This is I on the Ball with Steve Rivera on Fox Sports fourteen fifty powered by Nova Insurance Services Insure your most prized possessions.
Thank good afternoon, everybody.
Welcome to I on the Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifteen. I'm Steve Roberta with me today is.
My other kind of co hosts like Biager from Southern Areason a sports tourism in film authority. I love that when you start saying my name, the music just tends to get a little louder.
Well, I just kind of made the mistick.
I thought we should just let everybody know that you're doing two different things. I mean, Steve's in full multitasking mode right now. Don't confuse me. I have a D d ADHD or whatever these you want. Hey, are you over the hangover from WBC? Uh No, but not. I mean listen, it was It's great. I'm I'm, I'm I'm. I think I'm starting to get like six hours of sleep maybe at best, which a lot of people are like,
are you kidding me? I would kill for that, but like working on two to three hours at this point, so trying to get there.
Does your your wife love you?
Did she? Leave me.
She didn't leave me. She still loves I was gonna go with that. Does she love you?
She still loves So you see her more than you did before when you're working twenty four hours? Oay, well did you work that much? Did I mean she saw me at the field?
Yeah? Which I mean?
I meant you girl, she's yeah, you out hit the coverage? Yeah, I hope so.
Yeah, absolutely, if you got to look at this, uh, this mug every day? You know, so you're a good dude. No, thanks that that that doesn't help that you just called me ugly. Essentially, No, I didn't. I didn't disagree with you. I just didn't disagree with you. Look at you. I watch face for radio. Hey, we're on the radio for a reason, right.
A bit a voice for radio and a face for newspapers.
I don't have either, so thanks for having me on. Well what's the newspaper for the internet?
Hey?
You know so, so we'll talk about the WBC at some other point or you always here with me, so it doesn't really matter. Did you hear any scores today? I've been busy with EL tour, press conferences and all that good stuff. I saw that I think that i Alowa State took care of took care of their opponent, and it was Cincinnati, and then this afternoon's game.
What is this afternoon's game they have?
And then Arizona's future opponent is playing tonight I think.
Yeah, which was going to be either ucf ORNs.
Right, right, So you see Texas is beating Vandy. I'm not gonna have any breaking news. Let the kids do that. Texas being vandyed as they should. Baylor plays tonight against Kansas State or later today, so we'll see. We'll see because if the winner of the Kansas game plays Arizona tomorrow.
At the late game, right, that's correct. You just call up scores on ESPN.
Oh, Iowa State beat Cincinnati by twenty that I was just damn good.
Ilay State's really good.
But the fall, you know, the cliffs for Cincinnati has been dramatic.
Yeah, yeah, that's why.
You know what people when there's gonna play them in West West Virginia. Remember they were ranked. Yeah, it's almost good. They beat rankings. Don't believe the rankings. It's like that, it was almost not in the rankings. They're not a top twenty five team right now in the rankings, but they are in the net pretty good.
Yeah.
So I talk about this on Monday, like you're going into the attorney projected to be a four seed. Like, to me, that matters more than being a top twenty five without question.
Could you tell it to the crowd here, could you speak to people in the back of the room as they say, because that's true, you know you could. You're one of the top twenty teams in the country. I have no doubt about that. I do kind of am skeptical bout the team from time to time, but they are one of the best twenty teams in the country.
Yeah.
I mean what they did Ken Palm ratings on offense and defense and everything, there were one of the like nine top top yeah, top nine or something. I don't know if the last couple of games, but yeah, yeah. And I mean you're seeing Colorado beat West Virginia.
Oh they did they want two to row now sixty seven to sixty. That's wow.
That's pretty surprising. Wow, that is surprising. They're finding some legs here.
Yeah.
So you've got Kansas Day and Baylor, like you said, later today, and then you've got u c F in Kansas. So I mean most likely, I mean, I don't want to project too much, but most likely we're going to see Kansas again, right and then we I sorry, Arizona, you could be a WEE. I'm a Homer.
You are we.
That's fine. We you are WE.
You by tickets, you chair the team, you're one of the guys that I think you know after yesterday's discussion of Tommy talking about the crowd and the reason did you see that kind of explaining is he's we said he was right Monday.
We talked about Monday.
Yeah.
Yeah, so he kind of explained it to the press converse to the people of the press commence yesterday and he says, I want the guys to be better. I was impressed with Kansas. Did I want our guys to be that way?
Uh?
The end? Right that?
Yeah, they said, what did I say that was wrong? Because he didn't say anything that was wrong. It could it could be better. Why can't I mean, why can't we take constructive criticisms? Well, what did we talk about?
We are who we are.
We are just going to know who we are.
You don't know who you are?
Yeah, It's it's like if I tell you, Steve, you could have done this better. You tell me on your show, like, hey, you should have said this. I'll be like, okay, I should have said that, Like I'm going to make a change if the head coach of the University of Arizona men's basketball team says, hey, I need the crowd to be better. We need to be better whatever that means from an energy standpoint, We need to be better.
