Latest / Foul Territory / Karl Ravech reflects on legendary ESPN career on Tim Kurkjian's “Is This A Great Game, Or What?” show
Transcript
- 0:06Speaker 1: Welcome to Is This a Great Game or What? And
- 0:09Speaker 1: our special, special guest today is my dear friend, Carl Ravitch,
- 0:14Speaker 1: one of my best friends in the whole world and
- 0:16Speaker 1: certainly my best friend all these years at ESPN.
- 0:20Speaker 2: Ravi, have you met my.
- 0:22Speaker 1: Son Jeff yet?
- 0:25Speaker 2: Who's that?
- 0:27Speaker 1: Hey, Ravi, how's it going?
- 0:29Speaker 2: Hey, you guys are great. I think, you know, one
- 0:31Speaker 2: of the things I've thought about is maybe since you
- 0:33Speaker 2: have the word great in the title, is this a
- 0:36Speaker 2: great game or what? Maybe we consider a second or
- 0:40Speaker 2: third or I don't know. What do you guys have,
- 0:42Speaker 2: like nine podcasts? Maybe we do number seven and we
- 0:46Speaker 2: just call it, hey, you guys are great. And then
- 0:49Speaker 2: you bring on people and you just tell them how
- 0:51Speaker 2: great they are.
- 0:52Speaker 3: Hey, you guys are great.
- 0:54Speaker 1: Jeff, do you even know where this comes from? I
- 0:57Speaker 1: went to see Steve Martin live. Okay. And he told
- 1:00Speaker 1: a joke about when he was a standup comedian and
- 1:03Speaker 1: this guy came up to him really drunk one night
- 1:06Speaker 1: and came up to Steve Martin and said, Hey, you
- 1:08Speaker 1: guys are great. There's only one guy he's talking to.
- 1:12Speaker 1: So I have always said that Ravi's picked it up.
- 1:15Speaker 1: Then he turned it into, Hey, you guys stink. So
- 1:18Speaker 1: that's how I talk to Ravi on a daily basis.
- 1:21Speaker 1: Some point it's, Hey, You guys stink or hey, you
- 1:24Speaker 1: guys are great. Ravi, am I right about this?
- 1:27Speaker 2: Yeah, but it also starts, the conversation starts, Jeff, when
- 1:30Speaker 2: I call Tim or he calls me, generally we're in
- 1:33Speaker 2: a perpetual state of being exhausted. So rather than somebody
- 1:36Speaker 2: answer the phone and say, hey, Tim, how's it going?
- 1:39Speaker 2: Or hey, Ravi, what's going on? The first sound you
- 1:42Speaker 2: hear is, which is such an abnormal way to start
- 1:49Speaker 2: a conversation. But it speaks to the relationship that you
- 1:52Speaker 2: have with these people.
- 1:54Speaker 1: No doubt. Right. And then Ravi almost always answers with,
- 1:57Speaker 1: I'm dead. And my response is always, I've been dead
- 2:00Speaker 1: for several years here because we're either so exhausted or
- 2:04Speaker 1: we're going through so many things. But Ravi, all seriousness,
- 2:08Speaker 1: we have to acknowledge we've had some pretty good times
- 2:11Speaker 1: the last 33 years. And we are awfully lucky, awfully
- 2:15Speaker 1: lucky to have covered sports together and with everyone else
- 2:18Speaker 1: for all this time.
- 2:19Speaker 2: Agreed? Yeah, I don't think there's any doubt about that.
- 2:24Speaker 2: I mean, look, the regrets about my situation and being
- 2:28Speaker 2: laid off is not necessarily the events you don't get
- 2:31Speaker 2: to cover. That's on the list, but it falls way
- 2:34Speaker 2: below the idea of being able to be with you
- 2:38Speaker 2: or with Jimmy Dykes or with Eduardo or with Buster
- 2:42Speaker 2: or with whoever else you've done the games with. I mean,
- 2:45Speaker 2: in the end, after three and a half decades... you
- 2:48Speaker 2: miss the relationships, you miss the breakfast, you miss the,
- 2:52Speaker 2: you know, the dinners, you miss the pre and post games. Um,
- 2:56Speaker 2: and clearly you miss the actual game and the event itself,
- 2:59Speaker 2: but yeah, look, when you, when you look back on it,
- 3:02Speaker 2: the greatest part of anything to come out of this, uh,
- 3:05Speaker 2: the experiences of the games and the highs and the lows, uh,
- 3:10Speaker 2: they don't come close to the relationships that you've established and,
- 3:14Speaker 2: you know, these are, these are lifelong friendships, which is
- 3:17Speaker 2: a wonderful thing. And I'm, I'm, I'm grateful for that.
- 3:21Speaker 2: I'm grateful for the opportunity without 33 years, there wouldn't
- 3:25Speaker 2: necessarily be a next chapter. And there certainly wouldn't be, uh,
- 3:29Speaker 2: I am just.
- 3:33Speaker 4: Well, Ravi, obviously our families have been very close for
- 3:36Speaker 4: a very long time. I have a oddly distinct memory
- 3:41Speaker 4: of coming to your house in Connecticut when, when dad
- 3:44Speaker 4: and I were both up there at some point doing
- 3:46Speaker 4: baseball tonight and, and playing basketball in your home with
- 3:52Speaker 4: your boys. And I remember very specifically a tall ceiling,
- 3:56Speaker 4: maybe above your garage.
- 3:57Speaker 1: Am I getting this right?
- 3:59Speaker 2: It's kind of a core memory.
- 4:01Speaker 4: And I mean, it just, when you have a dad
- 4:03Speaker 4: who's like, I need to make a dream for my, my,
- 4:06Speaker 4: my kids.
- 4:06Speaker 2: To be able to do this kind of stuff.
- 4:08Speaker 4: It was like the coolest memory ever as a kid
- 4:10Speaker 4: to play basketball inside of the house.
- 4:14Speaker 2: Yeah, we, uh, that's, that is true. We, uh, we
- 4:17Speaker 2: added a garage to an existing home and the space
- 4:21Speaker 2: above the garage, I believe I'm not an architect, but
- 4:24Speaker 2: I think it was called a gabled roof. So it
- 4:26Speaker 2: gave you, a lot of room, not much unlike the
- 4:29Speaker 2: one that I'm sort of sitting in where you can
- 4:31Speaker 2: see the ceiling rises to a pitch. Well, this one,
- 4:34Speaker 2: this one rose to a pitch and this is not a,
- 4:37Speaker 2: you know, a 20 foot ceiling. It's probably, I don't know,
- 4:40Speaker 2: at its height, 15 feet. So we, we had a
- 4:44Speaker 2: small lower rim put in because the boys, Sam and
- 4:47Speaker 2: Max were very young, but it, it allowed us to
- 4:50Speaker 2: put a legitimate backboard in to line up a sort
- 4:54Speaker 2: of a free throw lane and and shoot basketballs. So yeah,
- 4:59Speaker 2: that was a pretty neat thing. I hadn't thought about
- 5:01Speaker 2: that in a long time, but yes, that did happen.
- 5:03Speaker 2: That was not a dream. It wasn't your imagination. We
- 5:06Speaker 2: had a mini court. It wasn't the Ripken court that
- 5:10Speaker 2: your dad played on, but... It was certainly serviceable for
- 5:13Speaker 2: a bunch of little boys and me to play around.
- 5:16Speaker 4: And Kirkjens, for that matter. I mean, a mini hoop
- 5:19Speaker 4: for Kirkjens is perfect.
- 5:21Speaker 2: We could jam on that, maybe, possibly. That's right. No,
- 5:25Speaker 2: we could get rimmed, for sure. We could get rimmed.
- 5:28Speaker 1: So, Ravi, you talk about relationships with the people you've
- 5:31Speaker 1: worked with. And you worked with Crucky, with Buck, with Booney.
- 5:36Speaker 1: You worked with Harold Reynolds. You worked with Todd Frazier.
- 5:40Speaker 1: But Eddie's the one that you worked with the most,
- 5:43Speaker 1: maybe other than me, in the 29 years that I've
- 5:46Speaker 1: been there. I get such a kick out of Eduardo.
- 5:49Speaker 1: And my favorite story, and I'm going to have you
- 5:51Speaker 1: follow or tell your favorite story, is when Eduardo last
- 5:56Speaker 1: year rented a helicopter to come from JFK into Manhattan,
- 6:02Speaker 1: as he put it. Because Eddie, he knows everyone. There's
- 6:05Speaker 1: nothing Eddie can't do. And there he is in between innings, Jeff.
- 6:10Speaker 1: we have like a minute and a half and I
- 6:12Speaker 1: am asking him a question and he goes, shut up.
- 6:14Speaker 1: I'm ordering a helicopter, which he took in. It took
- 6:18Speaker 1: seven minutes for 250 bucks. Ravi, you remember that. And
- 6:23Speaker 1: does that not personify who Eddie is?
