Latest / The Death Of Journalism / Episode Forty Seven: Trump And Another "Chick"

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Episode Forty Seven: Trump And Another "Chick" · The Death Of Journalism

• 0:00
  Welcome to episode number forty seven of the Death of Journalism podcast. My name
• 0:04
  is John Ziegler. I am your host. Later in this edition of the
• 0:07
  podcast, probably the best conversation about sports media you will hear in a very
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  long time, as I interview an old friend CBS Network sportscaster Chick Hernandez.
• 0:18
  So make sure you listen to that. But first, as you may have
• 0:21
  heard, former President Donald J. Trump was indicted and arrested in New York
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  City. Yes, I know it would have been very difficult for you to
• 0:30
  have missed that news since it was literally everywhere obscene amounts of coverage for an
• 0:36
  event that was highly overblown. I'll have a full coverage of what was and
• 0:41
  was not in the indictment of how the media reacted to it in a moment.
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  But first I want to begin by acknowledging something that I said in episode
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  forty six, which was I was so baffled by the nature of this indictment
• 0:55
  of Donald Trump by the Manhattan DA that I thought there had to be at
• 1:00
  least a kernel of something else in there, at least enough for left wing
• 1:04
  media to grab onto and say, look, look, look at this,
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  see this is more than what we were told or what we expected. There's
• 1:12
  more substance here. This is more serious than just hush money to a former
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  porn star during an election cycle. And I thought that, well, I
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  didn't think there was gonna be any bombshells. I thought it would be basically
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  what we thought. I thought there would be at least something that they could
• 1:29
  they could latch onto, they could desperately hold up and say, see,
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  see this is better than we thought. And that did not happen. That
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  clearly did not happen. So I was wrong about that. Even the left
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  wing media, effectively, not universally, but almost to a man and a
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  woman, has been very clearly disappointed in the substance of this indictment against Donald
• 1:57
  Trump, which includes thirty four alleged felony count I mean, there are all
• 2:00
  sorts of problems with this thing. It wasn't just the overt politicization, which
• 2:07
  was obvious. And I have been one of those that have been saying for
• 2:09
  the last couple of weeks, can we at least wait and see what the
• 2:13
  hell was in this thing? I really hate rushing the judgment on anything.
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  And you know, opinions on both sides were already being solidified before we even
• 2:23
  knew anything. But there's there's all sorts of issues here. There's statue of
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  limitations problems, There's how it is that got the felonies, There's whether or
• 2:34
  not the facts back up the allegations there, and then there's obviously the biggest
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  issue, which is does this really rise to the level of an indicting and
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  arresting not just a former president but the current front runner for the Republican nomination
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  in twenty twenty four. And I am one of those who believes, despite
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  the fact that I obviously loathed Donald Trump, that there is a higher standard
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  here. There has to be for the good of the country. Prosecutorial question
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  has used all the time. I mean, discretion is supposed to be used
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  in every level of the law, from from speeding tickets to to you know,
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  the worst possible criminal cases. That's why you get paid the big bucks
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  to make judgment calls. And you know, this was clearly a situation we
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  now know for sure because there was no there there at least nothing that was
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  particularly interesting, special or significant that this was motivated by politics. This was
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  a guy, Alvin Bragg, who who literally promised to go after Donald Trump
• 3:34
  in his election cycle got elected, and he's doing exactly that after having been
• 3:38
  criticized for not having gone after him on financial potential crimes. And so,
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  you know, there's no question that the reaction of this has been very negative
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  from the people who would be even a little bit respected. I mean,
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  it ran the entire spectrum of people who thought that this garbage. Mint Romney,
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  who I still respect. Mint Romney, obviously former Republican presidential nominee in
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  twenty twelve, lost to Barack Obama, senator from Utah, was the only
• 4:12
  Republican who voted to convict Donald Trump in both of his impeachment trials, which
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  I supported him in doing so. In fact, I even once wrote a
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  column in media basically begging Mitt Romney to do that in the first impeachment trial
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  of Donald Trump. And I really respect Mint Romney. I don't agree with
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  him on everything. I do think that he's become a probably always was,
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  you know, philosophically, more of a rhino. But I think he's a
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  good man's I think he has a good character. I think he's honest,
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  and I think he is has credibility, especially when it comes to being an
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  ardent anti Trump Republican, and he came out and said this was an obviously
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  politically based prosecution. And that's a big one right there. When you lose
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  Mint Romney for something anti Donald Trump, that's a pretty an indication. But
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  that was just the start. Other people I respect, like Dan Abrams from
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  News Nation, who is really strong on legal issues and tries to be very
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  very fair, he was pretty much downcast on this and expressed all sorts of
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  misgivings about the nature of the indictment. There was a liberal calumnist or a
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  legal calumnist for the liberal website Vox, who basically torpedoed the whole thing and
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  suggested it might get thrown out before it ever goes to trial. Even professional
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  Trump hater fraud and my former friend Joe Walsh, who once sort of ran
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  for president against Donald Trump, he condemned the indictment on Twitter. And when
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  you've lost Joe Walsh in a Trump indictment, that's a pretty good indication that
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  this is a piece of garbage. That's what this is. And so now
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  I feel very comfortable. I did not feel comfortable before we knew the details,
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  but now I feel very comfortable. Agreeing I did philosophically all along,
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  but now for sure I agree, based upon what we currently know, this
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  case should never have been brought. Now why it has been brought, I
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  don't know. Is it purely because Bragg feels like he needs to fulfill a
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  campaign promise and was getting heat for having not brought the financial case against Trump.
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  That's possible. Does he just want the attention and the love of the
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  left, and obviously he's in Manhattan, which is almost all very liberal,
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  that's possible, you know. I don't know that the guy is smart enough,
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  based upon what we currently know, to go with the theory that he
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  realizes that this would be helpful to Donald Trump and a Republican nominating process at
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  a critical juncture, and that Trump is easier to beat in the general election,
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  and so that maybe Bragg is doing this as a chess move and helping
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  the Democratic Party nationally. I don't think I really believe that, although that
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  could very well be the impact of all this. But the reality is we
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  now know this is garbage, and I have to say that I'm you know,
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  will The media coverage the last couple of days has been horrendous on so
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  many levels. And repeating all the same mistakes they made in twenty sixteen with
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  Donald Trump, only in spades. At least on the issue of whether or
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  not the indictment is credible, the news media has done at least a decent
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  job. Now, obviously the far left, the MSNBC's the world, they
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  have to pretend that this is legitimate because their audience is basically is in the
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  throes of an orgasm and they don't want to disrupt the climax. I mean,
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  that's really what this is. I mean when from a media perspective,
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  on the two fringes, you have the left titillating their audience into orgasm and
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  you have the right inflaming their audience into massive outrage. And both is very
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  good for their business model, for their ratings, for cultivating their customer base.
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  And this is partially, you know, another huge example of how and
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  why journalism is dead in the news media is completely broken. I will make
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  one point about from a substantive standpoint on the indictment that it really isn't legal.
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  It's much more about, I think how the media blew this story from
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  the beginning in a way that actually helped Trump. I know that's hard to
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  believe that that would happen. But I do believe that there is an element
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  of this entire scam scheme that Trump and his people concocted in twenty sixteen to
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  keep you his mistress is quiet during the election campaign that has not gotten enough
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  attention, and that is that, first of all, most people probably don't
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  even know. This didn't just deal with Stormy Daniels. It also dealt with
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  a former playboy model by the name of Karen MacDougall. Now I find this
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  is an interesting aside. It's weird to me how everyone knows about Stormy Daniels
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  but no one knows about Karen McDougall, which is particularly odd because Karen McDougall
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  is way way hotter than Stormy Daniels ever was, and you would think,
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  purely from a visual standpoint, from the pick showing pictures on television, they
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  would want to go with Karen McDougall more than Stormy Daniels. Now, Stormy
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  Daniels became more famous because her lawyer, Michael Avanati, was a media darling
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  before he ended up going to prison and being exposed as a complete crooking fraud.
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  And so Michael Avanati plays a big role in how this turned out the
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  way that it did from a media perspective. But if I'm Trump, I
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  mean I'm actually pissed off that Stormy Daniels is the one that gets associated with
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  me. I wouldn't mind that much if Karen McDougall got associated with me,
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  if I was gonna be blamed for having an affair. Interestingly, Karen McDougall
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  seems to actually have a legitimate affection for Donald Trump, at least she did
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  when she did her only interview about this, and she is apparently politically a
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  conservative. Stormy daniel it's just trashy. Karen McDougall is rather classy, at
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  least based upon what I've been able to discern from her interview and her pictures
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  certainly played Boy, which which are quite quite impressive. But that's not the
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  main point here. The main point is that not just are there two mistresses
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  that are involved in this situation. The main concern I always had from the
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  beginning of this, and I can't believe that the news media never ever made
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  this point, at least not that I ever saw, and certainly not in
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  a significant way, is that what was happening here was that the National Enquirer,
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  which at the time was tied to the hip with Donald Trump, was
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  the one who was facilitating these payments. They were doing effectively a catch and
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  kill. Part of the problem they're going to have here in even proving the
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  essence of the case. Now, no one disbelieves, No one rationally disbelieves
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  this is what happened. We know this is what happened, and it was
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  It was immoral, it was wrong, it was sketchy, and it should
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  have been a legitimate issue in determining whether or not Donald Trump is it should
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  be president of the United States, at least in a rational world. But
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  I think it's going to be difficult to prove in a court of law because
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  so much of this was purposely done in a complicated fashion, and plus you
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  have to trust Michael Cohen and his conflicting statements. But this was done in
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  a very mafioso sort of way, where you have this third party facilitating the
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  payments. Now, why does it matter that it's the National Inquirer. This
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  is the part that the media never understood or latched onto, and to me
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  always was the most bothersome part, because I'm I care about the country.
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  All right, It doesn't mean too much much to me at all that Donald
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  Trump was cheating on his supermodel wife with Stormy Daniels, you know, while
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  she had just after she had just given birth to his That's bothers him from
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  a character standpoint, but it's nowhere. It doesn't have a direct impact on
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  the country or his ability to be president, especially if it's it was not
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  publicly known. But what did very much potentially have a huge impact on his
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  presidency is the fact that this deal. Think about this, folks. This
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  is important, and I don't think it's not complicated. Trump made a deal
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  where either he must not have thought he was gonna win and he was just
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  trying to protect his wife from embarrassment, which is certainly possible. I mean,
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  but to make this deal and to think you had a chance to win
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  is I think outrageous and dangerous, because effectively, what he was doing was
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  saying, I am going to give the National Enquirer blackmail information on me as
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  president of the United States. I am going to allow the National to have
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  leverage over me for my entire term in office, having all of my secrets,
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  having things that I am paying lots of money to keep quiet, and
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  I am going to give them that kind of power. Now, let's be
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  clear, this would be bad under any circumstances with a quote unquote media outlet.
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  There'd be all sorts of conflict of interests and you know how it would
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  impact their coverage and whether or not you know, in either direction. I
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  mean, there's all sorts. The mind boggles and in all the possible scenarios
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  here when a media outlet has leverage over the President of the United States in
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  a very significant way. But this is way worse than just a normal media
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  outlet. This is the National Inquirer. With the National Enquirer is it's not
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  just a tabloid. It is effectively a terrorist organization. I know that sounds
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  dramatic, but that's what it is. That's what their business model is.
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  Or they make no bones about what they do. They are not really in
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  the business of selling newspapers. Would you see in the supermarket checkout line.
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  They're They're really in the business of leveraging information. And again the mind boggles
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  as to what the National Enquired may have done, could have done, theoretically,
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  could have done with that kind of blackmail power over the president of the
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  United States. These are not reputable people, so no one ever mentions this,
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  and it's you know, it's not part really of the legal case,
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  but it should have been part of the what the hell is going on here?
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  How the hell did we elect a president that voluntarily allowed an effectively immediate
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  terrorist organization to have blackmail leverage over him while he's president of the United States.
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  But this is how crazy things have gotten, folks, And that that
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  issue never ever ever gets mentioned in the news media. I guess it's just
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  too complicated or requires too much independent thought. I don't know, But to
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  me, it's always been obvious right from the beginning, and even yesterday as
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  we taped this on Wednesday morning, the National enquire element of the story barely
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  got mentioned it. It's just so amazing to me how oftentimes the bigger the
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  story, I always say, this is, the bigger the story, the
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  more chance that the most important part of it is going to get lost in
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  all the mess. And there was plenty of mess over the last couple of
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  days, and it was just not It wasn't just the day on Tuesday when
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  Trump got officially arraigned and the indictment took place, and the arrest and all
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  that garbage. I mean, this was absurd. This was O. J.
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  Simpson bronco Chase type twenty four seven coverage for two days, not just
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  when he was about to get officially quote unquote arrested, but the trip from
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  Florida to New York, York the day before, I mean, the limo
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  rides in New York. I mean, it was just it was absurd,
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  completely absurd, totally out of proportion to what was happening all under the guys
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  that you know who history is being made a US president for the first time
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  is going to be under arrest, and I mean it was It's just a
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  joke, and it fell right into the exact same mistakes only on steroids that
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  the news media made in twenty sixteen where they gave him and some media members
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  even mentioned the mistakes of twenty sixteen while they were perpetrating the same mistakes.
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  You know, gee, this is kind of like us showing the empty podium.
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  I think. I think Brett Baar on Fox News Channel said that there
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  were others, especially online, who definitely saw the parallels between what was happening
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  with the Donald Trump coverage and what occurred back in nineteen ninety four with the
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  infamous O. J. Simpson Bronco chase. Regardless, it made the entire
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  issue so much bigger than it deserved to be, to have basically two days
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  of NonStop live coverage. And it also, of course, going along with
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  that, made Donald Trump so much bigger than he deserved to be or should
• 17:15
  be, or that this event warranted. And there were so many insane moment
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  I mean, the whole thing was insane. I mean, it's insane.
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  There was no need, nothing was happening, Nothing was happening, nor was
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  going to happen. Even the arrayment itself is basically a nothing burger. It's
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  not as if going back to OJ, right, OJ happened because he was
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  suspected in the murder of two people. We had two dead bodies, and
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  it was already pretty obvious that he had done it, I mean, and
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  so this was inherently and obviously OJ being a massive celebrity, and he had
• 17:52
  a gun to his head and the whole bed I mean, there were legitimate
• 17:56
  reasons why that was as big as as it was. There's nothing to compare
• 18:02
  that to here. This was effectively based upon the indictment. It was basically
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  a clerical error, you could argue, I mean, this is it's not
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  even in the same stratosphere. Not to mention, you know, uh,
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  you know, OJ once he got apprehended, wasn't going to be led out.
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  Trump was immediately let go and went flew back on a private plane to
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  Florida and then held a speech to the nation, which I'll get to momentarily.
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  But I just it's just amazing to me how insane this whole thing was.
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  I could play so many specific moments, but I'm not going to because
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  if I start, I'll never end. But I do have to mention at
• 18:45
  least one where Anderson Cooper on CNN, I guess they were so desperate.
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  I mean, when when they're there live for hours and hours and literally nothing
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  is happening anything at all, become so madified as to be ridiculous. Anderson
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  Cooper actually theorized that a door to the courthouse was the first time that Trump
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  had to open a door for himself in a very long time. What I
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  mean, first of all, all that happened was Trump. You know,
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  someone else gave him through the door before him it was starting to close,
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  and he just kind of nudged it open himself and kept walking and followed everybody
• 19:30
  else into the room. It was no big deal yet yet that's how desperate
• 19:34
  they were for anything of substance, and more importantly than that, anything at
• 19:40
  all to show that this was really having an impact on Donald Trump. You
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  know, this is basically trying to give the left wing audience their orgasm,
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  trying to stimulate the most. See, he's a normal man. Now he's
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  suffering. He even has to open a door for himself. Kind to be
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  kidding me, but this is what they were reduced to. The whole thing
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  was nuts, and they got even nuttier maybe when it came to Trump coming
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  back to Florida, going back to Marrow Lago and giving a speech that was
• 20:11
  carried on fourteen different television networks simultaneously and live. Fourteen fourteen were carrying the
• 20:22
  the issue. Okay, now three of those were just talking about it,
• 20:30
  so but it was covered the issue on fourteen different networks. Eleven carried the
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  speech live and basically uninterrupted eleven different networks for an extended threiod of time.
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  Of course, you know, it's always a long speech with Trump, especially
• 20:47
  when he has a long list of grievances which he had during this presentation.
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  But think about this, folks, Donald Trump has not been carried live.
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  I mean, heck, he was complaining about not being carried live on Fox
• 21:00
  News Channel until his pack speech a month or so ago. And he's not
• 21:06
  been carried live on most of these networks since he was president, for sure.
