# How the NFL & ESPN DESTROYED Baseball, Boxing & Tennis

An episode of [The Right Time with Bomani Jones](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/982639043), 25 Jul 2025, 56 min.

Audio: https://podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/pscrb.fm/rss/p/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/370fc844-36bd-4f61-8b8f-b4bb010de39a/90fb3d13-fc33-40c3-93ad-b4bb01215b41/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=919a7cbe-003c-4146-b592-b4bb010de3a5

On today's episode of The Right Time, Bomani Jones is joined by Howard Bryant of ESPN & Meadowlark Media to talk about issues within tennis and Major League Baseball. The show begins with Bo and Howard discussing why fame may be dependent on how old someone is (6:15) and why the decline in SportsCenter means less knowledge across the board in sports (9:32). They move onto tennis and say why it's an American sport yet Americans aren't good at tennis (19:03) and why you no longer need to win tournaments to achieve success in the sport (26:02). After the break, they dive into baseball's issues including why stars like Mike Trout aren't recognizable (33:00), how the MLB lost its grasp on being the summer sport (37:28) and would America even care if a historic record was about to be broken? (50:01) . . . Subscribe to Supercast for Ad-Free Episodes: https://righttime.supercast.com/ Buy 'The Right Time' merch: http://therighttimebomani.com/ Subscribe to The Right Time with Bomani Jones on Spotify, Apple or wherever you get your podcasts and follow the show on Instagram, Twitter, and Tik Tok for all the best moments from the show. Download Full Podcast Here: Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6N7fDvgNz2EPDIOm49aj7M?si=FCb5EzTyTYuIy9-fWs4rQA&nd=1&utm_source=hoobe&utm_medium=social Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-right-time-with-bomani-jones/id982639043?utm_source=hoobe&utm_medium=social Follow The Right Time with Bomani Jones on Social Media: http://lnk.to/therighttime Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:05] Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the right time. A wave original.
[0:10] Speaker 1: My name is Beaumont Jones. Thanks for listening wherever you
[0:12] Speaker 1: get your podcast. Thanks for watching us on YouTube. Subscribe, like,
[0:16] Speaker 1: rate us, review us, give us five stars. You only
[0:19] Speaker 1: give us four stars. I'm inclined to believe you are
[0:22] Speaker 1: a hater. It is Howard Bryant Friday. Howard Bryant, what's
[0:25] Speaker 1: going on, man?
[0:26] Speaker 2: What's up, Beaumont Jones? How are you doing?
[0:28] Speaker 1: Hey, man, I tell you this. I was over here
[0:30] Speaker 1: at the house hanging out with my brother and another buddy.
[0:33] Speaker 1: And one of them popped up with words that you
[0:35] Speaker 1: want to hear, which is Howard Bryant is writing a
[0:37] Speaker 1: book on Jackie Robinson and Paul Robeson.
[0:41] Speaker 2: It is true. It is true. But we got to
[0:43] Speaker 2: wait till January. That's the thing about books, man. I
[0:48] Speaker 2: love the instant gratification of writing on the daily. If
[0:51] Speaker 2: you write today, it comes out tomorrow. You write today,
[0:55] Speaker 2: it's coming out January 20th. But yes, very fun book.
[0:58] Speaker 2: A lot to talk about there one day.
[1:01] Speaker 1: I think this part we can't talk about before we
[1:03] Speaker 1: get to January. And this is something that we discussed
[1:06] Speaker 1: out there with my buddies that came over, which is
[1:10] Speaker 1: the magnitude of Paul Robeson as an American figure and
[1:15] Speaker 1: the magnitude of Jackie Robinson. I wonder what the inflection
[1:20] Speaker 1: point is at what age that you have to start explaining. Oh,
[1:22] Speaker 1: wait a minute.
[1:23] Speaker 2: No, no, no.
[1:23] Speaker 1: Like Robeson. I feel like somebody my age might actually
[1:28] Speaker 1: be an outlier for understanding the magnitude of Robinson. But
[1:31] Speaker 1: Jackie Robinson, no. But you fast forward just a couple
[1:34] Speaker 1: of years past me, and it's kind of like the
[1:36] Speaker 1: declining significance of Jackie Robinson has kicked in.
[1:39] Speaker 2: It's the problem of the book. It was like, okay,
[1:42] Speaker 2: when you work on history, it's like, how many people
[1:46] Speaker 2: know what you're talking about? I said to Spike Lee,
[1:49] Speaker 2: I said, hey, Spike, you know, you might be the
[1:52] Speaker 2: most important figure in the history of Malcolm X. Because
[2:01] Speaker 2: in 1985, Malcolm X had only been dead 20 years,
[2:05] Speaker 2: but his entire narrative had been controlled by white America.
[2:09] Speaker 2: He hadn't really been claimed by black people yet. So
[2:14] Speaker 2: Spike with the movie and the merch and the time
[2:16] Speaker 2: period and all of it completely reclaimed Malcolm for black people.
[2:22] Speaker 2: And Paul Robeson never got that. People don't know who
[2:25] Speaker 2: he is. And so, as I say, you know, it's,
[2:30] Speaker 2: you know, as I always think about throughout this whole thing,
[2:33] Speaker 2: it's our job to rediscover our own people.
[2:38] Speaker 1: And he might have been literally. The coldest dude ever.
[2:43] Speaker 1: Top to bottom cold. Whatever this is, I'm going to
[2:46] Speaker 1: do it.
[2:47] Speaker 2: I can do it. Lawyer, check.
[2:50] Speaker 1: Possibly the greatest football player of my generation. Yeah, we
[2:54] Speaker 1: got that. And I got the nerve to be able
[2:56] Speaker 1: to sing.
[2:57] Speaker 2: Check. Stage, check. Act, check. Broadway, check. Movies, check. What
[3:03] Speaker 2: you got? What else you got? Check, check, check, check, check.
[3:06] Speaker 1: Highly dignified that's the other part too like i get
[3:09] Speaker 1: tired of white people uh talking about black men of
[3:12] Speaker 1: that era and talking about their pride and all that
[3:15] Speaker 1: stuff about them because it like why did they have
[3:17] Speaker 1: to demonstrate this so much however you look at paul
[3:19] Speaker 1: robeson to be like man that cat is dignified right there.
[3:23] Speaker 2: That's right and that all comes from from growing up
[3:27] Speaker 2: in princeton new jersey's like i am not going to
[3:30] Speaker 2: be on my knees for nobody neither was my father
[3:33] Speaker 2: and neither will i And we'll just let the chips
[3:35] Speaker 2: fall and the chips fell.
[3:38] Speaker 1: Now with he and Robinson, it ties in a degree
[3:41] Speaker 1: to what we want to talk about here. For those
[3:43] Speaker 1: of you who are just jumping in, we got a list,
[3:46] Speaker 1: the right time, top 25 athletes of the last 25 years,
[3:50] Speaker 1: 25 for the 25 in 2025. You see what I'm saying?
[3:54] Speaker 1: We're doing the whole thing. We got that set up
[3:55] Speaker 1: for y'all. Check it out. We are 15 in, or
[3:58] Speaker 1: we are 10 in, we have gone, from 16 to 25,
[4:02] Speaker 1: one through 15 are still to come out. So be
[4:05] Speaker 1: sure to check that out. Monday, we will give you
[4:07] Speaker 1: five more on that list. And what we're doing is
[4:11] Speaker 1: we're going through the numbers and going through the list,
[4:13] Speaker 1: but then also so I can live with myself and
[4:15] Speaker 1: not just entirely feel like this is engagement farming, which
[4:18] Speaker 1: is kind of what we're doing here. Um, you know,
[4:22] Speaker 1: let's talk about homies. We try to give y'all content,
[4:25] Speaker 1: but content ain't there. I, I, I did this for
[4:28] Speaker 1: you because y'all love this stuff. But anyway, um, What
[4:32] Speaker 1: I'd like to do and what we are doing, which
[4:34] Speaker 1: I think has been enjoyable in this, is just offering
[4:36] Speaker 1: some context of the time rather than getting into something
[4:39] Speaker 1: about bickering the order of the list or whatever. But
[4:41] Speaker 1: for the context of the time, I want to talk
[4:44] Speaker 1: to Howard now about two of the sports that are
[4:47] Speaker 1: at the top of his wheelhouse, baseball and tennis, which
[4:50] Speaker 1: is to say 25 years ago, the role that they
[4:54] Speaker 1: played in the public sporting consciousness was I feel was
[4:59] Speaker 1: completely different than it is right now. The biggest stars
[5:02] Speaker 1: in those sports were big stars on the same levels
[5:06] Speaker 1: as the biggest basketball players, the biggest football players. And
[5:09] Speaker 1: hockey also fits in this category also, though. Only the
[5:13] Speaker 1: super-duper-duper hockey stars were national stars, but it did exist
[5:17] Speaker 1: in that way. And now you fast-forward 25 years, and
[5:20] Speaker 1: I was watching the Wimbledon final, Alcaraz and Senna, And
[5:26] Speaker 1: they showed Chris Everett in the box with Stefan Edberg.
[5:30] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[5:31] Speaker 1: And I was like, hey, Stefan Edberg was a really,
[5:35] Speaker 1: really big deal for being a consistent top five tennis player.
[5:39] Speaker 1: From Sweden, serving volley dudes. We're not talking about somebody
[5:43] Speaker 1: that like jumped off the screen athletically for you. But
[5:45] Speaker 1: he was that guy. The number four tennis player in
[5:49] Speaker 1: the world doesn't get that anymore.