- 6:26Speaker 2: Yeah. Not only do I remember it, I think everybody
- 6:29Speaker 2: could probably go on some YouTube link and see it
- 6:31Speaker 2: because of course Eduardo recorded the whole thing and put
- 6:35Speaker 2: it out there for people to witness. So, It's not
- 6:37Speaker 2: only do I remember it, I think it's all available
- 6:40Speaker 2: online somewhere. Yeah, I mean, look, I think the thing
- 6:44Speaker 2: I've appreciated more and more about Eduardo and, you know, look,
- 6:48Speaker 2: Eduardo came into the Little League World Series booth there
- 6:51Speaker 2: on my final day with a microphone and a framed drawing,
- 6:57Speaker 2: which you can see over my shoulder there, of everybody
- 7:00Speaker 2: that I've ever called a championship series with. But it
- 7:03Speaker 2: was really the words, you know, that Eduardo spoke which
- 7:08Speaker 2: reminded me of exactly why I love the guy and
- 7:10Speaker 2: who he is and how that relationship has grown over
- 7:14Speaker 2: the years to a real, real close friendship and somebody
- 7:18Speaker 2: that I depend on and rely on. All that's the
- 7:23Speaker 2: sort of the sentimental side of it. Eduardo, to your
- 7:27Speaker 2: dad's point here, Jeff, is the guy that literally walks
- 7:31Speaker 2: into any building. And again, this is a hospital. This
- 7:36Speaker 2: is a restaurant. This is a dugout. This is an
- 7:39Speaker 2: airplane terminal. It literally doesn't matter. And to his great credit,
- 7:45Speaker 2: he is comfortable enough with, as he has told us before,
- 7:49Speaker 2: just act like you've been here and no one will
- 7:52Speaker 2: really question you. And that's sort of the way that
- 7:55Speaker 2: he lives. And it's been proven to Tim and me
- 7:58Speaker 2: that it works. Tim has often said that very few
- 8:03Speaker 2: people I kind of live the way that I do
- 8:06Speaker 2: when it came to traveling. Like, you'd show up 20
- 8:09Speaker 2: minutes before the flight, and I'd show up two and
- 8:12Speaker 2: a half hours before the flight. On a bad day,
- 8:15Speaker 2: on a good day, I'm there four hours. Well, Eduardo
- 8:18Speaker 2: skates in 10 minutes before a flight, and then he
- 8:21Speaker 2: will immediately send you a picture of him sitting in
- 8:24Speaker 2: his seat with his feet up with that big Eduardo
- 8:28Speaker 2: Perez grin on his face. And you are reminded... It
- 8:34Speaker 2: all worked out again for Eduardo, didn't it?
- 8:37Speaker 1: Always. Jeff, we got in like a limousine set up
- 8:41Speaker 1: by Eduardo to take us from our plane during a
- 8:45Speaker 1: stopover to like the greatest Admirals Club of all time.
- 8:50Speaker 1: Do I remember that correctly, Ravi?
- 8:52Speaker 2: There was like gourmet food in there and Eduardo.
- 8:55Speaker 1: Arranged the whole thing.
- 8:57Speaker 2: Well, I mean, Eduardo had it arranged because Eduardo, there's
- 9:00Speaker 2: this limited exclusive club thing that you can get into
- 9:05Speaker 2: when you're a concierge key member. What American Airlines does
- 9:10Speaker 2: a great job of is not letting anyone know how
- 9:13Speaker 2: in the world you get into that club. But ironically,
- 9:17Speaker 2: Eduardo was accepted, invited into the club. He flies less
- 9:23Speaker 2: than many people I know. He seems to be loyal
- 9:27Speaker 2: to American, which I guess is a big part of it.
- 9:30Speaker 2: but it flummoxes many a flyer. Like, so I'm flying
- 9:36Speaker 2: X amount of miles on American, and Eduardo flies this,
- 9:40Speaker 2: and it's not close to the amount. How in the
- 9:43Speaker 2: world did he get this privilege, which, to your dad's point,
- 9:47Speaker 2: when he's running late, there'll be somebody literally waiting for
- 9:51Speaker 2: him to escort him onto a plane, and or if
- 9:54Speaker 2: the connection is close, Mr. Perez, sign come on this way.
- 10:00Speaker 2: And you know how everyone walks out the long runway
- 10:03Speaker 2: to the actual airport? He goes down those stairs where
- 10:08Speaker 2: your luggage goes, gets into a Porsche or an SUV
- 10:13Speaker 2: and gets driven to gate B6 so that the plane,
- 10:16Speaker 2: which is now waiting for him, can take off close
- 10:19Speaker 2: to the time that it's supposed to because Eduardo has
- 10:22Speaker 2: been delivered. Fact.
- 10:24Speaker 4: Not to mention when traveling, Eduardo is my source for
- 10:29Speaker 4: photographic evidence of whatever is going on. The amount of
- 10:31Speaker 4: photos I have of my dad sleeping on a plane
- 10:35Speaker 4: or my dad pulling Diet Mountain Dews out of a
- 10:37Speaker 4: check bag are all from him, none taken by me.
- 10:41Speaker 4: And I know where my dad is because Eduardo is
- 10:43Speaker 4: checking in.
- 10:46Speaker 2: Yes, last year when we went to Toronto was sort
- 10:48Speaker 2: of the famous, let's just chronicle this through Eduardo's camera.
- 10:53Speaker 2: I mean, your dad had a bag the size of
- 10:55Speaker 2: the room we're all sitting in. He needs to have
- 11:02Speaker 2: the paper airplane boarding pass no one else in the
- 11:05Speaker 2: world does. He doesn't quite understand you can take a
- 11:07Speaker 2: train from the ballpark to the airport in Toronto. So, yeah,
- 11:13Speaker 2: I mean, the whole thing. Eduardo's a storyteller. He tells stories.
- 11:17Speaker 2: He's very big. Look, Eduardo also has two daughters who
- 11:21Speaker 2: are brilliant and understand all about how social media works. Now,
- 11:26Speaker 2: Tim has a son and a daughter who understand how
- 11:29Speaker 2: all of social media works. Eduardo has taken the reins
- 11:33Speaker 2: and run with it. Your dad has chosen to ignore it.
- 11:36Speaker 2: So that's just a different way of approaching things.
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- 12:45Speaker 1: Ravi, tell us a Buck Showalter story from all the
- 12:48Speaker 1: years you worked with him, because he is as unique
- 12:52Speaker 1: an individual as I think I've ever met. Do you
- 12:55Speaker 1: have a favorite Buck story from all your years?
- 12:59Speaker 2: Well, there's a couple of them. A couple hundred of them.
- 13:05Speaker 2: A couple hundred of them, but a couple of favorites.
- 13:07Speaker 2: I'll give you just a quick synopsis. A, of the
- 13:10Speaker 2: man who, again, I love Buck. I think he's He's
- 13:14Speaker 2: as observation oriented as any human being I've ever come across.
- 13:18Speaker 2: As you know, we would sit in the green room
- 13:20Speaker 2: and he'd see things. And I'm sure you can tell
- 13:22Speaker 2: your freckle story or, you know, the high hind leg story.
- 13:26Speaker 2: Those are all Buck-isms. And again, his attention to detail.
- 13:32Speaker 2: Buck has a wonderful sense of humor, which I think
- 13:35Speaker 2: over the course of you and I getting to work
- 13:38Speaker 2: with him, we saw more and more of, and that's
- 13:40Speaker 2: a wonderful thing. But I'd say the two stories about
- 13:44Speaker 2: Buck that stand out to me, one was the night
- 13:46Speaker 2: we were in the studio in Bristol doing a baseball tonight.
- 13:52Speaker 2: We're wearing suits, and there was a play at second
- 13:55Speaker 2: base where he had to, or we decided, why don't
- 13:58Speaker 2: we demonstrate how you can blow up a double play?
- 14:02Speaker 2: This was long before you couldn't make contact with the
- 14:05Speaker 2: second baseman or shortstop. And Harold was of course, playing
- 14:08Speaker 2: the role of the middle infielder and Buck looked around
- 14:12Speaker 2: and whispered to the camera people and our director, we
- 14:15Speaker 2: have one take on this. This is going to be
- 14:17Speaker 2: one take and that's all it's going to be. And
- 14:20Speaker 2: Harold got the flip from me and Buck came sliding
- 14:23Speaker 2: in and sent Harold ass over tea kettle onto the floor.
- 14:27Speaker 2: Buck is smiling. He's in a suit. I think the
- 14:31Speaker 2: first thing he said was when he, when he wiped
- 14:33Speaker 2: Harold out, he looked at the cameraman and said, did
- 14:36Speaker 2: you get that? Like that was it. That was one
- 14:39Speaker 2: of the ultimate Buck stories. And the other happened in
- 14:42Speaker 2: Seattle in 2001, when we were out there to cover
- 14:46Speaker 2: the all-star game and the home run Derby and doing
- 14:48Speaker 2: baseball tonight. Um, and it must've been on a Sunday
- 14:52Speaker 2: because I think the Derby was on Monday. So we
- 14:56Speaker 2: were back in our hotel rooms at roughly six at night, um, separate.
