Where do they go for Homecoming? | Brian Estridge & Mac Engel

Show Notes

Mike Rhyner is in the nurturing bio-sphere of the mothership with two heavy-hitters of the Fort Worth sports scene: Brian Estridge, the unmistakable voice of TCU football and basketball, and Mac Engel, the columnist who has made a career out of poking sacred cows at the Star-Telegram.

This episode isn’t your standard “rah-rah college football” pep rally. Nope, this is three guys who have seen everything pulling no punches about the state of sports today. From TCU’s rise (and how Josh Hoover is suddenly everyone’s new crush), to the absolute Wild West that is NIL and the transfer portal, they dissect how college athletics has turned into a giant ATM with shoulder pads. Spoiler: loyalty to teams is out, loyalty to whoever’s paying is in.

And because sports talk is never just about sports, Mike, Brian, and Mac veer into the dying gasps of newspapers and radio, the joy of covering legends (and clowns), and the absolute absurdity of trying to keep up in an industry where management decisions seem designed to sink the ship faster. It’s sharp, it’s funny, and it’s dripping with the kind of perspective you only get from guys who’ve lived it.

Chapters

0:02 – TCU, Josh Hoover, and the Surprise Start
Estridge explains why the Frogs might actually be for real this season.

4:21 – Beating Belichick? Yep, Apparently That Happened
How TCU toppled UNC and what it says about coaching transitions.

9:38 – NIL: Name, Image, Luggage
Why college sports now feels less like school spirit and more like a transfer market.

16:57 – Fans Love Players, Not Programs
How player mobility has completely rewired fan allegiances.

22:43 – Money Talks: NIL’s Growing Pains
The upsides, the ugly sides, and why nobody’s figured out how to police it.

31:28 – RIP Newspapers (And Maybe Radio Too)
Mack Engel explains how to kill media: cut the talent, then wonder why no one listens.

34:35 – Life in the Booth (and the 5 AM Alarm Clock Club)
War stories from careers that started long before podcasts were cool.

41:48 – If You’re Gonna Rip a Guy, Show Up
Brian’s take on journalistic accountability—and why too many skip the hard part.

52:21 – Nostalgia, Johnny Unitas, and Draft Day Weirdness
Because no episode is complete without a trip down memory lane.

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Creators and Guests

Host

Mike Rhyner

Mike Rhyner… "a little on the bumpy side, but rather likable"…so stated famously by a grade school teacher in Oak Cliff, where Mike grew up. A complicated guy, yet a guy who can do long division and remember call strike three to A Rod. Probably best left unattended. Don't expect assistance from him if a medical situation arises.

What is Your Dark Companion Podcast?

"Whatever I want it to be about on a given day; is what it is." Your Dark Companion couples your familiar friends from radio, Mike and Grubes! Mike brings his classic interviews that draw you in, and Grubes—The Devil—drops…well the drops, and throws the occasional grenade. Mike likes to draw on his fascinating acquaintances and friends allowing them to tell their stories as you've never heard them. But he also goes outside his network, sharing Grubes' network, and often outside of both, to bring you those they don't know, but believe have a story that will make you laugh, make you think, think differently, or just entertain you…"that's what we are trying to do here."