Though.
That's a great, great way to put it. But you're you're exact way. Don't don't be so loud on the radio, sir, Sorry, and don't tell jokes. It's only what funny guy in the room. Okay, I apologize. I did tell you the haircut.
Tell ye. So how's that going.
It's great, No, it's awful. Well, kenn Of, we tell people we get a bad haircut over the week.
Haircut, but you know, Monday got a terrible, like the worst haircut I've ever got in my life. I showed it on the radio to you and Wan, and you guys both laughed phythirically, and I think that's probably needed. So I had breakfast this morning with my buddy Dallas Howell, who's Jack How's son, and Andy Lopez, his son in law. And so I was telling the story and I had gone to his barber the last time, right, and as Barbara did a great job. You don't have a regular one, okay.
So I'm getting to that, oh okay. So he's like, hey, why didn't you go back to my barber? And I said that I just I knew I had like thirty minutes, right, So I just took the thirty minutes, got the worst haircut I've ever got. And I told you she'd never come my hair. No, she'd cut my hair three times. I was wrong on that. Yeah. So I was telling him about the story where I used to go to two Sons, which is a barbershop in town. Great barbershop, yeap.
So I went to the one on the east side, right, And so one time I was wearing a shirt from Pop Cycle, which is a store on Fourth Avenue. Great store. So I'm getting my haircut, right, and it's not my barber for the day, it's another guy that was like, hey, I can take you now or you can wait forty five minutes. I was like, just take me now. Didn't speak like, didn't speak greade English, and that's on me, Like I suld we should have gone full Spanish.
I could have done whatever I could possibly with that.
But so he's talking to me while he's fading me up, and I don't hear what he's saying. I only hear something about my shirt and pop Cycle. Well, we had been discussing my businesses, so he can he's he thought I said I own pop Cycle. So he starts telling everybody in the store, at everybody in the barbershop that I owned pop Cycle, and I'm I don't correct them, right, and I just go at the end of I go, never go back there again. So I've never been back
because I think they they got own pop Cycle. So there's another hair story for you. Well you got another job assignment.
Yeah, there you go. That's funny. That's funny. So are you not taking off your hat and all this time?
Oh, for a month. It's this hat staying on. And you can't overcorrect on the other side. You know, I can't go I can't go the other way with my hair. I don't look even worse.
Yes, forgive me, father, I've sinned. I mean the booth with the hat.
On, Yeah, I mean that's exactly what it is. You get word baby everywhere you don't have a wedding to go to.
You don't have it.
I don't even care at this point if I go to like you said, if I go to a funeral, there's gonna be a hat on. I'm not taking off in respect to the corpse. It's funny.
I had one of those many years ago, many years ago, and it was like, oh god. It was I got to go to a game and I kind of wore it that way and I said, oh god, and people noticed. They didn't say anything, yeah, but they know. It was like somebody sneezed, you know, when you and then you kind of well, it's gonna be okay, don't worry about it. Well it wasn't okay, and I worried about it. I two mistakes.
This is the worst haircut I've ever got, And for some reason, when I was in junior college, I thought it'd be a great idea to color my hair red. I look like just the worst human being alive. I look like the scariest clown you can go wrong.
It's just terrible. That's funny. That's funny.
Okay, enough about you, Sorry, I put this. Enough about you. You sounded like Jay all of a Sudden take it over the dam show. Sorry, welcome everybody again. We've got to keep you up to date with scores and stuff. We'll take your calls as well. We have a pretty good lineup today. We have Lindsey Schnell. We were supposed to have her on last week or two, it would be two weeks ago.
She was in town.
She's with the athletic spent some time with Tommy at practice and an interview in Tommy for the preview of the Big twelve tournament. So she's gonna be on with us at four four fifteen, four seventeen, and then we're gonna have a friend of mine. He's a former coach at New Mexico State.
He's an author.
He's written a few books on forty Minutes of Hell with Nolan Richardson back in the day.
He has a new one out here that.
He's going to be at the book festival here over the weekend, and we'll talk about that with him. I forget the name of it real quick. Oh, but it's an interesting premise. It talks about NIL back in the sixties and seventies, you know, and just kind of a fictional look at the NIL from back in the day, kind of small school.
How they fixed it. I don't know much about the book. I didn't read it.
I didn't get a copy. But we'll talk about that and maybe talk about the state of the world. Because he used to be a college college basketball coach. He has a great compelling story because he was with or very good friends with the former New Mexico State coach. Went to Illinois and then came back. And I know you don't know that name and I and I should know this because I went to New Mexico State. But we'll let him fell us in with all the hoopla, you know, the friends of lout back in the day.
He passed away not too long ago as well. So it's this is the best? Is this in your world? And I know your world is baseball, but I'm sure you have more worlds. What's March mean to you? Is it a fun time basketball wise? Is it better than Super Bowl? Is it better than the World Series? What's March madness?
Yeah?
