You Know I’m Right, Episode 228: Sports Media Legend Woody Paige

you know um right the podcast that uncovers the origin stories of some of the biggest things in sports media and entertainment nickters here along with Joe calories and Joe I'm really excited for our guests today he is the only person to work with Skip Bayless Stephen A Smith and Jay Mariani on a regular basis uh he's most well known for being a long time Sports columnist in Colorado he's worked at various newspapers throughout his career um also he's a legend a true living legend as you and I know we grew up one of those shows that you used to watch when we were younger around the horn on ESPN uh one of the greatest panelists to ever do it one of the most all-time winningest panelists who ever do it and by our estimation one of the most entertaining people uh to have ever been associated with the show in ESPN so we're so happy to have him on thank you for doing this with us uh Woody page Woody welcome how are you nice to see you uh welcome to you know I'm right hello Joe Panic uh when we started Around the Horn I asked ESPN I said who's going to watch his show in high school and college kids and they're right people in bars and and you grew up watching it probably after high school or after school or while you were in college a lot of guys watch it there so turned out they were absolutely right normal people don't watch around the horn or pardon Interruption it's got to be crazy people no we did and Tony reality fixed that Island guy uh I I noticed in my research that you guys are at least I think Nix and Staten Island and I went oh God another one of those Staten Islanders uh the only time I've been out there I covered uh uh Ground Zero when the crisis happened and the newspaper sent me to New York and they were taking all of the steel and garbage and human remains out to uh fresh kills yeah and I went out there and that was probably uh it's a great way to start the show with a serious story I went out there and I talked to a cop who actually uh spent time a lot of time in Colorado and I was wearing cowboy walkies baseball cap and I said have you recovered anything unusual he was among the police authorities there that were going through all of the uh stuff that was being barged out there and the trucks good taking it and he said sure we got wallets and we got uh all sorts of uh papers from uh the buildings and he said uh I I gotta watch with a uh the time on it exactly when the plane hit and I said oh could I see that and he went into a God that's a terrible I apologize for this but it hit me so no he he goes into a trailer it's a cool air-conditioned trailer and he comes out of the box and he opens the box and there's the watch with the exact time of the crashes and it's on an arm how's that to start the program no it's it's okay it's uh hopefully uh you can come back to New York and visit us someday maybe yeah I'm here will be so when I uh that that uh in my entire career which expands from uh the 1960s that the 60 something years that I've been doing I'm 76 and I started this when I was 16 so that's 61 years I guess uh I've never had uh period time like the week after uh title of it uh now let's talk about fun things I did give you a funny a lot I think about who was going to watch around a horn and it turned out to be true and it was I said Nick a thing that I worked with Stephen A Smith on a show called uh dream job I don't know you got a chance to see that but that was the ESPN Zoli uh attempt I think to try to do American Idol or reality show or the voice or something like that and whoever won that show we did uh I think Four Seasons whoever won that show got to be an anchor person on ESPN and it got a a Mustang convertible and ninety five thousand dollars and so Stephen A Smith and I were were judges on that show and huh there was a lot of talent that actually came through that guys that are still still on TV but at one point we were judging the finalists one season and two things happened Stephen A Smith told one of the guys through two young men he said you know I got to tell you the truth and you had to put this in Stephen A Smith's voice uh at the end of the day the bottom line is what you bring to the table there's just too many cliches that's funny Joe how does it bring back dream jobs so I could win and uh yeah I know we need to find Nick a uh so Nick does like freelance broadcasting so we need to find a good better concrete job here soon so I told I told one of the guys who actually ended up winning I said you were Rock Solid could I do a rock solid you you managed to get past the mistakes you managed to do the interview grade you did it and I said best performance the the entire season Rock Solid I told the other guy and I said you know what you were Rock hard and the host of the show was a late uh great uh personality for ESPN fellow before because I couldn't think of another word for rock like rock good or whatever and it was live it was live I work with ESPN with Stephen A Smith I worked with Skip Bayless on first take First and Ten we started that and anybody that has ever watched skip I apologize and uh uh we had we had actually uh auditioned about 300 people to be my partner on that morning show yeah and we had gone through rap artists uh former NFL quarterbacks uh disc jockeys around the country and I must tell you I would guess 90 percent of them were African-Americans because they were kind of recreating the pardon Interruption Dynamic I guess you know a white guy and a black guy and that was the same period time as the Olympics in Athens Greece and I went to the Olympics and I wanted uh I had picked out somebody I wanted to work with and that was part of my agreement that I could choose my partner and when I came back they said we're going to try Skip Bayless you know it really that's too old like that's really what they're called actually worked a bit uh until I think the end that relationship was we would have meetings in the morning to determine what was going to be on the show that day we do that for around the horn it would go through 12 14 subjects and figure out what are the best subjects they don't tell us what to say we just decide on what topics like you guys did the same thing you go all right what do we want to talk about and uh there was a great uh funny survey taken by a government magazine that said uh 38 of male golfers would give up sex for a year you think of break 80. and and the producer said to me would you give up sex for a year to two part and I said of course I would I've give little I said there's been probably 20 years I've had to give up sex for a year they turned to Skip Bayless there's a roommate about 10 people in there producers directors assistance production assistant uh would you give up God for a year to improve your job gate and he said I've had more sex than everybody together in this world that wasn't even the answer to people the question that was the question what he wasn't wasn't called Pizza like the Target demographic was females so weren't they trying I guess they thought you guys are two hunks maybe that's what lots of success what the target audience was to steal uh people from today and and CBS this morning and they wanted to just kind of slice into those morning shows so they felt like the dimension of sports and they added with that news and interviews we had a lot of rock stars and uh bands and and uh celebrities uh on the show and so I would guess it was about 70 Sports and they hired someone from uh one of the morning shows on the network to be the producing yourself so anyway uh that was the the pregame discussion on the air they asked me the question would you give up copper here and I said yeah same question yeah I've given up God for that yeah yeah I would do that to shoot it 75. and it turned to skip and said would you give up and he said I've had a lot more sex than Woody I got up out of my chair and went around and tried tried my best to choke him and he was he's Skipper and I know he's still doing this skip was in great shape I mean he worked out he sat on a stationary bike and watched Sports 24 hours a day hey it's been about 20 hours a day on a bar stool so I wasn't working out and so we got in the live a fight on live TV that Spilled Out onto Eighth Avenue we were about a block from uh Madison Square Garden we were right there by Empire State Building and we were out on the street kind of and I could hear in my ifb that the producer was saying to the cameraman keep getting it keep pushing again as much of it you can and I thought well that's kind of the end of this how this world's going to be and uh he didn't even a Smith ended up together and it's kind of funny how all of this cut really works together J Mariotti uh used to be a columnist in Denver and I was his boss I was a sports editor and he he had come from the other newspaper across the street to work for us and and uh uh I didn't like it very much but that didn't bother me but he left to go to the National newspaper which had a short uh life and I said let's go outside tell everybody you're leaving all these are true stories at The Denver Post I was in sports editor and the columnist and I went out and I said uh people uh Jay mariotti's leaving my work is done here I've accomplished all I could as you left every time I saw him a sports event I'd say hi Jade and say [ __ ] you and that's been on for like three years that is true that's all he would say and I would always say people like following me around when they saw a Mariani coming because they knew this is gonna happen I'd go hey Jay how you doing so uh when they started Around the Horn they said how do you feel about if we bring Jay marriotti over there with well he's not gonna like me because I'm the first guy they chose around the heart we met at Carnegie Deli in New York and it was Bob Ryan uh Tim kalashall guys who were Originals on Around the Horn Jay Mariotti uh uh Max Kellerman the producer of the show directors and so I sat down at the table and Mary audio was about two feet away and I said hi Jake and I know what he's going to say to me I said hi Jake and he said hi Woody how you doing and I went oh he's changed because we had a battle on around the horn we were uh antagonists for several years until he got into some trouble yeah so um that goes from 9 11 to James we've had we have Mary I on the show and you know he he's always quick to note that despite the fact that he hasn't been on around the horn in over a decade he's still top five all all-time wins you of course are at the top of the list I don't know if anyone's going to be passing Mariotti anytime soon to crack it to the top five so he's very impressed by that but you you're you're gonna be Untouchable Woody at the top of the leaderboard I don't know what that accomplishes actually what's that word you know nobody's going to I think what and I am honest uh I mean I'm honest on the show and my personality is my not much different but I think what people will always remember is the Blackboard and that's kind of a sad State about me as a journalist for 60 years that the the Blackboard that's behind me with