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  And so think about how much it would cost. This is why I
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  want you to think about. I don't know the answer, but it's tens
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  and tens of millions of dollars. If Donald Trump, which he doesn't have
• 21:19
  the campaign money, even despite all these people sending him money to support him
• 21:25
  in his time of being attacked by the deep state or by who whatever the
• 21:30
  enemy of the day is. But he doesn't have the money to do this.
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  But if he did have the money, it would cost tens and tens
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  of millions of dollars to get each of those networks to carry and address of
• 21:44
  his under any circumstances, live and uninterrupted. He got that for free.
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  He got that for free. That was a huge campaign contribution to the Donald
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  Trump for President campaign by the same media that it has pretended he's a grave
• 22:03
  threat to democracy, that he should be treated differently. And then, of
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  course, obviously this is all happening in the context of him being arrested and
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  indicted allegedly on felony charges, and so I really don't understand. I mean,
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  but this is where bad media coverage begets more bad media coverage, right,
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  because if you follow the logic, if we're going to carry his limo
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  ride from you know, from the airport to in New York City to the
• 22:30
  Trump Tower on Monday, and we're gonna do blowout twenty four seven coverage of
• 22:37
  the whole trip to get arrested on Tuesday, then you know, we got
• 22:41
  we gotta cover his speech, right because we've made this so big and the
• 22:47
  anticipation so large, and and you know, he hasn't said anything, so
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  therefore there's inherent value in what his personal reaction is going to be to having
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  this happen. So they all fall to the trap and they all they all
• 23:02
  give him exactly what he wanted. But in classic Trump fashion, he pretty
• 23:07
  much blew it. And there were Trump, you know, formerly Trump pro
• 23:12
  Trump people like Anthony Scaramoucci and Nick mulvaaney who went on News Nation last night
• 23:19
  and basically panned the speech saying, and these were very, very pro Trump
• 23:25
  people. They were part of his White House Scaramucci for like fifteen minutes.
• 23:29
  But I mean they were both thinking saying, Look, this was a unique
• 23:33
  opportunity that he was handed by the news media to talk to voters that have
• 23:37
  not paid any attention to him, that are certainly not within the MAGA crowd.
• 23:42
  That in a situation where he could have created a positive narrative towards his
• 23:49
  presidential campaign, not just for the nomination but also in the general election,
• 23:55
  and he did not do that. It was a list of grievances. It
• 24:00
  was classic Trump. Some people even called it low energy. So he had
• 24:04
  this golden opportunity handed to him, this maulty, multi multi million dollars of
• 24:11
  value live speech opportunity to major networks, not just Fox News Channel, not
• 24:18
  just Newsmax, not just one American news, but even the mainstream networks,
• 24:22
  and he did not take advantage of it. In classic Trump fashion, it
• 24:26
  was all about Trump. It was all about grievances. He even went after
• 24:30
  the judge, even went after the judge's family. Now I get that there's
• 24:34
  some conflicts there with the judge, including with his daughter. I mean worked
• 24:38
  for Democratic candidates. But I just don't think it's appropriate to go after the
• 24:44
  family of that. You shouldn't even be appropriate to go after the judge at
• 24:47
  this point, because the judge hasn't done anything. I mean, I get
• 24:51
  you're trying to create the impression that this is all out to get you,
• 24:53
  and that you're trying to create a case for recusal and probably more delay and
• 24:57
  all that, but just doesn't care about the rules of engagement or right or
• 25:03
  wrong, or the fact that you could in this environment, you could be
• 25:06
  theoretically endangering people who are are not even protected as judges. It's just classless.
• 25:11
  It's classic Trump, and it's wrong. But you know, he gets
• 25:15
  away with it because he's Trump. He can do basically anything he wants,
• 25:19
  and his cult is always going to cheer, and they're cheering very loudly right
• 25:23
  now. There's no question about that. It doesn't matter that you know,
• 25:29
  why you would give a speech targeting only your most ardent cult when you have
• 25:34
  that kind of opportunity is beyond me. I think it's mostly because Trump doesn't
• 25:38
  really have any advisors. There's I mean, the number one thing about Trump's
• 25:44
  campaign that is being ignored, especially in the right wing media is not only
• 25:48
  does he have very little money until the recent fundraising efforts off of this indictment,
• 25:53
  which has just been obscene. I mean, I've gotten probably twenty maybe
• 25:57
  twenty five emails from the Trump campaign asking for money based upon him getting indicted.
• 26:03
  But it's also that there's nobody working for the campaign. By the way,
• 26:07
  his family weren't even there with him. His wife wasn't even there with
• 26:12
  him. He was alone the whole time. And even you know, I
• 26:15
  get maybe then I want to be involved in the actual indictment arrest. Maybe
• 26:19
  they were trying to create imagery if it's one man against the world. But
• 26:22
  when you come back to Marrow Lago and you give this defiant there's what's supposed
• 26:27
  to be a defiant speech, and not one member of your family is in
• 26:30
  evidence, including your wife, And there are no major political operatives, certainly
• 26:37
  nobody that was from the Trump White House. Nobody's working on this campaign.
• 26:44
  I mean, it's like the d list of campaign staff and again, no
• 26:51
  family. He's basically running a one man show, which means he is completely
• 26:55
  reliant on the media, and the media is more than happy to oblige one
• 26:59
  because he's a great story, good for ratings, and because they know he'll
• 27:03
  lose to Biden in the twenty twenty four general election, so everybody wins,
• 27:08
  and so you know, this was as you might expect. I mean,
• 27:14
  the whole thing was just awful for someone like me to watch, who knows
• 27:18
  that Trump is death in the general election will almost assuredly make a Biden Harris
• 27:25
  second term a short thing, and maybe two more terms for Harris a short
• 27:29
  thing, and that the country just simply can't survive that. And it was
• 27:33
  lost in the midst of all the coverage. But also what happened on Tuesday
• 27:37
  was in Wisconsin, they had a Supreme Court election and their Supreme Court flipped
• 27:45
  from Republican to Democrat for the first time in fifteen years. And it wasn't
• 27:49
  close. And the Democrat who won is a complete nut job. And this
• 27:53
  is Wisconsin. This is a state that is critical if a Republican is going
• 27:59
  to win back the White House. It's critical for Donald Trump. Donald Trump's
• 28:03
  entire argument is that, well, in twenty twenty he, you know,
• 28:08
  was only forty four thousand votes away in Georgia, Arizona and in Wisconsin.
• 28:15
  And if you take those forty four you flip forty four thousand votes. Now,
• 28:18
  what they don't tell you is that that would have been it was a
• 28:21
  two sixty nine two sixty nine tie in twenty twenty and we would have had
• 28:25
  a civil war. I mean, there would have been a civil war under
• 28:30
  that scenario. So thank god that didn't happen. But that's the Trump argument.
• 28:34
  Now, you could, to be fair, those electric College votes will
• 28:37
  change in twenty twenty four because of the census, and so if you repeated
• 28:41
  that same scenario, of course that would require a whole bunch of other things
• 28:45
  happen in this favor, which likely wouldn't. But if you repeated that scenario,
• 28:48
  Trump would win. Well, not based upon what happened in Wisconsin Supreme
• 28:55
  Court battle, because you would think that in this environment that you know,
• 29:00
  and unfortunately the Republican candidate was a Trump character, was endorsed effectively by the
• 29:06
  Trump machine, and they got collabored. And so now this this is incredibly
• 29:11
  depressing on a couple of levels. One, it shows that wisconsint it might
• 29:18
  be moving into the realm of unwinnable. I'm not going to go that far
• 29:22
  yet, because you know, it's just one election in a you know,
• 29:26
  in April for a Supreme Court justice. However, what's going to happen.
• 29:30
  See, it's not just the indication of where Wisconsin is and where where it's
• 29:36
  heading. It's that now the Supreme Court is controlled by left wing Democrats,
• 29:41
  and they're going to get rid of all the safeguards when it comes to a
• 29:45
  voting process in Wisconsin. That's the conventional wisdom that you know, any you
• 29:52
  know, voter id and all that kind of stuff is going to go out
• 29:55
  the window, and they will do everything they possibly came because they now know
• 29:57
  the game plan. Right, we know law. We're living a world where
• 30:00
  justices make decisions based upon the law. It's based upon what politics is good
• 30:06
  for their team. And so now three of the five Wisconsin Supreme Court justices
• 30:11
  are lefty nut jobs and they know what's best for their team, which is
• 30:15
  you know, less voting quote unquote restrictions. They're not restrictions. They're making
• 30:22
  sure that the voting is done properly and that people that can't vote don't vote,
• 30:26
  or people don't vote multiple times or whatever it is. You know that
• 30:30
  you have some safety with regard to the sanctity of one person, one vote,
• 30:34
  Well, that's going to go out the window, and in a close
• 30:37
  election, that can easily make the difference. So now you have evidence that
• 30:41
  Wisconsin is drifting further to the left again. I mean, Wisconsin used to
• 30:47
  be a liberal state. Then for about a decade or so under Scott Walker
• 30:51
  it became somewhat read certainly purpleish read. And now it seems to be going
• 30:56
  in the other direction. And they're going to make new rule is to make
• 31:00
  it even easier for Democrats to win. So now you have to consider that
• 31:03
  Wisconsin is very close to off the table again if we go into an economic
• 31:10
  depression or something crazy, Biden's capacitated, whatever. I'm not saying Wisconsin's unwinnable,
• 31:17
  but I'm talking about under normal circumstances. It's really difficult now to see,
• 31:22
  all right, on what basis does Donald Trump win Wisconsin? And if
• 31:25
  he doesn't win Wisconsin, how the hell does he win the presidency? Because
• 31:30
  the other two parts of that equation, Georgia and Arizona we just found out
• 31:34
  in twenty twenty two, are not liking Donald Trump at all. Georgia was
• 31:40
  the perfect example an anti Trump Republican governor wins fairly easily, A very pro
• 31:45
  Trump Republican senatorial candidate loses not once but twice by at least two points herschel
• 31:52
  Walker in Arizona. The two very very trumpy gubernatorial and senate candidates law regardless
• 32:00
  of what Carry Lake will tell you. And so what's the argument that Trump
• 32:07
  wins Georgia, Trump wins Arizona, and Trump wins Wisconsin. That's the heart
• 32:10
  of his argument, folks. And all three of those are in tatters based
• 32:15
  upon the results of the twenty twenty two mid terms and last Tuesday nights Wisconsin
• 32:22
  Supreme Court balloting. And so you know, that's not getting much attention,
• 32:27
  not getting much coverage, But to me, that's a huge deal. And
• 32:30
  I guarantee and nobody in the right wing media it's going to make the argument.
• 32:34
  I just did to let the voters know how dire this situation is and
• 32:38
  how incredibly unlikely Trump's path already was and now really is in light of what
• 32:46
  happened it was consin on Tuesday. Now, as far as the nominating process
• 32:53
  for the Republican nomination, I am the first of knowledge. This looks really
• 32:58
  bad. I'm not sugarcoat it. I mean the convention to wisdom I think
• 33:02
  is correct, at least in the short run, that all of this has
• 33:06
  greatly helped Donald Trump. The national polls, most of them are a blood
• 33:12
  bath right now. If you're a DeSantis supporter like I am, it's creating
• 33:15
  a narrative that somehow the Santis is responsible for this. He's not even a
• 33:20
  freaking candidate yet. But you know, Trump is constantly putting out emails boasting
• 33:25
  about his poll numbers, which is hilarious to me since he doesn't believe in
• 33:30
  polls, especially those on election day, but when they fit his narrative,
• 33:34
  he's happy to talk about him. Although I'm going to get in a moment
• 33:37
  to an interesting situation where he emailed a pole about New Hampshire that I don't
• 33:43
  think helps him at all. It might be one of the few glimmers of
• 33:47
  hope in all of this, the silver linings in this pile of crap that
• 33:52
  we've been handed because of the Trump indictment and the media's reaction to it.
• 33:55
  But I mentioned in episode forty six, I witnessed firsthand my mother in law
• 34:01
  having a visceral reaction to the indictment, pushing her towards Donald Trump before her
• 34:09
  daughter. My wife and I talked her off the ledge and I thought that
• 34:15
  it was a really compelling moment. I think I felt it felt very much
• 34:20
  like, Okay, this is the process that a lot of Republican voters are
• 34:23
  going to go through. And interestingly, Reuters found the same thing. Reuters
• 34:30
  has been having a focus group of thirty five Republicans in Nevada and they wrote
• 34:37
  the following article Trump indictment pulls the Santis leaning Republicans back to maga fold and
• 34:45
  the article this is in Nevada, which is a key caucus state early on
• 34:50
  in the Republican nominating process, they write, Larry White, a self described
• 34:53
  Republican Conservative, was thinking of voting for Ronda Santis and his party's presidential nominating
• 34:59
  con believing the Florida governor had a better chance of winning back the White House
• 35:04
  from the Democrats than former President Donald Trump. Then came news on March thirty
• 35:07
  if the Trump had been indicted in New York on charges related to a hush
• 35:10
  money payment to a porn star, making him the first former US president to
• 35:15
  face criminal prosecution, White said, quote. Now, White is seventy five
• 35:19
  years old, he's a composer and musician in Nevada, and he said,
• 35:22
  quote, now, I'm absolutely voting for Trump. It's almost exactly what my
• 35:27
  mother in law said. By the way, the indictment was the last straw
• 35:30
  for me, because Trump has suffered so much political abuse. I think he's
• 35:35
  the strongest candidate to contest what the left is doing. I'm all in White's
• 35:40
  anger and returned to supporting Trump over to Santa's reflected the sentiment of many Republican
• 35:45
  activists and voters Ruters spoke to in Nevada under until the indictment. This is
• 35:52
  what Ruters wrote about their focus group. Until the indictment, a majority of
• 35:54
  the thirty five Republicans routers interviewed had been willing to turn their backs on Trump
• 36:00
  and go with a different candidate for the twenty twenty four election, believing he
• 36:04
  was too flawed and bombastic to win the general election for Republicans next year.
• 36:07
  The criminal charges in New York changed all that, up ending Republican primary contest
• 36:13
  and potentially giving Trump and his Make America Great Again movement a major boost in
• 36:16
  his quest to re enter the White House. Of the thirty five Republicans twenty
• 36:22
  said that they had been thinking of moving on from Trump and backing to Santis.
• 36:25
  Of those fourteen said the indictment was changing their thinking and leading them back
• 36:31
  to supporting Trump again. Peppi Kahn, a Republican Club at a Republican Club
• 36:38
  meeting in Henderson last Saturday, said I was really for Rondo Santis. I'm
• 36:45
  now more likely to support Trump than before. I think people who were more
• 36:49
  neutral than before will now go into back for him. This is the most
• 36:52
  frightening thing I've ever seen in the United States. Gee, I wonder if
• 36:57
  mister Kahn is a viewer of Tucker Carlson Show or Glenn Beck Show, or
• 37:02
  probably both of their shows, because that's exactly the message, and that's exactly
• 37:07
  what I've talked about twice on this podcast, where that is an incredibly dangerous
• 37:14
  narrative, incredibly dangerous but apparently also very effective narrative that this is so outrageous
• 37:20
  we have no choice but to nominate Donald Trump to show them that they can't
• 37:24
  get away with this, which is probably the most asinine thing I've ever heard
• 37:30
  in my life. I mean, there are some people trying to make the
• 37:31
  very rational argument. There are a few, not many, but a few
• 37:35
  trying to make the argument. You know, this indictment can be wrong,
• 37:38
  it can be bad, it can be horrible. You can oppose it with
• 37:44
  great passion and still not vote for Donald Trump in the Republican primary. You
• 37:49
  do know that those two positions make perfect sense, right, they obviously do.
• 37:55
  I'm not sure that that argument is going to win the day. I'm
• 37:59
  really not That might be too much. There's so much emotion, and most
• 38:04
  importantly, the Republican voting base has had their brains so corroded, so corrupted,
• 38:10
  so poisoned over the last eight years that I'm not sure that they can
• 38:15
  think straight. And weirdly, the media has created so much anger and so
• 38:20
  much distrust among the Republican voting base that it plays right into Trump's hands,
• 38:27
  where they become so emotional they can't even They literally cannot see straight. They're
• 38:32
  so angry, they basically at PTSD. They're not able to function. And
• 38:39
  this is what is really Trump's biggest benefit right now. I mean, this
• 38:45
  indictment helps him in so many ways, but one of the ways that it
• 38:47
  helps him, bizarrely, is it it gives him content. Think about it,
• 38:52
  folks, Donald Trump was out of content. That's why he was forced
• 38:55
  to attack rond De Santis constantly before De Santis is even in the race.
• 39:00
  He's not in office. He can't really talk about his great record because that
• 39:06
  got all erased by COVID. And you know, what's he talking about.
