The Opener: October 27th, 2023 - podcast episode cover

The Opener: October 27th, 2023

Oct 27, 202329 min
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Episode description

Here's the opening segment for Friday October 27th, 2023, featuring some Rangers stuff, and a look back in time at our high school football playing days

Transcript

The World Series is upon us. All eyes on Arlington, Texas. I never thought I would say that a big weekend gonna be a big show. Good Friday morning in the world or the downbeat. I'm Kevin Turner, Danny Baylis, Mike's Roy and JJ Jackson. Here. We are ready to do a lot of stuff today. We won't fully ignore the Cowboys. Goes Pepper Pavilion Cowboys three for all scorching hot predictions coming up at eight o'clock thing this morning, Tuesday thirty. We will be very ragers intensive today. This World

Series begins tonight. Nothing kind of the wild time of the year here get the late October. The weather starts to shift a little bit. The pumpkin people are out. Halloween parties are happening this weekend. Tuesday is Halloween. Cold Front hits on Monday. Cowboys have a noon or on Sunday. Mavericks play what I think will be their least watch the game of the year tonight. You can hear that here on ninety seven won the freak of course pre

game at seven. I think they're pissed. I don't know that they're pissed. They should be happy. They want to know yeah, well, you know, they beat the worst team in basketball. I hate the NBA. I hate how the NBA doesn't we do a little buddy, Okay, but I don't think these franchises really other than sending like a supportive tweet out, they don't really care about the other franchise in the city unless it applies to

them. And I guarantee when the World Series schedule came out, Cuban or somebody had a fist on the desk, go damn it because home opener is a big day. World Series Game one schedule has been out all year though, you know, yeah, but I don't think the MAVs, you know, we're worried. Yeah, no, no, they weren't. I mean he tweets and has the World Series schedule been out all year? Well, Friday the twenty I mean, yeah, they get it locked in of when

it starts Friday the twenty seventh. We did that massive segment about scheduling in sports. But I'm still incredibly fascinated by it too. What a cluster, dude, that was so good you presented that. Yeah, it was really good. NBA schedule. Oh, when the NBA schedule dropped, I did it and how complex and all the algorithms, and it sounds impossible even now with computers and whatnot, But can you imagine doing that I don't know, forty years ago, Oh my god, Yeah, it might have been easier.

Maybe there's less stuff going on at venues like concerts and stabe, but still, dude, all the travel and everything which made me think there was a I can't remember who it was, but some guy on Twitter posted this thing, and Katie and I had shared it with each other. It's like, maybe this would be good when you know the It was nearing the end

of the baseball season. We never got to it, but it was talking about how the teams travel, how many of them have their own planes, how many of them are using commercial planes, blah blah blah, all of that and just the amount of analytics, the amount of information and details that were involved just to get a baseball train, a baseball team travel schedule through

however many fifty series a year or more was just mind blowing. Well, just because the schedule has come out first, and then you have to I guess they're fairly well oiled. They also have a lot of money for this, you know, it's just a lot of TV companies you gotta make happy

too. But imagine whatever seventy five years ago whenever, like baseball, which was I guess the first to expand to the West coast, right, I think I don't know that sounds right, right, I mean, because it used to just be condensed in that deep northeast to whereas all buses I would imagine, right, yeah, yeah, trains and yeah, trains and then they start finally flying with their propellers. I wonder what that was like when Brooklyn went to LA. That must yes, what we gotta go? Where?

What? On a plane? Like that's a once a year type Like imagine living in New York back then and thinking of going to California. That's like once in your lifetime maybe. I mean that's like us going to Asia, you know, or like some crazy trip. Is a ten hour flight back then? Oh my god, well how long is it now? It's six hours four five right from York to Lay Yeah, five and a half, six five, five and a half. So what was six ten,

six ten? What was the Furthest West baseball team before Brooklyn moved to LA. I wonder Saint Louis, Kansas City? Well, were those even Yeah, I really don't know were those even Saint Louis was It was a major league, yeah, in the fifties, early sixties, and I can't remember when Brooklyn moved. I think it was in the late fifties. I don't know. But anyway, that evolution of the travel requirements had it even wilder back then. Like now they got it figured out well and now they I

wish that I had had that article pulled up. And I know we're going to be talking about this, but just the fact that the way that these players kind of are treated and live their lives now, as far as diet and exercise and all of the thought and infrastructure has to go into that, providing them meals. When do they eat, what do they eat, what's

