Latest / Boundary Corner Podcast / Right Man Wrong Time

Transcript

Right Man Wrong Time · Boundary Corner Podcast

• 1:47
  And welcome back to the Boundary Corner Podcast, a part of the
• 1:50
  College Huddle Network. Along with my partner, Brian
• 1:53
  Siegler, I'm Curtis Wilson, and this episode is brought to you
• 1:56
  by Doctor Jeremy Counts down at the Counts Family Pharmacy, your
• 2:00
  friendly neighborhood pharmacy, three O 1 S Main St. in
• 2:03
  Blacksburg. We are also brought to you by
• 2:06
  Moments on the Mori. Are you looking for a weekend
• 2:09
  getaway but still want to make it to Blacksburg for the game?
• 2:12
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• 2:15
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• 2:24
  or in the river right outside your back door.
• 2:26
  So check out the links in our comments section or at Instagram
• 2:30
  at Moments on the Morgue. Brian, we got a couple very
• 2:34
  special guests on tonight for a very special episode.
• 2:38
  So let's bring in our first guest.
• 2:40
  She is the wonderful wife of Our Music Man and the editor of the
• 2:45
  Roanoke Magazine. Long time friend of ours
• 2:50
  colleague. Long.
• 2:51
  Time. Long time.
• 2:53
  Liz. Long How are you, Liz?
• 2:58
  I'm well, how are you guys? Oh, doing so good, doing so
• 3:02
  good. We appreciate you coming on with
• 3:04
  us tonight. And it's it's a special night.
• 3:06
  I feel like this is this has been something that we've been
• 3:08
  really excited about and we've been talking about for a couple
• 3:10
  weeks now. So very excited to bring it to
• 3:12
  fruition. Well, thank you guys for having
• 3:14
  me and of course for having our guest that you're going to
• 3:16
  introduce here in a minute. Really appreciate the time and
• 3:19
  really excited to chat about what's going on for this
• 3:21
  episode. So when the article we're going
• 3:24
  to be discussing tonight, when will folks down in the New River
• 3:28
  Valley, those who have the role in Okra magazine, when will they
• 3:30
  see this? So it should be hitting
• 3:32
  subscriber mailboxes later on this week, so August 18th
• 3:36
  through the 21st typically as your USPS man arrives at your
• 3:39
  doorstep. And then of course, they'll be
• 3:40
  hitting news stands over the next week or two over that.
• 3:42
  So by the 1st week of September, you should be able to go to all
• 3:45
  your local spots, not only your Barnes and Nobles and your
• 3:48
  Kroger's, but also Crystal Spring Grocery.
• 3:50
  You've got your Barnes and Noble and Christiansburg, of course in
• 3:52
  New River Valley. We're also going to have some
• 3:54
  special places in the New River Valley and Blacksburg that are
• 3:56
  carrying it for us, especially for this particular issue.
• 3:59
  So we'll list all that stuff on our website and we'll be sure to
• 4:02
  share that cuz we're gonna have this episode on our website too
• 4:05
  and make sure to link everything for people.
• 4:07
  We appreciate that. I did not know we were gonna be
• 4:09
  on the website, Ron, we're gonna be on the website.
• 4:12
  We're gonna be on the website, man, that's gonna be cool.
• 4:15
  So before we bring rolling on to kind of talk through what this
• 4:18
  is all about, let's let's let's throw the cover up here.
• 4:23
  Yeah, it's. So exciting.
• 4:25
  It's such a great cover. I'm so proud of this one.
• 4:27
  We just got a sample today in our office.
• 4:29
  I'm holding my hands now. This photo and the photos inside
• 4:32
  that you're going to see in the feature are by the fabulous
• 4:34
  Aaron Spicer. He's a local photographer here
• 4:36
  in Ronan, Virginia, and he does photography all over.
• 4:39
  He has photographed so many amazing people.
• 4:41
  And so we're very, very lucky that he not only has the time
• 4:45
  and love for his local magazine, his local city magazine, but of
• 4:47
  course for the time and the effort and all the skill that
• 4:50
  went into photographing Coach Pry and, and the amazing work
• 4:52
  that you're going to see I see inside this issue.
• 4:58
  It's exciting stuff. And I mean, I know when we got a
• 5:01
  little bit of an early sample there and got to take a look at
• 5:03
  what was going on in preparation for this and really a whole lot
• 5:07
  of insight and it looks like a whole lot of work behind the
• 5:09
  scenes that go into this thing that you put out every month.
• 5:13
  Yeah, so what's very interesting about the magazine world,
• 5:16
  especially in terms of the Roanoke magazine, we're
• 5:18
  bimonthly, which means it is a, you know, it's a 2 month issue,
• 5:21
  so we have to plan pretty far in advance.
• 5:23
  I actually tend to plan on editorial about a year in
• 5:25
  advance. So that gives you any idea of
• 5:28
  how long I've been wanting this story to come to fruition.
• 5:31
  And so to give a little background, you know, obviously
• 5:33
  we live here in Roanoke, VA. We're surrounded by, you know,
• 5:35
  Virginia Tech Hokies and just the love that all of the fans
• 5:38
  have for the school and the team and especially the football
• 5:41
  team. And so it's very easy for us to
• 5:44
  think about, you know, how college football is going to go
• 5:46
  around here because go ACC, right?
• 5:48
  So we thinking about the magazine.
• 5:51
  We've been around for 52 years and we have covered Virginia
• 5:53
  Tech football as well as other Virginia Tech sports and of
• 5:56
  course, regional sports. But we have covered Coach
• 5:58
  Beamer. He's been on our cover at least
• 6:00
  once or twice. We've had all sorts of different
• 6:03
  opportunities to interview and cover the many, many years of
• 6:07
  great Virginia Tech football. So about a year ago, I believe,
• 6:10
  honest to God, I think we we're sitting here watching your
• 6:13
  podcast and I started thinking about Virginia Tech football and
• 6:15
  the way you guys were talking about it.
• 6:18
  I am a fan, of course, I love sports, but I don't necessarily
• 6:21
  get the statistics the way you do.
• 6:22
  But you know, what I can do is I can figure out how to tell a
• 6:24
  story. So I figured I would really love
• 6:26
  to dive in, not only to coach pride and the football team, but
• 6:30
  you know, Jason and you guys and everybody's been talking about
• 6:32
  the NIL and how all this comes together in terms of a national
• 6:35
  story. And so when I was thinking about
• 6:38
  how to do this story, there was literally, I'm not even joking,
• 6:41
  literally really no other writer in this world that I would
• 6:44
  rather have write this piece than Mr. Roland Lazenby.
• 6:46
  Not only because of his background and just the prolific
• 6:50
  writing that he's able to do, but he's a local.
• 6:52
  He knows the stories. He literally has worked in
• 6:55
  communications, you know, and sports writing for, for decades
• 6:58
  for Virginia Tech, for our region.
• 7:00
  And so he was the one and only choice.
• 7:02
  And thank goodness because he was so gracious in taking this
• 7:05
  piece on and being able to do it in the midst of his busy
• 7:07
  schedule between documentaries and sports writing and
• 7:10
  magazines. So he's just not only a
• 7:13
  wonderful sports writer and a great friend of mine, but just
• 7:15
  really generous with his time. So huge shout out to him for
• 7:18
  covering this piece. And I'm happy to talk more about
• 7:21
  the article. But he's going to be such a
• 7:22
  wonderful interview and I can't wait for your leader, listeners
• 7:25
  and readers and and viewers to meet him and to learn more about
• 7:28
  him. Absolutely, Liz.
• 7:33
  And you know, seeing the work already.
• 7:34
  We we got a sneak preview to it. The article was unbelievable.
• 7:37
  We just spent a few minutes backstage with Roland.
• 7:42
  So we look forward to it. And again, we really appreciate
• 7:45
  you getting us this straight up getting us this, because I don't
• 7:50
  know if we would have landed in any other way if one of a guy
• 7:54
  I've known since elementary school's wife had not gotten
• 7:58
  with Roland and running this unbelievable article.
• 8:01
  So we thank you for all of that. And we, I don't know, it's, it's
• 8:06
  tough to say because, you know, little connections in the world
• 8:09
  go a long way. Right.
• 8:11
  I feel like it's Prismet truly. And, and really I, I think that
• 8:14
  this story is so important, not again, not only in terms of
• 8:17
  Virginia Tech football, but the NIL applies to every college
• 8:21
  across the nation, right? All college athletes, their,
• 8:23
  their families, the teammates, the staff and sports and
• 8:26
  coaches, everybody that's working together is involved in
• 8:29
  this story in some way. And so this is not just a
• 8:32
  regional story, it is a national story.
• 8:34
  And again, what better persons tell this story and to care more
• 8:37
  about his insights and Roland Lazenby perfection.
• 8:42
  All right. Well, that's Brian.
• 8:44
  Yeah, let's Liz. Talked him up twice.
• 8:47
  Let's let's do a little introduction and bring him in
• 8:49
  here. All right, Liz, we appreciate
• 8:51
  the time spending with you tonight.
• 8:53
  Yes, thank you. I hope readers can pick up a
• 8:54
  copy as soon as possible. You're really going to enjoy
• 8:56
  this story. And thank you so much for
• 8:57
  supporting your local city magazine, your favorite college
• 9:00
  football podcast, and of course, just readership in general.
• 9:03
  We really appreciate your support.
• 9:04
  Thank you. And go, Hokies, obviously go.
• 9:06
  Hokies. All right, well, again, without
• 9:11
  further ado, let's let's let's bring him on.
• 9:12
  It's Roland Lazenby, member of the Department of Communication
• 9:16
  at both Virginia Tech and Radford, writer of more than
• 9:20
  five dozen books on basketball and football, including works on
• 9:23
  the Final Four, the Showtime Lakers, the 90s, Bulls, Colt
• 9:29
  Legend, Johnny U, Tom Brady and of course, the the run of late
• 9:34
  with Jerry West, Kobe Bryant, and wrote the book on the life
• 9:39
  of Michael Jordan. Here he is, guys.
• 9:43
  Rolling lays at me. Boy, that was tough.
• 9:46
  She, you know, there's too many people around here that know me.
• 9:57
  Anyway, she is sweet. Yeah, this is great.
