argument is

446
00:27:21,960 --> 00:27:26,000
Speaker 1: what time out. I grew up in the seventies. I mean,

447
00:27:26,320 --> 00:27:29,840
Speaker 1: sometimes the best team you didn't even get a play

448
00:27:29,960 --> 00:27:32,960
Speaker 1: for it. And you talk about the BCS era in

449
00:27:33,040 --> 00:27:36,480
Speaker 1: college football more pragmatically, and I'd like you to dive

450
00:27:36,520 --> 00:27:38,000
Speaker 1: into that a little bit. Well, yeah, I mean, I

451
00:27:38,160 --> 00:27:40,159
Speaker 1: gotta say I kind of disagree with some of what

452
00:27:40,240 --> 00:27:42,840
Speaker 1: you're saying here because I feel like the shift that

453
00:27:42,920 --> 00:27:47,520
Speaker 1: you're talking about is slightly more dramatic than sort of

454
00:27:47,520 --> 00:27:49,399
Speaker 1: the way you're perceiving. Okay, you tell you compared to

455
00:27:49,440 --> 00:27:53,239
Speaker 1: the NCAA basketball Tournament, the NCAA basketball Tournament still has

456
00:27:53,280 --> 00:27:55,520
Speaker 1: the element of all the conference tournaments. I think, like

457
00:27:55,600 --> 00:27:58,679
Speaker 1: a lot of people, I've become someone who almost enjoys

458
00:27:58,760 --> 00:28:01,120
Speaker 1: that week more than the actual tournament. Because you're seeing

459
00:28:01,480 --> 00:28:04,920
Speaker 1: teams who are playing for something that really is the

460
00:28:05,359 --> 00:28:07,359
Speaker 1: maybe the fulfillment of the kid's dream. You know, the

461
00:28:07,480 --> 00:28:10,960
Speaker 1: kid goes to you know, Central Michigan or whatever, his

462
00:28:11,080 --> 00:28:13,120
Speaker 1: dream is to just make the NCAA tournament. So you're

463
00:28:13,119 --> 00:28:16,800
Speaker 1: seeing this game where the outcome of that will potentially

464
00:28:16,920 --> 00:28:20,280
Speaker 1: be the greatest memory in that kid's life. Where with

465
00:28:20,359 --> 00:28:22,280
Speaker 1: the big schools and the ACC and the Big Ten,

466
00:28:22,359 --> 00:28:24,960
Speaker 1: you know, they go into the season with the assuming

467
00:28:25,119 --> 00:28:26,919
Speaker 1: with the assumption they're going to be in the tournament,

468
00:28:26,960 --> 00:28:30,840
Speaker 1: you know. And I feel like in general, we have

469
00:28:31,800 --> 00:28:36,159
Speaker 1: kind of dramatically attempted to push both college basketball, but

470
00:28:36,280 --> 00:28:41,200
Speaker 1: really college football into a pro reality. And the and

471
00:28:41,360 --> 00:28:43,840
Speaker 1: the difference that you know, the idea of USC and

472
00:28:43,960 --> 00:28:47,440
Speaker 1: UCLA going into the Big Ten. It's just to me

473
00:28:47,560 --> 00:28:53,160
Speaker 1: that it changes a lot about what made college football

474
00:28:53,400 --> 00:28:56,560
Speaker 1: separate from other sports in the sense that, like I mean,

475
00:28:56,560 --> 00:28:58,680
Speaker 1: I think it's not always really interesting to me that,

476
00:28:59,480 --> 00:29:03,880
Speaker 1: you know, how many years has it been that where

477
00:29:03,920 --> 00:29:06,520
Speaker 1: when the Mississippi Old Miss football game meant a lot

478
00:29:06,640 --> 00:29:09,480
Speaker 1: in the national picture. It's been a long time. There's

479
00:29:09,480 --> 00:29:12,000
Speaker 1: still a lot of interest in that game. Okay, that

480
00:29:12,120 --> 00:29:15,240
Speaker 1: game still has meaning in the state of Mississippi UM,

481
00:29:15,640 --> 00:29:19,240
Speaker 1: you know, and I see what college sports are doing

482
00:29:19,400 --> 00:29:21,400
Speaker 1: is like, I mean, here's a great I guess an

483
00:29:21,400 --> 00:29:25,240
Speaker 1: ancillary point. Think of other controversies in your life, you know,

484
00:29:25,400 --> 00:29:30,240
Speaker 1: adding the DHU, having pro basketball players play in the Olympics.

485
00:29:30,800 --> 00:29:33,760
Speaker 1: With these situations, I always recall there being two strong

486
00:29:33,880 --> 00:29:36,720
Speaker 1: sides to this, somebody wanting it and somebody being against it.

487
00:29:37,480 --> 00:29:42,320
Speaker 1: Who is for these conference realignments in college football? Outside

488
00:29:42,320 --> 00:29:45,080
Speaker 1: of the networks and a few university presidents. Have you

489
00:29:45,160 --> 00:29:47,280
Speaker 1: heard anybody who's a Pac twelve fan who's like this

490
00:29:47,440 --> 00:29:50,840
Speaker 1: is great? I mean, it's it's it's a strange deal.

491
00:29:50,920 --> 00:29:52,760
Speaker 1: It's almost as though we feel as though we have

492
00:29:52,920 --> 00:29:55,680
Speaker 1: no agency in this, Like it has to happen because

493
00:29:55,800 --> 00:29:58,520
Speaker 1: money dominates everything, and it just has to happen. And

494
00:29:58,640 --> 00:30:01,840
Speaker 1: we're I think accepting that this is going to be

495
00:30:01,920 --> 00:30:05,760
Speaker 1: a completely different sport to experience in five years. I mean,

496
00:30:07,280 --> 00:30:10,000
Speaker 1: what you see on the field will not be as

497
00:30:10,040 --> 00:30:12,920
Speaker 1: separate as the product we see now, but it seems

498
00:30:12,920 --> 00:30:15,280
Speaker 1: like a social meeting will be totally different. I mean,

499
00:30:15,520 --> 00:30:19,160
Speaker 1: it has hurt college basketball that it has become more

500
00:30:19,280 --> 00:30:22,440
Speaker 1: of a pro light game, like when you watch a

501
00:30:22,520 --> 00:30:25,000
Speaker 1: college basketball game now, especially if it's in the middle

502
00:30:25,000 --> 00:30:28,800
Speaker 1: of the year and the teams are good. What you're

503
00:30:28,880 --> 00:30:32,040
Speaker 1: really seeing, to me very often seems just like a

504
00:30:32,200 --> 00:30:34,800
Speaker 1: lesser version of the pro game where it used to

505
00:30:34,880 --> 00:30:38,360
Speaker 1: be in my relatively recent memory. Like, you know, the

506
00:30:38,440 --> 00:30:40,360
Speaker 1: Big East had a style of play, the Big Ten

507
00:30:40,400 --> 00:30:42,120
Speaker 1: had a style of play that as you see, the

508
00:30:42,160 --> 00:30:46,320
Speaker 1: style of play, and it almost rewarded the fan who

509
00:30:46,480 --> 00:30:49,120
Speaker 1: cared and was knowledgeable and interested in this. And now

510
00:30:49,200 --> 00:30:52,360
Speaker 1: I feel like they're almost making college football into something

511
00:30:52,680 --> 00:30:55,120
Speaker 1: that will be more accessible for people who want to

512
00:30:55,120 --> 00:30:58,600
Speaker 1: play college fantasy and for gambling, and to make sure

513
00:30:58,680 --> 00:31:01,680
Speaker 1: that there's not that one where like all the SEC

514
00:31:01,840 --> 00:31:04,840
Speaker 1: teams play subdivision teams and there's no game for CBS.

515
00:31:05,000 --> 00:31:07,240
Speaker 1: I feel like almost everything that has happened with this

516
00:31:07,560 --> 00:31:12,240
Speaker 1: change has been unpopular among people who like football and

517
00:31:13,520 --> 00:31:16,200
Speaker 1: also kind of just weirdly assumed to be inevitable. And

518
00:31:16,280 --> 00:31:17,960
Speaker 1: I don't think it was. I don't think this had

519
00:31:18,000 --> 00:31:21,240
Speaker 1: to happen, or do you feel like it had to happen? Yeah,

520
00:31:21,320 --> 00:31:24,000
Speaker 1: so college I love college football. You're the only guy

521
00:31:24,040 --> 00:31:25,800
Speaker 1: who really talks about this. I mean, this is also

522
00:31:25,840 --> 00:31:29,200
Speaker 1: the weird thing because ESPN is driving so much of

523
00:31:29,320 --> 00:31:32,520
Speaker 1: this because they dominate the college football Tilakas you turn

524
00:31:32,600 --> 00:31:36,120
Speaker 1: on all those ESPN shows, they're talking about basketball, even

525
00:31:36,160 --> 00:31:39,440
Speaker 1: though college football is substantially more popular than the NBA.