this is these coupons or quotes or whatever it is that will be remembered and I thought and I'll tell you something today that you don't care about but I really never talked about is I assumed after uh 10 or 15. I didn't take the show let me back up I didn't think the show would last longer than 13 weeks when they when they put together I felt like it didn't have the chemistry or the concept that would really work and that's why I asked them who's going to watch this show and in a book that's about ESPN Tim Kyle Shaw said everybody that they put together I think it was five or six people they felt like all of them belonged and I didn't belong that because I was super sales and you had to go back in history he had an afternoon show for kids that was really for adults out of Cleveland and Detroit and then it was National and I was kind of copying super sales as conceptual just being silly and Tim constell told the guys who wrote that book uh these guys are having all the fun he said paste and blog and he said after the show was on the week on TV for two weeks they felt like Bernie page was the show that they all had to develop personalities the belief was it was going to be like a daily Sports reporters for anybody that's uh your age or older we'll remember on Sunday mornings there was a serious sports topic show it included Bob Ryan and and several other sports writers and that's what Mariotti thought it was going to be we were doing a daily we're really serious when the producer of the show Max Kellerman uh who came to be one of my best friends in life drawn on about New York and the Yankees and boxing in New York in Madison Square Garden and we're sitting in the in the deli and he's just going on and I finally said Max you apparently had me confused with somebody who gives a [ __ ] what you think and the producer said that's the show and so I think the other guys got that it was supposed to be the idea of the show was like two guys sitting at a bar yeah look at each other about you know Sports outcome or a game that's in Pleasant so that was that was basically the because they told me I met with the ESPN Executives at the Super Bowl right so what is the show going to be he said sort of like Hollywood Squares and you'll be the Met Center Square and uh really and so I didn't think it was going to last very long but I thought it we got past uh we passed a lot of criticism early on and it caught on because people like uh pardon Interruption they love Tony and Michael and then they kind of figured out what we were and I thought well it's going to last for a while and somebody else will come along and I'll pass along the quote board you know the Blackboard with just my idea of a funny thing and I keep waiting for somebody who's going to come along I thought I'd be gone like 10 years ago and nobody's gonna go nobody wants to do a my assistant my associate knows that some of those Blackboard quotes are written under performance enhancing foreign how'd you come up with the idea for the Blackboard and is it tough at this point on the show to be putting new quotes all the time it's tough uh I was in New York working on Coal Pizza working on a dream job I was doing Disney kids Disney Channel I didn't realize when I agreed to go to New York that they were going to use me on 14 shows a day I was like who's the guy from New York that was uh Who Wants To Be A Millionaire he did the showing it Regis filming I talked once because you do big Notre Dame fan and and I saw him that was true and he said you're on TV more than I am and Regis was on The Tonight Show it's like poor because Skip and I would take two shows that would appear later and and Co pizza was on two hours live and it repeated two more hours and I was meant that I was on television like six hours a day and they thought this is ridiculous I don't want to see me six hours why would anybody else want you but uh my assistant then and I were walking down the street and the studio that I had in New York City uh was in the New Yorker Hotel if you're familiar with that that's that's where we were taping shows and I sit down we got nothing in the background like I have nothing in the background here this is my office and he said what do you want to put back there and I said every childhood has all these shelves have footballs in the back they'll have Jets footballs or helmets and I said we're gonna have something else you can what do you think about I said maybe a Blackboard and I'll just put something on it like you suck Marriott and we our first Blackboard came from Toys R Us and it had plastic letters and you could put them on the board and we had just enough letters to say Mariotti sucks or something like that and then we got another Blackboard that he could use chalk on so this goes back to 2000 and 23. and I told him I said let's get a Blackboard that we can uh use chalk on and actually use more than three three these and he brought that in and uh I I just wrote a few quotes and I got a call from the vice president of ESPN saying lose the Whiteboard that's not ESPN that's like we're a kid's show or something and I went okay all right a week later he called back and he said I guess I shouldn't say the Clockwork but he said put the [ __ ] Blackboard up I said really he's I said you got so many calls from Nick and Joe and everybody else out there saying no we love the Blackboard he said the president of the network like the book it would back up it was off the air nobody knows that story but it was off the air for a week and I went Ah that's okay I mean we'll put a football up there behind me and so then the uh the the Blackboard had one other problem [Music] the same assistant one day he put on the he put on the Blackboard I I would say him but he come up with one every once while he said if you don't like my performance call 1-800-347 or in a producing the show called me that afternoon and said a Blackboard is finished you may be finished and I said pray me he said if you call that number it's an escort service it's so um on the show you called to get a prostitute with the Blackboard and he said take the Blackboard back and the next day I got a call and say put the Blackboard back out so they just sort of put it I actually tell them we show them before the show starts what the bike boards are and I say to the producers and directions and everything if you don't like this one uh you better you better tell me right away because it's about to be on the air and the other painless can't see it so I make fun of them because the way the boxes are on that show they can't actually they don't watch me when I'm talking they they're looking at notes or on their cell phone or whatever it is and so uh reality and the other uh panelists don't really know what's on the Bible so I can make fun of all of them and they see it later on and I'll hear from Sarah Spade later on about you know what would that bike go about uh Marietta used to complain about it all the time uh but I would guess of several hundred thousand people I hear from that the Blackboard is generally appreciated or accepted or being what it is just my idea of something will again have some fun with and so when do I do it occasionally I I do them at bars on our napkins and I would guess out of 10 that I come up with we use like two or three you did a lot of them are not I I did a book of uh there's a book on Amazon you buy it it's about 2 000 of them and and that was the best seller for a while and I've been asked to do it again but uh I don't know I guess I've done five thousand I I guess that's my only accomplishment like and I that should end all your questions well listen you said it yourself you've been in this business for 60 years right you're not you're not gonna stay in this business for 60 years unless you have some personality to you now we can walk you through your career from the Whitehaven press uh wanting to be a journalist in high school the University of Tennessee your early days writing for the Knoxville journal the Commercial Appeal of Memphis uh the Rocky Mountain news The Denver Post because that now you you turned what primarily started as a writing career and you made a transition into TV and broadcasting uh and you were all part of one of the most successful uh entities that has ever existed at ESPN right so y'all gonna have all that success unless you have talent and you're a great Storyteller and you're entertaining right so uh what would be the best piece of advice to somebody who is looking to do that right now to a lot of colleges of poor kid in this house I grew up in the government housing uh going through Fayetteville group in the housing project where Elvis Presley if anybody saw the Elvis movie they show him as a kid at the Lauderdale courts and that's where we lived and I used to listen to them when I was a little kid uh uh singing and playing your guitar and my mother said he'd never amount anything she said why are you hanging out with that kid and Elvis and I would spreading throughout our Our Lives uh and so I don't think there's much promise for me to be but I mean it turned out okay for Elvis so I guess I turned out okay but I speak in all of these colleges and that question of course comes up all the time and I put a lot of thought into it years ago but in terms of how did I keep a job where I was longer to become somewhat successful it I it boils down to three or four things number one what car isn't everybody and I think when I was in high school and college in terms of Journalism I was a worst student at one of the most distinguished Tennessee alumni award and Peyton Manning found out he had won it the year before that's a pretty good company to be in Peyton Manning and then you win this award and Peyton said to me at practice you won that award you know it was a question not like like a statement and he said I'm giving mine back if they give it to you it must be worthless well this is right and he used to after a game Peyton Manning had would win a game and I go in the locker room and I'd walk over by him and nobody would ask him questions until he changed out of his uniform into so it's severe closed and I'd walk by and I'd hear Woody Woody and it was Pagan and I thought well he's going to tell me some kind of scoop or something like poverty said you should be the athletic director of Tennessee of conversations once he said get the ESPN playing and we'll fly to the Tennessee Alabama game that's it they're not going to give me the ESPN playing you're paid man you are a Peyton [ __ ] Manny you get us a play and you flies there and he said no but you can stay at my hotel in Knoxville and we'd have that conversation people come over and said what's out of sort of inside information did he give you we talked about to see a lot anyway when I speaking colleges I tell them I try to figure out how this all worked look uh not a lot of skill uh on radio you're called a person personality you know that they'll go Howard Stern he's a radio personality on TV you're called a talent and I thought I have no personality I have no talent I don't belong on the radio I don't blow on television I worked harder than everybody else