This is I on the Ball with Steve Rivera and Jakin Salis on Fox Sports fourteen fifteen powered by Nova Insurance Services. Hey sure your most Prized possessions katz R two so at iHeart Radio station. Hey, good afternoon, everybody. Welcome to I on the Ball here Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera. He's Jakin's house. Got our guy Jason in today. Good afternoon, gentlemen. Then I use that phrase, Lucy Jason the gentleman art Jason. Yeah, I think you are. Think so he has to pass our summer
class. He's got about coming solf and then he goes to the real world. Are you having fine? Man? Oh yeah, I'm having the bliff all right. He's learning. He's learned more than I have at that boarder. Yeah. Well, you know, we can teach people a lot. Just got to get him a job. Jason learned that Jason learned in your trick Today, he's gonna pro play him going out to commercial. Okay, he's on it. Man. Hope some some good music, same music we're
gonna we always have. We gotta make some more. I given you the go ahead if you've got a song that or songs that you feel you think we should play. I'm going out. Let me know, by the way, did you ever do some homework for us or your homework that we have Nina Turner, Tina Turner, Nina Turner. Oh my god, he clearly did not, Steve, he clearly did not. I mean it was like, what two weeks ago, I think I did? And what about what about Donna Summer? I don't think I heard? Oh why did you?
Because we just sent the same clips since Yeah, the two songs you guys put in, I did, and they're they're okay, they weren't. You hadn't heard him before, No, I hadn't never, never wanted to. And that little steak of yours. What do I listen to? Yeah, it's like whatever, Like hold your dad, I told your dad, um forty five. He still he still love to listen to our kind of bro
seventies Steve. You know, we've got all the the cable channels, right, So I go to MTV Classics and they're all songs that like three years ago classics, Yeah channel, because I go to the seventies table, it's like it's like no, no, but it's a it's a it's it's an MPV channel. It's like in the low hundreds, you know, on on
the on the on the directory. But I go to MPV Classics expecting to hear, you know, something from the BGS, some Earth Wind and Fire, and it's like some rapper that I've never heard of before, and that's supposed to be classics. I mean, yeah, those kind of shows you're not gonna care like music like the eighties or nine. They need to have old guys played, like the early two thousands. Well yeah, exactly in my in what's called my Gap. Yeah yeah, okay, cool, welcome
everybody started to bore you. Yeah, but we have a pretty good show today. Just kind of an imprompt two typics. Yeah you know, uh um, Well, the Las Vegas Nights won the Stanley Cup last night and their goalie happens to be a guy who played for the two Sun road Runners. Have a dream Yeah, no kidding, And so we're gonna we're gonna bring on Adrian Denny. Um. I got the brainstorm on that. I went on Justin Spears show this justin Ali this morning, and Adrian was on
just before me. I said, hey, there's a guest for us Adrian, we'll get him on our show. So, Uh, Adrian's going to just talk about the Stanley Cup and then you know, having a having an alum when the uh you know win the Cup, which is pretty cool, you know because we all kind of went crazy in this time when Nick Foles won. Uh. Uh, you don't won a Super Bowl, you know, we we you know, he's one of ours. So it was neat. It was neat to have that. So we'll see what Adrian Hill what's
the guy's name, Aiden Hill? A Hill? And he did he play? Was he? Yeah? He was the goalie? Was the start of Yeah, well he had a thing in it. And then uh, that'll be at three fifteen, then four fifteen. Lonnie Taverty who's yet been the athletic director and the and the girls a basketball coach at UH push ridd Christian for twenty years, I think thirty something like that. Um. I ran into Lonnie a number of times, uh in my day supporting my kids at
UH, at Saint Gregory and the Gregory School. UM, just a guy. One of those guys has been around high school sports for a really long time. He's he's decided to retire. Um, he still looks about twenty years younger than both you and I, Steve, So I don't know what he's retiring too, but or why, but he is retiring. Ask he was okay to come, what are you gonna do with your time? Too? Too young? Yeah, too young to put on the shelf. Yeah, but you know, he'll be one of those guys we can talk to
you about. You know, how are things different today that you were when you started doing that? That's exactly and it doesn't seem twenty years ago is a long time ago, but it kind of is. Well, when you think about all that's changed in twenty years, there's a lot that's changed. And I'm you know, I'm talking about you know, my you know, my kids were playing high school sports in two thousand. My youngest started playing hig school sports in two thousand and eight, so that's fifteen years ago.
There's a lot. It's way different now than it was even that. And so, um, whether it's high school where you got things, you know, all the you know, the rating services and this and that and the other, and you know the way social media and all those things that have happened. Um, you know, it's it's way different. Yeah, Okay, I still kind of want to talk about the discussion I brought up at the end of the show. Uh what do you love about sports? What
do you like that? And uh, what's special about sports? You know, I can't remember. I'll tell you one of the things I really like about it now, because I'd rather talk about that than politics and all the other crap going on around us. Right, where's politics? Crime? Uh, you know all the stuff that the hate that's going on to social media.