available to them. Baseball players used to eat so unhealthy, just just meat and whiskey, right, that don't be There are very few Kirby Pucket Tony Gwynn types, you know, maybe a couple back then, pretty common figure for baseball players. Those are awesome players. Cecil Fielder, Yeah, you know, like we don't have any fatties anymore. I know, it sucks because it's always fun when you see when you're like, that's huge. At John Singleton guy for the Astros, that was a big bopper. Yeah,

he's around. We shouldn't have walked in, but we did. But probably an incredible aerobic condition, you know, like fast and could probably run five miles or without too much effort. They look big, but they're still in remarkable shape, whereas back in the day you had to be you know, those guys that are just born with those body types and they don't work out, they don't do anything. They smoke cigarettes and eat steak and whiskey and

they're seventy years old and still rail thin and muscular. That you had to be born that way to be an athlete back then because they weren't working at it like they do now. Now it's like you can be born with not maybe the best body, but have a very disciplined regiment and kind of will yourself and work yourself into professional sports. Yep, That's what I'm gonna do

one day. Now you still have the first time left keV hopes of being lean and yeah hot, there's a part of it's given up on that thirty five. I mean, I've like I still have that. I'm forty seven, I'm like, all right, if I just you know, there's another fifteen and I get some punches, maybe have that nice v the visible hips, you know, and just kind of with the veins. Yeah, maybe it'll happen for me. I'd hate to give up on that. I tell you, I got a motivation. I lost like almost I think I lost

over over thirty pounds. It was on the end of like thirty one pounds. I had a TV show, like there was the motivation, TV's Tighten Up. And it was hard work and it sucked. How'd you do it? Mostly just change your diet and yeah, cut out the roller town. I cut out everything. You can only drink water and you could only eat vegetables and it sucked. Man, she lost thirty pounds, Yeah, I mean it was. That was my top note was like thirty one. Maybe

I got to thirty two. That was your lowest adult weight? Was adult weight? When I got down to like to twelve, that was then yeah to twelve. Yeah that's good. Wait, so you've always been a big dude. I got out of high school and I was a skinny guy in high school, and then once I hit puberty, I got all weird. Man, My metabolism shut down and yeah, crazy, So you've been You were two hundred when you graduated high school. Probably you're a football player though,

too right? Not really didn't get to play. I was on the team. I bet you were. I refused to play. I thought you were a hell of a pulling guard. Hell no, dude, bro, I was not doing anything that involved blocking. Weren't you a cornerback or safety or I told coach I'm playing wide receiver and cornerback, and I also am not playing defense, so don't put me out there. I said, have a seat, little buddy, I'm playing wide receiver. I was in charge of that team. How did you not have to go two ways at a

two way school? Because? Oh, they they couldn't have done They couldn't have said anything with blackmail firmly in play really follow and probas you talk about it honestly. But the point is wide receiver. He had the goods on a teacher or a coach that had been doing something inappropriate. Really, I guess I wouldn't say that I did. You said it, Okay, I would didn't deny it. That's what it was. So Halloween, are you guys going to a Halloween party. Like, there's Halloween parties all weekend.

I don't care about they get going tomorrow nights to be Halloween party Capital. You're about to expose a scandal and all me and yeah, you just kind of segue away finally do something important. There are no scandals. I was a pulling guard for a while, just because you mentioned that. Really, yeah, I remember freshman year. You walk in there and they're like, what do you want to play? You know, offense or defense? You know, and I'm thinking it be the damn quarterback. You kidding me?

So on my offense and they just throw me a jersey that says sixty three on it. I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. This is not the plan. This is nineteen twenty four. Yeah. But when you are a guard, which I did spend a year a year until they moved me to tight end once they realized the weapon. They had the perfect weapon. Good hands. I did have good hands, but I it was a run. We threw the ball four times per game. This sucks.