• 10:01
  Again, we, we, we've known Liz for a while and she's definitely
• 10:04
  one of the best people that there is out there.
• 10:06
  A while we've known her 20 plus years, college, college
• 10:10
  classmates, married again, one of our good friends and Roland.
• 10:14
  Before we even start the questions and let you unload
• 10:17
  here, thank you for a giving us your time.
• 10:22
  But I think, yeah, I tell you man, I sell autographs too for a
• 10:25
  dollar. So you guys are keeping me from
• 10:29
  my fortune. There we go.
• 10:32
  But but but also, I think in the coming weeks here, thank you for
• 10:35
  writing this piece because I think you're going to be under
• 10:37
  uncovering a lot for Hokie Nation and things.
• 10:39
  Maybe the way again, we've gotten Privy to the article
• 10:43
  already, the way it was written, I think some eyes are going to
• 10:46
  open up about what's going on with the future of NIL transfer
• 10:51
  portal and just college sports in general.
• 10:53
  And Speaking of that, let's let's kick it right off.
• 10:57
  The collegiate arms race has completely changed.
• 10:59
  It used to be the best facilities, the nice jerseys,
• 11:03
  the swag packages, boosters dropping thousands of dollars in
• 11:07
  kids cars and that's where they went to school because that's
• 11:11
  who gave them the money. And now we're compensation is
• 11:15
  pay or play. When all of this started coming
• 11:19
  downhill, you've been writing sports books.
• 11:23
  You mentioned you know you were Georgetown in 85 when they cost
• 11:27
  you some money with a book deal. But as you started seeing this
• 11:31
  come down, what is just your thought on the change of college
• 11:37
  sports in general with the with the thought of NIL?
• 11:42
  Well, as we all know, college sports has been all sports has
• 11:46
  changed dramatically constantly over a century and a half.
• 11:51
  However long you want to take spectator sports in America
• 11:53
  back, you know, I've written a lot of books.
• 11:57
  I wrote a history of Virginia Tech football in 86.
• 12:01
  And the program had cratered right then.
• 12:04
  So I think it may be sold 1000 copies.
• 12:07
  I don't know. And but it left me determined
• 12:10
  that whatever I did in life, I was going to try to write books
• 12:12
  and had a chance of selling. And of course, right in the
• 12:17
  cratering of the Bill Dooley era and some of the gross
• 12:21
  miscalculations there, here comes Frankie Beamer there.
• 12:26
  We go. And you know, I've, I've, I have
• 12:29
  to say, I've had a lot of fun riding for the Roanoke or over
• 12:33
  the years. Probably the most involving
• 12:42
  story for me was writing about Frank's family.
• 12:47
  They, they, you know, he explained to me one night in the
• 12:51
  hallway that they were the Allens who shot up the
• 12:56
  courthouse in Carroll County, New York Times.
• 13:01
  All of that and, and the stain on his family and his mother,
• 13:07
  Herma, her brother, Frank's uncle, who championed him.
• 13:11
  And so his uncle finally things got to him.
• 13:15
  He committed suicide when Frank was a junior at Virginia Tech.
• 13:21
  And so it's a very hard story, but a very important story is
• 13:27
  The Who Frank was. And this came out years ago on
• 13:30
  the Roanoke are but the Roanoke has given me nice opportunity to
• 13:35
  to do stories that matter to me and Virginia Tech does.
• 13:40
  I went to VMI because I hated Virginia Tech and you know, I
• 13:46
  was helping my old man put insulation in the ceiling of a
• 13:50
  cabin we had and listening to the 1969 Tech VMI game.
• 14:00
  And the year before Tech had wax BMI 70 to 10 and VMI or 70 to
• 14:09
  12. It was 70 to 12 and VMI won in
• 14:14
  6912 to 10. And not only did I, I had it's
• 14:19
  the only college I applied to. I had terrible grades and but I
• 14:23
  got in, I had good boards. But anyway, I got to play
• 14:28
  football at VMI as a walk on and so that I was tell my grandsons
• 14:33
  that was my Super Bowl, but also getting to play, I believe in
• 14:37
  the last Shrine game between the back then freshmen weren't
• 14:42
  eligible. We scrimmaged varsity four days
• 14:46
  a week, but to scrimmage against the Tech football team and, and
• 14:52
  you know, we arrived in one bus, We had like 45 on the roster and
• 14:56
  Tech gave I believe 90. Scott, there was no limit on
• 15:01
  scholarships and Tech soaked up every available player.
• 15:08
  That's one reason I'm sure I was a walk on and they had, they
• 15:13
  gave something like 90 freshman scholarship that year.
• 15:17
  So it it was an object lesson to me in the the great lust of the
• 15:24
  Hokies for what would you call it, prominence, dominance, I
• 15:31
  don't know, but they've always had that.
• 15:33
  And of course, I taught at Tech 11 years from 99 pivotal years
• 15:42
  in the terms of the program. I taught there full time from 99
• 15:47
  to 2010. And I taught media writing to,
• 15:51
  you know, 120 sophomores a year a semester.
• 15:56
  So I, I, I love Tech. I was there through the
• 15:58
  difficult times. But the important thing is the
• 16:03
  whole dynamic that everyone knows.
• 16:06
  I mean, what a wonderful thing to have Metallica.
• 16:12
  That was a religious experience. Yes, it was.
• 16:16
  And you know, the first team, they had a concert to raise
• 16:24
  money for the first very first team.
• 16:26
  Faculty members, wife of soprano gave a concert and they gave all
• 16:30
  the proceeds to the football team.
• 16:32
  So there's tradition there. And you know, the early days,
• 16:37
  everybody showed up in horse and buggies with the school colors.
• 16:40
  I don't think they were Chicago maroon and burnt orange at
• 16:45
  first, but I could be wrong. Black and Gray, black, black
• 16:48
  and. Gray if I.
• 16:49
  Recall, Yeah. And so this runs deep in the
• 16:56
  Southwest Virginia hills that we all love.
• 17:00
  This is serious business and the economy.
• 17:04
  I mean, Virginia Tech is such a generator from all the medical
• 17:10
  apparatus and research and operation in Roanoke.
• 17:16
  Just so many things so important to this state.
• 17:21
  And yet, you know, I'm in. I've edited Lindy's pro
• 17:25
  basketball annual and Al Birmingham for 31 years now few
• 17:33
  years back, Lindy who owns a he's a he's a lawyer who never
• 17:38
  practiced law. He publishes.
• 17:41
  He's University of Alabama graduate and he had me come.
• 17:46
  He says you've never seen anything like this.
• 17:48
  I said Lindy, I'm I'm really had a lucky life covering the NBA
• 17:53
  and spent the 90s with the Bulls.
• 17:55
  What are you talking about? I go down there, I've never seen
• 17:59
  anything like the University of Alabama.
• 18:02
  You know, they got acres and acres of tailgating.
• 18:06
  It's I mean, it would make Tex Saturday look like a country
• 18:11
  picnic. It is huge.
• 18:14
  I mean, you the scope of it and you know, they have maximized
• 18:21
  the whole football mojo thing in terms of out of state tuition.
• 18:28
  They they rake in 10's and 10s of millions a year to the point
• 18:34
  and they're all there to coast sitting at football stadium on
• 18:38
  Saturdays to the point that 50% of their students at the
• 18:43
  University of Alabama are from some place other than Alabama.
• 18:48
  They have more out of state tuition than in state tuition.
• 18:52
  Now Virginia Tech has always been, it's had a a long term
• 18:59
  tie. You know Hank Crisp, Virginia
• 19:04
  Tech's one arm football player from back in the 20s Hank Crisp
• 19:09
  coached at Alabama for years. Frank Mosley was Bear Bryant's
• 19:14
  roommate, Frank Mosley who was the coach and then the AD at
• 19:19
  Tech and Alabama and Virginia Tech went at each other.
• 19:26
  And so Virginia Tech with Vick's appearance in 99 right when I I
• 19:32
  started teaching there. Man, that mojo of that out of
• 19:38
  state tuition, which is vital in this age.
• 19:43
  Higher education is challenged like never before.
• 19:48
  And I don't want to get into the political factors of that, but
• 19:52
  it is challenged for a variety of reasons.
• 19:55
  And Virginia Tech has a sweet mojo.
• 20:00
  People love to come down there and get crazy.
• 20:03
  They love to jump up and down. They like to do that whole
• 20:06
  thing. ESPN loves to put it on their
• 20:09
  broadcast. It is a mojo.
• 20:12
  Those kids see it, and that's sweet.
• 20:15
  That booger fat out of state tuition helps drive the whole
• 20:22
  thing. And if you can do all that
• 20:28
  jumping around, if you will make all that noise and get all that
• 20:33
  brouhaha going, you got to have you a football team.
• 20:38
  There we go and it is what what the price tag come up.
• 20:50
  We're looking at, Wit said today He needs another what, 6570
• 20:55
  million on top of the 122 that he's already got for the for the
• 21:00
  program. Well, he's running a pro sports
• 21:04
  franchise like every every other school is and that is not you
• 21:09
  know, if you had that kind of money somebody when I was
• 21:12
  teaching their VM is I mean VP is entire foundation was 300
• 21:17
  million and then 9/11 hitting it dropped 60 or 80 million.
• 21:22
  It's now over a billion. But that's money to spend on
• 21:27
  research. And you know, if you raise $70
• 21:31
  million, the idea you'd put it into some of this hokey stone
• 21:36
  you guys got on your beautiful podcast, you'd put it into all
• 21:40
  kinds of developmental things, including some athletics,
• 21:45
  obviously. But you raised $70 million.
• 21:49
  It's going to be gone. I won't say months, but it's
• 21:54
  going to be gone pretty quickly because you're paying pro
• 21:56
  salaries and you're now tech. Brent Price been very crafty
• 22:04
  about what he pays and what he bids.
• 22:06
  They found talent to compete. But it's my personal opinion.
• 22:11
  I went down there. I didn't even ask a lot of
• 22:14
  questions till I got to sit down with him.
• 22:16
  I just wanted to watch him and watch everybody, watch the
• 22:20
  players, watch the media, question them.