I think it's my second favorite time of year, next to October. Yeah, I mean, you're right. I mean I'm a baseball guy at heart, but I mean from a fandom standpoint, March madness is. I mean, because anything can happen, and anything does happen. It's just super exciting to show.
So a few years ago when Arizona did not make the tournament, I think one whatever whatever tournament was, I went to Vegas for the first time to watch the first round on tournament.
It was you think, oh, it's gonna be great.
You just sit there and watch games all over there the sportsbook, but it was it was like you had ad you have all these screens and all these things. You have to keep up with what's going on. I don't know if I want to do this. It's just so much information. So just you talking about that gives me anxiety. It was just crazy, crazy screens and scores and ticker and you know I had to kind of you know, you have those flashes kind of like holy crap.
I said, yeah, I'm not sure I'll do do this again.
But I did it. I mean, what's your what's your takeaway? Like you say, you don't think you would ever do that again. I did have to be with the guys, you know. I went with a couple buddies, but it was it was too much. I'd rather be out playing, you know, things poker or something. But it was like, holy crap, all these games and times and scores and things like that. And I didn't even bet it, didn't bet them, didn't care too. I just wanted to experience it. And it's a lot.
To experience because you know, if you're in Caesars or wherever you're at yet forty big screens and all this information.
Yeah, it's wild. It was fun.
It was cool. Which sportsbook did you go? Did you go to Caesars?
I went to, Yeah, Caesar's and then uh, there's a couple of them MGM. Yeah, but you know, it's it's it is what it is, but it's it's everyone's crazy over there because it's the best time of the year for that first weekend of college basketball.
So many games.
You have a favorite going in to the NCAA Tournament, I mean, you like somebody someone some team. I like Houston. I just think I think where they're at, how gritty they are. They find ways to win. I mean that's the biggest thing. You look at them and how many times have they been behind and they find a way to win.
They clamp down.
Yeah, it reminds me a lot kind of like the Chiefs this year with Kansas City where they didn't blow you away from game to game, right, but they found a way to win what until until well until the Super Bowl.
Well, if you are you a Chiefs fan, no, no, So this was the issue with me and the Chiefs.
They did exactly what you said they did.
But at some point you're thinking, at some point they're going to catch that team that's going to not allow them to stay close. I'm not able to pull it off.
I just think you you have to give so much credit to the Philadelphia the Eagles defense that was that was incredible. Now, I you know, I grew up kind of a Niners fan and I kind of morphed into a Packers fan with my dad. But I play so much fantasy football it's ridiculous. So now I'm just like, I don't care about the team. Who's on the team.
Let me ask you, now that I know you're a big geek, what prompts you to do that with the with the fantasy footbollster?
I have an excitement from a week to week. Okay, yeah, I'm storting. I've I've played in and somebody's being the second year I've played in this fantasy baseball league where you give I don't know if you ever played in the budget leagues where you have two hundred and sixty dollars a start and then you pay for players. Oh no, I had to worry about that. I think it's exciting. You know, you kind of acted in the GM role. But again, yeah, it's kind of nerdy. But I don't care.
No, no, no for me.
I did it one year baseball wise, Yeah, and uh, that's a lot to do. You every day, it was every day, it was like the screen. But that wasn't my problem. My problem is I draft. I stayed loyal to my draft because I'm a I'm a loyalist this. There was a reason why I went after you. Now you've got to perform. Yeah, and I don't want to trade anything because it's too much work. One and then two you're supposed to be good. That's why I got you.
Yeah, it's never happened. That's why I sucked at it. And so you just did it for one year. I did it for one year.
I'm not good at this because I'm too loyal to my people that I drafted. Yeah, he'sho, I are What the hell you play fantasy football. No, no, yeah, yeah, Okay, Hey, let's take a break. We can get ahold of rush and talk more about college basketball and the state that it's in today.
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Streaming live on the iHeartRadio app. This is I on the Ball with Steve Rivera on Fox Sports fourteen fifty eight.
Hey, welcome back to I on the Ball here on Pot Sports fourteen fifty I'm Steve Rivera. Now I to phone. We have author and former college basketball coach Russ Bedford.
Russ haway. Can you hear me? Can you hear me?
Russ?
Yes?
Okay, great, I can hear you. Good to hear you. You'll be in Tucson pretty soon. Give us the title of your book real quick.
Well, it's big Time, big Time, and Big Time is a satire about sort of the elevated state of college sports on American campuses.
You started writing this how long ago? Because you're exactly right in the middle of it now.
Well, the funny thing is, Steve, I started writing Big Time about ten years ago. On the entire time, I thought, I've got to get this thing done before they put college sports in perspective and start paying the coaches what they pay the professors and not coming. But of course, now with nil things are completely out of control and we'll never get our universities back so, so.
What gave you the premise to do this, or not premise, but the inspiration to do this.
Well, just I've worked. You know, I was a college basketball coach, as you'll remember I was. I was an assistant.
Was he's on the road obviously, Yes, I can hear you.
