Latest / Kustom Conversations / Betting On Yourself with Chiefs Legend, Deron Cherry | Deron Cherry Interview | EP.06

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Betting On Yourself with Chiefs Legend, Deron Cherry | Deron Cherry Interview | EP.06 · Kustom Conversations

• 0:00
  Deron Cherry: He wanted to change my whole style of punting.
• 0:03
  Casi Joy: Yes, I want to talk about this.
• 0:04
  Deron Cherry: I'm like, I'm mad for you because I'm man, I'm in that orange bowl playing.
• 0:10
  Deron Cherry: Literally right before the game.
• 0:13
  Casi Joy: This guy and chain injured as serious as we thought.
• 0:17
  Deron Cherry: What?
• 0:17
  Deron Cherry: So we're not gonna be able to sign you.
• 0:19
  Casi Joy: I'm about to throw this mic.
• 0:21
  Casi Joy: Every story is different.
• 0:24
  Casi Joy: Every episode is custom.
• 0:26
  Casi Joy: Get ready to pull back the curtain on your favorite artists, athletes, and entertainers.
• 0:30
  Casi Joy: I'm your host, Cassie Joy, and this is Custom Conversations.
• 0:35
  Casi Joy: Welcome back to Custom Conversations.
• 0:41
  Casi Joy: Today's guest talks about a story of resilience and betting on yourself.
• 0:47
  Casi Joy: He went from being overlooked on draft day to becoming one of the greatest defensive playmakers in Chiefs' history with six Pro Bowls in a row, 50 career interceptions, and a legacy that extends far beyond football.
• 1:03
  Casi Joy: He's got one incredible story to tell.
• 1:05
  Casi Joy: Daron Cherry, welcome to Custom Conversations.
• 1:08
  Casi Joy: Well, thanks for having me.
• 1:10
  Deron Cherry: This is a pleasure.
• 1:11
  Casi Joy: I'm so excited to get to dive into your story because just doing a little, a little deep dive, which I always go a little too deep on the dive, so then I like know too much and it's it's borderline, you know, it's a little much.
• 1:26
  Casi Joy: Um but I was just so fascinated by your story and seriously just your unwillingness to give up and just the the passion that you had to have had for this sport and then just to end up I don't want to spill all the beans yet.
• 1:41
  Casi Joy: So let's uh go back to your early days.
• 1:44
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 1:45
  Casi Joy: So you grew up in New Jersey, right?
• 1:47
  Casi Joy: Yes, and your two brothers played football with you.
• 1:50
  Deron Cherry: Yes.
• 1:51
  Casi Joy: What was the age difference?
• 1:53
  Deron Cherry: We were a year apart basically.
• 1:54
  Deron Cherry: All through so yeah, all through uh growing up.
• 1:57
  Deron Cherry: So when I was a freshman, my one brother was a sophomore, and the other brother was a junior.
• 2:03
  Deron Cherry: Oh my god.
• 2:03
  Deron Cherry: And then when I became a sophomore, we were juniors and seniors.
• 2:07
  Deron Cherry: So three of us played together on the same team.
• 2:10
  Deron Cherry: I was a quarterback, my brother was a wide receiver, my other brother was a center.
• 2:15
  Deron Cherry: So he snapped at me, and I threw the ball to my brother, and we both kicked and punted, and my brother was the snapper, so we we always had something going on.
• 2:24
  Deron Cherry: You just had the field completely handled.
• 2:27
  Casi Joy: You're like the cherries got it.
• 2:28
  Casi Joy: Did you guys have like a little like family team name?
• 2:31
  Deron Cherry: Uh uh no, like Team Cherry.
• 2:33
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 2:34
  Deron Cherry: Well, the weird thing, and I must say this, because I gotta, you know, I have a sister too, and my sister, uh, when my brother was a senior, my other brother's a junior, I was a sophomore, she was a freshman.
• 2:46
  Casi Joy: Okay.
• 2:47
  Deron Cherry: And she started on the field hockey team.
• 2:49
  Deron Cherry: She was a very good athlete.
• 2:50
  Deron Cherry: She was actually, most people consider her was the best athlete in the family.
• 2:55
  Casi Joy: Wow.
• 2:56
  Deron Cherry: So it was, you know, when we were in high school, all four of us, we were all lined up.
• 3:01
  Casi Joy: Just dominating your letter jackets, just like the loudest jingling, like it was fun.
• 3:07
  Deron Cherry: That was uh some good times.
• 3:09
  Deron Cherry: Uh, you know, when you get to play with your brothers and you get to experience everything together, it's uh it can be uh quite special.
• 3:18
  Casi Joy: That really is.
• 3:19
  Casi Joy: Man, yeah.
• 3:20
  Casi Joy: I missed um I've got an older brother and sister and just missed getting to be in school with them.
• 3:27
  Casi Joy: Um that would have been, I'm so jealous.
• 3:29
  Casi Joy: That just sounds so it was fun.
• 3:31
  Casi Joy: What a cool bonding experience.
• 3:33
  Casi Joy: And to do all of you doing football, like that was probably pretty helpful to your parents instead of like one's doing baseball, one's doing this, and da-da-da-da-da.
• 3:43
  Deron Cherry: Well, we did it all.
• 3:44
  Casi Joy: Oh, you did?
• 3:45
  Deron Cherry: Like, no, we kept them busy.
• 3:47
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, we did.
• 3:47
  Deron Cherry: We kept them busy all through high school.
• 3:49
  Deron Cherry: We were football season was football, basketball, we played basketball, baseball, we played baseball.
• 3:54
  Deron Cherry: Except for my oldest brother, he he played track and he he did track and field too.
• 3:59
  Deron Cherry: He he did the shop put in track.
• 4:01
  Deron Cherry: So nice.
• 4:02
  Deron Cherry: Uh, but yeah, we were always doing something.
• 4:04
  Casi Joy: Okay.
• 4:05
  Casi Joy: So you um after high school, you had the opportunity to go to Princeton.
• 4:11
  Deron Cherry: Actually, yeah, I had an opportunity to go to Princeton and Cornell.
• 4:15
  Deron Cherry: And Cornell, and Rutgers was recruiting me.
• 4:20
  Deron Cherry: Um and my brother was already there.
• 4:23
  Deron Cherry: At Rutgers.
• 4:24
  Deron Cherry: At Ruckers.
• 4:25
  Deron Cherry: And um Rutgers was playing, you know, they were improving their schedule.
• 4:31
  Deron Cherry: So they were playing tougher teams.
• 4:32
  Deron Cherry: So on the schedule, their future teams they were playing was like Tennessee and Alabama and um Arizona State and West Virginia, Penn State.
• 4:44
  Deron Cherry: So their schedule was getting much bigger, playing much better competition.
• 4:49
  Deron Cherry: And when I weighed it, you know, uh, I was originally looking at Cornell real hard.
• 4:57
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 4:57
  Deron Cherry: And uh like academically, academically and football.
• 5:01
  Deron Cherry: They were recruiting me for football.
• 5:02
  Deron Cherry: So they had told me that I was the only quarterback, because I played quarterback in high school.
• 5:07
  Deron Cherry: Right.
• 5:07
  Deron Cherry: I was the only quarterback they were going to recruit.
• 5:10
  Deron Cherry: And so I was like, oh, that sounds good.
• 5:14
  Deron Cherry: So I went up there for a visit and loved the place.
• 5:16
  Deron Cherry: It's in Ithaca, New York.
• 5:18
  Deron Cherry: It's a beautiful place.
• 5:19
  Deron Cherry: And when I came back home, I go, huh, Mom, I think I want to go there.
• 5:24
  Deron Cherry: And I'll I'll never forget this.
• 5:26
  Deron Cherry: I remember calling the coach at Rutgers, who was recruiting me.
• 5:30
  Deron Cherry: He only lived the next town up.
• 5:32
  Deron Cherry: And uh I got on the phone with him.
• 5:35
  Deron Cherry: I said, Coach, I'm sorry, but I'm I'm I'm going to Cornell.
• 5:38
  Deron Cherry: I'm gonna change my mind.
• 5:40
  Deron Cherry: And he was like, he hung up the phone, and within 15 minutes he was at my doorstep at my house.
• 5:47
  Casi Joy: Oh wow.
• 5:48
  Deron Cherry: And he goes, No, if I gotta sleep on your doorstep, you're not going to Cornell, I'll stay here.
• 5:52
  Deron Cherry: Oh and uh so special.
• 5:55
  Deron Cherry: I got to thinking about it, and I said, Well, you know, Rutgers is good, they're giving me a full ride and everything, my brother's there.
• 6:03
  Casi Joy: And and closer to home.
• 6:04
  Deron Cherry: Closer to home, and so I wind up going there.
• 6:07
  Deron Cherry: And it's funny because we play Cornell my freshman year, the varsity did, and they brought back uh, you know, the game book program that they had, and Cornell actually had me listed on their freshman roster, and so I saw my name on their freshman roster, and then I looked at the roster, and there were probably like 11 quarterbacks that they have recruited, and they told me it was only one me, right?
• 6:36
  Deron Cherry: So I was gonna like, I'm so glad I didn't go there.
• 6:39
  Casi Joy: Yeah, scoundrels, yeah, man.
• 6:42
  Casi Joy: So like you were gonna go to like one of these other like two like Ivy League, like whoa, schools.
• 6:50
  Casi Joy: Like, what were you gonna study?
• 6:51
  Casi Joy: Are you like hella smart?
• 6:53
  Deron Cherry: Uh I was gonna major in biology, which is what I graduated uh in a BS degree in biology at Ruptors, because my ultimate goal, I wanted to go to dental school.
• 7:04
  Deron Cherry: Oh.
• 7:04
  Deron Cherry: And so that was that was the plan, but of course, as you well know, all plans can get disrupted.
• 7:11
  Deron Cherry: Yep.
• 7:11
  Deron Cherry: And and mine did.
• 7:13
  Deron Cherry: So um I still got my degree in biology with the an option in the field of nutrition, which the I the idea was, okay, we're gonna go to dental school when we get done.
• 7:25
  Deron Cherry: And uh that didn't happen.
• 7:27
  Deron Cherry: I had a a a major detour.
• 7:30
  Casi Joy: Yeah, quite a detour.
• 7:31
  Casi Joy: Yeah, so it's 1981 and you go undrafted.
• 7:37
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 7:38
  Casi Joy: Um, were you disappointed or did you feel confident?