• 39:12
  He has no plans that are great for the future. He seemingly, you
• 39:15
  know, he attacks Biden from time to time, but he's far more focused
• 39:20
  on De Santis recently, so he has no real stick. He's out of
• 39:24
  content. Well, this indictment and any other indictments that come, indictments that
• 39:29
  come down the pike, which the media is now very much anticipating and hoping
• 39:32
  for, because frankly, they realize this one's a piece of garbage. Is
• 39:37
  this going to give him more content and further build the narrative that he is
• 39:40
  so dangerous to the establishment that they must take him out. That's what the
• 39:45
  story is going to be. To Trump's supporters and to a lot of people,
• 39:49
  especially in Maga world. That resonates, and the more they attack him,
• 39:53
  the more it becomes very clear to them, Oh my gosh, wow,
• 39:58
  he is so dangerous. He's so dangerous, that's the guy I want
• 40:01
  in there and somehow, some way, you know, if there's any hope
• 40:07
  for this, those people need to be convinced that all of this might anger
• 40:10
  you. But it's actually playing right into the Democrat's hands. And if you
• 40:15
  go with it, you're gonna reelect Joe Biden, and you're probably gonna you're
• 40:20
  gonna elect eventually Kamala Harris because you know, in my opinion, she's gonna
• 40:23
  be president United States by twenty twenty seven because Joe Biden will resign, you
• 40:29
  know, and Biden's numbers part, there's so many problems here. One of
• 40:32
  the problems is that the Trump supporters think that Biden is going to be easily
• 40:37
  defeated. His numbers are bad, but they're not horrendous, and you know,
• 40:42
  the reality is that the media will do everything they possibly can to prop
• 40:45
  him up in twenty twenty four, assuming he's the nominee. I will say
• 40:50
  that for the record, you know, some of his poll numbers are so
• 40:52
  bad Joe Biden's that it's kind of becoming almost incredible that nobody significant has announced
• 41:02
  a candidacy to run against Joe Biden. They're all afraid. Right now,
• 41:06
  there is definitely a lane to run against Joe Biden. Whether that's going to
• 41:09
  be filled by Gavin Newsommer or somebody else, I don't know, but there
• 41:13
  is in the polling data. There's absolutely positively a lane. Whether or not
• 41:17
  anybody in the Democratic side is going to have the balls to take that lane,
• 41:21
  I don't know, but it's there. But I'm still presuming that Biden's
• 41:24
  going to be the nominee, and I very strongly believe that, barring massive
• 41:30
  black swan events, that Biden would beat Trump far more easily than he would
• 41:34
  beat the Santis. Now, I mentioned the polling data that Trump likes to
• 41:39
  brag about in his fundraising emails, and this is a classic example of Trump's
• 41:45
  hypocrisy and how his people are so gullible that they'll just eat up everything and
• 41:51
  facts don't really matters. One of the most recent fundraising emails about polling bragged
• 41:57
  about a poll released this Monday of New Hampshire registered voters. This is from
• 42:01
  an actual Trump Front fundraising email and the poll was conducted by the New Hampshire
• 42:07
  Institute of Politics at Saint Anselm College and it shows President Trump with a dominant
• 42:14
  lead. And here were the results now this is this is partially before and
• 42:20
  partially after news of the official indictment had become a you know, been known.
• 42:24
  Although it's important to point out because of Trump crying help, help,
• 42:30
  I'm going to get arrested, news of the indictment being imminent supposedly was already
• 42:35
  very much imbedded into the news cycle, So you could argue this was after
• 42:40
  news of Trump's indictment had already broken. Now Here are the results of this
• 42:46
  poll, which, if you wanted to, you could spend in a very
• 42:51
  very different direction, because I mentioned several episodes ago that one of the more
• 42:57
  depressing polling results recently was a pole out of New Hampshire where Trump was winning
• 43:05
  over to Sanders by forty one points forty one points. This pole even got
• 43:10
  mentioned by Bill Maher on his HBO show as mar was basically making the argument
• 43:15
  that he didn't think that sand has had it in him to take on Trump,
• 43:21
  and I said at the time, I thought, at the time,
• 43:23
  well, boy, I don't know why mar is using that pole, because
• 43:27
  it's it certainly seems like an outlier. I can't believe that Trump is winning
• 43:31
  New Hampshire by forty one points, especially since a couple months previous to that
• 43:37
  they were basically tied in New Hampshire. So that made no sense whatsoever.
• 43:42
  It felt like just a crap pole, one that was out of the blue.
• 43:45
  And sometimes you just get bizarre results, esposially be with Trump and especially
• 43:49
  with the news cycle being as crazy as been as of late. So that
• 43:53
  is the backdrop for this pole that Trump is bragging about in a fundraising email.
• 43:59
  Here are the result. Trump is leading, but he's only leading by
• 44:04
  thirteen percent and he only has forty two percent support. A man with a
• 44:12
  hundred percent name recognition, a man who is currently having the entire Republican Party
• 44:16
  rallied to his side because he's being indicted in an attack by the left.
• 44:22
  A guy who was president in the United States, a guy who one hundred
• 44:25
  percent of New Hampshire primary voters or basically one hundred percent of New Hampshire primary
• 44:30
  voters had previously voted for him for president at some point in the last eight
• 44:35
  years. Only forty two percent said that they would vote for Donald Trump.
• 44:39
  Twenty nine percent said the Santis. So you could argue, if you believe
• 44:45
  the forty one point poll from about a month or three weeks ago that this
• 44:51
  was a massive collapse by Donald Trump, that his lead had collapsed from forty
• 44:55
  one points to thirteen points, and oh my god, the indictment is taking
• 44:59
  its toll. I mean, if that, if the right wing wanted that
• 45:01
  to be the narrative, that would be very logical, because that's there's only
• 45:05
  been two poles recently in New Hampshire. Trump by forty one, Trump by
• 45:08
  thirteen. Oh my god, he's collapsing. Nobody's making that argument, nobody,
• 45:13
  not even I by the way, and not making that argument if you
• 45:15
  wanted to, you could. But here's the part that it really should put.
• 45:21
  People have forest people to put the brakes on this narrative that this thing
• 45:24
  is completely over. Not only does Trump only get forty two percent, you
• 45:30
  might say, well, Desandis is only getting twenty nine percent. Well,
• 45:32
  part of the problem here is they put in sun No, Governor Sanuno from
• 45:40
  New Hampshire, that's his state. He's an anti Trumper. He gets fourteen
• 45:46
  percent. If you take the fourteen percent in sun Clearly, I mean watching
• 45:53
  his interviews, to me, he's clearly going to be a Decandis supporter unless
• 45:57
  a miracle happens and he gets it's in and lightning strikes from whatever he's So
• 46:02
  if that fourteen percent went to the Santists, it's a big ift. But
• 46:06
  it's certainly logical. The Santist is beating Trump in New Hampshire, so I'm
• 46:13
  not I mean, look, I'm trying desperately to find some reason for hope,
• 46:17
  some silver lining. You know, I'm very much a realist and a
• 46:22
  pessimist, but I need some semblance of hope. And I just found it
• 46:27
  hilarious that this is a poll that's being touted in a Trump fundraising email that
• 46:31
  you could easily, as I just did, make a very strong argument,
• 46:35
  especially given the current environment is not good for Trump at all. And there's
• 46:39
  all sorts of other very bad polling data for Donald Trump, including there's an
• 46:45
  ABC poll that has his approval rating at twenty nine percent. Nationally, twenty
• 46:52
  nine percent of Americans, according to ABC and their pole, have a favorable
• 46:57
  view of Donald Trump twenty nine percent. How the hell do you win a
• 47:00
  national election against an incumbent with a twenty nine percent approval right now? Granted,
• 47:04
  Biden's approval rating supposedly was thirty two percent. I actually don't believe those
• 47:08
  numbers could possibly be true. But if they are even close, how and
• 47:13
  how absolutely sad is it that America is facing a presidential election between a guy
• 47:20
  with a twenty nine percent approval rating and the guy with a thirty two percent
• 47:22
  approval rating, which I don't believe, but that's what this poll says.
• 47:27
  And that might even be the worst news for Donald Trump. There's another pole,
• 47:31
  and this is bad for the country and bad for Trump, bad for
• 47:36
  everything. But there's been all sorts of polls before we even knew what was
• 47:38
  in the indictment? Do people agree with the indictment or not agree with the
• 47:42
  indictment, which, of course is insane because one the indictment hadn't been unsealed,
• 47:46
  we didn't know the details too, No one's going to read the actual
• 47:51
  indictment. The vast majority of people don't have the ability to make an assessment
• 47:54
  of the validity of an indictment. Also, it's just a damn indictment.
• 47:58
  There hasn't even been a evidentiary hearing yet, you know, I mean,
• 48:01
  just we're so far ahead of ourselves and this it's crazy. But one pole
• 48:07
  indicated that seventy six percent listen to this folks. This is scary. Seventy
• 48:14
  six percent of Independence believe that politics played a part in the decision to indict
• 48:19
  Trump. Okay, so seventy six percent, So basically everybody but hardcore Democrats
• 48:23
  believe that politics played a part in the decision to indict This is again before
• 48:29
  you know the actual indictment was unsealed. But here's the part that's really scary.
• 48:34
  Seventy six believe politics played a role. Seventy six percent. Sixty two
• 48:37
  percent of the same group of Independence still support the indictment. Now that's just
• 48:45
  chilling independence, the people that still basically determine who wins elections in this country.
• 48:52
  So seventy six percent believe politics played a role, but the vast majority,
• 48:57
  sixty two percent still support it. So they support an indictment of a
• 49:02
  former president that they believe was at least partially political in its origins. That
• 49:09
  is scary as hell. That is an American to me. How can you
• 49:15
  support an indictment you don't know the details of when you already believe or at
• 49:19
  least suspect that it was at least partially motivated by politics. But that's where
• 49:22
  we're headed. That is some scary Banana republic type stuff there. And so
• 49:30
  you know, look, I'm fully acknowledging that in the short run, at
• 49:34
  least this is all going to be very good for Donald Trump in the Republican
• 49:38
  nominating process. But there is still some evidence that, you know, it's
• 49:45
  not over. Like, for instance, there was a Florida pole. I
• 49:46
  have to mention this since I'm scrounging through the crap to find something positive.
• 49:52
  A Florida pole came out the same day there's being the indictment. Ron De
• 49:54
  Santis's job approval as to a four year high. His approval rating in Florida
• 50:04
  is fifty nine percent. His disapproval rating is thirty nine percent. Now you
• 50:08
  could argue this is good news or bad news. I'm not sure which.
• 50:13
  When it comes to a desantist Trump showdown in Florida, which is obviously it
• 50:17
  must win for De Santis, De Santis wins or is leading forty four to
• 50:23
  thirty nine percent. That's a lot of undecided voters, though, and I
• 50:28
  can I can kind of understand, especially in this environment. This is obviously
• 50:31
  clearly post news that the indictment was coming, that there would be a lot
• 50:37
  of people that were undecided when it comes to de Santis in Trump in Florida.
• 50:39
  But you know, amidst all this bad news, DeSantis is not a
• 50:43
  candidate. He's beating Trump by five points and his approval rating in Florida is
• 50:50
  fifty nine percent, a four year high. That's good news for Randa Santis
• 50:54
  again, who's not even actually a candidate. And if I was trying to
• 51:00
  make the argument to get people off the ledge when it comes to where this
• 51:04
  is headed, you know, there's a chance, there's a chance. I'm
• 51:07
  not saying it's likely, there's a chance that in a weird way, this
• 51:13
  is good that this happened now. I mean, it's a lot better to
• 51:16
  have happened now than for it to have happened later. Can you imagine if
• 51:21
  Rhonda Santis had already announced for president at this point, let's see it just
• 51:25
  announced and then this happened. I mean, that would have been a far
• 51:30
  worse scenario. There's enough time for this to die down before the Santis announces
• 51:37
  he's running in probably June, to kind of reset the race. At least
• 51:43
  that's my hope. And by the way, well I can't go into all
• 51:45
  the details in the realm of I guess you would call it good news.
• 51:51
  I have a friend and a friend of this podcast who met recently with Rhonda
• 51:54
  Santis for an hour and a half basically alone, talking about the potential presidential
• 52:00
  campaign. And while I'd love to tell you all the details, the results
• 52:07
  that I got from my conversation with my friend was very very positive. Very
• 52:13
  positive from my friend's perspective, very positive from how I perceived it because I
• 52:19
  had spoken to my friend almost literally before he went into the meeting, and
• 52:22
  then I spoke to my friend immediately after they left the meeting with rond De
• 52:28
  Santis, and the meeting was even better than expected. The best way I
• 52:31
  would describe the Santis according to my friend is that he gets it. He
• 52:37
  understood and understands the situation. He's in his basic philosophy. Again, I'm
• 52:45
  trying not to say too much here, but his basic philosophy on this campaign
• 52:50
  seems to be Trump can't beat Biden. The country can't survive another four years
• 52:55
  with Biden. I'm the only guy that can beat Trump. I have to
• 53:00
  do this. So that's seems to be the Santist's philosophy, which has to
• 53:07
  be the way he looks at this. He needs to understand there's a very
• 53:13
  good chance that this crusade is going to end up in catastrophe or at least
• 53:17
  defeat. But it was very important to me for him to understand, to
• 53:25
  hear that he understands the challenge that he's up against and that he is doing
• 53:30
  this as a patriotic endeavor. That he also understands that there must be blood.
• 53:37
  That was another interesting element of this, because you know, there have
• 53:40
  been some donors that have been trying to convince the Scantists that he should take
• 53:45
  the high road at all costs, and it appears again as the second hand,
• 53:51
  that the Santist understands that that can't be done, that there must be
• 53:54
  blood. Now how you draw that blood, and whether it's possible, that's
• 53:59
  very much open for debate. Eight. But I got, you know,
• 54:04
  a significant amount, at least temporarily, a significant amount of hope from the
• 54:09
  reports of my friends meeting with Rond to Sandus. Although I still I still
• 54:15
  got to say, if if he was my friend, which is not I've
• 54:17
  never spoken to him, I don't know him at all, but if we
• 54:21
  were friends and we were talking, you know, man to man, friend
• 54:23
  to friend, what do I ought to do here? Um, you know,
• 54:28
  I might be telling him, you know, luck for your own sake,
• 54:30
  you might not want to do this because this is this is going to
• 54:34
  be a very very very difficult mission to pull off, but it's a mission
• 54:38
  that must be successful because if it's not, I'm definitely in the camp.
• 54:43
  And it appears as if the Sandus is in the camp that this is it
• 54:45
  for the country, that's it. We might already be it, but this
• 54:51
  is the last shot, and the fact that it looks like we're gonna blow
• 54:54
  that shot on Donald Trump is just it's just a stop. But that's the
• 55:00
  country we now live in, and maybe we're going to get what we deserve.
• 55:05
  And so that's the situation. As I keep promising, I will do
• 55:08
  a deeper dive into how I see it all playing out in all the different
• 55:12
  scenarios. But these events keep happening that becomes very difficult. And there are
• 55:16
  a couple of things I want to get you before our interview four today and
• 55:22
  my friend Chick Hernandez. One of them is that in episode forty six,
• 55:27
  I talked about the women's college basketball Final four and the final between Iowa and
• 55:32
  LSU ended up getting almost ten million television viewers on ESPN, which was the
• 55:39
  highest rated women's college basketball game ever. It was one of the highest rated
• 55:46
  sporting events in recent years period. And you know, I believe, and
• 55:53
  I'm going to talk with Chick Hernandez about this shortly. I believe that the
• 55:59
  white team versus black team played a significant role in this. Now, that
• 56:01
  was not all of it. Obviously, Caitlyn Clark, the white star player
• 56:06
  from Iowa, who's a phenomenon, was a huge part of this. Without
• 56:10
  her, people aren't even brought to the table because she is just amazing.
• 56:15
  And of course LSU won the game, and there was all sorts of controversy
• 56:19
  that exploded because towards the end of the game, one of the star players
• 56:22
  for LSU, Angel Reese, taunted Caitlyn Clark pretty extensively in a way that
• 56:30
  I went into great detail on an episode forty six and I thought had a
• 56:34
  racial component to it. Of course, the media has ignored that. Since
• 56:37
  that has happened, there's been a couple of developments. President Joe Biden's wife
• 56:44
  Jill, suggested that both Iowa and LSU come to the White House to celebrate
• 56:52
  the game, which is not the way things are normally done. Usually the
• 56:54
  winner gets to go have a trip to the White House. I guess this
• 56:59
  is the new liberal form of equity, right, I mean I found that
• 57:04
  to be interesting. Oh so now the loser gets to go too if the
• 57:06
  game is highly rated enough that the is that the new rule? And Angel
• 57:10
  Reese went on social media and mocked Joe Biden's suggestion, calling it a joke
• 57:17
  very derisively, And of course I thought, well, wait a minute,
• 57:21
  hold on a second, Angel, I mean, this is all about equity,
• 57:23
  right, equity of outcome, So everyone gets to go participation trophies,
• 57:30
  even the loser gets to go again if the ratings are high enough. If
• 57:34
  this can be politically beneficial to have a white team and a black team come
• 57:37
  together in a Kumbayya moment at the White House, then we're gonna do it
• 57:42
  now. To Caitlin Clark's credit, she has really taken the high road in
• 57:45
  all of this. She took the high road with regard to the taunting.