- 15:02Speaker 2: We go back and I order some Chinese food, um,
- 15:06Speaker 2: because I'm going to spend the rest of the night
- 15:08Speaker 2: doing work. And I come to find out after eating
- 15:11Speaker 2: the Chinese food and laying down that, uh, it, it contained,
- 15:16Speaker 2: it contained oyster sauce and I have a shellfish allergy.
- 15:20Speaker 2: So I blew up like a jellyfish in that moment.
- 15:23Speaker 2: And I knew Buck was in the hotel. So I
- 15:25Speaker 2: called Buck and I said, Buck, you need to take
- 15:28Speaker 2: me to the hospital. You need to bring me over
- 15:30Speaker 2: to the hospital in Seattle because I need to get
- 15:34Speaker 2: medical attention quickly or I may not be sitting next
- 15:37Speaker 2: to you when we're doing the Derby preview show or
- 15:40Speaker 2: the All-Star Game preview show. So he and his son
- 15:44Speaker 2: drive me to the hospital and I have a shot
- 15:47Speaker 2: of adrenaline and Um, and they're literally sitting in the
- 15:51Speaker 2: hotel room with me. So, uh, you know, long story short,
- 15:54Speaker 2: I tell Buck who his son, I believe is Ethan.
- 15:58Speaker 2: So I call Buck Ethan, even though his name is Nathan,
- 16:01Speaker 2: I call him Ethan. Jeffrey, I rarely call anybody by
- 16:05Speaker 2: their real name. So that's a separate aside, but I tell,
- 16:09Speaker 2: I tell Buck to this day, I said, you know,
- 16:10Speaker 2: you and You and Ethan or Ethan and Nathan, you
- 16:13Speaker 2: both saved my life. So those are my two Buck
- 16:17Speaker 2: Showalter stories. We've had that.
- 16:20Speaker 4: And listen, Ravi, this is the beauty of it. Don't
- 16:22Speaker 4: take this the wrong way.
- 16:23Speaker 2: Harold Reynolds.
- 16:24Speaker 4: Buck Showalter and now Carl Ravitch have told us the
- 16:28Speaker 4: taking Harold Reynolds out on Baseball Tonight story.
- 16:31Speaker 1: And it gets better from each perspective. It's our favorite story.
- 16:36Speaker 2: It's so good. This is not grass or dirt. This
- 16:38Speaker 2: is a linoleum floor. This floor hurts. And Buck went
- 16:43Speaker 2: into it knowing I'm going to wipe him out. There's
- 16:46Speaker 2: no gray area here. He's going to get it. And
- 16:49Speaker 2: I am going into his legs so hard he's flipping over.
- 16:54Speaker 2: I don't know. Buck wasn't seemingly concerned with the ability
- 16:57Speaker 2: of Harold to eventually get up from that incident. But
- 17:00Speaker 2: he knew what he was doing and made sure it
- 17:03Speaker 2: was caught on tape. Right.
- 17:05Speaker 1: And Buck's the first to tell you that he tore
- 17:07Speaker 1: his pant leg of his brand new suit. So it
- 17:11Speaker 1: was at a cost. Now, speaking of Harold. Ravi, nobody
- 17:15Speaker 1: worked with Harold more than you did. And you got
- 17:18Speaker 1: him like right away out of his major league career.
- 17:23Speaker 1: What is your favorite Harold story of the million that
- 17:27Speaker 1: you have?
- 17:27Speaker 2: The Hounder. Yeah, the Hounder. Well, again, there's a million
- 17:32Speaker 2: of them. I think it's worth noting, as great as
- 17:37Speaker 2: Harold has become on television, we got him when he
- 17:40Speaker 2: was a green apple. Like he hadn't ripened yet. So-
- 17:43Speaker 2: you know, there was a lot of work. I think
- 17:44Speaker 2: that's one of the things I look back on and
- 17:46Speaker 2: love about my career, especially with baseball tonight. People like
- 17:50Speaker 2: yourself and Peter and Harold, so many of these guys
- 17:54Speaker 2: come off the field or from the newspaper industry, and
- 17:57Speaker 2: they'd never done this before. So in some ways, I
- 18:00Speaker 2: get a chance to help them along their journey. And
- 18:05Speaker 2: I'm grateful for that opportunity to do it. And I'm
- 18:08Speaker 2: You know, in some ways, like a like a professor,
- 18:11Speaker 2: you get to see many of your students shining later.
- 18:14Speaker 2: Harold is currently shining. But in the beginning, you know,
- 18:18Speaker 2: it wasn't nearly as smooth as it has become now. Ultimately,
- 18:22Speaker 2: Harold got into a position where he got very comfortable.
- 18:25Speaker 2: And I'm sure I'm sure this story has been told
- 18:28Speaker 2: by by your dad or by Harold himself. But Harold
- 18:31Speaker 2: got so comfortable. that he knew our goal was to
- 18:34Speaker 2: come up with what we would call breakdown tapes. So
- 18:37Speaker 2: if you had two or three breakdown tapes on a
- 18:40Speaker 2: particular game, in a sense, you were kind of good.
- 18:43Speaker 2: Like I, I, you know, I I'm all set. It's,
- 18:46Speaker 2: it may be early in the game. It may come
- 18:48Speaker 2: in the eighth inning. Harold mastered the ability to come
- 18:52Speaker 2: up with his tapes, uh, maybe before there were three
- 18:55Speaker 2: outs recorded in the game, which was a, which was
- 18:58Speaker 2: a skill. It was a gift, but he would sit
- 19:01Speaker 2: there with us in the green room or on a set.
- 19:03Speaker 2: And as, as your dad knows, he would announce, I
- 19:06Speaker 2: got my tape. Wait, what, what, what did you see
- 19:10Speaker 2: that no one else? I got my tape. I'm all good.
- 19:13Speaker 2: I'm going to, I'm going to break down. I'm going
- 19:15Speaker 2: to break down the way that whoever it was, I'm
- 19:17Speaker 2: going to break down the way Fernando Vina took, took
- 19:21Speaker 2: the turnaround second base. okay, Harold's got his tape. Harold's
- 19:25Speaker 2: good to go. Now we're going to wait to see
- 19:26Speaker 2: what Tim says and what Buck says or what Kruki
- 19:29Speaker 2: says or what Peter has. But that was one of my,
- 19:32Speaker 2: that's long been one of my favorites. I got my tape.
- 19:36Speaker 6: Right.
- 19:37Speaker 1: I'm telling you, Jeff, Harold would just, his name would
- 19:41Speaker 1: come up and Ravi would just reflexively say.
- 19:44Speaker 2: Shoot, I got my tape. I'm going to the movies.
- 19:46Speaker 1: I mean, these are the little inside stories we have.
- 19:50Speaker 1: about all these guys that we worked with and we
- 19:53Speaker 1: loved so much. And again, you mentioned Kruki, Ravi. There
- 19:57Speaker 1: are a million Kruki stories. I did the bus tour
- 20:01Speaker 1: with him. I spent like a month with John Kruki.
- 20:05Speaker 1: We went to every major league, spring training facility, he
- 20:10Speaker 1: asked me once, did I ever tell you about the
- 20:12Speaker 1: time I shot a deer in the hot tub? And
- 20:14Speaker 1: of course, with Krooky, you have to ask, were you
- 20:17Speaker 1: in the hot tub? Was the deer in the hot tub?
- 20:20Speaker 1: Or were both of you in the hot tub? So
- 20:23Speaker 1: tell us, tell us one of your favorite Krooky stories.
- 20:27Speaker 2: Well, my favorite part of you recounting that story was
- 20:30Speaker 2: Jeffrey sitting there on screen, nodding his head like, okay,
- 20:34Speaker 2: he got the first part right. And I've heard the
- 20:36Speaker 2: second part. Good. Dad nailed it. I do that all
- 20:40Speaker 2: the time. We've all heard them. They're all great. But
- 20:44Speaker 2: you just want to you almost could finish the story
- 20:46Speaker 2: for him, right?
- 20:47Speaker 4: Wait, wait until you and Sam get your own podcast together.
- 20:51Speaker 1: All the stories I've.
- 20:51Speaker 4: Heard once are now on YouTube a hundred of our times.
- 20:55Speaker 4: And we just did that story in front of a
- 20:57Speaker 4: live crowd. It's one of my favorites.
- 21:00Speaker 1: So I said to Ravi, I'm sorry, I'm going to
- 21:03Speaker 1: let you go to second Ravi. I said to Ravi
- 21:05Speaker 1: so many times on national TV, did I ever tell
- 21:09Speaker 1: you that I went to Walter Johnson High School? And
- 21:11Speaker 1: after maybe the 500th time, he just yelled at me
- 21:15Speaker 1: on the air. Yes, you've told me that 10 million times.