• 7:41
  Casi Joy: You're like, this isn't the end.
• 7:42
  Casi Joy: Like, did you know in the back of your mind?
• 7:44
  Deron Cherry: I knew in the back of my mind I knew on draft day that it wasn't the end, that there were teams, because I had like four or five different teams reached out to me.
• 7:54
  Deron Cherry: A lot of them local, like the Giants, the Jets, the Eagles, um, the Redskins, and then Kansas City had reached out because my defensive coordinator in college wound up leaving and taking a job with the Chiefs as a linebacker coach under Marv Levy.
• 8:12
  Casi Joy: Yeah.
• 8:12
  Deron Cherry: And so he's Ted Ted Catrell.
• 8:15
  Deron Cherry: So Ted called me and said, Hey, if you, you know, we may draft you, we're looking for a punter.
• 8:21
  Deron Cherry: Um, but I also noticed that Ken C was looking at safeties too.
• 8:26
  Deron Cherry: Mm-hmm.
• 8:26
  Deron Cherry: And they had drafted three safeties that year.
• 8:29
  Deron Cherry: So I was going like, Well, you know, that might be an opportunity there.
• 8:33
  Deron Cherry: I can go there and punt, and then also figure out, you know, they're looking at safeties, looking for safeties.
• 8:40
  Deron Cherry: Let me see what what that could happen.
• 8:42
  Deron Cherry: And then when I got to camp and I saw the safeties that they drafted, other than Lloyd Burris, I'm going like, well God, if they drafted those safeties and those guys played in all-star games and everything, and I mean, I'm just as good as they are.
• 8:56
  Deron Cherry: And so that's when I kind of said, Well, you know, I may have an opportunity here.
• 9:02
  Deron Cherry: And um, you know, we had a new special teams coach, which was Frank Gance, and you know, he wanted to change my whole style of punting.
• 9:11
  Casi Joy: Yes, I want to talk about this.
• 9:13
  Casi Joy: I'm like, I'm mad for you because you have this great like college career as a punter, right?
• 9:20
  Casi Joy: Mm-hmm.
• 9:21
  Casi Joy: And then you go to the NFL and he changes your style.
• 9:25
  Casi Joy: Why?
• 9:26
  Deron Cherry: Well, he believed as a special teams coach that you want to get the ball off faster, but I was always fast getting the ball off.
• 9:36
  Deron Cherry: That was never the issue.
• 9:37
  Deron Cherry: And here he wanted to make me like a two-step punter, where I was almost like a two and a half-step punter.
• 9:44
  Deron Cherry: So, like, what I mean by that is when the ball gets snapped, I'm kind of inching forward, taking a little quick step, and then becoming a two-step punter.
• 9:53
  Deron Cherry: Okay.
• 9:54
  Deron Cherry: He wanted me just to catch the ball, take two steps and punt, you know, get it off, because he felt like punts didn't get blocked.
• 10:01
  Deron Cherry: Well, my whole career in high school and in college, I never had a punt blocked.
• 10:07
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 10:08
  Deron Cherry: And I was a good athlete, so even if somebody got close, I was athletic enough where I could pull the ball down and then turn and run and maybe pick up a first down or something like that.
• 10:18
  Deron Cherry: So I never got in trouble kicking the ball.
• 10:21
  Deron Cherry: And this was um, you know, his idea that no, this is this is what we want.
• 10:27
  Deron Cherry: And so I knew after that mini camp that my punting wasn't what it should.
• 10:33
  Deron Cherry: And uh so I went home and I got my letter to report to Kansas City.
• 10:39
  Deron Cherry: It was like, you're gonna report three days before where they told me when I left, you're gonna come back in two weeks prior to training camp so you can get acclimated and work out and everything.
• 10:50
  Deron Cherry: And so when I saw the three-day report date, I'm going, This doesn't feel good.
• 10:56
  Deron Cherry: No, this doesn't feel good.
• 10:58
  Deron Cherry: You know, it's like that handwriting's on the wall.
• 11:00
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, they're gonna bring you back in, but then they're just gonna uh maybe give you a shot, but then release you.
• 11:06
  Deron Cherry: So when I got that letter, I was sitting in my mom's bedroom at home when I opened it up and I was reading it, and I'm going, man, what what do you do?
• 11:15
  Deron Cherry: And so I got this crazy idea as well.
• 11:19
  Deron Cherry: I'm gonna pick up the phone and call Marv Levy and talk to him and say, hey, I know my punting's not what it should be because Coach Gance is changing my whole style of punting.
• 11:30
  Deron Cherry: But I said I could play quarterback for you, I could be a safety, play both safety positions, I could do all these things and punt.
• 11:39
  Deron Cherry: So there's like four positions I can play.
• 11:41
  Casi Joy: More bang for your buck right here.
• 11:43
  Deron Cherry: And at that time, you know, the leg it was only a 45-man roster.
• 11:47
  Deron Cherry: So the more you could do, the better off you were.
• 11:50
  Deron Cherry: And so I um, you know, convinced him to say, hey, give me a shot.
• 11:56
  Deron Cherry: And he says, Well, let me get back to you.
• 11:58
  Deron Cherry: So he called me back and and uh said, okay, we'll we'll bring you back in and let you play.
• 12:06
  Deron Cherry: So um that was the start really of you know the change in my story, you know, because had I not made that phone call to Coach Levy at that time, there's no telling where I would have ended up.
• 12:18
  Deron Cherry: If I would have just taken that letter and said, okay, that that's it, this is what's gonna happen.
• 12:23
  Deron Cherry: Going to dental school.
• 12:25
  Deron Cherry: Have enough faith and and belief in myself that you know I could play in the league and I could, you know, I could make it, then I wouldn't I wouldn't be here talking to you then.
• 12:37
  Casi Joy: Yeah.
• 12:37
  Casi Joy: Well what do you I mean, what do you think would have happened if Frank Gans wouldn't have changed your style?
• 12:44
  Casi Joy: And like would you have preferred that, like, to stay a punter?
• 12:48
  Casi Joy: Uh or or is it just like, man, this all just like totally happened for a reason in the best way?
• 12:55
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, there there's no I I always tell people this, you know, God works in mysterious ways, and it's just you know how he structures things, you you just really don't know what the outcome's gonna be.
• 13:07
  Deron Cherry: But yeah, if I hadn't have done that and asked him, okay, I saw you drafted these safeties, I believe I'm just as good as they are.
• 13:15
  Deron Cherry: Give me an opportunity to play there.
• 13:17
  Deron Cherry: And you know, Coach Levy didn't have to to give me that opportunity, but he did.
• 13:23
  Deron Cherry: And I'm so grateful for it because he gave me that opportunity, and you know, I think they realized that I had the belief in myself that I could Yeah, like this guy's not giving up.
• 13:33
  Deron Cherry: Right.
• 13:34
  Deron Cherry: And so that that just made it uh, you know, better for me in the long run.
• 13:41
  Casi Joy: Yeah, because you you end up making it through training camp this time and preseason.
• 13:47
  Deron Cherry: So I made it through the preseason training camp, made it through preseason, and then I thought I had made the team.
• 13:53
  Deron Cherry: This is where the story gets really crazy, right?
• 13:55
  Deron Cherry: So I thought I had made the team.
• 13:58
  Deron Cherry: I, you know, made it through the last cuts.
• 14:01
  Deron Cherry: You know, interesting enough, the last preseason game we played in the Orange Bowl in Miami, and I can't tell you how many times I watched, you know, teams play at the Orange Bowl, the Dolphins, you know, and the Super Bowls that were played there.
• 14:15
  Deron Cherry: And now all of a sudden, man, I'm in the Orange Bowl playing in a preseason game, the last preseason game, and getting warmed up, getting ready to go out on the field right before the game.
• 14:26
  Deron Cherry: Literally right before the game.
• 14:28
  Deron Cherry: Frank Gance comes up to me and goes, Hey, you're gonna be our punt returner today.
• 14:34
  Deron Cherry: I never returned a punt in my life.
• 14:37
  Casi Joy: This guy, and changing your style all the time.
• 14:40
  Casi Joy: Like, can't I just be mean?
• 14:43
  Deron Cherry: And he's like, Yeah, you're gonna return punts.
• 14:47
  Deron Cherry: And I'm smart.
• 14:48
  Deron Cherry: I know what they were trying to do.
• 14:49
  Deron Cherry: They were trying to put me out there in a situation I wasn't comfortable with.
• 14:53
  Casi Joy: Like to make you look bad.
• 14:54
  Casi Joy: Right, to make feel better about like cutting your life.
• 14:57
  Deron Cherry: Right.
• 14:57
  Deron Cherry: So it'd be easier for them to cut me.
• 14:59
  Deron Cherry: So I get back there, the first punt goes up, and I go, okay, I'm sitting there thinking, okay, what would I do now?
• 15:06
  Deron Cherry: You can feel, you know, that's probably one of the most craziest positions to be in if as a punt returner, because you got these guys running down the field full speed, and all they want to do is just knock your head off, right?
• 15:17
  Deron Cherry: And so you're sitting there, the ball's up in the air, and you gotta focus on catching the ball, right?
• 15:23
  Casi Joy: So you're just like you don't even know if you're about to just be like cut in half.
• 15:26
  Deron Cherry: And and I'm sitting there saying to myself, Golly, what am I gonna do?
• 15:30
  Deron Cherry: So I see the ball, I get underneath it, and I go, okay, what would a guy from Rutgers do?
• 15:35
  Deron Cherry: So I put my hand up and fair caught it, caught it, walked off the field.
• 15:39
  Deron Cherry: Wow.
• 15:40
  Deron Cherry: So then the next one comes, the punter punts it, the ball drops in front of me, and it takes a nice bounce, I catch it.
• 15:45
  Deron Cherry: I think I return it for five yards or something like that.
• 15:48
  Deron Cherry: I get over to the sidelines and Frank Gans walks over to me and says, Alright, you're done for the game.
• 15:53
  Deron Cherry: You're you're dumb.
• 15:54
  Deron Cherry: We're good.
• 15:55
  Deron Cherry: We've seen enough.
• 15:56
  Deron Cherry: So it was like, okay, I didn't make a mistake, so there's no reason to cut me.
• 16:01
  Deron Cherry: And at that time, you know, we had there were seven defensive backs on the team.
• 16:05
  Deron Cherry: Usually a team with a 45-man roster kept seven defensive backs.