Stuff sports gives you, I think gives me an outlet of I mean, I mean, you know I have I have three Twitter threats that I that I run those Your problem right there, Well, well, I'll explain one is. One is and you and I are both on it is the Eye on the Ball Twitter, which is all sports. Right. Occasionally a sports person that we follow comes in with some comments about politics, but in
general that that feed is strictly sports. That I have my personal one where I've got a mix of sports and you know, the news that I want to get or the news sources that I want to get. You know, I follow the New York Times, Washington Posts, you know some of those things that you know, I end up with a lot of stuff that I really don't want to read, but I know it's there for me to read if I feel I need to or want to. So it's a mix.
And then I've got this one that I run for you know, all the football pool, all the polls that I run, which is pretty much all sports, and we kick out anything that isn't that but the one but mine personally, I go to it only when I know there's something going on important that I feel I need to know about. Right Otherwise, all I want for my social media is sports, information about sports, stuff about sports.
I feel like I'm more a little more versed in the NBA, maybe even a little bit of hockey and you know, some of the other sports because maybe I don't go read every article that comes across and I don't I see headlines, I see comments, I see stuff, and that's my outlet. Um. You know, I once got accuse of putting my head in the sand because I don't want to hear the political stuff and said, my head and eye in the sand. I know what's going on out there, just
don't want it. I just don't want to surround myself. Yeah, in fact, I'm with you on that. In fact, my cousins who are involved in that somewhere else ask me, how come you don't post stuff like this? Well, uh, I using Michael Jordan and Republicans by Tennis Hues too. And I know we have advertisers. Advertisers are both Democrats and Republicans. I ain't gonna piss them up. And I'm not, you know, and and and honestly, what's the use? Yeah, what's you know?
Exactly? It's funny because I just saw a trade young tweet. This is how stupid the Twitter world isn't I I'm rarely on it, But he tweeted We're next or we're next the Hawks right right after seeing and everyone jumped him. Jumped him because that I ain't gonna happen, blah blah blah. Who couldn't. Can't you just say hey, we're next? Pretty simple? Yeah, who are you gonna say you're next? No, you're gonna you're gonna
invest in yourself? Yeah you can't. You can't say anything online without people coming after you. It doesn't make any sense, doesn't the best? Oh no, you're not. Well, shut up. I'm gonna admit that I just went after some guys. Uh. ESPN justin Ali posted a poll would rather go to a rose ball or a final four? And the majority of people said a final four? And so I went on the basically I said it niceness. I said, it's not even close. It's a rose ball.
But we talked about this when we first came on the roseball. And the people who are saying it's a final four are people who weren't here in nineteen seventy eight when Arizona got into the pack ten. No question, We're going to some rose balls and we'll still haven't no question. Well, you know these polls. Uh, they had a poll about ten years ago, whatever it was years ago, the best moments in MacHale Center, Best best moments in MacHale Center. You know what the number one was? It was
the the the block, Uh, Derrick Williams block. Are you exactly? The best moment in Michale cent in history against Washington. You know why? No, no offense to the kids today, but they don't remember yesterday they did. They didn't right beating UCLA for the first time. Are you kidding me? It's just that old people don't have time. You lugging into this one hundred one hundred percent. You know it's it's I there was something I was gonna I was gonna say to that, but I mean, you're okay.
Here's what I was gonna say. How many how many Arizona fans maybe went to that National Championship nineteen ninety seven, How many Arizona fans were there? Maybe what three four thousand? Did you guys ever determine or no? It was a pretty good section. But from maybe five thousand, maybe seven thousand, fifty thousand people would go Arizona fans would go to the would go to a Rose Bowl and there would be a lot of people left out.
It wouldn't get It would remind me how remember in New Mexico State came here for the Tucson would be the same thing happened with Kansas State back in the Corper when when they came to the Copper Bowl, it was the first bowl game they'd been to in like three hundred years, and they filled the place up. That's bizarre because you've been to a final four four times. Yeah,
you could, you could. You could sell I bet you you could sell two hundred thousand Rose Bowl tickets and two Sun Arizona if they got into the Rose Bowl. Not that I'm saying if everybody, if you had enough tickets for everybody, I bet you could sell two hundred thousand tickets, it would be a party. Certainly, six figures, it would be a party. Yeah. How many? Was it a big crowd for the festival for the last festival? Uh? Yeah, whatever it was. I was there.