• 57:50
  She said she barely even noticed it. She supported Angel Reese's right to trash
• 57:55
  talk because she herself as a trash talker. She said, she doesn't believe
• 58:00
  Iowa should go to the White House because that's something for the winners to do.
• 58:05
  That's their right because they won the game. So kudos to Caitlin Clark
• 58:08
  and how she has handled a very difficult situation. And she's got star written
• 58:14
  all over her and looks like she's going to have at least another year maybe
• 58:16
  two of college basketball to play. So that's something to look forward to there.
• 58:21
  But if you're interested in a deeper dive into that issue, make sure
• 58:25
  you listen to episode forty six if you haven't already, or just stay tuned
• 58:30
  to this interview that I'm about to play for you that I taped after both
• 58:35
  the men's and women's College Championship basketball games with a good friend of mine.
• 58:40
  This topic is one of those that we discussed in a wide ranging interview about
• 58:45
  the sports media, an interview with my old friend. He's a CBS play
• 58:50
  by play announcer, Chick her Nandez. He specializes in college basketball and in
• 58:53
  football doing play by play. And here is our rather I think remarkable conversation,
• 59:00
  which I know you'll enjoy even if you aren't really into sports. Our
• 59:06
  guest on today's podcast episode is an old friend of mine, a very interesting
• 59:10
  guy. He is a network sportscaster for CBS. His name is Chick Hernandez
• 59:16
  and he joins us. Now, Chick, welcome to the Death of Journalism
• 59:21
  podcast. Well nice. You know, I don't think I've been labeled interesting
• 59:25
  before other than you know, when I'm late, late at night out into
• 59:29
  the streets of DC. So that's cool. Well, you're a very interesting
• 59:32
  guy. And I don't even know if you know this, Chick, but
• 59:36
  I was thinking about this in preparation for the interview. You and I have
• 59:38
  worked for four different companies in common. Four different companies. Four Yeah,
• 59:45
  I knew that higher number than you would have anticipated. We've both worked for
• 59:51
  Channel nine in Washington, DC, for Glenn Yeah, for Glenn Brenner.
• 59:57
  I was also an intern for the legendary Glenn Brenner. While I was going
• 1:00:02
  to Georgetown. You went to Maryland, and then um, we both worked
• 1:00:07
  together at the Sports News Network, which you know, was lasted for about
• 1:00:10
  a year but was extraordinary experience. And we've both worked for the PGA Tour
• 1:00:19
  at different times. You far more. I lasted about six weeks and what
• 1:00:25
  happened there, that's a long story, not that long story trying to qualify
• 1:00:31
  for an event, didn't. No, No, Well, you actually worked
• 1:00:36
  broadcasting PGA tour events, which I never came close to doing. I was
• 1:00:39
  working for PGA to our productions and UM and then we also worked for the
• 1:00:45
  same group of local TV stations. I was in Steubenville, Ohio, Wheeling,
• 1:00:50
  West Virginia, and you were in Augusta, Georgia. Augusta, Georgia
• 1:00:52
  w r DW still going strong, just built the brand new facility. I
• 1:00:57
  wish I was there. Well, obviously this week in particular, there's a
• 1:01:01
  reason to talk about Augusta. But before we get into any of this,
• 1:01:05
  I kind of want to lay down some context because so much of sports I
• 1:01:10
  actually believe that that politics over the last generation or so has become entertainment,
• 1:01:15
  and sports has become politics in a lot of ways. And so thank you
• 1:01:21
  social media. Yeah, and so your politics, I think is kind of
• 1:01:23
  relevant to this discussion. You know, I'm I'm very conservative. My perception
• 1:01:29
  of your politics as you are, I would describe you based upon my knowledge
• 1:01:35
  of you, chick, is you're a rational liberal. Would that be a
• 1:01:37
  fair liberal? Yes, that would be fair, Yes, that would be
• 1:01:40
  fair. My mom was raised by a single white mother in Washington, DC
• 1:01:45
  and Maryland. And so you know when when you grow up in that area
• 1:01:51
  and your mom tells you listen as a youngster, we're gonna go down the
• 1:01:55
  street and I'm gonna hold your hand and you're gonna hear things. And I'm
• 1:02:00
  completely unaware of what she's talking about until I hear things like bad words directed
• 1:02:05
  at me and my mother. So that's the base I come from. And
• 1:02:08
  my mom taught me about treating and it's sound like like a trite phrase,
• 1:02:15
  John, but treating all equally. Um So I had her. I had
• 1:02:21
  James Brown at Channel nine and Washington DC now the head of you know,
• 1:02:24
  any network he wants to be as the nicest man in the business, who
• 1:02:28
  taught me basically the same thing. Um So that's that's where I come from.
• 1:02:32
  And you mentioned you're a mixed race. How would you describe your race?
• 1:02:37
  I honestly don't know the answer to what you're gonna say, and I
• 1:02:42
  don't either, to be quite honest with you. I mean, I have
• 1:02:44
  to put down on my birth certificate desist Caucasian. Clearly, if I'm walking
• 1:02:47
  down the streets and I get pulled over by a cop. CoP's not thicking.
• 1:02:51
  I'm white, simple as that, you know I have. I'm half
• 1:02:53
  Cuban. That's where I get the color in my skin. Um, but
• 1:02:57
  I've never ever, I would say, I was talked about this the other
• 1:03:00
  day with my wife. Just came up. I don't know why she's a
• 1:03:02
  white woman. I'm like, I just never thought about it. I was
• 1:03:07
  raised. My high school was Montgomery Blair High School, Silver Spring, Maryland.
• 1:03:09
  We had ninety nine different nationalities for the most racially balanced school in the
• 1:03:15
  district. Maryland, Virginias City Wonder came to our school my senior year and
• 1:03:19
  performed for two hours because he was trying to get doctor King's birthday holiday.
• 1:03:22
  And they asked the school board whereas the most racially balanced school, It's Blair.
• 1:03:25
  That's my school. So I grew up with all of that, So
• 1:03:29
  I never ever, I I mean, I have to identify by identify.
• 1:03:32
  Here's how identify whatever you think I am. I am, that's what it
• 1:03:38
  is. I don't. I don't. There's no checkbox. I don't do
• 1:03:42
  that. It's like I am what I am, popeye, Well check I
• 1:03:45
  have to say I've always expected you to do amazing things in your career,
• 1:03:51
  not just because you're very talented, but you really have a perfect combination here.
• 1:03:55
  I mean, let's face it, you look black, you have a
• 1:03:58
  Hispanic name, and you sound white. I mean you should. You should
• 1:04:01
  be doing white. Really, I think you sound white, don't you?
• 1:04:04
  Okay, I don't know. I don't. I don't think I again,
• 1:04:08
  I don't think I sound like anything when I literally wash. I did a
• 1:04:13
  game a few weeks ago for CBS, and and I was playing it back.
• 1:04:15
  I wasn't actually playing it back. My son was playing it back.
• 1:04:17
  And I walked in a room and I'm listening, and I'm thinking, who's
• 1:04:21
  that? And he listened to me like it's you. I'm like, oh,
• 1:04:25
  okay, I don't again. I just I don't feel like I sound
• 1:04:29
  like anything. There's not a I don't have a great deal of self awareness,
• 1:04:31
  John, have you learned this yet? I don't you know. I
• 1:04:34
  don't. I mean my friends, my friends that listen and watch the I
• 1:04:40
  sound like me. It's not a it's not a white black thing. Um,
• 1:04:45
  you know, I can, I can. You know the bosses that
• 1:04:47
  I work for, there's I don't I've never. I've never thought of it
• 1:04:51
  that way. And I might be, you know, I might be good
• 1:04:55
  for you, color for you in in a sense, but it's never been
• 1:04:59
  I've never changed my voice doing a game to sound like anybody, to sound
• 1:05:02
  like anything. Again, taught by that by by by JB. Glenn Brenner,
• 1:05:08
  the sense of humor, stuff um and and quite frankly, the guy
• 1:05:12
  who just left the Final four, Jim Nance, who was a mentee of
• 1:05:15
  mine for my days in AUGUSTA. Well, let's talk about sports broadcasting,
• 1:05:18
  and that will led us into a lot of the issues that I want to
• 1:05:21
  discuss with you. Since you mentioned Jim Nance, and since we are taping
• 1:05:27
  this the day after his final college basketball game, I've always been a Jim
• 1:05:31
  Nance fan. Although he's, you know, a guy who never makes any
• 1:05:35
  mistakes and always rises to the occasion. But he's but I don't know that
• 1:05:39
  he's a guy who makes a lot of memorable moments. I mean, you
• 1:05:44
  know, I don't know if would you agree with that. By the way,
• 1:05:45
  my assessment of Jim, I know you're close to him, so I'm
• 1:05:48
  not. I'm not close. But we we do chat, and we've chatted
• 1:05:50
  since I joined CBS. He's been very kind to me. Um yeah,
• 1:05:55
  I mean he you know, he he calls the moment like it's supposed to
• 1:06:00
  be called the Chris Jenkins three from Phillin Villanova. I called four years prior.
• 1:06:05
  Chris Jenkins said a three to win a high school game. I called
• 1:06:09
  that, and then Nance calls it four years or three years later for Villanova.
• 1:06:13
  And I went back and looked at both and said, boy, Nance
• 1:06:15
  is really good. I'm not so good. Um it is. He calls
• 1:06:19
  the moment that that that that's required. He doesn't try to be outlandish,
• 1:06:26
  you know, with football, with golf, basketball, he's just really appropriate
• 1:06:31
  and I think sneakily, if that's a word. He kind of sits you
• 1:06:36
  up in your chair when those moments come. It's not you know, I
• 1:06:40
  mean, you know, we think Al Michaels and the eighty hockey team.
• 1:06:43
  You go, okay, that's unreal. Um you know, uh, Kirk
• 1:06:46
  Gibson hitting the you know, the tator to win the game, all of
• 1:06:50
  it. You know. Uh, it's he's just really he's really good,
• 1:06:56
  really solid, and you're and it's a comfort. He wants you to be
• 1:07:00
  comfortable with him, and and that's what anybody who's got a brain is when
• 1:07:04
  they listen to Jim nance And again I want to emphasize I have respect for
• 1:07:09
  him and you know, to be able to do those three sports at the
• 1:07:12
  top of his game. And by I've I've talked to Bob Costas about this.
• 1:07:15
  You might find this interesting because you know, we're basically in this situation
• 1:07:19
  where Jim is essentially the last of the Mohicans. When you know, that's
• 1:07:24
  how I would described him to Bob. In other words, the last of
• 1:07:27
  the the really huge network sportscasters like Bob was. Al Michaels is barely you
• 1:07:33
  know, almost essentially retired now. But I even suggested to Bob, you
• 1:07:39
  out and Jim should all get together for a show and call it the Last
• 1:07:44
  of the Mohicans because you guys are it um and and he loved that idea
• 1:07:48
  because politically they're all all three of them are very very different. Before before
• 1:07:54
  I can make my other point about Jim, what do you think about the
• 1:07:58
  loss of the huge play by play superstar. When you and I were growing
• 1:08:03
  up, there were two dozen household names. I mean, at least among
• 1:08:10
  sports fans who were legends, legends and largely because of fragmentation. And now
• 1:08:16
  there's a hundred different games on at any particular time, and the audiences of
• 1:08:20
  shrunk for all of them. But I also think there's got to be more
• 1:08:25
  too with them, just that there is. Jim Nance really is the last
• 1:08:29
  of this breed. What is your theory about why that is? Well?
• 1:08:33
  I think the fragmentation part certainly. I mean, I'm a benefactor of the
• 1:08:36
  fragmentation. Right, I get a chance to call games for CBS Sports Network,
• 1:08:41
  you know that the big guns aren't going to call. I'm trying to
• 1:08:44
  hone my craft, but I'm not going to get to that level. There
• 1:08:46
  is. You're absolutely right, and it's but it's the way it is nationally
• 1:08:51
  and locally. I mean, you know, back in our town, Glenn
• 1:08:55
  Brenner, George Michael, they were the two huge b myths in our business,
• 1:09:00
  and those personalities are not allowed anymore on local levels. News directors think
• 1:09:08
  that the news anchors can do the sports that's happening here in Washington, DC.
• 1:09:12
  It's abominable to watch. I reposted somebody who butchered the name Bruce Boudreau
• 1:09:17
  when he took another when he got fired by the Vancouver Canucks and the person
• 1:09:21
  butchered Boudreau. I can't even I can't even butcher it on purpose and call
• 1:09:28
  them and call them the Canucks. That's a news person and it's and it's
• 1:09:31
  and it's a coach who was very popular with the Washington capitals in our town.
• 1:09:36
  So that's what folks are getting now. Um, So the business has
• 1:09:41
  changed. News directors executives go, well, we don't need to to uh,
• 1:09:45
  you know, and get this big personality we got. We got our
• 1:09:47
  news. Everybody wants news. Anybody what's weather? And the sportscaster is the
• 1:09:53
  is the accordion? Well, whatever happens, they get the back end of
• 1:09:56
  the show. And it used to be when I got the Fox five in
• 1:09:58
  DC, I would get six to eight minutes. When I left it was
• 1:10:00
  two and a half and I'm like, no, I can't do my my
• 1:10:05
  thing, my stick in that amount of time. So the business has changed
• 1:10:09
  locally and nationally. And you're right, I mean the big guns, those
• 1:10:14
  voices that you long to hear and be on a game, you know,
• 1:10:16
  once nance is gone is I don't I don't know who is? I mean?
• 1:10:20
  And Kevin Harland does a great job but he's doing so many different jobs
• 1:10:24
  because they can that they're not you know, they're not stuck. Stuck's not
• 1:10:30
  the right word, but they're just not associated with this. There is one
• 1:10:31
  big platform. How much does political correctness player role in what we're talking about
• 1:10:38
  here, chick where um you know you mentioned it's a little bit different than
• 1:10:42
  the network level, but the local sports guy, UM to be able to
• 1:10:46
  be known and to make a name for yourself, you've got to be different,
• 1:10:50
  you've got to be funny, you've got to do things that are on
• 1:10:54
  the edge. We both worked for a guy who you know, is not
• 1:10:57
  known nationally, but I believe, and I know you agree, was an
• 1:11:00
  absolute genius in Glenn Brenner. Glenn Brenner could not do what he did back
• 1:11:06
  in the day today in my opinion, Um, and and largely it's because
• 1:11:12
  when you're running the car that fast and the highway is this narrow as it
• 1:11:17
  is now, meaning be a political correctness, you're gonna run it off the
• 1:11:20
  road at some point. And Brenner and others had a much wider road to
• 1:11:28
  drive that car at that speed than we have today. You can't get out
• 1:11:32
  of line or you're gonna lose your job. And as we you know and
• 1:11:36
  obviously we all know in this business, that's a death sentence because really good
• 1:11:43
  get gigs are very difficult to get and no one wants to get fired,
• 1:11:45
  and it's very difficult to recover from from being fired, especially from a high
• 1:11:49
  profile situation. So what do you make of that assessment? Well, I
• 1:11:55
  mean you're absolutely right, and that you know a slip up. Now sometimes
• 1:11:59
  you can do every the slip and I would I would say to you about
• 1:12:01
  like a guy like Glenn Brenner. I will now he'd be really old.
• 1:12:06
  But I think because you said the word genius, I think he would have
• 1:12:12
  found a way to still bring viewers in um because he would have done something.
• 1:12:15
  He did something in this market that was different than George Michael was a
• 1:12:19
  video guy, brought in all the videos from across the country. George Glenn
• 1:12:23
  Brenner made husbands and wives sit down to watch sports, which wasn't the case
• 1:12:29
  always. I think he would have adapted in some sort But but in this
• 1:12:31
  climate, if you say the wrong thing, certainly. But what's funny is
• 1:12:38
  that they I'm watching now some of the younger guys coming up and they are
• 1:12:42
  taking some risks. They're taking calculated risks, but they're taking risk to have
• 1:12:46
  their voice heard. And um, you're starting to see that a little bit
• 1:12:50
  at least I'm seeing on social I don't watch them on TV, but I'm
• 1:12:53
  seeing their their postings on social media getting their word out, you know.
• 1:12:58
  And the old Guard too, Darre Hanson down in you know, Dallas h
• 1:13:01
  I mean he puts, he goes hard at several different serious topics, Um,
• 1:13:06
  that aren't just sports related. So you know, it's a different it's
• 1:13:13
  a different animal. My my family and my co workers always marveled at the
• 1:13:18
  fact that I could. I'm not exactly a clean mouthed individual. Uh and
• 1:13:25
  when I do stand up comedy, I work blue. Um, but the
• 1:13:30
  fact that I've never cursed on the air was something that folks marveled at.