• 16:09
  Deron Cherry: That was always the standard.
• 16:12
  Deron Cherry: But the Chiefs that particular year drafted two tight ends.
• 16:16
  Deron Cherry: A guy by the name of Willie Scott out of South Carolina, and a guy by the name of Marvin Harvey out of southern Mississippi.
• 16:23
  Deron Cherry: One was drafted in the first round, the other was drafted in the third round.
• 16:27
  Deron Cherry: They had two tight ends that were originally there from the past year, Al Dixon, who was the starter, and Ed Beckman, who was the special team's captain.
• 16:38
  Casi Joy: Okay.
• 16:38
  Deron Cherry: So those four guys were there.
• 16:41
  Deron Cherry: So after that Miami game, we come back in that Monday.
• 16:44
  Deron Cherry: I walk in the locker room, you know, I'm thinking I made the football team, right?
• 16:48
  Deron Cherry: I'm dressed, ready to go out for practice.
• 16:51
  Deron Cherry: Now we're playing the Pittsburgh Steelers in Pittsburgh opening day.
• 16:56
  Deron Cherry: Now my family lives in Palmyre, New Jersey, which is not that far.
• 17:01
  Deron Cherry: Well, it's a good drive to get to Pittsburgh, but they're on the East Coast.
• 17:04
  Deron Cherry: So they were gonna come up to the game.
• 17:07
  Deron Cherry: Everybody's excited, I'm excited.
• 17:09
  Deron Cherry: You know, they're gonna get to see me play, right?
• 17:11
  Deron Cherry: Against the Steelers, who was a team I grew up loving and was my favorite team.
• 17:16
  Deron Cherry: So I'm going like, okay, I'm dressed, sitting there, and this guy comes over and taps me on the shoulder and says, Hey, go see Les Miller.
• 17:23
  Deron Cherry: Les Miller was our pro personnel director.
• 17:26
  Deron Cherry: And um, I'm thinking, yeah, he's gonna congratulate me on making a team.
• 17:31
  Deron Cherry: I go up to his office, dressed in my practice gear and everything, and he walks in and he goes, Hey man, you you had such a great camp, and we're we're real excited, but we're we're gonna have to let you go.
• 17:44
  Deron Cherry: And I'm going like, What?
• 17:46
  Deron Cherry: He goes, Yeah, well, we got a situation, we gotta keep four tight ends and not three.
• 17:54
  Deron Cherry: Two of 'em are draft picks, we're not gonna cut 'em, and then one's a starter, he's gonna start, and then the other was our special teams captain, and they didn't wanna let him go, even though he was just a special teams guy.
• 18:06
  Deron Cherry: And so I was like, okay, so I wind up going back to New Jersey, got on a plane, went home, went up to East Orange, New Jersey, and spent the weekend with my college roommate and his family.
• 18:20
  Deron Cherry: And um Sunday night I get a call after the game, and the Chiefs wind up upsetting Pittsburgh in Pittsburgh that day.
• 18:29
  Deron Cherry: My mom gets a call, calls me up and says, Hey, Kansas City called.
• 18:33
  Deron Cherry: They want you to come back out there because one of the players got hurt uh in the secondary, and they they think they need you, so they've got a ticket waiting for you at the airport in Philadelphia.
• 18:46
  Deron Cherry: So I had to drive, get all my stuff, drive home from East Orange, get all my stuff packed, get on a flight out of Philadelphia, heading back to Kansas City.
• 18:56
  Deron Cherry: Did that, got into Kansas City, they had a runner came pick me up at the airport.
• 19:01
  Deron Cherry: I think I got to the stadium about 5:30, 545, 6 o'clock, walk up to the general manager's office, sit down, wait for him to come in, and he looks at me and goes, Ah, we're not gonna be able to sign you because the player that got injured wasn't injured as serious as we thought.
• 19:18
  Deron Cherry: What?
• 19:18
  Deron Cherry: So we're not gonna be able to sign you.
• 19:21
  Deron Cherry: I'm about to throw this mic.
• 19:23
  Deron Cherry: So I I go, okay, all right.
• 19:26
  Deron Cherry: So he goes, Well, you know, you could stay.
• 19:29
  Casi Joy: It's fine, it was super easy to get here.
• 19:31
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 19:32
  Deron Cherry: So Gary Green, who was uh cornerback for the Chiefs, the all-pro player, he had a two-bedroom apartment, and he was it was just him.
• 19:41
  Deron Cherry: So he says, Hey, you can come stay with me.
• 19:44
  Deron Cherry: You can drive me, use my car, drive me to practice, and then pick me up afterwards.
• 19:49
  Deron Cherry: I get to show up to practice.
• 19:51
  Deron Cherry: So he he he let me use his car where I could go to the gym and work out and stay in shape, and all I had to do was just go pick him up.
• 20:00
  Deron Cherry: And after about a week, the Chiefs called me back in and said, Hey, if nobody gets injured, we're gonna have to let you go.
• 20:07
  Deron Cherry: We're gonna have to send you back home.
• 20:08
  Deron Cherry: Because at that time, you know, you weren't supposed to hide players, you know, you couldn't hide players in the NFL in case some other team wanted you or something like that.
• 20:17
  Deron Cherry: So they paid, you know, gave me some money for food and stuff like that for the week.
• 20:24
  Deron Cherry: And and then we um and so they had a game that next week, and unfortunately for some players, fortunately for me, a few guys got injured.
• 20:37
  Deron Cherry: Actually, Art still got hurt, who's my cousin.
• 20:41
  Deron Cherry: What yeah.
• 20:42
  Deron Cherry: And he got hurt, and another guy, uh linebacker got hurt, and then they signed me.
• 20:49
  Casi Joy: Man, yeah, that's in uh September of 1981.
• 20:56
  Casi Joy: So at that point, when you're finally like signed, it's really happening.
• 21:03
  Casi Joy: Like, were you how long did it take you to like not be walking on eggshells?
• 21:06
  Casi Joy: It's like, is this real?
• 21:09
  Deron Cherry: I tell people all the time, you know, people ask me, I get cards every day, people sending me cards to sign and stuff like we were signing cards earlier, right?
• 21:17
  Deron Cherry: And um they they'll ask me a question like, okay, what was your greatest football moment?
• 21:23
  Deron Cherry: You know, and you know, I had one game where I had four interceptions, another game where, you know, my first game back after knee surgery, I hit Bo Jackson and he fumbled the ball and we recovered it against the Raiders.
• 21:34
  Deron Cherry: Oh man.
• 21:35
  Deron Cherry: And uh we wind up winning that game.
• 21:37
  Deron Cherry: But I tell people my my my greatest memory was you know, that first time, that first game where you're suiting up in an official NFL game, like regular season game.
• 21:51
  Casi Joy: Especially after what it took for you to get there.
• 21:54
  Deron Cherry: To get there.
• 21:54
  Deron Cherry: Um it was it was amazing just to be out there and know that.
• 21:59
  Deron Cherry: That you had made it when you all the odds were against you, and so many people who would say to you, Oh, you'll never make it, yeah, you'll never make it, and you make it.
• 22:12
  Casi Joy: Man, that is just it's this is the coolest story.
• 22:17
  Casi Joy: What made you so resilient and just like to keep betting on yourself?
• 22:23
  Casi Joy: Because you also had a great brain to fall back on, you know, with like dental school and like all these college offers, and what made you stick with it?
• 22:32
  Casi Joy: Was it like something your parents instilled?
• 22:35
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, there's no question.
• 22:36
  Deron Cherry: So my mom was, I would say, is the the greatest gift that I ever had in my life.
• 22:41
  Deron Cherry: Uh because my mom and dad divorced when we were very young.
• 22:45
  Deron Cherry: I was still little, and there were five of us.
• 22:48
  Deron Cherry: So my mom basically was, you know, she was the man and and and and the mom, right?
• 22:55
  Deron Cherry: She was all things.
• 22:56
  Deron Cherry: So she always instilled in us that we could be anything and everything we wanted to be.
• 23:02
  Deron Cherry: Um all we had to do was believe in ourselves.
• 23:06
  Deron Cherry: But the one thing my mom, she always kept us in check, right?
• 23:10
  Deron Cherry: If we thought we were getting a little bit too, you know, proud of ourselves, she'd bring us back there.
• 23:15
  Deron Cherry: She'd she'd always say something that would make sense to you.
• 23:19
  Deron Cherry: It wouldn't make sense to you then.
• 23:21
  Deron Cherry: But as you grew, you know, you understood.
• 23:24
  Deron Cherry: And I and I'll never forget this.
• 23:25
  Deron Cherry: I came home after a game, a high school game, and I was a quarterback, so you know, the quarterback gets all the love from everybody, right?
• 23:33
  Deron Cherry: And I'm I'm feeling good about myself.
• 23:36
  Deron Cherry: And I'll never forget her telling me, she says, you know one thing, she says, Yeah, you think you're all this, you're hot stuff.
• 23:42
  Deron Cherry: She goes, You you better understand how you need to be humble.
• 23:46
  Deron Cherry: You need to take it for what it's worth.
• 23:49
  Deron Cherry: She goes, because you know, you might think you're climbing the ladder right now, and this is all good for you, but at some point in time things aren't gonna go your way and you're gonna come down the ladder.
• 24:00
  Deron Cherry: And she goes, how you treat people is gonna be reflective of those folks that are going up the ladder when you're coming down, because you want those folks that are going up the ladder to take you with them.
• 24:14
  Deron Cherry: Exactly.
• 24:14
  Deron Cherry: And the only way they take you with them is if you have a humble heart and a humble spirit and you respect them and treat them the way you want to be treated.
• 24:24
  Deron Cherry: And so that always stuck with me.
• 24:26
  Deron Cherry: And so I always had that that never quit, never say die.
• 24:32
  Deron Cherry: And you know, my pal football coach, you know, he said something to us one time in a game, you know, when the going gets tough, the tough get going.
• 24:41
  Deron Cherry: And I never forgot that.
• 24:43
  Deron Cherry: So whenever I was faced with an adverse situation, it would always bring me back to that moment.
• 24:50
  Deron Cherry: You know, I was nine years old when when he made that statement.
• 24:53
  Deron Cherry: And but I understood, you know, going through life and going through the struggles, having to, you know, do your homework.
• 25:02
  Deron Cherry: Do you do it or do you quit?
• 25:04
  Deron Cherry: Do you give up when you come through adversely or you're facing adversity, how do you respond?