I was there, and I was there for the twenty fourteen twenty fifteen it was cold as house, how but yeah, no, we you know, we jumped on tickets for that because we thought that there would you know, that they would run out. I think I think it was I don't know if it was a salad, but it was pretty cool. Another one that was very full too. That was hard to get tickets too, was
the uh was the uh the ninety eight to holiday boat. We needed a block of like forty tickets and we couldn't get those from the U of A. We had to buy them from And what was the what was the vote? It was like fifty four percent, uh, final final four and and uh, I'll give it to you because I had it right here, and some I'm like fifty four percent Final four and I'm like, guys, you don't what anybody who says that has been here long enough. Here it is.
It was, um, is there enough sample size? It was, Oh that's pretty good. Where would you go fifty? There's no bad answer? Yeah, you know there, Yes, there is. There is a bad answer. Rose Bowl. I think I was I was the Final four because because um, you're more of a basketball. I'm more of a basketball. I think I haven't seen it, so I feel like I don't I haven't seen the Rose Bowl. Yeah, I haven't seen that either, but I think I would enjoy more of us being in the final four. Then.
I mean that explains it right there. I think I think the people who voted for that or who were up in the morning actually listens to the show. I'm not one because it's too early in the morning for me that day. Would vote for the Final four because there's a sectionist to it, but they just don't know about the roads boat. Yeah, it was fifty six point two for the Final four and forty three point eight four. I wonder what the breakdown demographically would be. Well, they're all younger people.
No, that's my point. There's very very few older people. It's it's all younger people and who just you know, and again, you know, Final four is find force a bigger deal. You know, it's a national championship as opposed to you know, a football game. But no, I get it. You'd you'd sell your left arm to the to get there. I sound a kid. Yeah, I definitely sell a kid. Yeah, you know, and I probably throw in a Q in a lot of the group that the old dudes that you talk to. Yeah, yeah, we
all would. Yeah. Well you know, I mean we've because you got to go there before you Yeah, so wait, we've had the conversation. Would would you be okay for Arizona to cheat its way to a Rose Bowl? And we all unanimously said yes, get a hold on we get a hold of Carol peak Carrol, because absolutely, because you know what, even if you go and they take it away from you later, they can't take away from the fact that you went. Dais going I can't go on that
show ever again. Yeah, acknowledging, acknowledging your thoughts. Okay, cool, let's let's get ready to get out of here. We're gonna talk to again, Adrian coming on, we're talking about I haven't heard any news reports about about what happened, you know, post game. I was looking for last night, if anybody died, I said on Brian Peterson's What's he over under in Casual Pizza? Yeah, especially in Vegas. Yeah, but you see they're gonna they're gonna do the parade on a Saturday night in Vegas?
Is it down the strip on the strip? Oh man, it's already crazy without the parade, I know, I know, all right, So yeah, no, I I because I guess I did the shooting that you mentioned in Denver. That was a separate thing that was read. It was a drug deal that was going on, yeah, downtown near near where it happened, and the shooting broke, and the shooting happened, and uh and uh ten people got shot. It wasn't related to It wasn't related to the It
was a fat drug deal. It was like not here downtown when when there was at one time, it wasn't one of those there. It wasn't where they were turning cards over. But they did see something a video something where somebody fell from something. And the thing I saw said that the person died. But I haven't heard that that from something and uh and and and died, so I don't know and anyways, but okay, so let's uh, let's go and take our break right here, the little little going up music
there waiting. I knew you were going to pick do a leap on the first one, dude, I knew it all right, Let's get out.
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we have Adrian Denny of the Two Sun Roadrunners. Adrian, how are you hey? What's up? How's it going? We're doing well? How is the summer treating you? It's not even summer. How's the late spring treating? Yeah, late spring. I tried to. I had to get Steve straight on his seasons. We're still a few days away from summer. Yeah, isn't that wild? Uh, it's it's kind of been springing to son, it's only been a hundred like twice. No, I guess. I
guess it's going great, isn't it. Don't drink? So don't just so we First of all, I saw that you were. You were up bright and early, just like I was this morning too with Justin and Ali talking about the Stanley Cup and the Roadrunners having a having an alum in the uh, you know, carrying the Stanley Cup last night. What was that like
for you guys as a franchise. Yeah, it was really special, especially because it was it was one of our our first guys that that was here to help introduce a lot of people to professional hockey with the Roadrunners, Aiden Hill. He was our first goalies, one of five players that played for us our first five seasons we had. We had five of those guys, and and so I think if if you mentioned Aiden Hill, uh to folks and two sons more more than not would identify him as a Roadrunner just because
he was with us for five years. He was the first goalie that a lot of people saw it the TCC plans for us our all time leader in every goaltender category still, so it was it was special. And you know what was has been really awesome, guys, over the last twenty four hours, the amount of people and it really I thought it was really special. Like we try and be out in the community and out with our fans and
our players, interacting and getting to know everybody. And the amount of people who have tweeted or posted on Facebook or Instagram photos that they got with Aiden Hill when he was a Roadrunner after a game at a season ticket member event. You know, somewhere out in the community. It's it's been. It's been amazing, And I just thought that was that was really cool that so many people had a photo with Aiden and an Aiden's story, a favorite Aiden
memory. As we're sharing him with the rest of the hockey world right now. That's funny because I was just going to ask you, I'm sure that the Roadrunners can figure out a way to market to where dreams began or something like that, because if he was part of you guys, you can. All these guys want to get there, right, they want to be here. Yeah, And it's it's the second year in a row the starting goalie
for the Stanley Cup final teams is play for US something it. Last year it was Darcy Kemper who came to Tucson for one game on a conditioning assignment.