• 1:13:32
  Now, if I if I, if I pissed off an audio guy,
• 1:13:35
  he could leave my mic open for a little extra time and I might get
• 1:13:40
  I might get hammered and I fired. But you know, I always knew
• 1:13:44
  where the line was. And you know, those of us who have half
• 1:13:47
  a brain, we kind of figure out what the line is, and uh,
• 1:13:50
  well it's difficult sometimes I know where that line is, Chick, because
• 1:13:54
  the line seems to move and it seems to be different for different people.
• 1:13:58
  But I want to go back to Jim Nance for a second before we move
• 1:14:00
  on to other topics again. I'd love him in a lot of ways,
• 1:14:04
  but he frustrates me. And this gets into a little bit of the political
• 1:14:08
  realm. You and I I think you know this both. No, Jim
• 1:14:12
  Nance is politically very conservative. Okay, he is. He is you know,
• 1:14:16
  has been close to the Bush family, I mean he and yet he
• 1:14:23
  will never, ever, ever, ever let any semblance of that belief system
• 1:14:30
  come out in his broadcast. Now, some people might say good for him,
• 1:14:34
  but what what frustrates me is people on the other side don't have the
• 1:14:39
  same restrictions, especially those guys on ESPN. If he was liberal, he
• 1:14:45
  would be allowed to spew whatever, almost whatever he wanted, especially in areas
• 1:14:50
  of race or specifically COVID. I mean, it drove me crazy, Chick
• 1:14:56
  to see Jim Nance trying to justify the fact that the twenty twenty one Pebble
• 1:15:01
  Beach pro am didn't happen because of COVID, which is in his backyard and
• 1:15:06
  I'm thinking there's not a chance in the world. Jim Nance is agreeing with
• 1:15:10
  this. He's going along with it simply because he knows this is a third
• 1:15:14
  rail and he's Jim Nance, and if he goes against it, it's gonna
• 1:15:17
  be a problem. So he just decides to throw his own tournament under the
• 1:15:20
  bus. So, as you can see, it's a it's a point of
• 1:15:24
  frustration for me. What do you make for you? What do you?
• 1:15:27
  What do you? What do you make of what I just said? Well,
• 1:15:30
  here's what I make of it. I'm like Jim Nance, and then
• 1:15:31
  I worked for CBS, so I'm gonna be very careful with what I say.
• 1:15:34
  UM. And that's I mean, I mean, he he has that's
• 1:15:41
  the way he's done his entire broadcast career UM from from day one. I
• 1:15:45
  mean, I was there in nineteen ninety two, so he started ninety one,
• 1:15:48
  I think at Augusta. UM. Now he was there for eighty six.
• 1:15:54
  He was first six eighty six with Jack's six green jacket. The bear
• 1:15:58
  has come out of hibernation. It's the only line I'll ever remember Jim Nance
• 1:16:00
  ever saying his entire career, the bear has come out of really Okay,
• 1:16:05
  wow, wow, are we sending this to Jim right now? I like
• 1:16:11
  you, I know you do. I think to each I mean, for
• 1:16:15
  me, John, it's to each his own. I you know, we
• 1:16:16
  all have our beliefs, we all have our protective protecting our jobs, all
• 1:16:21
  of it. Um. You know, it's whatever station you are in life,
• 1:16:27
  wherever where you are in your life, you've got to make that call.
• 1:16:30
  Jim made that call to to not express his political beliefs on air.
• 1:16:34
  I don't have that problem with that. A lot of guys do it.
• 1:16:36
  A lot of guys do not, UM, and you know I don't.
• 1:16:42
  I don't think ever on the air I've ever done it. I might do
• 1:16:44
  it in social media, um, if I'm questioning someone, but I've never
• 1:16:48
  done it on the air because for me, I don't think anybody cares what
• 1:16:54
  I believe. You know, when I'm when I'm broadcasting a game, whether
• 1:16:57
  I'm in a studio host in the show, they don't, you know,
• 1:17:00
  they don't care. And if and if I if I go off topic about
• 1:17:02
  something, I certainly hear about it on social media. We don't need that
• 1:17:05
  from you, you know, you know, shut up and dribble. I'm
• 1:17:08
  like, yeah, well, I know when I felt it, I did
• 1:17:12
  it. It wasn't and I was never point of fact for me. I
• 1:17:15
  just I just did it. Um, And Jim is that way. And
• 1:17:18
  I don't have a problem with Jim not, you know, certainly not as
• 1:17:21
  much of a problem as you have yet. All right, so let gets
• 1:17:27
  us to the other basketball related story this week, which becomes case Caitlin Clark
• 1:17:32
  and Angel Reese. Yeah right, And look, I mean, first of
• 1:17:35
  all, how how amazing is it that the women's Final Four probably as a
• 1:17:41
  more lasting impression on the public consciousness than the men's Final Four this year?
• 1:17:45
  Would you agree with that? I would? I would, Um, unless
• 1:17:48
  San Diego State had won that game on the last second shot, I'd say
• 1:17:51
  I would. Uh uh yeah. I mean, look, before the game,
• 1:17:55
  it was it was a huge it was a huge topic, you know,
• 1:17:58
  and again credits social media, credit all of it. You know that.
• 1:18:02
  I mean, everybody talked about Caitlyn Clark and my lord, I don't
• 1:18:06
  think there's a spot on the court that she can hit a jumper from right,
• 1:18:10
  ridiculous ridiculous baller, ridiculous passer um and and Angel Reese really good rebounder.
• 1:18:17
  Double double player. Um and and plays the social media game far better
• 1:18:24
  than Caitlyn Clark plays the game. UM And you know, and we know
• 1:18:29
  that that game or the aftermath came down to uh, those two athletes uh
• 1:18:34
  and went down racial lines, um, all of it. And I'm glad
• 1:18:40
  to see that Caitlyn Clark came out and said she shouldn't get grief of what
• 1:18:43
  she did. We all trash talk, you know. I mean, whether
• 1:18:45
  she believes it or not, it sound like she did when she said it.
• 1:18:47
  Why would I not believe her? Now? If I didn't, you
• 1:18:49
  know, if if I believe everything else she said she said, we trash
• 1:18:53
  talk, not a big deal. I mean, you know, it didn't
• 1:18:56
  look good. It wasn't a good look for sure. And people want to
• 1:18:59
  say, well they did the same thing. Well they didn't do the same
• 1:19:00
  thing. I mean, Angel Reese sought her out and it looked it looked
• 1:19:04
  childish to me. It looked childish to me. I wouldn't call her everything.
• 1:19:08
  Now, if you were calling the country, called her chick, if
• 1:19:11
  you if you were calling that game, how do you think you would have
• 1:19:13
  handled what Angel Reese did? I don't think I would have addressed it.
• 1:19:18
  I don't think I would have. I would have I would have congratulated at
• 1:19:21
  LSU uh and what a great victory, and I would come from it.
• 1:19:25
  Obviously I'm from Maryland. She went to Maryland, so I might that might
• 1:19:29
  come in there a little bit, um, But I don't think I would
• 1:19:31
  address it during the broadcast at all. Um, you know the ring thing
• 1:19:39
  was done, you know the previous game. Uh, So I don't.
• 1:19:43
  I don't. I don't think I would have addressed it during the game.
• 1:19:45
  Um. They were both, They're both wrong for what they did. Um.
• 1:19:53
  In my opinion, Uh, Angels Uh just was a really bad look.
• 1:19:58
  Um. And I credit I you know, I credit that to youth
• 1:20:01
  and not being completely mature. Just you know, kind of got lost in
• 1:20:06
  the moment. And it's like, you know, I'm sure at some point
• 1:20:11
  when she's maturing, she looks back at she's a go. That wasn't really
• 1:20:14
  a good look. And it's true, it wasn't a good look and had
• 1:20:16
  nothing to do with black or white. Just wasn't a good look. Well,
• 1:20:20
  I want to give you, I want to give you my very very
• 1:20:24
  brief synopsis of what happened in that final for and get your impressions of it,
• 1:20:29
  because I know you're going to disagree with some of this at least,
• 1:20:31
  if not all of it, but which is fine, which is partially why
• 1:20:35
  I had you on, because I wanted to make sure that I had if
• 1:20:40
  there is another side to this, I wanted to hear it, and I
• 1:20:43
  figured you could correct me if I'm wrong. All right, So, okay,
• 1:20:45
  there's a couple of observations I don't think are being touched in the media
• 1:20:49
  because they are two third rail. The first is the reason why the ratings
• 1:20:55
  for the semi final against South Carolina and Iowa and the final LSU and Iowa.
• 1:21:00
  There are two reasons. One Caitlin Clark is a unicorn and she's amazing
• 1:21:05
  to watch, and that's all about basketball. That's number one. But both
• 1:21:12
  were essentially a white team versus a black team, and that drove interest.
• 1:21:16
  Let me stop right there. Do you agree with that? I think for
• 1:21:20
  sure that was a definite component of it when it comes to the nation watching
• 1:21:26
  a game and being able to voice their opinion on social media. I mean,
• 1:21:30
  and by way, there's nothing necessarily wrong with that. I mean,
• 1:21:32
  it's it is an interesting situation. Yeah, go ahead, I mean,
• 1:21:40
  if you take it too far, it can be bad. I mean if
• 1:21:43
  people are you know, if people make it racial, if you're rooting against
• 1:21:46
  a team because you know they're black, or you're against rooting against the team
• 1:21:49
  because they're white, that would be bad. But I don't think it.
• 1:21:53
  I don't think it's inherently wrong. Like, for instance, if you're a
• 1:21:58
  young white kid and you see Caitlin Clark, I don't think there's anything wrong
• 1:22:01
  with a going, oh my gosh, just this girl is amazing, right,
• 1:22:05
  I mean, and and and similarly, you know, uh, similarly
• 1:22:10
  with with all the all the players in LSU, but specifically Angel reasons you
• 1:22:14
  mentioned her, and she she's become most prominent in the aftermath. So we
• 1:22:16
  both agree that there's nothing inherently wrong rooting for somebody because you associate with them,
• 1:22:21
  you can identify with them, right, I mean is that fair?
• 1:22:26
  That is that is fair? That's that's the way our country is. Uh,
• 1:22:30
  it's absolutely fair that that's what how some folks um, you know,
• 1:22:36
  design their their their fan interest. It's fair. It's it's it's natural to
• 1:22:43
  some degree. So so here's where things started to go sideways in my opinion,
• 1:22:47
  and um. And that was with Don Staley's press conference after the semi
• 1:22:51
  final game, where she I believe got a set up question that was based
• 1:22:59
  in a largely a falsehood or at least a distortion of what another coach had
• 1:23:04
  said. And then she turns it into rumors that she's heard from the news
• 1:23:09
  media, and she references thugs and monkeys and don't judge us by the color
• 1:23:15
  of our skin, and I'll be I hear you, I hear you almost
• 1:23:19
  you know, wagging her finger and seemed like a threatening fashion. And remember
• 1:23:24
  Don Staley is by far the most prominent coach in women's college basketball. She
• 1:23:30
  is immedia darling. She went out of her way to be, in my
• 1:23:33
  opinion, wrong about what happened in the BYU Duke volleyball situation where she canceled
• 1:23:39
  a game with BYU for no reason. And she would be what I would
• 1:23:44
  call woke, And I think that she used her platform to promote a political
• 1:23:48
  agenda and also to distract from her team's loss. What do you make of
• 1:23:53
  what I just said there? I you know, I don't know Don Staley.
• 1:23:58
  I don't know what UM what what she's heard, I don't know what
• 1:24:01
  it was a set up question or not. I just you know, she
• 1:24:05
  comes from where she comes from, and and that is a place of you
• 1:24:11
  know, a lot of African American folks, people, athletes, all of
• 1:24:15
  them feel like they're they're at the bottom and trying to come a mountain.
• 1:24:18
  And when she gets uh to that to that point, um, she wants
• 1:24:23
  to make a point. I don't know what she's heard. I will tell
• 1:24:26
  you that in doing my job and being inside the ropes, uh, you
• 1:24:33
  know, inside the white lines of a basketball court, that coaches and media
• 1:24:41
  will say things that would never be uttered on air ever. Okay, Um.
• 1:24:48
  I was stunned at uh talking to some coaches this year and the fact
• 1:24:54
  that one said I couldn't afford this player. And I'm like, I remember
• 1:24:59
  that back in the day when you couldn't you know, illegal recruiting. But
• 1:25:01
  they like, I literally cannot afford this player, right, Um, We're
• 1:25:06
  talking hundreds of thousands of dollars to get this player to come to our school.
• 1:25:12
  And I'm like, okay, what like what if I I was like,
• 1:25:15
  what if I walked like I should I even be here? But I
• 1:25:17
  felt like like that's what I felt like. I'm just gonna go out and
• 1:25:20
  and do something else and I'll come back because it was two inside for me,
• 1:25:25
  right. Okay, but that's coach. But here hear me out.
• 1:25:28
  Coaches talk about other uh, coaches talk about other coaches. Coach just talk
• 1:25:32
  about other players. It's not always in a positive light, okay. And
• 1:25:38
  and how that gets back to people, It just does. It happens.
• 1:25:43
  I don't know what what don Staley heard. I know what she told us.
• 1:25:47
  She heard, um, and she's we want to call it woke.
• 1:25:53
  That's that's your term. If she's looking to stir the pot, then yeah,
• 1:25:58
  I think she she was doing that. Oka. Um, But chick,
• 1:26:01
  you would know this even better than me because I haven't been in this
• 1:26:04
  world in a long time. But I feel like I have a pretty good
• 1:26:08
  sense of it, even from watching as an outsider. What are the chances
• 1:26:13
  that a reporter at the women's College Final four would ever use the word in
• 1:26:19
  private monkeys to describe an all black South Carolina team. It's number one,
• 1:26:25
  ranked in the country and undefeated. What are the chances of that? Check?
• 1:26:28
  Yeah? I don't. I don't think they're very very high. Um,
• 1:26:30
  but I don't. I don't think they're very high. Um, you
• 1:26:32
  know, but I also didn't think that, you know, al campanis,
• 1:26:35
  would you know, say that blacks couldn't swim they're not buoyant enough. So
• 1:26:41
  you just don't know what comes out of people, Okay, Um, and
• 1:26:43
  that's a long time ago. It's a long time ago. But but yeah,
• 1:26:46
  I don't. I don't. The chances are are slim to none.
• 1:26:49
  Um. And I so I don't know where you know, where she was
• 1:26:53
  going with that. I don't. I don't know what her impetus was,
• 1:26:57
  and I can't assume it fair enough. So I want to take this to
• 1:27:00
  the last chapter of this saga because I think I have a different take than
• 1:27:03
  than you would, and I want to get your response to it. So,
• 1:27:06
  so we already referenced the Caitlin at Clark and the and the Angel Reese
• 1:27:12
  confrontation. I guess if you will, were Reese at the end of the
• 1:27:15
  game taunts her taunts Clark extensively. Um. And and there was already some
• 1:27:24
  uh consternation on social media about this because Reese was way over the top.
• 1:27:29
  This was not a normal you would agree you, I think you've already said
• 1:27:30
  it. This was not a normal taunt thing. This was about a ten
• 1:27:35
  if it was if it wasn't a men's game, hands would be thrown.