• 22:24
  I just wanted to look at everybody and I came away prize
• 22:32
  a pretty cool customer. You know, when he talked to me
• 22:36
  sort of first, one of the first things he did, he sort of
• 22:39
  acknowledged under his breath and we got to coach a little bit
• 22:46
  any you know, all the great coaches.
• 22:48
  I've had a lot of luck. I spent the 90s with the Bulls
• 22:52
  with Phil Jackson and Tex winner and the great coaches are
• 22:56
  realist to the core. They that that they're very fact
• 23:01
  based. It's not a it's not an I
• 23:05
  apologize for that daggone phone, not to hide it somewhere,
• 23:10
  but but it you know, the great coaches are very fact based.
• 23:14
  And I I had to I had to see is he real?
• 23:17
  And he is he knows. I think the reset button is not
• 23:23
  what it used to be because the there's so many moving parts,
• 23:28
  the coaching college major college football today, it's not
• 23:34
  a three or four year window. Now you can see if somebody is a
• 23:37
  total disaster. You can see that sometimes in
• 23:41
  two seasons. But this is this learning curve
• 23:47
  has been substantial. And but the other big reason I
• 23:52
  don't think that this school can afford to unless the season just
• 23:57
  falls flat on its face on its face, and I don't think it will.
• 24:01
  I don't think they can afford that.
• 24:02
  If they got 70 million, they're certainly not thinking about
• 24:05
  spending 5 to 8 million on another coach.
• 24:09
  You, you got to put that money in players.
• 24:13
  You can't put that money anywhere else.
• 24:16
  And and, you know, somebody's going to have to come in here
• 24:20
  and learn the culture to make this thing work.
• 24:23
  Yeah. And let's talk about that a
• 24:24
  little bit because you know, you've hit on pride a good
• 24:28
  amount here. And kind of what were your
• 24:30
  initial takeaways were for that? Let's talk about pride at
• 24:33
  Virginia Tech. What is kind of a benchmark for
• 24:36
  success in this NIL era for a Brent Pryor regime at Virginia
• 24:40
  Tech? Well, it's got a coach better.
• 24:44
  They need to win more games that they really have zeroed in on
• 24:48
  winning close games. What you got to do?
• 24:50
  I mean, I'm not, I'm, you know, if you want a coach to be a
• 24:57
  realist, you got to be a realist too.
• 25:00
  And looking at the program, but I think they got a clear window
• 25:07
  to, I don't know, at least above 500, maybe eight wins.
• 25:12
  They might get another win, they might not.
• 25:15
  But I will tell you this, the other parallel is these new
• 25:19
  coordinators. I think there's a really good
• 25:24
  mojo with them. I don't think it's going to.
• 25:28
  I mean, it is rapid assembly you are building all the first of
• 25:38
  all, a lot of the values have been drained off of college
• 25:43
  athletics. And so that's why the story's
• 25:46
  called Love and the Time of Neil, which is a take off on the
• 25:50
  Nobel Prize winning novel, Love and the Time of Cholera.
• 25:55
  This is sort of a collar. But you know, I just wanted to,
• 26:03
  I wanted, I wanted to look closely as these guys who stayed
• 26:07
  here were being interviewed. And then I wanted to look at the
• 26:10
  guys who had come in via the port and you know, I everything
• 26:18
  this country's ever done, whether it's D-Day or whatever
• 26:23
  has been 17/18/1920 year old kids, every major thing this
• 26:30
  country's ever accomplished, it's been on those kinds of
• 26:36
  fresh faces, people who are willing.
• 26:39
  And that's what I absolutely loved about teaching at Virginia
• 26:45
  Tech. I had the most amazing kids.
• 26:51
  And I mean, I'm not being nostalgic.
• 26:54
  They were just amazing and they, they're great kids.
• 26:59
  It is a great place that really attracts fantastic young people.
• 27:06
  It's had its heart breaks, but this is an existential moment,
• 27:14
  which is what I am saying in the magazine piece because there is,
• 27:21
  it's not a delicate mojo, but it is a well balanced mojo.
• 27:28
  You have got to sustain what Frankie Beamer and Bud Foster
• 27:35
  established. There's a, there's a grit.
• 27:37
  It's there. Pry gets it, Coach Price, all
• 27:44
  those coaches do. It is a culture.
• 27:48
  You know a lot. I'm an NBA guy, so there's a lot
• 27:51
  made of heat culture. Well, hokey culture.
• 27:55
  It it is a thing that matters deeply now that that goes on at
• 28:01
  a lot of schools. But I, I don't care about a lot
• 28:04
  of the schools. I, I, I care about this one.
• 28:08
  It is the region I've lived in my whole life.
• 28:12
  It is the place that feeds us all or helps to feed us all.
• 28:19
  And so the football team is important to bringing those
• 28:24
  students. It's important to the
• 28:26
  experience. Is it $70 million eaten up in
• 28:30
  five years or four years or three years?
• 28:32
  Important. I don't see how that's, I mean,
• 28:38
  I went to Blacksburg this spring because Coach Sands made this
• 28:42
  comment almost on his side that it's not sustainable.
• 28:47
  And the truth is he's absolutely correct.
• 28:50
  This is not sustainable unless, you know, when, when Frankie had
• 28:58
  his trouble, he had to fire and change his assistant coaches and
• 29:04
  that changed the, the arc of his narrative at Virginia Tech.
• 29:09
  He had his heart in the right place.
• 29:11
  And so the evaluation's going to have to be, are these the right
• 29:16
  guys? Can we afford to, to be sort of
• 29:20
  cavalier about it? You know, I, I will say my
• 29:23
  observation about the hokey fan base.
• 29:26
  I, I, I dealt with a lot of schools because I've done a lot
• 29:29
  of projects with a lot of schools.
• 29:32
  Duke, Louisville, University of Florida, the list goes on.
• 29:37
  Billy Packer and I work together on a lot of things back.
• 29:41
  I got to know Billy in the 80s when I first, when I did my
• 29:45
  first book on Ralph Sampson and Billy and I ended up doing 5
• 29:49
  books together and Billy is a money guy.
• 29:53
  The first lesson he taught me was keep your money in your
• 29:57
  pocket and let people give you your work to do what you're
• 30:05
  doing. And Billy was just all over
• 30:11
  college athletics and the economics of it.
• 30:15
  And I will tell you that it's been a battle.
• 30:21
  I don't have to tell any hokey fan.
• 30:22
  It's been a battle to to get in the right league in the right
• 30:26
  position. And we hit that sweet spot.
• 30:30
  That's water under bridge now. But it is instructive.
• 30:34
  And so you got to separate it as water under the bridge, but you
• 30:38
  got to look at what it is. You got to find players and I
• 30:46
  think these guys are suited to do that.
• 30:49
  They haven't shown that they can't find players.
• 30:51
  What they've got to get better at is figuring it out.
• 30:55
  And so I just don't think it's a one year window on this deal
• 31:01
  because of that. I think you're going to get the
• 31:03
  they got so many they got it's any bidder or you know, one of
• 31:07
  the assets of the whole hokey culture is Andy Bitter's been
• 31:13
  here that that is a sharp dude. I watched him work and there a
• 31:17
  lot of those guys in media are sharp, but Andy is is a real he
• 31:25
  just leads by how he does it And he he pointed out that they had
• 31:32
  more four players in the portal this year than they've had in
• 31:37
  all their years combined. It's true.
• 31:39
  Think about those moving parts. I've coached enough.
• 31:44
  I've had a lot of fun coaching over the years, starting with
• 31:48
  being a 24 year old varsity head wrestling coach at Blacksburg
• 31:53
  High School where I had great wrestlers.
• 31:56
  But but the whole thing is constructing the kind of culture
• 32:03
  that Virginia Tech's going to need to prosper, is going to
• 32:08
  take first cool heads in the fan base.
• 32:12
  I think you got cool heads in place.
• 32:15
  And the Hokies haven't been known for cool heads.
• 32:18
  I mean, they have. They're no worse than anybody
• 32:22
  else, don't get me wrong. But that's not how it works
• 32:29
  anymore. And you know, the Hokies, they,
• 32:32
  they, Al McGuire had a say, a saying, he's got the, he's got
• 32:38
  the shortest arms and the deepest pockets.
• 32:42
  And you know, they, they just, they just don't go reaching for
• 32:48
  the damn money. Now, now, don't get me wrong,
• 32:51
  there are donors and people who love Virginia Tech and have done
• 32:55
  a lot. This is a lot.
• 33:00
  Yeah. Let's.
• 33:02
  Let's pull it back a little bit because one thing I want to talk
• 33:05
  about is, you know, especially looking at your tenure in
• 33:09
  Blacksburg, you know, starting with 99 there and thinking about
• 33:13
  how college athletics has changed, particularly in that
• 33:16
  kind of 2010 kind of pivot window.
• 33:19
  And especially once NIL came along.
• 33:21
  Did Virginia Tech as an institution and as an athletic
• 33:26
  department do enough to capitalize on the success of
• 33:31
  Michael Vick and that national title run and the buoyed success
• 33:36
  of those early years in the ACC? Because the leading up to me
• 33:39
  that we were behind from there and it only got worse because of
• 33:45
  the steps we didn't take in the 2000s.
• 33:48
  Roland, before you say, but even before that, 199395 Sugar Bowl
• 33:54
  beating up to 99. And then Roland, you were there
• 33:58
  for the subsequent years. Ten wins, ACC titles, big bowl
• 34:03
  games. To Brian's point, did you tell
• 34:09
  how you feel? You want me to tell me?
• 34:10
  Shut the hell up. I'm fine with it.
• 34:11
  Did the administration drop the ball?
• 34:14
  Because at that point in time, we were top 10 every single
• 34:18
  year. We had players going to the NFL.
• 34:22
  We were a brand and I will never forget.
• 34:26
  This is one of the big moments for me because I missed the
• 34:28
  game. One of our dear friends who
• 34:30
  passed away a few years ago, 2003 Miami was a spectacle on
• 34:36
  ESPN. It was one of the best overlay
• 34:39
  production of Sandman very early in its infancy and I could have
• 34:44
  been in North End zone. I had an insurance payment I had
• 34:47
  to make. Then I made it and I couldn't
• 34:48
  drive the Blacksburg because I was a great college kid.