not as a student but in college as the editor of the high school of the college Daily Newspaper in Tennessee I worked hard uh I was doing a midnight to six radio show on a on a stationary called Woody wake up and I know nobody was listening to it because I would have a record that would skip for like 19 minutes and nobody called and complained and I'd go out to breakfast and leave the record on and then just play over and over again and I did breakfast and come back and uh I think the only girls that were having uh overnight parties were probably listening to the music again and I worked for the newspaper the daily newspaper in Knoxville Knoxville Journal and I had a TV show on the campus nuke I worked I worked very hard at what I wanted to do in life if you work harder you guys are doing a podcast if you work hard at this podcast it's probably better than how many podcasts do you think they are about sports probably five thousand just I don't know if you work harder than those other five thousand you're gonna be in the top 20 percent success rate that's what I did this is my advice to everybody out there you want to be successful in broadcasting journalism ESPN Carter automobile business whatever it is if you work harder in school and college in your life than everybody else you rise to the top 20 if you're more passionate I want you to ask the psychiatrist that said why is it that the that I actually am successful and say if you're more passionate than anybody you love what you're doing most people in what he told me he said and and I'm not putting anybody down with this but he said you know a guy collecting garbage not passionate about what he's doing he collecting qualities he puts it on the truck and moves on so that's it number two is if I if then if you're more passionate than anybody else about what you're doing if you pass another 10 of the people and the third is creativity so if you're passionate about the podcast you're doing you're working hard at it to give people that are really good I saw the list of people you've had come on so if you work hard at that you work hard at putting on a good good show you're passionate that you're excited about doing this every week I would I assume you're doing once a week maybe more you're passionate about you love it you want to do it you'd probably want to do it three times a day if you're good if they pay if somebody would pay you you could pretend today the third thing is to be creative what does that mean a Blackboard yeah a Blackboard is created you can laugh and you're smiling at that and that sounds stupid creativity is in college when they moved they took a male dormitory in Tennessee and move them in out and put the women in that summer tour and our journalism Professor told us to do a story on the women moving into the men's dormitory uh everybody in my class or the 40 other people that did this paper are the story wrote about the women and do you like uh the lobby and the plants and stuff like that I went and interviewed uh female students about what were they doing with the urinals think to me and odd story that they go into the bathroom in the dormitory and there would be urinals everywhere and they told me that they they watched their hoes and underwear in their urinals and that uh they actually had peeing contests in euros and two or three other things that they were doing I turned it in and the professor gave me an f and everybody who did the normal stuff the other day I sent that to a National Collegiate uh writing contest and I won but it was created 30 people did the same story and I did the different story now I may be silly it might have been put off the wall but it was different when I when I've been to 47 Super Bowls and guys would come up to me as writers and say what are you writing this year I would I went to a nudist colony colony in Florida and asked uh who they were cheering for in the game because they weren't wearing any clothes it wasn't like they had on the Mets cap or you know Jets sweatshirt and Rick Riley who was riding the back uh column for Sports Illustrated said what are you doing this weekend I'm going to the news College why I said nobody else is they went on the day of uh of the Tuesday the interviews with the players you got 10 000 people asking the same questions those guys I went to a news Colony I went to a leper colony I I tried out for Jeopardy on that day in Los Angeles and in Phoenix Arizona the local columnist there said to me what are you doing I said I'm going out to interview a medicine man at a reservation one of the Native Americans and I went out true story went out and I found their leader he was the what was called the medicine bag and I said to him uh you keep up with football and he said oh yeah and what kind of sitting around and probably smoking something that's illegal in 32 states and I said it was uh the it was the Cowboys and the Steelers were playing and that's super cool and I said so you're gonna watch the Super Bowl oh sure yeah what team are you pulling for and he said the Cowboys and I said an Indian calling for the Cowboys and I'm thinking this is going well so I said uh what do you think the score is going to be Cowboys 48 uh either I said did you read the lead did you talk to the world did you go up in the mountains for three days and contemplate you said no I watched ESPN and it came back and I wrote this column about the medicine bed pulling for the Cowboys the Arizona the Phoenix paper ran my column on the front page and the guy who was there called us was on the sports page and he came to me and he said I should have gone with you I should have done I'm not trying to impress you with my ability I just try to always think of the story that everybody else is not doing that is true in college that was through in high school it's true to this day uh I did a story this week John Elway left the Broncos after 40 years and uh nobody had interviewed it I mean it's one of the great greatest pop can maybe top five quarterbacks of all time I I called the golf course where he was and I knew that he was in Palm Springs and he was in the bar and we talked and I I did a column with him and he I thought he was at peace with himself and I I also thought that he was about as truthful as he ever been uh and I said let's do your top seven memories and he said any kind of chuckled and I said of course that's because your number and he said to me the number I wanted was 11. he said I was 11 in high school and when I went to Stanford I will ask for number 11 and a older player had that number and wouldn't give it to me so John Elway is the most famous with Mickey Mantle those are the two most famous sevens in the history of sports he didn't want seven he wanted 11. seven was his second choice and it was basically based on 7-Eleven the convenience store he went well it was sounded like eleven seven seven eleven I found it funny that nobody else this John Elway had 40 years with the Broncos second most Super Bowl appearances by quarterbacks Brock Brady of course number one and I'm just a good communist and I interviewed I found him I found him and interviewed him he's got nine grandkids stuff that he hasn't talked about and I did that last Sunday for Easter Sunday which seemed kind of appropriate I don't know why but uh and still nobody's believable time nobody thought maybe to call the Gulfport where he might be playing golf that didn't again that's not me but that answers your question I I've always bob Knight who's been sick lately and I got along he used to come to uh when he was coaching in Indiana he would come to Colorado to hunt and fish and I knew a guy hunted and fished with him and Bob would talk to me and he would call me and he said to me most people learn to read and write when they're in the second grade and they go on to more important things I never went on to more important things I read and I write I write books I read books and I work hard I'm passionate and I'm creative that's the advice if you do that you're now in the top 10 percentile that doesn't put me in the you know I don't know what group that is but I think that puts you beyond most everybody else in life no matter what no matter what you choose I do tell people particularly lately that I there was no vision in my mind that there would ever be anything like around the horn I couldn't I I asked to Kimberly Mutombo once but when he was growing up and advertising did you dream of being an NBA player and he said yeah he said I couldn't dream beyond the end of the dirt road and I thought that made sense he didn't know there was such a thing as basketball he played soccer when he when he grew oh he didn't know about basketball until he kind of left and went to Big City I didn't know who knew there was going to be around the horn you guys 10 years ago when you were watching around the horn there was no such thing as the podcast you could you couldn't dream of having a successful podcast what I tell students now or young people or guys like you dream of what doesn't exist YouTube didn't exist if I were a young man I would be I would be thinking of what what is next Beyond this pocket what is the next big thing Beyond a YouTube channel a podcast I don't know what it is I'm too tired and old to know but you two guys Joe Nick you'll be doing something in two years that you didn't even know it did you didn't know there was going to be a podcast and you woke up one day and you met whoa let's do a podcast I woke up one day and said oh I think I'll do I'll be on radio I grew up listening to radio talk shows uh on on from Cleveland in Memphis Tennessee and I could pick up this station and there was a guy named Joe Franklin who would talk to kids who would call him and ask questions and they go go do your homework go to bed kid and it was he was a Howard Stern fight before Alex Drake and I that that's what I kind of thought you know maybe I can do that maybe I could do talk radio someday that's all I could dream of it can be the tunnel could only dream of maybe playing soccer but he was seven feet tall he could have a dream to lose I couldn't dream but the Blackboard uh you couldn't dream when you were 15 years old there was a podcast so people need to dream but don't dream of what you think then Alexander Graham Bell woke up one day and said here's an idea a telephone well that's what I tell college students dream of the next name what it what podcasts are going to evolve into something beyond that I'm being too serious you'd rather me be silly go ahead no it's I mean it's all good you've accomplished so much in your career you did the big expose will say on Invesco Mile High you got you got sued there you you are a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame Community baseball fan voter so what are just some of the favorite events or type of stories that you've gotten to to do over the years survey and we were both the same age and he was in the ABA I was covering the ABA and I just talked to him manager he just come into the league and I talked to another room in the locker room and we kind of fit I ask him about his name and he told me a great story that his