526
00:31:39,680 --> 00:31:42,120
Speaker 1: I feel like people aren't talking about this enough. Oh

527
00:31:42,200 --> 00:31:45,280
Speaker 1: I talk about it constantly. I talked about college football today, Chuck.

528
00:31:45,480 --> 00:31:48,720
Speaker 1: My feeling was there's a seven year TV ratings and

529
00:31:48,840 --> 00:31:52,440
Speaker 1: attendance decline in the sport. It is too insular and regional,

530
00:31:53,080 --> 00:31:55,560
Speaker 1: and the biggest problem with the game because it has

531
00:31:55,640 --> 00:31:58,720
Speaker 1: no czar as a billion dollar league. This is why

532
00:31:59,000 --> 00:32:02,680
Speaker 1: the UFC stole so much real estate from boxing. There

533
00:32:02,800 --> 00:32:06,640
Speaker 1: was no centralized voice until Dana Wide arrive. Like him

534
00:32:06,720 --> 00:32:11,320
Speaker 1: or not, here's the message I'm delivering it. Here's the

535
00:32:11,440 --> 00:32:15,760
Speaker 1: fight card. We're all in. Boxing was Aerum, boxing was

536
00:32:15,880 --> 00:32:19,000
Speaker 1: Al Hayman, it was Don King. There was no leadership,

537
00:32:19,040 --> 00:32:22,680
Speaker 1: So college football has no leader. The problem being, of course,

538
00:32:22,800 --> 00:32:28,480
Speaker 1: is all these power brokers, Saban Dabbo. They run the sport.

539
00:32:28,880 --> 00:32:31,480
Speaker 1: They do whatever's good for their schedule. They put buys

540
00:32:31,520 --> 00:32:35,200
Speaker 1: before the big games. So college football has an overwhelming issue,

541
00:32:35,280 --> 00:32:37,760
Speaker 1: and I think this helps solve it. It's got a

542
00:32:37,880 --> 00:32:42,760
Speaker 1: big game problem. On any given Saturday, Labor Day is

543
00:32:42,840 --> 00:32:46,640
Speaker 1: wide open. It should be college footballs. There's ninety five games.

544
00:32:47,040 --> 00:32:49,560
Speaker 1: There are two I have to watch Notre Dame, ohiuse

545
00:32:49,640 --> 00:32:52,760
Speaker 1: date Georgia Oregon. The following week there's ninety eight games.

546
00:32:53,000 --> 00:32:56,720
Speaker 1: There's one I have to watch Texas, bamma. Is it

547
00:32:56,840 --> 00:33:03,760
Speaker 1: in college football? I don't get an expanded playoff forces

548
00:33:03,880 --> 00:33:07,560
Speaker 1: because you can lose multiple games. Now, USC will now

549
00:33:07,640 --> 00:33:12,160
Speaker 1: play Wisconsin, Penn State, Michigan, Ohio State, Iowa. They literally

550
00:33:12,240 --> 00:33:14,920
Speaker 1: have a UCLA game in a Notre Dame game. The

551
00:33:15,040 --> 00:33:19,960
Speaker 1: sport doesn't have enough big games. But to me, you

552
00:33:20,080 --> 00:33:23,480
Speaker 1: seem to be describing it as purely and maybe this

553
00:33:23,680 --> 00:33:25,880
Speaker 1: is maybe not only this is your opinion, maybe it's

554
00:33:25,920 --> 00:33:28,640
Speaker 1: the right opinion. You seem to be describing this purely

555
00:33:29,560 --> 00:33:33,400
Speaker 1: as a form of entertainment that there is that there

556
00:33:33,520 --> 00:33:36,760
Speaker 1: is really no difference between college football and the film

557
00:33:36,840 --> 00:33:39,560
Speaker 1: industry or any of these things, because because the entire

558
00:33:39,600 --> 00:33:41,480
Speaker 1: filter you're going through on this is sort of like,

559
00:33:42,080 --> 00:33:44,040
Speaker 1: how does this you know? And I think that this

560
00:33:44,200 --> 00:33:46,880
Speaker 1: is a that's an unreasonable argument. I mean, ultimately, this

561
00:33:47,160 --> 00:33:49,840
Speaker 1: is all entertainment, and television does control all of this.

562
00:33:50,400 --> 00:33:52,360
Speaker 1: But I mean when you say, you talk about the

563
00:33:52,400 --> 00:33:57,880
Speaker 1: seven year decline in ratings and revenue, I mean that

564
00:33:58,160 --> 00:34:00,560
Speaker 1: has its just I mean, I think all sports in

565
00:34:00,600 --> 00:34:03,680
Speaker 1: the United States, with the possible exception of the NFL,

566
00:34:03,760 --> 00:34:06,320
Speaker 1: are sort of eroding that that you know, they're losing,

567
00:34:06,400 --> 00:34:10,040
Speaker 1: they're just because things are are more splintered. And I

568
00:34:10,120 --> 00:34:13,759
Speaker 1: think I think the regional quality of college football is

569
00:34:13,960 --> 00:34:17,880
Speaker 1: kind of what in some ways insulated it that that

570
00:34:18,120 --> 00:34:21,680
Speaker 1: it was. But by keeping that regional quality, they're still

571
00:34:21,800 --> 00:34:23,719
Speaker 1: going to be interested in this sport no matter what

572
00:34:24,120 --> 00:34:27,200
Speaker 1: it sort of happens in sort of a national specter.

573
00:34:27,360 --> 00:34:30,080
Speaker 1: Games in Florida are still going to be popular in Florida,

574
00:34:30,320 --> 00:34:33,160
Speaker 1: you know. I And I think that, like I mean,

575
00:34:33,280 --> 00:34:36,160
Speaker 1: I don't know, when you watch a college game, it

576
00:34:36,280 --> 00:34:38,040
Speaker 1: just to me it means so much more than watching

577
00:34:38,080 --> 00:34:40,319
Speaker 1: a pro game, because, in a sense, if you watch

578
00:34:40,440 --> 00:34:43,640
Speaker 1: the Giants play the Cowboys, okay, you're watching guys who

579
00:34:44,360 --> 00:34:47,680
Speaker 1: happen to pay taxes in those communities that everything just

580
00:34:47,800 --> 00:34:50,439
Speaker 1: kind of changes and cycles through. When you watch, say

581
00:34:50,520 --> 00:34:53,440
Speaker 1: Stanford and Notre Dame, you are also thinking about the

582
00:34:53,560 --> 00:34:55,160
Speaker 1: kind of kid who goes to Stanford, the kind of

583
00:34:55,239 --> 00:34:57,200
Speaker 1: kid who goes to Notre Dame. But that that that

584
00:34:57,360 --> 00:35:00,920
Speaker 1: that even though these athletes are outside that, and that's

585
00:35:00,960 --> 00:35:03,160
Speaker 1: certainly a lot of guys who, like I mean a

586
00:35:03,239 --> 00:35:06,319
Speaker 1: lot of guys who maybe play football for Duke, maybe

587
00:35:06,360 --> 00:35:08,359
Speaker 1: couldn't get into Duke in any other way or whatever,

588
00:35:08,600 --> 00:35:11,160
Speaker 1: there's still an like the university sees them as an

589
00:35:11,200 --> 00:35:14,399
Speaker 1: extension of the student body. And I just I think

590
00:35:14,440 --> 00:35:18,000
Speaker 1: it's weird that we're just sort of accepting that the

591
00:35:18,120 --> 00:35:22,080
Speaker 1: thing that made the sport unique is the like, the

592
00:35:22,200 --> 00:35:25,279
Speaker 1: primary obstacle to its popularity. I just I don't think

593
00:35:26,680 --> 00:35:31,040
Speaker 1: it's troubling to me, Like I'm pretty disenchanted by what

594
00:35:31,280 --> 00:35:33,360
Speaker 1: has happened when I mean, when I heard USC and

595
00:35:33,440 --> 00:35:36,120
Speaker 1: UCLA were going to the Big Ten, I mean it

596
00:35:36,200 --> 00:35:42,719
Speaker 1: just at first, I was like, so, so none of

597
00:35:42,760 --> 00:35:45,080
Speaker 1: this matters, Like, like it was strange enough when the

598
00:35:45,120 --> 00:35:47,640
Speaker 1: Big Ten had to suddenly have eleven teams. It took

599
00:35:47,680 --> 00:35:49,480
Speaker 1: me a long time to get used to that. But

600
00:35:49,600 --> 00:35:51,600
Speaker 1: now we realize, well, the Big Ten is just a name.