• 34:51
  God bless Brian Wilkerson. So he found me a ticket, but I
• 34:54
  could not make it. But did we drop it?
• 34:56
  Because some schools get that window and they literally just
• 35:01
  run. I don't care who we piss off.
• 35:03
  I don't care who we make mad. We are one of the best college
• 35:07
  football programs. We are going to go get every
• 35:10
  single part that's ours, money included.
• 35:14
  Sorry I get a little bit sometimes.
• 35:16
  Well, I would say that we probably danced in then zone a
• 35:21
  little bit. It was a long road to glory when
• 35:27
  I mean having to having to listen to all that bullshit from
• 35:30
  all the ACC folks all those years.
• 35:33
  And if Mudkat Saunders hadn't found found a way with Steve
• 35:37
  Jarding to threaten the damn governor, they wouldn't have
• 35:41
  gotten to the. ACC.
• 35:43
  It's true. It's so true.
• 35:45
  And so I think in some ways it doesn't matter.
• 35:55
  It I mean, the only thing that matters right now is the road
• 36:03
  ahead. Now, were the mistakes made?
• 36:07
  Yeah. Well, there always are.
• 36:10
  Yeah. You know, maybe there was
• 36:17
  another coach out there they could have hired besides Pry,
• 36:19
  who maybe was, but they hired a pretty good coach.
• 36:28
  I just don't think he ever totally bought in here.
• 36:31
  I could be wrong about that. Got a prior for one day.
• 36:37
  Yeah, but I'm saying they maybe could have hired, you know, but
• 36:44
  it's tough to hire coaches. You know, the thing I look at
• 36:47
  and personnel, whether it's players or coaches, You Jerry
• 36:53
  West told me I was sitting with him in 89 and I asked him
• 37:00
  because he he was coming up and he knew Magic was actually it
• 37:06
  was 91 because Magic had already been diagnosed.
• 37:10
  This right after that I was doing a project and I asked him
• 37:14
  how he was going to find the next magic and he said you know
• 37:17
  the hard part is you can see what people can do on the floor
• 37:22
  what a player can do. You can see what an executive
• 37:26
  has done, the kinds of experiences, but what you can't
• 37:32
  read are their hearts. And so I, I just sort of went to
• 37:42
  Blacksburg in my own sort of unscientific hillbilly way just
• 37:47
  to sort of go up there and take an inventory on the arts.
• 37:51
  That's really what a lot of this is about, because it's going to
• 37:55
  require hearts and wisdom and all that good stuff and, you
• 38:03
  know, pride. Some good answers for me.
• 38:05
  You know, he's he's not, he was a wrestler.
• 38:09
  You know, you're out there alone by yourself.
• 38:11
  As how I explained it, I understood exactly.
• 38:14
  You know, it's you and what you got to get done.
• 38:18
  And I just think the circumstances are such.
• 38:28
  And I, I, I in the article, I say the circumstances are such.
• 38:34
  You may want to fire Brent Pride for this season.
• 38:39
  And I said, you know, go ahead, be my guest.
• 38:43
  But you better look around on a landscape and find you some oil
• 38:46
  wells in the fan base. And the last thing I said, my
• 38:49
  last piece of advice is never blink at a mirage.
• 38:56
  You can lose everything you think you've got in your field
• 39:00
  of vision in an instant. I think they're making progress.
• 39:07
  I don't think there's a more thorough guy than Phil Steele.
• 39:10
  He thinks so. I was just and I work for Lindy,
• 39:14
  so if I'm touting Phil Steele, you know that I'm just doing it
• 39:18
  on but excuse. Me, I apologize.
• 39:22
  You're good. But I, you know, there are
• 39:26
  limits to each and every one of us in terms of perspective on
• 39:31
  this thing. I think what we do have to read
• 39:34
  is the seriousness of the changes.
• 39:37
  And ESPN has, you know, has made the moves it's going to make.
• 39:45
  Everybody's gambling on the future.
• 39:47
  Nobody knows what's going to happen.
• 39:50
  I've had to do 100 Zoom interviews in the last year with
• 39:54
  Rick Welts, who's now the president of The Mavericks.
• 39:58
  Before that, it was the president of the Warriors.
• 40:01
  Before that, it was the president of the Sons.
• 40:05
  And the NBA just got $100 billion in their media rights
• 40:11
  deal and their their network ratings and cable ratings are.
• 40:19
  A little iffy or a lot if he did some.
• 40:23
  And so I was asking him how does that happen?
• 40:26
  And his answer, he's a really bright guy.
• 40:29
  He said. You know, it's all about 23 year
• 40:31
  old eyeballs. Everybody is is trying to it's
• 40:38
  like an Oklahoma land race for the future in media.
• 40:42
  These people are paying for all these NBA rights.
• 40:46
  They they're not guaranteed that's going to deliver them to
• 40:49
  the promised land, but that's their best clear path.
• 40:53
  And so that's sort of the kind of decision because each of the
• 40:57
  schools is in the same circumstance.
• 41:00
  You could pad your schedule back in the day.
• 41:03
  I mean, everybody needs a break, everybody wants some tasty cakes
• 41:08
  on the schedule. You know, you drink a little
• 41:11
  more on game day, you, you know, your anxiety levels low.
• 41:16
  But that ain't happening now because ESPN is in a life or
• 41:22
  death struggle itself. And so they have turned all of
• 41:29
  the force of their power on the 2 super conferences while
• 41:34
  waiting to see if this thing realigns into some other
• 41:38
  concoction. But what we know about the
• 41:42
  richest and the strongest? I mean, this is an eternal
• 41:48
  truth. They ain't giving it up.
• 41:51
  They are not giving up any of this money that that the SECU.
• 41:56
  What was Charlton Heston said about gun rights for my cold
• 42:00
  dead hands? Well, the same applies to nil
• 42:03
  money to to, you know, all of that network broadcast power
• 42:09
  money that the SEC and the Big 10 get.
• 42:11
  Hell, they split up the oldest one of the oldest conferences in
• 42:17
  America, Distinguished Conference in the in the Pacific
• 42:23
  and spread it all over the place.
• 42:25
  We are running around our elbow to get to our ass to have play
• 42:30
  games on the West Coast. That's not sustainable either.
• 42:33
  But we do have to match up with those slightly relegated teams
• 42:40
  because if you're worried about Virginia Tech, take a look over
• 42:45
  your shoulder at the ACC. It's they're coming for them.
• 42:52
  So that's a that leads into this question and and you throw what
• 42:57
  you think's going to happen in the next, I don't know.
• 42:59
  They'll say ACC contract ends in 2035, ten years.
• 43:05
  What's going to happen just with the, the conference in general?
• 43:08
  Are we going to go to two Super leagues, 28 teams in the SEC, 28
• 43:12
  teams in the Big 10? Is someone going to step in and
• 43:17
  say, hey, we all get together, we're worth a hell of a lot more
• 43:22
  money than we are apart? Or is it somewhere in between?
• 43:25
  What do you see? Cause 'cause you've written and
• 43:28
  seen sports and Senator, like you said, Rick Welts, the former
• 43:32
  executive president of the, the current president of The
• 43:35
  Mavericks, former of the Warriors.
• 43:37
  You've been around some of these guys like that, that have
• 43:40
  visions and have thoughts. What do you think happens?
• 43:45
  Well, the, the happy ending is what you just described.
• 43:53
  The, the problem is that goes against human nature.
• 43:57
  And I, I don't think anybody, we're in a competitive business
• 44:02
  that's competition is about stepping on the other guy's neck
• 44:06
  and keeping your foot there until he's gone.
• 44:10
  And that is what it is. And it is the white collar crowd
• 44:15
  in each of these universities. They are hungry for that baby.
• 44:22
  And that's, that's, that's what feeds it.
• 44:26
  That is competition in America. And so the happy ending is that
• 44:31
  we get everybody lined up and whatever, 405060.
• 44:38
  You know, I've seen Virginia Tech listed anywhere from 50, I
• 44:42
  believe to 31 in, in various rankings this season headed into
• 44:50
  things. I think if they somehow arranged
• 44:55
  to get 80 teams in football. But you know, we've just had a
• 44:58
  whole bunch of folks just jump into D1, including Liberty.
• 45:04
  And Liberty is probably the best suited of any school in the
• 45:07
  state just to keep shoveling cash in its sports programs
• 45:13
  because they, they, they just have that apparatus for raking
• 45:16
  in that money. I mean, they're not just fans,
• 45:20
  they are religious folks. And so there's nothing wrong
• 45:25
  with that. They're they're, they give to
• 45:27
  the place they love. That's how it all works.
• 45:32
  So the happy ending, yeah, they sort this out.
• 45:37
  They, you know, that still makes a lot of things probably go
• 45:41
  away. I, I I hate to see ACC
• 45:44
  basketball go away. There are things that are near
• 45:48
  and dear. They are.
• 45:49
  They are things Change shouldn't just obliterate culture.
• 45:59
  Now change does move on from culture, but the culture,
• 46:04
  college football, the culture of the various conferences, that
• 46:10
  resonates a lot of things, but nothing resonates like the cold
• 46:18
  cash. Not at all.
• 46:21
  I love what you said there a second ago about the goal is to
• 46:25
  squeeze and kill all your competition.
• 46:28
  But the thing about sports is you have to have competitors.
• 46:33
  If you kill all your competition, who's going to turn
• 46:37
  on the TV anymore? Who's going to say, hey, do you
• 46:40
  want to watch Ohio State play Texas for the sixth time this
• 46:43
  year? Well, no, I've watched the first
• 46:45
  one. I'm I'm done with it.
• 46:48
  And I think that's what a lot of people think could happen
• 46:51
  because right now we're in this unbelievable bubble for college
• 46:57
  football and, and the whole thing you talk about that cash,
• 47:01
  eventually you're going to kill the wrong person or the wrong
• 47:05
  school and people are going to start turning off the.
• 47:08
  Television, the wrong conference.
• 47:11
  And I and I think, you know, in our discussion on and off
• 47:16
  camera, yeah, I've talked about reasons to articulate hope.
• 47:21
  And that's a big part of what I'm doing and looking at this.