- 21:19Speaker 2: Now we have a.
- 21:20Speaker 1: T-shirt on our podcast that reads, did I ever tell
- 21:23Speaker 1: you I went to Walter Johnson High School? That's how
- 21:26Speaker 1: bad I was.
- 21:27Speaker 2: Did you put the pitch on the back too? I mean,
- 21:28Speaker 2: is that whole thing on the back and all?
- 21:31Speaker 1: And the wind up?
- 21:32Speaker 2: And the wind, all of it. Yeah, we know. Did
- 21:34Speaker 2: I ever tell you? Maybe that's another podcast. See, that's
- 21:37Speaker 2: a great, that's a great, that's a great title for
- 21:40Speaker 2: a podcast, Tim. Did I ever tell you? I mean,
- 21:43Speaker 2: just think about where that could go.
- 21:44Speaker 6: Right.
- 21:45Speaker 1: And that's how Krooky started every sentence. Did I ever
- 21:48Speaker 1: tell you about the time that I, and then he
- 21:51Speaker 1: tells you some unbelievable story. Sorry, I interrupted.
- 21:54Speaker 2: Tell me a story that you love.
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- 23:05Speaker 2: And he still does do that. So there was one
- 23:07Speaker 2: night I'm on the set with Kruki and Terry Francona, Tito.
- 23:12Speaker 2: And Kruk isn't feeling well, apparently, which I'm not sure
- 23:17Speaker 2: Kruk ever truly felt well, but it didn't feel well.
- 23:20Speaker 2: So Francona reaches into his pocket and he pulls out
- 23:24Speaker 2: this plastic bag full of medication. What medication? I don't know.
- 23:29Speaker 2: But full of medication, different color pills, et cetera. You know,
- 23:33Speaker 2: Tito also had been banged up. I mean, he'd been
- 23:37Speaker 2: dealing with injuries, et cetera. So on a show one night,
- 23:40Speaker 2: he asked Krucke, here, take this. This will help you.
- 23:44Speaker 2: Honest to God, within 20 minutes, Kruki is sweating profusely
- 23:50Speaker 2: live on television and he is beginning to hallucinate. He's
- 23:54Speaker 2: sitting there and he's over a highlight talking about the
- 23:59Speaker 2: lights flashing in the studio. Like there are lights flashing
- 24:02Speaker 2: in the studio and we're doing a highlight of a game.
- 24:05Speaker 2: So at that point, I have to make up something
- 24:08Speaker 2: because the audience is listening to this man talk about
- 24:11Speaker 2: lights flashing. They're not seeing any lights flashing because there
- 24:14Speaker 2: are no lights flashing. But in Kruki's world- There are
- 24:17Speaker 2: lights flashing. So I say that's because they just hit
- 24:20Speaker 2: a home run. In the stadium, John, they have flashing lights.
- 24:23Speaker 2: I'm trying to cover for the story he's telling while
- 24:27Speaker 2: he is sweating and hallucinating. That's one of my favorites
- 24:33Speaker 2: on Kruk. The other one is when we went into,
- 24:35Speaker 2: I don't know if Tim can tell me, Studio D maybe,
- 24:38Speaker 2: whatever it was. It was a tiny studio. And this
- 24:42Speaker 2: was when ESPN decided to use robotic cameras. This was
- 24:47Speaker 2: sort of like an experiment. We're going to use cameras
- 24:50Speaker 2: that you can program to move or you don't need
- 24:53Speaker 2: a human being to run them. And during a show
- 24:56Speaker 2: one night, one of the robotic cameras continued to move
- 25:01Speaker 2: closer to the set live with Kruki on camera. And
- 25:05Speaker 2: it didn't stop. So you're watching Kruki and the screen
- 25:08Speaker 2: like this and like this and like this. And the
- 25:12Speaker 2: robotic camera moved. banged right into the set like we
- 25:15Speaker 2: lost the ability to communicate with the robotic camera and
- 25:20Speaker 2: you know Krooky he of course had great lines for
- 25:23Speaker 2: it but didn't include swears it's amazing that John Krook
- 25:27Speaker 2: never swore if you know John Krook he's not afraid
- 25:31Speaker 2: to sling a swear every now and then but a
- 25:34Speaker 2: beautiful beautiful person who I love and has reached out
- 25:38Speaker 2: a billion times and I'm sure you've heard the Kyle
- 25:41Speaker 2: Lowe story right Jeff No.
- 25:44Speaker 1: Jeff might not know that. Maybe not. I've heard it
- 25:46Speaker 1: a billion times, but please tell it, Ravi, please.
- 25:51Speaker 2: So, you know, before I did Baseball Tonight on a
- 25:54Speaker 2: full-time scale, Chris Berman hosted Baseball Tonight, in particular on
- 25:59Speaker 2: Sunday nights. Especially on Masters Sunday, because we would have
- 26:04Speaker 2: what was called the Green Jacket edition of Baseball Tonight.
- 26:08Speaker 2: Boomer would dust off the green jacket that he had
- 26:11Speaker 2: in his closet. And on Masters Sunday, when Baseball Tonight
- 26:15Speaker 2: was on and he hosted, well, the Green Jacket edition.
- 26:22Speaker 2: So we had the Green Jacket edition on Masters Sunday.
- 26:26Speaker 2: But there was one show where... Krucke was sitting next
- 26:29Speaker 2: to him. Boomer was hosting. And Kyle Loesch had just
- 26:33Speaker 2: pitched a game for the Cardinals, apparently, and pitched a
- 26:36Speaker 2: good game. Maybe, let's just say, I don't remember the
- 26:39Speaker 2: exact numbers, but seven innings, two hits, no runs, six strikeouts.
- 26:45Speaker 2: And our job, and Jeff, you know this really well
- 26:48Speaker 2: as hosts, is to tee up. You know, I heard
- 26:51Speaker 2: your dad recently talk about being a point guard. You've
- 26:54Speaker 2: got to put the shooter in a great position to
- 26:57Speaker 2: make a shot. So Kruki is the shooter in this case.
- 27:01Speaker 2: Boomer is the point guard in this case. So the
- 27:04Speaker 2: tee up to Kruki after the Kyle Loesch highlight was Kruki.
- 27:10Speaker 2: Kyle Loesch. We knew, but we didn't know. this is
- 27:19Speaker 2: when crux like after the show he comes up to
- 27:23Speaker 2: us and says what in the world what does that
- 27:26Speaker 2: even mean what do i do with that what's my
- 27:30Speaker 2: response was that a t up what what does that
- 27:33Speaker 2: really mean we knew but we didn't know no and
- 27:37Speaker 2: if you know boomer you realize what he's saying is
- 27:39Speaker 2: we knew he was good we didn't know he was
- 27:41Speaker 2: this good john But it just sort of died on
- 27:44Speaker 2: the vine of, we knew, but we didn't know.
- 27:49Speaker 1: Jeff, the truth is, every time Kyle Loesch's name comes up,
- 27:53Speaker 1: it doesn't come up a lot anymore.
- 27:55Speaker 2: He doesn't pitch anymore.
- 27:57Speaker 1: But I can't get a sentence out about Kyle Loesch
- 28:00Speaker 1: without just thinking, Krucke, Kyle Loesch, we knew, but we
- 28:04Speaker 1: didn't know. What does that mean?
- 28:07Speaker 2: All right, so Rami, you- We wear out, as you
- 28:11Speaker 2: can tell, we wear out lines- like they're tires on
- 28:14Speaker 2: a car that's driven a billion miles. We're not afraid
- 28:17Speaker 2: to regurgitate. And there's a comfort in that. I mean,
- 28:20Speaker 2: there's a comfort in that for sure. Right.
- 28:23Speaker 1: Let's see if Ravi remembers this one. Back in the 90s,
- 28:27Speaker 1: early 2000s, every once in a while, Ravi would start
- 28:31Speaker 1: a show or a highlight and say, it's a Kung
- 28:35Speaker 1: Pao and computer night. And it's like three people in
- 28:40Speaker 1: the world understood what that meant.
- 28:42Speaker 2: But I was one of them.
- 28:44Speaker 1: So I'm like laughing on the set, a Kung Pao
- 28:48Speaker 1: and computer night.
- 28:49Speaker 2: Ravi, do you remember? Of course I do. And in fact,
- 28:53Speaker 2: I just got a photo sent to me the other day. Yesterday,
- 28:56Speaker 2: in fact. You got the same one. Apparently... Apparently he
- 29:01Speaker 2: was sending them to a variety of people because you're
- 29:04Speaker 2: now the third person who told me I got that
- 29:06Speaker 2: same picture. But the former producer of Baseball Tonight named
- 29:11Speaker 2: Judson Birch, who was with the former executive producer named
- 29:15Speaker 2: Jeff Schneider, they were together and he sent the picture
- 29:19Speaker 2: with those two. Kung Pao and computers had to do
- 29:21Speaker 2: with it's you're eating Chinese food and you're able to
- 29:24Speaker 2: sit on your computer and work while the show was on.