601
00:35:51,680 --> 00:35:54,040
Speaker 1: It's just a word. Like it's like we all these

602
00:35:54,120 --> 00:35:59,400
Speaker 1: things that are just words, you know. For the record, overwhelmingly,

603
00:35:59,760 --> 00:36:02,839
Speaker 1: the media that covers college football and the fans who

604
00:36:02,920 --> 00:36:06,040
Speaker 1: enjoy it agree with you. So I'm wrong often generally

605
00:36:06,080 --> 00:36:08,680
Speaker 1: with conviction. But that's just my take. So I also

606
00:36:08,760 --> 00:36:14,200
Speaker 1: want to talk about something about television and your your

607
00:36:14,280 --> 00:36:17,840
Speaker 1: your book is about the nineties, and you know, you

608
00:36:17,920 --> 00:36:23,600
Speaker 1: know the nineties. I was let's see, I was just

609
00:36:23,800 --> 00:36:29,160
Speaker 1: getting married, been married, just having kids, actually just had

610
00:36:29,239 --> 00:36:32,440
Speaker 1: my daughter. Late nineties, early two thousand. Did I ask

611
00:36:32,560 --> 00:36:36,600
Speaker 1: coo old? How old are you now? Fifty eight? Soft,

612
00:36:36,880 --> 00:36:40,399
Speaker 1: so you're eight years Yeah. You talk about the oj

613
00:36:40,600 --> 00:36:43,160
Speaker 1: trial how it changed television. I can remember the brown

614
00:36:43,280 --> 00:36:45,759
Speaker 1: couch in Tampa, Florida I was laying on during the

615
00:36:45,920 --> 00:36:50,239
Speaker 1: verdict and hearing people in the apartment complex react to

616
00:36:50,560 --> 00:36:56,839
Speaker 1: the verdict. How did it change television in your opinion? Well,

617
00:36:57,080 --> 00:36:59,640
Speaker 1: I mean in a lot of ways. I think when

618
00:36:59,680 --> 00:37:03,520
Speaker 1: you look at every aspect of the O. J. Simpson

619
00:37:04,000 --> 00:37:10,960
Speaker 1: of scenario, the crime itself, his Brocco chase on the highway,

620
00:37:11,280 --> 00:37:15,560
Speaker 1: the length of the trial, the amount of characters who

621
00:37:15,640 --> 00:37:18,960
Speaker 1: kind of moved through that child and temporarily became super

622
00:37:19,000 --> 00:37:21,560
Speaker 1: famous Kato Kaylin or whatever, you know, the idea of

623
00:37:21,640 --> 00:37:24,239
Speaker 1: talking about Marcia Clark's hair style and all of these things.

624
00:37:24,680 --> 00:37:27,440
Speaker 1: It was almost as if all of the things that

625
00:37:27,640 --> 00:37:31,680
Speaker 1: people had been that, like naysayers and critics have been

626
00:37:31,800 --> 00:37:36,480
Speaker 1: saying about television since its inception, suddenly happened, like the

627
00:37:36,840 --> 00:37:40,960
Speaker 1: idea of seeing a tragic news of it purely is entertainment,

628
00:37:41,680 --> 00:37:46,200
Speaker 1: the idea of seeing real people as characters, the idea

629
00:37:46,360 --> 00:37:50,320
Speaker 1: that something is meaningful simply because it's on television, so

630
00:37:50,640 --> 00:37:55,840
Speaker 1: because the trial is being shown, and that the interest

631
00:37:56,000 --> 00:38:00,520
Speaker 1: in it perpetuates a greater interest, so that through so

632
00:38:00,680 --> 00:38:04,120
Speaker 1: that the obsession that the country or the world had

633
00:38:04,160 --> 00:38:08,239
Speaker 1: with oj Simpson's trial was not necessarily a product of

634
00:38:08,320 --> 00:38:10,680
Speaker 1: what happened, but of a need to be included in

635
00:38:10,760 --> 00:38:13,920
Speaker 1: what everybody else was interested in. I mean, it is

636
00:38:14,160 --> 00:38:15,920
Speaker 1: I you know, I don't you know you look at

637
00:38:16,000 --> 00:38:17,480
Speaker 1: something and you say like, well, this was some kind

638
00:38:17,520 --> 00:38:20,000
Speaker 1: of social tipping point. I mean, to me, it seems

639
00:38:20,040 --> 00:38:25,400
Speaker 1: clearly that that was that that the way people talk

640
00:38:25,840 --> 00:38:31,719
Speaker 1: about current events and the assumption of what a current

641
00:38:31,760 --> 00:38:35,280
Speaker 1: events coverage will be was shifted and sort of misshapen

642
00:38:35,400 --> 00:38:37,440
Speaker 1: by that period. And the fact that it went on

643
00:38:37,560 --> 00:38:40,359
Speaker 1: for fourteen months is just a staggering thing. I mean,

644
00:38:41,000 --> 00:38:44,759
Speaker 1: look at how rarely the war in Ukraine is now

645
00:38:44,840 --> 00:38:47,640
Speaker 1: mentioned as opposed to the way it was two months ago,

646
00:38:47,680 --> 00:38:50,200
Speaker 1: and that's a that's a war, right, I mean the

647
00:38:50,360 --> 00:38:54,840
Speaker 1: idea that there was interest in this trial for fourteen

648
00:38:54,960 --> 00:38:58,160
Speaker 1: months pretty much NonStop, and that it was still kind

649
00:38:58,200 --> 00:39:00,279
Speaker 1: of reaching its crescendo at the end. I mean, you

650
00:39:00,360 --> 00:39:02,680
Speaker 1: say you remember the verdict. I mean, so do I.

651
00:39:02,920 --> 00:39:05,440
Speaker 1: I think most people who were alive during that period

652
00:39:05,520 --> 00:39:08,080
Speaker 1: remember that, and they remember where they were during the

653
00:39:08,160 --> 00:39:10,759
Speaker 1: Bronco Chase. I think those are two things that people

654
00:39:11,040 --> 00:39:14,479
Speaker 1: use in a way that people in the past would

655
00:39:14,480 --> 00:39:17,279
Speaker 1: have used landing on the moon or the assassination of

656
00:39:17,400 --> 00:39:20,080
Speaker 1: Kennedy or any of these things. And that's odd. It's

657
00:39:20,120 --> 00:39:24,240
Speaker 1: odd that this athlete's trial became that for that period

658
00:39:24,280 --> 00:39:26,719
Speaker 1: of time. And it's a very nineties thing in a way,

659
00:39:27,080 --> 00:39:30,600
Speaker 1: because it was like it's a murder trial and the

660
00:39:30,719 --> 00:39:36,319
Speaker 1: stakes felt low. It was strange. You know, Chuck, something

661
00:39:36,360 --> 00:39:38,719
Speaker 1: that I have noted a couple times on the air.

