Pittsburgh’s dean of sportswriters Jim O’Brien ( Looking Up: From the ABA to the NBA the WNBA to the NCAA - A Basketball Memoir ; Looking Up Again - A Basketball Memoir ) has seen it all in his more than 50 years of chronicling stories across the pro and collegiate sports landscape - but perhaps no more deeply than in basketball, and in more detailed fashion than during the old American Basketball Association. Throughout the life of the league, you could find O’Brien’s reliable ABA reportage and...
Jul 12, 2021•1 hr 13 min•Ep. 223
As the debut season of the surprisingly entertaining Tony Stewart/Ray Evernham-led Camping World SRX Series nears its conclusion next week, we dive deeper into the rabbit hole of one of its major influences - the legendary International Race of Champions (IROC) - with longtime automotive journalist and former Motor Trend magazine Executive Editor Matt Stone (“ The IROC Porsches: The International Race of Champions, Porsche’s 911 RSR & the Men Who Raced Them ”). As table-set in our previous E...
Jul 04, 2021•1 hr 34 min•Ep. 222
FrontRowSoccer.com 's Michael Lewis returns after a two-year absence to help us dig into the news of the Major Arena Soccer League's hiring of three marquee names from pro indoor soccer's 1980s heyday - as it attempts to translate the sport's past glory into interest for a new generation of fans. The additions of Shep Messing (Chairman), Keith Tozer (Commissioner) and Episode 66 guest JP Dellacamera (President, Communications/Media) to the MASL executive suite signals a major effort to stabilize...
Jun 28, 2021•1 hr 36 min•Ep. 221
Most baseball fans are familiar with the World War II-era All-American Girls Professional Baseball League from the hit 1992 movie " A League of Their Own " - but most do not know that there was another pro women's circuit that played only in the greater Chicago area at around the same time. Documentary filmmaker Adam Chu (" Their Turn At Bat ") joins the pod to discuss the fascinating story of the National Girls Baseball League (1944-54) - formed out of the city's amateur softball talent-loaded ...
Jun 21, 2021•1 hr 36 min•Ep. 220
We knock out a bunch of previously unexplored US soccer franchises of yore with the delightful Graham "Buster" Tutt (" Never Give Up: The Graham 'Buster' Tutt Story ") - whose tragically derailed, but ultimately persevering pro soccer journey across three continents serves as the backdrop for intriguing tales of the modern-day American pro game's formative years. A promising young goalkeeper for England's Charlton Athletic in the early 1970s, Tutt turned pro with the London club the day after gr...
Jun 14, 2021•1 hr 32 min•Ep. 219
In our Episode 104 with David Hubler & Josh Drazen, we examined the existential crisis faced by organized baseball during the first half of the 1940s, when America's heightened involvement in World War II threatened to shut down pro leagues entirely as the country focused its attention elsewhere. While President Roosevelt's now-famous "Green Light Letter" to MLB Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis on January 15, 1942 ensured the game would continue unimpeded Stateside, hundreds of major-lea...
Jun 07, 2021•1 hr 26 min•Ep. 218
We dial up Robert Cherry, author of the definitive biography of legendary pro basketball great Wilt Chamberlain (" Wilt: Larger Than Life "), to delve into the lesser-known (but enormously fascinating) aspects of the "Big Dipper"'s athletic career - including intriguing stops and stints with: The Harlem Globetrotters (1958-59) - where Chamberlain effectively played out his senior college year after two years (and an NCAA Tournament Final) with Kansas, before becoming age-eligible for the NBA Dra...
May 31, 2021•1 hr 38 min•Ep. 217
The starting grid is set for the 105th running of the Indianapolis 500 this Sunday, and what better way to get ready than with a look back at the divisive battle between two competing sanctioning bodies that almost decimated the sport of open-wheel IndyCar racing - and even "The Greatest Spectacle in Racing" itself. Veteran motorsports reporter John Oreovicz (" Indy Split: The Big-Money Battle That Nearly Destroyed Indy Racing ") joins the podcast to help us better understand the political infig...