But it was a big Saturday night in February at twenty twenty, so that you know, you see stuff like that and it's special a player coming down for for one game only, and you know the guys that were able to see and their first experience playing professional hockey is in Tucson, Arizona, and your first your first experience with something, right, it's always kind of kind of what you remember, right, you remember your first car, your
your first house that you buy, the first place you worked, Like like for these guys, especially in a spot like this where you want to come and live because it's it's so nice that it's so great to be eighty degrees outside and play in pro hockey. It's special that these guys too when they
love it. Sure, the amount of guys over the years that have told me, you know, it might be coming to an end, with the Coyotes, with the Roadrunners here, but me and my wife we've talked about coming back here to retire, coming back here to live, and you see a lot of it, and you've seen a lot of it up in the valley with this guy's right, original Phoenix Roadrunners, original Arizona Coyotes, to come here and maybe they leave, go finish their career, but they come
back and stay. And I we're definitely going to see that. And we've heard it from a lot of guys that have played for it. It's kind of like you're breaking some minor news there, I guess, But let me ask you a part of that. The question was going to be, what do you think the core fans in two Snunnar give me if you can give
me a number. Jay was obviously with the Sugar Skulls, and I was gonna ask you, is there like a in the thousands in the two thousands where you have that core group who just loves one hockey and then loves the Roadrunners. I say, you know, we've we've got fifteen hundred season ticket members, right, so we build on that and and it's it's really a market where you can you can look at and say, well, you've got the college crowd, You've got the tourists that that are here for for for
a bit, the Snowbirds that the family community. Like you can you can pull from any side and and build on that base and turn anything into a special night. Just we have so many people in town and so many different backgrounds that we can bring to a hockey game for the first time, or they're from markets where they bend up going to hockey games for years that they
come here and can come be part of us. So when when you have something like this, a guy like this who's you know, as you said, as you you know the cliches, they made it to the top of the mountain, you know what what can that do for say a minor league franchise like you know, like the road Runners, as Steve said, you know you can tell people, Look, you know you can you can start here and you can get there. Is is there anything that you can do
with that or how do you do that? Especially with the Coyotes right now, it's you know, they're they're going through the rebuild, right but the guys they're drafting, they're gonna start here. Ninety percent of the players to play in the NHL play in the HL. So ninety percent of the Coyotes core to come is going to come through Tucson. They have the sixth overall pick. They've got the twelfth overall pick. Last year they had the third
overall pick. Yere before that traded up got the ninth overall pick. We've seen a lot of guys come through here. It's it's over fifty that have played for both the Coyotes and Roadrunners. And now at fifth stage with the Coyotes, you know, really young and developing players that they've drafted, right, We're just gonna see see more and more of that, and and I
think you're going to see some really good teams as as a result. And some guys like Aiden Hill that we see we know, we know the name that goes up and all of a sudden, everybody knows who he is. Not that I want you to get into the weeds, but you did mention this, really, but the connection with the Coyotes and you guys, um, Yeah, that's it must be tough given given the relationship between the two and all the politics involved. What's going on up in Phoenix, right,
Yeah, you know the vote in in May and Tempe. It obviously it didn't go how we expected. We thought, okay, this is this is great, this is going to pass. We're gonna move on. And it didn't pass. Right, So so disappointed that Matt, but not defeated and not without not without options. And Gary Bettman, the commissioner of the NHL said at the Stanley Cup final, Coyotes have said it repeatedly since then. Right, the home is the valley, so the home is Phoenix, the
home is Arizona. So okay, option number one it didn't didn't pass. We were surprised, right, Right, Politics is politics. But now we've we've got other options, and I think it's it's it's it's exciting that that Sometimes I've always felt like sometimes you have your heart on something, you think think something the best, and doesn't doesn't happen. But maybe your next option is the best option. Right, So I think everybody's just just moving forward
and and excited for for for what's to come. But but the commitment from from the NHL and from the Coyotes and the Marella family, who's who's just been absolutely amazing for for the Roadrunners and the Coyotes, is we want to. We want to be in Arizona. We want want the best fit and the best best spot for for the Coyotes in Arizona. So the all the hockey is over now, just like all the all the NBA. So what what's next hockey wise for you guys, you know as the Roadrunners? Uh
what you know, what's on your agenda? As as the season ends, everybody kind of catch your breath and then and then what how do you how do you start cranking up next season? What kinds of things are you starting to do already? Yeah, we had a fun event in May at Hooters with the Junior Roadrunners and it was it was really special because they were having