662
00:39:39,800 --> 00:39:43,279
Speaker 1: I was fortunate enough when I worked at ESPN to

663
00:39:43,440 --> 00:39:46,160
Speaker 1: have President Barack Obama on the air with me twice,

664
00:39:46,560 --> 00:39:50,600
Speaker 1: so during his eight years, for no reason other than

665
00:39:50,680 --> 00:39:55,840
Speaker 1: good fortune. He talked to Andy Katz at ESPN, and

666
00:39:56,120 --> 00:39:57,680
Speaker 1: you would have Andy Kats and they would do their

667
00:39:57,760 --> 00:40:01,239
Speaker 1: little a little sixty four pool. And he came on

668
00:40:01,400 --> 00:40:04,520
Speaker 1: with me twice in radio, and the second time I

669
00:40:04,600 --> 00:40:07,719
Speaker 1: asked him a question and I got probably his best response,

670
00:40:08,680 --> 00:40:12,920
Speaker 1: and I said, you're the first president in the history

671
00:40:12,960 --> 00:40:16,800
Speaker 1: of this country there's half that has had to preside

672
00:40:16,840 --> 00:40:24,880
Speaker 1: over America with this vile and reactionary weapon called Twitter

673
00:40:25,360 --> 00:40:29,279
Speaker 1: and social media, and that every action is viewed and

674
00:40:29,440 --> 00:40:34,520
Speaker 1: often viewed harshly. And I just asked him, have you

675
00:40:34,560 --> 00:40:36,400
Speaker 1: ever thought about that? And perhaps it was playing to

676
00:40:36,480 --> 00:40:39,840
Speaker 1: his vanity, but he gave a more elaborate answer about

677
00:40:40,560 --> 00:40:44,320
Speaker 1: that we were becoming a more a rougher society and

678
00:40:44,360 --> 00:40:47,440
Speaker 1: a less empathetic society, or a more judgmental society. If

679
00:40:47,440 --> 00:40:51,839
Speaker 1: I recall and I and I think about this when

680
00:40:51,880 --> 00:40:54,680
Speaker 1: I look at the nineties, Chuck, I'm going to throw

681
00:40:54,760 --> 00:40:56,759
Speaker 1: this out there, not related to your book, and I

682
00:40:56,840 --> 00:40:58,640
Speaker 1: just want you to fire back at me. I could

683
00:40:58,680 --> 00:41:02,040
Speaker 1: be wrong, but people that were public used to be

684
00:41:02,360 --> 00:41:07,880
Speaker 1: popular in the nineties. Nobody is popular. Presidents aren't popular.

685
00:41:09,239 --> 00:41:12,600
Speaker 1: I don't know the unlikable qualities of Obama. He wore

686
00:41:12,640 --> 00:41:15,239
Speaker 1: a brown suit. Now, if you're a conservative, you could

687
00:41:15,239 --> 00:41:20,400
Speaker 1: disagree with policies. Commissioners aren't popular. Governors aren't popular. Senators

688
00:41:20,440 --> 00:41:26,279
Speaker 1: aren't popular. Tom Cruise, some of obviously scientology is not.

689
00:41:26,440 --> 00:41:31,839
Speaker 1: Really he's polarizing. There are no truly popular figures. They're

690
00:41:31,880 --> 00:41:36,240
Speaker 1: only polarizing figures. Maybe Tom Hanks or Denzel's an exception.

691
00:41:36,719 --> 00:41:41,160
Speaker 1: But in the nineties you could be somewhat worshiped. Doesn't

692
00:41:41,160 --> 00:41:44,360
Speaker 1: mean it's healthy, Chuck, But I feel like nineties was

693
00:41:44,440 --> 00:41:48,480
Speaker 1: the last time that we loved public figures and we

694
00:41:48,680 --> 00:41:54,799
Speaker 1: defended them righteously with their issues. Now we seek their problems. Yeah, well,

695
00:41:54,960 --> 00:41:57,680
Speaker 1: you know, I think what you say, But I guess

696
00:41:57,719 --> 00:41:59,880
Speaker 1: if I was getting my answer, I would say the

697
00:42:00,120 --> 00:42:03,040
Speaker 1: nineties are actually at the beginning of this shift. And

698
00:42:03,120 --> 00:42:05,480
Speaker 1: here's why I say that. Um, you know, when you

699
00:42:05,560 --> 00:42:09,680
Speaker 1: look back, say, celebrities of with all the relatively distant past,

700
00:42:09,960 --> 00:42:16,480
Speaker 1: Joe DiMaggio and Marilyn Manson, Marilyn Monroe, Jacio and Marilyn Monroe,

701
00:42:16,719 --> 00:42:19,319
Speaker 1: you got these, uh, you have these figures who well,

702
00:42:19,480 --> 00:42:23,360
Speaker 1: you know, they were seen as almost separate from the

703
00:42:23,440 --> 00:42:27,840
Speaker 1: rest of society. And partially that was because the assumption

704
00:42:28,160 --> 00:42:32,080
Speaker 1: was what they had done to achieve that. Uh, it

705
00:42:32,400 --> 00:42:35,839
Speaker 1: was remarkable that that DiMaggio's greatness as a player, uh,

706
00:42:36,080 --> 00:42:39,239
Speaker 1: Marilyn Monroe's beauty, but also for stage presence and all

707
00:42:39,239 --> 00:42:42,480
Speaker 1: of these things. Uh Like, there was a reason that

708
00:42:42,600 --> 00:42:44,960
Speaker 1: they were separate. When you get to the nineties, you

709
00:42:45,080 --> 00:42:48,600
Speaker 1: see the rise of several interesting things, reality television being

710
00:42:48,680 --> 00:42:52,400
Speaker 1: one the central one, but also the fact that the

711
00:42:52,600 --> 00:42:57,000
Speaker 1: most popular form of nonfiction writing became memoir writing, and

712
00:42:57,640 --> 00:43:01,640
Speaker 1: a certain kind of confessional music had already always existed

713
00:43:02,719 --> 00:43:04,960
Speaker 1: was sort of covered in a different way that somebody

714
00:43:05,120 --> 00:43:07,960
Speaker 1: was more interesting because of the experience they had as

715
00:43:08,000 --> 00:43:10,320
Speaker 1: opposed to the song they wrote about it. And I

716
00:43:10,440 --> 00:43:15,200
Speaker 1: think that that changed people's perception of how valid celebrity was.

717
00:43:15,880 --> 00:43:18,000
Speaker 1: That if they saw somebody who was famous because they

718
00:43:18,040 --> 00:43:20,759
Speaker 1: were on the real world, or if someone like, you know,

719
00:43:20,840 --> 00:43:23,640
Speaker 1: like Elizabeth Wurtzel writes Prozac Nation, where she seems to

720
00:43:23,719 --> 00:43:27,160
Speaker 1: just kind of be admitting the darkest things about her life, uh,

721
00:43:27,320 --> 00:43:29,880
Speaker 1: you know, for kind of like, for for reasons that

722
00:43:30,280 --> 00:43:33,840
Speaker 1: aren't necessarily clear. I think that changed people's perception on

723
00:43:34,000 --> 00:43:36,720
Speaker 1: how we're supposed to feel about a famous person. Because

724
00:43:36,760 --> 00:43:39,960
Speaker 1: what you're describing now is true in the sense that

725
00:43:40,800 --> 00:43:46,239
Speaker 1: the idea of like a universally beloved person that that

726
00:43:46,680 --> 00:43:49,279
Speaker 1: just doesn't happen even in politics. Go back and look

727
00:43:49,400 --> 00:43:52,200
Speaker 1: at I mean, maybe maybe it makes more sense, but like,

728
00:43:52,480 --> 00:43:56,000
Speaker 1: look at the approval rating for Colin Powell in nineteen

729
00:43:56,120 --> 00:44:00,600
Speaker 1: ninety two from both sides of the from Democrats and Republicans.

730
00:44:00,719 --> 00:44:04,040
Speaker 1: His approval rating was almost untouchable. Like there, you know,

731
00:44:04,880 --> 00:44:07,200
Speaker 1: who would be a political figure like that? Now, like

732
00:44:07,320 --> 00:44:09,759
Speaker 1: what would have to happen? Well, what would have to happen?

733
00:44:10,040 --> 00:44:13,479
Speaker 1: Like you, we can't even create a hypothetical one because

734
00:44:13,560 --> 00:44:16,600
Speaker 1: there was You can't because what you like, what positions

735
00:44:16,640 --> 00:44:19,640
Speaker 1: would this hypothetical politician have that would make you know,

736
00:44:19,840 --> 00:44:24,200
Speaker 1: that would make them completely beloved by people with a

737
00:44:24,360 --> 00:44:28,640
Speaker 1: kind of disparate interest you know, um, the binary nature

738
00:44:28,760 --> 00:44:34,359
Speaker 1: of society. You know it, say, going into the two

739
00:44:34,440 --> 00:44:37,400
Speaker 1: thousand election, this is maybe even the better example. So

740
00:44:37,719 --> 00:44:39,520
Speaker 1: going into the two thousand election, and I'm sure you

741
00:44:39,640 --> 00:44:44,560
Speaker 1: remember this, the overriding description of Gore and Bush was

742
00:44:44,640 --> 00:44:47,640
Speaker 1: that these guys are identical. They're both white guys who

743
00:44:47,680 --> 00:44:50,239
Speaker 1: went to Ivy League schools. You know. Gore in some

744
00:44:50,400 --> 00:44:52,600
Speaker 1: ways was seen as more reactionary because of who he

745
00:44:52,640 --> 00:44:55,000
Speaker 1: had selected for VP and who his wife was. You know,

746
00:44:55,280 --> 00:44:57,560
Speaker 1: Bush at the time was somebody who spoke Spanish and

747
00:44:57,680 --> 00:45:00,239
Speaker 1: was seen as like a kind of compassionate conservative, which

748
00:45:00,280 --> 00:45:02,399
Speaker 1: kind of merged them in the middle. The reason people

749
00:45:02,440 --> 00:45:05,560
Speaker 1: were interested in Ralph Nader was not because he was

750
00:45:05,640 --> 00:45:07,680
Speaker 1: a third choice, but because he was seen as a

751
00:45:07,840 --> 00:45:11,120
Speaker 1: second choice outside of this sort of conventional political world.