May 24, 2021•1 hr 35 min•Ep. 216
We admit that when our friends at Liverpool's deCoubertin Books reached out recently with an advance look at their upcoming title devoted to the history of one of England's most venerable top-flight soccer clubs, we weren't immediately sold on the premise, nor its applicability to our (admittedly) odd brand of sports curiosity. But after just a few minutes with the meticulously detailed " Toffee Soccer: Everton and North America ," we became not only intrigued by the rich, storied saga of Everto...
May 17, 2021•1 hr 32 min•Ep. 215
American soccer insiders know Steve Gans as one of the sport's leading domestic corporate attorneys, with a long track record of legal representation from all sides of the ball - including as a former candidate for the US Soccer Federation's highly contentious presidential election in 2018. Few, however, are aware that the Boston-born-and-raised Gans - who also spearheaded the Foxborough, MA venue bid for the US-hosted 1994 World Cup - began his long professional association with the 'beautiful ...
May 10, 2021•1 hr 45 min•Ep. 214
Soccer America columnist and Episode 49 guest Ian Plenderleith (" Rock 'n' Roll Soccer: The Short Life and Fast Times of the North American Soccer League ") returns to the show for our initial hot take on the ill-fated "Super League" - a long-rumored, big-money elite European club tournament concept that is already being left for dead a mere two days after its official launch on April 18th. Stealthily announced on the eve of a UEFA Executive Committee meeting set to revamp and expand an already-...
May 03, 2021•1 hr 22 min•Ep. 213
Baseball historian Steve Treder (" Forty Years a Giant: The Life of Horace Stoneham ") steps up to the plate this week to delve into the oft-overlooked contributions of influential San Francisco (née New York) Giants owner Horace Stoneham - who quietly stewarded the storied National League franchise through four turbulent decades of baseball history (1936-76). Inheriting the club at the tender age of 32 from his father after his death in 1936, Stoneham actually began his tenure with the Manhatta...
Apr 26, 2021•1 hr 32 min•Ep. 212
The Roarin' Twenties was a time of Prohibition, jazz, gangland murder - and, for baseball, an age of superstitious magic - when even future Hall of Fame players believed that rubbing the hump of a hunchback would guarantee a hit at the plate. Irreparably disfigured by a childhood playground seesaw accident, South Philadelphia teenager Hughie McLoon never grew taller than 49 inches; but in an era when baseball club mascots were chosen with as much care as starting pitchers(!), McLoon prevailed up...
Apr 19, 2021•1 hr 29 min•Ep. 211
There’s one question Cam Perron (" Comeback Season: My Unlikely Story of Friendship with the Greatest Living Negro League Baseball Players ") has heard over and over again: “How does a white kid from a suburb of Boston become friends with all of these former Negro League baseball players?” An ardent Red Sox fan, Perron grew up during the '00s loving history, and from an early age, had a knack for collecting. But when he was twelve and bought a set of Topps baseball cards featuring several playe...
Apr 12, 2021•1 hr 26 min•Ep. 210
Founded as the "Eastern Pennsylvania Basketball League" for its first season in post-war 1946 - and later (1970-78) known as the Eastern Basketball Association before eventually morphing into the NBA's semi-official minor-league Continental Basketball Association - the Eastern Professional Basketball League was the probably greatest pro hoops circuit you've never heard of. The EPBL was a fast-paced and physical affair, often played in tiny, smoke-filled gyms across the northeast and featuring st...
Apr 05, 2021•1 hr 38 min•Ep. 209
Author Dan Taylor (" Lights, Camera, Fastball: How the Hollywood Stars Changed Baseball ") joins the pod for an in-depth look at one of baseball's most uniquely inventive teams - known for its star-studded celebrity ownership structure (including the likes of Bing Crosby, Gary Cooper, Barbara Stanwyck, George Burns, and Cecil B. DeMille) - and warm embrace of movie industry publicity during the 1940s/50s heyday of Hollywood's "Golden Age." Long before Brooklyn's relocated Dodgers colonized Los A...