- 29:27Speaker 2: Like it was a it was a reference to people
- 29:29Speaker 2: that could chill and just enjoy the show baseball tonight. Subsequently,
- 29:34Speaker 2: we were told, let's let's shy away from using that.
- 29:37Speaker 2: But that's that's really what it was about. It was, hey.
- 29:39Speaker 2: we got an audience out there let them have their
- 29:42Speaker 2: food let them be doing work but as long as
- 29:44Speaker 2: they're watching us at 10 at midnight then then we
- 29:47Speaker 2: win so i certainly do remember that as i'm as
- 29:50Speaker 2: i'm quite quite clear you do too.
- 29:53Speaker 1: Oh, never forget Judd Burch for a million different reasons,
- 29:56Speaker 1: all of them good and all of them funny.
- 30:00Speaker 2: I did respond to that picture by saying, where is
- 30:02Speaker 2: Jimmy Rodriguez?
- 30:07Speaker 1: Well, we can't go into this because mine was, did
- 30:10Speaker 1: he go, Judd?
- 30:11Speaker 2: Exactly right. I was just going to ask, did you
- 30:15Speaker 2: ask him, Judd, did he go?
- 30:17Speaker 1: Right, again. Jeff, five people in the world understand that joke,
- 30:21Speaker 1: and it's not worth explaining. But the fact that Ravi
- 30:24Speaker 1: and I could laugh out loud, it happened 25 years
- 30:27Speaker 1: ago at least, and we still bring that back.
- 30:30Speaker 2: Now, Ravi, you mentioned Tito. I will say, Jeff, but
- 30:34Speaker 2: I will say about Boomer, who is a close friend
- 30:36Speaker 2: and a great host and a Mount Rushmore guy at ESPN,
- 30:40Speaker 2: the one thing Boomer used to remind all of us, hey,
- 30:44Speaker 2: we do this show for ourselves. Like in a sense,
- 30:48Speaker 2: it's the people in this room that we're doing this
- 30:51Speaker 2: show for. So he was the king of inside jokes.
- 30:54Speaker 2: I mean, he would throw it's late September and I
- 30:56Speaker 2: really should be back at school. Everybody understood it, but
- 30:59Speaker 2: he was the king of like inside jokes. So that concept,
- 31:04Speaker 2: I think we took, we took very seriously and we're
- 31:07Speaker 2: not alone. I mean, these things go on all the time.
- 31:10Speaker 2: whether it's on television shows, podcasts, movie sets. There are
- 31:15Speaker 2: inside jokes, which you need. These are long seasons. These
- 31:19Speaker 2: are long shows. You've got to be able to humor
- 31:23Speaker 2: and entertain yourself and your teammates out there. Otherwise, it
- 31:27Speaker 2: can drag. And one thing we never let it do
- 31:30Speaker 2: was drag too much, thankfully.
- 31:32Speaker 4: Right.
- 31:32Speaker 1: Ravi, tell Jeff about the re-airs that we used to
- 31:36Speaker 1: do almost, well, 30 years ago. And we would all
- 31:40Speaker 1: have to stay until that final game was done on
- 31:44Speaker 1: the West Coast because Baseball Tonight, Jeff, was going to
- 31:47Speaker 1: re-air over and over again. And when you're re-airing at
- 31:51Speaker 1: 5 o'clock in the morning, you can't have a Giants-Padres
- 31:55Speaker 1: game without a final score. Ravi, how many times did
- 31:59Speaker 1: you sit through one of those things and tell us
- 32:02Speaker 1: what that was like?
- 32:04Speaker 2: Yeah, eventually I got enough courage to say I have
- 32:08Speaker 2: a better idea because it's 2.30 in the morning. There's
- 32:12Speaker 2: a great story around these re-airs. I mean, the idea
- 32:15Speaker 2: was if you're not up at midnight, which many people
- 32:18Speaker 2: on the East Coast weren't, but you're going to get
- 32:20Speaker 2: up early the next day, how can we show baseball
- 32:24Speaker 2: tonight in its entirety? Because you've got to remember, you know,
- 32:28Speaker 2: back in the 90s, that was the only way to
- 32:31Speaker 2: get players a show exclusively dedicated to baseball and highlights.
- 32:36Speaker 2: It was baseball tonight. It's why the McGuire-Sosa home run
- 32:40Speaker 2: race was so big. It's why 1995 was so big
- 32:43Speaker 2: after the strike. You now have all of these RSNs
- 32:48Speaker 2: that show the local games, and then there's a postgame.
- 32:51Speaker 2: There's also a pregame. None of those ever existed. When
- 32:54Speaker 2: your game ended, you would go back to the regular
- 32:57Speaker 2: programming on the station that the baseball game So we
- 33:01Speaker 2: had that advantage that we knew we were the only
- 33:03Speaker 2: game in town. How do we allow people to do
- 33:06Speaker 2: a watch the next morning? Let's re-air the show, which
- 33:09Speaker 2: meant when Rob Nen would come into a game, unfortunately,
- 33:13Speaker 2: more often than not, it was a tightrope walk. And
- 33:16Speaker 2: there were many a night in which he would blow
- 33:19Speaker 2: a save. These games start at 10 in the East.
- 33:22Speaker 2: It's 1.30 in the East. And oh my God, the
- 33:25Speaker 2: Mariners have just tied the game up, whatever it may be. So-
- 33:30Speaker 2: We got into a show finally where we no longer
- 33:34Speaker 2: kept the two analysts. We figured out it's not fair.
- 33:38Speaker 2: We don't need three people up here until two in
- 33:40Speaker 2: the morning. There was one night where it was Peter Gammons,
- 33:44Speaker 2: Mike McFarlane, and myself doing the show. Peter's got to
- 33:48Speaker 2: drive to the Cape. That's where he lived. It's a
- 33:51Speaker 2: three-hour drive. Peter leaves after the midnight show. It's 1230
- 33:56Speaker 2: in the morning. The Mariners are playing. The game goes
- 34:01Speaker 2: 17 innings. We had no ghost runners.
- 34:06Speaker 3: 17 innings.
- 34:07Speaker 2: We record the final out that now needs to be
- 34:11Speaker 2: edited on to the broadcast tomorrow morning. We record it
- 34:15Speaker 2: in a booth no larger than a closet. It's an
- 34:18Speaker 2: audio booth. So I am describing how whatever. Here's Dan Wilson.
- 34:23Speaker 2: Here's Jay Buhner. Whoever it is drives in the winning run.
- 34:28Speaker 2: When it happens, we're sitting in a room no bigger
- 34:31Speaker 2: than a closet, and Mike McFarlane is sleeping underneath the
- 34:36Speaker 2: audio booth. He's sleeping. He's prone on the floor. It's
- 34:41Speaker 2: now 3.30 in the morning. We call Peter Gammons to
- 34:45Speaker 2: find he is crossing the bridge, the Bourne Bridge. He's
- 34:49Speaker 2: home now. Three hours later, he drove home to the Cape.
- 34:53Speaker 2: By the time the extra innings were finished, We had
- 34:56Speaker 2: to kick McFarlane in the head to wake him up
- 34:58Speaker 2: to say three things. Buhner with a line drive to right.
- 35:03Speaker 2: Mariners end up winning the game 4-3. He says, look
- 35:06Speaker 2: at the way he stayed back on the ball.
- 35:08Speaker 6: Done.
- 35:09Speaker 2: That's it.
- 35:10Speaker 1: Out.
- 35:13Speaker 2: It got to a place, Jeffrey, where thankfully cooler heads
- 35:18Speaker 2: and smarter heads prevailed. Honest to God, if the game
- 35:21Speaker 2: wasn't over, at 1 a.m. when the hour show ended,
- 35:25Speaker 2: or 12.30 if it happened to be a half hour,
- 35:27Speaker 2: I would say, you know, Reds, Pirates, 3-3 in the ninth,
- 35:31Speaker 2: and here's how it ended. And then they would literally
- 35:34Speaker 2: edit on the last play using the sound from the game.
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- 36:51Speaker 1: Now, Ravi, you mentioned Tito earlier. Tito only worked with
- 36:55Speaker 1: us for one year, but it naturally was a memorable
- 36:59Speaker 1: year because Tito worked for us. And I have a
- 37:04Speaker 1: thousand stories about Tito in the one year he worked there.
- 37:08Speaker 1: Give me one of your favorite Tito stories when he
- 37:11Speaker 1: was at ESPN in 2012.
- 37:15Speaker 3: Right.
- 37:15Speaker 2: Well, I will say this about managers, which I found,
- 37:18Speaker 2: and managers more so than baseball players, Buck Showalter notwithstanding.