752
00:45:11,560 --> 00:45:15,160
Speaker 1: Then that election happens, it's chaos. Nine to eleven happens.

753
00:45:15,239 --> 00:45:17,800
Speaker 1: The Supreme Prior to that, the Supreme Court makes the

754
00:45:17,880 --> 00:45:21,719
Speaker 1: decision to basically keep Bush installed his presidency and not

755
00:45:21,800 --> 00:45:25,480
Speaker 1: Allower to recount. And that swapped everything that these two

756
00:45:25,560 --> 00:45:28,359
Speaker 1: guys who had at one point seemed identical. Where there's

757
00:45:28,360 --> 00:45:31,640
Speaker 1: like a rage against the machine video about how they're identical.

758
00:45:31,840 --> 00:45:34,239
Speaker 1: It was so pard that the idea was, oh, no,

759
00:45:34,320 --> 00:45:39,000
Speaker 1: they're diametrically opposed, and in fact, everything is diametrically opposed,

760
00:45:39,280 --> 00:45:42,680
Speaker 1: that there are only two sides to anything that not

761
00:45:42,800 --> 00:45:44,800
Speaker 1: just to an issue, but to a person, there's the

762
00:45:44,840 --> 00:45:47,440
Speaker 1: goodness the bad, and that's it. I mean, that is

763
00:45:47,560 --> 00:45:50,919
Speaker 1: the way we understand the world now. And everybody sort

764
00:45:50,920 --> 00:45:53,560
Speaker 1: of recognizes that it's a problem. Like no one says

765
00:45:53,600 --> 00:45:56,239
Speaker 1: it's good that the world has become more binary, but

766
00:45:56,400 --> 00:45:58,759
Speaker 1: everyone also accepts that it has and is trying to

767
00:45:58,880 --> 00:46:03,560
Speaker 1: live within those conditions. Chuck, what when you finish a

768
00:46:03,680 --> 00:46:08,200
Speaker 1: book or a project of this depth and nature and

769
00:46:08,400 --> 00:46:12,040
Speaker 1: you look at it from the rear view mirror, what

770
00:46:12,280 --> 00:46:19,799
Speaker 1: is your favorite quality of the nineties? You know, it's

771
00:46:19,800 --> 00:46:22,800
Speaker 1: it's it's, it's this is the thing. I'm not supposed

772
00:46:22,840 --> 00:46:25,640
Speaker 1: to say. I realized and that that this will be

773
00:46:26,000 --> 00:46:30,040
Speaker 1: seen as troubling. But I think when people feel nostalgia

774
00:46:30,200 --> 00:46:32,200
Speaker 1: for the nineties, and I really tried to stay away

775
00:46:32,680 --> 00:46:35,160
Speaker 1: from nostalgia with this book. I tried to stay away

776
00:46:35,239 --> 00:46:39,200
Speaker 1: from thinking about events to my own personal experience. But

777
00:46:39,320 --> 00:46:41,160
Speaker 1: I think when people do do that, when they look

778
00:46:41,200 --> 00:46:43,040
Speaker 1: back at something from that period, they're like, oh, that

779
00:46:43,120 --> 00:46:46,200
Speaker 1: was a good time, you know, I like liberty, and

780
00:46:46,280 --> 00:46:49,680
Speaker 1: you ask them why. I think what it was was

781
00:46:50,600 --> 00:46:56,759
Speaker 1: less social pressure to be involved with society, like it

782
00:46:56,960 --> 00:47:00,759
Speaker 1: was still completely understandable to have your own thoughts and

783
00:47:00,920 --> 00:47:03,560
Speaker 1: keep them to yourself and to to you know, if

784
00:47:03,600 --> 00:47:06,400
Speaker 1: you if you wanted to engage with whatever the like

785
00:47:06,520 --> 00:47:08,759
Speaker 1: the public discourse, boys, you could, but you didn't have to.

786
00:47:09,080 --> 00:47:13,240
Speaker 1: There was no sense that, for example, someone like Michael

787
00:47:13,280 --> 00:47:16,160
Speaker 1: Jordan as we talked about earlier that our perception of

788
00:47:16,280 --> 00:47:20,000
Speaker 1: him as a basketball player was going to radically shift

789
00:47:20,960 --> 00:47:24,960
Speaker 1: because uh, you know, you know, he was unwilling to

790
00:47:25,000 --> 00:47:27,600
Speaker 1: come out against Jesse Helms like. He was criticized for that,

791
00:47:27,960 --> 00:47:32,160
Speaker 1: but it didn't completely alter his perception. Um. You know,

792
00:47:32,280 --> 00:47:34,839
Speaker 1: you when you look at celebrity from this period, when

793
00:47:34,840 --> 00:47:38,400
Speaker 1: you have movie Titanic or whatever, it's like Leonardo DiCaprio

794
00:47:38,760 --> 00:47:41,520
Speaker 1: became this massive star in a way that we really

795
00:47:41,600 --> 00:47:44,799
Speaker 1: had never experienced before. And yet there was no expectation

796
00:47:44,960 --> 00:47:47,600
Speaker 1: that we had to understand what he thought about the world.

797
00:47:47,719 --> 00:47:50,759
Speaker 1: He was not expected to give an opinion about the

798
00:47:50,840 --> 00:47:53,120
Speaker 1: two thousand in the election. Nobody it would have almost

799
00:47:53,120 --> 00:47:56,440
Speaker 1: seemed at the time ridiculous to ask him. And now

800
00:47:56,560 --> 00:47:58,520
Speaker 1: that's part of it. So so when I think of

801
00:47:58,600 --> 00:48:00,759
Speaker 1: the nineties and like, what do I miss about it?

802
00:48:01,920 --> 00:48:04,520
Speaker 1: I just think that the stakes were lower, and that

803
00:48:04,640 --> 00:48:07,319
Speaker 1: the idea of just being a person going through life

804
00:48:07,360 --> 00:48:10,400
Speaker 1: with your own concerns was not perceived as being like

805
00:48:10,560 --> 00:48:13,200
Speaker 1: selvesistic and selfish. It was just going to perceive just

806
00:48:13,280 --> 00:48:15,960
Speaker 1: the way people move through the time. And now I

807
00:48:16,200 --> 00:48:18,799
Speaker 1: understand the trouble with that because some people would say like, well,

808
00:48:18,840 --> 00:48:21,600
Speaker 1: that's just sort of shutting off the rest of the

809
00:48:21,680 --> 00:48:23,920
Speaker 1: world so that you can be happy, you know, in

810
00:48:24,280 --> 00:48:29,000
Speaker 1: your own insular, private society, I guess. But in some ways,

811
00:48:29,040 --> 00:48:31,680
Speaker 1: I think that's what good times are. A good time

812
00:48:31,760 --> 00:48:34,120
Speaker 1: for a country is when people are able to think

813
00:48:34,160 --> 00:48:36,319
Speaker 1: about their own life, and I think that that's something

814
00:48:36,360 --> 00:48:39,360
Speaker 1: the nineties afforded people a chance to just be themselves

815
00:48:39,400 --> 00:48:42,120
Speaker 1: and not worry about other people. Yeah. I mean, if

816
00:48:42,120 --> 00:48:44,600
Speaker 1: you go back to your high school days, certainly mine,

817
00:48:45,120 --> 00:48:47,960
Speaker 1: there were the quiet kids, there were the shy kids,

818
00:48:48,640 --> 00:48:51,160
Speaker 1: there were the kids that didn't want to be engaged socially,

819
00:48:51,480 --> 00:48:55,920
Speaker 1: and that was completely okay. And I know, as a

820
00:48:55,960 --> 00:49:00,520
Speaker 1: public figure, if I tweet something and something else has

821
00:49:00,560 --> 00:49:02,719
Speaker 1: happened throughout the course of the day or a twenty

822
00:49:02,760 --> 00:49:05,759
Speaker 1: four hour news cycle and somebody has passed or it's

823
00:49:05,760 --> 00:49:10,640
Speaker 1: seen as controversial, I'll get criticized as a sportscaster for

824
00:49:10,760 --> 00:49:13,560
Speaker 1: not having a political or social view on a story.