0:00:02 - (Rhyner): Hey, everybody. Mike Reiner of your dark companion here to talk to you about almaximo. Football, soccer, F1. They are our Spanish language show. It features Victor Vialba, the Spanish voice of the Dallas Cowboys and the Dallas Mavericks. And Carlos Nava, ESPN Deportes, reporter of NFL, mlb, NBA boxing and soccer. They give the majority's look at sports and all that that implies. They are Almaximo. Check them [e-mail]
0:00:34 - (Rhyner): sunsetloungedfw Nobody would have thought that I would be the one. Reiner. Sports talk. Baseball, baseball, baseball, baseball. Oh, with the big mic. Oh, okay. All right. Yeah, okay, now I get it. Isn't that a lightning strike, boys? What happened over there, Grego? We had a little light crack right outside the window. All right, all right. Here's a tip for all these Americano league teams.
0:01:10 - (Brian Estridge): Don't.
0:01:11 - (Mac): Wait, you said tip? Yeah.
0:01:12 - (Brian Estridge): Okay.
0:01:13 - (Rhyner): The P. Keep jamming the ticket colon. Nothing but a big Gen X jerk off. Is this a cool night or what? Although somebody would hear that. Go. I'm back. Hello again, everybody. Welcome to another episode of your dark companion, America's favorite podcast. And we're in here inside the nurturing biosphere of the mothership. Today we're ready to talk about.
0:01:51 - (Mac): I.
0:01:51 - (Rhyner): Don'T know, whatever pops up. But a lot of it is going to center around college football because I don't know if you know this or not, but college football is underway. And guess what? As of tomorrow night, the NFL will be underway. Yeah. How you like that? You like that? You ready for this? Well, regardless, that's what you got. But let's stick with the college world today. We can get into the pros some other time because we have with us today Brian Estridge, the longtime play by play voice of TCU football.
0:02:34 - (Brian Estridge): How you doing, brother?
0:02:35 - (Rhyner): I'm doing great. How are you doing, man?
0:02:37 - (Brian Estridge): It's good to see you, man. It's good to be here. Honored to be here, man.
0:02:40 - (Rhyner): Well, we're honored to have you and very appreciative of you doing this.
0:02:44 - (Brian Estridge): We can say anything on this show, right?
0:02:46 - (Rhyner): Oh, yeah.
0:02:46 - (Brian Estridge): Sweet.
0:02:47 - (Rhyner): Oh, yeah. Anything at all.
0:02:49 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, we could talk about anybody.
0:02:51 - (Rhyner): Yeah, you can.
0:02:52 - (Brian Estridge): Good. Our former bosses. Yeah, okay.
0:02:55 - (Rhyner): That's always at play.
0:02:56 - (Brian Estridge): I'm all in.
0:02:57 - (Rhyner): Especially for me.
0:02:58 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, I'm all in there.
0:03:01 - (Rhyner): Now, that other voice you're hearing is a guy who was nice enough to come in here and give us a hand with this today. You know him from the Engel angle heard over on the Sunset Lounge. He is also a sports columnist, also of the Star Telegram, actually, first and foremost.
0:03:23 - (Brian Estridge): Don't you have to say the sports columnist?
0:03:25 - (Rhyner): I guess you do start telegram.
0:03:27 - (Mac): Not a lot of us.
0:03:28 - (Brian Estridge): Yes. Just say the.
0:03:31 - (Rhyner): Well, a long time when you could be an. A sports columnist and one of several. He was one of several. Now he's the guy. He is the great Mack Engel.
0:03:41 - (Mac): Thank you very much, Mike. It's nice to see you.
0:03:43 - (Rhyner): Good to see you as always. Now we got to talk a little TCU football for sure today because they got off to a pretty rousing start, I would say, with a big win over North Carolina. And ordinarily you might say, okay, North Carolina basketball school. That's, that's, that's nice. And you might think, okay, let's pat TCU on the head and send them out to play with the other kids. This time around, though, it's different because the eyes of football America were on this game the other night.
0:04:21 - (Rhyner): Why? Because North Carolina is now coached by Bill Belichick and TCU laid a thrashing on him. Did you see that coming?
0:04:36 - (Brian Estridge): I didn't see the ass whipping it was. I, I thought there was a shot that North Carolina might be bad because 70 new players there were ran off that you knew Matt could recruit. He might not be a great ex's nose guy, but he could recruit players.
0:04:55 - (Rhyner): Yeah.