Yeah, I think we're getting a weather. I'm driving through West Texas, and I think he was giving us a win advisory. H I was on the academic side of first, I was on the college basketball assistant for Don Haskins at UTAP for eight years and then Lou Henson at New Mexico State and for six years and things, and when I saw the stark difference between them, you know. But the book is sort of poking fun and how
big college sports have gotten. But it's also poking fun at the academics who have been so impotent and and and they're sort of cooperation and allowing this to happen. And so and I do think I've gotten where.
I think.
I don't know what your politics are, Steven, I don't want to talk about politics, but I've gotten where. I think that that you know that that Stephen Colbert may be a better news source than the New York Times, and and that John Oliver may be a better news source than NPR is there's something poking fun of things and making fun of things where you're able to get in a truth that serious writing is not able to do.
Sure, sure, of course.
So did it take you all ten years or did you kind of like because you've had some other books.
Yeah, I worked on and off for a decade, and so I didn't work in the entire ten years on it, but but for quite a long while. And fiction is a different animals, as you know. I've written books about non fiction books. My most recent one before this was about gun violence in the world of Chicago basketball. And that's why I was at the Tucson Festival Books last time. I was interviewed by Jim Rosboro, the long time Ludelsen assistant.
But yeah, I didn't work on the entire time, but I kept sort of mulling it over in my mind and sort of the absurdity of what's happened on our campuses, you know, in every well, for example, if your kid goes to the University of Arizona, that I imagine the coach. I don't have the numbers in front of me but I imagine the basketball coach is making two million dollars
a year. You're goes to the University of Arizona or your son, you know, they're never going to meet the basketball coach a University of Arizona, but they're going to get taught by by adjuncts and part time h instructors their first few years that are completely underpaid and don't have health insurance. And so I do think our universities have been lost for a long time.
Now.
It's different at the smaller colleges.
It's not.
That's not true at you know, it's not true at Colorado College. It's not it's not true at at you know, Point Loma in California and that kind of thing. But it's true at the big schools at Arizona State, Arizona what used to be the Pac ten. And we just have a situation now that it's completely out of control and I've just got where I thought the only thing to do anymore was to make fun of it. It's never going to go back to what it was before. But but certainly, and it's not it's not we're only
just now that academics have taken a back seat. But it's uh, but it's but it's that's what's happened. And so what I did was, I imagine the university was in trouble and they take a billion dollar buyout from Coor's Beer, the brewing company, and Cores wants the school renamed as Cores State University. So the entire book takes place in Core State. But their stipulation is that we'll give you the billion dollars you call it Cors State University.
But all the money has to go to football in basketball. And so the professors that don't quit the university or get fired, they wind up working, you know, for Course State, they have to work for the football or basketball teams. And so engineering is enlarging the stadiums, Women's Studies is doing the players laundry. The mass department just statistics. The Business department does the investments for the players and the coaches.
But these two old history professors who love the nineteen sixties, they decide we're going to do like the nineteen sixties. We're going to do campus protests. And you know, campus protests of course are big in the news again for a different reason. But they're going to do campus protests and take their university back from the Brewing Company. But of course everything goes wrong and it's far too late.
But anyway, I do think that sattire, you're able to get a sort of a truth through humor that you're not able to get at. You know, I think the greatest book ever written about the greatest anti war book ever written is Catch twenty two, and it's hilarious. And I think no one would ever read Catch twenty two and say I think I'll join the army or isn't
war a great thing? And I think in this case, I'm not trying to compare myself to Joe Heller or Catch twenty two, but that was one of the models, is by making fun of the situation, we could sort of get it a larger truth.
Yeah.
Hey, hey Russ, this is Blake. Thanks for being on the show. Really appreciate it. You brought up something so when we're talking about cors University that I think there was a they tried to do that with the Colorado School of Minds in Golden Colorado. Something similar in School of Minds kind of shut that down. But what do you see as in it might not be a solution, but what do you see changing in the next five to ten years with the current nil and the disparity between and players and professors.
Well, I think I think our universities are lost. I don't think you know in bike in nineteen thirty six, uh, the University of Chicago was in the Big Ten conference. If you can imagine University of Chicago in the Big Ten and the Heisman Trophy winner. Uh. And by nineteen thirty nine the president had decided and it was corrupting the mission of the university. But now it's the boosters that are running the universities and that they want they
want winning teams. I think what's likely to happen is that I don't know what sense it makes to pay that Tommy Lloyd, the Arizona coach. I don't I don't see what sents it makes to pem. Sorry, I hope he's not listening. I don't see what Senten makes to pay him two or three million dollars. I think you pay him two hundred and fifty thousand dollars and then give the money to the players. By the way, a couple of things I want to point out. I'm in
favor of playing paying the players. I think, you know, especially you know, money is going into poor communities. It wasn't before. But I think what will happen is it could wind up like the NV where you know in the old days and the Lakers Shaq and Kobe and you know a few of the players are making way more than the coach, and the coach might be making more than a couple of guys on the end of the bench. Because I don't understand the point of no
one's coming to watch Tommy Lloyd coach the team. They're coming to watch great players. And there's there's very good coaches, you know, they're there. You know, there's very good coaches all through Arizona that could if you gave them five million dollars, that could put together a good team. For example. I think there's a lot of excitement about how Rick
Patino has really got Saint John's going. But the article today in the New York Times was he's got five million dollars that he's paying those kids, you know, And I don't think that's any stroke of genius when you've got five million dollars to pay the kids. So I think what will happen is that the players will keep getting paid, and the coaches will go on a reduced salary.