825
00:49:14,120 --> 00:49:18,080
Speaker 1: And I think I'm a sportscaster. I was told for

826
00:49:18,160 --> 00:49:19,960
Speaker 1: the first twenty years of my career to stay in

827
00:49:20,080 --> 00:49:23,400
Speaker 1: my lane. Well, no, it's a tough thing because it's

828
00:49:23,440 --> 00:49:25,920
Speaker 1: sort of like a person wants to be more than

829
00:49:26,040 --> 00:49:27,879
Speaker 1: what society tells them they can be. And then when

830
00:49:27,880 --> 00:49:31,000
Speaker 1: you do that, there's there's a weird penalty if you're

831
00:49:31,000 --> 00:49:34,160
Speaker 1: having made you know that, like, I'm curious, Like, okay,

832
00:49:34,400 --> 00:49:39,560
Speaker 1: how much how much do you think about the reaction

833
00:49:39,920 --> 00:49:46,080
Speaker 1: to your ideas before you express them? I don't at all, Chuck,

834
00:49:47,239 --> 00:49:51,160
Speaker 1: My loyalty is too interesting. And so when I build

835
00:49:51,560 --> 00:49:55,480
Speaker 1: my topics in the morning, I not only want to

836
00:49:55,520 --> 00:49:58,359
Speaker 1: make the audience feel something or think something. I'm trying

837
00:49:58,400 --> 00:50:01,320
Speaker 1: to think of something myself feel like the process of

838
00:50:01,440 --> 00:50:05,239
Speaker 1: building the topic is often more interesting and it's more

839
00:50:05,320 --> 00:50:09,200
Speaker 1: rewarding to me than the airing of the topic. Well,

840
00:50:09,280 --> 00:50:13,040
Speaker 1: I realized that, but it's to some degree that can't

841
00:50:13,160 --> 00:50:16,400
Speaker 1: totally be true. And here's why I say that, because

842
00:50:16,600 --> 00:50:19,640
Speaker 1: that would also suggest a lack of thoughtfulness if you

843
00:50:19,840 --> 00:50:22,800
Speaker 1: never considered how what you said, how that would be

844
00:50:22,920 --> 00:50:25,439
Speaker 1: perceived by people. And you can't really have your job

845
00:50:25,560 --> 00:50:28,480
Speaker 1: being a thoughtless person. So certainly, when you wake up

846
00:50:28,520 --> 00:50:30,120
Speaker 1: in the morning and you're thinking about what you're going

847
00:50:30,160 --> 00:50:33,080
Speaker 1: to talk about that day, there must be times when

848
00:50:33,120 --> 00:50:36,200
Speaker 1: you're like, well, I really think this is true. But

849
00:50:36,320 --> 00:50:39,200
Speaker 1: if I say this, I realize it's going to be

850
00:50:42,440 --> 00:50:45,600
Speaker 1: interpreted to mean a very different thing. And then do

851
00:50:45,680 --> 00:50:48,080
Speaker 1: you alter? Did you then alter the way you express it?

852
00:50:48,200 --> 00:50:49,720
Speaker 1: Or do you say, like, I've got to go ahead

853
00:50:49,800 --> 00:50:52,640
Speaker 1: on this and just sort of absorb the damage, Because

854
00:50:52,680 --> 00:50:54,520
Speaker 1: if I don't just go ahead on this, then I'm

855
00:50:54,520 --> 00:50:56,520
Speaker 1: going to become this false kind of caricature of who

856
00:50:56,560 --> 00:51:00,400
Speaker 1: I was. Um, there are John Saracino was a writer

857
00:51:00,440 --> 00:51:03,839
Speaker 1: for the USA Today, and one time, covering a boxing match,

858
00:51:03,920 --> 00:51:06,480
Speaker 1: he said, you can write the same story two ways.

859
00:51:07,360 --> 00:51:10,880
Speaker 1: There are ways that I could deliver something more harshly

860
00:51:11,040 --> 00:51:14,359
Speaker 1: and off putting, and then there are stories I want

861
00:51:14,360 --> 00:51:17,040
Speaker 1: to give more context, and I would call it soft

862
00:51:17,080 --> 00:51:20,000
Speaker 1: pedaling it. Like, folks, this may not be right, but

863
00:51:20,120 --> 00:51:21,799
Speaker 1: I'm just going to tell you authentically, this is how

864
00:51:21,840 --> 00:51:24,759
Speaker 1: it lands for me, and that I think you get

865
00:51:24,840 --> 00:51:28,400
Speaker 1: blowback on it. But there are, as a broadcaster, ways

866
00:51:28,480 --> 00:51:33,680
Speaker 1: to verbalize things that are perhaps less punitive to the

867
00:51:33,840 --> 00:51:37,680
Speaker 1: person I'm delivering the blow too. Does that make sense? Oh? Sure?

868
00:51:38,280 --> 00:51:40,880
Speaker 1: But I mean you have a particularly interesting job. I

869
00:51:40,960 --> 00:51:44,839
Speaker 1: mean it's like, do you ever feel that because your

870
00:51:44,920 --> 00:51:48,040
Speaker 1: job requires you to have an opinion on almost any

871
00:51:48,160 --> 00:51:53,160
Speaker 1: pressing issues that it damages the value of those opinions,

872
00:51:53,680 --> 00:51:55,640
Speaker 1: but the fact that it's like it's part of what

873
00:51:55,800 --> 00:51:57,960
Speaker 1: you need to do, Like like it would be very

874
00:51:58,000 --> 00:52:00,960
Speaker 1: weird if someone called in about wanting to get traded

875
00:52:01,000 --> 00:52:02,480
Speaker 1: and you're like, I don't know, I haven't really I

876
00:52:02,480 --> 00:52:04,600
Speaker 1: don't really have an opinion. You've got to have an opinion.

877
00:52:04,800 --> 00:52:07,239
Speaker 1: So does that in any ways damage the opinions that

878
00:52:07,320 --> 00:52:12,439
Speaker 1: you're forced to express. Well, yes, that's a really good point,

879
00:52:12,480 --> 00:52:14,440
Speaker 1: and that's something I don't talk about, but since you

880
00:52:14,520 --> 00:52:21,960
Speaker 1: asked it, Yes, I had this discussion once with Bill Simmons.

881
00:52:22,040 --> 00:52:24,320
Speaker 1: I said, as I age, I don't want the quality

882
00:52:24,360 --> 00:52:26,960
Speaker 1: of my work to slip. I want the volume of

883
00:52:27,040 --> 00:52:30,320
Speaker 1: it to be reduced, and that I'm on a treadmill

884
00:52:30,440 --> 00:52:32,839
Speaker 1: three hours a day. If you take me every day,

885
00:52:33,040 --> 00:52:36,520
Speaker 1: you can find fault and inaccuracies every day. I'm literally

886
00:52:36,640 --> 00:52:39,800
Speaker 1: just it's just my show is the equivalent of twenty

887
00:52:39,880 --> 00:52:44,000
Speaker 1: eight sports columns a day. I have bad columns. So

888
00:52:45,120 --> 00:52:48,640
Speaker 1: I think the problem with my job and the frustration

889
00:52:48,719 --> 00:52:54,480
Speaker 1: I have Chuck is that I don't have strong opinions

890
00:52:54,719 --> 00:52:58,160
Speaker 1: on everything, and that it can at times hurt my

891
00:52:58,360 --> 00:53:02,040
Speaker 1: ratings or hurt my relevancy. Is that I don't care

892
00:53:02,239 --> 00:53:05,600
Speaker 1: deeply and am rarely outraged. I'm outraged if you are

893
00:53:05,680 --> 00:53:12,880
Speaker 1: harmful to children, women, animals. Sports rarely gets me worked

894
00:53:12,960 --> 00:53:16,399
Speaker 1: up because I try to be impartial. Therefore, I don't

895
00:53:16,440 --> 00:53:19,920
Speaker 1: have that sort of visceral view of sports where a

896
00:53:19,960 --> 00:53:23,080
Speaker 1: guy like Bill Simmons still screams at a TV over