0:04:55 - (Brian Estridge): Mac being Brown. Yeah. I mean, I. So when, when they had 70 new faces and then you see who they took and you thought they weren't exactly top of the line players and I thought TCU was going to be. I, I think TCU has some talent, so. But I didn't see that coming, Mike. I didn't see what took place. And then after drive one and they drive down and score, you obviously didn't see it coming. You thinking, oh, this might be for real here.
0:05:18 - (Brian Estridge): But then after that it was just on, you know, it was easy.
0:05:22 - (Rhyner): Did you notice any one particular thing that seemed to turn the game TCU's way?
0:05:27 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, they made.
0:05:27 - (Rhyner): It must have happened really early.
0:05:28 - (Brian Estridge): It did, yeah. They made a couple of adjustments along the defensive line. I, I think that was the one thing they weren't pre for what they were going to see out of North Carolina's offense. You know, they brought an extra offensive lineman in at times. I think that was a little something that caught them off guard. They became a little more aggressive defensively. They went small up front a couple of times with the D line, did TCU just to use their speed. And I think those made. Those were some adjustments and I think some of it is just Kind of, hey, settling down. I mean, you had 50,000 people there, yet the other LT ahead, Michael Jordan, Mia Ham. There are a lot of goats in the house, you know, for that game. And so I think they had to get kind of get past all that. And then after the dust settled, you realized, okay, we're better than they are. I think that's what TCU decided. And they went out, took care of business.
0:06:15 - (Mac): Did I. I thought they would win. I did not realize. And hit me about the middle of the second quarter or whenever it was, TCU got to pick six to go up by 10. And you knew when they went up by 10, game was over. Yeah, I wasn't moving the ball at all, but. But the thing I think what's happened is that Belichick, after 20 years, really did become the extreme version of the coach who believed his own bullshit.
0:06:42 - (Mac): And I'm sorry. I mean, the guy's a great coach. I mean, he was. What he did with the Giants under Parcells and in some other places, and certainly what he did as a defensive guy in New England, you can't take that away from him. But if you don't have players who can do what you want, I don't care how smart you think you are. And, you know, I think the other thing, too, is everybody has an expiration date in that business.
0:07:06 - (Mac): And, you know, Bill Parcell said it. I like to quote him a lot. He's got a lot of good sayings, but at some point, you gotta get off the train. You just do. And he doesn't want to because he doesn't know what else to do with his life. And meanwhile, the NFL has told him in two coaching cycles, yeah, we don't. We don't want you anymore. You had a great run. And the fact that he got a run as long as he did is remarkable. But to think that he's going to walk down to the college level, which I know everybody wants to say, well, it's the pro game. No, it's not.
0:07:32 - (Mac): It's not. I know guys are getting paid, but these are still college kids, and they still. A lot of them have to accommodate for classes and maturing, things that pros don't have to do. I'm like, why did you think this was going to work? It didn't work for Bill Walsh at Stanford, and it's not going to here. And he. Meanwhile, he loaded up a roster that's just inadequate, and TCU exposed all of it.
0:07:52 - (Rhyner): Are you surprised? Are either of you guys surprised that nobody want.
0:07:57 - (Brian Estridge): Wanted Him.
0:07:58 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:07:59 - (Rhyner): Because, I mean, I'm not.
0:08:00 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. He must just be a pain in the ass.
0:08:02 - (Mac): I mean, nightmare.
0:08:03 - (Brian Estridge): I mean, he's just got to be that way.
0:08:05 - (Rhyner): Yeah.
0:08:05 - (Brian Estridge): To the point where you can't get past it.
0:08:07 - (Rhyner): That's why on one hand, I'm not surprised that nobody wanted him. But on the other hand, there's always somebody that's crazy enough and desperate enough out there.
0:08:16 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:08:17 - (Brian Estridge): You know, you would think I would.
0:08:18 - (Mac): The thing that. I think the age thing worked. If he was 63, he gets a job. He's not. He's 73.
0:08:24 - (Brian Estridge): Right.