And also I think if you look behind most college basketball benches, look on the bench at u C l A, and they've got ten coaches, ten coaches, And I don't know, why why not use that money to pay players? Why not have you know, in the early days, when you know, when when Loudolfsen first came to Arizona, he probably had he probably had three assistant coaches and Josh Passner as his as his student manager. And I think having ten coaches is completely ridiculous. But by the way, I also
want to say, Blake, I'm part of the problem. So when I'm criticizing this, I'm the color analyst on ESPN Plus for New Mexico State home games, and now New Mexico States are much more in perspective, I think our coach is making three hundred seventy thousand a year. It's much more reasonable than than paying him three point seventy million like at a lot of schools, like at Arizona State football coach.
And that kind of thing.
But I'm the television announcers. I'm I still love college basketball, and I'm like the alcoholic who's walking by the bar, saying said Blake, and Steven said, think I'll just go in and have one. I'll just go I'll just go and have one. I'm going to have one or two with Lake and Sy and so I And I think that's part of the the That's why I think it'll
all continue. Is it at seven o'clock they throw up that ball and it's Arizona against you, It's Arizona against Arizona State, or Arizona against UCLA or whoever's in their league Visa, and it's still a great game. Once once he starts, you know, it's like it's like the diamond ring on your wife's finger, Blake, is it? You know, it's really you know, there's a lot of there's a lot of blood and child labor and damaged environment behind that diamond ring, but she's still a beautiful diamond ring.
And if you I think it's the same with college basketballs. Once the game starts, starts, I'm as excited as anybody for the game, and it's still a great game.
Ross, brother Ross, So let me tell you you you you you gave Tommy Lloyd a three million dollar discount because he makes five.
I didn't know, so that's that.
But do you are aren't you glad? Or are you glad that you no longer coach?
Well, I mean I never made that kind of money I think I made. I was making seventy thousand. I think are seventy one thousand when I quit to become a writer. And it took twenty years to get my salary as a professor up to what I'd made as the associate head coach for lou Henson. In some way, in many ways, I am. I mean, I think my strength as an assistant coach was I was a good If I can pat myself on the back of anything, I discovered Tim hardaway, and I was a good I
was a good evaluator of talent. And I think that skill of evaluating talent is still going to be important, because you know, if if Northern Arizona can get this guy for forty thousand dollars and he's good enough to play for Arizona and they've done a good job of evaluating and then they'll get him. The problem now is he'll you know, he'll dump it Northern Arizona as soon
as he's good enough. And the switching around of teams is I think as much as anything as it's discouraging to me because I don't think it's one thing to pay the kids to have them switch schools every year. They're not learning anything at all. And and I think what sports is supposed to teach you. First supposed to teach you how to fail, what do we do when
things go wrong? But it's supposed to teach you how to sustain effort and sustain attention, and to be loyal to your teammates and to develop camaraderie with your teammates. There's some great things that sports does, but college basketball has ruined it. And I also want to say, Blake, it's not the kids that have made the rules. It's easy to say, aren't the kids all screwed up today and that kind of thing, But it's the grown ups
that made the rules. We've handed it. It's like putting, you know, putting chocolate in front of your seven year old daughter and saying, now, don't eat this. And I think that's what we've done to the kids, is that, Yeah, the kids. I think the kids are sort of messed up today because this is the world that we've presented them with. It's not it's not that they didn't invent this world.
He's governed his.
Tommy Lloyd makes five million a years.
That's what you got out of that. Yeah, right, no question, I didn't know. I didn't know, right, right, So give us an update real quick. You're coming in now over the weekend. Will where will you be Saturday? And will you be here Sunday?
Well, I'm here Saturday and Sunday. I don't have the schedule in front of me, but let me I'm still I can do it from memory. On Saturday, it's a two pm it's at the Integrated Learning Center whatever that means. Two pm at the Integrated Learning Center. And I'm with a couple other writers Lewis Moore wrote the book about Doug Williams and Keith O'Brien. Keith O'Brien who wrote a book that I can't remember. So that's Saturday at too, And it's a it's a panel like that's what I
did with Jim Rosborough last time. A different different writers were with me. But it's a panel about about the place of college sports and out writing about sports. Because you know, in my book in Big Time, in this satire, there's only there's two pages of actual sports in the book, and the rest of it is the wacky craziness of it. And for me it was always the stories that are
more interesting than the actual games themselves. Like I'm not that interested in I'm not that interested in I'm not that interested in the games, But I'm interested in OG's. You know that this guy's mother died of cancer and he played that very same even that's much more interesting, you know, after working for Lou Henson and Don Haskins for all that time, I don't know if I could drop a single play of Lou Henson's, but I've got
some good stories about them anyway. So that's Saturday at too, and then Sunday in the same room, it's at ten am. And and that's with Jack McCallum, the Great. I mean, you know, I hate, I hate. I think the word of legendary gets thrown around too much. But he had a long time sportsvilly. He's sports illustrated, I think for forty years. Jack McCallum and a man named uh.