[5:53] Speaker 2: And the number four tennis player in the world is
[5:54] Speaker 2: American and still doesn't get it. I mean, it's a
[5:58] Speaker 2: whole different thing. I am interested in your theory before
[6:01] Speaker 2: I leap into this, though, because I have my own
[6:03] Speaker 2: theories on what's happening. But obviously, the entire idea of
[6:10] Speaker 2: fame is such a fascinating concept unto itself. It all
[6:15] Speaker 2: depends on how old you are, like everything else. At
[6:19] Speaker 2: what point in the river did you enter, right? I mean,
[6:22] Speaker 2: for me, fame... was one of the most difficult things
[6:26] Speaker 2: to achieve because the avenues to access were so narrow.
[6:32] Speaker 2: Like when I was growing up, you had three networks, three.
[6:36] Speaker 2: You know how famous you had to be to break
[6:38] Speaker 2: that chain? There are people here making $ 20 million a
[6:42] Speaker 2: year I've never heard of because there is so much
[6:45] Speaker 2: opportunity now. There are so many access points that you
[6:50] Speaker 2: might not know who these folks are and they're loaded.
[6:53] Speaker 2: Whereas back then, because it was only three networks, if
[6:57] Speaker 2: you got on one of those three networks, if you
[6:58] Speaker 2: got on The Tonight Show, if you got on something
[7:00] Speaker 2: like that, the entire country knew who you were. It's
[7:03] Speaker 2: a totally different dynamic.
[7:05] Speaker 1: So I'm going to look at tennis and baseball through
[7:09] Speaker 1: similar lenses, but a bit different. Because also, we could
[7:11] Speaker 1: throw boxing in this category.
[7:13] Speaker 2: And horse racing.
[7:15] Speaker 1: Right. Horse racing. I feel like horse racing is like
[7:17] Speaker 1: two generations up.
[7:18] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[7:19] Speaker 1: A big fight in the 1980s and even through the 90s.
[7:23] Speaker 1: And I even say through the two, like the aughts
[7:26] Speaker 1: of the 21st century.
[7:28] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[7:28] Speaker 1: I think that like the biggest boxers were huge stars
[7:33] Speaker 1: still in a way that I don't necessarily think is
[7:35] Speaker 1: the case right now. Now, boxing comes with its own situation.
[7:38] Speaker 1: And some of this, of course, is just the evolving
[7:41] Speaker 1: trends and tastes of a society.
[7:44] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[7:45] Speaker 1: So, for example, with baseball, baseball is a It was
[7:49] Speaker 1: a big city professional sport. I think that's a very
[7:52] Speaker 1: important part of it. Big city, played in summer at
[7:56] Speaker 1: a time and in cities where you could go outside
[7:59] Speaker 1: during the summer. It was tolerable. I think it is
[8:01] Speaker 1: associated with the fall from winter. The idea of spring
[8:06] Speaker 1: training means something completely different to people who are from
[8:08] Speaker 1: the north than people who are from the south because
[8:09] Speaker 1: the idea of spring means something different. So you have
[8:12] Speaker 1: all these different things that affect, I think, the way
[8:15] Speaker 1: that we view these sports. With tennis, I think a
[8:20] Speaker 1: big part of it is right there. The avenues of
[8:22] Speaker 1: access to this and the fact that tennis was a sport.
[8:26] Speaker 1: I mean, on the three channels, I think of NBC
[8:28] Speaker 1: and CBS for the U.S. Open and NBC. So like
[8:30] Speaker 1: the idea of like the tradition at breakfast of breakfast
[8:33] Speaker 1: at Wimbledon, which is ESPN has recently co-opted. but it
[8:37] Speaker 1: is like many other things like the nicknames queen of
[8:39] Speaker 1: soul and godfather of soul back in the day these
[8:42] Speaker 1: things were not created organically these things were created by
[8:45] Speaker 1: marketers right the marketers for nbc and selling wimbledon came
[8:49] Speaker 1: up with that the godfather of soul all every every
[8:52] Speaker 1: one of these nicknames that you see one of these
[8:54] Speaker 1: musicians has somebody at the record company came up with
[8:57] Speaker 1: it but but it gets drilled home to you over
[9:01] Speaker 1: and over again and then it begins to start feeling
[9:04] Speaker 1: like tradition and so with tennis We didn't have that
[9:07] Speaker 1: many things that came around. And so when Wimbledon comes around,
[9:10] Speaker 1: that's the one that really jumps out. It was an occasion.
[9:13] Speaker 1: It was like a tent pole on your calendar. It
[9:17] Speaker 1: comes on on Saturday morning, right? You're not doing anything else.
[9:21] Speaker 1: It's Sunday morning for those championships. You get up and
[9:24] Speaker 1: you watch them. Then couple that with, and I think
[9:27] Speaker 1: this is a huge one for these people of my generation,
[9:31] Speaker 1: the declining significance of SportsCenter. I found that I started
[9:36] Speaker 1: knowing a lot less about what was going on on
[9:39] Speaker 1: a regular basis in baseball, in those sports, when I
[9:42] Speaker 1: stopped watching 30 to 60 minutes of SportsCenter a day.
[9:45] Speaker 1: I knew who everybody was. When I talked to my
[9:47] Speaker 1: friends who are SportsCenter anchors, they know who everybody is.
[9:51] Speaker 1: When I talked to my friends who aren't SportsCenter anchors,
[9:53] Speaker 1: they don't know who none of these people are.
[9:57] Speaker 2: Well, and it all comes down to... a couple of things.
[10:01] Speaker 2: Number one, it's where do you get your information? Like
[10:03] Speaker 2: and what how routinely do you get your information is
[10:05] Speaker 2: you have a breakdown of routine, right? Routine is usually
[10:11] Speaker 2: where you get everything. And once you run out of routine,
[10:15] Speaker 2: you realize that things aren't that important. Like things just disappear.
[10:19] Speaker 2: Things don't matter. And also that you have a list
[10:23] Speaker 2: of sports that are reliant on those types of programs
[10:29] Speaker 2: where you're going to get a snippet of something every
[10:30] Speaker 2: single day. Now you can go weeks without getting any
[10:35] Speaker 2: of that. And you can go a very long time
[10:38] Speaker 2: without having to engage with sports you don't immediately take
[10:42] Speaker 2: an interest in. Like how did we like reach these
[10:45] Speaker 2: different spots in the river? How did you become a
[10:47] Speaker 2: How did you know who Stefan Edberg was? You didn't
[10:49] Speaker 2: wake up as a tennis fan, right? Like, where does
[10:51] Speaker 2: it all come from? Some of that osmosis. And, you know,
[10:55] Speaker 2: let's face it. This is one of the reasons why
[10:57] Speaker 2: it drives me crazy when people talk about the business
[11:00] Speaker 2: just pivoting. No, the business is pivoting because American capitalists love, love,
[11:06] Speaker 2: love to make it seem like there's no such thing
[11:08] Speaker 2: as a problem. No, no, no. This isn't pivoting. This
[11:11] Speaker 2: is collapsing. Your industries are collapsing. They're collapsing right in
[11:15] Speaker 2: front of you. There's no room for tennis. There's no
[11:18] Speaker 2: room for horse racing. There's a little bit of room
[11:21] Speaker 2: for golf. It's a football world. And so now you
[11:26] Speaker 2: start to determine, okay, what's going to get your time
[11:28] Speaker 2: when you talk about fame? And you go, oh, well,
[11:29] Speaker 2: how come we don't pay as much attention to this person?
[11:32] Speaker 2: Or how come this person was bigger back when I was... Well,
[11:34] Speaker 2: because there was more room for everybody. And now there's
[11:37] Speaker 2: no room for anybody. And so... And it's not necessarily
[11:41] Speaker 2: a money question because as we know, if there's one
[11:43] Speaker 2: thing we do know, there's plenty of money in this country.
[11:47] Speaker 2: It is not a money question. Your interest is being
[11:51] Speaker 2: steered by extremely powerful corporate entities to push you into
[11:56] Speaker 2: a given direction. And when you give to this, you
[12:00] Speaker 2: take from that and you start seeing what goes by
[12:03] Speaker 2: the wayside.
[12:03] Speaker 1: And I think That point is very interesting because I
[12:07] Speaker 1: think that we often throw out red herrings as to
[12:11] Speaker 1: why things have changed the way they have. For example,
[12:14] Speaker 1: I do like I think in boxing, the American presence
[12:18] Speaker 1: for American viewers does matter because boxing interest is a
[12:22] Speaker 1: bit more tribal in that sort of way. Right.
[12:25] Speaker 2: Like you and I are very interesting in this point.
[12:28] Speaker 2: We're very interesting because there is in for boxing specifically. Right.
[12:32] Speaker 2: Which is why I didn't mean to cut you off,
[12:33] Speaker 2: but I felt I needed to there. is because is
[12:36] Speaker 2: there any other sport that you can think of where
[12:40] Speaker 2: the 12-year gap between you and me in ages is
[12:43] Speaker 2: more significant than boxing? No. No.
[12:46] Speaker 1: There's none.
[12:47] Speaker 2: There's none.
[12:47] Speaker 1: And I still got a pretty good boxing era, right?
[12:50] Speaker 1: But no, it is– And you got the middleweights, but
[12:54] Speaker 1: you were a little kid. Tyson got the middleweights, and
[12:56] Speaker 1: the 90s at least gave us another generation. To me,
[13:00] Speaker 1: the end of the big heavyweight fight, the last giant
[13:03] Speaker 1: heavyweight fight for me, and this one barely even counts really,
[13:06] Speaker 1: Lennox Lewis, Mike Tyson in Memphis in 2003 is kind
[13:08] Speaker 1: of the last heavyweight fight.