a fundraising event. We donated some stuff to it, invited our fans and we had a packed house watching Aidon Hill and Vegas against against Dallas in the last the last series there. But anything we can do to get out and help out and be part of something, especially when hockey's involved. We's got a draft party that we're gonna be officially announcing next week, but it's going
to be on Wednesday, June twenty eighth to TCC. It's gonna be a free event again we're gonna have a donation a community component involved with the brand new the Tucson Family Food Project, So we've got that. In July, we're working on something. Hopefully the Zoo doesn't doesn't get mad at me for saying this, but we're working on a big Saturday night at the Zoo with
an event there in August. We're gonna bring back our Community Day. We rolled it out as drive for events during during the COVID shutdown, and it was one of those things like, well, man, we need to do this every year. And then Fan Fast coming up at September. So working on something big every month, just to get out there and get get more
folks involved and uh and just uh just keep growing. It's funny. You guys have been part of this in a big way, but it never stops, right You one season ends the next day or maybe a couple of days later, you take a breather, and then you you get back right at it. Yeah. My boss, Bob Hoffman, the president of the road
Runners, has never used the word off season. So yeah, it's uh, it's it's we're just always when we when we're playing, we're playing, we're busy, right and during the off season, it's what next, what can what's next? What can we do in the community right? And what can you do better? Right? Because you're always looking for stuff to do, either different or better. Do you know what our our head coach Steve Poplan, our GM Ferguson, we talk about it on the hockey side every
day. We want to get one percent better every day, right for the players, the coaches, for the staff. We've taken that to our business operations as well. Um, we want to get one percent better every day on everything we do. And you keep that, keep that mindset. You're you're moving forward, but you're not You're not saying that's what we've always done, and you're not saying, well, we'd like to double our attendants,
right. Yeah, it's it's just just incrementally better every day and over the course of time, you're going to see your where you want to be. So you guys got to the playoffs. I mean, so is there sort of a good feeling, a good buzz around around the organization right now? You know looking forward to next season? Is getting to the playoffs alone get
you that? Um? You know, because if you have a really bad year, you know that can stick quite a bit as well, So what's kind of the feeling and the buzz around the around the organization right now. We were so excited to get to the playoffs. Last year we didn't make the playoffs. This year we did, and we took a lot of guys to the playoffs for the first time, and we had some great leaders. Mike Carconi led the league in scoring, our captain Adam cracknall guys like that,
Ivan Pros the top our goal. He was playing playoff hockey for for the first time then, and we've been playing kind of a game on our Insider podcast that we've got on the iHeart radio up in Fox Sports fourteen sixty dot com. We've been playing a game or a segment called we played Coachella Valley better than You. That's the team that knocked us out of the playoffs for the siding game of the series. Right We went into that Sunday afternoon
hoping to win and move on. We didn't. They did there in the finals. Right now, they're up two games to one, and we feel like we've played Coachella Valley better than any other team so far. So we've got that we played Coachella Valley better than you and getting back to the playoffs was a big deal, even if it was only for one round. Getting those those those kids that that experience, including Josh Stone and the home home hometown hero out of the Valley, and that of course is Shane and play
to the ASU and to get him those those extra games. It's big deal and and excited to just to get there and something really big to shoot for next year. We want to make that run. We want to still be playing right now. So you're saying that the game is still being played even though everything has been so your league is stilled in the playoffs, is what
you just said. Yeah, don't you love that the h L every year goes about a week longer than the NHL, just based on how the schedule layout is with with coinciding with the NHL and and and kind of kind of stretching the series out a little more so that you're getting more more kind of weekend games. So it's two one Coachella Valley right now against her she FESTI
seven. They've got probably another probably another week left. So selfish reasons, I know we don't have much time enough with I need to get a shirt for a kid. Where do I go? How do I get one road run a shirt? Yeah? Yeah, shop dot tusun roadrunners dot com. And if if you tell me a size Steve, I'll start digging myself. But shopp dot tusun roadrunners dot com is our online store. Okay, I'll
let you know, I'll send it. Okay, I'm gonna bring you back and hopefully you've rethought this a little bit conversation you had with Justin and Ali this morning. I got ask the same question, You've got the Stanley cup? What are you drinking out of it? I said diet coke earlier? And then you got and then you and Justin agreed on cereal, and Ali was relentless with you. He lost his mind. Me and yeah, Me and Justin were talking about our favorite kinds of stereo and all He's like,
are you guys? Nuts? Are you? How big a nerds? Are you? Guys? How about how about a big bowl of pasta, spaghetti and meatballs and throw on some Alfredo sauce And does that work? Is that that's better for food? And then for for for drinking out of it? I don't know, guys, I'm a diet coke guy. I'm working out in the morning. I'm freaking out over calories I've out and them I got sick with the diaco. Maybe maybe, if it's not too late in the