0:08:25 - (Mac): And I think when Atlanta interviewed him and he thought he was the, you know, the leader in the clubhouse, and then they said, we're gonna go to this guy who didn't work out in Tampa, that said to me everything. And I also think the owner in New England, Bob Kraft, must have buried him.
0:08:43 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. He must wake around.
0:08:44 - (Mac): Yeah. Oh. Whenever they were sitting around having drinks at the owner's meetings and they're, you know, at five star hotels and they're just chit chatt and telling stories, he must have absolutely buried him. And I think that's what ended.
0:08:55 - (Rhyner): He must have just unloaded all the things that he couldn't get Belichick to do, all the, you know, normal things that, you know, when you work for somebody, the things that you will do for them. And. Yeah, he must have just unloaded on all the things that he wanted Belichick to do that he just wouldn't.
0:09:10 - (Mac): And I think that's why Belichick, to this day, harbors so much anger and resentment towards him, even though what he should do is bow down and thank him. Because he was the only one who was going to give him a job.
0:09:21 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. At the time.
0:09:21 - (Mac): At the time.
0:09:22 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:09:22 - (Mac): And he did. He was going to fire him.
0:09:24 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:09:24 - (Mac): Drew Bledsoe not getting hurt, and he played out the rest of the way. Belichick was going to get fired.
0:09:29 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:09:29 - (Mac): But they found Brady and 20 years of magic.
0:09:32 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:09:34 - (Rhyner): Well, all that's well and good, but we're not here to talk about North Carolina.
0:09:38 - (Mac): This isn't North Carolina.
0:09:40 - (Rhyner): This is not North Carolina talk.
0:09:42 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. It's over.
0:09:43 - (Rhyner): This is TC Utah.
0:09:45 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:09:46 - (Rhyner): So let me ask you, Brian, how real was what we saw the other day?
0:09:50 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, that's a great question, Mike, because I'm not sure if it's, how bad is North Carolina or how good is tcu?
0:09:55 - (Rhyner): Yeah.
0:09:56 - (Brian Estridge): And it's probably somewhere in between.
0:09:57 - (Rhyner): Sure.
0:09:57 - (Brian Estridge): You know, it's probably. It's probably a little bit of both. You know, I think you had Galloway on last week, right? Yeah, we did the other day. And, you know, Galloway had that saying forever. It's about the quarterback, you know, and it is. And TCU's got a good one, you know, and Josh Hoover's a. A guy that turned down a whole bunch of money from Tennessee to stay at tcu. That tells you a little bit about his worth. I think that, you know, hey, Tennessee and SEC school wanted him, and he's a great kid.
0:10:25 - (Brian Estridge): And, you know, you kind of pull for a guy like that. I think he showed in game one that, you know, he's. He's a quality player. And so as long as you've got an upright Josh Hoover, I think you got a chance. And especially the way the game is today, man. And, you know, this is also a team that was homegrown pretty much. I mean, yeah, there are some portal transfers that are making a difference, but the majority of these players have been in the program, and that's the way Sonny wants it. It's not, as he said, this is a relationship program. It's not a transactional program.
0:10:53 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:10:53 - (Brian Estridge): You know, they're not going out and buying 70 new players. And so with that comes some continuity that I still think has value in this game. And I think we saw it on Monday night. You know, they brought in 70 new players. And by the end of that game, I thought the body language for North Carolina was awful. Oh, they quit, you know, and. Yeah, and I'm thinking, man, it's game one for Bill Belichick, and you're already acting like that.
0:11:16 - (Brian Estridge): So I think that. I think that where. That. That's where having guys that have been, you know, in the program for a while make a difference.
0:11:23 - (Mac): I think the thing that really struck out to me about the first weekend was Texas is loaded with quality quarterbacks. Yeah. SMU has Kevin Jennings.
0:11:32 - (Brian Estridge): Oh, you talking about from the state school?
0:11:35 - (Rhyner): I'm thinking, man, what game were you.
0:11:39 - (Mac): Hear me out. No. So the state is loaded with quality.