- 37:23Speaker 2: Managers are so programmed into having someone tell them where
- 37:29Speaker 2: they need to be at what time. And in a
- 37:32Speaker 2: lot of instances, showing them where they need to be,
- 37:36Speaker 2: like taking them to wherever they need to be. That
- 37:39Speaker 2: was a big struggle for many of the managers that
- 37:43Speaker 2: we worked with over the years. Dusty Baker, Bobby V, Tito,
- 37:49Speaker 2: they would occasionally be told, well, here's where the studio is.
- 37:53Speaker 2: You got to go out, make a right down that stairway,
- 37:57Speaker 2: go across the hall, make a left down that stairway. Boom.
- 37:59Speaker 2: There's a studio. Many a time they would get lost
- 38:04Speaker 2: on the way. It would somehow get lost in translation.
- 38:07Speaker 2: So the show would be about ready to begin. And
- 38:10Speaker 2: you're wondering like, where is Dusty? So where did Tito go?
- 38:13Speaker 2: Anybody seen Tito and, Or Tito is walking around a
- 38:17Speaker 2: hallway looking at old SportsCenter pictures wondering, where did he go?
- 38:22Speaker 2: And he would kind of stumble in just before the
- 38:24Speaker 2: show started. The best Tito story wasn't actually a Baseball
- 38:27Speaker 2: Tonight story. He was calling the games for us, and
- 38:32Speaker 2: his zipper broke. Did you hear the zipper breaking story?
- 38:35Speaker 4: No.
- 38:38Speaker 2: His fly, not like a zipper on a jacket, like
- 38:41Speaker 2: his fly zipper broke when you go into a men's
- 38:45Speaker 2: room and it broke. And we had a makeup person,
- 38:48Speaker 2: a wonderful, lovely makeup person named Susie, who is still
- 38:54Speaker 2: very much a part of our lives, who had to...
- 38:58Speaker 2: kneel down and try to sew the zipper up. And
- 39:03Speaker 2: you can just imagine how odd that would look to
- 39:05Speaker 2: anybody walking into a booth. But poor Susie had to
- 39:09Speaker 2: do that. And that's one of the great Terry Francona.
- 39:12Speaker 4: Oh, my God.
- 39:13Speaker 2: There's a fly in my soup.
- 39:15Speaker 1: Right, right. Susie famously said, I will never do this again,
- 39:21Speaker 1: as she said.
- 39:23Speaker 2: Fixed his zipper. It was so bad.
- 39:25Speaker 1: Ravi, I don't think even you know this one. Tito's
- 39:28Speaker 1: first winter meeting. they bring him in and he's just
- 39:32Speaker 1: getting started. He doesn't have a company credit card. And
- 39:35Speaker 1: even though Tito pays for everything, you go out to
- 39:38Speaker 1: dinner with Tito, he's buying no matter what. It doesn't
- 39:42Speaker 1: matter how many people are there. That's how generous he is.
- 39:44Speaker 1: But somehow he has no credit cards. So two of
- 39:48Speaker 1: the producers take him out And they are having the
- 39:51Speaker 1: greatest time ever. Tito's learning the ropes. But before long,
- 39:55Speaker 1: the two producers, they have run out of money on
- 39:59Speaker 1: their credit card.
- 40:00Speaker 2: The limit is up.
- 40:01Speaker 1: So they said, we got to build this to someone's roof.
- 40:05Speaker 1: So they billed it to my room and they told
- 40:08Speaker 1: me the next day. And I said, so what? What
- 40:11Speaker 1: is there a fifty dollar bar charge? And they said, no,
- 40:15Speaker 1: it's about eight.
- 40:15Speaker 2: Hundred dollars.
- 40:18Speaker 1: Put on my hotel bill because they had to treat
- 40:22Speaker 1: Tito the right way his first week. On the job.
- 40:27Speaker 2: Only Tito could that happen. Was that in Dallas? Where
- 40:31Speaker 2: was that? Was that in Dallas?
- 40:33Speaker 1: I think that was in Dallas.
- 40:35Speaker 2: Was that the Albert Pujols signing? Because the next day
- 40:39Speaker 2: there was a massive signing, and it was difficult to
- 40:43Speaker 2: get a few people out of bed that morning when
- 40:45Speaker 2: all of a sudden they're like, you remember? Like, Albert
- 40:47Speaker 2: Pujols just signed this big deal. We need to now
- 40:49Speaker 2: go on. And here we go again. Anybody seen Tito?
- 40:53Speaker 2: Can we get him up and ruffle the feathers? If
- 40:57Speaker 2: I'm not mistaken, I think it was Dallas. I could
- 40:58Speaker 2: be wrong.
- 41:00Speaker 1: You're absolutely right. And Albert was the number one free
- 41:04Speaker 1: agent out there. He wasn't supposed to go to the Angels.
- 41:08Speaker 1: And now we get the word at nine in the
- 41:10Speaker 1: morning that he's signing with the Angels and they have
- 41:13Speaker 1: to rouse people out of bed. And we got that
- 41:15Speaker 1: story in. That was Tito. One year of Tito was
- 41:20Speaker 1: like 10 years of anybody else. He made me laugh
- 41:23Speaker 1: so many times during all that. Ravi, you also worked
- 41:28Speaker 1: a tremendous amount with Todd Frazier, Little League World Series,
- 41:33Speaker 1: and other places. We jokingly call Todd, lovingly call Todd,
- 41:37Speaker 1: the biggest 12-year-old of all time. Is that an accurate statement?
- 41:42Speaker 1: Todd Frazier, at age whatever he is, is still the
- 41:45Speaker 1: biggest 12-year-old ever.
- 41:48Speaker 2: Yeah. Sure. Oh, absolutely he is. He does an amazing
- 41:52Speaker 2: Mickey Mouse voice. If you've never heard that, you should
- 41:56Speaker 2: all listen to it. the Mickey Mouse voice. Yeah, I'd
- 42:00Speaker 2: say this about Frazier. He's taught me a great deal
- 42:06Speaker 2: about being a teammate, about his personality. After the Little
- 42:10Speaker 2: League World Series ended, we were all hugging each other goodbye. And,
- 42:15Speaker 2: you know, for a 12-year-old to show emotion is rare,
- 42:20Speaker 2: especially when it is a matter of the heart and
- 42:22Speaker 2: there's sadness. So, we're hugging each other. It's my last
- 42:26Speaker 2: game there. And I look over and he is, he's
- 42:29Speaker 2: wiping tears from his eyes, which affected me in a,
- 42:32Speaker 2: in a, in a big way. I had tried really,
- 42:35Speaker 2: really hard not to lose it when I was there.
- 42:38Speaker 2: And I look over at him, uh, and he's, he's
- 42:41Speaker 2: really in, in tears. He's really broken up, which again
- 42:45Speaker 2: speaks to his ability to connect, which he did with me,
- 42:49Speaker 2: which he did with you. He, uh, he became a very,
- 42:53Speaker 2: and still, and will always be a really important figure
- 42:57Speaker 2: in my life. And again, I, to me, it speaks to,
- 42:59Speaker 2: and I've said this a lot. One of the great
- 43:03Speaker 2: takeaways from covering major league baseball guys is, is the
- 43:07Speaker 2: clubhouse culture is how they are willing to wrap their
- 43:10Speaker 2: arms around other men when things aren't going well or
- 43:14Speaker 2: celebrate when things are going well. And I've learned a
- 43:17Speaker 2: great deal from, about baseball players and their acceptance of
- 43:21Speaker 2: everybody at their best and at their worst. And, you know,
- 43:25Speaker 2: to see Todd share that, to hear some of the
- 43:28Speaker 2: things that he told me before and after words he
- 43:31Speaker 2: shared with my wife, Chris, about the impact that I've
- 43:34Speaker 2: had on him, you know, really pulled at the heartstrings.
- 43:37Speaker 2: But at the same time, you know, he's the same
- 43:40Speaker 2: guy who demands we're going out, we're getting meatballs, we're
- 43:43Speaker 2: walking down the street. He's worse than your dad when
- 43:46Speaker 2: it I know he's done all of that with regards
- 43:50Speaker 2: to his officiating. So he's a wonderful person who's got
- 43:55Speaker 2: the rainbow of emotions and actions. Love the guy and
- 44:01Speaker 2: hope like heck I get to work with him again.
- 44:03Speaker 2: He is a joy to be around. Love everything about him.
- 44:07Speaker 2: Literally everything.
- 44:07Speaker 1: And as we know, he's also the greatest collector of
- 44:11Speaker 1: pins at the Little League World Series as anyone. And
- 44:14Speaker 1: this touched me. He shows up one day and he's
- 44:17Speaker 1: got a pin. that he has specially made of me, Ravi,
- 44:22Speaker 1: and Todd Frazier on a Little League World Series pin.
- 44:26Speaker 1: This is in my drawer. I look at it every
- 44:29Speaker 1: single day because he felt enough about Ravi and I
- 44:33Speaker 1: to put us with.
- 44:34Speaker 2: Him on a pin.
- 44:35Speaker 1: Of course, I look like some tiny little kid just
- 44:38Speaker 1: trying to ease his way into the, sneak his way
- 44:42Speaker 1: into the picture.