mother had his single mother and when she gave birth yeah uh the verse said yes it was his birthday you look it up is is George Washington's birthday uh you should name your kid George of Washington Irving and Judy's mother said you name your kid George Washington Smith I'm naming my kid Julius and Harvey and I thought that was a cute I mean I thought that was really good story of why he was Dr J he would have been Dr GW if she had named him George Washington and he said that was a really good question and we got to be close friends that I went you know this is immediated to you now people say oh he's bragging about I'm not bragging I'm just saying that was just me saying how you doing kid I like your game the thing within uh with the stadium in Denver is a lucky story I was I was invited by my ex-girlfriend to come to the opening of a Mexican restaurant and she said would you do me a favor yeah I was pretty well known did you stop by say hello again that's it's here I'll do it for you went there valet park by car within Silo was leaving I think I had a margarita maybe a couple of tacos I was leaving a guy came down the street who was obviously drunk he was around happy hour timeline and he said to my ex-girlfriend I could tell he was hitting on her which didn't bother me yeah we were no longer together and she said uh This is 40 page this is said his name and he said I'm Executive Vice President of uh whatever the name of the company notice the name of that company the the Invesco which it got into a lot of trouble they're now back they were doing college basketball they've got in really deep trouble went bankruptcy anyway uh he set up by Executive Vice President investor and I said you probably don't want to talk to me I don't like this table again he said we don't like it either and my ex-girlfriend said they have back it up back it up you don't want to you don't want to talk to Woody about this and he said oh yeah yeah and I could tell he was bragging he said we hate it we call it uh by day that uh it's kind of funny and it was named after a woman's uh device and she's saying to talk to him don't tell him about this and he said I don't care that he knows we all we kid about it the president is an idiot for doing this to the true story so I leave I go right that here's there that I did I wanted it to be Mile High Stadium like the original one that's a great name like Yankee Stadium Chase Stadium yeah go through the great names that now have uh uh corporate names on them I didn't want it to be uh in physical field I wanted to be Wildlife statement so I don't know to sing saying they agree with us the people that work for Invesco think it's the worst name in the whole world I got on a plane and went to Wimbledon to cover the tennis tournament and the British Open I get a call from the end of the paper saying we're being sued for two billion dollars by Invesco that you made that up and I went black yeah shortened story he'd give me his card I wouldn't have remembered his name but he gave me his actual card and he said Executive Vice President when I left to go to London on the flight I put it on my desk at home and that editor said they're selling this do you have any proof I said yes I have my ex girlfriend who's well known on the town she's PR person and I've got this card on my desk go there let him go in take the card they said they're investigating that you made this up live uh so it was a big obviously you knew about it because it's on the internet forever and uh uh they did Sue I don't know that they're exactly but it was a big money item on Thursday they publicly announced that they were backing out of a lawsuit they found the guy and he admitted it and they found out doing their you know they probably hired really expensive lawyers investigators they found out everybody was calling and people were calling me saying they knew people who worked at it at Invesco they called it by this other name and diaphragm because it I was told it looked like a diaphragm if you were in a helicopter I thought it looked like a spaceship myself I wouldn't have come up with anything so anyway it became a rather famous National story and they backed they backed out and into their lawsuit and I I saved my job I think I saved my job if it had been anybody that maybe I didn't know or my ex when my ex-girlfriend maybe they wouldn't have stood up for me but I also had the card which was pretty good proof you know that was like a very amazing moment where there's the guard there's the guy we know the name so uh stories uh it was like what I said about the Super Bowl I think that uh when everybody else was interviewing everybody was in me going to trial for Jeopardy so my my belief about trying houses Jeopardy is maybe now they they'll maybe have a sports uh subject and I do good if I studied the Bible which I did in the southern baptist uh it turned out that I became my a question on Jeopardy that's kind of one of my problems about this journalist is on the show called around the one I don't I I think the subject must have been more something and my daughter and I were in a movie uh Marvel movie I think and everybody's calling me saying you're on Jeopardy tonight uh they talk to me about being on as a celebrity you know and yeah I couldn't get on it but as a regular guy I just try to and Rick Riley who became I think the premier sports writer in this country for a long time I I helped him get an early job and we we've had a lot of conversations about it we both feel the same way the bigger the event the smaller you make the story so if you're at the Super Bowl by the small story if you're a high school track meet turn that into a big story and that's what I that's advice I give to to young people who are journalists are studying that in colleges that everybody covers the Super Bowl is a big story five minutes small story and if you're going to I found I I talked to a girl who's doing the discus at the State high school music and people go why don't you go to the State High School track meet they have the greatest hamburgers there and I go every year because the hamburgers were like you know as parents making hamburgers and I thought gee I like the hamburgers I'll go there and I'll find this the column that's true that's the true story that I talked to a girl who's a discus thrower and she was she had just set the state record and she was going to get a pack our trophy her school had gone out of business State closed her school the track meet was after the school they closed she couldn't take the statue back to her school and put it in the trophy case she couldn't even go back and have a celebration with everybody it was small town in Colorado and I made that into the biggest story if I possibly could I thought what a great big story and so I think it makes sense to go to state high tree school track meets because the burgers are better than anywhere else and when you go to the Super Bowl find that smaller story that might be uh you know a coach that is 96 years old that when the Broncos played and won the Super Bowl no no the debacos played in yeah one when they won Super Bowl 50 I went and found John Austin who had been their coach in a retirement home and he had awesome and I talked to him about he was only like 10 miles away from the stadium where the Broncos were in the Super Bowl and nobody thought to maybe go find John Boston and I didn't know he was in a city at all so I'm not sure that he was in the retirement uh place I found out where he lived and I went there and his wife answered the door and I told her that you know I'd like to talk to John who had been uh coach at Stanford and won the Rose Bowl he was he actually made the Broncos into a competitive team their first winning record and she said he's not here that's in this home now and I went by I asked her if I said you know can I talk to John Lawson sure if he's having lunch and I went into this room and he [Music] he could answer approve me but I think that's that's my I'm not I'm not a personality I'm Motown but I think I'm creating you guys are you guys reached out to me that doesn't make you anything but he reached out to people that you want to have on your podcast and you'll find as you have that people will do your podcast then you'll become famous and somebody will say why is your campaign it's because we just we're willing to reach out to people and say come on our podcast we turn that into a YouTube channel you turn that into a network let me turn that into the best uh Sports network but that's that's how it works uh bob Knight was telling me that uh you create your own look because I'd say yeah you wasn't as much three I think and I said did you feel like you got lucky you create your own luck he said everybody talks about luck plus skill no no lock is not something you find on the street luck is something you create so that's why I'm giving you too much to ask me something that would be funny all right Woody what what sporting stadiums have the best food Dodger Dog now they have changed companies but I would apply to Los Angeles just to have a it's funny you brought that up because this week I looked there's a new company making I think I've read a Farmer John's or farmer Jim's or whoever's been doing it for like 70 years and they got a new company and I went really it's not going to be able to taste like the regular dodgy dog I wonder if I can get Farmer John I think that's right it's company with the old the sold the old one in fact call him and say would you sing these Badger dogs uh and I haven't been able to really find him yet but think about the hamburger at the track meet I went and found the box that the hamburger meat came in and I called that company because I thought I don't need to go to track meet I can make these hamburgers myself they would not sell them to me by the gross that's the way they sell them sports kids sports of it and I said but I'm Woody paid I don't play The Woody page card but I played it that is I'm Woody page you know I'm on ESPN it's the kitchen I'll say uh what do you I'll pay 150 for a dozen hamburgers because I want to see if I can do something uh desk Baltimore barbecue uh Albion where I feel fence uh the sandwich in Pittsburgh from the deli that uh named their sandwich after the quarterback it has fries and coleslaw on it and the Roethlisberger yeah yeah uh I I when I go to you know I've in the every when I go to the cities I go to there's a place in San Francisco that's called the stinking roads that's the greatest garlic pride in the world the garlic fries at San Francisco and Oakland Oakland actually has as bad a stadium as that is they have better garlic but whole stadium smells like garlic fries and you could smell it because there's only like eight people going to the AIDS game so you can you don't have to stand in line or anything so that showed you something about me that I when I when the season comes uh season comes around and the block was scheduled and then I go oh gee I'm going to Baltimore I'll have crab cakes on crab cakes I'm going to New England I'll have clam chowder I'm going to New York I'll I'll go down to when I lived there I