[13:10] Speaker 2: Didn't we watch that together?
[13:12] Speaker 1: No, not me.
[13:13] Speaker 2: Okay. Okay. I could have sworn I was watching for
[13:15] Speaker 2: a big fight, but go ahead, I digress, go on.
[13:18] Speaker 1: No, but with boxing, the American part matters. I don't
[13:21] Speaker 1: think that matters as much with tennis, for example, right? Like,
[13:25] Speaker 1: for example- Yvonne Lendl, really famous in the United States.
[13:29] Speaker 1: We could go through a slew of these other tennis players,
[13:32] Speaker 1: really famous in the United States. And yes, there were
[13:34] Speaker 1: some Americans that popped up in the 90s with Sampras
[13:37] Speaker 1: and Agassi. And so you have guys, but Bjorn Borg, really,
[13:42] Speaker 1: really famous. We could go through a list of other
[13:44] Speaker 1: guys from these other countries and be like, no, no, no,
[13:46] Speaker 1: that was not the impediment. Now, we just had a
[13:48] Speaker 1: run of three great tennis players, none of whom were American,
[13:52] Speaker 1: but probably the best top three there's ever been. Playing
[13:54] Speaker 1: tennis at a time where you end up with a
[13:56] Speaker 1: plausible argument that either of those three could be the
[13:59] Speaker 1: greatest player of all time, depending on what metric you
[14:02] Speaker 1: decided to use. And I think overwhelmingly people are aware,
[14:08] Speaker 1: but don't quite. And I don't think that's strictly about
[14:12] Speaker 1: the fact that they're not from America. I think that's
[14:15] Speaker 1: much more in line with what you talk about, which
[14:18] Speaker 1: is the money is not in line with giving you
[14:22] Speaker 1: a healthy dose of tennis regularly so that you care
[14:26] Speaker 1: about it in that way.
[14:28] Speaker 2: Do you believe, Bomani Jones, that if you give them
[14:32] Speaker 2: something to watch, they'll watch it? Or do you have
[14:35] Speaker 2: to create interest?
[14:39] Speaker 1: I think that at least it used to be. Now
[14:42] Speaker 1: this is crazy when you got 200 channels plus the
[14:44] Speaker 1: streamers and everything else. But I was thinking the other
[14:48] Speaker 1: night about the Black Widow. You remember the Black Widow,
[14:51] Speaker 1: the Asian lady that used to play pool?
[14:54] Speaker 2: Oh, yeah, of course. Yeah, yeah.
[14:55] Speaker 1: Dude, we all know who she is because it was on.
[14:59] Speaker 1: It's not like we were a bunch of people interested.
[15:01] Speaker 1: We were like, ooh, who's that playing pool?
[15:03] Speaker 2: And what are you talking about there? That's right. What
[15:06] Speaker 2: are you talking about there? There was a show... called
[15:09] Speaker 2: Wide World of Sports that had a whole bunch of
[15:12] Speaker 2: stuff on there you were never going to see. You had,
[15:15] Speaker 2: remember the king in his court, the dude who played
[15:17] Speaker 2: the fast pitch softball, he was on there. Then you had,
[15:20] Speaker 2: you know, the downhill skiing and it wasn't an Olympic year,
[15:22] Speaker 2: it was weekly. So, you know, live from Kitzbühel, you know,
[15:25] Speaker 2: you're watching, you know, you're watching all of these different sports.
[15:28] Speaker 2: And now, once again, it's all been swallowed whole by
[15:31] Speaker 2: football and there's no room for anything else. And I
[15:36] Speaker 2: think that what's really fascinating about this when you're talking
[15:39] Speaker 2: about just fame in general, is those guys were more
[15:44] Speaker 2: famous then, and there's way more access now. That metric
[15:50] Speaker 2: doesn't always work for every sport. For tennis specifically, you
[15:55] Speaker 2: gotta go into the 70s and early 80s. And the
[15:58] Speaker 2: reason was because Americans dominated the sport. It's fascinating to
[16:02] Speaker 2: me that tennis was bigger, more popular, than in the
[16:08] Speaker 2: 70s and the 80s than it is right now, or
[16:12] Speaker 2: than it is with Federer, Nadal, and Djokovic. But none
[16:14] Speaker 2: of those, as you were saying, none of them are American.
[16:17] Speaker 2: And there's that American tennis, especially on the men's side,
[16:21] Speaker 2: is so beaten down. When I was a kid, you
[16:26] Speaker 2: could mention Arthur Ashe, John McEnroe, Jimmy Connors, Agassi. You
[16:32] Speaker 2: could name Americans, and it is true, Americans. If American's
[16:35] Speaker 2: not in it, he's not going to watch. But looking
[16:39] Speaker 2: at the way the game is played right now and
[16:43] Speaker 2: how good you have to be, being good in tennis
[16:46] Speaker 2: is nowhere near enough. You don't even, you know, otherwise
[16:51] Speaker 2: there'd be no question there'd be a tennis boom right now.
[16:54] Speaker 2: But it has nothing to do with the popularity of
[16:58] Speaker 2: the sport. You can't tell me these guys aren't charismatic.
[17:01] Speaker 2: You can't tell me they're not great players. And they
[17:03] Speaker 2: speak English. And I was going to say, and they
[17:05] Speaker 2: all also speak English. That was the other point I
[17:07] Speaker 2: was going to get to when we talk about baseball.
[17:10] Speaker 2: The things you have to have. And they're all good
[17:12] Speaker 2: looking guys, right? It's not like they're not telegenic. It's
[17:16] Speaker 2: not like they need translators every time they speak. They're
[17:19] Speaker 2: not American. And in a game now, who are you
[17:25] Speaker 2: competing with? Why is there a serve clock in tennis?
[17:27] Speaker 2: Because TV is like, your time is up. Let's go,
[17:29] Speaker 2: let's go, let's go, let's go. There's no room. You know,
[17:34] Speaker 2: there's no room for anything right now. And the problem
[17:37] Speaker 2: is there's plenty of room for everything if you allow
[17:40] Speaker 2: it to be.
[17:41] Speaker 1: I think the interesting question also gets us to it.
[17:43] Speaker 1: I hadn't thought about this, but I have not seen
[17:47] Speaker 1: as much. I'm sure that this has been a broader
[17:48] Speaker 1: discussion in worlds in which you inhabit in ways that
[17:51] Speaker 1: I do not. But the fact that there aren't Americans
[17:54] Speaker 1: at that level is kind of crazy when you think
[17:57] Speaker 1: about it.
[17:58] Speaker 2: I'm so glad you brought this up because the men
[18:03] Speaker 2: in tennis... Let's not talk about the women, okay? The
[18:07] Speaker 2: women require a different conversation. No man has won a
[18:13] Speaker 2: major final in tennis. No American man since Roddick in
[18:17] Speaker 2: 2003 U.S. Open. No man had won, had even reached
[18:22] Speaker 2: a final after Roddick in 2009 when he lost to
[18:26] Speaker 2: Federer at Wimbledon. Taylor Fritz when he lost last year.
[18:30] Speaker 2: That's three finalists. in a quarter century, three. You haven't
[18:38] Speaker 2: had an American world number one in 20 years, right?
[18:43] Speaker 2: I mean, the game, and the thing about it is
[18:45] Speaker 2: the reason why this is important is that this is
[18:47] Speaker 2: not that different from the Canadian arguments and the black
[18:51] Speaker 2: basketball argument, which is all black people in basketball. We
[18:53] Speaker 2: know that in terms of ownership, that game belongs to us, right?
[18:57] Speaker 2: But does it? Giannis and Jokic and everybody else. Tennis
[19:01] Speaker 2: is an American game. Tennis is dominated. by Australians and
[19:05] Speaker 2: by Americans. Three quarters of the sport, its major sports,
[19:09] Speaker 2: its major tournaments are English speaking, right? You have to
[19:13] Speaker 2: be good at this, but yet Americans aren't. And it's
[19:17] Speaker 2: been willing to be sacrificed in a way that you
[19:21] Speaker 2: don't see in the other sports. When Black people do
[19:24] Speaker 2: not win at basketball, there is outrage. When Canadians do
[19:29] Speaker 2: not win at hockey, there is outrage. But this sport,
[19:32] Speaker 2: you know, we gave this one up. And the argument
[19:34] Speaker 2: had been that, well, we don't get, as we being
[19:42] Speaker 2: tennis players, we don't get the best American athlete. So
[19:47] Speaker 2: we don't get our Michael Jordans. We don't get... our,
[19:51] Speaker 2: you know, Kobe Bryants. We don't get those, you know,
[19:53] Speaker 2: those go to the NBA and those go to the NFL.
[19:57] Speaker 2: Imagine how good American tennis would be if we got
[20:00] Speaker 2: the top American athletes. And to that, I say, yeah,
[20:05] Speaker 2: but when did we ever? Dr. J wasn't playing tennis.
[20:09] Speaker 2: You know, I mean, so that argument, it has never existed,
[20:13] Speaker 2: but it's a good argument to make in terms of
[20:15] Speaker 2: finished athletes and who's, you know, which country is getting
[20:18] Speaker 2: your best and tennis has never gotten America's best, all
[20:21] Speaker 2: good arguments. But tennis has never produced that. So it's
[20:27] Speaker 2: something else.