• 25:09
  Deron Cherry: And so I always remember that going is tough, tough get going.
• 25:13
  Deron Cherry: Don't give up, don't quit.
• 25:14
  Deron Cherry: Don't ever give up on yourself.
• 25:16
  Deron Cherry: And what happens is you build this inner endurance inside yourself that says, I'm never gonna quit, I'm never gonna give up.
• 25:24
  Deron Cherry: And sure enough, it benefited me tremendously because whenever I got into those situations when people would tell me, Oh, you're not gonna be able to do this, you're not gonna be able to do that, watch me.
• 25:34
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 25:35
  Deron Cherry: You know, when they said I wasn't big enough, strong enough, fast enough to play in the national football.
• 25:40
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, you like got a sprinting coach and like coach, a track guy who was like 50 years old, who was a world-class sprinter in his age group, and he trained me on cinders, right?
• 25:51
  Deron Cherry: We were running on cinder.
• 25:52
  Deron Cherry: We didn't have these nice tracks back then.
• 25:54
  Deron Cherry: And uh he would say, Hey, I I can't, he said, one thing I can do is uh I can teach you how to run, and you can run faster.
• 26:03
  Deron Cherry: And I remember coming in, I ran like four, nine, and a forty, but the thing so that was a blessing, right?
• 26:09
  Deron Cherry: I ran four, nine, to forty, but I was a punter, right?
• 26:13
  Deron Cherry: Uh-huh.
• 26:13
  Deron Cherry: So I wasn't playing safety because if I was a safety, they would have probably said, oh no, no way, you're too slow.
• 26:19
  Deron Cherry: You're too.
• 26:19
  Deron Cherry: And I knew I was faster than that.
• 26:21
  Deron Cherry: It's just that when that watch was on me, I would tense up.
• 26:25
  Deron Cherry: And so when you tense up, you don't run as fast.
• 26:28
  Deron Cherry: But he taught me how to run, how to relax, and everything.
• 26:31
  Deron Cherry: And I came back when they say I wasn't fast enough, I wound up running four or five in the 40, right?
• 26:36
  Deron Cherry: Which now they're saying, like, okay, they can't look at you and say you're not fast enough because you ran a good time, right?
• 26:41
  Deron Cherry: You ran a fast time.
• 26:43
  Deron Cherry: I got in the gym, lifted weights.
• 26:45
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, board 400.
• 26:48
  Deron Cherry: 400 pounds.
• 26:49
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, yeah.
• 26:50
  Deron Cherry: That's so I got stronger, and then I got bigger.
• 26:53
  Deron Cherry: You know, I added 10 pounds to my frame.
• 26:56
  Deron Cherry: So now these are three areas that they're saying They literally can't say no.
• 27:00
  Deron Cherry: They can't say no, right?
• 27:01
  Deron Cherry: They gotta, and all I was asking for was just an opportunity.
• 27:06
  Deron Cherry: You know, give me an opportunity and let me do with the opportunity when I get it.
• 27:12
  Deron Cherry: You gotta prepare yourself, though, right?
• 27:14
  Deron Cherry: You gotta work hard.
• 27:15
  Deron Cherry: You gotta put yourself in position.
• 27:17
  Deron Cherry: I see a lot of people a lot of times, you know, um, where they may get an opportunity, but they weren't prepared for the opportunity.
• 27:26
  Deron Cherry: They weren't prepared to take advantage of it.
• 27:28
  Deron Cherry: So it um it causes them to fail rather than always looking to have yourself in the best possible position to take advantage of the opportunities that come because you don't ever know when they're gonna come.
• 27:44
  Deron Cherry: Yep.
• 27:44
  Deron Cherry: But I can remember going, you know, and working out when I couldn't get anybody to work out with me and I had to go do it by myself.
• 27:52
  Deron Cherry: It's those times that builds your character and builds up your strength and endurance and your toughness when you have to go do something when nobody else wants to do it, but you still know you gotta go out there and run them steps in the stadium or run up that hill on the outside of Arrowhead Stadium and and run, you know, miles around the complex to get yourself in condition and shape to be ready when that opportunity comes.
• 28:18
  Casi Joy: Yeah, I mean there's there's always going to be someone that is like willing to outwork you unless there's not, unless you will not be outworked.
• 28:28
  Deron Cherry: Right.
• 28:28
  Deron Cherry: You know you you have to say to yourself, you you never know when it's gonna happen, but you gotta be prepared when it does happen.
• 28:39
  Casi Joy: So your first year you end up making the Pro Bowl.
• 28:44
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, the first year I started.
• 28:45
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, so yeah, yeah.
• 28:47
  Casi Joy: That how vindicating did that feel?
• 28:50
  Casi Joy: Like, was there any like told you so?
• 28:53
  Casi Joy: Like if you just would have quit, cut it.
• 28:55
  Casi Joy: We could have had this years ago.
• 28:58
  Deron Cherry: Well, I'll tell you, two people.
• 29:00
  Deron Cherry: Um, actually, three people.
• 29:01
  Deron Cherry: So Walt Corey, who was my secondary coach, Tay Catrell, who was the coach that brought me to Kansas City, they always believed in me, right?
• 29:10
  Deron Cherry: So having those two two guys believe in you.
• 29:14
  Deron Cherry: And then the year that I started, we had a a new defensive coordinator, Bud Carson.
• 29:20
  Deron Cherry: And it was up to Bud Carson to say, okay, I'm we're gonna give this guy this this opportunity, right?
• 29:27
  Deron Cherry: Because I was playing behind a two-time all-pro player in Gary Barbero.
• 29:32
  Deron Cherry: Um, and he wind up leaving the Chiefs.
• 29:36
  Deron Cherry: That was the new football league, the spring league, that they called it.
• 29:41
  Deron Cherry: And he wound up going there, so they were they were saying, hey, we got to find a safety.
• 29:47
  Deron Cherry: The Chiefs were saying we got to find a safety, and it was Walker.
• 29:49
  Deron Cherry: Oh, well man, I wonder who Walt Corey steps up and goes, no, we've got a we've got a kid here, he can play.
• 29:56
  Deron Cherry: Give him a shot, give him an opportunity.
• 29:58
  Deron Cherry: And so that first year I started, they gave me that shot, and halfway through the season I'm leading the league in interceptions and leading the team in tackles and just doing well and playing in a new system under Bud Carson, and so it was good for me that we were in a new system because the veteran players who were there, they didn't have to worry about Gary calling all the calls uh the way they were used to because it was a whole new system.
• 30:26
  Deron Cherry: So I had to be the guy to make sure I had them in position because now I'm the one making all the calls.
• 30:33
  Deron Cherry: So I had to be, I had to know what I was supposed to do.
• 30:36
  Deron Cherry: And so getting everybody lined up, getting them in the right position, and they had to have confidence in me that I'm gonna do.
• 30:43
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, for your first year.
• 30:45
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 30:45
  Deron Cherry: So, but I credit Gary Green, Gary Barbaro for those guys.
• 30:51
  Deron Cherry: When I came in our first two years, they made us rookies and first year players, you know, second-year players do all the work, right?
• 31:00
  Deron Cherry: We had to answer all the questions when we're in the meeting room.
• 31:03
  Deron Cherry: So they got us prepared just in the event that they got injured and we had to step in.
• 31:08
  Deron Cherry: They had to have confidence that we knew what we were doing.
• 31:11
  Deron Cherry: So that was the the special thing about that group was they were so unselfish.
• 31:17
  Deron Cherry: Because normally people were very selfish when it comes to trying to take your position away from them.
• 31:23
  Deron Cherry: These guys were unselfish, they taught us how to be professionals, and so you always Kansas City has always had that mentality in their secondary, you know, bring guys up, teach them, you know, help them, support them.
• 31:39
  Deron Cherry: And that's what they did for me, and that's one of the reasons why I was ready to play.
• 31:44
  Casi Joy: That's so special.
• 31:46
  Casi Joy: So you make so you make the Pro Bowl, your first year, hello, and then you make the Pro Bowl five more times in a row.
• 31:55
  Casi Joy: I gotta say it again.
• 31:56
  Casi Joy: What do you think separated you you from other safeties in the league?
• 32:01
  Casi Joy: Was it that you watched like 12 to 15 extra hours of film?
• 32:05
  Deron Cherry: Oh, yeah, totally watch film.
• 32:07
  Deron Cherry: I mean, I remember having my own projector that we bought that I would take with me on like on dates, you're like, you're gonna love this one.
• 32:14
  Deron Cherry: Hey, we had to stay in the hotel night before a game.
• 32:18
  Deron Cherry: I had my projector with me on the road, we took it with us on the plane.
• 32:22
  Deron Cherry: We're constantly watching film.
• 32:23
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, so and it's weird because you know, technology changed so much.
• 32:31
  Deron Cherry: I mean, before it was like a a big You gotta wheel it in, and it was, you know, a reel-to-reel film.
• 32:39
  Deron Cherry: So you're putting reels of film on and you're watching, and you got this clicker where you're going back and forth and you're looking at it.
• 32:45
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 32:45
  Deron Cherry: Then it came like these little video eight tapes that you had this little cassette that you would put in and slam.
• 32:52
  Deron Cherry: The VCR had the tapes, and then uh oh yeah, and now it's what on the phone?
• 32:58
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, now it's yeah, you can look at it in anything, it's digitized, so it's so much better and easier now to watch it.
• 33:05
  Deron Cherry: But yeah, I used to study a lot of film.
• 33:07
  Deron Cherry: I mean, I enjoyed studying a lot of film because I could pick up things that players were doing that would give me an advantage.
• 33:16
  Casi Joy: What were you looking for?
• 33:17
  Deron Cherry: Like what so most of the time is the defensive back.
• 33:19
  Deron Cherry: When I first came in the league, the defensive backs, you looked at the the sideline, the all 22, right?
• 33:25
  Deron Cherry: So you're looking at it from the sideline.
• 33:26
  Deron Cherry: So you see some things, you don't see it all.
• 33:29
  Deron Cherry: But what I would do is I would sit, you know, I remember going into a defensive meeting, and these guys were watching like the end zone view of the game.
• 33:40
  Deron Cherry: Because everything is up in front of them, the offensive linemen and stuff like that, and I go like, darn.