used to hang out at a place in World legally I go there for it was a place where in a Godfather where the the night and stabs one of the bad guys at the bar my dad lives down there I know that place really well yeah I so I I go there and sit at the bar and um I love the Italian bread that's got the meat inside of it so that's what I think about when I go to your Buffalo I go to the Anchor Bar they have isn't that interesting stuff so yes I'm familiar with every stadium and the food in it and I I there are a lot of new stadiums lately but I've been to you know every NFL stadium most of the baseball stadiums and most of the basketball arena so I have not been to the new Warriors play since San Francisco and then each one of them I would try there was a New York writer very famous Paul Zimmerman and he played at uh Hustle he was an offensive lineman he became Dr Z and he was in Sports Illustrated and was considered the ultimate uh he was on the Hall of Fame committee with me and he would sit next to me we would go to the Senior Bowl and he was showing me his folder where he kept every national anthem that he ever heard who sang it and how long it was and he had the shortest the longest the best the worst and he never wrote it and he'd show me that book and he was like his Bible that he throughout his career so he does that I go to Philadelphia and go oh do I go to Pat's Cheesesteak or do it the one across the tree so that's terrible that's I can I could I could you know that's terrible I'll I'll tell you I met a guy you guys are Joe are you in the New York area too yes when I was a kid I was a Yankees fan and a Cardinals fan and I say I collected baseball cards and there were 16 Kings in in baseball I knew every player and every team that's not how much I was 10 11. when I 10 years ago or something I go to Florida uh Brent takes me to a lunch meeting and a Sir Thomas club or something I'm not a speaker I'm just going with my buddy and he says we got this guy over here probably I do like baseball let me introduce you to he thought I assume that I want to meet our baseball player and his name was uh he said he's a dentist and his name is Dr Wise and so he introduced me I could tell Dr Wise had no interest in me whatsoever he said what he's written for Sports Illustrated and it kind of been on TV and ignorant stuff and I could tell he had no interest in I said Casey wise and he said yes and I said switch hitter 267 lifetime leverage Cleveland Indians uh played uh for the Milwaukee Braves back up second baseman a utility infielder you went to Florida state to become a dentist and I went on and he sat down in the chair he was walking by sat down and checked there and he said what and he turned out all these guys and he said what the hell is this what did that how did you set him up and they said we don't know him it just came up out of nowhere and I said Casey why so uh which hitter and uh you were born in 1937 and today and you played in two World Series against the Yankees and I said and here are the starters for the Milwaukee praise Joe Adcock who [Music] brother Frank Adcock was one of the two first baseman second base was red shankings the shortstop was uh Felix mantea Third Base Eddie Matthews an MVP Hall of Famer I catchers devil rice and Dale Crandall Warren Spahn blue Burdette and the first Little League player to ever make it to the major league Georgia and Casey wise said I've never heard anything like that how do you know that and that's it it's kind of what I do I said I memorized all the players in 1956. I was 10 years old and he said that's why we're multiple and I said my my daughter could use a dentist or you can see her so uh that's worthless how's that feel worthless information it's like what you said about the most wins I won this week on around the horn and I said how many wins is that and I thought the producer said 666 and I went well that's not good please decide the devil and he said no six five six and so that's how I know because I don't I don't really pick I think if I uh if I Googled the show they they might have it on there but uh it's fun uh I haven't really talked much about it but uh Tony there is no plot of who's going to win the show you don't know until the moment arrives and I've won many times not knowing what I'm going to say at the end of the show and I even did a show where I won and I said I don't have anything and so for 30 seconds I just sat there and stared at the thing at the camera and they said that's the worst 30 seconds of all time and I said yes and I can't ever repeat it dude that's a one-time holy that's a walk-off I like the show has become very diverse which I think is fantastic we have uh as many women as we do I think there's like 21 or 22 now people I I did every show every day for like 15 16 years and I said I need to I need to back off this and so I do one or two a week and I I have a contract for I don't know maybe an insurance and I really think uh the women who 've joined the show over the years of that added to the presence we have we've added many many African Americans but we have gay panelists we have Mary Penny we have the Asian American people have become big stock many times has become a big star that resulted of being known around Sarah's Spain uh it's become it's evolved for the good it started as for a white men we weren't I wasn't an old man well I guess I was so maybe 15 three or something but uh and I'm not the oldest Bob Ryan until the show and he's his wife and I were born on the same date that Bob's about a few months older than me to always tell him he's you know they're thinking but it's evolved in the from when you were seeing it I don't know how old you guys are but it was evolving when you first started watching it I thought it was the same kind of show I would have watched when I was a kid but I watched the original Batman we've watched that once a week in my fraternity I was in college I watched the Soupy Sales show and they've been everybody out there including YouTube guys look up sweet potatoes a great comedian who did an afternoon talk so nationally for kids but it wasn't for kids it was for adults kids didn't really understand the jokes that were behind the joke and I met him uh at a club years later I mean many many years later told him that I was actually doing online my personality of Around the Horn is a combination of Soupy Sales and Dan Reeves who is the Hall of Fame type coach coach the Giants and Dan Reese used to rip on the media and come out and say why do I have to always straighten you guys out you don't know what you're talking about so when I gone there I was doing soupy salesman I was doing Dan Reed's going you don't know what you're talking about and I used that line this week I went we were talking about the NBA playoffs and I said to the other three panelists why do I have to always straighten you guys out and that was my salute to the late Dan reads and nobody knew I mean I'll say on the show you have to look at the schedule and that's what you on the Google site you'll see what he says you look at the schedule all the time that's a running Jag that I don't ever look at the schedule is but the researcher might tell me the schedule in my ear because the producer talks to me all the time and it's usually I won't put I won't be making a lot of them set but he'll say you're killing me Woody and he puts a word in that word in there and that's what if you see me smiling it's because a producer is saying I'm talking too long or uh shut up or you know get on with it or whatever and so you're looking at the panelist on around the board yeah we have these expressions and they're probably based on the researchers saying in my head that the Jets are opening again the Giants and then they're playing football together the Jets are opening and I seem like I'm smart when I'm absolutely it's being said into my age foreign so you talked about making your own luck before so we've had a previous guest on this podcast where I think that's a really great story uh and that we can actually trade stories so I'm trying to make it as concise as we can Once Upon a Time uh last year Nick and I we had Scott Hamilton on the podcast with us now Scott Hamilton uh as you know Olympic gold medalist you have your own story with him as well but our story is that we had him on uh and then a couple days later there was this big wrestling event the WWE event uh their big Stadium show was SummerSlam that was at Nissan Stadium where the Titans play in Nashville so we had Scott on that Thursday and before the podcast started Nick was picking his brain and found out uh that he goes to hockey games there Predators games and the wrestling came up and Nick was like oh you should talk to him about you know you know you want him to go blah blah blah little did we know Scott knows an employee who works for the company that employee provided Scott with tickets within a matter of a day or so Scott was texting me and he said hey you know I got you an extra ticket I'm going with my son uh we're sitting not far from The Ring which is right behind the commentary table and uh ended up being on a plane 48 hours later on Saturday morning because the event was Saturday that that night and that was the first time I ever went to Nashville so uh without doing the podcast never would interview Scott Hamilton without Nick speaking to him and bringing it up would never know that all of that was going to transpire how it did so talk about creating your own luck Nick and I uh I don't think it goes over our heads we create our own luck here and we've had a lot of really amazing experiences so we know that you after Scott won those gold medals at the Olympics uh you flew back with him so talk to us what that experience was like meeting him in person and uh let's trade stories here he lived he trained in Colorado he didn't grow up here but he trained me Colorado because the Olympic Center is here and the Broadmoor which is a famous ring for national championships for broke men and women Dorothy ham training see their so many skating yeah plus you want to train at altitude before you go to the Olympics because of the altitude will help you particularly when the Olympics were in Mexico City uh anyway I I knew him in passing that I go to Sarajevo which is there's a bunch of the Yugoslavia no longer exists with Terry Avon all of the Olympic menus who have destroyed and he won the gold medal and here's the luck the luck that comes in you make your own luck but it does happen that get on the plane and I actually had a contract and I could fly first class which was rare for a sports writer uh but if you look at my history I was in our newspaper award for one newspaper a one street to another newspaper on another Street and part of ideals I said I want to apply first question and they made an agreement with me this is about making your look I always wanted to fly first place and I said I do a lot of columns on the airplane and I feel like I can write better if I mean first time and so they made me agree to put it in the contract that if I was writing a column I could fly that flight on First Class well I opened my computer