[20:29] Speaker 1: Well, I think it also raised an interesting question. And
[20:33] Speaker 1: I think the basketball argument and what we're seeing happen
[20:36] Speaker 1: with certain European players is in line with this, which is,
[20:39] Speaker 1: I hear this discussion a lot more in soccer. Americans
[20:43] Speaker 1: vastly overrate athleticism or just raw athletic ability rather than
[20:48] Speaker 1: the finer detail type of skills, the hand-eye coordination, the
[20:52] Speaker 1: importance of Acceleration, deceleration, like the ability to move shuttle stuff,
[20:58] Speaker 1: like short space movement. The things that make somebody like
[21:01] Speaker 1: Luka Doncic and, by the way, somebody like James Harden,
[21:04] Speaker 1: the things that make somebody like that excellent, the things
[21:06] Speaker 1: that make somebody like Luka Doncic, I mean, Nikola Jokic
[21:10] Speaker 1: or Larry Bird is another person that fits this description.
[21:13] Speaker 1: Like being able to jump out of the gym has
[21:17] Speaker 1: value in places, but being really good at basketball, is
[21:21] Speaker 1: the part that matters. Now, tennis to me also becomes
[21:24] Speaker 1: interesting because it is at once the sport that has
[21:26] Speaker 1: changed the most and changed the least. And I say
[21:29] Speaker 1: changed the least in the sense that the court is
[21:31] Speaker 1: the court is the court is the court. It is
[21:33] Speaker 1: the court. As long as I can think of, the
[21:36] Speaker 1: court has not changed.
[21:37] Speaker 2: Right.
[21:37] Speaker 1: Like the actual rules of playing tennis is that well,
[21:41] Speaker 1: like the surfaces.
[21:41] Speaker 2: Yes.
[21:42] Speaker 1: But I mean, like the measurements.
[21:43] Speaker 2: Yes. Oh, yeah. It's the same. Yeah. Yeah.
[21:46] Speaker 1: The dynamic of tennis is the same. What has changed, obviously,
[21:50] Speaker 1: is the equipment.
[21:51] Speaker 2: Yeah.
[21:52] Speaker 1: And beating the dog shit out of the ball became
[21:55] Speaker 1: a whole different game, but also created. I think we
[21:58] Speaker 1: would generally agree on less interesting sport because it was
[22:00] Speaker 1: a sport that and you correct me if I'm wrong,
[22:02] Speaker 1: if I'm from the coming from too much of a distance.
[22:05] Speaker 1: But where there was there's there's less stylistic variation at
[22:09] Speaker 1: this point than there was before the racket changed.
[22:12] Speaker 2: Thousand percent. Thousand percent. Not just the rackets, but the
[22:16] Speaker 2: surfaces have changed. So the grass is different now than
[22:20] Speaker 2: it was when I was growing up, right? The services
[22:22] Speaker 2: have become so homogenized that the real anomaly is grass.
[22:27] Speaker 2: Like you had to, you know, you had different champions
[22:30] Speaker 2: in some of these services. That's why, look at the
[22:31] Speaker 2: clay champions before Nadal. You had a whole bunch of
[22:34] Speaker 2: dudes up there winning that one. Why? Because clay was different.
[22:36] Speaker 2: Thomas Booster. Exactly, right? Tom, I mean, Sampras never even
[22:41] Speaker 2: got to a French Open final. you know, never even
[22:45] Speaker 2: got there. And so here's a guy who won 14 majors,
[22:48] Speaker 2: but not on that surface, never even got to a final.
[22:50] Speaker 2: Venus Williams never, you know, got to one against her sister,
[22:54] Speaker 2: but Venus didn't win on clay. And so, but when
[22:58] Speaker 2: you got to grass, that was your ass, right? When
[23:01] Speaker 2: you went up against them on that surface, and it
[23:03] Speaker 2: was only two weeks later, but a totally different surface.
[23:05] Speaker 2: And so all of these different things do affect sort
[23:09] Speaker 2: of who becomes great. But I think that in terms
[23:12] Speaker 2: of fame, like when you're really thinking about great players
[23:15] Speaker 2: and why, why does it stick here and why doesn't
[23:18] Speaker 2: it stick there? It really does to me come down
[23:22] Speaker 2: to if you give them something to watch, and this
[23:27] Speaker 2: is obviously something that the WNBA is going to talk
[23:29] Speaker 2: about in their labor negotiations. If you give them something
[23:32] Speaker 2: to watch, they will watch it. That's why I was
[23:35] Speaker 2: asking you about this, you know, how you felt and like, okay,
[23:38] Speaker 2: you know, if, The more women's basketball you watch, the
[23:42] Speaker 2: more women's basketball we're going to know, or you can't,
[23:46] Speaker 2: that doesn't stick. Some sports stick and some sports don't.
[23:49] Speaker 2: I just tend to think that you create the market
[23:52] Speaker 2: that you want. And I think that so much of
[23:57] Speaker 2: what we have here is a fundamental creation of the
[24:03] Speaker 2: world you want to be.
[24:05] Speaker 1: Also with tennis, and we're going to get to a
[24:07] Speaker 1: lot more baseball in just a few. But with tennis,
[24:11] Speaker 1: when I was younger, like during summers in Houston, so
[24:16] Speaker 1: we would have a very limited window where we could
[24:17] Speaker 1: do this. But it's me and my brother waking up
[24:21] Speaker 1: as early as we possibly could at an age where
[24:24] Speaker 1: it was hard for me to wake up early in
[24:26] Speaker 1: the morning and at a time in his life where
[24:28] Speaker 1: it was hard for him to. get your ass up
[24:31] Speaker 1: and we go out there and we play a couple
[24:32] Speaker 1: sets of tennis.
[24:33] Speaker 2: And go hit.
[24:33] Speaker 1: Like people played tennis in a much different way. Regular people,
[24:38] Speaker 1: when they got tennis lessons. Well, they play more now.
[24:40] Speaker 2: And that's the thing. That's the beauty of the sport,
[24:43] Speaker 2: which is why I find it so fascinating about what
[24:46] Speaker 2: sticks and what doesn't, is that there are two sports
[24:50] Speaker 2: that are almost equally watching and playing sports. Tennis and basketball.
[24:58] Speaker 1: Interesting, because I don't see as many tennis. I don't know.
[25:01] Speaker 1: You're from Atlanta. But see, that's what I'm saying. But
[25:04] Speaker 1: what's funny is the people I do know who play
[25:06] Speaker 1: tennis play.
[25:07] Speaker 2: Play tennis. I mean, Atlanta is the number, I think
[25:10] Speaker 2: it's number one, even bigger than Los Angeles and New
[25:13] Speaker 2: York in terms of per capita USTA membership. Atlanta is
[25:18] Speaker 2: tennis central. That Atlanta tournament, the 250, I think it's,
[25:23] Speaker 2: they don't even play that Atlanta anymore. It should be
[25:26] Speaker 2: right after, it should be now. But I know they're
[25:28] Speaker 2: in D.C. I don't know if the Atlanta tournament exists anymore.
[25:30] Speaker 2: But that tournament was huge and multiracial. It wasn't like, oh,
[25:34] Speaker 2: this is just a little country club sport where they go,
[25:37] Speaker 2: you know, play off in a way. Tennis is dominated
[25:40] Speaker 2: by the middle class down in a lot of these
[25:43] Speaker 2: different places. And I just what I find to be
[25:49] Speaker 2: so fascinating about about this sport specifically is its ties
[25:54] Speaker 2: to money, its ties to the country club idea and
[25:56] Speaker 2: all of that. But when you talk about fame too,
[25:58] Speaker 2: you had to win to earn back then. You don't
[26:01] Speaker 2: got to win to earn. Like you look at Jimmy Conn,
[26:05] Speaker 2: they were playing 80, 90 matches a year because they
[26:09] Speaker 2: didn't make any money. Today, you win one major, you
[26:11] Speaker 2: get $ 3 million. You set. You know, you don't have
[26:15] Speaker 2: to go run the calendar and go run yourself crazy. Whereas,
[26:18] Speaker 2: you know, back in the day when those guys were playing,
[26:20] Speaker 2: they were playing every single week. You saw them. They
[26:23] Speaker 2: were on the, you know, one thing we didn't talk about.
[26:25] Speaker 2: It was a more literate society. Cover of Sports Illustrated.
[26:28] Speaker 2: That was the same as being on The Tonight Show.
[26:29] Speaker 2: You made the cover of Sports Illustrated. Everybody knew who
[26:32] Speaker 2: you were. What is the equivalent today? What is the
[26:35] Speaker 2: fame equivalent? What is the fame quotient where if you
[26:38] Speaker 2: get this, you get that? Right? I mean, that's what
[26:42] Speaker 2: I mean about that level of fame. Think about if
[26:44] Speaker 2: you were a comedian and Johnny Carson put you on. Like,
[26:48] Speaker 2: where are the equivalents? Even in the last 25 years,
[26:50] Speaker 2: that equivalent, I don't think it exists anymore. Like, which
[26:53] Speaker 2: one is it? Like, what do you have to have
[26:56] Speaker 2: in order to make your career?
[26:58] Speaker 1: Well, you hit one of the more distressing questions. It
[27:02] Speaker 1: applies to my line of work and others, which is
[27:05] Speaker 1: being good. How much does that really matter?
[27:09] Speaker 2: Exactly.
[27:10] Speaker 1: Like, think about how many things that are out there. Like,
[27:13] Speaker 1: if you think about podcasting, for example, people can tell
[27:17] Speaker 1: you the biggest podcast. And when you think in your head,
[27:19] Speaker 1: I don't need to call any names out. You think
[27:21] Speaker 1: in your head about what the biggest and most famous
[27:23] Speaker 1: podcasts are. How many of them are big and famous
[27:27] Speaker 1: for being good? Like, I'll ask you how big a
[27:30] Speaker 1: podcast is. But the people who tell me about it
[27:34] Speaker 1: are never telling me how good it is.