• 33:46
  Deron Cherry: You mean I can look at this film and I can get tips on whether it's run or pass because these guys are gonna have to show, like, when they're up against a guy like Art Still or Bill Moss or somebody like that, you know, when it's pass, you know, they got to get out of their stance quick because they got to get into a protection mode to protect the quarterback, right?
• 34:09
  Deron Cherry: So their hands are gonna come up, or if it's a running play, you can look at them and they got a lot more weight on their fingertips, right?
• 34:17
  Deron Cherry: So there were times where I could see that, and now I would know, okay, okay, this is gonna be a running play, or this is gonna be a passing play.
• 34:26
  Deron Cherry: But what it gave me was if it was pass, I could back up a little bit and give myself a little bit room to take a little extra space to read what was gonna happen.
• 34:36
  Deron Cherry: If it was a running play, I could cheat up because now I could come forward and be at the line of scrimmage making the tackle at the line of scrimmage instead of five or six yards behind the line of scrimmage.
• 34:48
  Deron Cherry: So all that stuff through film study, you could learn tendencies, what receivers are gonna do, what quarterbacks would do, how they would look.
• 34:57
  Deron Cherry: Like rookie quarterbacks, you know, they like to stare receivers down, and you're going like, okay, I see this.
• 35:05
  Casi Joy: Yeah, okay.
• 35:05
  Casi Joy: This might be a dumb question, but like when like can you tell that a quarterback is about to throw an interception before they do, or is a lot of it just like, oh my god, I was in the right place at the right time.
• 35:19
  Deron Cherry: No, I think sometimes you can put yourself in position.
• 35:21
  Deron Cherry: I'll give you a case and story.
• 35:22
  Deron Cherry: So we played the Raiders one year, and uh we played them out in the Coliseum, and we had to win in order to get a playoff game at home.
• 35:33
  Deron Cherry: We were both already in the playoffs.
• 35:35
  Deron Cherry: So whoever won that game would get the home field advantage.
• 35:38
  Deron Cherry: Either we were gonna have to stay out there in LA if they beat us, or they were coming to Kansas City.
• 35:44
  Deron Cherry: And we wind up beating them, but they had a quarterback that they their quarterback got hurt, they bring in a uh a young quarterback who was uh rookie, Ty Marinovich.
• 35:54
  Deron Cherry: And he threw for like 300 yards against us in that game.
• 35:59
  Deron Cherry: Well, we hadn't not seen any film on him at all.
• 36:02
  Deron Cherry: And so when we come back to Kansas City that next week in the playoff, I told Coach Schottenheimer, I said, give me this week to figure him out and I'm gonna f I'm gonna figure him out.
• 36:14
  Deron Cherry: Trust me, just put me in a position where I could read, let me read him and I'll I'll get him.
• 36:21
  Deron Cherry: And sure enough, we start the game and they're out on the field, and the first play he drops back and passes, I picked it off.
• 36:30
  Deron Cherry: Because I knew from studying film he was always gonna stare down his receiver.
• 36:35
  Deron Cherry: So what I did was fake like I was going one direction, and I just kept my my head on him, and I knew he was coming back because he turned his shoulders, and so I just ran over here, I intercepted the ball.
• 36:48
  Deron Cherry: The next time he comes out, he does the same thing.
• 36:52
  Deron Cherry: I picked him off twice in that game, and he was never the same after that.
• 36:57
  Deron Cherry: Oh, but it was a playoff game, it was a big game, but you know, I put myself in a position to know what his tendencies were and what he was doing, and we wind up getting two quick interceptions in the game, which helped us win the football game.
• 37:13
  Casi Joy: That's just wild to be able to think that fast in such a like high intensity environment of like, oh, we looked at the completely changed my entire body, and like that is so wild.
• 37:25
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, it's it's uh you know, but that's that's what happens when you're studying and you're preparing to be able to do that.
• 37:31
  Deron Cherry: When you're prepared, yeah.
• 37:32
  Deron Cherry: It's not what people think, it's like you're studying tendencies, so you know on certain down and distant situations what potentially could happen or what they could do, or what you know, if it's third and extremely long, what are you thinking?
• 37:47
  Deron Cherry: Well, are they gonna throw it deep down the field?
• 37:49
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, they may, but a lot of times they might just be a screen pass.
• 37:53
  Deron Cherry: So now you gotta be mindful of that.
• 37:55
  Deron Cherry: So you you're studying, you know, a lot of things in the game.
• 38:00
  Deron Cherry: It's called situational football, right?
• 38:03
  Deron Cherry: So you understand situations and you think in your mind prior to that, but the way you do that is by studying film, you can get an idea of what it's like because you get all the information because the the team gives it to you.
• 38:17
  Casi Joy: They break it down, you know what the tendencies are, uh, because you have computers now that can break it down and they can tell you are people using like AI now to be like they are.
• 38:29
  Casi Joy: Oh yeah, like how are the like what's the ratio of like Patrick Mahomes doing this if he this then like oh yeah, because you can feed all those tendencies in and it's gonna spit you out and go, okay, hey, if they're lined up in this formation, it's a hundred percent run.
• 38:45
  Deron Cherry: If they line up in this formation, it's eighty-five percent pass.
• 38:49
  Deron Cherry: So you can get that, and that's how coaches can make calls, you know, that okay, against an offensive formation or an offensive set, because they know, okay, here are their tendencies on third down and this down and distance.
• 39:03
  Deron Cherry: This is what they like to do.
• 39:04
  Deron Cherry: These are the plays they like to run.
• 39:06
  Deron Cherry: So you have all that information available to you.
• 39:09
  Deron Cherry: What it boils down to is execution.
• 39:12
  Casi Joy: That is wild.
• 39:13
  Casi Joy: Um, and like just how things have changed and like AI is probably involved now.
• 39:18
  Casi Joy: That's weird.
• 39:19
  Casi Joy: Um, so you once intercepted four passes in a game against Seattle, and I think I read that you uh accredited um Dan Marino for helping you do it.
• 39:33
  Casi Joy: No somehow, or like teaching you something in some previous game or something.
• 39:38
  Casi Joy: And I tried not to, I was like, I don't even want to I don't want to dive deep into this story, I want to find it out real time.
• 39:45
  Deron Cherry: As far as Merino to me was, he was probably the most difficult quarterback to get an interception on.
• 39:53
  Deron Cherry: To read, to read, because he had such a quick release.
• 39:56
  Deron Cherry: So he kind of helped me from a standpoint that I always had to look at him and be honest because in playing against him, you couldn't cheat, right?
• 40:09
  Deron Cherry: You couldn't kind of shade one side of the field or another side of the field because he could he could turn and throw the ball so quick, his release was so quick, you would think you would be in position, and you're not.
• 40:22
  Deron Cherry: I mean, one time he threw the ball, and I'm like this, ready to run the other way for a touchdown, and the ball somehow got through my hands.
• 40:32
  Deron Cherry: I I don't know to this day, right?
• 40:34
  Deron Cherry: How I didn't intercept this pass, but he had such a quick release and he had velocity and and I'm missing.
• 40:41
  Deron Cherry: I'm going like, man, that guy's good.
• 40:43
  Deron Cherry: That guy's good.
• 40:45
  Deron Cherry: But against Seattle, the good thing was, you know, it was it was pouring down rain that game, and when it's pouring down rain, you have an opportunity to really sit down on receivers because they gotta always chop their feet because the conditions are so bad.
• 41:01
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 41:02
  Deron Cherry: And I wound up getting four, but I had my hand on like nine footballs that day that I missed it, it skipped off my hand, and then I had one which would have been my fifth interception, and Lloyd Burris, my teammate, knocked it out of my hands.
• 41:19
  Deron Cherry: So I was just like, yeah, I would have had the record all to myself.
• 41:23
  Casi Joy: Oh my gosh.
• 41:25
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, it's crazy.
• 41:26
  Casi Joy: We'll still give it to you in our heights.
• 41:28
  Casi Joy: Let's talk about life after football, because you've had um a lot going on after that.
• 41:38
  Casi Joy: All of you guys, I'm like, aren't you tired?
• 41:42
  Casi Joy: Don't you want to just chill after your life in the NFL?
• 41:45
  Casi Joy: But it seems like all of you, like we've had um like we've had Christian Okoye on and Neil Smith um and Bill Moss, um, and just like just hearing about what they all do after the league, I would just imagine that, like, oh my god, my knees hurt, I gotta just go to a beach somewhere and chill.
• 42:03
  Casi Joy: Um, but you went from an undrafted player to becoming part owner of the Jacksonville Jaguars.
• 42:09
  Casi Joy: Yes.
• 42:10
  Casi Joy: How did that come about?
• 42:12
  Deron Cherry: So before that, prior to that, um, you know, I had an opportunity to um own a Anheuser Busch distributorship.
• 42:22
  Deron Cherry: So prior to me leaving the game of football, I was always forward thinking, trying to prepare for the opportunity in my future when I'd have to walk away from the game of football.
• 42:33
  Deron Cherry: Uh-huh.
• 42:34
  Deron Cherry: And I wanted to walk away on my terms and not somebody else's terms.
• 42:38
  Deron Cherry: And so I got an opportunity to um, you know, purchase an Anheuser Bush or got awarded an Anheuser Bush distributorship.
• 42:46
  Deron Cherry: My last year I was playing.
• 42:48
  Deron Cherry: So I was actually playing and setting up the business with my partner Jim Brooks at the same time.
• 42:54
  Deron Cherry: Okay.
• 42:54
  Deron Cherry: So um, and that was in we got awarded it in I think it was August or July.
• 43:01
  Deron Cherry: We didn't start operations till like started working on September, setting up the business, and then it became operational January of ninety-two.
• 43:12
  Deron Cherry: So literally played that season, was whenever I wasn't practicing or whatever, I was down at the office setting up the business, interviewing folks.
• 43:24
  Deron Cherry: And then in January 5th, I think January 4th, we've had a playoff game in Buffalo, which was the last game, January 5th, I was in the office working the next day.
• 43:37
  Deron Cherry: And so No rest for the wicked.
• 43:39
  Deron Cherry: No.
• 43:40
  Deron Cherry: So I had that opportunity to be able to, you know, have, you know, a business that I was working for myself and not somebody else.
• 43:53
  Deron Cherry: Mm-hmm.
• 43:53
  Deron Cherry: And so preparing for that future, and one of the guys that I met was a gentleman by the name of Pat.
• 43:59
  Deron Cherry: Sherger, who was a wholesaler on the Kansas side, and we became friends.