Head Doll.
But I can't think of his first name, be righteous, Why I should I'm kicking myself.
Yes, In fact, we have his brother lives here and he's I guess from Jersey and he's coming in. So we had a we had an author, Yester, you talk about stuff like that. So yeah, that's interesting. So I've got to go Sunday Sunday at ten.
Right, Sunday at ten, you skip church, like or Steve whoever, I.
Can't tell he's talking about you. You're good. Yeah, but.
You guys skip church and come and come, come and see. Yes, it'll be Jack McCallum, and sure it's your haggall who I guess maybe the premier writer of women about women's that, one of the premier writers of women's basketball. So I've read. I've read one of his books, and i've read you actually read. I've finished Jack McCallum's novel called foul Lines, which is it's sort of I wish I had read it before I wrote Big Time because foul Lines is very funny. It's about a pro basketball team and the
sort of the wacky stuff in pro basketball. Anyway, the Tucson Book Festival, if you still believe in books like I do, and you're still in prison in stories, the Tucson Festival Books is a great one, great great well.
I haven't seen you since the last time you were here.
We had you on the show maybe three four years ago with roz so Russ.
We'll see you this weekend. Thanks for being part of.
Us perfect no Cats, bear down or whatever you guys do.
You nailed it. You know you got it.
Thanks, roll right go silver boats of course State thankfully.
Out there Texas that went out there this seven years crazy. Okay, No, thanks for joining us, Yes, thank you. Uh interesting stuff. Let me ask you this and just think about this. Oh no, oh no, oh college sports. You played college sports. What is the reason why you play? I mean you want to play, But don't answer this because he talked
about you learn to lose ya YadA, you know, play teammates. Plus, I'll ask you on the other side, if you're an Arizona men's basketball fan, you know it's been successful for nearly forty years.
Now.
Take a look back at the Ludolsen era in my new book, Lessons from Lout 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 man who led them, competed against them, and inspired them. Twenty five chapters for his twenty five years as Arizona's beloved coach. Lessons from Lut is an insight to how he built the program into a national powerhouse. Want one, email me at Steve dot RIVERA ninety five at gmail dot.
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Steve Ravera, he's got his eye on the ball on Tucson's sports station yet Fox Sports fourteenth fIF day.
Hey, welcome back to il the ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera and with me it is Blake Eager. And that's a fun quick call.
Yeah.
He talked really driving through a tornado and West Texans trying to get through this conversation as fast as he could.
Russ Bradberg, Brad Bird, He's going to have a book out there, big, big time. Yeah. So if you're interested enough, it's an interesting book. It's all fictional, but I'm sure there's a lot of truth.
I mean, that's what he was trying to say, right, So there's truth and just yeah.
Oh so I was talking about teamwork and and and learning stuff. So what when you what did what did you learn playing college ball?
Are you talking experience or on the field?
Uh?
Both.
I think it gave you. Like I mean, we had to learn how to balance your time, keep a schedule. You had to deal with failure. At the same point, you had to learn how to deal with different people in a working environment.
Right, A lot like life. It taught you.
How to deal with life. It prepared you for life before you got into life.
Do you think you learned more that way than you did in class, because you don't. You learn what you learn in class, right, Yeah, but you get it's like algebra. Yeah, I don't know if I've ever used algaebra since I used Elaiebroth twenty thousand years ago.
Yeah.
I'm just not that smart, so I probably could have. I just don't know how to do it.
Yeah, denominator, denominator. If you go into frash, I'm lost. I'll leave right now. But you know my point.
He talked about defeat and also I think one of the biggest things you learned how to.
Be a teammate.
Yeah, we were ha this conversation earlier. I think in today's society, and I don't want to be the you know, speaking from an older point of view and trying to sound wise, I think the coddling aspect of today's youth athletes from a parent standpoint, is far greater. We call them helicopter I was just going to say, it's far greater than we ever knew growing up. Right, it was pretty much like, Hey, I'm going to see you later.
I'll see you tonight at you know, eight pm or whenever the lights are go down, right, and we're playing tackle football and asphalt. But that's you get into you get into collegiate sports, You're you want to fail to some degree because you want to learn from it, right, So you want to get punched in the face to understand the way it motivates you too.
It motivates you.
I think in today's society, we're so scared of letting our children fail, and there's creating a safety net that we just never It's going to be interesting to see what the next twenty years looks like.