0:11:43 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:11:44 - (Mac): Quarterbacks. Yeah. Baylor. Baylor has.
0:11:46 - (Brian Estridge): Sawyer Robertson didn't play great.
0:11:48 - (Mac): No, he didn't. But he's. He's been good. I thought he was good. Auburn kind of did a number on him a little bit. Marcel Reed at A. M. Yeah. Looks really talented. Obviously, Kevin Jennings did a phenomenal, phenomenal job last season at smu. You have Arch Manning, who got all of the. The headlines because of his last name, and the best one might have been Josh Hoover. Yeah, I mean, he had. And you think of the guy, he's played 24 college games. That's a lot.
0:12:12 - (Brian Estridge): That's.
0:12:12 - (Mac): That's a lot in this day and age. And there were certain plays that he made that only an older guy could make where all he did was just move around a little bit, got himself square and he made really nice throws. And I eventually think Arch Manning will do that. He looked terrible. God, he looks so bad, some of those things. What are you doing?
0:12:30 - (Rhyner): Yeah, I mean, it was just beyond description.
0:12:33 - (Mac): It was bad. Yeah, it was bad. But I. I think, you know, when you look at all. And it'll settle down and.
0:12:38 - (Rhyner): Yeah, he will, he will.
0:12:39 - (Mac): But the, The Hoover thing, I mean, he's a fourth year player. He's been there for four years and he's pretty good. So I think, you know, we. You don't know really know who's what yet. You have to give it another three or four weeks. But that, to me was the most encouraging sign, was this is a guy who keeps getting better and better.
0:12:56 - (Rhyner): Yeah.
0:12:56 - (Mac): If your quarterback keeps getting better, better, then you can do a lot.
0:12:59 - (Brian Estridge): You know how us old guys like to compare?
0:13:01 - (Mac): Oh, yeah.
0:13:02 - (Brian Estridge): We always have to flash back with these new ones.
0:13:04 - (Mac): Just like, do you do that with your wife? With girlfriends?
0:13:06 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, yeah, I've tried that. Remind me. Yeah, right. No, the. But, but with Josh, I've kind of done that already. I'm like, hey, who does he remind me of? And because I do play that. That sort of comparison game, and if you want to think of like a fairly new era guy, he reminds me of Drew Brees. You know, he kind of reminds me of Drew Bree's a little bit shorter. But if you want to even go back, Max. Not as old as you and I are. If you want to go back. I mean, he reminds me of Pat Hayden.
0:13:33 - (Brian Estridge): Remember Pat? Smaller than Josh, I think. I think they're about the same size. You know, Pat could run around a little bit, but he could throw it. They had great teams of the Rams when he was there. He kind of reminds me of Pat Hayden, the way he carries himself, you know, and so, you know, if you're six feet tall and could run around like that, it's a good thing.
0:13:52 - (D): I covered Josh when he was in high school.
0:13:54 - (Brian Estridge): Did you really?
0:13:54 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:13:55 - (D): Rockwall Heath with Inside High School Sports.
0:13:58 - (Brian Estridge): He's.
0:13:58 - (D): He's been a great kid.
0:13:59 - (Mac): He's.
0:14:00 - (D): He's a great person off the field too, not just on there. So I love. I think he's awesome and I love seeing him in tcu.
0:14:05 - (Mac): Well, the one thing I Liked about. And I think it goes to say for all those guys that I mentioned, Robertson, Jennings, Reed, I can't really speak to as much, certainly Arch, because the way he grew up, all these guys act like the adult. And they were in the room.
0:14:18 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:14:18 - (Mac): They've all been groomed now.
0:14:19 - (Rhyner): Yeah.
0:14:20 - (Mac): Since they were like 13. To be older than they really are. Like, none of them you would come away with saying, well, this guy's a knucklehead. He's an immature idiot.
0:14:26 - (D): It's funny.
0:14:27 - (Rhyner): Don't all coaches want their quarterback to be like the leaders of the team? I mean, that's certainly one thing that hasn't changed in the game of football.
0:14:35 - (Brian Estridge): Has won the one.
0:14:36 - (D): You all know he was a better baseball player than he was a football player, right?
0:14:39 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, he was a great pitcher. Yeah.
0:14:40 - (D): Was it really going to get drafted?