• 44:05
  Deron Cherry: And Pat had a friend that lived next to him at the lake.
• 44:09
  Deron Cherry: This guy's name was Wayne Weaver.
• 44:11
  Deron Cherry: And Wayne was a guy that owned uh a shoe company, Nine West Shoes.
• 44:16
  Deron Cherry: Most women know about Nine West.
• 44:17
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 44:18
  Casi Joy: I'm familiar.
• 44:19
  Deron Cherry: Well, he owned Nine West Shoe, and then he wound up buying carnival shoes and became a very wealthy person.
• 44:25
  Deron Cherry: But he um was living in Jacksonville, and Jacksonville was looking to get an expansion NFL team.
• 44:33
  Deron Cherry: And so Pat and Wayne were friends, and Wayne called Pat and said, Hey, I'm looking for some folks that I want to partner with.
• 44:43
  Deron Cherry: And Pat told him, he goes, Well, from a minority standpoint, because the leg was wanting minority participation in ownership, Pat said, I know Bo Jackson and I know Daron Cherry.
• 44:53
  Deron Cherry: And Wayne says, Well, I don't want to work with Bo Jackson.
• 44:56
  Deron Cherry: Let me meet Duran Cherry.
• 44:58
  Deron Cherry: So we set up a meeting in Kansas City, went to Grozo's downtown, had dinner, and Wayne asked me if I would be a partner with him in Jacksonville.
• 45:09
  Deron Cherry: And I said, I didn't know Wayne at the time, but one of the people that I did know that worked for the commissioner at the time was Roger Goodell.
• 45:19
  Deron Cherry: Roger was an assistant under Paul Tagliaboo.
• 45:22
  Deron Cherry: And Roger and I had met at one of the Pro Bowls that I went to and we became friends.
• 45:28
  Deron Cherry: And so I called Roger and said, Hey, tell me what you think about this guy.
• 45:31
  Deron Cherry: And Roger goes, Well, I think potentially he's gonna be an owner in the lake one day.
• 45:35
  Deron Cherry: And sure enough, um, so I said, Okay, I'll I'll do it, and then became a partner with Wayne, and then we wind up getting the franchise in Jacksonville, and uh just amazing deal to go from a player, former player, yeah, to now an owner in the national football play, um, National Football League, and I became the first African American former player in the league that had an ownership interest in in a national football league team.
• 46:09
  Casi Joy: Yeah.
• 46:09
  Casi Joy: And was there anything that you learned on like from going from the player side to the business side?
• 46:15
  Casi Joy: Anything that you learned that was like, whoa, I did not know this is how this was behind the scenes.
• 46:19
  Deron Cherry: Well you figured out very, very early on it was a low margin business, right?
• 46:23
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 46:23
  Deron Cherry: It wasn't that much money.
• 46:25
  Deron Cherry: Like you you're borrowing a lot of money because you're paying a lot of player salaries.
• 46:30
  Deron Cherry: But the way the league was set up is like you're sharing revenues, right?
• 46:34
  Deron Cherry: Each team gets an equal share of the revenue, and each team has to pay the league an equal share of their revenue, right?
• 46:41
  Deron Cherry: And uh, and so but you're playing a lot a lot of it is in player costs where the value goes, it's the appreciated value of the asset that that grows over time, and it depends on at the time when you sell it, who wants to buy it, and how much do they want to pay for it.
• 46:57
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, right.
• 46:58
  Deron Cherry: And so you you learn a lot about business and about the structure of the league, and the NFL is, you know, they've got it down to a science, right?
• 47:08
  Deron Cherry: So small market, small market teams can still succeed, you know, because of the revenue sharing package that they have, and usually the revenues grow on year over year over year.
• 47:21
  Deron Cherry: And then the players now are benefiting tremendously too from that increase in uh the revenue that's being generated.
• 47:29
  Deron Cherry: They're now getting a bigger portion of that.
• 47:32
  Deron Cherry: So that's why you see the salaries as high as it went.
• 47:35
  Deron Cherry: You know, when I when I look back on this and I think about my first year, my rookie year when I came in the league, I made $21,000.
• 47:44
  Casi Joy: That was your NFL money?
• 47:46
  Deron Cherry: That was my NFL money.
• 47:47
  Casi Joy: One of my qu I just had Bill Moss on, and one of my questions that I was so excited to ask, I was like, what is the first most obscure, stupid thing you as your 20 whatever year old self bought with your NFL money?
• 48:01
  Casi Joy: And he was like, Well, it wasn't the money that they're getting today.
• 48:04
  Casi Joy: It's different.
• 48:05
  Casi Joy: He was like, I think I helped finish my parents' house.
• 48:08
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, I remember my my first contract, it was for $35,000, but because I didn't play the full year, I made $21,000 that year.
• 48:17
  Deron Cherry: So yeah.
• 48:18
  Deron Cherry: And then my second contract.
• 48:19
  Casi Joy: And then though that is still more.
• 48:21
  Casi Joy: Like, what does that equate to now?
• 48:23
  Deron Cherry: I mean, you still would have to have a a job in the off season if you were gonna live on $35,000 a year.
• 48:31
  Casi Joy: Can you imagine Patrick Mahomes like, oh yeah, and also I work at Ivy.
• 48:36
  Deron Cherry: $21,000, that wouldn't even be uh like a quarter of his game check.
• 48:41
  Deron Cherry: It wouldn't even be oh, it'd be nowhere close.
• 48:44
  Deron Cherry: Uh I mean, if he's making fifty million and they get paid over seventy.
• 48:48
  Deron Cherry: He probably gets that to make a Facebook post.
• 48:51
  Deron Cherry: Right.
• 48:51
  Deron Cherry: Oh yeah, absolutely.
• 48:53
  Deron Cherry: So yeah, it wasn't we weren't making that much money.
• 48:57
  Deron Cherry: So you're playing literally for the love of the game.
• 49:00
  Casi Joy: Right, yeah.
• 49:01
  Casi Joy: Oh man, that makes your story even more special.
• 49:03
  Casi Joy: Like, ugh.
• 49:05
  Casi Joy: Um, so when did you you're not still an ownership in the J Wars, are you?
• 49:11
  Casi Joy: Okay.
• 49:11
  Deron Cherry: We wind up selling it to Shad Khan, who is uh he's the current owner.
• 49:17
  Deron Cherry: Uh I think it's his son that owns the wrestling deal that they have out.
• 49:22
  Casi Joy: Okay.
• 49:23
  Deron Cherry: And uh so we sold it.
• 49:25
  Deron Cherry: Uh I remember walking into a meeting and Mr.
• 49:28
  Deron Cherry: Weaver's wife said, We're selling the team and there's nothing y'all gonna do about it.
• 49:32
  Deron Cherry: So Okay, well good to see you.
• 49:34
  Deron Cherry: Thank you.
• 49:35
  Deron Cherry: Turn right back around.
• 49:36
  Deron Cherry: So, no, it's been good.
• 49:38
  Deron Cherry: I mean, it's it's um it was a good run.
• 49:42
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, had a great time.
• 49:43
  Deron Cherry: I mean, what a cool thing.
• 49:43
  Deron Cherry: He didn't have any kids that he wanted that wanted to continue on in the business.
• 49:48
  Deron Cherry: So I understood that.
• 49:49
  Deron Cherry: I mean, so yeah did okay.
• 49:52
  Casi Joy: So I read a story about someone opening up a gym for kids in your neighborhood when you were growing up and how that influenced your charity work.
• 50:03
  Casi Joy: Um so tell me about kind of how that where that came from.
• 50:07
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, that's um so when I grew up, our little town of Palmyra, you know, it was kind of a suburb, you know, we had Camden, New Jersey, Philadelphia.
• 50:16
  Deron Cherry: I was right across the bridge from Philadelphia.
• 50:18
  Deron Cherry: So it's tough neighborhoods, you know.
• 50:21
  Deron Cherry: You grow up and you know, you're there's always something going on.
• 50:25
  Deron Cherry: Um, and I remember uh we had a janitor at our high school, Mr.
• 50:30
  Deron Cherry: Merle Pratt, and he was a close family friend.
• 50:32
  Deron Cherry: I mean, I spent more time at his house than I probably spent in my own house, right?
• 50:38
  Deron Cherry: Because he had a swimming pool, he wanted to swim, he had a pool table, we go play pool, and um he was the janitor, but he would let us come to the school and play inside and keep us kids safe and keep us out of the streets and keep us from you know doing destructive things to ourselves, right?
• 50:58
  Deron Cherry: And giving us an opportunity to to grow and to to to make something of ourselves.
• 51:04
  Deron Cherry: And he was always positive, always there to support us, you know, he's at every game, you know, always giving us encouraging words and stuff like that.
• 51:14
  Deron Cherry: But I remember him never, never denying us the opportunity to get in the gym, knowing he was gonna have to clean that place up after we left.
• 51:22
  Deron Cherry: He had probably cleaned it once already, and he was gonna have to do it.
• 51:26
  Deron Cherry: So he's getting home late at night, you know.
• 51:29
  Deron Cherry: And um, I never forgot that.
• 51:31
  Deron Cherry: I always thought that, you know, when I got to a point where I could have, you know, a platform to be able to give back, like Mr.
• 51:42
  Deron Cherry: Pratt gave to us and gave us that opportunity, that that's what I would do.
• 51:45
  Deron Cherry: So we set up our foundation and here in Kansas City, and we've been going strong for we're going into our 35th year.
• 51:54
  Deron Cherry: We're actually in our 35th year for our charity this year, but our golf tournament, our big fundraiser, we just finished 34 years.
• 52:02
  Deron Cherry: Next year it'll be 35.
• 52:03
  Deron Cherry: So I mean it's it's we've raised millions of dollars and we're working with a lot of different charitable groups out there now, um, making an impact in our community because it just there's such a need out there, and we want to try to be a gap to be able to help fill those needs that some of these folks that are struggling, yeah, just need a little more support.
• 52:27
  Casi Joy: Yeah.
• 52:28
  Casi Joy: Were you ever able to tell this janitor, Mr.
• 52:33
  Casi Joy: Pratt?
• 52:33
  Casi Joy: Like how much like does he know?
• 52:35
  Deron Cherry: He knows, Mr.
• 52:36
  Deron Cherry: Pratt knows.
• 52:37
  Deron Cherry: He's um as a matter of fact, uh the NFL and the Chiefs did a story on like where they had a series where you are now, and then they went back to my hometown and they interviewed Mr.