And we had a wide receiver named Amp Campbell who went to Michigan State on a full ride. We had an Amp. Did you really yelled him. His name was Anthony MP We did too, and I don't is no one in the damn NFL that was Was there an amp Lee, f Su, maybe Amply whatever it was. That's funny you had one because it's cool. As almost just SAIDs it's pretty casual. We had Amp Campbell who went to

Michigan State full ride. I mean, he was a badass. So among the four passes per game we threw, how many do you think went to Amp Campbell? All the future Spartan all four? Yeah, the tight end, pop pass it and get a lot of action. What were you guys doing running the wishbone or the beer or what wishbone? Are you excited? I did everyone love the triple option so much back in the nineties because basically

you were running. It was a confusing formation. And if you had the run confusing after you've like seen them play one time, it just gives you it's either going to fullback, either the quarterbacks going to keep it, or he's going to pay. You got three things they got to stop if you have if all they do, the wishbone is terrible if you don't have the personnel. But if you do have the personnel. It's unstoppable. It's truly

unstoppable. It's stoppable if you have disciplined defense who reads their keys. Okay, the fullback better be a beast than and able to go get five every time you give it to him at the middle. Otherwise, because the fullback can be rendered obsolete. If you're able to shut that down real quick, it's easy. I've just weeded out one of your options because you know they ain't throwing. Nobody stopped our stupid wishbone. It was amazing how our why

even cover the wide receiver. We had, not me, but we had really good dudes. We had Tim Alexander as our quarterback. He went to the NFL seventh rounder, but he played at Oregon State. They were good there. We played. I played against Tommy Frasier, the Nebraska man who won the Heisman or was real close to it. And Peter Warwick, oh wow, of FSU. He went to Bradenton Southeast Southwest Southeast Southeast played against him there. But they're bad ad and we all they ran wishbone, give

or take we all did. It was just a big wishbone fight with tight ends doing nothing. We ran the straight two tight end, one flanker, pro set veer, and I think we had like seven or eight plays that were and maybe like five or six that were the go tos, and if you had the personnel, you just stop it and we were fast. That's

how we won State was sheer speed. You had pulling guards that could run so fast and get out in front, and we would run bases, veers, sweeps, just load up and run and it was unstoppable in those first couple of years, or just like freshman year, because ours, much like every school now, is kind of a football factory where when you're on your freshman team, they don't care you're learning this wishbone. So by the time you get to varsity, everyone knows what they're doing. You know. That's

how it worked. So we weren't even equipped for it for the freshman team, but we still ran it like crazy. So I was a pulling guard a ton, and like, blocking in the trenches is really damn hard, and I still nothing but respect for o lines, which sort of determine how good your team is on every level always and they're like so underappreciated. But that was hard than trenches. But boy, when you got whatever the play was for the pulling guard, and it was you and the tackle pulling.

I mean I remember a dozen times where you, you know, hike, you cut out behind the center, you run and you can see the defensive end who has that moment when their tackle doesn't hit them yep, and they're like, no one's blocked. Bam. Yeah, the blind side like this, they get left, they're like, there's the quarterback boom and you just full speed t off this dude who's probably bigger than you and better than you. But it's like advantage pulling guard. We had the same It was the

same concept, but it was downfield. So I played left side tid end, which is our weak side, and my sole responsibility on ninety five percent of the plays was to chip the defensive end, slow him down a little bit, and just run downfield across field. So if they played did break beyond like five or ten yards, yeah, I'm there to smush crackback time, not really crackback, but basically you would have the you know, I guess you know what they called They didn't even call them safeties back then,

they called them halfbacks. What Yeah, that's dumb. Yeah, we had cornerbacks and we had halfbacks, and your your job was to basically blindside the halfback and smosh him. And man, there's nothing more fun than just an unsuspecting clean hit that just sends some little one hundred and twenty five pound kid that's shaken in his cleats back there into the sideline. Good block Bayless, you heard that once? Good block Bayless Bayless. Yes, And our cornerbacks

we had these two. I'm not trying to turn into Uncle Rico, but on defense are two two cornerbacks. And you probably remember if you guys are running that type of offense, your defense was not dissimilar to this, where the other team would try to do the same thing. You know, they'd run a lot of sweeps, a lot of bellies, and the cornerback's sole responsibility was to cut the lead blocker. So if you had a running back,

you had a couple of pulling guards. The corner job was to just run as fast as he could at the knees, chop him down and chop them down and just create a massive triage in front of the running back to slow him up. But I don't think you can do that anymore. I don't think the corners can can cut lead blockers like that in the NFL or anywhere for that matter. I think I touched the ball three times. I