• 47:24
  And you just articulated in excellent fashion one of the
• 47:28
  biggest pieces of hope. ESPN likes the Hokies probably
• 47:35
  love them. I don't know if a corporation
• 47:39
  can't, but I think so, I think. And so there are adjustments to
• 47:44
  be made. It's going to require a lot of
• 47:46
  wisdom. It's going to require a lot of
• 47:49
  political skill. So far, the ACC is thrown enough
• 47:55
  punches and tough enough to hold on.
• 47:58
  I don't think the PAC 10, PAC 12, whatever it is, did that
• 48:03
  they they gave up the money got going and that there's going to
• 48:08
  be some defections. But what is going to be left and
• 48:12
  how's it going to be spread around?
• 48:15
  I don't know because it's it's beyond what each of us can see
• 48:22
  and what and the huge thing clouding it is the amount of
• 48:25
  money it takes for these colleges operates pro sports
• 48:31
  teams. And it certainly means the death
• 48:34
  of a lot more minor sports. And you know that you're going
• 48:43
  to have people making pretty good money playing football and
• 48:48
  basketball, and you're going to have a lot of people doing
• 48:53
  excellent things in sports. But we've now let the the I'm
• 48:59
  not a big fan of the Supreme Court.
• 49:01
  They've just made decisions that have wrecked American culture in
• 49:04
  my mind. And they are holding position.
• 49:08
  And I think this is one of them. I don't know where we get sanity
• 49:14
  on this, but whatever is created is ultimately going to end up at
• 49:21
  the Supreme Court again, and it's not going to be able to
• 49:25
  infringe. I don't think they're going to
• 49:26
  back off of infringing on the name, image, likeness rights of
• 49:35
  these young people playing sports.
• 49:37
  You know that all centered on my man here, Jordan, the the NBA
• 49:42
  was used to take him was getting ready to take the name image
• 49:45
  likeness rights and Jordan's agent very quickly negotiated he
• 49:49
  is ahead of that. And they they weren't able to
• 49:55
  commandeer and pull Jordan away from the great wealth the market
• 49:59
  was ready to bestow upon him. It took him a long time to get
• 50:03
  paid his work as a player. But off the court, you know, it
• 50:08
  was a different story. And so some of these players,
• 50:12
  you know, probably another Jordan or two coming along that
• 50:16
  are somehow going to win the lottery of the culture.
• 50:22
  They're going to step up. Boy, I hope he's in Parisburg
• 50:27
  right now. Wouldn't that be a blessing?
• 50:33
  Well, you never know, but you know, I, I have, I have
• 50:36
  marvelled over a variety of coaches.
• 50:38
  We'll get a lot of speed on the Dang on roster and they pretend
• 50:43
  like it's not there. I, I don't know if the speed is
• 50:46
  deeply flawed somehow. If if I ever had chance to to
• 50:51
  really sit down and annoy the shit out of a coach, I would ask
• 50:57
  those kinds of questions. That would be a good question
• 51:00
  because I think in particular, just looking at this past
• 51:03
  combine where you had, you know, your your running back and your,
• 51:07
  your wide receiver go out there and you know, put top 340 times
• 51:10
  on the board against the best competition in in the country.
• 51:15
  And you know, you didn't always see that necessarily come out on
• 51:18
  game day. It it would come out and burst,
• 51:20
  but I think it wasn't always maximized by the offensive staff
• 51:25
  in particular last year to take advantage of some of those speed
• 51:29
  elements of those players. I, I will say from my years of
• 51:33
  coaching, it takes a while to know what you have, but you, you
• 51:40
  got, you can't let that go on. You have got to really.
• 51:45
  And I think changing coordinators is a huge thing and
• 51:51
  I think I do believe we're going to see that this season.
• 51:54
  You you have people who are actually coming in.
• 51:59
  It's one thing to have a first time head coach who's been a
• 52:02
  great coordinator, but when you're coming in and your roles
• 52:07
  are filled by people who are also learning on the job, that's
• 52:13
  very hard to do because, and I'm dealing with that.
• 52:16
  We're making a LeBron James documentary and it's with a
• 52:19
  Canadian film company and it's it's we've had a lot of fun.
• 52:23
  We shot 110 hours of film. But we we've gotten a point in
• 52:27
  the road where these guys are really looking at each other a
• 52:32
  loss for a loss for what to do. And so that's the course of
• 52:39
  human events. I do think surprise, a smart
• 52:43
  tough guy. I think his heart's in the right
• 52:46
  place. I think he has, you know, all
• 52:50
  that he told me all the coaches are talking.
• 52:52
  He he says it's a wild, Wild West.
• 52:54
  We can't keep doing it like this.
• 52:56
  And that's what they've all said.
• 52:59
  And, you know, I think you're going to be lucky to hold on to
• 53:05
  a coach because it is crazy. I mean, you barely have time to
• 53:12
  learn the names, much less evaluate to talent.
• 53:15
  Now they're working. They've gotten that.
• 53:17
  They've been given more time. They are paying players like
• 53:21
  pros, and they are working beyond what the pros are doing
• 53:24
  in a lot of regards. And so they got eyeballs on them
• 53:29
  more. But what drama?
• 53:39
  Let me ask this before we move on.
• 53:42
  So you know, we talked about Pry there.
• 53:44
  You know, we titled this this episode, right Man, Wrong time.
• 53:51
  When we look at Brent Pry and we look at the way and the position
• 53:55
  that Virginia Tech's in, we look at the potential realignment.
• 54:00
  We look at NIL in the extra 70 + 1,000,000 that Whit Babcock says
• 54:05
  he needs. What are the chances that
• 54:08
  Virginia Tech gets left out in this next shuffle?
• 54:12
  And if they do, is that a death sentence from from a long term
• 54:16
  competitive standpoint? Well, I'll tell you this,
• 54:19
  they're still jumping. That's item number one.
• 54:25
  There's still absolute joy on game day.
• 54:30
  They're still jumping. They got to have a little more
• 54:32
  to jump about. If they get a little more, I
• 54:34
  think they'll jump higher. I really do.
• 54:37
  And I think this I said it's the most consequential season in the
• 54:42
  history of the program. And I don't think that it if if
• 54:47
  I mean, there is no way that that Miami game that was that
• 54:54
  was basically the ACC in a shitty they had a school.
• 55:00
  No, it is. It was just no, they had a
• 55:03
  school that had a chance. They've got to make noise.
• 55:06
  They're going to have stature. The ACCS like ESPN, everybody
• 55:09
  else, they're in survival mode. And so they had they had to just
• 55:14
  abandoned their rules and give the game to Miami because that
• 55:17
  was their best bet for the College Football Playoff in that
• 55:21
  moment. Now that that didn't but that
• 55:24
  that decided that game because there's no way.
• 55:27
  And they admitted to him there's no way Coach Prague, you know,
• 55:31
  went back at him a good bit. I think that Virginia Tech is up
• 55:44
  against it. Obviously.
• 55:47
  I think they've got a batch of players in here.
• 55:51
  They got some nice players and the other bottom line here, in
• 55:55
  addition to the the things you mentioned, it's a great place.
• 56:00
  It's a beautiful place. I I saw Pry.
• 56:06
  I saw this video of Pry. He was like a kid with
• 56:09
  Metallica. Did y'all see that video?
• 56:12
  Oh yeah. You know, he's out here.
• 56:14
  He's listening. He'll show up at a Jared Stout
• 56:17
  band show. He is he's he's a genuine
• 56:24
  spirit. Now that may end up being
• 56:27
  tragically wrong. I don't think so, because he is
• 56:30
  tough as nails too. And he talks constantly about
• 56:33
  hard conversations. So these guys are getting paid.
• 56:36
  These are not children anymore. These are pro athletes.
• 56:40
  And so they, you know, pro the pro game.
• 56:44
  I, I, I enjoyed going to cover in the NBAI didn't like talking
• 56:49
  to college athletes. I didn't think it was fair.
• 56:53
  They're kids. When I, I worked for the old
• 56:57
  Blacksburg Son, I quit my coaching and teaching job to
• 57:02
  become a writer and I got hired as a sports editor of Blacksburg
• 57:06
  Son. I covered Dooley's first season
• 57:10
  and I you'd interview those guys and they're all going yes Sir,
• 57:16
  no Sir. And and I, I was 24 at the time.
• 57:20
  So but, but the thing I liked about the NBA, if they didn't,
• 57:26
  each guy you talked to was a corporation.
• 57:29
  If they didn't, if they didn't like and you talk about
• 57:32
  testosterone, the NBA was quite a experience and having done it
• 57:38
  40 years, they they didn't like your question.
• 57:40
  They tell you just to take a long walk.
• 57:43
  They I mean, they wouldn't say it like that and, and, and they
• 57:47
  were there. They're empowered people.
• 57:49
  And so there there's part of this thing that's pretty good.
• 57:56
  The opportunity for young people is good.
• 57:59
  I don't resent somebody changing jobs to get more money.
• 58:03
  It it it sort of cracks the egg on the falsehood of, you know,
• 58:09
  we're doing it for the old alma mater here.
• 58:12
  They're doing it because they're getting paid.
• 58:15
  And guess what? A lot of them need to Jack, They
• 58:18
  need to scratch their families. A lot of them really need it.
• 58:24
  And but others are loyal to the core.
• 58:29
  And I like talking to both parties.
• 58:32
  You know, young people are impressive and I think Brent
• 58:35
  Pryor and his crew, they've gotten together.
• 58:38
  I thought, you know, maybe I'm an old fuddy Duddy.
• 58:41
  I don't think so. I, I, I read hearts up there.
• 58:46
  I, I think they're pretty good now.
• 58:48
  They may quit on y'all against South Carolina.
• 58:50
  They may just get waxed. And that will be, that's the
• 58:56
  thing. And maybe they won't.
• 58:58
  Maybe they'll do some crazy stuff.
• 59:02
  Maybe Kyron Drones is going to come out there and stick the
• 59:04
  ball in somebody's face mask right off the bat.
• 59:06
  I don't know. But the daggone thing is, it's
• 59:14
  going to be something. It could be the greatest horror
• 59:17
  show, and it could be, you know, I'll tell you a story I like.
• 59:26
  Do you have a minute for a Virginia Tech story?