• 52:48
  Deron Cherry: Pratt.
• 52:49
  Deron Cherry: And so uh that was to go find that.
• 52:52
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, that was that was that was cool.
• 52:54
  Deron Cherry: They interviewed my old high school coach and interviewed Mr.
• 52:58
  Deron Cherry: Pratt, and it was uh it was nice because um he he did a lot for us kids in that neighborhood.
• 53:05
  Deron Cherry: And we had a close conversation.
• 53:06
  Casi Joy: And it seems like for nothing in return, not knowing how much of a huge impact it was gonna make.
• 53:13
  Deron Cherry: And I tell everybody, you know, you never know where that impact comes from.
• 53:19
  Deron Cherry: And here it is, you know, we say it all the time, you know, you don't have to be some millionaire, billionaire to have an impact on somebody's life.
• 53:29
  Deron Cherry: For me, it was this high school janitor that had the impact in my life, and my pal football coach when I was nine years old, and he made that statement to me, a statement that I live by live by today.
• 53:43
  Deron Cherry: Uh so there's all types types of people they come from all different diverse backgrounds that can be.
• 53:50
  Casi Joy: And it's sometimes just small acts that make a huge difference that you know kids don't ever forget.
• 53:54
  Casi Joy: That's right, that's right.
• 53:55
  Casi Joy: I love these feel-good stories.
• 53:58
  Casi Joy: Um, so and I also read that back in um in the Chiefs days that you would donate to um cystic fibrosis every tackle.
• 54:12
  Deron Cherry: Every tackle we donate.
• 54:14
  Casi Joy: Yeah, where did that inspiration come from?
• 54:15
  Casi Joy: Like for that specific cause.
• 54:17
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, just from you know, understanding that you have a platform and you can do some things that can help a lot of people in in ways that are going unnoticed, right?
• 54:29
  Deron Cherry: You know, because I got involved in a lot of different charities.
• 54:33
  Deron Cherry: It wasn't just Sister Fibrosis, but you know, the United Negro College Fund.
• 54:37
  Deron Cherry: We did stuff with them.
• 54:39
  Deron Cherry: Um, we did stuff with um you know, boys and and girls' clubs, 'cause my sister used to work for them.
• 54:46
  Deron Cherry: Um and we did stuff for a l I mean, the one thing that I was so blessed was the fact that I was here in Kansas City and so many of the players would get involved in community uh activities.
• 55:03
  Deron Cherry: They would be involved with a charity and you know, we had you know, Nick Lowry, kick for Nick, Bill Moss had his charity, Art Still, um, Derek Thomas had to be a lot of things.
• 55:16
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, with Neil Smith.
• 55:17
  Deron Cherry: They, you know, so we would all support each other, and you when you see the impact that you can make with working with some of these groups, and the Chiefs allowed us to do that, um, you know, you can't say no to that because you know you're helping so many.
• 55:36
  Deron Cherry: I mean, we just honored a really good friend of mine, Vinny Vicero, and Vinny, when I was playing, ran the dream factory.
• 55:44
  Deron Cherry: So he used to bring a kid in that had cancer, um, and we would show him around the locker room before the game, and they'd take him out on the field during warm-ups, and then after the game, we'd bring them into the locker room, and we did that.
• 55:58
  Deron Cherry: I mean, for years we did that.
• 56:00
  Deron Cherry: We'd have a kid that their wish was, hey, I want to come to an NFL game and meet some players, and we did that.
• 56:07
  Deron Cherry: So, you know, he received our first community award.
• 56:10
  Deron Cherry: He has since passed, he died this past year.
• 56:13
  Deron Cherry: But to honor his legacy and what he meant, you know, we we're naming this award after him, and every year we're gonna give it to somebody deserving in the community, um, that uh kind of reflected the the heart and the spirit of Vinny Vicero.
• 56:30
  Casi Joy: Man, that's so cool.
• 56:32
  Casi Joy: So what's next for like I saw that your foundation um has been giving back for decades and it's expanding um that work with Care for KC grants.
• 56:45
  Casi Joy: Um what's next?
• 56:48
  Deron Cherry: So we want to expand and grow on our grant program.
• 56:52
  Deron Cherry: We're still supporting those three main charities that we have answering the call, which is first responders, uh, in conjunction with Ronnie Dumit uh over in Lee Summit.
• 57:03
  Deron Cherry: Uh we have Camp Quality that we support.
• 57:06
  Deron Cherry: We send those kids that have cancer to camp for a week up at Lake Bower.
• 57:10
  Deron Cherry: And then we have uh Score One for Health, which is our original program with Kansas City University, which is the osteopathic college here in town, where we do all of our health screenings every year.
• 57:23
  Deron Cherry: We're not only here in the Kansas City area, but we're down in Joplin because they have a university down there.
• 57:28
  Deron Cherry: So we're screening 13,000 plus kids a year and making sure that they're healthy as they start their career in education.
• 57:36
  Deron Cherry: Uh, we think it's so important that our kids know what it feels like to be healthy.
• 57:41
  Deron Cherry: So, regardless of their socioeconomic background, we at least can give them a foundation where they can build it in education, but in order to do that, they got to be healthy.
• 57:50
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, feel good.
• 57:51
  Deron Cherry: And so we we want to make sure that those kids at least have that opportunity.
• 57:56
  Deron Cherry: So we've been working with the university for 35 years on this program.
• 58:00
  Deron Cherry: Um and so we're we're continuing to grow that, we're continuing to find more ways that we can be helpful.
• 58:09
  Deron Cherry: Like we have a program where we we gave like 700 kids glasses, right?
• 58:14
  Deron Cherry: Like a one-day event where they go into the university and we have an organization that comes in, and the kids that need glasses, they get them right there, and then so we're we're trying to do those things, and then like I said, the grant program.
• 58:27
  Deron Cherry: There are so many non-for-profits here in Kansas City, smaller ones, not the big ones we hear about all the time, but smaller ones that just need, you know, whether it's a thousand dollars or twenty five hundred dollars, that can make a huge impact in what they're doing and how they're helping people in Kansas City.
• 58:45
  Deron Cherry: So we want to continue to grow that part of our foundation.
• 58:50
  Casi Joy: Hmm.
• 58:50
  Casi Joy: Man, you guys are doing a lot of stuff.
• 58:53
  Casi Joy: That is really cool.
• 58:55
  Casi Joy: Is there where can like do you can people get involved in the city?org, they can go on there and there's a site.
• 59:03
  Deron Cherry: I mean, if you want to volunteer, we have volunteer and we have a lot of different activities going on throughout the course of the year.
• 59:10
  Deron Cherry: So we have a podcast coming up this week uh at Ameristar.
• 59:15
  Deron Cherry: We've got our guests, will be Bill Miles, will be one of the guests, Tim Grunhart will be another one.
• 59:20
  Deron Cherry: I'm trying to get Bobby Bell to come.
• 59:22
  Deron Cherry: Okay, but we're doing a podcast, and that's um uh gonna be um something that the the charity benefits from.
• 59:31
  Deron Cherry: We're also, I think, in November time, we don't have the date yet, but um we have a huge partnership with Target, and uh they've been really a great blessing for us where you know as they change out the seasons and they have to get rid of the inventory, we're able to take that inventory and and spread it out around the Kansas City community to charitable organizations that need whatever it is we're able to, you know, get from them.
• 1:00:01
  Deron Cherry: So we're gonna have a big giveaway.
• 1:00:03
  Deron Cherry: Uh last year we did it, we had like 35 non-for-profits that came.
• 1:00:08
  Deron Cherry: It was clothes, it was food, it was um baby furniture, car seats, it was everything we were able to give away to these non-for-profits.
• 1:00:17
  Deron Cherry: And so we're looking to do that again in conjunction with the Maristar Casino.
• 1:00:22
  Deron Cherry: They've come on and been a partner now, and so we're we're pretty excited about where we can go with that partnership and relationship as well.
• 1:00:30
  Casi Joy: Yeah.
• 1:00:30
  Casi Joy: All right.
• 1:00:31
  Casi Joy: So Daroncher Foundation.org.org.
• 1:00:34
  Casi Joy: All right, check it out, people.
• 1:00:36
  Casi Joy: So let's talk a little bit.
• 1:00:37
  Casi Joy: I've just got a few more questions for you.
• 1:00:39
  Casi Joy: Um, I want to talk about like the NFL then versus today, besides the pay.
• 1:00:45
  Casi Joy: Yeah, yeah.
• 1:00:46
  Casi Joy: So a lot has changed clearly since you played.
• 1:00:50
  Casi Joy: What is something that players got away with back then that like would not fly today?
• 1:00:55
  Deron Cherry: Oh, just the nature of the hits.
• 1:00:57
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 1:00:58
  Deron Cherry: Uh yeah.
• 1:00:59
  Deron Cherry: I mean Oh yeah, now that we found out like Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 1:01:02
  Deron Cherry: Concussions, it's like, I mean, you could, you know, you could use your helmet, you could hit, you know, I mean, you were taught to face them up, but now you can't have that helmet to helmet contact anymore.
• 1:01:14
  Deron Cherry: Uh which is great because I think it protects guys from serious injury, and there's no question about that.
• 1:01:21
  Deron Cherry: Um what's changed um, you know, from a player safety standpoint is really where the biggest difference has been.
• 1:01:30
  Deron Cherry: Because football's the same.
• 1:01:31
  Deron Cherry: It's blocking and tackling and making plays.
• 1:01:34
  Deron Cherry: I mean, guys I wouldn't say, well, I would say that because in high school now they have so much better facilities, right?
• 1:01:44
  Deron Cherry: Better weight rooms and stuff.
• 1:01:46
  Deron Cherry: So players are getting bigger, stronger, and faster.
• 1:01:48
  Deron Cherry: You're seeing bigger guys that can run faster, right?
• 1:01:51
  Deron Cherry: And so that that's a difference um in the league, but it's just a whole practice schedule now, you know.
• 1:01:59
  Deron Cherry: It's like training camp.
• 1:02:01
  Deron Cherry: You only get one practice.
• 1:02:02
  Deron Cherry: I remember when we were going to training camp, you know, we would have three hour practices, three a day, yeah, sometimes.
• 1:02:10
  Deron Cherry: And now you're only allowed to have one practice, it can only last two and a half hours, and then if you have a second practice, it has to be walkthrough.