Well, you're you're much younger than me, and it's funny that you say this because you're part of that coddle generation, maybe just not close to that. But you My son my oldest than me, thirty, and I know, I know I didn't do this with him, uh and my both of my sons. But I saw parents that did with their kids. And you say you can't be there when
they fall. You just can't all the time. And in fact, they like to fall, they like to get scarred up or you know, it's maybe not like but they know how to Yeah.
I know they know how to survive that. Kids are resilient, right, They're going to figure it out if you know them, especially mom, don't do that. Yeah, get away from especially with my friends are around. Yeah, I have, I have, I have a boogirl, I don't get don't wipe it, mom, don't you know that. Don't don't da let me alone. And by the way, I love you, but stay over there.
Yeah.
I just I think you're learning these lessons as we go. So you're seeing guys that fail at certain spots, and the NIL just emphasize that a little bit more where they're not willing to come back and put the time into that program. They want to know that they're going to have guaranteed playing time.
So let me ask you something. I've said this in something.
I used to be a halfway decent athlete, and I've said this for a thousand times. The only way I got better just get him my ass kicked. Oh yeah, because one it motivated me, and it made me want to play better. You know, I played you know, whatever sport. But you know what I'm saying, If I win every game, what the hell fun is that?
But I'm sure like you, I mean, you lost.
He said, Okay, you gotta do this differently next time, YadA, YadA, and he made you a better ball player.
Yeah, I mean I you know, I always had an few mentality so I wanted you to give me the ball and get out of the way and I'll figure it out from there. But I mean I went through you know, I didn't get recruited out of high school. I had to walk on eightiestern Arizona, so we had to prove it. I was the last person. I literally made the team because somebody got arrested like two days before you said this, right, So, so I knew that my window I had to do whatever I possibly could
to keep my window open. So when I got drafted a night and I showed up to Port Saint Lucie and they were like, we don't even know where you're going. I was like, that's fine, I'm here, That's all that matters. Yeah, and I'm supposed to be that. I'm supposed to be here, right, And that's what you need to do. You need to act that part because you had to believe that part right.
No, no, because if you don't, you dell eat in live one and they'll notice that.
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, there's signs of weakness, there's blood in the water. Whatever you want to do.
Was there a point were you with me? Were you the guy know? Uh, somebody else?
Oh?
I was with one of my other buddies who's probably listening right now. Where you get somewhere and you played college ball and you went to another college that you said, Oh, these guys are different, these dudes are different.
Yeah.
When I when I got to double all time, it's not coming up. You're on there and the wall.
How you doing it's Jim, Jim?
How are you doing pretty good? How are you? We're fine? Thank you? Long time, no talk yeah.
You know, along the lines of what you guys are talking about now, it's uh there. It's a process to learn how to fail. And even at the little league level, where I coached for several years, you know, I would end up in a discussion with moms usually, you know, they're a little more closely guarded guarding their their kids, and I would just tell them, you know, you hate to see your kids fall down. You hate to see it,
but you love to see them get back up. And that's what it's about, is teaching them how to fail and then come back from that and succeed.
Right.
You remember that time I fell down and it was okay, and you say, yeah, yeah, now went champion.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
Well I'm using that as a metaphor. I mean, you know, you get your butt chewed out on the field once in a career, maybe for doing something that just totally violates everything he learned or been taught, and once in a while you have to put up with a little heat to get there.
Right, right, Okay, anything else, Jim.
No, I don't have much today. Just called because you told me.
To, because you try to you know, you said you were trying to get in but you didn't know because you wanted to know who the last guy was.
I wanted to know who the writer was.
Yeah, okay, yeah, sorry. I didn't mention his name enough, probably when he was talking, because I didn't.
He talk so much.
I told Jay that it would be great if you guys would mention the whole the guest's name right at the end of the interview, because you know a lot of people are driving around in cars and you don't get to hear all.
Yeah, I'm a rookie at testing. I'm a rookie.
My bad.
See that's constructive criticism and learned from it. I'll forget about it tomorrow. So thanks Jim. Thanks good to hear from you.
Please, thanks, bye bye, Jim.
Uh So he's accurate, right, Uh, you have a story that motivated you, like I'm sure you do, like some I remember, like you were asking me, when did I notice, right, like, the people I played with were a little bit different.
So, I mean it was probably when I got to double a my first start. The game was so slow comparatively what it was because guys were just so much more season they knew what they were doing. But are Honestly, the first time I saw hunterd Pens take batting practice, was like, this is a different role.
This guy's in a different world.
Do I belong here? What did you think?
I was fine with it, Like I remember throwing him with curveball at that point, which was unhittable, I thought, and he took it to the warning track and I was like, Okay, yeah, I'm gonna have to face these guys quite a bit, so we'll see what happens. But you know, it's it's crazy and to speak to Jim's point a little bit and the little league mentality and
we'll call it little league for you U sports. I think parents are finding a way to create a fail safe for their kids by blaming either the coach, referees or the umpires. And we talked about it. It's hard to take critical, you know, criticism, but it's hard to look at ourselves and say maybe it was our fault.