on every player and I'd write like two paragraphs did I close it and then now we drink and so I was flying first class because that was part of my deal and coming on the plane that Scott Hamilton I went hi Scott and he knew me well enough to say hello and he said oh pardon me William who's classy next to you and so we spent he just won the gold medal and so we sat next to each other and his agent sat behind us and I said you want me to change places with your agent so you can sit next to him he said I see him all the time you and I talk I want to know about writing and I assume you want to know about the gold medal and so we spent you know 10 hours or something talking about stuff so when I got back I had a bitter story than I did at the venue when he won and I had a story nobody else had because nobody spent 10 hours with him at that point and I went hella came down and so it's across if he was living in Denmark so it was crossed the front page and it was gee that's that's the Jew serving story you know all over again uh you know if you if you just make an effort at it things tend to happen and not good but uh I was a young sports reporter in Memphis in the outdoors editor covered the breastplate and I grew up in the South you grew up as uh uh a fan of wrestling and stockholation and college football that's your whole life and I assume that'd be what I've covered when I was doing sports college football sec and uh I did Cover stock car racing I didn't feel like I'd coal wrestling because we all know for those of you who don't you know it's fixed fixed is not the right word it's it's scripted how about that we'll go with scripted and I loved it when I was a kid and I became great friends with Bobby The Brain heated Joe you must have heard of him the late buddy of course okay good forget everything else I'm doing okay so Bobby de brain was the tag team champion they were in Denver I got to know him and and his partner was a guy who played uh the defensive end at Oklahoma and co-op with me and became a wrestler and I was going to go out to dinner with him after rescue match in downtown Denver and they wrestled against each other that night and the one guy threw Bobby de brain out of the ring and a guy stood up with his aluminum tear in the crowd and whacked Bobby de brain over the head and just burst his forehead he had those vessels the two blood blood capsules so he already had fake blood on his forehead now he's got a cut it's just wide open and the cops carried the guy away after it's over I'd go back and the two of them is smoking cigarettes and Bobby says I got to go to the hospital he said I've never been hurt this bad in the ring and they're looking at it and said I gotta go get you know 15 stitches damn it and he's just cursing her they bring in the guy who hit him over the head got him handcuffed they put him up against the concrete wall with the handcuffs and Bobby brain goes away but what the heck he's screaming at the guy and he goes to hit the guy and the guy ducks and Bobby The Brain hits the concrete and breaks his hand and he said get me out of here before I kill myself so he goes to the hospital the other wrestler and I go to the hospital and meet him and uh we're gonna go to dinner now walking down the street with Bobby The Brain now I said what are you going to do with the story he said I hope I become an announcer which he did he became famous wrestling announcer and he said and I was up in Breckenridge today uh buying some condos I'm gonna own some condos in the mountains and ski area and as he's telling me the story a kid comes up like eight or nine years old and says Mr brain Mr brain would you give me an autograph and he takes it out of the kid's hand the piece of paper and he tears up the piece of paper and spits with the kid and we go look Jason so I've got these five condoms and I'm thinking if I could make it oh wait wait wait wait Bobby Bobby I can't just ask you for your autograph and you spit on him what was that all about he said if I'd have given him that photograph he'd lost it tomorrow when he's 40 years old he'll remember the night Bobby the brain food and it actually made sense in that weird kind of way and I love being around West wrestler and when I was a kid when I was a young reporter the the outdoors editor covered wrestling we Memphis it was important and he came to me and said you want to earn some money kid and I said the church now uh cover wrestling while I'm on vacation and I said oh really good I didn't cover it he said what that involves you is they'll send you the schedule and I said okay and on the schedule below the schedule will be the results and the times and how they went away I won the match so you write on board Saturday on the matches coming up and then you write the results and I said but they don't wrestle to a Monday night turn it in at the same time so I wrote two stories a week I'd write the schedule the results before they fought before they had the rest of the budgets and so made twenty dollars and I thought if I could just get somebody to have gambling or wrestling and call them and say I bet this happens this happens and this happens and I took my daughter to see uh one of the uh this period of time where the most famous wrestler was always said oh yeah oh yeah so he was wrestling I introduced him to my daughter it was like eight or nine years old it goes into his routine she starts crying and he puts his arm around her and he talks into the little voice I'm sorry oh I got a kick it's wrestling is a part of my life too that goes somewhat unknown uh what do you know sports betting on uh on wrestling it's just be coming soon that's what Nick Khan's trying to do but I mean you grew up without this friends with Dr J Bobby they praying and macho man you're just pulling out all the all the names here it's unbelievable dick Cod was my agent oh so you you along with the ad named Burke all those other greats the con is gonna take over the new uh Endeavor he's gonna run UFC in WWE that's my finish that represented the Eagles and he kind of concentrated on the Eagles and he said I got a guy that works with me I'll turn you over the helmet so Nikon uh negotiated a lot of contracts with reviews for me and then we said I'm getting out of it trying to get somebody else but he said I'm getting out of it and then the next time I actually seen the economy like he's had him well that's just rich but that made sense that these guys that are agents uh yeah the Los Angeles Lakers yeah yeah that's iron Brody Van Wagon in you know that happens ESPN used to do have us really the reason why I got involved with ESPN they called me one day and said uh we're doing a show they had a network ESPN classic do you remember that number of course and they had a show there was a es ESPN century and they would do 30-minute shows on athletes and they called me they said we're doing this so this is before I was just talking about the log kind of thing uh we're gonna do Sean John Elway we're going to be chosen we'd like to we'll pay you the 250 bucks if you come to this hotel room with a show is called ESPN century and it looked like an office or an English manor kind of place and you just tell us some stories kind of like I'm doing with you right now so I went into this hotel bowling and they had it through there and I thought I was going to be asked about five athletes asked me for about 100 athletes they go Ted Williams tell us a story and I go not that old uh Joe Montana I tell a Joe Montana story uh the Secretariat uh so I'm not uh I didn't know secretary person so I did like six hours of just telling stories about athletes and they called me back about a month later and they said he wants to do that again I said I ain't doing it for 250. I said that that was Mark that was really worked so they gave me like two thousand dollars and uh this included people like Larry Brown who used to coach the New York Knicks and you know every other team in the world and uh and they called me and said we're going to start this show called around the horn and that's kind of they liked it I was funny and they liked what I actually had a history of knowing stuff and uh that's kind of how that All-Star they said we're gonna start the show we'd like for you to be uh you're the first guy we're hiring and so I met with them at the Super Bowl in Tampa bay where the most famous uh national anthem Zimmerman would have told you that most famous national anthem of all time was was so environment by devotion yeah so that's kind of all right because I was available I I I I actually I'm sure I've used the Blackboard but at this point I don't know whether it quotes I'll go that seems familiar I must be stealing everything stadium for myself I am not recycling anything the best ability is availability and that's all right my best ability is available right so with this with ESPN now I mean basically the way the origin story goes kind of like you know part of the interruption came along as a you know based off Mike and the Mad Dog then you guys came right around the horn as the the follow-up show but I think UConn revolutionized the programming of ESPN now when you went to the mornings you were doing you know cold pizza First and Ten with Jay Crawford and Skip Bayless which led to First Take so how much of skip and Stephen A's success that I owe to you uh Stephen A was around he actually got fired right after we were working together the the management team at that time didn't much like it he did a nighttime show that was kind of a uh David Letterman kind of show I went on it uh it was in Times Square and his contract ran out and they didn't renew it and he was you know doing local uh um of radio programming in New York and and they providing back to ESPN uh I in terms of I am that's a good question I I haven't thought I don't think I had any effect on this bit uh on on Stephen A Smith I think I was a good counter argument to Skip Bayless because I I promise you all the Greek he gets he's serious he's not making up that he hates LeBron he's he's the most serious person I've ever been around in my life he at that time we were doing cold pizza he would drink like 14 uh Red Bulls during the show I would talk to people we had a little studio audience in the New York Donald Trump I talk to people in Elkins and he would go back to his room and he and he got pissed at me all the time because he'd have a list of 10 things to get into a subject and I had a I had an old car and I'd have one word all the Nets the Trap and he'd have tinting and we'd finish the second one and you'd say I didn't get to All by 10. I said I didn't even get to do it by one but he talked about me and so it was not a great relationship uh but I think that show he wouldn't have been on this show without I mean he thought I had my way uh but when we did the audition together it didn't work because we were opposites and the show did work because of it and they thought so much of it they repackaged it all day long and put it in you know First and Ten and then it was uh he was called to and they take segments out of it and put it we were on like three four times a day that's what I