• 1:27:39
  Yeah, right, okay, and I and I and I all I would
• 1:27:42
  say to people that are questioning whether it was a bad look or not,
• 1:27:45
  was if Steph Curry. And she's not Steph Curry, but if Steph Curry
• 1:27:49
  had done that to someone else in the league, you'd go, you'd scratch
• 1:27:56
  head, going, what's he doing? What's it doing? That's a what's
• 1:28:00
  it's stupid? It's stupid, all right ahead. But here's the part that
• 1:28:02
  bothered me most way more than the taunting. So she after the game,
• 1:28:08
  and I'm not one hundred sure you saw this, So if you didn't,
• 1:28:11
  I apologize. But she immediately does an interview with the ESPN panel. There's
• 1:28:16
  like four female ESPN commentators post game. She comes on the set and the
• 1:28:23
  atmosphere is giddy. They these the women are literally giddy in excitement over the
• 1:28:30
  taunting that she gave Caitlin Clark, which I thought was weird to begin with,
• 1:28:35
  but then it was the substance of what Reese said in response, because
• 1:28:41
  she doesn't reference retaliating against Clark for having taunted her or her team. She
• 1:28:47
  references having taunted South Carolina two nights before, and when you consider the context
• 1:28:57
  of South Carolina all black team, LSU all black team, and Stanley's comments
• 1:29:01
  in the post game making it racial. I perceived what Rees was saying was
• 1:29:09
  those are my not just girls, those are my black girls. And I
• 1:29:15
  was I was disrespected or they were disrespected by Clark, and I was standing
• 1:29:20
  up for my black girls. Am I out of line for interpreting it that
• 1:29:28
  way? I don't know if you're out of line. Um, if if,
• 1:29:31
  if, if South Carolina had a white player that couldn't shoot a three,
• 1:29:35
  I think Caitlyn Clark would have done the exact same thing, which was
• 1:29:39
  to waiver off. So so so Caitlyn Clarks. You know the scouting I
• 1:29:44
  said on social media it was a scouting report to I said it not to
• 1:29:48
  Angel Reese, but I said it wasn't disrespectful. It was a scouting report
• 1:29:51
  for for people to check, just for people that don't know. In the
• 1:29:55
  South Carolina game, Caitlyn Clark played off of a South Carolina player who was
• 1:30:01
  about the three point line off, like fifteen feet her off and waved her
• 1:30:09
  off. Okay. She waved her off, like like, I'm not gonna
• 1:30:11
  I ain't gonna worry about you. Right, you can't hit the three,
• 1:30:14
  which is fine. I think it's fine, Okay, okay, But but
• 1:30:16
  again, if that was a white player, I think Caitlyn was done the
• 1:30:18
  same thing. I don't think angel from from where you're coming from. Uh,
• 1:30:26
  I can't make that leap. I guess so, and I'm saying I
• 1:30:29
  guess, I guess so, I just come from I just thought it was
• 1:30:31
  a dumb comment to say that that that Iowa and Caitlyn in particular disrespected South
• 1:30:39
  Carolina's players because she played off and waved them off because that's the scouting report.
• 1:30:43
  They can't hit the three. It was a break. There's two aspects.
• 1:30:46
  There's two aspects to this. The first aspect is we both agree that
• 1:30:49
  what Caitlyn Clark did was not offensive. In fact, it was I mean,
• 1:30:55
  it was literally defensive because she was on defense, but it was also
• 1:30:58
  it was also it was also well within the realm of playing a normal game
• 1:31:02
  of basketball, and it certainly didn't warrant the level of retaliation by Reese.
• 1:31:08
  But again, it wasn't retaliation for something that happened to her or her team.
• 1:31:13
  I've never have you ever heard have you ever heard chick and your entire
• 1:31:16
  sportscasting career have a player taunting a player for retaliation for something that happened against
• 1:31:23
  another team. Well, I've I know football players who have you know,
• 1:31:29
  friends and stuff who and if a guy gets cheap shot at in the game
• 1:31:32
  no week two prior, I've I've seen where a guy will come and head
• 1:31:36
  hunt and and and say in the locker room afterwards, you know that was
• 1:31:41
  from my boy, blah blah blah, because that's a little different. But
• 1:31:44
  okay, I get I get it. But yeah, I uh, you
• 1:31:45
  know you you come from it definitely than I do. Um back to the
• 1:31:48
  original part of our conversation, whether Angel was was was saying all this because
• 1:31:55
  South Clods an all black team or predominantly black? Are they all black?
• 1:31:59
  I don't know. I believe every player I've seen on the team was black,
• 1:32:01
  so I mean as possible l ls us not. I mean, they
• 1:32:04
  have they have white players, so I don't. I just again, it
• 1:32:10
  goes back to the immature nature of it all for for me with with Angel
• 1:32:13
  Reese and and you get you know, and then that and the in in
• 1:32:17
  that arena, literally and figuratively, I mean, you're everything's you're highting,
• 1:32:23
  your your senses are heightened, and you just sometimes don't and you don't do
• 1:32:26
  the right thing. Thank you Chris Webbert for calling a time out. You
• 1:32:29
  just don't do the right thing. Thank you Fred Brown, You're Georgetown guy
• 1:32:31
  for passing the wrong guy. They just lose their minds. And sometimes because
• 1:32:34
  now microphones, there's no by the way, remember back in the day when
• 1:32:39
  we covered sports, there was like a teniute cooling off period. There's none
• 1:32:43
  now. There was a reason there was a timid a cooling off period for
• 1:32:45
  right, for most good point. They don't have those now. They just
• 1:32:47
  now by way, by the way, sometimes the announcers should take a ten
• 1:32:50
  and a cooling off period. Well, yeah, I don't. I didn't
• 1:32:55
  watch the postgame show. But again, you're you get caught up in it,
• 1:32:58
  and I mean, right, right, So let's move on to because
• 1:33:00
  it's a couple other things I want to talk to you about. Okay,
• 1:33:02
  and this one I think will probably more comfortable for you because it's it's golf,
• 1:33:06
  and it's Augusta and obviously the Masters The Masters is this week. I
• 1:33:11
  don't know if you've heard, but the Masters is this week. I'm not
• 1:33:13
  hurting this week, assuming that the weather lets them play. It's not looking
• 1:33:17
  particularly promising. By the way, before before we get into the nuts and
• 1:33:21
  bolts of it, how many times have you played Augusta National Chick? Three
• 1:33:25
  times? Wow? Okay, every time times? And I will ever play
• 1:33:29
  Augusta National. Very fortunate to be a member of the media down in Augusta.
• 1:33:32
  We were actually guaranteed one day a year to play at the end of
• 1:33:36
  May, so three media days I played. I played the first year right
• 1:33:41
  handed, the next two years left handed after switching, and uh yeah,
• 1:33:45
  I'll never forget it. And you know, like I don't remember what to
• 1:33:46
  have for lunch, but I can basically tell you what I did on every
• 1:33:49
  whole, all three rounds. It's kind of sad. Well, that's not
• 1:33:54
  sad at all. That's great. Although I don't I don't think I've ever
• 1:33:57
  told you this story, but the year that I covered the Masters for this
• 1:34:00
  same company you were working for at the time, but we didn't know it,
• 1:34:03
  which is astonishing, an amazing and impossible to believe in retrospect. I
• 1:34:09
  was told to put my name in for the lottery to play on the Monday
• 1:34:13
  after you guys, as the local media, you get your own day,
• 1:34:15
  but the local media, the national media, gets a lottery to play the
• 1:34:19
  course on Monday. And I was told by the general manager of the same
• 1:34:24
  station that was employing you got the name of the I think it was Bill
• 1:34:28
  Evans, Bill, Bill Evans, all right. So he brought me down
• 1:34:32
  and he told me, go sign up for the Go sign up for the
• 1:34:35
  lottery. And this was like on Tuesday or Wednesday. And I go,
• 1:34:39
  okay, fine, And the woman that was in charge asked for my credential,
• 1:34:43
  and I gave her my credential and it was Bill Evans's credential because I
• 1:34:46
  had not been registered as a regular media member. And she looked at it
• 1:34:51
  and goes, you're not Bill Evans. I go, no, I'm here
• 1:34:55
  working for Bill Evans and as well, I will have to take your credential
• 1:34:58
  and you will be escorted off the ground of Augusta National and Um. And
• 1:35:02
  you may recall they had this security guard, three hundred and thirty pound guys,
• 1:35:05
  tiny tiny, so tiny, escorted me off the grounds of Augusta Nash
• 1:35:13
  nine ninety. Yes, dread couples won that year. But now, if
• 1:35:18
  we I had not been working for your station indirectly, the CBS affiliate in
• 1:35:24
  Augusta, I would never been allowed back in. But apparently Bill you know,
• 1:35:28
  begged and pleaded and they let me back in, but I was not
• 1:35:30
  allowed to sign up for the UH for the media lottery to play that.
• 1:35:34
  Yeah, it's a great story anyway, more importantly than that funny little story.
• 1:35:40
  So um, I am curious are I'm gonna give you another analysis of
• 1:35:45
  of of what I think has happened here and get your take on it,
• 1:35:48
  all right, because you when you were there UH in Augusta, and you
• 1:35:54
  you've played the course three times and I know you still have friends there.
• 1:35:57
  Whatever Augusta National was considered to be we want to talk about conservative politically,
• 1:36:02
  it was the most conservative entity on the planet in every way, shape or
• 1:36:06
  form, not just politically but literally by the term conservative. They will not
• 1:36:12
  change anything unless force two. And even by the way, if you've tried
• 1:36:15
  the forsom they would be less likely to change. You would agree with that
• 1:36:19
  assessment, correct they had? Yeah, it was it was a tough not
• 1:36:23
  to crack, for sure. Um, you know, I can only tell
• 1:36:27
  you from the dealings that I had with them how they treated the locals was
• 1:36:30
  far different than than their national reputation. But yes, agreed, it was
• 1:36:33
  screen jackets only. And let's move on. We don't we don't tell you
• 1:36:36
  how much money we make on the tournament, don't ask, don't run on
• 1:36:40
  the course and their patrons. That was it right? And and look,
• 1:36:45
  I am I am not someone who doesn't believe that there should never be change.
• 1:36:48
  I mean, I love tradition and but to me, it's part of
• 1:36:53
  what made the Masters great was it was the one weekend a year where you
• 1:36:57
  could still pretend it was nineteen seventy five, basically if you if you wanted
• 1:37:01
  to, I mean that very little had changed. U. Yes, no,
• 1:37:06
  but no, but I think you understand what I'm saying that that for
• 1:37:09
  some people, like especially when we start to get older, it's nice to
• 1:37:13
  be able to look at something, especially when change is happening at such a
• 1:37:15
  rapid pace and so many elements of society that there and and I'm you know
• 1:37:19
  there might be some people to think, are you talking about racially? No,
• 1:37:23
  I'm I am thrilled that kind of Lisa Rice, for instance, is
• 1:37:26
  a member at Augusta National. It's fantastic. I have no problem with that.
• 1:37:30
  So there were there was need for some changes. But I gotta tell
• 1:37:33
  you a check. As a conservative, you thought I was irritated by Jim
• 1:37:38
  Nance. I was I rate at Augusta National Golf Club for how they caved
• 1:37:45
  during COVID, the idea that Augusta National could have been the only sports entity
• 1:37:51
  that had the power, the wherewithal the funding, they could have said,
• 1:37:56
  go screw yourselves, We're having it. We play our tournament in April every
• 1:38:00
  year, and you guys do whatever the hell you want, because we are
• 1:38:03
  the goddamn masters. We're Augusta National. We're gonna do what we want,
• 1:38:08
  and we're gonna play this tournament and show the rest of the country how ridiculous
• 1:38:11
  it is that people aren't allowed to go outside and play golf in April twenty
• 1:38:15
  twenty, and then not only did they move their tournament in November that year,
• 1:38:19
  they then the next year had limited crowds and they were masked masks and
• 1:38:26
  Augusta National, for God's sake, Now, if Augusta National has gone that
• 1:38:30
  woke and as that was suffied and curled that much into the fetal position because
• 1:38:35
  of of of a virus. Then God help us all. We are all
• 1:38:40
  screwed. So I as you can tell, I am, I will never
• 1:38:45
  forgive Augusta National for what they did because they could. Yes, please,
• 1:38:48
  do you're gonna watch this year? Oh? Yeah, of course of course.
• 1:38:55
  And they know that, and that's the that's you're You've hit the nail
• 1:38:58
  on the head chick. They know they can crap in the face of people
• 1:39:00
  like me. And I'm still gonna watch, right, Yeah, I'm gonna
• 1:39:06
  watch. I have several different devices, and one of the changes that I
• 1:39:11
  love they've made is that they made every whole, every player accessible, you
• 1:39:15
  know. And so for the golf attict, the golf junkie, I will
• 1:39:18
  be sitting here like a pig and slop as every cover from surgery, sitting
• 1:39:21
  on my couch and I'll have my my MacBook, I'll have my iPad,
• 1:39:25
  I'll have my phone, and I will watch every single shot, not that
• 1:39:30
  every player hits, but any player that I want, I will watch every
• 1:39:34
  single shot. August National has changed. I'm not of your same milk when
• 1:39:40
  it comes to COVID and everything I don't believe the same things you believe in.
• 1:39:44
  But I don't have a problem with what they did. I don't have
• 1:39:46
  a problem with what they did because they made a decision based on what I
• 1:39:53
  don't know. I don't know where they got okay, but I mean somebody
• 1:39:57
  had to. Those green jackets, who who we talked about so stayed for
• 1:40:00
  so long, the new breed of green jackets, I don't know, have
• 1:40:05
  come in and said, we gotta, we gotta pay attention to what's going
• 1:40:08
  on, you know, in the country, and whether it's whether it's our
• 1:40:13
  our perception. I don't think they you know, I mean they have,
• 1:40:16
  they have John, They've changed, I mean female members the I mean,
• 1:40:21
  let me, let me ask the questions I said. I watched the young
• 1:40:25
  the youngsters, I watched the the the women amateur. I watched that from
• 1:40:29
  from first tea to eighteen right because because because because of the golf course,
• 1:40:33
  I mean because of the golf course. See how they're faring on it.
• 1:40:36
  You know, I know how I fared on it. I'm comparing myself.
• 1:40:40
  Can I watch the youngsters, chick I'm I'm just saying that's that's that's fortunately
• 1:40:45
  and I'm very humble about the Fortunately I can deal from it from that perspective,
• 1:40:48
  even though the course has changed dramatically in many respects since when I played.
• 1:40:54
  Let me ask the question in a different way. Am I right that
• 1:40:58
  if Augustin ash had wanted to, if they had the political will, they
• 1:41:03
  could have in April of twenty twenty said we're playing our tournament, and you
• 1:41:08
  know, you can come if you want, or not come if you don't
• 1:41:11
  want, and they could have gotten away with it. They had that kind
• 1:41:14
  of power. Do you agree with me on that? At least I think
• 1:41:17
  they could have done that. I think they could have done that. I
• 1:41:19
  think they would have suffered from not having all of the top players come.
• 1:41:25
  Oh, come on, you don't think we don't think you think there would
• 1:41:28
  have been players that wouldn't have played? Really think there are. I do
• 1:41:31
  think there are players that wouldn't have played because outside of golf dollars, there's
• 1:41:36
  this thing called the brand and sponsorships, and the sponsors have already spoken out
• 1:41:41
  against whatever whatever side they're on in the COVID chain. You know, if
• 1:41:45
  if they're gonna like that's their top players like I want to play, well,
• 1:41:53
  then you go play, but you're no longer with us. That's that
• 1:41:56
  can happen. We've seen it happen when it comes to live and J Tour.
• 1:42:00
  All right, well, let let's move on to live, because I'm
• 1:42:01
  very curious to get your take as a guy who has worked for the PGA
• 1:42:05
  Tour as I mean, how long did you work for the PGA Tours and
• 1:42:08
  announced probably about two three years radio and I did PJA Tour Live. I'm
• 1:42:13
  still with PJA Tour Live to a certain degree. Okay, all right,
• 1:42:15
  and so what is your take on the entire live PGA Tour controversy? Because
• 1:42:21
  I don't even know what the answer to that is. So what do you
• 1:42:24
  make I think if if the live players they just said guys too good to
• 1:42:32
  pass up, simple as that, I am talking about generational wealth for my
• 1:42:38
  family, my kids, my grandkids. I'm out. I don't really care
• 1:42:43
  about the legacy of or my legacy in the game of golf. I'm just
• 1:42:46
  going because I can do this. I ain't got a play as much and
• 1:42:49
  make a crap ton more cool. What did they do? They didn't say
• 1:42:56
  that, at least most of them didn't say that. I want to spend
• 1:42:59
  more time with my family. Really, and you got the head guy,
• 1:43:02
  Lefty Philly Mick, who one sentence disparages the sadies as murderers and then like,
• 1:43:10
  oh, I probably shouldn't have said that. Let me come back in
• 1:43:12
  a few weeks and say something different, like what are you doing so I
• 1:43:16
  leagues, leagues, leagues change. The NFL wasn't always the NFL. Okay,
• 1:43:21
  it happens, there's a split, A progression doesn't bother me. I
• 1:43:26
  just wanted the guys to tell the truth. And I don't have a problem
• 1:43:29
  with playing in the majors. Just just tell them the truth, and I
• 1:43:32
  agree with them. This week, a bunch of the guys are on Lived
• 1:43:34
  Tour and a bunch of guys in PGA Tour that I'll put quotes air quotes.
• 1:43:39
  We the media and social media are making more of a tension between Lived
• 1:43:45
  Tour guys and the PGA Tour players. Certainly, there is some tension between
• 1:43:48
  some of them because some of them can't keep their mouth shut and don't say
• 1:43:54
  the right things. And there's also Pat Reid who's just not well liked by
• 1:43:57
  a lot of guys. But I agree that there's a little bit over over
• 1:44:02
  over analyzing the supposed tension. But chick's come Sunday or whenever this tournament ends,
• 1:44:10
  depending on the weather. But come to find them round to this tournament.