Mar 29, 2021•1 hr 43 min•Ep. 208
International Tennis Hall of Fame Museum director Doug Stark ( The SPHAs: The Life and Times of Basketball's Greatest Jewish Team ) joins this week's 'cast for an authoritative exploration of one of his first loves - pro basketball's pioneering Philadelphia SPHAs. Originally organized in 1918 as a local amateur team by South Philadelphia High School grads Eddie Gottlieb, Harry Passon and Hughie Black - and acronymically named for their early uniform sponsors, the South Philadelphia Hebrew Associ...
Mar 22, 2021•1 hr 29 min•Ep. 207
Youngstown State professor Denis Crawford (" The Life and Teams of Johnny F. Bassett: Maverick Entrepreneur of North American Sports ") joins the 'cast for a jam-packed deep dive into the life of one of the most underrated, yet enormously influential pro sports figures of the 1970s/80s. A third-generation scion of a prominent Canadian industrialist family steeped in both media and sports team ownership, John F. (Johnny) Bassett distinguished himself from his elders as a marketing-savvy showman w...
Mar 15, 2021•2 hr 12 min•Ep. 206
We fire up the GPS for a trek back to the City of Brotherly Love this week for a fond - but decidedly one-of-a-kind - remembrance of Philadelphia's oddly beloved "octorad"-styled outdoor sports mecca known as Veterans Stadium. Memoirist, Philly native and actual (Vietnam War) vet Tom Garvey ( " The Secret Apartment " ) joins us to delve into his incredible story of living in a self-fashioned apartment underneath the seats of the old Vet's left-field Section 354 (above the visiting team's basebal...
Mar 08, 2021•1 hr 16 min•Ep. 205
Arizona State calculus professor Scott Surgent (" The Complete World Hockey Association, 11th Edition "; " The World Hockey Association Fact Book " ) joins this week to discuss his personal passion project of documenting everything statistical from the fascinatingly ephemeral World Hockey Association - despite never having witness a single game during its brief seven-year run (1972-79). Like many young sports fans of the 70s living outside of actual WHA markets (for as long as they lasted), Surg...
Mar 01, 2021•1 hr 31 min•Ep. 204
After a severely challenging, COVID-hampered 2020, it wasn't altogether surprising to hear NBA Commissioner Adam Silver openly muse with reporters at year's end about the potential for adding a new franchise or two to help shore up the league's finances. "I'd say it's caused us to maybe dust off some of the analyses on the economic and competitive impacts of expansion," Silver said back in December. "We've been putting a little bit more time into it than we were pre-pandemic." While not necessar...
Feb 22, 2021•1 hr 28 min•Ep. 203
We continue our dogged pursuit of the history of baseball's Negro Leagues with a stop this week in the suburban Philadelphia borough of Darby, PA - for a look at the famed Hilldale Club with SABR Seymour Medal-winning historian Neil Lanctot ( " Fair Dealing and Clean Playing: The Hilldale Club and the Development of Black Professional Baseball " ). Established as an amateur boys team in 1910 by a moonlighting civil servant named Ed Bolden, the club incorporated in November 1916, as the Hilldale ...
Feb 15, 2021•1 hr 35 min•Ep. 202
Philadelphia's dean of baseball writers Rich Westcott (" The Mogul: Eddie Gottlieb, Philadelphia Sports Legend and Pro Basketball Pionee r ") steps outside the batter's box this week to help us go deep into the story of one of pro basketball 's most foundational figures, Eddie Gottlieb. Armed with a great smile and a razor-sharp memory, the Ukranian-born and South Philly-raised Gottlieb was a multi-faceted hoops pioneer - rules innovator, successful coach, masterful promoter, and logistics wizar...