day, a shot of crystal lighted. That's too funny. I went Maneu though, Steve, I went Maneu though, or or you know about four bottles of Pacifical. You've better cleaning that bull before there was a baby in at the night of the k you better change that bull. That baby had been changed. Hey, Adrian, thanks a whole bunch man, appreciate your time. Uh, congratulations on you know, having something that you get,
you guys can feel really good about. So both your season and then having a guy like this, you know, be have be a big player in the in the Stanley Cup. So good, good job on that. Hey, appreciate it, guys, always the pleasure coming on. You guys are clearly much more fun than us there with what you drink out of the Stanley Cup. Sou We'll learn some lessons and see if we can do better next time. All right, thanks to munch A you see later. They're like
Captain Crunch and tough. Come on, man, you gotta you know you gotta go. I don't think Justin's only like nineteen years old, right, so he can't you can't say too much. Yeah you should. You should have hurt all that. He was pretty funny. I'm embarrassed to know you guys. All right, let's go and take you know, I don't even
remember early in the morning. Well you got you know, you got do something like Marguerite is right, yeah, with a little yeah, you know, I'm thinking maybe some fireball, right, yeah, a little fireball, maybe fireball in hot chocolate. Have you ever tried that? That would be really but Jason's yeah, yeah, I know he doesn't know what. All right, all right, let's take our break. We're gonna come back and we'll break some of that down to talk some more about other stuff going on
around us. Whip you right back. If you're an Arizona Man's basketball fan, you know it's been successful for newly forty years. Now. Take a look back at the Ludolson era in my new book, Lessons from Lute. It was a labor of love through the eyes of twenty five former players, coaches, and friends to give insight to the coach and the men who led them competed against them and inspired them twenty five chapters for his twenty five years
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for a part time job or a second income. Come be a part of a winning team The A Team apply online today at a Team security dot net. Steve Bravera and Jagan Slid they have their eye on the ball on two Sons Sports stage yet Fox Sports fourteen fifty streaming live. I mean I heard radio app Hey, welcome back to hing the ball here, I'll Fox Sports fortune Cookie. I'm Steve, He's Jake and we got our guy Jason and with us, they've got fifteen minutes. Do you want to call us?
Please? Do five two old four one six seventy four forty who I'd like to hear from you good to talk to Adrian. Yeah, you know, um guy would probably need to talk to more because you know, the Roadrunners, like the Sugar Skulls, this this town needs to support them. They get you know, they do get a lot of support. You they get some some good crowds. Um. I was when he said that, I was thinking, man, what if they lose them? Well, yeah,
I mean you'll fall to the role. Yeah, if the Coyotes go somewhere else, you know, who knows what happens there, you'll fall to the Rome. Did they take the team with them? And some they don't always, but you'd hate to see that happen because you know, uh, you know, during my time with the Sugar Skulls, you know, would go to the world, would go to some Roadrunners games to see how the stuff they're doing, how their crowds are doing. Um, you know, just
see how they run their show. And uh, a lot of what we you know, we we got ideas. Let me just put it that way. And so, uh, you know those two both of those franchises, you know, they're pro sports, they're here and uh, you know they're fun and and you know people should support them so and we should do the same. So okay, so let me ask you, Jackson. You didn't answer my question about why you love sports or do you? Yeah, of
course I do. I think for me it's really escape, an escape from reality because you know, in life, there's so many things going on all the time. Sports helps you kind of get away from all of the worries and stresses are of your day to day life. And it's just for me, it's always been a way to relieve stress, kind of just fine. Sometimes doesn't give you more stress. Um, No, not really. I mean there's no true I mean, Dodgers, it's not. But it's it's
this is gonna sound stupid. It's fun stress. Yeah, I say, it's fun stress like it's good. It's not stress that makes me lose sleep at night, you know. Yeah, I get Yeah, do I get worked up for the games and stuff like that, Yes, But I do actually realize that in the end, losing the game is not the end of the world. And and and that's kind of what's fun about it because you
can take it for what you think or what it's worth to you. Yeah, definitely, so you know, and and again it's you know Jason talking about how it's it's it's it's a way to get it away from some one of my favorite things to do, uh on a long drive, you know, driving to La or whatever. Used to put a game on and m makes time go by so fact because you feel like you get to the end of a football game and you've driven three hours. You know. I used
to this. I spent this summer working at the newspaper in Bullhead City. Okay, like at the time, there's no punishment for that. There's like a five it's like a five hour drive and I and I would come home on some weekends and I would time my drive back up there for when the Dodger game was going to come on the radio. So if they were playing at home on a Sunday, I'd leave home at one o'clock so I could put the game on. And by the time the game was over, I