• 1:44:14
  If there's two or three live guys near the top of the leaderboard,
• 1:44:16
  that is gonna get intense. Do you agree with that? I mean,
• 1:44:19
  that is gonna be there's gonna be a huge rivalry there. It'll be intense,
• 1:44:25
  um. But not for the guys that are on the course. Now
• 1:44:28
  here's this intense for the guy who's tried to take down the PGA Tour for
• 1:44:31
  many years. And that's Greg Norman, the guy who's leading the live tour,
• 1:44:34
  who's already said, man, it's just a live guy on eighteen putting
• 1:44:38
  out we're all gonna run down there, blah blah blah. You don't burst
• 1:44:41
  of no. No, no, I think. I think. I think
• 1:44:45
  if there's a live no, I think, if there's a live guy putting
• 1:44:48
  for the win or up for the win on eighteen, I think, like
• 1:44:51
  you see guys who hang out, you know, the young guys the JT's
• 1:44:56
  hanging out to watch Ricky Fowl or if vice versa, or watching Jordan Speed.
• 1:44:59
  Those guys, guy would come out on eighteen to watch. I think
• 1:45:02
  live tour guys, if DJ's up there looking for the another green jacket,
• 1:45:06
  I think live tour guys have been instructed make your presence felt because Greg Norman
• 1:45:14
  is all about shoving it in the You really think that they're gonna risk the
• 1:45:16
  wrath of Augusta National, because I mean, there's no there's no wrath.
• 1:45:23
  You just sit on eight you sit off eighteen. No, but the way
• 1:45:26
  way Norman described it to be, that's not happening. That's not happening.
• 1:45:29
  So you are running out. Yeah, yeah, they're not running down on
• 1:45:31
  eighteen. Blah blah blah, that's not happening. But for damn sure,
• 1:45:33
  if DJ is coming off, or if somehow Patrick Reid comes off, they're
• 1:45:40
  gonna hang out and that big walk line those guys hang out by the Scoring
• 1:45:44
  building, they'll be there and they'll make they'll make it. They'll make it
• 1:45:47
  a scene. I think they would make it a scene there, But Augustin
• 1:45:50
  National can't do anything about that. CBS is gonna show the pictures like they
• 1:45:55
  always do. Now, for the record, I don't believe a live player
• 1:45:59
  will win because I don't think the lived players are properly prepared for major championship
• 1:46:03
  golf based upon what they've been playing in. Although this week's weather might change
• 1:46:09
  the equation, might change. The equation you got and a healthy Brooks keep
• 1:46:13
  even I'm coming off a win, he's a little bit scary for me,
• 1:46:15
  A little bit scary. I just think they're playing member guests, you know,
• 1:46:19
  once a month, and I don't think that that. I don't think
• 1:46:21
  that's really the way you prepare for a major golf chap. I can't watch
• 1:46:25
  it. I can't. I can't watch it. I mean, the graphics
• 1:46:28
  confuse me. I can't. I can't watch it. All right, this
• 1:46:30
  whole team thing. Give me Ryder Cup, Give me President's Cup. That's
• 1:46:32
  enough for me. I'm right there with you, chick, all right now.
• 1:46:35
  One other thing on golf, and I don't know whether or not people
• 1:46:39
  think I talk too much about this, but I love using the golf media
• 1:46:44
  as an example of this much much larger issue that we talk about on this
• 1:46:48
  podcast, the death of journalism, quite a bit, because I believe that
• 1:46:53
  the golf media is literally the worst form of alleged I don't know what you
• 1:47:00
  would call it news, media, sports media, content media that there is.
• 1:47:03
  And it's not because the people that do golf reporting are worse people or
• 1:47:11
  dumber people, the fact that many of them are not dumb. It's because
• 1:47:13
  the incentive structure when it comes to covering golf is an exaggerated form of all
• 1:47:19
  the other media. In other words, it is such an incestuous relationship to
• 1:47:25
  go from town to town to be with these guys on a consistent basis,
• 1:47:30
  You've got massive conflicts of interest. I mean, not to throw Jim Nance
• 1:47:34
  in here again, but Jim Nance does commercials for titlists, which means he's
• 1:47:38
  got a commercial connection to you know, all the other titleist guys. I
• 1:47:42
  mean, that's just one example of many. There are so many. There's
• 1:47:45
  a web of conflicts of interest. Plus the other most important thing is chick
• 1:47:48
  And you know this better than anybody. If you have a regular gig,
• 1:47:53
  especially on television covering the PGA tour, it is the cushiest damn gig on
• 1:47:59
  the planet, going to a different, wonderful, warm weather place every week.
• 1:48:03
  You're getting paid a lot of money. It's a very easy job unless
• 1:48:08
  you're walking the course. But even that, you know, is a pretty
• 1:48:11
  good gig, which you've which you've done. I mean, it's so all
• 1:48:15
  these things, all these things combine make people who cover golf incredibly fearful of
• 1:48:23
  rocking the boat and getting out of line and potentially losing the gig or pissing
• 1:48:29
  somebody off. I mean, so would you what do you make of what
• 1:48:32
  I just said? And do you agree that when it comes to golf reporting,
• 1:48:38
  it's basically an oxymoron that there is no such thing is real golf journalism.
• 1:48:43
  It's a traveling circus m and you go from town to town. My
• 1:48:46
  question, do you be what do you want them to do? I mean,
• 1:48:50
  what they're covering. They're covering guys. This is gonna sound funny.
• 1:48:54
  They're covering guys who play golf. It's not exactly like, it's not a
• 1:48:58
  contact sport. There's not a trash talking going on. They just go and
• 1:49:02
  they compete and they move on. What would you I mean, I don't
• 1:49:08
  know what would you want them to to? Oh my gosh, well,
• 1:49:12
  I mean I think golf played an incredibly important role in shutting down the country
• 1:49:16
  during COVID. I think that if I think if the PGA Tour, which
• 1:49:21
  they originally said they were going to do chick. If you remember the original
• 1:49:25
  PGA Tour, a pronouncement was we'll have no fans, but we're gonna keep
• 1:49:29
  playing. And then in twenty four hours they caved at the Players Championship.
• 1:49:32
  And if you remember that in March of twenty twenty, if if the PGA
• 1:49:36
  Tour had done the right thing, and then they and part of the reason
• 1:49:40
  why they didn't do the right thing is they knew they weren't going to get
• 1:49:43
  media support, and they weren't going to get support from other sports. But
• 1:49:45
  golf had this amazing opportunity. They could have been the only thing going.
• 1:49:50
  They could have had Super Bowl ratings because they were an outdoor sport with natural
• 1:49:57
  social distancing. And they I did the cave. And so the media,
• 1:50:02
  the golf media, played an important role in that. Let me give you
• 1:50:04
  another I mean, this is going to get too deep in the weeds,
• 1:50:08
  but I mean you remember the whole Brooks Keepka and Bryson d Shamba feud.
• 1:50:13
  Right, Well, well, Todd Lewis from the Golf Channel had a video
• 1:50:18
  this to me was the most amazing moment in the history of modern quote unquote
• 1:50:24
  reporting, where he's interviewing Brooks Kepka, the shambo walks past him, Kepa
• 1:50:30
  stops talking and gives a massive eye roll, and they and they stopped the
• 1:50:34
  interview, and Todd Lewis acting as if he is the pr person for Brooks
• 1:50:41
  Keepka laughs and says, Okay, let's start over and do that again,
• 1:50:45
  and then never played the tape. And then when it got leaked out,
• 1:50:47
  the Golf Channel was in this bizarre situation of either ignoring their own tape or
• 1:50:55
  commenting on a tape that they had spiked. And this thing sounds like an
• 1:50:59
  incredibly all piece of evidence, but it is, I believe, emblematic of
• 1:51:03
  a much larger issue. And it's basically the rest of the media on steroids.
• 1:51:09
  There's not the natural adversarial relationship. There should be some semblance of an
• 1:51:15
  adversarial relationship between reporter and subject. And in golf, they're on the same
• 1:51:20
  team, chick, right, yeah, right, it's yeah, it's golf,
• 1:51:26
  dude, it's golf. That's I mean, I mean, I don't
• 1:51:28
  for me. I've I've covered the events. I've covered Tiger's tournament when it
• 1:51:33
  was here, um, you know, as at Congressional and at Avanel you
• 1:51:39
  go out and you talk to the guys. I mean, forget COVID for
• 1:51:44
  a second. There's you know, when you're covering these these golfers, you
• 1:51:47
  you get them on the range, and you get them after the round and
• 1:51:50
  in between they do their thing, and if they have an issue, you
• 1:51:55
  asked them about that issue, like what on a shot? Um, I
• 1:51:59
  don't know what I'll you want, I'll put it as us to do.
• 1:52:02
  Let me let me. I'm already give it. I've already given a couple
• 1:52:05
  of examples. But I'm gonna give another example that might hit even closer to
• 1:52:09
  home because I know you and I are both huge Tiger Woods fans, right
• 1:52:13
  and um, and you've had more interaction with Tiger than I have. But
• 1:52:15
  I've had a little bit, um and and I've followed Tiger at least as
• 1:52:20
  closely as you, if not more so. As hard as that might be
• 1:52:24
  to believe, okay, I believe. I believe that if golf had real
• 1:52:30
  reporters, Tiger would not have ever gotten into his sex scandal to the degree
• 1:52:36
  that he did because he felt safe and protected, because he knew he owned
• 1:52:44
  the media literally literally. He did a men's health magazine cover in exchange for
• 1:52:51
  the National Enquirer killing a story about him cheating with a Jurgen's waitress. All
• 1:53:00
  this is a guy who was lulled into believing he could get away with anything,
• 1:53:04
  and it understandably so, because he was living in a world with no
• 1:53:10
  scrutiny, where he was the king and no one was going to do anything
• 1:53:15
  to criticize the king. And that eventually set him up for his downfall.
• 1:53:19
  And you could argue that it destroyed not his entire career, but it's truncated
• 1:53:26
  an enormous amount of his career. Uh and and all sorts of things that
• 1:53:30
  happened after that. What do you make of that assessment, chick, Well,
• 1:53:32
  I mean, it's all his fault, That's what I make of it.
• 1:53:35
  It's all it's all his fault. I'm not suggesting it's not. I'm
• 1:53:40
  saying that if there was real reporting, he wouldn't have felt comfortable and in
• 1:53:44
  doing it the way that he did. Well, I mean, he had
• 1:53:46
  people that were protecting him, for sure, and both in the media and
• 1:53:50
  out. Um, I don't know, you know, prior to that,
• 1:53:54
  what was going on, as far as people try to dig on things that
• 1:53:58
  he was doing Um. But the bottom line is it was I mean he
• 1:54:05
  I've I've said it time and time again. He knows that he brought it
• 1:54:10
  on himself. And certainly the people that cover golf when they found out,
• 1:54:15
  what did they do? Probably nothing right? We probably probably nothing, and
• 1:54:19
  some certainly pro protected him. Um. John hont want to tell you,
• 1:54:25
  Uh, it happens in all sports to some degree. I mean, we're
• 1:54:30
  about to find out, you know, the NFL, I mean how Roger
• 1:54:34
  Goodell is doing things that you just you scratch your head at and you go,
• 1:54:40
  but who's protecting who? Goodell protecting the Washington owner? I mean an
• 1:54:44
  oral report? What is that? What is the last time you've heard of
• 1:54:46
  that? All right, let's let's let's let's I want to talk about this
• 1:54:50
  because but this is this is one of my list of things, and this
• 1:54:54
  is probably gonna be the last topic since we're up against an Now we're I
• 1:54:57
  don't want to take too much more of your time, but I'm fascinated by
• 1:55:00
  this topic because I again, I think you and I are going to see
• 1:55:01
  this differently. You were referencing the Washington NFL football team, currently called the
• 1:55:06
  Commanders, formerly called the Redskins. Yeah, I assume this was. They
• 1:55:10
  were your favorite team growing up, right, I mean not correct? I
• 1:55:14
  was. I was a Dallas cowboy growing up. Oh my gosh, wow,
• 1:55:17
  yeah, living in DC, Living in DC. How the heck Drew
• 1:55:20
  Pearson. Drew Pearson. Oh, when you're at that age where everything else,
• 1:55:25
  everything that your family does, you're against it. So literally, watching
• 1:55:29
  my first one of my first football games, Roger Stallback's first comeback against the
• 1:55:32
  San Francisco forty nine ers, and everybody in my house said, I want
• 1:55:36
  San Francisco to win because they didn't like the guys with the other guys,
• 1:55:40
  And I said, I want the guys with the stars helmet. And they
• 1:55:42
  were down by two touchdowns and everybody laughed at my house, that's not happening.
• 1:55:45
  Incomes Roger Stallback leads them down two touchdowns and wins the game. That's
• 1:55:49
  my guy, that's my team. And it was so until I got in
• 1:55:53
  the business. So good. So no, I was not a I mean
• 1:55:55
  I went to I went to Washington games as a kid, but it was
• 1:55:58
  not a all right, but you have followed you follows. You have followed
• 1:56:00
  the Washington football team very very closely, and and and I think the reason
• 1:56:06
  why you're mentioning it is there is speculation even as we talk, that Dan
• 1:56:10
  Snyder, the owner of the Washington football team, is finally going to be
• 1:56:14
  effectively forced to sell his team. Now I know you're very happy about that,
• 1:56:18
  and look, I'm very happy. I want to make and no one's
• 1:56:20
  gonna cry for Dan Snyder one because he's a jerk and he's perceived as as
• 1:56:25
  way worse than a jerk. And he's also going to make a boatload of
• 1:56:28
  money. There's no ques I mean, he's gonna make he's gonna make an
• 1:56:30
  insane amount of money from the sale. But but I am I am somebody
• 1:56:35
  who um you know, I care about the truth and I care about accountability
• 1:56:41
  for for false Indian narratives. And so I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna give
• 1:56:45
  you a different version of the Dan Snyder narrative. And I want to get
• 1:56:48
  your get your reaction to it, all right, all right, So so
• 1:56:53
  dance, Here's what I think happened with Dan Snyder. All Right, He's
• 1:56:56
  a jerk and he's any and he and his team, he took over a
• 1:57:00
  storied franchise, the Washington reds Story franchise, and they were not successful,
• 1:57:05
  right and correct, right under Dan Snyder, they were not successful. And
• 1:57:12
  that went on for several years. Now, the Washington Redskin nickname had been
• 1:57:15
  a bubbling controversy for quite a while, but it never got any traction.
• 1:57:21
  Okay, it was always one of those things of isn't it weird that the
• 1:57:26
  Washington team is still allowed to be called the Redskins? And every you know,
• 1:57:29
  every couple of years, it would come up and immediately everyone would stamp
• 1:57:32
  it down, and the try the Indian tribes would come forward and say we
• 1:57:36
  don't we don't care, we like it, and there would be a poll
• 1:57:39
  out. There would be a poll out that said most Native Americans are fine
• 1:57:43
  with a name, and then we would move on. The Washington Post would
• 1:57:45
  move on again in a couple of years and not mention it. But but
• 1:57:48
  a couple of things happen. The Redskins stopped being successful. Dan Snyder was
• 1:57:56
  unpopular, partially because they were unsuccessful, partially because he's a jerk and perceived
• 1:58:00
  as a jerk. And I believe the media saw that as a vulnerability that
• 1:58:06
  now we can finally get traction on the Redskin name, because Dan Snyder is
• 1:58:13
  weak and vulnerable. And once they start attacking him full more, all guns
• 1:58:19
  a blazing on the Redskin's name, and he refuses to back down, they
• 1:58:26
  decide to destroy him. There is a code red put out on Dan Snyder.
• 1:58:31
  And at that point, once everyone knows the Code Red is put out,
• 1:58:36
  all of a sudden, allegations that either wouldn't be taken very seriously against,
• 1:58:42
  like a Jerry Jones, since you're a Cowboy fan, I mean,
• 1:58:44
  Jerry Jones has had some things happen like, yeah, when I left,
• 1:58:48
  I left, I left Cowboys when Jerry fired Landry. Just so you know,
• 1:58:53
  good for you. Wow, that's that's awesome, all right, boy,
• 1:58:55
  you just rose in my esteem. But the point, the bigger point
• 1:58:58
  of this is Jerry Jones has had some things happened that if the media wanted
• 1:59:01
  to destroy him, they could have destroyed him. You agree with that,
• 1:59:04
  correct, yes, okay, But they didn't because Jerry. Because Jerry Jones
• 1:59:09
  is a made man in the mafia. Jerry Jones is a made man.
• 1:59:13
  Dan Snyder was the opposite of a made man. Dan Snyder was put on
• 1:59:17
  the attack list because he refused a cave on the Redskins, and I'll give
• 1:59:24
  you example instead of being theoretical. Look, there's so many allegations that came
• 1:59:29
  forward after the Redskins name thing really started to heat up. But what was
• 1:59:34
  done with the what's that? Sorry, the allegations were already some of the
• 1:59:39
  allegations were already there. Yeah, but let me give you an example of
• 1:59:42
  there was a whole bunch of allegations evolving the Redskins cheerleaders. I'm sure you're
• 1:59:45
  aware of this right now. When when I read the story about the Redskins
• 1:59:50
  cheerleaders, I immediately went way to wait a minute, hold on a second.