897
00:53:23,320 --> 00:53:25,800
Speaker 1: a Celtic game. I don't have that because I've moved

898
00:53:25,880 --> 00:53:28,120
Speaker 1: so much in my career for commerce, I don't have

899
00:53:28,280 --> 00:53:31,719
Speaker 1: a favorite team, and so I do think the criticism

900
00:53:31,840 --> 00:53:34,360
Speaker 1: that people like me have to have an opinion a

901
00:53:34,440 --> 00:53:37,400
Speaker 1: strong one every day. I've tried to fight it and

902
00:53:37,600 --> 00:53:41,360
Speaker 1: sometimes it makes me less interesting, and that I struggle

903
00:53:41,440 --> 00:53:45,000
Speaker 1: with that I'm not interesting all the time. Yeah, Well,

904
00:53:45,000 --> 00:53:49,040
Speaker 1: because your self identities based around being interested, I think

905
00:53:49,080 --> 00:53:51,200
Speaker 1: you identify asself well, because I mean, you wouldn't have

906
00:53:51,200 --> 00:53:54,000
Speaker 1: gone into broadcasting certainly. I mean your show, you're one

907
00:53:54,040 --> 00:53:56,120
Speaker 1: of the only shows where the guy just talks at

908
00:53:56,160 --> 00:53:58,160
Speaker 1: the camera from usually twenty minutes a time. You know,

909
00:53:58,400 --> 00:54:00,920
Speaker 1: that's a very that's a different thing if you, um,

910
00:54:01,880 --> 00:54:04,399
Speaker 1: I you know, because that this is something that really

911
00:54:04,480 --> 00:54:07,400
Speaker 1: happened to me just sort of as I moved through journalism.

912
00:54:07,480 --> 00:54:10,000
Speaker 1: I guess is is it? It seemed like when I

913
00:54:10,160 --> 00:54:14,640
Speaker 1: was younger, Um, it was easier to like, having an

914
00:54:14,680 --> 00:54:16,480
Speaker 1: opinion is always easy for me, but to have a

915
00:54:16,560 --> 00:54:19,840
Speaker 1: really kind of strong one that somehow was an easier

916
00:54:19,920 --> 00:54:22,279
Speaker 1: thing when I was young. And I wonder if it

917
00:54:22,400 --> 00:54:25,320
Speaker 1: was because when I was a younger person, I actually

918
00:54:25,440 --> 00:54:28,600
Speaker 1: had this unconscious craving for attention and that all once

919
00:54:28,640 --> 00:54:31,319
Speaker 1: that and it once that assension was sort of satiated,

920
00:54:31,560 --> 00:54:34,880
Speaker 1: it certainly seemed preposterous that I had that I had

921
00:54:34,960 --> 00:54:37,720
Speaker 1: to have these that they're like like the idea of feeling,

922
00:54:38,120 --> 00:54:42,480
Speaker 1: you know, And but it's tough because the expectation from

923
00:54:42,520 --> 00:54:47,240
Speaker 1: the consumers that like, people aren't interested in moderate ideas,

924
00:54:48,040 --> 00:54:50,799
Speaker 1: Like they're just not they're not like when they hear

925
00:54:50,800 --> 00:54:52,680
Speaker 1: a moderate idea, they're like, I could have had that

926
00:54:52,840 --> 00:54:55,160
Speaker 1: idea with what I think. What they were what they're

927
00:54:55,200 --> 00:54:58,279
Speaker 1: interested in is an idea that seems to take something

928
00:54:58,320 --> 00:55:00,920
Speaker 1: that they thought was no big deal and make kindaclismic.

929
00:55:01,000 --> 00:55:03,799
Speaker 1: And that's a hard thing to get up every day. Yeah,

930
00:55:03,800 --> 00:55:08,520
Speaker 1: I think you have spotted not a moral dilemma, but

931
00:55:08,640 --> 00:55:11,120
Speaker 1: a broadcasting dilemma for what I do. And I don't

932
00:55:11,160 --> 00:55:12,520
Speaker 1: think you know, I'm not going to go you know,

933
00:55:12,640 --> 00:55:15,680
Speaker 1: you're I'm interviewing you today, but you have spotted the

934
00:55:15,800 --> 00:55:19,600
Speaker 1: dilemma that I think about, which is this show is

935
00:55:19,680 --> 00:55:22,880
Speaker 1: mostly boring because I'm not outraged by any of these stories,

936
00:55:23,480 --> 00:55:26,000
Speaker 1: like like you know today, just to give you one,

937
00:55:26,400 --> 00:55:28,800
Speaker 1: I don't think I was outraged, don kd. But my

938
00:55:28,920 --> 00:55:32,239
Speaker 1: take today was the reason the market for him as

939
00:55:32,280 --> 00:55:36,319
Speaker 1: small as this. So he couldn't play with a domineering

940
00:55:36,400 --> 00:55:40,480
Speaker 1: player like Westbrook. Okay, I get that. Then he couldn't

941
00:55:40,560 --> 00:55:45,080
Speaker 1: play long term with selfless players like Golden State. That's odd.

942
00:55:45,920 --> 00:55:49,319
Speaker 1: Now he can't play with a friend Kyrie. Who can

943
00:55:49,400 --> 00:55:51,840
Speaker 1: he play with? Well, I mean, you know we're talking

944
00:55:51,880 --> 00:55:53,960
Speaker 1: about we were just referencing earlier. I mean, this is

945
00:55:54,040 --> 00:55:57,759
Speaker 1: no brilliant insight, but kat has definitely been the most

946
00:55:57,840 --> 00:56:00,600
Speaker 1: damaged by the social media era of any any athlete.

947
00:56:00,600 --> 00:56:03,239
Speaker 1: I can think of that in terms of like like

948
00:56:03,719 --> 00:56:05,520
Speaker 1: It's not that he's the only guy who cares as

949
00:56:05,600 --> 00:56:08,120
Speaker 1: much a lot of these guys do, but he is

950
00:56:08,160 --> 00:56:12,279
Speaker 1: the most talented athlete who seems to have a hard

951
00:56:12,360 --> 00:56:16,520
Speaker 1: time separating himself from how he is perceived. He said,

952
00:56:16,560 --> 00:56:19,320
Speaker 1: not even a hard time, an impossible time where I

953
00:56:19,400 --> 00:56:25,080
Speaker 1: actually think that his perception of himself is mostly just

954
00:56:25,560 --> 00:56:28,520
Speaker 1: pushback against what other people seem to tell him, Like

955
00:56:28,640 --> 00:56:31,040
Speaker 1: his whole life is that way. I mean, I don't know.

956
00:56:32,120 --> 00:56:35,040
Speaker 1: I guess I feel sorry for him in some ways,

957
00:56:35,120 --> 00:56:37,520
Speaker 1: but you know, because you know, people would say, like, well,

958
00:56:37,520 --> 00:56:39,440
Speaker 1: he should just turn off his phone or whatever, but

959
00:56:39,560 --> 00:56:43,879
Speaker 1: like that's not the person he is. You know. It's

960
00:56:43,920 --> 00:56:47,000
Speaker 1: like I was a rock critic and a movie critic

961
00:56:47,080 --> 00:56:49,200
Speaker 1: and stuff like that. So when I put books out,

962
00:56:49,480 --> 00:56:52,400
Speaker 1: my books get reviewed. Sometimes the reviews are bad. It

963
00:56:52,520 --> 00:56:54,920
Speaker 1: bothers me. People say, just don't read them. It's like,

964
00:56:55,080 --> 00:56:58,640
Speaker 1: so I spend my whole life reading reviews about other

965
00:56:58,760 --> 00:57:01,960
Speaker 1: things about you know, reading the Rolling Stone review about

966
00:57:01,960 --> 00:57:04,520
Speaker 1: the Second Poison Record, like I was super interested in

967
00:57:04,560 --> 00:57:06,720
Speaker 1: that when it came about. So now when people review

968
00:57:06,760 --> 00:57:08,640
Speaker 1: my own work, I'm not supposed to care. I mean,

969
00:57:08,680 --> 00:57:11,000
Speaker 1: I think that's how Kevin Durant feels. He's like, so

970
00:57:11,400 --> 00:57:14,200
Speaker 1: there's all this conversation about people in the NBA. There

971
00:57:14,239 --> 00:57:16,800
Speaker 1: are people talking about Kyrie, there's people talking about Lebron,

972
00:57:16,880 --> 00:57:19,240
Speaker 1: there's people talking about Janas. But I'm not supposed to

973
00:57:19,280 --> 00:57:21,960
Speaker 1: care what they're saying about me. Like it seems insane

974
00:57:22,040 --> 00:57:26,600
Speaker 1: to him, but what has happened it is just, you know,

975
00:57:26,960 --> 00:57:28,960
Speaker 1: my thing. I think what he should do. I don't know,

976
00:57:29,040 --> 00:57:32,360
Speaker 1: maybe there's like contractual rules against this, but I think

977
00:57:32,480 --> 00:57:34,960
Speaker 1: what he should do is try to harness this weakness

978
00:57:35,400 --> 00:57:38,360
Speaker 1: and make it into his strength. Kevin Durant should say,

979
00:57:38,560 --> 00:57:40,720
Speaker 1: from now on the rest of my career, I'm only

980
00:57:40,760 --> 00:57:42,960
Speaker 1: going to sign one year deals. I'm just gonna go

981
00:57:43,000 --> 00:57:44,960
Speaker 1: to whatever team I think can put over the top.