got two tight end pop passes which we reeled in. Ah. The pop pass very common in those crappy offenses, yes, because the last thing they expect is obviously a pass, much less amp camel not to get it. I think I got a first down once, I got a two point conversion. Yes, that was it. I had big days in JV and Junior I, but when we get DI varsity, big days turner because I was skinny and athletic, and then after I hit puberty and get like just slow

and just it just stuck to my sides the way it did. So everybody wants to talk about hardwork and all these things, I don't believe in them. That's probably also that discovered a beer. I did kind of stop believing in discipline and hard work. You got radio body. I got so mad though, because like when I, uh, my brother's six years younger than me, and coaches leave, or when I left, and then the town kind of changes, some of the coaches leave. My brother was running,

he was the quarterback, and they were running four wide receivers. One running back modern and modern offense, and they did not have the person off for that because my brother got destroyed. That just got killed a lot, you know, because of lack of an offensive line to run that type of offense. Probably, but I was like, you're still on the ball like thirty times a game. It's incredible. It wouldn't never have let us do that. Oh my god, that would have been so great. It would have

been pretty decent receiving tight end. I was slow, but I could catch everything same. I would have caught a good couple few balls a game and probably a couple touched. I mean, obviously nothing's real good because I probably ran up. Maybe I ran a sub five at my best. But yeah, when you're in the wishbowe, you're screwed. I told you this one before. The best thing ever was because I ran a lot of Scout team because I could catch, and we played against a lot of passing teams,

so they needed to simulate that. You know, this is a very noble the real heroes of any team or the Scout team players. And I was standing by the coach once and the running back got hurt or something, and they don't care who they throw in there, and the coach just grabbed me try and he put me in at tailback, like to simulate it because I happen to be the closest one to him. And they say bone right, thirty two dive right, which is you know, wishbone right, but we're

handing it to you on the what two gap? Hell yeah, right to the right of the center. I mean it's a dive right at the middle. I'm like, okay, I know what to do. I got my little running back stance. And it's such chaos football, such chaos that it even if you've played high school you know it a little bit. Well, god, it's chaotic. They snap it. This bastard gives me the ball, and I'm like, all you have to do is run dead straight. And I was with the starting to eat or no, we were a scout

team. Anyway, they blocked it good and I got through the line and I think I feel like I ran for twenty five yards. I probably ran for four. And I remember having a moment of oh my god, I could do this. I might have even I had a flash in my head like they're gonna switch me to running back while I was running this ball. It took a total of one second, and my buddy John Haskins and I'm going to Stanford and got drafted by the Chargers, lit me up so hard.

There has never been a quicker fumble in football history because I completely forgot I had to be holding the football or god forbid, squeezing it, which is another thing in football that you don't think about a prioritizing, is the protect the foot. I mean, we all know protect the ball because we're on our couches like a bunch of faddies, but the actual concept of holding this maybe with one hand and not getting it knocked out or getting lit up.

The ball went flying. I fumbled it up. I'm gonna be the running back. I think I thought that in a milliseconds. Dude, they're switching me, They're switching me to running back, and then boom, flying football and then me and John are landing on the ground laughing. He drilled me so hard, and I was laughing that I forgot. I wasn't supposed to fumble. You forgot you had the football. I don't know, but I just wasn't thinking squeeze it. I was definitely just holding it like I'm

running out playing in the street, mailbox, the mailbox. Did you ever play against any girls? No? Ken in junior highe there was a school, you know, the Little Hamlin Yeah, of course, the Pied Pipers. Pipers. Yes, they had a middle linebacker chick and she was awesome. And our quarterback getting hurt and I was the backup quarterback. So you know, basic steps in the three man, the the and the triple option. You know, okay, we're running, Ve're right thirty. Okay,

here we go, fake the hand off to the full back. I'm keeping it and I'm definitely wanting to pitch the ball because about four times I just got smashed by this girl. I mean, dude, broken ribs. It felt like. I mean, I didn't break a rib, but I was every time, knock the wind out of me. Get up, and I'm like, I've got to go do it. We didn't have a third quarterback, you know, I mean, that was a tough one to take in eighth grade. I mean every time too, like she's like, oh yeah,

they're not giving it to the full back. I was like, okay, fine, I'm just gonna get the full back every time. Now she was clocking you. Oh my God, and you wanted to pitch it was and then I mean, dude, I bubbled one of them too. That's why I thought about this. It's like one of those pitches you're supposed to like, you know, give a little time and it's like the pitch doesn't even go backwards because your phone bullet shoots out. Oh that was that was

a I mean when you're in eighth grade too. That's the worst thing is getting destroyed by a girl at anything. Now I can handle it. Get destroyed by women every single day because of what they do in this world. I didn't recover one fumble in a game. Neither was getting out of it. Someone texts KT you got to share that clip that you shared for the Bendskin Show a couple of years ago of you taking the ball like fifteen yards around the left end. Oh yeah, what does that mean? Dude?