• 1:02:18
  Deron Cherry: You can't run, you can't do anything.
• 1:02:20
  Deron Cherry: Why?
• 1:02:20
  Deron Cherry: Just because injury risk or from and it's part of the negotiation between the players' union and and the clubs since they've added more games to the schedule.
• 1:02:32
  Deron Cherry: Uh so that's different.
• 1:02:33
  Deron Cherry: That's that's changed.
• 1:02:35
  Deron Cherry: Um, and I think for the benefit of players from a health standpoint.
• 1:02:39
  Deron Cherry: And now, like you said, you get a concussion, you know, they're taking you off the field, you gotta pass a test before you get back on.
• 1:02:47
  Deron Cherry: In our day it was the finger test.
• 1:02:49
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 1:02:50
  Deron Cherry: Foul the finger, yeah.
• 1:02:52
  Deron Cherry: How many fingers am I holding up?
• 1:02:54
  Casi Joy: Five, sure, get back in.
• 1:02:56
  Deron Cherry: That's right.
• 1:02:56
  Deron Cherry: So, you know, that's changed, and you know, so I think the league has gotten better, and and I'll give the league credit.
• 1:03:03
  Deron Cherry: They're at least reaching back and trying to support the players that came up um prior to this group now that has so many more benefits than players, even the players that came before me.
• 1:03:16
  Deron Cherry: I mean, you know, you want to try to reach back to them too, the Bobby Bells of the world and those folks that you know, they didn't have anything, you know.
• 1:03:25
  Deron Cherry: I mean, literally nothing, and you know, their pensions were, you know, literally next to nothing.
• 1:03:32
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 1:03:32
  Deron Cherry: So you wanna you wanna root for the leg to, you know, look at those guys and try to help those guys out as much as possible too.
• 1:03:42
  Casi Joy: Yeah.
• 1:03:42
  Casi Joy: Um, what is your I've been excited to ask this one, what is your favorite uniform combo that the Chiefs today wear?
• 1:03:52
  Deron Cherry: Wow, that's a good one.
• 1:03:54
  Deron Cherry: I remember where it was just red pants, white tops.
• 1:03:59
  Deron Cherry: Uh-huh.
• 1:03:59
  Deron Cherry: White pants, red tops.
• 1:04:02
  Deron Cherry: Yep, and just yeah, and then I remember when we wore all white one game.
• 1:04:08
  Deron Cherry: That's my favorite.
• 1:04:10
  Deron Cherry: I think it just looks so crispy.
• 1:04:12
  Deron Cherry: The all-white looks good.
• 1:04:14
  Deron Cherry: Um I kind of liked because our colors in high school were red, red and black, and white.
• 1:04:23
  Deron Cherry: And so I kind of liked when we had like we wore all red.
• 1:04:28
  Deron Cherry: That's my husband's favorite, is red on red.
• 1:04:30
  Deron Cherry: Red pants, red, red pants.
• 1:04:32
  Deron Cherry: It's a little loud for me, I think.
• 1:04:33
  Deron Cherry: It's a little loud, but for one game a year, it's okay.
• 1:04:37
  Deron Cherry: But I will tell you this um of all the teams in the National Football League, the Chiefs have not changed at all.
• 1:04:50
  Deron Cherry: No, you know, it's so classic, it's so like it doesn't need to change because you know, regardless of what it is, you know, because there's people say, well, why don't they have yellow jerseys, right?
• 1:05:03
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, you know, you can like how some teams are getting like neon and neon and stuff like that.
• 1:05:08
  Deron Cherry: And you know, I give Clark Hunt a lot of credit that they haven't, you know, bowed to, you know, popular demand.
• 1:05:17
  Deron Cherry: Like on outside of that, they could have different um, you know, combinations to sell to the fans and stuff like that.
• 1:05:25
  Deron Cherry: But as far as the team.
• 1:05:27
  Casi Joy: My husband has a black Mahomes jersey and it looks pretty slick.
• 1:05:31
  Deron Cherry: And I do think like for a one-off game for the Chiefs to wear with the white pants, or like yeah, black with red on black or yes, black on black with the black.
• 1:05:40
  Deron Cherry: That would just look me.
• 1:05:41
  Deron Cherry: With the red helmet and the black helmet.
• 1:05:44
  Casi Joy: All right, do you have someone you can call?
• 1:05:47
  Deron Cherry: I doubt if they'll do it.
• 1:05:48
  Deron Cherry: I mean, Lamar was you know, going back to Lamar, he was pretty traditional type of guy, so I don't know if we'll ever see that.
• 1:05:56
  Casi Joy: Yeah, well, here's hoping.
• 1:05:57
  Casi Joy: Okay.
• 1:05:58
  Casi Joy: Um Last question that as a musician, this is a very important question for me.
• 1:06:05
  Casi Joy: Who what was your guys' like pump up jam music like in the locker room back in your era?
• 1:06:11
  Casi Joy: Like, was it like 80s hip hop or was it like deaf leopards?
• 1:06:17
  Deron Cherry: It was always hip hop.
• 1:06:17
  Deron Cherry: It was some some form of hip hop.
• 1:06:20
  Deron Cherry: Uh and mostly, most of the time back in our day, most of the guys had their own music.
• 1:06:26
  Deron Cherry: So everybody was individual.
• 1:06:28
  Deron Cherry: You had your your own.
• 1:06:29
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, you had your walkman, and everybody's listening to their own music.
• 1:06:34
  Deron Cherry: You know, some guys had that headbanging music, they get them ready.
• 1:06:37
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, listening to like Pantera.
• 1:06:39
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 1:06:40
  Deron Cherry: I was more, you know, yeah, I liked hip hop, but you know, I just like good, you know, upbeat music.
• 1:06:48
  Deron Cherry: It didn't matter what it was, just as long as it kind of got you pumped up and you know, got you hyped for the game and you know, but to be honest with you, just being out there got you hyped up.
• 1:07:02
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 1:07:02
  Deron Cherry: And we used to always, you know, we'd always want to hear good music in the stadium before you know when we were warming up.
• 1:07:10
  Deron Cherry: That was the thing, you know, to hear that good music that's out there that get you pumped up and stuff like that.
• 1:07:16
  Deron Cherry: Cause you'll go through warm-ups and you get tired, you know, because your your adrenaline's going and you got uh so much you're thinking about.
• 1:07:25
  Deron Cherry: But yeah.
• 1:07:26
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, that any good music like that.
• 1:07:29
  Deron Cherry: Music can really do a lot for but now what's changed, you know, they got music at practice now, you know.
• 1:07:36
  Deron Cherry: They Yeah.
• 1:07:36
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, you know, it's like, okay, we want to simulate crowd noise.
• 1:07:40
  Deron Cherry: Let's bump into some music.
• 1:07:41
  Deron Cherry: So now they got they got the good tunes at practice, which is nice.
• 1:07:45
  Casi Joy: Oh my gosh.
• 1:07:46
  Casi Joy: Well, Daron, thank you so much for joining us for this episode.
• 1:07:51
  Casi Joy: Your story is like just I feel like you should come out with like um words of affirmation app or something, like just to get the kids going and inspired because you're just a total inspiration of just betting on yourself and not giving up.
• 1:08:09
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 1:08:10
  Casi Joy: Um, so the people can check out um your involvement in the community with drawn cherry foundation.org.
• 1:08:18
  Casi Joy: Yep.
• 1:08:18
  Casi Joy: Um, do you want me to follow you on I couldn't find.
• 1:08:21
  Casi Joy: Do you not have an Instagram?
• 1:08:23
  Deron Cherry: I don't.
• 1:08:24
  Casi Joy: How is a girl supposed to do her research?
• 1:08:26
  Casi Joy: I couldn't even figure out what you eat for dinner.
• 1:08:29
  Casi Joy: I don't know.
• 1:08:29
  Casi Joy: You're not even posting.
• 1:08:31
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, I'm I'm starting to post a little bit.
• 1:08:34
  Casi Joy: Uh I found your foundation's Instagram.
• 1:08:37
  Casi Joy: Yeah.
• 1:08:37
  Casi Joy: And I was like, he's really not posting about what he does every weekend.
• 1:08:40
  Casi Joy: How dare he?
• 1:08:41
  Deron Cherry: Yeah, I know.
• 1:08:42
  Casi Joy: How's a girl supposed to research?
• 1:08:44
  Deron Cherry: I know.
• 1:08:44
  Deron Cherry: I try to I try to blend in on the weekends when I'm at home because I spend a lot of time with family and um, you know, we we we we're in church a lot, so that's that's important to us.
• 1:08:58
  Deron Cherry: So we're always doing something.
• 1:09:00
  Deron Cherry: Um we got a big program coming up this weekend at our church, it's Fall Balooza.
• 1:09:05
  Deron Cherry: Oh, yeah.
• 1:09:05
  Deron Cherry: And so I go to Summit Park Church in Lee Summit.
• 1:09:08
  Deron Cherry: Okay.
• 1:09:08
  Deron Cherry: So for all the folks that want to come out this Sunday, they can, you know, come out and we've got games and all kinds of stuff.
• 1:09:17
  Deron Cherry: I'll be out there and just hanging out, and it it'll be a great time.
• 1:09:22
  Casi Joy: All right, very cool.
• 1:09:23
  Casi Joy: Yeah, well, thank you so much for coming on sharing your story.
• 1:09:27
  Deron Cherry: Yeah.
• 1:09:28
  Casi Joy: And thank you guys for tuning in to another episode of Custom Conversations.
• 1:09:33
  Casi Joy: Don't forget to like, subscribe, share, star, rate.
• 1:09:36
  Casi Joy: Anything you can do to help us rate a little bit higher in that algorithm, we'd sure appreciate it.
• 1:09:41
  Casi Joy: And um don't forget to get your Chiefs tickets at ticketsmarter.com.
• 1:09:46
  Casi Joy: And we're also going to have uh Daron Cherry, we had him autograph a ton of cards uh that we're gonna be doing a giveaway.
• 1:09:53
  Casi Joy: We're gonna put all the details in the caption because we just decided this.
• 1:09:56
  Casi Joy: Um, and we've got some other really cool giveaways from some Chiefs players that um all those details will be in the caption, so check it out below.
• 1:10:04
  Casi Joy: We'll put it here ish right here.
• 1:10:06
  Casi Joy: All right, thank you guys so much.
• 1:10:08
  Casi Joy: This has been Custom Conversations.