was nearly the Kingman. And and it was that it's it's kind of just as you say, getting away from the reality. I hated the drive, but I just flowed zeroed in on the baseball game and it and and it made it Uh, it made it easier. Yeah, do you love sorts? No I do, No, No, I do. I just the question is what what's the appeal for it? Uh? You know, I think I asked that of the Jay yesterday when I saw George Cluney. Why
do you think people love love athletes? I think it's because, you know, they're like people like us, but they can do these, you know, incredible things. And that's what it was. Person can do exactly what he said, exactly what he said. They could be George clin and they get to dream that, they get to dam dude, the things we dream about. You know, many of them screw it up. But but that's for another day. Yeah, and my whole thing is is something that you
mentioned yesterday, Jay, was is the competition. I love competition more than anybody, but especially when you win and you lose, it sucks, right, but you love the competition. Right, Winning is fun. Losing is hard, but when winning, it is fun. And we talked about the fact that losing is harder than winning is easy. Well, you enjoy the enjoy, enjoy, you enjoy. You hate the losses more than you love to win, right, and that but that's you know what that's that's the
competitive nature of some people. And if you play baseball, football, softball, you know, whatever, and you've competed at a level where you're on a team or something like that, you know, it's it's, uh, you're you're gonna think that way. You know when I when I play golf, I think of my bad holes at the end of the round more than I think if I hadn't done this, if I hadn't done that, if I hadn't done this when I when also I did some good things that got
me to where where I got to. So uh, it's it's it's just the way that it's just our nature as competitors. But but think of it. But in the world like me, um uh and I don't know, but you Jason, But it's the shots that I hit, I played really but the shots that you hit, you're thinking, I want to I can do that again. I'm gonna come back and try that again. Yeah, And that happens very very Oh yeah, well, you know I swore that.
You know, we went down to play this golf course in Rocky Point and based on how we played last time, and it was holleying wins and I played terribly. I thought, Okay, I'm gonna play well today, and I shot the same scored I did the year before, and the conditions were batter, the course was still nice, and I just played terribly. I mean I hit some I I hit some really bad balls that day and I couldn't figure it out. And I know I didn't. I didn't play
that bad the time I played before that. So I don't who knows what they have, but you know, I guess I, like Jason said, I just love sports because it gets me away from all the other crap. And there's a lot and there's more crap now than Oh yeah, of course. And that's that's why I don't really follow Twitter. It's just everybody. It's it's like thinking the stuff that you have in your head that nobody's nose r sees, they put it on Twitter. Yeah no, I don't need
to know what you're thinking. I don't know. I do it kind of super lee on Facebook. But what I'm eating, which means I'm stupid. But yeah, But the alluder there, Steve, I think is is we we have fun. And again, my daughter is one of those people who says Facebook is for old people, which pretty much, you know. But you know, I feel like I'm more connected to people that I otherwise wouldn't have any connections, right of course, right, um and uh? And
I like seeing that, do I do? I go to everybody's post and respond or read every article that somebody posted. No, but if I see something, but like I just found out from a call, oh, let's take the call. II are on the air and I on the ball. Hey jay, this is done. I just wanted to put in my two
stands on the love of sport and all that. At first, for me, it was playing the games, right, and then you realize, you know, you're you're playing the games, and then you start watching the pros do it and you're like, well, you know why I'm doing what they're doing, you know, And that kind of made it more fun. But one thing I miss about the old days in sports was remember when your team won in football, when your team won on the weekend on Sunday, you
had all week to gloat and feel good about it. But now nowadays we have so much information. As soon as the game is over, I'm worried about the next game. Yeah. They don't let you. They don't let you enjoy it do they I'm sorry, they don't let you enjoy it, right, they say, well, you're gonna suck next year and years. There's there's just so much information. I mean, even if if you win
the championship. You know, if your team wins a championship and you're going, yeah, but this guy's a free agent, this guy's dad, this other guy's you know, he's gonna retire. What are we gonna look like next year? Yeah, exactly. No. You could go on social media right now and find stories about why the Denver Nuggets will win the NBA against again next year and why they won't. You could find exactly well, I
mean, here's your perfect it's all fun, it's all fun. But now to me, it just seems like there's this this calm simmer of stress all the time. Yes, well, let me tell you. Here's the thing with UVA basketball. Not sooner than the tournament end, they had the nuts. So the early early projection for twenty five top twenty five, and everybody eats that up when we know that it's seven months away from the season and nothing matters until March, and yeah, and we have no idea from the
middle of April. Who who's who's gonna be what on the middle of November even very much. So I know, I know it's fun to talk about it, and we're doing that right now. There's nothing that's in stone and new noise. But you know, don you mentioned the thing too that you know, we play a sport, right we played, whether it's baseball, golf, bowling, whatever, that other people play and you kind of compare
