Good Seats Still Available

“Good Seats Still Available” is a curious little podcast devoted to the exploration of what used-to-be in professional sports. Each week, host Tim Hanlon interviews former players, owners, broadcasters, beat reporters, and surprisingly famous "super fans" of teams and leagues that have come and gone - in an attempt to unearth some of the most wild and woolly moments in (often forgotten) sports history.

Last refreshed: July 15th, 2025 at 5:27 PM ⓘ

Follow this podcast in the Metacast mobile app to refresh it and see new episodes.

Follow on

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

RSS

Podcasts are better in Metacast mobile app

Don't just listen to podcasts. Learn from them with transcripts, summaries, and chapters for every episode. Skim, search, and bookmark insights. Learn more

Episodes

018: Pro Football Historian Ken Crippen & the All-America Football Conference

Pro Football Researchers’ Association president Ken Crippen ( The Original Buffalo Bills: A History of the All-America Football Conference Team ; The All-America Football Conference: Players, Coaches, Records, Games & Awards ) joins Tim Hanlon to discuss the upstart pro football circuit that gave the war-weary NFL a formidable challenge in the late 1940s. Crippen describes: How a newspaper sportswriter from Chicago convinced big money investors spurned by the NFL to start a directly competit...

Jul 10, 2017•1 hr 34 min

017: Abe Saperstein & the American Basketball League with Author Murry Nelson

Penn State University professor emeritus Murry Nelson ( Abe Saperstein and the American Basketball League, 1960–1963: The Upstarts Who Shot for Three and Lost to the NBA ) joins Tim Hanlon to discuss the oft-forgotten second incarnation of the ABL – and the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Famer who willed it into being. In this hidden gem of an episode, Nelson describes: How the master promoter of the legendary Harlem Globetrotters attempted to parlay his influence in pro basketball circles...

Jul 03, 2017•1 hr 23 min

016: National Soccer Hall of Famer Rick Davis

National Soccer Hall of Fame legend Rick Davis joins Tim Hanlon direct from his family-owned/operated Ellsworth Steak House in Ellsworth, KS for a revealing conversation about his pioneering career as one of America’s first pro soccer superstars. Among the many highlights, Davis discusses: the circumstances that vaulted him from AYSO youth soccer in Claremont, CA to international fame with the NASL’s star-studded New York Cosmos; the priceless on-field, in-game tutelage of world-class players li...

Jun 26, 2017•1 hr 30 min

015: MISL Memories with Michael Menchel

This week, Tim Hanlon buckles up for a wild ride through the tumultuous early years of the original Major Indoor Soccer League with sports PR veteran Michael Menchel, in our longest and most anecdote-filled episode yet! Menchel takes us on a head-spinning audio journey across some of the most memorable (and forgettable) franchises in professional indoor soccer history – including stops in Long Island, NY (the Arrows trade for Pete Rose!), New Jersey (scoring champ Fred Grgurev’s unique approach ...

Jun 19, 2017•1 hr 46 min

014: Radio Personality Terry Hanson’s Formative Years in NASL Soccer

Syndicated morning radio personality Terry Hanson ( The Big Show with John Boy & Billy ) joins Tim Hanlon to discuss the formative years of his renaissance career in sports and media, across three of the original North American Soccer League’s more memorable franchises. Hanson waxes nostalgic about doling out “Americanized” first names to the Serbian-infused roster of 1976’s Rochester Lancers; moonlighting in the Washington Diplomats broadcast booth with play-by-play pros Jon Miller and Don ...

Jun 12, 2017•1 hr 15 min

013: Author Bill Young & the Baseball Legacy of J.L. Wilkinson's Kansas City Monarchs

Religious studies professor-turned-baseball-historian Bill Young ( J.L Wilkinson & the Kansas City Monarchs: Trailblazers in Black Baseball ) joins Tim Hanlon to discuss the life and legacy of one of baseball’s most overlooked and underappreciated executive figures. Young recalls the photograph at the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City that inspired him to pursue the telling of Wilkinson’s story, and describes how the quiet-yet-influential pioneer affectionately known as “Wilkie”: ...

Jun 05, 2017•1 hr 9 min

012: Author Jim Sulecki & the NFL’s Cleveland Rams

Author and Cleveland native Jim Sulecki ( The Cleveland Rams: The NFL Champs Who Left Too Soon ) joins Tim Hanlon to discuss his Pro Football Researchers Association award-winning book about the oft-forgotten first decade of one of the National Football League’s most enduring franchises. Sulecki describes the Cleveland Rams’ inauspicious first season in the shaky second incarnation of the American Football League in 1936; its struggles to remain competitive against entrenched NFL powerhouses lik...

May 22, 2017•1 hr 20 min

011: The USFL’s Philadelphia/Baltimore Stars with Publicist Bob Moore

Long-time Kansas City Chiefs public relations director Bob Moore joins Tim Hanlon to recount his pre-NFL baptism-by-fire tenure as communications lead for the United States Football League’s most successful franchise, the Philadelphia/Baltimore Stars. Moore recalls the instant credibility boost of snagging General Manager Carl Peterson from the cross-town NFL Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles; credits Peterson’s vision in building the USFL’s most consistently dominant team from his mastery...

May 15, 2017•1 hr 30 min

010: The American Soccer Sojourn of Clyde Best

Perennial NASL and MISL soccer all-star Clyde Best ( The Acid Test: The Autobiography of Clyde Best ) joins Tim Hanlon from his native Bermuda to discuss his 1970s/80s soccer adventures in the United States, emanating from his stellar, but challenging beginnings with England’s First Division West Ham United. Best recalls his first matches in a five-team 1969 NASL, when the Hammers spent the summer masquerading as the “Baltimore Bays”; recounts a hot and steamy friendly a year later at New York’s...