[27:35] Speaker 2: Well, it's the same as books.
[27:36] Speaker 1: They're telling me how.
[27:37] Speaker 2: Big it is. Well, that's right. It's the same as
[27:38] Speaker 2: books now. I mean, when I look at the New
[27:40] Speaker 2: York Times bestseller list, the first thing I look at
[27:43] Speaker 2: is how many of these people in the nonfiction list,
[27:46] Speaker 2: how many of them write as a primary occupation? They're
[27:50] Speaker 2: all celebrities. They're all just famous for something else.
[27:52] Speaker 3: Right.
[27:53] Speaker 2: And so that's really where the currency is. But once again,
[27:59] Speaker 2: who's creating this? Does this have to be like this?
[28:02] Speaker 2: Or is this the way that it's been chosen to be?
[28:04] Speaker 2: And so I think that once again, when you start
[28:07] Speaker 2: looking at why certain people get certain things, it was
[28:15] Speaker 2: so much more a, I'm not going to say meritocracy,
[28:19] Speaker 2: because who knows? I mean, the puppet masters have been
[28:21] Speaker 2: controlling us for some time now, right? It's just there's
[28:24] Speaker 2: more to control and now less to control. But when
[28:27] Speaker 2: I'm thinking about why did I fall in love with tennis,
[28:33] Speaker 2: it was exactly what you said. And it was breakfast
[28:35] Speaker 2: at Wimbledon. But before that, it was NBC, the French
[28:38] Speaker 2: Open in the morning, you know, a month earlier, because
[28:41] Speaker 2: it was so weird watching them play tennis on dirt.
[28:45] Speaker 2: We don't have clay courts in Boston. We don't have
[28:47] Speaker 2: clay courts. It's a clay court. Right. Which, by the way,
[28:50] Speaker 2: is also why American players aren't as good, because. Americans
[28:53] Speaker 2: are hardcore players, and you've got to learn how to
[28:57] Speaker 2: play on clay now. So big serve, big forehand, can't
[29:00] Speaker 2: play D, Americans, they just get whooped after the first week.
[29:04] Speaker 2: And so all of those things, that level of exposure
[29:09] Speaker 2: just changes everything. And the power of ESPN is really
[29:14] Speaker 2: like one of the big deals because once that whole
[29:17] Speaker 2: wide world of sports thing that they inherited from ABC–
[29:20] Speaker 2: When that began to disappear, you began to lose sight.
[29:24] Speaker 2: And suddenly every other sport was, well, if it's not
[29:26] Speaker 2: Olympic year, I'm not watching it. You used to get
[29:29] Speaker 2: a taste of everything. All right.
[29:31] Speaker 1: Put a pin in that thought. We're going to come
[29:32] Speaker 1: back in just a couple because there is a place
[29:35] Speaker 1: where ESPN, I think, becomes a very interesting point of
[29:38] Speaker 1: discussion when it comes. to baseball. And I'll tell you
[29:41] Speaker 1: what that is coming up next. All right. We are
[29:44] Speaker 1: back with Howard Bryant. We talked a lot about the
[29:46] Speaker 1: role in place that tennis plays in our society and
[29:49] Speaker 1: how that's changed in the last 25 years. And I
[29:51] Speaker 1: think one of the more stark examples where we can
[29:54] Speaker 1: feel the change is in baseball. Um, And of course,
[29:58] Speaker 1: a lot of things we talked about before, English speakers
[30:00] Speaker 1: and the likes, they come into play. But this, I think,
[30:03] Speaker 1: is the big one. Now, you have made the point
[30:05] Speaker 1: about the corporations and where they are sending our eyeballs
[30:10] Speaker 1: and our interest and how that affects all these other things.
[30:14] Speaker 1: Baseball is interesting because a clear decision was made around
[30:17] Speaker 1: ESPN maybe about 15 years ago where somebody looked at
[30:20] Speaker 1: the numbers and said, hey, man, We start talking about baseball.
[30:23] Speaker 1: People start changing the channel. So we're not really going
[30:26] Speaker 1: to do that no more. It could be the World Series.
[30:29] Speaker 1: It's not happening.
[30:30] Speaker 2: Right.
[30:30] Speaker 1: And the rest of us and us being people who
[30:33] Speaker 1: do the kind of work that I do, we kind
[30:34] Speaker 1: of follow suit because why would you talk about something
[30:36] Speaker 1: that people don't talk about? But on the other side
[30:39] Speaker 1: of it, people will tell you local baseball ratings and attendance.
[30:42] Speaker 1: All those numbers are good, which is to say there
[30:44] Speaker 1: is still an interest in baseball, but it is a
[30:48] Speaker 1: poor national talker. It is a sport that was at
[30:52] Speaker 1: its height. And I don't know how many people make
[30:54] Speaker 1: this connection. And maybe I'm wrong. You let me know.
[30:57] Speaker 1: That is a sport that was very well served when
[31:00] Speaker 1: the center of the sports consumers news existence was the
[31:03] Speaker 1: local newspaper and the local newspaper did the job. You
[31:06] Speaker 1: can't pay attention to 30 baseball teams at one time
[31:09] Speaker 1: in a way you could pay attention to 32 football teams.
[31:11] Speaker 1: but a way you can pay attention to 30 basketball teams. Baseball,
[31:14] Speaker 1: you watch your team and your league, and you watch
[31:17] Speaker 1: that team, 162 games going all around the circuit. And
[31:20] Speaker 1: by the time the year was over, you knew every
[31:23] Speaker 1: team there was in that league. You knew everybody's bullpen,
[31:26] Speaker 1: all of that stuff. All it took was a couple
[31:27] Speaker 1: three-game series, and you would then be caught up. As
[31:31] Speaker 1: the sports consumer became a national sports consumer, the interest
[31:36] Speaker 1: in baseball by the people who aren't all the way
[31:39] Speaker 1: into baseball increased.
[31:41] Speaker 2: That fell.
[31:42] Speaker 1: And then as a result, we're in a place where
[31:45] Speaker 1: we have seen some of the greatest baseball players ever
[31:47] Speaker 1: to walk in the last 15 years. Mike Trout's a
[31:49] Speaker 1: great example. Otani, of course, right now jumps off the page.
[31:53] Speaker 1: And Otani, I think, is famous as an idea, but
[31:57] Speaker 1: not famous as a person. And that's not just because
[32:00] Speaker 1: of the Japanese factor. Ichiro felt more famous than he did.
[32:03] Speaker 1: Hideo Nomo, when it first got started. felt more famous
[32:07] Speaker 1: than he does. And I think that's really as ESPN
[32:11] Speaker 1: became the, the operation that dictated everybody's coverage, even the
[32:15] Speaker 1: networks that compete with them. Baseball is the biggest loser
[32:20] Speaker 1: in terms of how we view its biggest teams and
[32:23] Speaker 1: its biggest stars.
[32:25] Speaker 2: A hundred percent. And, and I'll throw a couple of
[32:28] Speaker 2: other points out there, but you're right. And I think
[32:30] Speaker 2: you and I have talked about this over, over the years. Um, 2018,
[32:39] Speaker 2: maybe 2017, somewhere in there. I'm at spring training. And,
[32:44] Speaker 2: you know, when you live in Massachusetts, you just don't
[32:47] Speaker 2: have the same type of, uh, we don't like colors
[32:50] Speaker 2: out here. Right. It's very drab place when it comes
[32:54] Speaker 2: to shopping, when it comes to clothes. So you're always
[32:55] Speaker 2: going to go shopping when you're out there on the
[32:57] Speaker 2: West coast, um, out West. So I go to Nordstrom,
[33:02] Speaker 2: to go buy some clothes at Spring Train up in
[33:04] Speaker 2: Fashion Center in Scottsdale. And I'm sitting there looking for
[33:07] Speaker 2: some shoes and looking for some stuff, whatever I forgot,
[33:10] Speaker 2: whatever I wanted to get. And who's walking through the
[33:14] Speaker 2: mall but Mike Trout? He might as well have been
[33:18] Speaker 2: somebody's daddy. Just nobody spoke to him. Nobody looked at him.
[33:23] Speaker 2: And it wasn't like New York, like, oh, there's somebody famous,
[33:26] Speaker 2: but we're New Yorkers, so we're just going to act chill,
[33:28] Speaker 2: but we see him. We see you. Nobody knew who
[33:30] Speaker 2: he was. Nobody even gave a little side there and said,
[33:34] Speaker 2: let me go get a little side photo. They didn't
[33:38] Speaker 2: know who he was. And this is in spring training
[33:43] Speaker 2: in Arizona. And Mike Trout at that time is winning
[33:47] Speaker 2: back-to-back MVPs and people are comparing him to Willie Mays.
[33:52] Speaker 2: That he's quite possibly the greatest baseball player who ever played. Right?
[34:00] Speaker 2: I mean, We're not just saying, oh, yeah, he's the
[34:02] Speaker 2: best player in the game. You got to remember who
[34:04] Speaker 2: Mike Trout was back then.
[34:05] Speaker 1: He's the evolution of Ricky Henderson.
[34:07] Speaker 2: Exactly. They were comparing him. He was like LeBron James.
[34:13] Speaker 2: The reason why you talk about LeBron James being that good,
[34:15] Speaker 2: I don't know where you find him in terms of that.
[34:18] Speaker 2: But for me, when I first saw LeBron James play
[34:21] Speaker 2: in 2003, the first thing that hit me was he's
[34:25] Speaker 2: got the size of magic. He's got the strength of Chamberlain.