- 44:43Speaker 2: But Ravi, you remember that, right? Remember, and I still
- 44:47Speaker 2: have it in my bag. You know, here's another example
- 44:49Speaker 2: of Frazier. I hope you guys can see this, but
- 44:50Speaker 2: I'm going to hold it up. So he took this
- 44:53Speaker 2: picture in Williamsport. And this is a picture of me
- 44:58Speaker 2: standing there looking out at Lamanie. And he sent it
- 45:00Speaker 2: to me. And he said, you know what? I took
- 45:03Speaker 2: this on your last day. This could be a wonderful pin.
- 45:06Speaker 2: So those are the types of things that he thinks about, which, again,
- 45:11Speaker 2: shows another side of the 12-year-old, who is also a
- 45:14Speaker 2: very mature adult when it comes to doing things like that.
- 45:18Speaker 2: But Tim, I have the pin in my black bag.
- 45:22Speaker 2: The pin is never leaving that significant. I probably should
- 45:25Speaker 2: display it up there. You know, and as I tilt
- 45:28Speaker 2: my head this way, there's a picture over here. Like that's,
- 45:31Speaker 2: that's me, you and Eduardo right there. That's all. That's
- 45:36Speaker 2: those are the three of us in the booth. I think,
- 45:38Speaker 2: I think Danny Wexelman may be in there. That's our
- 45:41Speaker 2: last or one of our last radio games doing it
- 45:44Speaker 2: in Toronto. So, Yeah, I have a lifeboat full of
- 45:50Speaker 2: great memories that are going to carry me for a
- 45:52Speaker 2: long time.
- 45:59Speaker 1: So, Ravi, again, we have to get into this just
- 46:02Speaker 1: at least once. What was it like for you, a
- 46:05Speaker 1: dinky little guy from Needham, Mass., to be standing on
- 46:08Speaker 1: the field at Williamsport, having done the little league world
- 46:13Speaker 1: series better than anyone could possibly do it. And you
- 46:17Speaker 1: were honored by the little league world series with a
- 46:20Speaker 1: tribute 30 minutes before the three o'clock game. What was
- 46:25Speaker 1: it like for you to be out on that field
- 46:28Speaker 1: looking around and thinking what?
- 46:32Speaker 2: Yeah. I, to me, it probably felt like when you
- 46:36Speaker 2: got into the hall of fame or got that phone call,
- 46:39Speaker 2: I think it's an appreciation for how much I cared
- 46:42Speaker 2: about the event, how much I love the event, how
- 46:46Speaker 2: much I embrace the event, how much I recognize the
- 46:49Speaker 2: significance of a Little League World Series. If you take
- 46:54Speaker 2: a 30,000-foot approach to a Little League World Series, it
- 46:58Speaker 2: would be very easy to sit there and wonder, like,
- 47:01Speaker 2: what impact does this have? Why is this important? And
- 47:04Speaker 2: I knew 20 years ago when I first went there
- 47:07Speaker 2: that this was arguably one of the most significant events
- 47:12Speaker 2: that I could ever be a part of at ESPN
- 47:15Speaker 2: for a number of reasons. One, I think it touches
- 47:19Speaker 2: every generation. I know that the people who watch range
- 47:23Speaker 2: in age from five to 95. So you're covering a
- 47:27Speaker 2: demographic that very few other sports do. It's baseball, it's Americana,
- 47:32Speaker 2: it's Little League, it's kids making mistakes. It's kids having fun.
- 47:38Speaker 2: It's a Japanese team winning a third place game and
- 47:40Speaker 2: crying about it. It's a girl on the mound who's
- 47:44Speaker 2: blowing people away with her abilities. So I knew that
- 47:49Speaker 2: it was significant. And I think there was an appreciation
- 47:51Speaker 2: from Little League. Like this guy's on board. Like he's
- 47:56Speaker 2: bought all the way into this. And the viewers feel
- 48:00Speaker 2: the same way. That's why they tune in each and
- 48:02Speaker 2: every year. That's why the ratings change. continue to grow
- 48:06Speaker 2: each and every year so when you have somebody who
- 48:09Speaker 2: is the front-facing person on the event who loves the
- 48:12Speaker 2: event as much as anybody that's ever done it who
- 48:15Speaker 2: recognizes the importance of the event to the country when
- 48:19Speaker 2: things are not necessarily going well you get a chance
- 48:23Speaker 2: to sit in your home and watch 12 year olds
- 48:25Speaker 2: play baseball and tell stories to your your your spouses,
- 48:29Speaker 2: your grandchildren, your kids about what you remember about your
- 48:33Speaker 2: days on the little league field. There's so many flowers
- 48:37Speaker 2: that bloom from the garden of the little league world series.
- 48:41Speaker 2: And I knew it was an important garden to walk through.
- 48:43Speaker 2: I think it has to do with their appreciation for
- 48:46Speaker 2: my recognition of those things. I will say I was,
- 48:50Speaker 2: I was really and continue to be blown away by
- 48:53Speaker 2: the support and words of encouragement that people share with
- 48:57Speaker 2: me about the the impact that I had on them
- 49:00Speaker 2: through the Little League World Series, let alone Baseball Tonight
- 49:04Speaker 2: or ESPN. But this group was particular about Little League
- 49:07Speaker 2: World Series. And when you're doing it, you don't think
- 49:10Speaker 2: that way. Like, this is a job. I love it.
- 49:12Speaker 2: I love the people I do it with. So you're
- 49:14Speaker 2: not thinking about the impressions you're making year after year
- 49:19Speaker 2: after year. And as your dad knows, Jeffrey, when you
- 49:24Speaker 2: start something and the viewer is 10 and 33 years later,
- 49:29Speaker 2: you're laid off. That person is 43 years old. Imagine
- 49:34Speaker 2: the life experiences that they've gone through over the course
- 49:38Speaker 2: of your career 10 to 43, like that's their life
- 49:43Speaker 2: to this point. Like literally every memorable thing has occurred
- 49:46Speaker 2: with your voices. And I, those things never occurred to me.
- 49:50Speaker 2: Like I didn't know that. So to hear all these things,
- 49:53Speaker 2: you know, absolutely can make you and does make me
- 49:56Speaker 2: well up. But I got a great appreciation for the
- 50:00Speaker 2: impact that the medium can have and an event like
- 50:03Speaker 2: that can have, let alone an individual can have on
- 50:06Speaker 2: a large swath of people.
- 50:09Speaker 4: Yeah, Carl, this is how impactful the Little League World
- 50:13Speaker 4: Series is. My father-in-law, who's a little over 70 years old,
- 50:18Speaker 4: when my daughter was born three years ago, it was
- 50:21Speaker 4: right before the Little League World Series, and he has
- 50:24Speaker 4: always wanted to go to Williamsport. And so I took
- 50:26Speaker 4: him with a 10-day-old baby, staying here with my wife
- 50:31Speaker 4: and my mother-in-law. They both gave us the approval because
- 50:34Speaker 4: my wife knows how important that place is for someone
- 50:38Speaker 4: to go and see and visit And we went together
- 50:41Speaker 4: and watching him go down the cardboard on the hill
- 50:45Speaker 4: was like seeing him be a child again. I mean,
- 50:48Speaker 4: it really is a special place. And you're absolutely right, Carl.
- 50:52Speaker 4: You were honored because you were one that bought in
- 50:56Speaker 4: almost as much as everybody else has. You can't help
- 50:59Speaker 4: but fall in love with that place.
- 51:00Speaker 1: It really is special.
- 51:02Speaker 4: And, you know, I welled up.
- 51:05Speaker 1: For what they did for you.
- 51:06Speaker 2: And it's well-deserved.
- 51:07Speaker 4: It's a special place and, and it won't be the
- 51:09Speaker 4: same without Carl Ravitch.
- 51:10Speaker 1: I just got to say that.
- 51:12Speaker 2: Oh, thank you. Thank you.
- 51:14Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 51:14Speaker 2: It was, uh, by the way, you know, I will say, uh,
- 51:17Speaker 2: a wonderful amount of credit, uh, goes to little league
- 51:21Speaker 2: for wanting to do it. And ESPN, it's like, I was,
- 51:23Speaker 2: I'm in a, I was in a unique spot. Uh,
- 51:26Speaker 2: most people don't get a chance to finish in a sense,
- 51:30Speaker 2: their assignments or what they, what they love. And, you know,
- 51:34Speaker 2: Mike McQuaid, who was one of the executives there, certainly
- 51:38Speaker 2: made it clear he would hope that I would get
- 51:41Speaker 2: the opportunity to do that. So I'm grateful that ESPN
- 51:44Speaker 2: afforded me that opportunity. The day that I found out
- 51:47Speaker 2: about it was the day after a Dodger-Philly game. And
- 51:50Speaker 2: if it ended there, there would have been no trip
- 51:52Speaker 2: to Williamsport. There would have been none of what so
- 51:55Speaker 2: many people got a chance to see. So as I
- 51:58Speaker 2: said to many, in a lot of ways, I you
- 52:03Speaker 2: have a greater appreciation for if only people could hear
- 52:08Speaker 2: the eulogies that are being read while they're already passed away.