Feb 08, 2021•1 hr 24 min•Ep. 201
Author Geoff Williams ( C.C. Pyle's Amazing Foot Race: The True Story of the 1928 Coast-to-Coast Run Across America ) joins for the stranger-than-fiction story of the cross-country long-distance running event/endurance contest that only the Roarin' 20s could have spawned. On March 4, 1928, a motley assortment of nearly 200 marathon pros, amateur sports enthusiasts and random publicity-seekers took to the starter's pistol from Los Angeles' Legion Ascot Speedway to begin an incredible 3,423-mile t...
Feb 01, 2021•1 hr 37 min•Ep. 200
After overwhelming response to our Episode 194 exploration of hockey's epic 1972 "Summit Series," we gas up the Zamboni for a return visit into Canada/Russian competition lore - this time for the equally intriguing (but often overlooked) sequel Summit Series of 1974 - with sports author/historian Craig Wallace ( The Forgotten Summit: A Canadian Perspective on the 1974 Canada-Soviet Hockey Series ). While ostensibly a "round two" between the world's top national hockey programs, the 1974 Series ...
Jan 25, 2021•1 hr 44 min•Ep. 199
We sit down with the eldest scion of Los Angeles' legendary Dr. Jerry Buss family sports empire for a wide-ranging discussion about its early construction, day-to-day operations, eventual unwinding - and its ongoing legacy via the current NBA World Champion Lakers, of which (along with his five siblings) he is a part-owner. Along the way, Johnny takes us through his personal adventures in places like: The original mid-1970s World Team Tennis (the Los Angeles Strings, Jerry's first pro sports own...
Jan 18, 2021•2 hr 34 min•Ep. 198
Former Denver Post columnist and long-time sports writer/author Terry Frei (“ Third Down and a War to Go ;” “ '77: Denver, the Broncos, and a Coming of Age ” + plenty more ) joins to discuss the briefly curious life (1976-82) of NHL hockey's Colorado Rockies - Frei's first-ever professional newspaper beat assignment back in the day. As originally recounted in his eyebrow-raising 2010 memoir Playing Piano in a Brothel: A Sports Journalist's Odyssey , Frei helps us better understand the events, pe...
Jan 11, 2021•1 hr 37 min•Ep. 197
Filmmaker and Maryland-native Troy Lowman (" The Ghosts of 33rd Street ") helps us kick off the new year with a look back at the pro football franchise that still looms large over the city of Baltimore's sports exploits - the Colts. While the Ravens have been carrying the region's modern-day NFL torch since their messy arrival/conversion from the original Cleveland Browns franchise in 1996, few residents of Charm City would dispute the deep roots and lasting contributions of the legendary club t...
Jan 04, 2021•1 hr 33 min•Ep. 196
[ A re-release of fan favorite episode from January 2020! ] Prolific rock/R&B drummer/musician Steve Ferrone (Average White Band, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers) joins to delve into the backstory of helping write/craft the official theme song for the New York Cosmos – the latest chapter in our irregular series devoted to Tim’s longstanding fascination with the North American Soccer League’s most famous franchise. Pop music aficionados know Ferrone as part of the “classic” mid-70s lineup of ...
Dec 28, 2020•1 hr 16 min
We bid an emphatic good riddance to a crappy 2020 with our second-annual holiday roundtable spectacular featuring the return of fellow defunct sports enthusiasts Andy Crossley ( Fun While It Lasted & Episode 2 ); Paul Reeths ( OurSportsCentral.com , StatsCrew.com & Episode 46 ); and Steve Holroyd (Episodes 92 , 109 , 149 & 188 ) – for a spirited roundtable discussion about the past, present and potential future of “forgotten” pro sports teams and leagues. It's a look back at some of ...
Dec 21, 2020•2 hr 12 min•Ep. 195