[34:30] Speaker 2: He's got the speed of Isaiah. He's got the court
[34:34] Speaker 2: vision of bird and magic, right? He's got the aerial
[34:38] Speaker 2: game of Jordan, right? He's the composite. He's the most
[34:43] Speaker 2: devastating physical basketball specimen ever. That's what they were saying
[34:48] Speaker 2: about Mike Trout, you know? He's got the speed of
[34:52] Speaker 2: Mantle and Mays. He's got the power of Bonds and
[34:56] Speaker 2: Aaron and those guys and McGuire. You know, he's got
[34:59] Speaker 2: he can run the bases, not like Ricky, but he's
[35:01] Speaker 2: got Ricky like speed. You know, he's he's the guy.
[35:03] Speaker 2: He's everything. And baseball made a decision to be a
[35:09] Speaker 2: regional sport. I have always questioned this and I don't
[35:13] Speaker 2: and I'm not saying I question it because I'm right.
[35:15] Speaker 2: I'm saying maybe they just looked like looked at the
[35:17] Speaker 2: numbers and said we can't win that every all the
[35:19] Speaker 2: factors that you're talking about. We can't win. People don't
[35:22] Speaker 2: consume this product the way they used to. There were
[35:26] Speaker 2: national stars in the 70s. There were national stars in
[35:30] Speaker 2: the 80s. You know, if somebody said to me today,
[35:35] Speaker 2: who's the most famous baseball player? Not who's the best
[35:38] Speaker 2: baseball player. Who's the most famous, recognizable baseball player? I
[35:42] Speaker 2: don't know. Maybe it's Otani. But when we talk about fame,
[35:46] Speaker 2: what are we really talking about? We're talking about Madison Avenue.
[35:50] Speaker 2: Pete Rose is doing Aqua Velva commercials. Reggie Jackson had
[35:53] Speaker 2: his own candy bar. And he's doing... I'm sorry, Panasonic,
[35:58] Speaker 2: remember Reggie Vision? Remember those commercials? Like those guys, Ken
[36:02] Speaker 2: Griffey Jr. was doing Nintendo commercials in the 90s. Like
[36:05] Speaker 2: these guys, everybody knew them. Like you saw somebody's face
[36:09] Speaker 2: in you. That's fame. And baseball doesn't have that, right?
[36:13] Speaker 2: And part of the reason, I believe, in my opinion,
[36:19] Speaker 2: is that technology has done baseball the worst disservice. Baseball
[36:23] Speaker 2: has been served. You get more baseball because there's more technology.
[36:26] Speaker 2: Technology has given you everything. But in terms of scarcity,
[36:29] Speaker 2: scarcity creates fame, right? So if you're a baseball player
[36:33] Speaker 2: and you're the one who gets on one of those
[36:35] Speaker 2: three networks, or if you're the game of the week,
[36:36] Speaker 2: everybody's watching the same thing. They see you. Today, not
[36:40] Speaker 2: everybody's watching the same thing. Y'all got the baseball package.
[36:42] Speaker 2: So that creates that sort of regionality, you know, that
[36:45] Speaker 2: sort of regional nature. But there's no national spot. And now,
[36:50] Speaker 2: you know, because baseball's got removed from baseball tonight. Baseball
[36:55] Speaker 2: has taken its signature product, the World Series, and has
[36:59] Speaker 2: refused to compete with week eight in the NFL, right?
[37:02] Speaker 2: I mean, that's the level of surrender that they've beaten us.
[37:09] Speaker 2: But that's the other thing, right? The other thing about
[37:14] Speaker 2: it is that the other sports have decided two major,
[37:17] Speaker 2: major pieces that people really don't talk very much about
[37:20] Speaker 2: was there's a certain protocol. Right. We all kind of
[37:23] Speaker 2: had rules. Right. Now there are no more rules. And
[37:26] Speaker 2: the rule was that once the Stanley Cup and the
[37:29] Speaker 2: NBA finals were finished, the rest of the summer belonged
[37:32] Speaker 2: to baseball. Doesn't belong to baseball anymore. I remember when
[37:37] Speaker 2: I was in spring training, I remember seeing the great,
[37:39] Speaker 2: you know, the late, great Walt Jockety, who was the
[37:41] Speaker 2: GM of the Cardinals at the time, get all mad
[37:43] Speaker 2: at me because I worked for ESPN and Larry Barrett,
[37:47] Speaker 2: the giant, same thing. Mad at me. He was like,
[37:48] Speaker 2: what are you mad at me for? I don't make
[37:49] Speaker 2: the decisions. They're like, they were timing. When you turned
[37:53] Speaker 2: on SportsCenter, when did baseball enter the chat? It's the
[37:59] Speaker 2: only live sport. And baseball was averaging like 11 minutes.
[38:05] Speaker 2: That's after like two commercial breaks. You start talking about baseball.
[38:09] Speaker 2: They're like, we're the only game in town and we
[38:11] Speaker 2: can't get on. Y'all are talking about the NBA free agency.
[38:16] Speaker 2: You're talking about coming up NFL minicamps. And baseball can't
[38:22] Speaker 2: compete with those soap operas. And so you start looking
[38:27] Speaker 2: at this when you were a kid, when I was
[38:29] Speaker 2: a kid, all you talked about all summer was baseball.
[38:32] Speaker 2: You know, in addition, periodically, if you had an Olympic year,
[38:35] Speaker 2: if you talk, you know, tennis and you get Wimbledon
[38:38] Speaker 2: and whatever, there were a few things taking place in
[38:40] Speaker 2: the summer. But the whole damn summer belonged to baseball
[38:42] Speaker 2: until school started. And now baseball doesn't even control the
[38:48] Speaker 2: old monopoly it used to have. Changed everything.
[38:52] Speaker 1: And it is interesting to me because as has always
[38:56] Speaker 1: been the case, there is something uniquely breathtaking about an
[39:02] Speaker 1: amazing baseball player. Like not just a guy that hits
[39:06] Speaker 1: a lot of home runs, right? But a, I say
[39:10] Speaker 1: four to five tool player. And I say that because
[39:12] Speaker 1: like Barry Bonds was a four tool, not a five, right?
[39:15] Speaker 1: Like we don't want to take away some of these people.
[39:19] Speaker 1: of Sid Bream scoring from second base.
[39:22] Speaker 2: I knew that left arm. Yeah, that's all it is.
[39:25] Speaker 3: You got a left arm problem yeah it's the only
[39:27] Speaker 3: one it's the it's the oh i mean look the
[39:28] Speaker 3: other what the other the other tools were so amazing
[39:31] Speaker 3: that it doesn't matter right but like you know it
[39:34] Speaker 3: gets to that space but did you see.
[39:37] Speaker 1: That throw a kunya made the other day.
[39:39] Speaker 2: For the braves yeah geez yeah.
[39:41] Speaker 1: Okay like That is maybe the most impressive throw I've
[39:45] Speaker 1: ever seen, just because I didn't even think he was
[39:48] Speaker 1: trying to do that.
[39:48] Speaker 2: His back to the infield?
[39:50] Speaker 1: His back to the infield. I'm like, there's no way
[39:52] Speaker 1: he's actually trying to throw the dude out. And I
[39:54] Speaker 1: feel bad for the dude he threw out there. Like,
[39:56] Speaker 1: the problem is he didn't hustle. He didn't slide.
[39:58] Speaker 2: Why would he?
[39:59] Speaker 1: Why would you think that this was a necessary thing
[40:02] Speaker 1: to do? The third baseman didn't actually think the ball
[40:04] Speaker 1: was coming. But there's something about a guy that could
[40:07] Speaker 1: do that. Because to me, the combination of skills that
[40:09] Speaker 1: makes you that type of baseball player is so few
[40:12] Speaker 1: of them have anything to actually do with each other.
[40:15] Speaker 1: And if you can put them all together, like, think
[40:17] Speaker 1: about it. What are you good at? I can see
[40:19] Speaker 1: a ball start coming from 300 feet away and immediately
[40:22] Speaker 1: figure out where I need to run in order to
[40:25] Speaker 1: get the ball. And then when I do, I can
[40:27] Speaker 1: stop and I can flang that motherfucker right back to
[40:29] Speaker 1: wherever it is that it needs to go. And then
[40:32] Speaker 1: I can take this stick and hit a moving ball
[40:35] Speaker 1: and then run. Like, none of these things have anything
[40:37] Speaker 1: to do with each other, but they're so, like... every
[40:41] Speaker 1: man is athletic you know what i mean like.
[40:43] Speaker 2: Isn't that like isn't that's why it's so beautiful when
[40:46] Speaker 2: you start taking these pieces and you say okay skill
[40:51] Speaker 2: number one that you just brought up there's no value
[40:54] Speaker 2: inside of baseball right wrong that's a wide receiver skill
[40:58] Speaker 2: but can you throw right so it's like okay you
[41:01] Speaker 2: got piece one randy moss right you can go track
[41:04] Speaker 2: wide receiver can track jerry rice can track but once
[41:06] Speaker 2: you catch it can you throw it on a line
[41:09] Speaker 2: like clemente You know, can you throw it like Vlad?
[41:11] Speaker 2: Can you throw it like Acuna? Right. So you've got
[41:14] Speaker 2: all these different skills that you've got to put together.
[41:17] Speaker 2: But the ball stick one, that's the one that you've
[41:21] Speaker 2: got to come with on your own.
[41:23] Speaker 1: Right.
[41:24] Speaker 2: I mean, that hand, the ability to hit a baseball,
[41:28] Speaker 2: where's the equivalent? There's really not much of one.