thought about boy I was over over Overexposed on TV I was on all the time and as soon as I finished uh cold pizza I had to work on around the horn and I had to come up with different Arguments for the same subjects because that's all you're doing is you're repackaging but it's sort of like peop the most beloved I think Sports show is is the NBA show on on uh Kia tape with Charles Barkley because of Barkley uh and Shaquille and they're repackaging stuff all the time they have to repackage you know at halftime and afterwards that's what a lot of sports broadcasts you're repackaging it and the idea is to come up with because many times for instance was all with levitar she was on NFL today or whatever she has to discuss the same job except it's three times so you've got to be able to to show you know I may not be any good but I can repackage stuff and come from a different direction with it that's important when you are doing your podcast and you got somebody on the show you've got to repackage whatever you might have asked the previous guy you might want to ask the same subject about wrestling but you better come up at a you know people are going to go that's the same question he asked you gotta report you have to come up with a different angle all the time it's sort of like if basketball you've got to create a new Lane you've got to create a new Lane and a new angle to come in from so uh I don't I don't I they they achieved whatever they achieved all right well we'll we'll say it uh we'll say it for you we think Skip was a lot too my favorite First Take episode was the height of Tebow Mania they came out to Denver you were on the show that was a big surprise you guys kind of uh you looked like you were uh he was happy to see him but I guess that was all just smoke a mirrors uh he says he's been in magazine articles consuming he's certainly become richer and more famous than me I once said to my daughter who's an adult and very successful I said if I stayed with skip I'd be making you know 15 million dollars a year and we'd be on box and she said no one of you would kill the other one my daughter takes me smarter than I am and that's right we wouldn't have it wouldn't have lasted because we would have you you always wonder how the view broke up I'm not comparing us to The Beatles but you wonder how could John and Paul it happens all the time dear people on television on ESPN that hate each other and they work together uh it wouldn't have it it wouldn't I didn't want to go back I didn't want to go to uh Connecticut they were moving the show to Connecticut that's brilliant and I quit and that um I didn't buy in my contract was for New York and when they moved it to Bristol I went I'm not doing that and my contract was up and they were and so we agreed that I'd continue to do around the horn and I'd come back to Denver but uh uh skip went and he lived in a hotel for years in a Marriott and he'd go to New York on the weekend uh uh we never came to blows except that one time but uh I I think that show worked for that time period and that time and then it worked with the two of them together Stephen A Smith and uh Skip and they like each other they really like each other but I can tell you uh they're both [ __ ] artists so I guess I'll put myself in that class dude well in order for TG to work there needs to be a certain Dynamic right and there's there needs to be friction so going back to what you were saying at the beginning uh you're we'll say your your relationship with Jay Mariotti and again Nick mentioned this before too we've had Jay on a couple times with us uh he's always treated us really really well but major reason why I think around the horn lasted so long in those initial early years is because you and Jay and the dynamic that you you guys had which evidently based on what you were saying before didn't start out great but got a little bit better over time um that's ultimately why I think the show worked through those first couple years and you're not totally unfamiliar to podcasts right you had uh you did the unmuted podcast with Jay there for a period of time so yeah not not very long not very long to be honest with you that was that that relationship I'm talking about a love relationship could be reenacted he could not come it couldn't come back Jay had gone off in a totally different wall that's not a negative he gone off in a totally different world I'd gone into a different direction and even though it was my idea and I kind of wanted to uh uh bring his career back I don't know any other way to put it because he was kind of on the Shelf but it still is to an extent and I I was trying to trying to help him and it didn't work yeah I interrupted your question no it's never all going to work so I also wanted to ask you uh about the craziest things now you've pitched a lot of spooky stories always looking at the angle that nobody has ever looked at previously and that has helped uh your career immensely um but what are some of the other notable crazy stories that you've got to work on and research for and uh do Through The Years well one thing about that before I answer that is we started the show with a really serious solemn kind of story about me going out to press kills where they took all of the press kills and you will and I always wondered what why that why you would name adult fresh kills that didn't I assume it had something to do with birds or something but a lot of people at The Denver Post got very upset that the timber post sent me to New York they're feeling like you've taken this sports writer who writes playing and you're sending him to well I'd cover civil rights and the assassination of Dr King in the South uh I went on peace marching as a reporter uh and I covered Columbine which was the most famous first of the school killing cover the column the a war shooting to read it I consider myself a serious journalist or I wanted to be Mike royko out of Chicago there there have been famous colonists in New York City that that I kind of pattern what I wanted to be like I wanted to be like Jim Murray the the sports writers Sports columnist red Smith and I had a Kurt Vonnegut and I you know you're talking about I got to know Kurt Vonnegut toward the end of his life and that Kurt Vonnegut was my idol if you were to read anybody read my writing you'll see that I'm basically doing I'm a cover Kurt vodka cover band that gives a good way to put me is that I thought he was the greatest American author of all uh so I think that that influenced me so much but I was a serious journalist I mean when I went to cover 911 I didn't do funny go back and look at the stories I did out of New York uh at 9 11. but I think that's what kept me I'm 70 how old am I I'm 76 with I I think that my phone is answering how old I am thank you if I ever if I ever wanted to impress anybody I go on and say uh I can't say very loudly I'll say uh to Amazon uh do you know who Woody Pages my bio and people go really you know Alexa knows that that's my idea of a bad joke at a party the uh some I told you some of the crazy stuff but I flew with the uh Blue Angels and that and I actually flew the fighting for a while and I grew up all over the cockpit and thought I was gonna die that was kind of a crazy thing uh and when the Olympics were I'll give you one that actually was copied by I think 20 guys in Australia I decided during the Olympics in Australia I want to go to the Outback and so I found found a travel agent that worked with the Olympic Committee that found me two flights to get to the outback out of the middle of nowhere went out there Rent A Car asked where I could go to where they made the Mad Max movies did you ever see the Batman movie and I said I want to go over there I went out and said in your bar out there yeah it's about 150. so I I'm in the middle of Australia away from the Olympics I made a I get to a bar that's nowhere I mean it it is and that's where if you see the original uh Mad Max movie ticket number okay second one favorite trucks racing and there's an old Detroit that was right where I was and I said to the barn people uh where can I find uh kangaroo well the Rangers right then the Roses went to the ranger picked short swords I said where are kangaroos uh they come out uh at dusk right over at that Hill here's a little red go over there standing on the hill the the kangaroism coming you feed them the bread all right that sounds simple but when I understood on the field I had the bread at dusk there's like a thousand kangaroos coming from all directions this is like out of a novel out of the world war or something and they surround me and they're Big Reds and they're uh the female uh uh kangaroos with babies in their pouches they're surrounding me and I'm throwing bread and I'm backing toward the car which is about 100 yards away in a bag I've met a doctor this is like the birds this is Hitchcock movie I I run and I'm throwing the bread and I get a car and they're jumping on the car and I think they're going to break the windshield and everything the ranger had told me I thought the ranger was there to protect the kangaroos his job was to kill Kangaroos and he killed 68 that day he told me later you think of a ring in this cup in this country a ranger is protecting the forest he's protecting the Bears he's not going out shooting Bears that's what I thought they would do and kangaroos are rats you know so I go back to the ranger station and I said and he's laughing he is laughing his ass off and he said do you see kangaroos I said you're a dick and you knew that why didn't you give me three floats of bread or something or tell me that there was going to be hundreds not five and he said you need to find out for yourself and so in that bar go back to the bar and I'm watching the Olympics and the the the the TV set is black and white up in the corner and it's about 14 inches and I'm watching I've been sent to the Olympics to cover the Olympics I am in a town called Broken Wheel the Broken Spoke or something in a bar there's three of us in the bar looking at it on a white and the black and white TV was 14 inches covering the Olympics and writing about kangaroos is that a guy called me I had a cell phone that you could call from anywhere I granted it and the phone rang and I went who's calling me it was my best friend in Colorado and he said so what event are you at the track and field are you uh at the basketball I said I'm in a bar in the outback I just was surrounded by a couple hundred kangaroos he said no really where are you are you it is a great meet tonight dad and nobody would believe that I was it down under I mean waved down I was I was probably 2 000 miles away from the Olympics and so uh I'll tell you the other one is I try to pick out something different every day uh and I went I was one of the only probably 20 more traders that covered the greatest uh Olympic wrestler of all time he was Cuban he never lost a match he never lost a point in the match and he went up against an American who was a kid and it was the greatest singular upset in the history of the Olympics and I looked around and I thought nobody else is here he gave me this