• 59:30
  Frankie Allen, you know, he's getting ready for the 8687
• 59:34
  season. He's Charlie's assistant.
• 59:38
  And they come up with something where they got to fire Charlie
• 59:41
  because some kind of recruiting bullshit.
• 59:45
  And so everybody in the metro is making 400,000 and they pay
• 59:50
  Frankie 35 to be the head coach. And Billy Stevens, the hero of
• 59:56
  the NIT, gets furious if they hire Frankie over him.
• 1:00:01
  And he quits. And so Virginia Tech says it
• 1:00:06
  doesn't have the money to hire an assistant.
• 1:00:08
  So they find him an intern out of the Midwest.
• 1:00:12
  So he's got a Frankie's got to pull them together.
• 1:00:17
  And Frankie's a man of faith. He's, he's a great guy and so he
• 1:00:22
  pulls them all together and they've got to play John
• 1:00:25
  Thompson in Georgetown. They've got to get on a bus and
• 1:00:28
  ride Virginia Tech wanting to pay to fly and they've got to
• 1:00:31
  ride down to Tidewater. John Thompson is recruiting
• 1:00:35
  Alonzo Mourning and they, they want to have the Hokies down
• 1:00:39
  there to, to whip up on him in front of Alonso.
• 1:00:42
  And so the Hokies get on this daggone bus and they ride what,
• 1:00:47
  7 hours in a bus down to play John Thompson.
• 1:00:51
  And Frankie calls everybody together before they get on the
• 1:00:57
  bus. He says, I want to talk to you
• 1:00:59
  all about John 316. Does anybody know about that?
• 1:01:06
  And Tim, I forget Tim's last name, A guy raised his hand says
• 1:01:10
  John Thompson weighs 316 lbs. The whole locker room just
• 1:01:19
  explodes in law. So that becomes their battle
• 1:01:22
  cry. So they're chatting John 316
• 1:01:26
  John, they're going down there and the world doesn't know about
• 1:01:31
  Bimbo Coles. And they get down there and
• 1:01:37
  they're supposed to, you know, be the Washington generals for
• 1:01:41
  for John's big recruiting and, and Frankie's got all these John
• 1:01:44
  Thompson stories. But they get down there in tech
• 1:01:48
  beats and they're all chanting as they leave.
• 1:01:53
  And John Thompson's out there cussing reporters saying you
• 1:01:57
  better get that interim name off that guy.
• 1:02:00
  You got the interim tag off that guy's name.
• 1:02:02
  He's a hell of a coach. And just load up in the bus and
• 1:02:07
  they're coming back up to Blacksburg and it's a long bus
• 1:02:13
  drive and they have the same bus driver, some old cat they give,
• 1:02:18
  they're always on his last. And so they're they're coming in
• 1:02:24
  the back up into western Virginia.
• 1:02:26
  And the state trooper pulls them over and they are raising him.
• 1:02:31
  He'll take you to jail. Snuffy or whatever his name was.
• 1:02:34
  He had to get off and talk to the trooper and he said he gets
• 1:02:39
  back on the bus. They're all yelling at him.
• 1:02:42
  He says they're giving us an escort to Blacksburg and they
• 1:02:48
  roll into Blacksburg. Castle is swamped with people
• 1:02:53
  going nuts and they've ended up beating George Raveling in USC
• 1:02:58
  in that preseason. Now, here's the thing with this
• 1:03:02
  trumped up thing against Charlie Tech has a great basketball
• 1:03:06
  season, but they barter away the rights to go to the tournament
• 1:03:10
  to get out of sanctions from that very corrupt organization,
• 1:03:16
  the NCAA. Well, one thing we can all be
• 1:03:19
  glad for and Sonny Vaccaro, my my friend, you know, has run a
• 1:03:24
  lifelong campaign against NCAA that that son of a gun is almost
• 1:03:30
  gone because it what up. I had to do a write a magazine
• 1:03:36
  story for Lindy when Ohio State won and I I titled it tattoo
• 1:03:42
  this because you know, the NCAA going to come in and burn these
• 1:03:49
  guys over some tattoos today. The cash flying around.
• 1:03:54
  I mean, it's just gone from ridiculous to insane.
• 1:03:59
  Well, they've, they created this problem.
• 1:04:01
  They, they, they've created the situation doing nothing, sitting
• 1:04:04
  on their on their fists, doing nothing, fighting it tooth and
• 1:04:08
  nail instead of saying this is where it's heading.
• 1:04:11
  Understanding you can't be raking up this much money as an
• 1:04:16
  organization, as these conferences, as these member
• 1:04:19
  schools, and not compensating the players that are going out
• 1:04:22
  there and sweating for it, right?
• 1:04:24
  And, and, and not not having the longevity and the vision to see
• 1:04:28
  that that's where it's going. And then being put in the
• 1:04:31
  situation where you are forced to implement it from a legal
• 1:04:34
  standpoint and still just wash your hands of it like it's not
• 1:04:38
  your problem. The place the the sports were
• 1:04:41
  awash in money back in the day in 1970.
• 1:04:46
  As I said, I was a walk on it. VMI Yeah, that season VMI
• 1:04:51
  varsity was one in 10. Now we were a bunch of skinny
• 1:04:55
  ass freshmen going. I weighed 159 lbs playing notes
• 1:04:59
  card and a linebacker. The starting Center for BMI
• 1:05:03
  weighed 220 on the varsity. And I mean by by the third game
• 1:05:08
  and VMI was playing a lot of money games.
• 1:05:10
  By the third game, those guys were so beat up UNC with Don
• 1:05:14
  McCauley beating like 62 to three.
• 1:05:17
  You know, they were, they were just getting slaughtered.
• 1:05:20
  And even then those guys on that team, and it ended up being the,
• 1:05:26
  the, the head coach and the the captain, the senior tackle
• 1:05:33
  gotten a fistfight in practice in front of everybody.
• 1:05:36
  They're about rolling around in the dirt like it's WWE or
• 1:05:40
  something. But even the even the players at
• 1:05:43
  VMI on A1 in 10 team, we're getting $50 handshakes after the
• 1:05:48
  game from the alums and $50.00 that isn't selling much.
• 1:05:53
  I unstopped sewers for the town of Whitfield with a $23 take
• 1:05:58
  home pay a week at $1.30 an hour was the minimum wage then.
• 1:06:04
  So a $50 check was two weeks pay for every game.
• 1:06:08
  They were getting those handshakes and that was VMI.
• 1:06:11
  Which VMI is like ridiculous in terms of observing every kind of
• 1:06:18
  rule possible. And so college athletics has
• 1:06:23
  always been full of a lot of money, but handed out in weird
• 1:06:27
  ways. And then no longer, in a weird
• 1:06:30
  way, I want to go back to South Carolina because you telling
• 1:06:33
  that story about Georgetown, you say we're going to go.
• 1:06:36
  We could go down and get our asses waxed.
• 1:06:38
  But that's why they play the games, right?
• 1:06:42
  Because if you had told that crew going up to play Georgetown
• 1:06:47
  in 19, I think it's 88 or 89, you're going to win this king.
• 1:06:53
  People probably laughed at you. No, it's John Thompson.
• 1:06:57
  That's where Ewing play. They got Mourning, then they got
• 1:07:00
  Mutombo and all these guys. But that's why they play the
• 1:07:03
  game. So going down to Atlanta, it
• 1:07:06
  won't be on a bus. It's probably going to be on a
• 1:07:08
  nice commercial flight out of Roanoke down to Atlanta.
• 1:07:12
  Yeah, I don't know. They're probably won't even sit
• 1:07:14
  down in the in the big Atlanta airport.
• 1:07:16
  They'll probably go to one of the private ones down there to
• 1:07:18
  make it easy on team. But you play the game.
• 1:07:23
  How much tone? Because you said this is one of
• 1:07:26
  those season. It is a crossroads season.
• 1:07:28
  It is a season that is going to define a lot of things for Brent
• 1:07:31
  Pry and for this school. Guys, Karen drones and and he is
• 1:07:39
  back. We are going to get a window
• 1:07:43
  into his heart. Now, I'm not talking about
• 1:07:45
  misfortune. He he had a lot of misfortune.
• 1:07:48
  A lot of he played injured last year.
• 1:07:51
  But I am telling you, he showed me at the end of that Miami
• 1:07:55
  game. He stood there, made that play
• 1:07:57
  and I that guy's got heart. He he could have, he could have
• 1:08:01
  ducked out. He he wants to stand here and
• 1:08:04
  confront this thing. And if he goes down there and
• 1:08:09
  you don't know right, I agree. And they needed some kind of
• 1:08:13
  chant. Maybe I should have told pry
• 1:08:15
  about John 360. Anyway, it doesn't matter.
• 1:08:18
  But the point is, yeah, I I you know, I would like it is a
• 1:08:24
  family struggle. You know, this is, this is a
• 1:08:28
  family struggle. You know your next book.
• 1:08:32
  Oh. If crazy shit, what if crazy
• 1:08:34
  shit happens down there in this season?
• 1:08:36
  No, you know. Back story's there.
• 1:08:47
  This Gordon book is 700 and some pages, my magic book that came
• 1:08:54
  out was the cover of the New York Times book is 800.
• 1:09:01
  I, I don't have any I'm, I'm rolling along on.
• 1:09:04
  I'm getting paid to do, I'm sort of an executive producer on
• 1:09:12
  projects that will either be scripted or documentary films.
• 1:09:17
  And sometimes I'm getting points, but you know, I don't
• 1:09:23
  have to work too hard and they've got fine writers that
• 1:09:29
  are doing the thing and so I don't need to.
• 1:09:35
  I had fun doing this article. I don't mind doing articles, but
• 1:09:41
  you know I've I've had my run at it.
• 1:09:46
  And and this season, I mean, when you look, you talked about
• 1:09:49
  Kyron and I think, you know, we've had Kyron on this show.
• 1:09:52
  We talked to him, we talked to his dad a lot.
• 1:09:54
  I mean, these are these are really great people.
• 1:09:57
  And I think the. Oh, tell me about that.
• 1:10:00
  Yeah, I'm going to hear what you.
• 1:10:03
  When when we talked to to Kyron, he is he's very much a quiet
• 1:10:08
  lead by example guy, but he is a guy when he gets in the moment
• 1:10:12
  and he is feeling it and his confidence is is burning.