[41:33] Speaker 1: And it's harder to do than ever. And the guys
[41:36] Speaker 1: who do it excellently are less famous and visible than ever.
[41:43] Speaker 2: Let's talk about that, right? I mean, I think that
[41:45] Speaker 2: one of the big issues that you have when it
[41:47] Speaker 2: comes to baseball is, and I've really enjoyed this conversation
[41:51] Speaker 2: because so much of it has nothing to do with athletics.
[41:53] Speaker 2: We're talking business. You know, we're really, you know, if
[41:58] Speaker 2: you look for players, you're going to find them, right?
[41:59] Speaker 2: Baseball is a less athletic sport right now. Baseball is
[42:04] Speaker 2: a less... charismatic sport right now. And no disrespect to
[42:10] Speaker 2: Mike Trout, because, hey, man, you have a right to
[42:13] Speaker 2: be comfortable, right? However, you know, and I know, and
[42:18] Speaker 2: the American people know, Bobani Jones, that 30 years ago,
[42:25] Speaker 2: the Players Association would have told Mike Trout, your ass
[42:28] Speaker 2: is going to the Yankees. I know you like your
[42:33] Speaker 2: little retirement community here in Anaheim. Nobody sees you. Mike
[42:37] Speaker 2: Trout has been to the playoffs once. Once. 2015, oh, 2014,
[42:45] Speaker 2: got swept by Baltimore, right?
[42:48] Speaker 1: Once.
[42:51] Speaker 2: They would have never allowed that. Think about it. Ken
[42:54] Speaker 2: Griffey Jr. Ken Griffey Jr. played the majority of his
[42:57] Speaker 2: career in Cincinnati and Seattle. Cincinnati and Seattle? Seattle? They
[43:04] Speaker 2: were Nintendo and Nike. They were running Griffey for president ads.
[43:08] Speaker 2: What are you doing in Seattle? Back then, the union
[43:14] Speaker 2: would have been like, look, we need our best where
[43:18] Speaker 2: the lights are brightest. And, you know, and Griffey got
[43:22] Speaker 2: criticized a little bit for that when he went to Cincinnati.
[43:26] Speaker 2: And we all know he's got his personal issues, why
[43:27] Speaker 2: he wasn't going to go to New York, but he
[43:28] Speaker 2: could have played for the Mets, could have played for
[43:30] Speaker 2: the Dodgers, could have, you know, like, but, you know,
[43:34] Speaker 2: when you think about those great players, they end up
[43:39] Speaker 2: where the lights are brightest. How much Ken Griffey Jr.
[43:44] Speaker 2: did we get? At least Bonds. Bonds made the World
[43:45] Speaker 2: Series once. We saw Bonds in the playoffs. These great players,
[43:50] Speaker 2: you got to be on stage. This is one of
[43:52] Speaker 2: the reasons why I say it is harder to be
[43:55] Speaker 2: a great player than ever today, even though the nutrition's better,
[43:59] Speaker 2: even though the The opportunities are better, even though the
[44:02] Speaker 2: knowledge is bigger, even though there's so much more that
[44:04] Speaker 2: gives this, the advantages are bigger because the money is
[44:07] Speaker 2: so huge. You can get the visibility of a great player.
[44:11] Speaker 2: You can get the attention of a great player. You
[44:14] Speaker 2: can get the compensation of a great player without being
[44:18] Speaker 2: a great player. You don't have to win championships and
[44:22] Speaker 2: be everywhere to be loaded, set for life. And that
[44:28] Speaker 2: changes fame. That changes how the public sees you, how
[44:34] Speaker 2: they view you. Imagine how different the world is when
[44:39] Speaker 2: you got to win to get anything, right? I mean,
[44:45] Speaker 2: it creates, you know, literal hunger, right? I mean, you
[44:51] Speaker 2: are literally hungry. If you don't win, you don't get paid.
[44:56] Speaker 2: It's a totally different game. And so we pay the price.
[45:01] Speaker 2: And Mike Trout pays the price. Now, Mike Trout's like,
[45:03] Speaker 2: I didn't pay no price. I was right where I
[45:05] Speaker 2: wanted to be. Good for him. We paid the price.
[45:08] Speaker 2: Imagine being able to see him on the biggest stage.
[45:09] Speaker 2: That's why seeing Mookie Betts in Los Angeles is such
[45:12] Speaker 2: a big deal. We want to see the best when
[45:15] Speaker 2: the leaves change for the biggest contests. And if you
[45:19] Speaker 2: don't get that, everybody loses.
[45:22] Speaker 1: And he specifically went somewhere where people just don't care
[45:24] Speaker 1: that much. Like, that's the thing about Mookie Betts in Boston.
[45:26] Speaker 1: They care a lot there.
[45:28] Speaker 2: That's right.
[45:28] Speaker 1: Like, what makes the Red Sox interesting.
[45:30] Speaker 2: Mookie went in two places where people care, because they
[45:32] Speaker 2: do care in Los Angeles. Right.
[45:34] Speaker 1: But what makes, right, they care in Los Angeles, not
[45:37] Speaker 1: so much in Anaheim, at least not in the same way.
[45:40] Speaker 1: But the thing that makes the Red Sox interesting to observe,
[45:43] Speaker 1: even if you don't care about them, is how much
[45:44] Speaker 1: the people there, like, actually care about what the program is, right? Like,
[45:48] Speaker 1: that is a significant thing that makes them interesting.
[45:51] Speaker 2: There are three cities in Major League Baseball, like it
[45:54] Speaker 2: or not. I'm sorry, Rob Manfred, but you know it
[45:56] Speaker 2: to be true, right? Boston, New York, Philadelphia. Those are
[46:02] Speaker 2: the three cities. Maybe you can throw Chicago in there,
[46:04] Speaker 2: but they've done a lot of losing in the past
[46:06] Speaker 2: 125 years.
[46:08] Speaker 1: Sorry, yes, Phillies too.
[46:09] Speaker 2: The Dodgers are always good. But I'm just talking about
[46:12] Speaker 2: in terms of that East Coast insanity, that passion for
[46:15] Speaker 2: that sport. That's it's different over there. And that's why
[46:19] Speaker 2: some dudes, Bryce Harper, like, yeah, send me over there
[46:21] Speaker 2: for 13 years with no trade. And that's why some
[46:24] Speaker 2: other dudes are like, I'm never going to those three
[46:27] Speaker 2: crazy cities where they boo you on opening day when
[46:30] Speaker 2: there's 161 more of these things. Right. I mean, it
[46:34] Speaker 2: is a different thing. And that East Coast piece of
[46:37] Speaker 2: it is very, very real, because. As a kid growing
[46:41] Speaker 2: up up there watching the local news. When you saw
[46:45] Speaker 2: those trucks going down to Florida for spring training, you
[46:48] Speaker 2: knew winter was almost over. And that was baseball, and
[46:51] Speaker 2: that brought you to the sport. It made you care
[46:53] Speaker 2: about the sport in a way that you didn't care
[46:56] Speaker 2: about the other sports. Sports were already going on. And
[46:59] Speaker 2: so all of this, and when I was talking earlier
[47:03] Speaker 2: about technology hurting baseball, is that when you talk about fame,
[47:08] Speaker 2: you had to watch the all-star game as a kid.
[47:12] Speaker 2: Because when I grew up, we had three networks. Because
[47:15] Speaker 2: I grew up in a place we didn't have cable
[47:16] Speaker 2: until 89. Hold on.
[47:18] Speaker 1: Three networks and two entirely distinct leagues.
[47:21] Speaker 2: And two different leagues didn't play each other. Exactly. So
[47:24] Speaker 2: you got to see, if you wanted to see the Dodgers,
[47:26] Speaker 2: if you wanted to see Fernando and Steve Garvey and,
[47:30] Speaker 2: you know, Hershiser and all them guys, you got the
[47:35] Speaker 2: all-star game, you got the game of the week, and
[47:39] Speaker 2: you got the World Series. And they lived in a
[47:42] Speaker 2: whole other universe. And when I said it covering baseball,
[47:45] Speaker 2: Tony La Russa used to talk about it. He would
[47:46] Speaker 2: be like, you know, in the other league. There was
[47:48] Speaker 2: no interleague back then. The other league. It was a
[47:51] Speaker 2: totally different place. You saw them in spring training. You
[47:55] Speaker 2: saw them in the All-Star game. And maybe you saw
[47:57] Speaker 2: them in the World Series. But now that you've got
[47:59] Speaker 2: interleague every single day, the specialness of all of it
[48:03] Speaker 2: goes away. I don't really, I think the All-Star game
[48:06] Speaker 2: should sort of disappear. But once again, if it's not
[48:09] Speaker 2: So where's your fame coming from now? If it's not
[48:11] Speaker 2: going to be the All-Star Game, maybe it's going to
[48:12] Speaker 2: be the Home Run Derby, right? I mean, so these
[48:16] Speaker 2: are the things that when you're talking about fame and
[48:18] Speaker 2: you're talking about greatness and not just greatness, but fame,
[48:21] Speaker 2: how do we recognize you? That's the stuff. And if
[48:26] Speaker 2: you don't have it, you're not getting it. You know,
[48:31] Speaker 2: when you think about your most famous sports commercials, like
[48:35] Speaker 2: all that crossover stuff, Or you think about the TV
[48:39] Speaker 2: shows you used to watch and Kareem showed up on
[48:42] Speaker 2: different strokes or whatever it was, right? Or whatever it was,
[48:46] Speaker 2: where are those crossover opportunities where everybody who doesn't watch
[48:50] Speaker 2: your sport still knows who you are? Where are those opportunities?