is the biggest I'm writing a book and the title is I wouldn't believe this [ __ ] either because you guys are going to say I don't believe that [ __ ] that he said I gave got a one-on-one interview with a guy just pulled off the biggest upset in Olympic history against the greatest Olympic wrestler who would never not only never lost never allowed a point can you do and I went back to uh oh okay went back to Olympic headquarters and we had other people because Denver had the Olympics Center here we had five people at the Olympics and this guy called me and he said I'm going to cover that uh I'm going to cover the wrestling thing I'm gonna do a story and I'll try and find the I said I was there I think I can do it and he said no that's my story I kind of cool listen I think I I think I got that story uh I said I was there he said what were you doing there and I said I don't I got to go there so that's those are a couple of I mean I think I I always do stuff and say why are you doing this well yeah I'm now 76 to reading my brother it's time to not do [ __ ] you know it's time to do this [ __ ] not not it's time to do that [ __ ] my shit's okay because I'm not making any sense to you guys doing around the horde is okay yes keep doing it we need you on there is okay doing [ __ ] where I buy a jet airplane uh that's on him yeah it was either that or I mean that's 16 A4 A4 is an A4 uh that's not a good idea they're nice well I think the kangaroo stories is surreal and that book sounds incredible Joe read that in one sitting but this has been fantastic our last question here our signature question what in your life or your career has been your art you know a right moment so I mean by that is the time or place where you wanted to pursue something you asked somebody for advice or maybe you were trying to persuade an editor they said no and you were like you know what I'm gonna do it anyway and ultimately you will see why it is that I'm right I don't know that that's ever uh happened uh they've never not okay this is a good way to answer there was a period of time in this country where uh Sports pages had a lot of advertising and there would be breast enhancement ads on Sports pages I don't know why they came out with penis enlarge I wouldn't believe this [ __ ] came up with penis enlargement and it was next to my column in the post and I thought how does that work I mean we could kind of figure out what breast enhancement word how do you so I made a made an appointment at the doctor's office and I was going to do it under a fake name but I assumed they were going to ask me for an insurance and I would act with it and so when I went in the doctor started explaining it to me that it requires injections of fat from your butt into your penis you can cut this part of the show off and it requires uh the case can be enlarged to link and as he taught me uh the women like circumference you're not believing so I uh he showed me pictures and tables and he said here's a good one for you and I said well I kind of like this one does it come in a white you asked about this and I and I said that one looks like he's wearing a Boy Scout cap the weirdest so he said are you ready to do this because it required me flying to Houston and no no I let me think about you know that's what to do when you walk out of a store let me think about it somewhere back and I wrote a story it was Christmas time I wrote a column and I thought for the man who has almost everything here's a good Christmas gift and I thought the ad is right there next to me so I mean I I wasn't using language that you could put and it was Christmas I said you know here's something you'd consider to get the man in your life better I don't know about it I got a call at night I think it was Christmas Eve from the publisher of the paper saying we can't put that we're not putting magic that's not going to you put that ad in the paper it's the only time in my 60 years or whatever somebody said we're not putting that in paper but Along Comes a new magazine in Denver that's a monthly or a week monthly magazine yeah City magazine like New York Magazine look every city has that guy called me he said I can't afford you but I'd love for you to write a story in our first magazine to help us get off the ground and I and I kind of knew to God I said I got something and he said what I said how would you like a story of peanuts in large group and he said why and I said I'll send it to you he said I can't pay you much I said you have to pay me anything just running he called me and said we want to put you on the cover see the story gets good you can you can find this if you want but what what do you want to put me on the cover report we're gonna put you in a hot tub with the the two women and they'll be holding a yardstick nowhere okay let's talk about doing crazy things I'm like yeah sure but uh so I did if there was a photo shoot the magazine comes out the undercover [Music] story in there and I get a call from the publisher this is what maybe six or eight months later and he just for me anyway and I said once you didn't run it it was my property you couldn't do that to me you couldn't you can't do that to me I don't think to this day and I still know him well I think if we picked up the phone and you interviewed him and you said what is the worst thing Woody Pedro does in his life uh I got an answer for that so that's the only time so that kind of answers three or four questions about the craziest thing you've ever done I thought that was a good idea that was unusual idea nobody's ever written that oh the one I did in Australia though I just want to tell you that after I went to the Outback and did that piece every columnist from the United States copied that they went out there there were a bunch of guys that went out there somewhere in Australia they went to either uh see kangaroos or you know go to where my meds movies so that kind of showed me uh that some of those ideas could be you know unique and different so anyway yeah that was that last one I told you about was unique uh yeah you can find it if you actually I think you can actually that that was 19. and a late 80s I think you could probably find that story if you want to read it it's funny it's funny to tell it's a lot funnier in the magazine that would have been in newspaper guys you've been great I think that's probably more than you would ask about about it did I ever get any advice yes I went to a seminar when I was in high school to get away from school I knew I I knew in the second grade I was going to be a writer don't ask me why my family were all cotton Plantation workers in Mississippi and uh so I knew in high school and uh I asked a sports writer at this seminar at the Commercial Appeal which I eventually worked for uh what What's the best advice you could give me and he said two one take a typing course and two don't get into journalism and I always remember and so I left and I went that's my advice so I was the only man only male student in the typing class I taught myself how to type but not very well I was the only which was a he was right about that that was great I got several dates because I was the only guy in the typing class that kind of stuck with me and they knew I could type and they could that was kind of impressive someone and the other thing is I didn't pay attention to him I I decided I was gonna get into journalism and I couldn't dream of Television I mean uh I didn't think about television and I didn't think about radio or certainly podcast or anything else and I I still think that's the most important aspect of our conversation today of people that are out there is that think of something that hasn't who thought who invented the podcast we know it wasn't Al Gore if you did the internet uh who invented the podcast I don't know do you have any idea I mean who's the father of your podcast I found that out about you but I would uh I would maybe if I were 22 and just kind of starting out this week and I'd come up with I try to come up with something that hasn't been done before I've done that once in my life I I like to play golf I got two of my friends one of them was an engineer and I said we need to come up with an invention that when you point this gun at the flagstick it tells you how far away you are and they went oh that's a good idea and we came up with uh uh a yardage gun and it wasn't high tech but it would bounce off the you'd have to have a special flag that it would have a room and we went to the PGA which is in New Jersey the PGA home office is in New Jersey we went to uh the USGA maybe that's one in New Jersey they said that will never be allowed in God I said what about the recreational players you know maybe both oh no uh we'll send out if you put that out we'll send out messages to all the country clubs all over the country that that's a a legal aid well guess what one of the biggest things in golf is the yardage that was my chance to be somebody so I instead of that I end up on your [ __ ] podcast well it's a good consolation prize dude the money's not here we're not paying you like Chris Russo gets paid a hundred thousand for our first take episode but we've appreciated the time Woody and I thanks for reaching out to me dick and it's a pleasure to meet you Joe and thank you for putting me on you'll go away from them go for whatever the Wild satisf guy it was it was a joy and next time you're doing a Broncos game in New Jersey you off to get together and meet up and maybe you can go visit that famous mobster place to uh yeah let me let me end on that that's important so I'm at the Jets the the Broncos played to get like three years ago and after the game I'm gonna go into a little lizard to go to the restaurant that I that I like and the Yankees were playing if you go back Yankees were playing in the playoffs yeah so it's three four years ago after after the game out there I'm gonna get an Uber and nobody picked me up I can't get a cab I can't get anything I'm in the empty Stadium outside nowhere and a golf cart comes over and there's five guys on this golf cart and they start screening and they said we work for the Jets and uh we're supposed to go around and make sure everything is done can we take you somewhere I said take me somewhere where I can get a would you take me somewhere where you get the bride back into to New York and they said oh we'll give you a ride back in the mail so we went and got no car and they were saying oh what event is in the car and everything and I said well thank you and so we all grow together and I'm getting out of the car and they said you're not at all like you are on TV we could barely hear you you didn't scream and holler that's it don't tell anybody my secret that I don't scream them and it said wow this is the greatest angel that lives he wrote in the carpets so that's next time I will ride with the two of you out of the stadium perfect I'm looking forward to it so that's going to do it here for this amazing episode of you know I'm right for the often imitated never duplicated our special guest Woody page my college Joe Calaveras I'm Nick Durst and this has been you no right foreign