• 1:10:15
  He's a gamer. And I think that's what I think
• 1:10:18
  a lot of people maybe miss about him is that in the moment, with
• 1:10:22
  playing with confidence, I would I would take him up against any
• 1:10:25
  college quarterback in the NCAA right now.
• 1:10:29
  Brian. There's one game rolling.
• 1:10:31
  I want you to go back and look at Pittsburgh 2023.
• 1:10:35
  He throws a bomb touchdown. He is running down that
• 1:10:37
  sideline, given the finger and given the FU to every single Pit
• 1:10:41
  Panther defender and, and and you're watching and it's like he
• 1:10:48
  doesn't care. He's almost challenged him to
• 1:10:51
  come hit me because I'm going to keep putting it in the end zone
• 1:10:54
  every time. And I think seeing that in
• 1:10:59
  saying what Brian said and we talked with him, he is that soft
• 1:11:01
  guy, but you put him on that field.
• 1:11:03
  There's always talking about and you've probably Jordan had it,
• 1:11:06
  Magic had it. So many great players have it.
• 1:11:09
  It's a switch and when they click that switch get out of the
• 1:11:13
  way. Especially in football.
• 1:11:17
  Exactly. Now basketball is, is, is a
• 1:11:19
  different product. But, but there's a, there's the
• 1:11:24
  tremendous explosion. Jordan's unbelievable.
• 1:11:26
  I, I, I thank my lucky stars for all those seasons.
• 1:11:32
  Tex Winter was my best friend and guide to the whole thing.
• 1:11:36
  I couldn't have been luckier. I didn't deserve it.
• 1:11:39
  And you know, the Chicago Tribune needed somebody to do
• 1:11:42
  projects on the team, their book division of all things.
• 1:11:46
  But the point is drones. I saw something.
• 1:11:51
  Everything I've got is that. And I went up there and I saw
• 1:11:54
  him stand over on the far sideline and at indoor facility
• 1:11:58
  all by himself. And I said something's not
• 1:12:00
  right. The next day they announced they
• 1:12:03
  were shutting him down. But I got the sense that he had
• 1:12:08
  a lot of they got a lot of new faces, but that he had a lot of
• 1:12:13
  respect on that roster. But somebody on one of these
• 1:12:17
  sites slandered the crap out of him.
• 1:12:21
  And so I just wonder, you just never know because some of these
• 1:12:26
  Hokies can get a little weird, But I, I, that's not what I get
• 1:12:31
  out of Kyron drones. I think he is, he's that guy
• 1:12:39
  that wants to do it. You know, I also spent a lot of
• 1:12:42
  time with Kobe. People thought he was out of his
• 1:12:46
  mind. I was with Kobe through all the
• 1:12:48
  eight man years and you know, I did 2 books on him.
• 1:12:53
  But Kobe was was sort of like that.
• 1:12:58
  He he was just going to be that guy and he, you know, he's
• 1:13:03
  riding that horse for destiny. And Kobe was I thought, man, you
• 1:13:07
  got to worry about him. He's thinking he's going to be
• 1:13:10
  the greatest. He was 1819 year old kid when I
• 1:13:12
  was first hanging out with him. He thinks he's going to be the
• 1:13:15
  greatest all time and he'll look at you and tell you that I said
• 1:13:19
  Lord and and Karen just sort of the kinds of things you're,
• 1:13:27
  you're saying there could be good things happen.
• 1:13:32
  It's not precluded for Virginia Tech.
• 1:13:35
  It's not it's not hopeless. It's just very difficult.
• 1:13:42
  Sure. Well, you brought it up and
• 1:13:45
  let's go ahead and talk a little bit about it because I don't
• 1:13:48
  know if you know, but I am a I'm a Lakers fan here.
• 1:13:51
  So I'd like to hear somebody that's that's, you know, talked
• 1:13:55
  extensively with, you know, wrote the book on Magic, wrote
• 1:13:59
  one on Kobe, had had some conversations there.
• 1:14:02
  What's what's 1 story about Magic and one story about Kobe?
• 1:14:06
  Maybe you want to share with us that that that might be kind of
• 1:14:10
  cool to hear. Wow, Co with magic it actually
• 1:14:17
  he was an amazing kid. He was an he just had and you
• 1:14:23
  know, it's a complicated story, but they were had bussing.
• 1:14:30
  This is in 7370 and he had an older brother.
• 1:14:34
  He had ten siblings or nine siblings and his older brother
• 1:14:39
  was a hell of a player. And but they, they all got
• 1:14:43
  bussed. They were in a perfectly
• 1:14:45
  racially balanced school, but they, they started bussing in
• 1:14:48
  Lansing, MI, 100 kids a time. And so his brother, the day
• 1:14:55
  before Christmas, Magic was still in like 8th grade and he
• 1:14:59
  wouldn't go to high school at 10th grade.
• 1:15:01
  But it's the coaches, first time they had black players right
• 1:15:05
  before Christmas, they kicked 5 black players off the basketball
• 1:15:10
  team. First all white school, first
• 1:15:14
  time they're there. And I, I spent, I spent 100
• 1:15:17
  hours interviewing these two coaches that kicked them off.
• 1:15:21
  And it, it, it's like this really sore subject that it just
• 1:15:26
  ached across the decades. And magic has to go.
• 1:15:33
  The school system says he has to go to that white school now.
• 1:15:38
  He sleeps in a bed with his brother, his brother.
• 1:15:41
  When he got cut, all the other four kids took it.
• 1:15:44
  His brother cussed the coaches out.
• 1:15:47
  He would cuss them out in the hall.
• 1:15:48
  Every time he saw him, it was like.
• 1:15:52
  And this boiled over and he and Magic shared a bed.
• 1:15:55
  And Magic went to bed every night listening to his angry
• 1:15:59
  brother. And Magic did not want to go to
• 1:16:01
  Lansing play for those coaches. And he lives way down in the
• 1:16:09
  city. They're out in the suburbs.
• 1:16:12
  And it's finally when he has to go.
• 1:16:17
  And it's it's like that summer and he has a bicycle.
• 1:16:21
  He's the only kid in his neighborhood has a bicycle.
• 1:16:24
  He never rides because nobody else has a bicycle.
• 1:16:29
  What's he going to do, get on a bicycle?
• 1:16:31
  This old man's an auto work. So he gets on that bicycle and
• 1:16:37
  rides way out in the country. There's a park out there and he
• 1:16:41
  rides by the coach's house. And I'm, I mean, you don't cross
• 1:16:48
  those lines in the 70s. And he goes and knocks on the
• 1:16:53
  door and visits with the coach's daughter and and the coach
• 1:16:59
  hasn't as a short goal, but but Magic takes it upon himself as a
• 1:17:06
  14, almost 15 year old kid. And he goes back several times,
• 1:17:14
  his emotional intelligence and the ability to do it now, all
• 1:17:23
  the stories about everything. I mean, he went from this
• 1:17:26
  incredibly. And he was a powerful kid.
• 1:17:28
  I mean, he took over the school and he would call his own, he
• 1:17:35
  would call his own assemblies outside first for things.
• 1:17:41
  And they would just, they didn't know what to do with it.
• 1:17:44
  But he was a really good kid. But you know, he got he got
• 1:17:50
  mixed up with Terry Furlough and what's going to Terry Furlough
• 1:17:54
  got killed early. He's a brilliant player of
• 1:17:56
  Michigan State, but Magic at 1516 got over there with the
• 1:18:01
  college girls at Michigan State, which I mean, just the trial run
• 1:18:06
  for the insane life he lived in LA.
• 1:18:09
  And so his business story, you know, he's a he's a billionaire.
• 1:18:17
  He was trying to catch Jordan, but I mean, the business deals
• 1:18:20
  he struck and the things he's done and then to to, you know,
• 1:18:28
  to basically be sex addicted and end up HIV positive.
• 1:18:35
  It's a it was a crazy story. Jordan on the other hand, he
• 1:18:44
  just scared everybody to death. The NBA was the damn like I
• 1:18:50
  said, Testosterone City and I spent five seasons with the
• 1:18:54
  Detroit Bad boys. I did their their team books and
• 1:18:59
  their championship stories and for Stylist Publisher.
• 1:19:04
  So anyway, I got to my whole thing was watching Jordan and
• 1:19:11
  the bad boys and all the evil shit they did to him.
• 1:19:15
  So it was and and Jordan, I mean, not backing down and he,
• 1:19:22
  you know, he finally got built up and but Jordan scared
• 1:19:27
  everybody. Not quite the the bad boy
• 1:19:31
  Pistons, although he scared them too.
• 1:19:34
  But Jordan was just I mean, and I had to work hard to to really
• 1:19:47
  get that audience with Jordan that I needed all those
• 1:19:50
  one-on-one interviews with him and Tex winner, you know, coach
• 1:19:54
  Jordan longer than anybody. And he would tell me all the
• 1:19:57
  shit that was going on and I would then start to use that.
• 1:20:01
  For example, I was up in Toronto and the locker rooms were packed
• 1:20:07
  the. The PR director, Tim Hallam
• 1:20:10
  called it the Pig Fuck. It was packed with, with media
• 1:20:14
  and, and the, the, the proposal for my Jordan book, the little
• 1:20:18
  Brown was called the Pig Fuck. And and it was about being in
• 1:20:22
  that crazy crowd. And we're up in Toronto and
• 1:20:26
  Texas told me some stuff that I need to ask Jordan to just to
• 1:20:31
  send a message. And so Pippen comes out of the
• 1:20:35
  locker room 1st and all the media go follow him.
• 1:20:40
  I mean, it's like whoosh. And you, I've gotten where I
• 1:20:45
  could time it here. A minute later, here comes
• 1:20:47
  Jordan. And I know that I'm going to get
• 1:20:50
  a minute and a half, maybe, maybe a minute walking across
• 1:20:54
  the locker room one-on-one with him to ask him a question.
• 1:20:57
  And I always tried to ask him where he would stop and cut
• 1:21:01
  those eyes at me. Like, you know, how do you know
• 1:21:04
  that? And so Jordan was a challenge
• 1:21:08
  there. Kobe and Shaq were in a war.