Yeah? Dude yeah. So yeah. One of my buddies is like going through old tapes and digitizing stuff, and he was on a run of sending me highlights and it's a play of you, yeah with the radio call running. No, it's me taking an end around like a video. You guys can see how slow I was I would give anything if somebody would go back to the mid eighties and digitize all of our game film. I know it's got to be in that old ass field house in Knox City in some library

lockdown on VHS. That's well, creative can digitize it for you. I mean cash digitize all of our dad's old boat races and stuff. Yeah, that's true. Wonder if they'd actually trust me to bring those to Dallas and get them done. How much does he charge? I don't know for you, but a healthy double healthy He could probably show me how to do it. Yeah, I'll just do it honestly, but yeah, I would pay for that. Doubles. You have the opposite of you, Mikey. I

could get open because I was tall as crap compared to anybody else. So if basically you just threw the ball above everybody else's head, in theory, I would be able to catch it and I could get open. Problem was cement cinder blocks for Yeah, yeah, terrible, just couldn't see. Me and Sory were both won the award for best Hands. But you get that. You get that stigma early on. You know, if you can't catch when you're a freshman, then you carry that with you the rest of your

your high school football career and they never go back to you. My coach, coach Lobo, I think it was except I caught a lot of balls and scouts team really good, pretty good catches, and he's like, gee, damn it, sir, roh, you got NFL hams and a powder puff body. And I swear I was like, thank you, that is lovely. All you heard was nfln for a reason, it puff body. He also yelled at to you, guys, my buddy Dan, it doesn't

matter who. And they were doing drills and like hitting in each other and he goes, you two look like a pair of big floppy teas slapping together. There's nothing better can coach speak, And especially in high school, yes, cause they're saying stuff. You're like, oh my god, there's a

nasty bit. There's some stuff you couldn't One that I think happened every single year from freshman through senior was when you'd show up for two days and our you know, you're supposed to work out in the summer and hit the weight room and be on this regiment and be running and everything, and he'd show I'd show back up for two a days, winded on sprints by the second one with long hair, and I'd have to get my hair cut, Bayless. If you spend as much time in the weight room as you do plunking

guitars, you might actually start this year plunking guitars. Plunking guitars. You know, they make you go in on Saturday mornings after the Friday game and I go to be quick, and I remember the coach told me and I was like, well, I'm not gonna go. It was like not Saturday early morning. It was like a eleven a m thing. But I had tickets to my first ever Dave Matthews concerts, and it's like you just want to say. I was like fifteen. My parents were going. They were

driving and like my mom and they're like, you know it's Saturday. Like you're good, Like you've been to everything. You never missed a school, you never miss a practice. I've aig deal. We're gonna go up to Dallas early. And I remember telling coach like, I'm gonna make it Saturday morning. Like he goes, you need to get your priority straight. I said, they are straight. I don't even play perfect. What are you talking about? Perfectly along. There's exactly what I want them to be.

They are straight. I don't even want to play football. I only do it because we kind of have to. Yeah, you had to. It wasn't really an option. It was either that or you were in study hall and the only athletic event you would participate in would be the Special Olympics. I'm not kidding. Yeah, it's amazing being told to get your priority straight. Like really, I think they're pretty much in line with what I want

to do. Dude, at that age, I don't have delusions of I don't know the NFL right now, all right, we have a full slate of high school action this weekend, right school games galore. That was the saddest trip down memory lane. We highlight the negatives. We didn't highlight all of our highlights. No one wants to hear that. Wait to see my football highlight. I'm going to show you in the break, JJ understand. I bet JJ would have let you up. She had actually broken those ribs

broke OKT. Yeah, get the football handed a lot of anger in high school. I probably would. You could have caught me because it's a slow man on your worst end around ever okay, coming up, next, most important thing in the world. It's clear what the most important thing in the world is you do for this is it's world series time, The Rangers. The Rangers series, they're already doing bits next to ninety seven won the Freak

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