• 1:59:56
  These these are These are women who are not effectively getting paid, who
• 2:00:01
  know that they're not going to be with the organization very long. They know
• 2:00:04
  that Dan Snyder's blood is in the water, They know that the media is
• 2:00:09
  thirsting for any negative Dan Snyder's story, that he's so vulnerable over the name,
• 2:00:15
  that there's far more likely that they're going to get paid out for any
• 2:00:19
  kind of allegation to be you know, put it pushed under the rug.
• 2:00:23
  And the nature the allegations were such they were so easy to move from the
• 2:00:29
  realm of Okay, that's a little weird too. Somehow that's harassment because a
• 2:00:33
  lot of it was very subjective. There was no rapes or anything inherently criminal
• 2:00:40
  it was. It was all stuff that in a different context would have been
• 2:00:45
  considered not that big of a deal. To me. That was a classic
• 2:00:47
  example of where a story that if the Redskins nickname did not exist, the
• 2:00:54
  media never would have had the appetite for it, and it would not have
• 2:00:58
  built this narrative, and so the native builds on itself, where one negative
• 2:01:01
  story creates another negative story. Everyone sees how vulnerable Snyder is. They see
• 2:01:06
  how willing he might be to pay somebody off because he's got to stop the
• 2:01:12
  bleeding, and the media doesn't stop until they have their pound of flesh.
• 2:01:16
  And I also, just to finish this, I believe that when he finally
• 2:01:19
  caved on the name, and he finally said, Okay, uncle, I
• 2:01:24
  give up, I'm giving up on the name, which I think was far,
• 2:01:28
  far, far worse and had far more corrosive impacts on all elements of
• 2:01:33
  society than most people realize. I just think it's absurd that the Redskins had
• 2:01:39
  to change their name. But once that happened, I think chick. He
• 2:01:43
  thought he would then be protected by GOODEBT, like he was making an exchange.
• 2:01:47
  Okay, I'll give you what you want on the name, but I'm
• 2:01:50
  gonna be protected now, right, And they said yeah, yeah, yeah,
• 2:01:54
  yeah, sure, sure sure. And that didn't happen because he had
• 2:01:59
  given up whatever support he had because the only people still supporting him were the
• 2:02:02
  people that were in favor of the Redskin's name. So he lost all that
• 2:02:06
  support from the media attacks on him, and then he lost whatever support he
• 2:02:11
  had left when he came on the name, and now he's forced to sell.
• 2:02:15
  Now. I realize that's a long commentary, but I'm very curious what
• 2:02:19
  you make of what I just said. All right, So, um,
• 2:02:23
  what I can speak to is I can't I can't make a determination. Well,
• 2:02:28
  let's go to the cheerleaders first. I can't make a determination as to
• 2:02:31
  what truly happened. I will not ever say that the worst didn't happen or
• 2:02:39
  that the least happened. I know that the culture in that building was not
• 2:02:45
  good. Um, so what those ladies came after Snyder with is how they
• 2:02:54
  felt. I don't know if they're They've been talking about this for years and
• 2:02:58
  it's been it's been under the rug, there's been settlements, all that jazz.
• 2:03:02
  So something took place. If I'm look from the outside looking in,
• 2:03:06
  Um, so I can't you know? You said, you know, let's
• 2:03:13
  it wasn't as bad as rape something, you said something like that. I
• 2:03:16
  don't know, and I there's no chance that I'm going to speak to that
• 2:03:19
  because I don't know what took place. Um, I'm not asking. I
• 2:03:25
  was out. I was outlining a theory. I was out running a theory.
• 2:03:29
  I think Dan thought he's protected when when Goodell asked for the oral report,
• 2:03:31
  and that's after the name has been changed. I think he felt like
• 2:03:33
  he was protected, like there's no there's no nothing written down. Oh okay,
• 2:03:39
  cool, you know. I think he felt protected. I think Goodell
• 2:03:43
  protected him from that standpoint. US folks in DC felt that way, like
• 2:03:46
  what's you know? And I'm sure some of the league, but and certainly
• 2:03:48
  in DC, both media and the fan base, like wait a second,
• 2:03:53
  those who wanted Dan out, like how is that possible? The refrain was
• 2:03:58
  if I did that for I'm sure this shit's been written down and it's been
• 2:04:02
  spelled out as to what I did or didn't do and we're not getting that,
• 2:04:05
  and we didn't we didn't get so we felt we all feel like Dan
• 2:04:08
  got protected by the league, you know, slash Goodell in that regard.
• 2:04:13
  Well, maybe maybe to a certain extent. Name change. All right,
• 2:04:16
  let's post name change, right, and that might have been. Maybe the
• 2:04:19
  deal was was made that I suggested was made, but that it just wasn't
• 2:04:23
  powerful enough to keep him his owner because he's feeling as if he has to
• 2:04:27
  sell. But here's the thing I really want to understand from you, chick.
• 2:04:30
  When you hear me outline my theoretical narrative regarding the name, can you
• 2:04:35
  see where I'm coming from? That the name played an incredibly important role in
• 2:04:41
  the media's treatment of Dan Snyder. Do you can you see where I'm coming
• 2:04:45
  from there? Uh? You know, I have to do it from the
• 2:04:47
  local basis. Uh. You know, we deal with the folks who cover
• 2:04:50
  the team. Uh, and the big paper here, the Washington Post.
• 2:04:55
  Um, I think I don't. I don't. For me, it's not
• 2:05:00
  the name. It's it was the person and folks knowing getting enough intel on
• 2:05:05
  the person and the things that were going on that they just like said,
• 2:05:09
  you know what we can't. We can't. We're not We're not letting this
• 2:05:12
  slide. We gotta we gotta dig deeper and find out what's going on.
• 2:05:15
  Um, I don't know the name. You know, it's it's it's funny
• 2:05:24
  because I live in this town. And as soon as the new owner takes
• 2:05:27
  over, what does everybody want? They want another name change? Uh?
• 2:05:30
  And a lot of folks want to go back to the R word. Um
• 2:05:34
  okay, but that's you know, it's gonna be on the new owner.
• 2:05:36
  Now, did you say our word? Did you say our word to be
• 2:05:39
  funny or did you say our word because you don't want to say redskins?
• 2:05:42
  I don't say the word. I don't say the word now. Really.
• 2:05:45
  Yeah, it's just a yeah, it's a it's yeah. I don't.
• 2:05:46
  I don't say the word now because John I grew up being called names.
• 2:05:54
  And sometimes when you listen to people, here's the thing. I'm the last
• 2:05:59
  person and to sit down with Dan Snyder for a television interview. And that
• 2:06:03
  was six seven years ago. Wow. And and this is prior to the
• 2:06:09
  name change. And I came into it not having an issue other than you.
• 2:06:15
  He said, you know, we're going to the reservations and we're taking
• 2:06:18
  some alumni to go see talk you know, talk to you know, to
• 2:06:21
  the Native Americans, and he said you should come. My first thought was,
• 2:06:27
  oh cool, I'm on a private jet. And then the next thought
• 2:06:29
  was the next thought was are we going to the reservations that don't want the
• 2:06:34
  name? And that's what I said, are we going to both? And
• 2:06:38
  the face changed. He just lost all color in his face. He's like,
• 2:06:42
  oh crap. And the interview changed right then and there. Um So
• 2:06:47
  I'm a big proponent of seeing both sides. You know, I grew up,
• 2:06:51
  I grew up here. I watched this team play. And then you
• 2:06:57
  know, as you get older, you listen to folks and you know again
• 2:07:00
  we are we are both were on different political scales. And I listened to
• 2:07:03
  some of the chicks. I know you, I know you're I know you're
• 2:07:08
  a cowboy fan. But doesn't it bother you? Was was, but you
• 2:07:13
  weren't a redskin. You weren't a redskin fan growing up. So it doesn't
• 2:07:15
  it bother you that those those Joe Thiseman, John Riggins teams, the Mark
• 2:07:24
  Rippian team, those are gonna be erased from history. You understand, that
• 2:07:29
  right that you you understand that in ten years, NFL Network will not replay
• 2:07:34
  the Super Bowls that the Redskins played in. You understand they got no no,
• 2:07:41
  no, no, no, no, no no. That's what's gonna
• 2:07:43
  happen, Chick. They will be erased. They will be erased in history.
• 2:07:46
  They will be raised. Let me give you. I'll give you a
• 2:07:49
  proof that they're gonna be erased. Okay, okay, it was um I
• 2:07:53
  think it was last Super Bowl. They did a feature on Joe Gibbs.
• 2:07:58
  I can't even remember what the reason was, but there was some reason why
• 2:08:03
  a Redskin Super Bowl win was being talked about, and they did a cartoon.
• 2:08:07
  They didn't use they didn't use the video of the game. They did
• 2:08:11
  not use the video of the game of the Super Bowl. And in the
• 2:08:15
  cartoon they had Joe Gibbs and the other assistant coaches on the sideline and as
• 2:08:20
  you well know, in the day, there was an R on their hats.
• 2:08:26
  Right in this cartoon depicting the Super Bowl. It was a double It
• 2:08:31
  was a double Chick. It was not an R. That is aracing history.
• 2:08:39
  That's what's going to happen. Those teams will not exist they will be
• 2:08:43
  sponged. Video don't lie, and there's no chance. And when you're looking
• 2:08:48
  back at Doug Williams winning MVP of a Super Bowl, they're gonna they're gonna
• 2:08:52
  erase him for well, isn't that amazing? Is that amazing that the first
• 2:08:56
  black quarterback to win a Super Bowl is now for boating to talk about because
• 2:08:58
  he for a racist team. I mean he does talk talk about here,
• 2:09:05
  he talks. Okay, let last the last thing last. You've been very
• 2:09:09
  generous with your time, but I can't. I can't let you go without
• 2:09:11
  asking. A guy who broadcasts both college basketball and college football for CBS,
• 2:09:16
  I gotta ask you, what is your assessment of where we are heading with
• 2:09:22
  nil and transfers? Because to me, as a traditionalist and as as someone
• 2:09:26
  who just basic believes in basic logic, I think this is catastrophic and gonna
• 2:09:31
  get so much worse than it currently is. What is your view? Yeah,
• 2:09:35
  there's no question it's gonna get It's gonna get worse, there's no question.
• 2:09:37
  And I don't know how you regulate it. Are you gonna have Congress
• 2:09:39
  to it? Really? Um, it's gonna get worse, Because, like
• 2:09:45
  I talked, about earlier in the in this conversation about players and coaches can't
• 2:09:48
  afford The reason they can't afford him it can't get the nil dollars now the
• 2:09:52
  nil dollars, right, So this is it's done a horrible path um of
• 2:09:58
  players who won't go to a school because they can't get the right Neil.
• 2:10:01
  This is not about going to play for a coach now, this is about
• 2:10:03
  going to play for money for a lot of a lot of uh athletes.
• 2:10:09
  Um. And and the transfer portal, I mean, it's gonna calm down
• 2:10:13
  a little bit because the COVID year that you're getting an eligibility thing is gonna
• 2:10:16
  go by the wayside here next year. Um. But no, it's it's
• 2:10:20
  uh, it's it's it's laughable at you know, guys, back in the
• 2:10:26
  day when I was growing up, we were growing up, I thought Anthony
• 2:10:28
  Carter played for Michigan for like ten years. That's what it looked like.
• 2:10:31
  He's still on the squad. But now we're seeing seventh year seniors playing college
• 2:10:35
  basketball. Um, it's yeah, it's gonna be And it's tough for a
• 2:10:39
  coach, really tough for a coach because now you don't you don't get used
• 2:10:43
  to be like the Gary Williams of the world. The Hall of Fame coach
• 2:10:46
  at Maryland, he had guys for a good amount of time. I tell
• 2:10:48
  you want a national title was he had guys that stayed. Gwand Dixon,
• 2:10:52
  Steve Blake all stayed for four years. Chris Wilcox was a ridiculous player,
• 2:10:56
  and he stayed for two and he was gone to NBA. Fine, but
• 2:11:00
  he had this base of guys. You're not going to have that, uh
• 2:11:03
  in the college game. Now you're gonna have these guys for one and two
• 2:11:05
  year deals. Uh. And then instead of going pro, I'm gonna go
• 2:11:09
  over here and go to another school because I like what they're doing. Um.
• 2:11:13
  And there's nothing right now that the coachings, the coaches, administrators,
• 2:11:18
  athletic directors can do about it. When you when you talk, you talk.
• 2:11:22
  You talked to a ton of college coaches. Do you do you do
• 2:11:24
  you sense that some of them are going to get out of the business because
• 2:11:28
  this is so insane. They love the broadcast money. They do a lot
• 2:11:33
  of guys who've got you know, have left. I mean, you know,
• 2:11:35
  Jay Wright left a great situation at Nova. Great. I believe that
• 2:11:39
  was because of Ani Allen transfer. Do you do you agree with that?
• 2:11:43
  I think I haven't talked to Jay about it, but I think so.
• 2:11:45
  And he's like, I can go in broadcast games and you know, be
• 2:11:48
  treated like a king. Cool, No stress. I mean, I've done
• 2:11:52
  game, you know. I did games with Mark Turgeon, the former Maryland
• 2:11:54
  coach this year. I did his first game and then I get a game
• 2:11:56
  five six games later, and and part of his deal. He was burnt
• 2:12:00
  out, burnt out by all of it, right, And so we did
• 2:12:03
  Davidson VCU, Davidson VCU former coach now Mike Rhodes UH and and Davidson was
• 2:12:11
  Matt McKillop and VCU wins. We're putting on our jackets to leave. And
• 2:12:16
  Mark says to me, look at that, and he points over at Mike
• 2:12:20
  Rhodes BCU guys on top of the world. Look at Matt McKillop. Watch
• 2:12:24
  to kill a cat right now. Absolutely desponded, because I can't do that
• 2:12:28
  anymore because it's just too much. And that's what these coaches are facing now
• 2:12:33
  is trying to hang on. You gotta win, right, you gotta win
• 2:12:35
  for your fan base. You gotta win for your contracts. But how do
• 2:12:39
  I do that when I just brought in John Ziegler, who was here for
• 2:12:43
  a year, and now I got this guy Chickernad? What am I?
• 2:12:46
  Where's my assemblance of of you know? No, I've got to you know,
• 2:12:50
  Gary, Gary ran up the flex offense. That's an intricate offense.
• 2:12:54
  And when it comes down to it, you can't do it for a year.
• 2:12:56
  It's got to be a two three year deal in order to be proficient.
• 2:13:01
  Only guys are not gonna and the level, the level of insanity has
• 2:13:03
  no end here. I mean, you just reminded me of one very small
• 2:13:07
  element of it. You actually, now, if you were at a non
• 2:13:11
  blue blood school, you actually have to root for your star players to not
• 2:13:15
  get that good because they're gonna leave. They're gonna leave, They're gonna they're
• 2:13:22
  gonna leave for another college. I mean, I mean, are the blue
• 2:13:24
  bloods anymore? Now, I've been totally wrong about how this thing would work
• 2:13:28
  itself out with regard to parody, at least in basketball so far. I
• 2:13:33
  thought we'd have five or ten teams that would dominate every game, and exactly
• 2:13:37
  the opposite has happened. So far, so I was totally wrong about that.
• 2:13:41
  It was great. Well straight, you're right, it's going down.
• 2:13:43
  It's going down a bad path right now. And you know it's normally sports
• 2:13:48
  and life is cyclical. Somehow someone will forgot a way to put some parimeters
• 2:13:52
  on it and straighten this thing out. I hope you're right, Chick.
• 2:13:56
  This win't even better than I expected. Thanks so much for your time.
• 2:14:00
  Really appreciate it. How can people follow you on on social media or Twitter
• 2:14:03
  or what have you? This was almost as fun as getting my cather out.
• 2:14:09
  Oh um uh yeah, I just mister chick sports. That's all it
• 2:14:15
  is on Twitter, and I g all that jazz. I'm I'm down for
• 2:14:18
  a little while. I'll get some rehab going and I'll be back for college
• 2:14:22
  football. Chick, Thanks so much for your time. See on the golf
• 2:14:24
  course at some point in my life, I hope. So let's do it
• 2:14:28
  all right. Thanks so much for Chick and his time. I hope you
• 2:14:33
  enjoyed that as much as I did doing that interview or kind having that conversation
• 2:14:37
  with Chick. And as is always the case, please remember to subscribe to
• 2:14:41
  this podcast, rate and review it, to share it on social media.
• 2:14:45
  If you do so and you tag me, I'll share it as well.
• 2:14:48
  And always, thanks so much for listening. This is episode number forty seven
• 2:14:52
  of the Death of Journalism podcast. My name is John Zickler.