• 1:21:14
  And I introduced Tex to Kobe before Tex became a Lakers
• 1:21:21
  assistant coach because Kobe was a lost, lonely kid.
• 1:21:27
  I really worried for his mental health and the Techs started
• 1:21:35
  calling him up. They they, they exchanged phone
• 1:21:40
  numbers. I hooked him up.
• 1:21:42
  And Jerry Crowell said, what in the hell is Tech calling Kobe
• 1:21:46
  Bryant? You know, because the assistant
• 1:21:48
  coach called a player on another team a huge no no.
• 1:21:52
  And then I introduced Kobe to George Mumford before a game in
• 1:21:56
  Houston one night. George is the mindfulness guru
• 1:22:00
  who was Phil Jackson's Zen master.
• 1:22:03
  And Kobe considered George. He was very skeptical.
• 1:22:10
  That was Michael skeptical of George, but they both came to
• 1:22:14
  consider him critical. In fact, George was the only
• 1:22:18
  thing that Shaq and Kobe really ever agreed on that it was, it
• 1:22:24
  was tense there. It was.
• 1:22:26
  It's crazy when a team has terrible chemistry and you got a
• 1:22:35
  lot of talent and terrible chemistry, immense talent.
• 1:22:39
  Immense. Talent.
• 1:22:40
  Terrible. Chemistry and what what these
• 1:22:43
  tech teams sometimes have had and and I will say one thing,
• 1:22:51
  you know, the pandemic that for Fuente and Pry it was, you know,
• 1:22:58
  I don't want to throw off too much from Fuente.
• 1:23:00
  I really didn't spend time talking to him or I just he
• 1:23:05
  really pissed me off and he went down to Baylor to apply for that
• 1:23:08
  job. I said, you're out of there,
• 1:23:09
  buddy. There's no way you can.
• 1:23:14
  Yeah, him coming back from that was kind of, I know.
• 1:23:17
  It rubbed a lot of people in the fan base the wrong way.
• 1:23:19
  And you know, you call it, you know, a reconnaissance mission
• 1:23:23
  to see what other schools are doing or whatever you will.
• 1:23:26
  But I mean, it's still it, it, it, it rubbed people the wrong
• 1:23:29
  way. It sent it sent a wrong message
• 1:23:31
  about where where we were and where we wanted to be and what
• 1:23:35
  his commitment was exactly. And, and I mean that.
• 1:23:38
  Was already at a point where. From a from a closing standpoint
• 1:23:43
  and a recruiting standpoint, he didn't really have the the
• 1:23:48
  goodwill of the fan base to burn on something like that.
• 1:23:51
  Yeah, he did not. He never really wanted to
• 1:23:57
  connect, you know, pry is he under?
• 1:24:06
  He got, you know, he was there. He gets it.
• 1:24:09
  He, you know, a lot of coaches would really bristle at Frank
• 1:24:13
  Beamer walking around the halls and he worships pride, worships
• 1:24:19
  Frank Beamer. And he really does not want to
• 1:24:22
  disappoint him. And, you know, so much for that.
• 1:24:27
  I ultimately you do have to win games.
• 1:24:30
  I just don't see it in the cards unless they go oh, and 11 or
• 1:24:36
  whatever it is they're playing or three and eight.
• 1:24:42
  I don't see that happening at all unless they have horrific
• 1:24:46
  injuries. I think these coordinators are
• 1:24:50
  given pride. The support he did not have from
• 1:24:52
  his coordinators previously. That's my and I think that's
• 1:24:57
  the, I think that's the truth coming out of all this.
• 1:25:01
  I really do. And I think they got it.
• 1:25:04
  They got an offensive offensive coordinator.
• 1:25:07
  He's offensive minded. I mean, the guy knows what he's
• 1:25:09
  doing, He knows what he's looking for.
• 1:25:12
  They had a he's coached A Heisman Trophy winner.
• 1:25:15
  So I mean he's. Experiences everything.
• 1:25:20
  And, and, and I, you know, the, the, the defensive coordinator,
• 1:25:27
  they're not bashful. They are not I I think they're
• 1:25:32
  going to be good and The Who knows what the Hokies will do.
• 1:25:36
  That's on Chiron a lot and he wants to do it.
• 1:25:41
  I know that. And he he hasn't said I'm
• 1:25:44
  telling you the money and running.
• 1:25:45
  He's that's that's not what he's about South in that sense, just
• 1:25:54
  by the Jerry West rule. He, he shows up, he's got I, I
• 1:25:59
  read him as having a lot of heart.
• 1:26:02
  I think he he kind of epitomizes.
• 1:26:05
  Just from a personality standpoint, a lot of kind of
• 1:26:08
  what we what we saw a little bit from those big runs in the
• 1:26:14
  2000s. He's got, he's got grit and
• 1:26:17
  swagger in equal amounts. And I think you kind of need to
• 1:26:21
  have that to be successful at quarterback.
• 1:26:24
  Now you got to, you got to be tough, but you got to have a
• 1:26:26
  little bit of swagger and a little bit of attitude and, and,
• 1:26:30
  and play with the chip on your shoulder.
• 1:26:34
  I you just hear you say that. Makes me think of all the
• 1:26:37
  swagger with those Bulls. I had to do a flashback piece
• 1:26:41
  about that 9596 Bulls team that that went 72 and 10.
• 1:26:47
  They they were, it was ridiculous how much swagger they
• 1:26:52
  did. And you know, Phil, I was
• 1:26:56
  thought I had to talk to Phil Jackson and he was saying, you
• 1:26:59
  know, there's no more powerful feeling than walking into a
• 1:27:05
  building, somebody's building. You get off your bus, you walk
• 1:27:11
  into the building and you're walking in with Michael Jordan.
• 1:27:18
  You cannot, he says. You cannot imagine that now
• 1:27:21
  where it gets really bad is trying to be around him on the
• 1:27:25
  days between games. He he is.
• 1:27:29
  It just will eat you alive trying to deal with him.
• 1:27:34
  But Jordan had a lot of charisma.
• 1:27:37
  The the the big fuck thing was about, you know, he would come
• 1:27:41
  out in these great suits and the they would glom onto him in that
• 1:27:46
  locker room. And then I mean, you know, post
• 1:27:49
  locker room, all the and the PR directors were going Michael
• 1:27:54
  come to the podium. Don't and he did not want to do
• 1:27:58
  it. He wanted the intimacy of all
• 1:28:01
  those damn reporters. And he you know, he had so much
• 1:28:05
  charisma and everybody there, he was like a spectacle.
• 1:28:10
  I can't believe I'm looking at this guy.
• 1:28:13
  You know, everybody's this is surreal and every minute of it
• 1:28:18
  was borderline surreal. And there are guys like that
• 1:28:24
  now. Michael was just a a regular Joe
• 1:28:28
  a lot North Carolina. You you don't know.
• 1:28:33
  It makes you wonder if Michael had that gear if he hadn't
• 1:28:37
  gotten with the dogs. I don't Michael Vick.
• 1:28:43
  I don't know. I don't I don't know.
• 1:28:44
  I didn't really spend time observing him, but it's
• 1:28:53
  interesting. It it it is part of the hope for
• 1:28:56
  the Hokies. They just got to they got to
• 1:29:00
  understand this is not business as usual in college, this wild,
• 1:29:07
  Wild West. Yeah.
• 1:29:09
  And I think that they've I. Think we're?
• 1:29:11
  Understanding that, I think the changes that have been made, you
• 1:29:14
  mentioned the coordinators a couple times tonight, the
• 1:29:17
  changes in strength and conditioning, the bringing on
• 1:29:19
  with more staff. I think Brent Pride knows it.
• 1:29:21
  And we, we've talked to Brent Pride, we've interviewed him
• 1:29:23
  twice and he does understand the culture.
• 1:29:26
  He understands the importance of it.
• 1:29:28
  And Roland talking with you the last 90 minutes here, it's great
• 1:29:33
  to see how much you understand the importance of it.
• 1:29:35
  And you have been there, Hey, growing up in Withville School
• 1:29:39
  in Lexington, the whole valley. Yeah.
• 1:29:43
  We're going to wrap it up here. Please.
• 1:29:46
  Please. What what I want you to do if?
• 1:29:48
  You're able leave us e-mail. Phone number something because
• 1:29:51
  we want you back on here. We don't know when.
• 1:29:54
  Maybe it'll be a good story. If you like enjoying, if you
• 1:29:57
  like to partake in any sort of bourbon or whatever, every year
• 1:30:03
  in December. Drinker from age 13 on.
• 1:30:06
  So yeah. OK, so write this down in
• 1:30:09
  December every. Year we get on here, we call it
• 1:30:13
  the state of the program. And we talk about our Hokies.
• 1:30:15
  And it is a night where we we Evan Williams White label, I've
• 1:30:20
  got a big bottle of Black label Johnnie Walker Scotch, and we
• 1:30:24
  lay our feelings. But Roland, we.
• 1:30:27
  Appreciate you having on. Hang with us just a second.
• 1:30:29
  We'll grab your info. We're going to wrap up this
• 1:30:33
  episode of the Boundary Corner podcast.
• 1:30:36
  Brought to you by the Main Street Pharmacy in Blacksburg.
• 1:30:39
  Brought to you by Moments on the Moray in Lexington, 2 of
• 1:30:43
  Roland's most favorite places in the world, I'm assuming along
• 1:30:45
  with the Virginia. I'm Curtis Wilson.
• 1:30:48
  I'm Brian Siegler. Check out Boundary Corner BT.
• 1:30:52
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• 1:30:56
  Twitter, Instagram, all the fun places, YouTube as well.
• 1:31:00
  Get us on your favorite podcast source.
• 1:31:03
  As always, Jason Long who plays us on plays it out down in
• 1:31:07
  Roanoke. That's Liz's husband, that's our
• 1:31:10
  buddy's wife. Check him out Jason Long
• 1:31:12
  music.com and you can link to everything from him there.
• 1:31:16
  We appreciate Roland, you do not know the stories.
• 1:31:21
  We might just be calling you just to get a few stories every
• 1:31:24
  now and then, rolling just for the pure hell of it.
• 1:31:28
  As always, let's go Hokies.