May 08, 2017•55 min

009: Documentarian Mike Jacobs & the International Volleyball Association

Award-winning ESPN 30 For 30 sports documentarian Mike Jacobs ( The High Five ; The Pittsburgh Drug Trials ) joins Tim Hanlon to discuss his new film Bump & Spike , which recounts the curious tale of the 1970s International Volleyball League – the short-lived pro co-ed circuit hatched by Hollywood moguls, fueled by a basketball legend, and ultimately undermined by a combination of sketchy ownership and a US Olympic boycott. Jacobs relates how TV/movie producer David Wolper charmed his entert...

May 01, 2017•1 hr

008: Documentarian Dan Forer & the ABA’s Spirits of St. Louis

Emmy Award-winning TV producer and ESPN 30 For 30 sports documentarian Dan Forer ( Free Spirits ; Mike and the Mad Dog ) joins Tim Hanlon to discuss the curious two-year odyssey of the American Basketball Association’s colorful Spirits of St. Louis franchise, whose impact still continues to haunt the modern-day NBA, forty years after the team’s demise. Forer describes the importance of mercurial star forward Marvin “Bad News” Barnes to both the club’s success and the making of the documentary; w...

Apr 24, 2017•38 min

007: “Krazy” George Henderson & The Art of Pro Sports Cheerleading

America’s most famous professional sports cheerleader “Krazy” George Henderson ( Still Krazy After All These Cheers ) joins Tim Hanlon to discuss some of the wackiest adventures from his 40+ years of live performances – and how a self-described shy, mediocre schoolteacher ultimately followed his passion to a unique and storied career converting passive game-day attendees into cheering fanatics. Henderson (along with his signature drum!) recounts how a school field trip to an Oakland Seals NHL ho...

Apr 17, 2017•1 hr 14 min

006: Columnist Paul Gardner & the Original North American Soccer League

Legendary Soccer America columnist Paul Gardner ( The Simplest Game: The Intelligent Fan's Guide to the World of Soccer ; Soccer Talk: Paul Gardner on Soccer ) joins Tim Hanlon to wax nostalgic on his unlikely journey from fledgling British pharmacist to America’s most persistently influential soccer commentator. Gardner recounts the chaotic formation of the modern professional game in the U.S. during the 1960s; recalls how ambitious sports entrepreneurs like the International Soccer League’s Bi...

Apr 10, 2017•1 hr 34 min

005: Bobby Moffat & and the 1970s NASL Dallas Tornado

Former Dallas Tornado defensive stalwart Bobby Moffat ( The Basic Soccer Guide ) joins Tim Hanlon to reminisce about life in the 1970s North American Soccer League, and how his commitment to nurturing the game’s grass roots in the Metroplex became the envy of US soccer enthusiasts during a tenuous decade for the sport. Moffat recounts how not-so-glamorous off-the-field jobs helped him and most of his teammates make ends meet; how Dallas’ 1971 marathon overtime-riddled championship season helped ...

Apr 03, 2017•58 min

004: Author Matthew Algeo & the NFL’s 1943 “Steagles”

Author Matthew Algeo ( Last Team Standing: How the Steelers and the Eagles – "The Steagles" – Saved Pro Football During World War II ) joins Tim Hanlon all the way from Maputo, Mozambique to discuss the marriage of convenience that literally saved the National Football League from collapse in 1943. Algeo describes how a desperate Art Rooney scrambled to save his Pittsburgh Steelers franchise, depleted by wartime military call-ups; how a hastily assembled squad of ragtag draft rejects practiced f...

Mar 27, 2017•56 min

003: Author Michael MacCambridge on Lamar Hunt & the American Football League

Sports author/historian Michael MacCambridge ( America’s Game: The Epic Story of How Pro Football Captured a Nation ; Lamar Hunt: A Life in Sports ) joins Tim Hanlon to discuss the legacy of Lamar Hunt – the most unlikely of sports executive pioneers – and the outsized role he played in modernizing 1960s pro football into the enduring American sports juggernaut it is today. MacCambridge recounts how a strong rebuff from the stodgy 1950s NFL establishment galvanized Hunt’s determination to disrup...

Mar 20, 2017•1 hr 20 min

002: Sports Executive Andy Crossley & the WPS Boston Breakers

Fellow defunct pro sports enthusiast ( Fun While It Lasted ) and former Boston Breakers General Manager, Andy Crossley, joins Tim Hanlon to discuss his rollicking ride on the Women’s Professional Soccer league roller coaster in the late 2000s, and why the second major attempt at professionalizing the women’s game in the U.S. fell apart after just three seasons. Crossley recounts why Harvard’s archaic on-campus football stadium became the oddly natural choice for Breakers home games, the moment w...

Mar 13, 2017•1 hr 39 min

001: Documentarian Mark Greczmiel & the NHL’s California Golden Seals

TV producer Mark Greczmiel ( E! True Hollywood Story ) joins Tim Hanlon to discuss his labor-of-love documentary The California Golden Seals Story, and the colorful late 60s/early 70s National Hockey League franchise that inspired it. Greczmiel recounts the Seals’ largely hapless record on the ice, tortuous ownership history (including a turn by tightfisted Oakland A’s baseball impresario Charles O. Finley), unique approaches to gaining promotional “exposure,” and why current fans of both the NH...

Mar 06, 2017•1 hr 21 min

← Prev

Hosted on Libsyn

For the best experience, listen in Metacast app for iOS or Android