So right that happens to be Blake Eager, my co host today.
That I learned any bad letters you want to write make him out to Steve.
No No, but you're right.
I mean I've had a number of coaches in here and say the same thing, and everyone hasn't answer right, But that's let them fail.
They'll come back. Don't worry. They're there. What'd you say?
They're brilliant, resilient.
They are.
It's like kids when they go through divorce. Kids are smarter than you know. We're not going to stay together because the kids are saying, mom, dad, just get divorce.
We alred.
You know, you can just hit each other. Yeah, and it makes for not a great home environment when you try to make that.
When when you fake it, yeah right.
I mean I grew up with a buddy that his parents were essentially roommates for his whole life. While he's living there, and he's like, my dad's dating somebody. My mom's saying, but they think that.
We don't know.
It's like, just get different houses at this point, like it's creating a weirder environment by staying together.
Well, I won't name names on there.
Yeah, please do it.
I need my job. Yeah, I know.
Of course, we have about four or five minutes if you want to call five, two zero, four, one, six, seventy four or forty. We're kind of waxing poetic on life. I'm solving the world's problems.
I mean, see, let me ask you a question. So you've been in this You've been in this position for so long. You've seen transitional phases through sports, through parents, through life. Like what at the end of the day, where we stand right now, how confident do you feel in youth sports and creating quality young adults in the next twenty years.
Well, that's a good question.
I don't follow the youth sports like I used to, but let me tell you, I get this question a lot. I had the training Fries, the Luke Waltons, There's been a number of them, totally totally and they say, Steve, what's the difference between the guy that's petulant and the pain of the ask when you cover them? You know, they know it all blah blah blah. And the good dudes who give you time don't speak I little bit, buddy.
Their parents. Yeah, but they have good parents. They've raised them well to be respectful and to you know, talk to you like a human being. You're not below them, you parents, You're already you right away if you have good parents. And that's in life too. Good students, Yeah, I.
Mean you can also you can also kind of point out the Eddie Haskells of the road world too, where You're like, this isn't the real view, right right?
Yeah, but here here's the funny thing. They think that that's the real view. Yeah, hey, hey, I bought you so I bought you a drink today. You know, I hope you do a good job. Just do your job. Just do your job, show up, do your job. And that's always it's not brain surgery, Belichick. That's why I get to do this. It's not brain If it was brain surgery, I wouldn't be able to do this. Yeah, it's pretty simple. You could try.
Do you want to be the.
Pat I don't want a love botomy at this point in my life. So yeah, I just thought it's it's interesting to know and and kind of take a step back and look at you know. I always we're scared of what's going to happen in the future and how things are going. But I think everybody in the last you know, one hundred years have probably said that same thing about the other generation coming up, and that same
thing about the other generation coming up. But I do think it's going to be a little bit different for this when our when our youth care up at this point to see how kind of everybody works out.
We got about a couple of minutes.
So did you in your in your exploits as an athlete, did you see athletes that when they failed, they didn't recover?
Yeah, at different levels. I mean collegiate athletes who have always been told I mean, you know, here's two great UH analogies, right, so UH coach Andy Lopez would always say this, he wants he wants a couple of ones, which are you know? And then all three is no number twos. So when you see number twos at the collegiate level fail, they don't know how to recover. They're done because there I think the truth is coming out, right, You're not a number one. You've been found. You've been found,
and now you're just realizing yourself. So psychologically that's really difficult to process. Good enough from the pro level, it was more from an injury standpoint, like once you get injured multiple times, your your psyche completely changes.
Right.
The confidence is what you because.
You you know you're not going to be healthy, so you've got to fight through that, fight through that. That's really the like the confidence level. When you fail at the pro level, you grow as an adult, you mature, you start to understand it, but the failure when it's attached to an injury is a lot more difficult.
Sure, and it's tough to reinvent yourself too. I think failure you can kind of find a way to, you know, if you're a speedball guy, you can, you know, try to find enough speed or a knuckleball, you know, you find something else didn't to Who's the one that passed away just reaching the knuckleball guy for Boston.
Tim Whitefield.
Tim, he was that dude right then he changed he hadn't changed his survival survival so he started throwing the knuckleball.
Yeah.
How sad is that though? And his wife passed away just months after. Yeah, sorry to be depressing, but that's.
A lot of love there, right.
Yeah, But you know what I'm saying, you have to find yourself again because if you're good at that level, you're you're you're you have this chip on your shoulder and you're your poop doesn't stink, and you can find ways to be good.
When you're at that level. You're meant to be at that level. Right, So but you're right, you're if let's say you're you know, Vince Carter who still can jump out of the roof. Right, But you you've been known for or for that, and you get to thirty six years old and you can't jump like that anymore, how are you going to recreit yourself?
Sure?
If Paul Pierce already you know, like Paul Pierce is the world, you play like a seventy five year old man anyway on the court, so you never have to change your game because it's already there.
It's like it's like Luca, oh, yeah, same thing. We got to go okay by