yourselves to them. That's why one of the things I love doing is I love watching a golf tournament, a PGA tournament that's at a course that I've played at, right, and I'll watch even though I might not even care about the golf tournament when whenever they play a tournament a pebble beach, because I got to play that years ago, I'll watch that. Or now I've
played Tory Pines, I'll watch that. And or I loved watching the Tucson Open on on on television because we got to play there and you see yourself, you know, in the same place that the pros are standing. Because we don't get to go hit batting practice at Dodger Stadium. We don't get to you know, shoot baskets at wherever the you know at Staples Center where the Lakers play, but you know, you know, we we we can go play a golf course that and that's one of the reasons I love golf
so much is because I get to do that. Yeah, that and that's that's really a feel good thing. And I think it keeps it keeps you young to just to be able to keep on doing those things, like even walking around El Rio. You know you know Lee Trevino won that three times, right right, yeah rtorical. Yeah, that's why. That's why Tusson National remains one of my favorite golf courses in town because as a little kid, you know, I'd go watch the Tussan Open over there, you know,
Dean Martin and Joe Gargiola and all those guys. It was very cool thing used to hang out with Dean Martin when you were a little kid. To have here Jay, but he was already old. So let's remember that they have a Toddy or two and be a Bob Open all. Yeah. But Dino, Dino, Dino, Yeah, he was man. He was a star here. We loved him. My mom loved him to death. She would she would have kicked my dad to the curb in a heartbeat for him. All right, Don, thanks so much, man. I appreciate
the call as always. Take care, guys. You got to call it your mom. I think I can say that it's a true story. It's a true story, and that's all you can ask all my siblings. We would have been father. Let's if my mom had a champ with dark. We have about three minutes. Let's two much information for me, if you want to call it. I just what your love for sports. As we middle through the early spring or late spring looking for topics, we have a
breaking news, right, breaking news. There's a lot of that going on. And then we have from an athletic director girls basketball coach at Push Reggie's retiring after a long tenure there, so we'll yeah, it was listen some of that. Let's ask him twenty twenty years, right, Yeah, that's let's see if that's a long tenure, because sometimes it's it doesn't feel like a long tenure. Maybe it does. Twenty years. Well, guys, come on, we've been I've been here thirty five years. You've been here
all your life, thirty five years. It's long, but it's not really long. Does it feel like thirty five No? No, and maybe because I don't feel old, but I am old. I don't know. Yeah, when I when I tell people that I left the newspaper in eineteen ninety one, oh damn, seriously, probably I don't know. Probably twenty years after after I had left The Star, I was at I was an event downtown and a guy came up to me and said, you know, he recognized, said, oh, I'm happy to meet you. I still read
your stuff. And I'm like, no, you don't. You stopped reading myself a long time. How are you doing. I didn't want to break his hard dump. Dude, you do you do not? But you know we said, yeah, I read your stuff all the time, and I'm like, yeah, well you obviously do not. I'd been out of the paper for a really, really really long yea, look a lot like might have been man, might have been just just none. Never mind that. Yeah, you know where I was going. You were doing, Hey,
Rivero, what's up? But you know, get getting back to the thing that I was saying about, you know, playing a golf course at the pros play. You know, when when I was playing in that city league baseball team, our championship was always at high Corbett, right, because we played at the NX fields, right, that's like playing in the park. But the championship game for the tournament was always at High Corbett and that was fun as hell. Yeah, you know, because you're in the stadium.
Yeah, there's there's only like twenty people there, you know, wives and kids. But it was awesome to play at High Corbett Field. You know, get on the pitchers mount go out there and you know, take some groundballs and some flyballs and and all that kind of stuff. We looked for so forward to playing on a field like that. Uh. And then for a while to Soun Electric Park would rent the field out to high school teams
to go play there, and it was cheap. It was like a hundred bucks, you know, and you'd get lights and and the sound system and stuff. So we would go play a double hair there for at Saint Gregory, you know, every year, just to play there, just to give the kids that experience of meaning that dugout right everybody come close to Yeah,
no, no, that's just as we did. We did get it during during uh we were taking in field outfield and one of our players got hit in the mouth with a fly ball and so we went next door to Keno, got his stick lip stitched up and came back to play. So we had that. But I know it's you know, but it was fun to play on that grass, on that infield, being that dugout. The kids
just love that stuff. And that's the love of sports. That's the kind of the love of sports in essences that just to do things that maybe you don't otherwise get to. Okay, let's not take the break. You can put some some music on me and get us out. We'll get get out here. We're gonna come back here. See what song number two is. Jason's gonna have some breaking news and we'll be we'll be right backt