- 52:13Speaker 2: I got a chance to hear a lot of those
- 52:16Speaker 2: thoughts and I'm still alive. And I would hope that
- 52:20Speaker 2: one of the things that come out of it that
- 52:21Speaker 2: I certainly will, will share with my own boys and,
- 52:25Speaker 2: Remind my folks to share the feelings that you have
- 52:29Speaker 2: when they can still hear them. It means a lot
- 52:32Speaker 2: to hear those things. It impacts you in an amazing
- 52:35Speaker 2: way that you probably hadn't anticipated. So I appreciate, you know,
- 52:41Speaker 2: the funeral and all that goes into it. But if
- 52:44Speaker 2: you have something nice to say to somebody, well, I
- 52:48Speaker 2: would encourage you to say it before they're gone.
- 52:51Speaker 1: Right. And Ravi, you're far from gone. You are going
- 52:53Speaker 1: to be thriving again in this business very, very soon.
- 52:57Speaker 1: But in the meantime, you've got some time to go
- 53:01Speaker 1: play golf. In fact, we're going to let you go
- 53:03Speaker 1: now to go play in a member guest. As you know, Jeff,
- 53:07Speaker 1: Ravi's a really good little athlete, but he's a great golfer.
- 53:10Speaker 1: He's like a five handicap. So Ravi, is there a
- 53:14Speaker 1: chance your golf game over the next couple weeks or
- 53:17Speaker 1: so is going to get a whole lot better?
- 53:18Speaker 2: What do you think? Um, that's a good question. I,
- 53:22Speaker 2: you know, I do love it. I love pickleball. I
- 53:25Speaker 2: like to be active. As I said, I used to
- 53:27Speaker 2: do run around sports. I wasn't one of those that
- 53:29Speaker 2: ended up in broadcasting because I sat there and watched
- 53:32Speaker 2: the games and said, I want to be the next X.
- 53:35Speaker 2: That wasn't me. I would rather be like you guys
- 53:37Speaker 2: and be outside running around and playing sports. Will it?
- 53:40Speaker 3: Maybe.
- 53:41Speaker 2: I mean, I, uh, you know, I, I'm not, I'm
- 53:44Speaker 2: not one of those that would go into it thinking
- 53:46Speaker 2: I need to get down to a two. That's not
- 53:48Speaker 2: of interest to me. That's probably more work that I
- 53:51Speaker 2: want to do. But I go out there and if
- 53:54Speaker 2: I shoot a good round, there could be motivation to
- 53:57Speaker 2: go practice more and things like that. But that's, again,
- 54:01Speaker 2: I think we're at an age and a stage where
- 54:02Speaker 2: the competition is a great part of it, but the
- 54:05Speaker 2: camaraderie probably outweighs it. So if I can get a
- 54:08Speaker 2: good group of three, whether they're good golfers or not,
- 54:11Speaker 2: I'm going. That's more of my motivation than breaking 70,
- 54:15Speaker 2: say that.
- 54:17Speaker 4: Yeah, I have to say, some of the most fun
- 54:19Speaker 4: rounds I've played is with that, you know, you bring
- 54:21Speaker 4: two people and you pick up a fourth. I played,
- 54:24Speaker 4: this was a couple years ago when I was living
- 54:26Speaker 4: in Las Vegas, me and two buddies, we said a
- 54:29Speaker 4: fourth will join us.
- 54:30Speaker 1: There's a gentleman just shy of 80, I would say.
- 54:34Speaker 4: And he shot a 76. And he never drove the
- 54:40Speaker 4: ball more than about 180 yards.
- 54:43Speaker 1: And he just, everything was.
- 54:45Speaker 4: Two shots par, two shots par. I mean, he parred
- 54:48Speaker 4: every hole, bogeyed four holes and called it a day.
- 54:51Speaker 2: That was it. Infuriating for sure. Yeah. Three of my
- 54:56Speaker 2: good friends, including Tim and Jeff, Jim King. And I,
- 55:00Speaker 2: many of you have heard the story, but I'm playing
- 55:02Speaker 2: with Jim King who used to be the news anchor
- 55:05Speaker 2: in Binghamton when I was the sports anchor. And I
- 55:08Speaker 2: would befriend Jim and we would remain very close. And
- 55:12Speaker 2: I was in, at Jim's wedding, and he was at
- 55:15Speaker 2: my wedding. And now Jim and I get a chance
- 55:17Speaker 2: to watch his son, Mike King, pitch for the San
- 55:20Speaker 2: Diego Padres at an incredibly high level. So I'm going
- 55:23Speaker 2: to be golfing with Kinger today and a couple of
- 55:25Speaker 2: other guys, and we'll be talking about what Mike is doing.
- 55:28Speaker 2: And Mike is absolutely killing it right now for the Padres,
- 55:31Speaker 2: which is such a neat thing to see.
- 55:33Speaker 4: Well, before we let you go, Dad, we got to
- 55:36Speaker 4: talk about Dirt from the Dugout, okay? So this new podcast,
- 55:39Speaker 4: which is actually part of the Foul Territory Network that
- 55:42Speaker 4: we're a part of, I have to tell you guys,
- 55:44Speaker 4: when I was building a playground in my backyard by myself, it.
- 55:49Speaker 1: Took three days.
- 55:51Speaker 4: It took 18 working hours, Ravi.
- 55:53Speaker 2: I thought.
- 55:54Speaker 4: I was going to go insane, but I had my
- 55:57Speaker 4: headphones in listening to dirt from the dugout to hear
- 56:00Speaker 4: what this new podcast was all about. So Ravi, thank you.
- 56:04Speaker 4: Because if I didn't have that, I would have jumped
- 56:07Speaker 4: off the top.
- 56:07Speaker 2: Of the playground.
- 56:09Speaker 4: Three stories high.
- 56:11Speaker 2: How is it going?
- 56:12Speaker 4: Tell the people a little bit about what this is,
- 56:14Speaker 4: because just like our baseball podcast, it isn't, we're not
- 56:18Speaker 4: breaking down the hot takes. We're not going into the
- 56:21Speaker 4: standings per se. You've got a different approach on this thing.
- 56:25Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, it goes back to sort of the
- 56:27Speaker 2: Little League World Series. I think one of the things
- 56:31Speaker 2: that we try to do on that show, our main goal,
- 56:34Speaker 2: is to use guests that you listen to, whether it
- 56:37Speaker 2: be Mark DeRosa or Dustin Pedroia or Dusty Baker or
- 56:41Speaker 2: Buck Showalter or Adam Wainwright or David Ross, Dave Roberts
- 56:46Speaker 2: just the other day, is to use their journeys to
- 56:50Speaker 2: get to where they got to and share those experiences
- 56:53Speaker 2: with parents and young players who are beginning or in
- 56:57Speaker 2: the middle of their own journeys. And to see that
- 57:00Speaker 2: this is not necessarily a linear journey. There are so
- 57:04Speaker 2: many different ways to go about. If you want to
- 57:07Speaker 2: be a high school player, if you want to play collegiately,
- 57:09Speaker 2: if you'd like to end up in the major leagues,
- 57:12Speaker 2: they all do it in different ways, as opposed to,
- 57:16Speaker 2: I think sometimes we get misguided into, there's only one
- 57:20Speaker 2: way to do it. And it is to specialize beginning
- 57:23Speaker 2: at the age of eight. And I don't agree with that.
- 57:26Speaker 2: I do think that if we can play Little League
- 57:29Speaker 2: and play with your neighbors until you're 12, that's what
- 57:32Speaker 2: you should be doing. So it has to do with
- 57:35Speaker 2: really trying to help people along their journeys and using
- 57:39Speaker 2: those examples. If you listen to the Pedroia podcast while
- 57:43Speaker 2: you were building the swing set, you may have ended
- 57:46Speaker 2: up wanting to jump off at the top of the
- 57:47Speaker 2: swing set.
- 57:53Speaker 1: So good. Well, Ravi, keep up the great work on
- 57:57Speaker 1: the podcast. I hope you break 70 today. I hope
- 58:01Speaker 1: you win your member guest. And I hope more than
- 58:05Speaker 1: anything that soon two things are going to happen. I'm
- 58:08Speaker 1: going to play golf with you and I'm going to
- 58:10Speaker 1: work with you again. That's one of my goals moving forward. First,
- 58:15Speaker 1: we're going to play golf. Then we're going to work
- 58:16Speaker 1: together again because nobody did more shows and games with
- 58:20Speaker 1: Ravi than I did. I'm pretty sure about that. And
- 58:24Speaker 1: it was a pleasure all along. So thank you so
- 58:26Speaker 1: much for joining us today on our dinky little podcast.
- 58:31Speaker 2: Thank you guys for having me. I love both of you.