[48:55] Speaker 2: And when you ask yourself those opportunities, where do they
[49:00] Speaker 2: really exist? Is baseball part of it? And if baseball
[49:05] Speaker 2: is not part of it, then those opportunities disappear for you.
[49:08] Speaker 2: People just aren't going to know you. And yeah, your
[49:10] Speaker 2: regional ratings will go up, but it's not the same
[49:15] Speaker 2: as everybody knowing who you are. It changes the entire
[49:20] Speaker 2: dynamic of fame. And that's what technology has done. There's
[49:24] Speaker 2: a whole bunch of super millionaires out there that none
[49:26] Speaker 2: of us have ever heard of because we're not watching everything.
[49:30] Speaker 2: It's impossible to watch everything. Right.
[49:33] Speaker 1: So there have been a lot of huge baseball stars
[49:36] Speaker 1: through the course of time. There's really only been like
[49:37] Speaker 1: one hockey star that ever cut through, which was Gretzky.
[49:39] Speaker 1: Like there was others whose names you would know. But
[49:41] Speaker 1: the only like Wayne Gretzky became Tiger Woods in that way.
[49:45] Speaker 1: Like this is the one name that everybody like. What
[49:48] Speaker 1: do you know about hockey? I know Wayne Gretzky may
[49:50] Speaker 1: not know who he plays for, may not know anything.
[49:52] Speaker 1: He was the name that cut through baseball. Used to
[49:54] Speaker 1: have all these different things that cut through. And this
[49:56] Speaker 1: is the question I have yet to come up with
[49:58] Speaker 1: an answer for. But I think about all the time.
[50:01] Speaker 1: you were of the age where you can remember Pete
[50:05] Speaker 1: Rose 44 game hitting streak. My father and my brother,
[50:08] Speaker 1: by the way, were in Atlanta at the stadium the
[50:10] Speaker 1: day that Gene Garber shut Pete Rose down and ended
[50:13] Speaker 1: the 44 game hitting streak where Pete Rose told him
[50:15] Speaker 1: to pitch to him like a man instead of throwing
[50:17] Speaker 1: them change-ups. And then I think he threw him another
[50:19] Speaker 1: change-up because Gene Garber just threw change-ups. But I remember
[50:24] Speaker 1: Paul Molitor had a 39 or 38 game hitting streak
[50:25] Speaker 1: in 1987. How long of a hitting, like, I don't
[50:31] Speaker 1: even know if people know about the DiMaggio hitting streak anymore.
[50:33] Speaker 1: How long of a hitting streak would a baseball player
[50:35] Speaker 1: have to have for it to be a thing that
[50:37] Speaker 1: America cared about, right? If somebody were to hit 400,
[50:39] Speaker 1: does this cut through?
[50:41] Speaker 2: Well, what was the last one? Wasn't it Luis Castillo?
[50:44] Speaker 2: Wasn't it 35 when he was at the Marlins? Yeah.
[50:46] Speaker 2: I think it was 35. And I was like, and
[50:49] Speaker 2: I remember people kind of on the down low rooting
[50:52] Speaker 2: against him. He can't have this record.
[50:55] Speaker 1: No.
[50:57] Speaker 2: You can have all the other records you want. You
[50:58] Speaker 2: can't have that one. Luis Castillo, really? You're going to
[51:01] Speaker 2: replace DiMaggio? A little drop in quality there? That's a
[51:07] Speaker 2: great question. The question is, I mean, and I think
[51:10] Speaker 2: for context, T.C. Sabathia, who's going into the Hall of
[51:13] Speaker 2: Fame next week, called me up one day in his
[51:18] Speaker 2: rookie year and said, Shohei Ohtani is the greatest baseball
[51:22] Speaker 2: player of all time. I'm like, he's been here two months.
[51:26] Speaker 2: He's like, he's the greatest baseball player of all time.
[51:30] Speaker 2: I was like, don't you want to wait a little bit?
[51:32] Speaker 2: And he's like, I don't need to. He's the greatest
[51:34] Speaker 2: baseball player of all time. And here's why. Because he's
[51:37] Speaker 2: doing shit at the major league level that we did
[51:41] Speaker 2: in little league. Nobody else can do what he's doing.
[51:45] Speaker 2: He's the best pitcher. At the time, he's the best
[51:47] Speaker 2: pitcher in the league. He's the best hitter in the league.
[51:49] Speaker 2: And he hits home runs too. And runs. And can run. Well,
[51:53] Speaker 2: they give a stolen bases away, but he can still run.
[51:55] Speaker 2: But I mean, seriously, he's like, nobody can do that.
[52:00] Speaker 2: He could literally win 20 games one year if he
[52:02] Speaker 2: stayed healthy to do it. And think about that. That's
[52:06] Speaker 2: LeBron James level. Like, seriously, like when you think about
[52:12] Speaker 2: that level of talent and nobody cares. I'm not saying
[52:17] Speaker 2: nobody cares that I'm saying because people care about Shohei Ohtani,
[52:20] Speaker 2: but it's he should be at that level. except for
[52:26] Speaker 2: the fact that, you know, he doesn't speak English and
[52:28] Speaker 2: he's not, you know, he's not marketing that way. You know,
[52:32] Speaker 2: baseball doesn't do that. And also, I don't think it
[52:34] Speaker 2: could work anyway. I mean, what are you going to,
[52:35] Speaker 2: you have to speak English in this country if you're
[52:37] Speaker 2: going to cross over like that. I mean, remember Sammy
[52:40] Speaker 2: Sosa in the late 90s doing those Pepsi commercials and
[52:43] Speaker 2: he would just sit at the camera and smile. That
[52:45] Speaker 2: ain't going to go all the way. It'll do a
[52:47] Speaker 2: little bit, but it's not going to do what it
[52:48] Speaker 2: needs to do. To answer your question, I don't even
[52:55] Speaker 2: know if it's going to be home runs because people
[52:57] Speaker 2: have been so soured by what happened. What do you
[53:00] Speaker 2: got to do? The record is 73. So if Aaron
[53:03] Speaker 2: Judge goes out there and starts threatening in 75, I
[53:06] Speaker 2: think people would pay attention. I think it's still home runs.
[53:08] Speaker 2: You got to hit the ball over the fence.
[53:10] Speaker 1: Yeah, they tried to make 62 a thing again, and
[53:12] Speaker 1: it don't work like that.
[53:14] Speaker 2: It doesn't work like that at all.
[53:16] Speaker 1: At all.
[53:17] Speaker 2: It's okay. All right. Way to go, buddy.
[53:26] Speaker 1: The American League record.
[53:29] Speaker 2: The American League record. No, no, it's 73. So, I mean, seriously,
[53:34] Speaker 2: if we were on September 1st and Aaron Judge had
[53:42] Speaker 2: 66 home runs, people would pay attention. But it would
[53:47] Speaker 2: take something like that.
[53:51] Speaker 1: That is where we are. This is Howard Bryant, my man.
[53:54] Speaker 1: I appreciate you, brother.
[53:55] Speaker 2: No, man. Thank you, as always.
[53:57] Speaker 1: What's the title of the book? At least let the
[53:58] Speaker 1: people pre-order.
[53:59] Speaker 2: Title of the book is called Kings and Pawns, Jackie
[54:02] Speaker 2: Robinson and Paul Robeson in America.
[54:05] Speaker 1: This man sent out the damn cover on the internet
[54:07] Speaker 1: and they want to get all shy when somebody got
[54:09] Speaker 1: questions about the book. I see how you do.
[54:13] Speaker 2: You know what? It's not that I'm shy. It's that
[54:16] Speaker 2: my brain is fried. I'm trying to get this thing done.
[54:18] Speaker 2: You've been talking about this book for two years. Exactly.
[54:21] Speaker 2: When we hang up, I have to actually send another
[54:25] Speaker 2: edited version of the manuscript. So it's like... Oh, damn.
[54:28] Speaker 1: I thought we was done. No.
[54:30] Speaker 2: It's never done until... You'll know when it's done because
[54:34] Speaker 2: I'm going to send you a galley in mid-August. And
[54:36] Speaker 2: then once it's bound, then it's done. But right now
[54:39] Speaker 2: we still got pages.
[54:40] Speaker 1: I didn't realize you were still at it.
[54:41] Speaker 2: I would have approached that a whole lot differently.
[54:43] Speaker 1: I understand. Now I feel like I'm the jerk.
[54:46] Speaker 2: No, no, no. It's great. All I can tell you
[54:48] Speaker 2: is it's the thing that I love about this project
[54:50] Speaker 2: more than anything else is that, I mean, it feels
[54:54] Speaker 2: like today just in terms of where this country is going,
[54:59] Speaker 2: in terms of how we, you know, The name calling
[55:03] Speaker 2: and stuff is a lot of McCarthyism going on here.
[55:09] Speaker 2: A lot of past is prologue right now.
[55:15] Speaker 1: What a time.
[55:16] Speaker 2: What a time.
[55:16] Speaker 1: My brother, I greatly appreciate you.
[55:18] Speaker 2: Thank you, bro.
[55:19] Speaker 1: All right, now, and ladies and gentlemen, thanks so much
[55:21] Speaker 1: for joining us here on The Right Time. We do
[55:23] Speaker 1: this three times a week. Ryan Brumley handling everything behind
[55:26] Speaker 1: the scenes. Thank you, sir. Remember, follow The Right Time. Subscribe, like,
[55:31] Speaker 1: rate us, review us, give us five stars. You only
[55:33] Speaker 1: give us four stars. I'm inclined to believe you are
[55:35] Speaker 1: a hater. Talk to you guys in a couple of days.
[55:38] Speaker 1: Take it easy.

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