982
00:57:45,000 --> 00:57:47,760
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be the ultimate mercenary. I'm gonna see if

983
00:57:47,760 --> 00:57:50,520
Speaker 1: I can win eight titles in eight years, and I think,

984
00:57:50,640 --> 00:57:53,680
Speaker 1: weirdly public sentiment would change in his favor. Then it

985
00:57:53,720 --> 00:57:56,040
Speaker 1: would be like, oh, he owns this now he actually

986
00:57:56,240 --> 00:57:58,840
Speaker 1: is the ultimate winner. He only cares about winning. Like

987
00:57:59,000 --> 00:58:00,720
Speaker 1: if he decided he was going to play for eight

988
00:58:00,760 --> 00:58:03,160
Speaker 1: different teams in the next eight years, and the idea

989
00:58:03,280 --> 00:58:04,880
Speaker 1: was every one of those teams was going to be

990
00:58:05,000 --> 00:58:07,200
Speaker 1: like whoever fit, Like if he went to the Celtics

991
00:58:07,280 --> 00:58:09,000
Speaker 1: this year, and then the year after that he went

992
00:58:09,000 --> 00:58:11,560
Speaker 1: to whoever you know took second the year after that,

993
00:58:11,920 --> 00:58:14,880
Speaker 1: I think it would be an interesting career. That's one

994
00:58:14,920 --> 00:58:19,400
Speaker 1: of the greatest sports ideas. I've ever heard, honestly, but

995
00:58:19,520 --> 00:58:21,200
Speaker 1: I don't know if. I don't know if the contractors

996
00:58:21,240 --> 00:58:22,720
Speaker 1: because they used to those deals where it was like

997
00:58:23,120 --> 00:58:25,360
Speaker 1: it's like a one plus one deal like Lebron kept

998
00:58:25,360 --> 00:58:28,080
Speaker 1: signing yes where you and I think that might be

999
00:58:28,160 --> 00:58:29,600
Speaker 1: the only way to do it. And I think some

1000
00:58:29,760 --> 00:58:31,760
Speaker 1: people would say, well, he's gonna leave money on the

1001
00:58:31,800 --> 00:58:33,480
Speaker 1: table if he does this, because you can't sign out

1002
00:58:33,480 --> 00:58:35,840
Speaker 1: a supermax if they keeps signing one year deals. But

1003
00:58:35,960 --> 00:58:38,400
Speaker 1: the amount of money he would make outside of the

1004
00:58:38,600 --> 00:58:42,040
Speaker 1: NBA would be insane. I mean, if all he did

1005
00:58:42,400 --> 00:58:44,480
Speaker 1: was go to somebody who was playing for the title

1006
00:58:44,600 --> 00:58:47,960
Speaker 1: every year for a decade, his public profile would be huge,

1007
00:58:48,280 --> 00:58:50,440
Speaker 1: and he would also be perceived kind of in the

1008
00:58:50,600 --> 00:58:53,600
Speaker 1: present tense the way we believe Jordan used to be

1009
00:58:54,120 --> 00:58:56,240
Speaker 1: this merciless guy who would do whatever it took to

1010
00:58:56,320 --> 00:58:58,560
Speaker 1: win a title. So I think that would actually be

1011
00:58:58,600 --> 00:59:01,080
Speaker 1: the best thing he could do, like completely give up

1012
00:59:01,120 --> 00:59:03,720
Speaker 1: this idea that he cares about team identity at all,

1013
00:59:03,840 --> 00:59:06,960
Speaker 1: that he's just a guy. You know. The greatest compliment

1014
00:59:07,080 --> 00:59:10,800
Speaker 1: Chuck I can give you is want My producer one

1015
00:59:10,840 --> 00:59:12,880
Speaker 1: time said, hey, do you want Chuck Closterman on your show,

1016
00:59:12,920 --> 00:59:16,160
Speaker 1: and I said, you can't give Chuck Klosterman twelve minutes.

1017
00:59:16,880 --> 00:59:20,520
Speaker 1: That's not fair. That's like, that's just not fair. That's like,

1018
00:59:20,840 --> 00:59:23,640
Speaker 1: that's like going to a David Bowie or a great

1019
00:59:23,720 --> 00:59:26,080
Speaker 1: brand and saying, we're going to invite you all the

1020
00:59:26,120 --> 00:59:29,680
Speaker 1: way to Texas to play just want one song. It's

1021
00:59:29,720 --> 00:59:33,080
Speaker 1: like Guns and Roses, it was an experience. They'd be

1022
00:59:33,240 --> 00:59:36,080
Speaker 1: three hours laid on stage, then they would get better

1023
00:59:36,200 --> 00:59:38,560
Speaker 1: as the concert went on. You gave your day out

1024
00:59:38,640 --> 00:59:40,600
Speaker 1: for Guns n' Roses. It's three hours of waiting and

1025
00:59:40,640 --> 00:59:44,280
Speaker 1: then three hours of show. Basically, well, you know, you

1026
00:59:44,320 --> 00:59:46,360
Speaker 1: could add me on for twelve minutes. You could have me.

1027
00:59:46,400 --> 00:59:48,200
Speaker 1: You could tell me I can only talk for thirty

1028
00:59:48,240 --> 00:59:50,200
Speaker 1: seconds a question, or you could just ask me one question.

1029
00:59:50,440 --> 00:59:52,480
Speaker 1: I appreciate you having me on this at all. I mean,

1030
00:59:52,600 --> 00:59:54,919
Speaker 1: it's you know, it's always fun to do stuff like this. Chuck.

1031
00:59:55,280 --> 00:59:57,960
Speaker 1: So the book is called the Nineties. You're just a

1032
00:59:58,040 --> 01:00:02,680
Speaker 1: fascinating guy. Love that you were willing to say that

1033
01:00:02,880 --> 01:00:06,440
Speaker 1: may be unpopular, but it's something that I think that

1034
01:00:06,520 --> 01:00:09,680
Speaker 1: you're spot on with and that we live in the nineties.

1035
01:00:10,600 --> 01:00:13,120
Speaker 1: You were allowed to be private, not have an opinion.

1036
01:00:13,360 --> 01:00:20,600
Speaker 1: On controversies, and that was not only accepted it sometimes

1037
01:00:20,640 --> 01:00:22,760
Speaker 1: it was seen as a bona fide strength. It was

1038
01:00:22,880 --> 01:00:25,360
Speaker 1: rewarded to be apathetic, which is weird, but I was

1039
01:00:25,440 --> 01:00:32,680
Speaker 1: perfect for that. Chime Absolute Pleasure. Chuck nineties is the book.

1040
01:00:32,720 --> 01:00:49,480
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, thanks a lot man the volume.

1041
01:00:52,920 --> 01:00:55,800
Speaker 1: Make sure to check out The dram On Green Show.

1042
01:00:56,280 --> 01:00:58,600
Speaker 1: I brought Draymond Green into the volume because one of

1043
01:00:58,600 --> 01:01:03,200
Speaker 1: the more entertaining voices sports unique perspective understands behind the rope.

1044
01:01:03,720 --> 01:01:07,120
Speaker 1: Also chops up with guests like Gary Peyton, Zach Levine,

1045
01:01:07,200 --> 01:01:11,440
Speaker 1: Tracy McGrady. Make sure download The Draymond Green Show wherever

1046
01:01:11,680 --> 01:01:16,680
Speaker 1: you get your podcasts, only on the Volume podcast Network