0:14:41 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. I even said, I said that Monday night when he, when he threw the pick. I thought he's. I said, he's a little high on the four seam there. I mean, it was because. But you know, you think about it though, you're right about it. I mean, the one thing, when we asked him last week, hey, what was the one thing in the offseason you want to be better at? When we were talking to Josh Hoover, Mike, and you know how guys will always say, oh, I got to work on my footwork, I want to work on my decision making.
0:15:04 - (Brian Estridge): And he said, I need to be more consistent. And I said, as a player. And he said, no, with my teammates, I want to be because they follow my lead. I just want to make sure I'm working hard every day. I'm consistent in my attitude every day. I'm, you know, I'm consistent in how I eat every day. I'm demonstrating, you know, things that they should see. And I'm thinking, how old are you, dude? You know, you sound like a 40 year old who's trying to get that next job.
0:15:30 - (Mac): I'm 52 and I wish I said.
0:15:32 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, no joke, I'd like to eat this thing. Yeah, exactly. I mean, so there's, there's something to be said about that. But, you know, the thing you'd like about him is his dad was a linebacker. His dad played college linebacker at Colorado State. And that's how he taught him how to play offense from the other side. So he, yeah, he taught Josh about defenses and how you attack them. He goes. Because he would say, okay, you know, hey, if they're in this, this is what they're trying to get you to do. This is how you beat it.
0:16:02 - (Brian Estridge): And so he taught him from the other side. So he kind of has that. That skill set that not all quarterbacks have had, you know, or been blessed with, I guess.
0:16:08 - (Mac): Yeah, he looks good, I think. Yeah, he looks pretty good. And when you look at TCU's best teams in the last 20 years, they all have one thing in common. Quarterbacks who are upperclassmen, juniors and seniors.
0:16:18 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:16:19 - (Mac): Yeah. And that's a common for a lot of teams with them. More. More so than. Than most.
0:16:22 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:16:23 - (Rhyner): Let me ask you guys this, because I haven't had to pay a lot of attention to college athletics for a few years now, and I've done a real good job of that.
0:16:37 - (Mac): You've excelled?
0:16:38 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:16:40 - (Rhyner): In fact, it's one of the best things I've ever done.
0:16:42 - (Brian Estridge): Right. Really good at it.
0:16:45 - (Rhyner): How hard has it been for you guys who are in the big middle of it and have been for all this time, to adjust to the way it's. To what it's turned into?
0:16:57 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. I try not to think about it. I try not to think about what they're making. I try not to think about, you know, the fact that a kid could only be here for a semester. It's not a year. Yeah, they're here for a semester. Try not to think about whether or not they're going to class. And I. And. And I'm not talking about TCU there, and I'm not spinning that because I work there, but I do know that they do go to class and there are some places that they don't.
0:17:21 - (Brian Estridge): I try not to think about any of that crap, man. Because if you do, then you kind of go, what am I doing here? You know, why am I watching some 19 year old who's making $500,000 powed on the sideline? You know, it makes. It would make the job a lot more difficult. So I don't even think. I try not to think about it. I don't think about. I don't think about lines. I don't think about any of the gambling stuff because I just don't want to know. It just.
0:17:45 - (Mac): Would lines interest me? Just to give me an idea.
0:17:48 - (Brian Estridge): Well, you're trying to get out of the hole.
0:17:49 - (Mac): Yeah, yeah. I'm just chasing it, you know? What time's the game?
0:17:51 - (Brian Estridge): On a light. Exactly.
0:17:53 - (Mac): You know what I mean? And again, he kept packing. Any kickball I can get on? No, but I think the thing that bothers me about it and I was wrong. I was really wrong about paying student athletes. I Was like, it'll never work, blah, blah, It'll be Pandora's box. Because that's what all the decision makers in the administration and the NCAA had said forever. Well, we can't do it. It'll implode. Well, that's not the case.
0:18:13 - (Mac): People are still playing. People are still paying, all that stuff, and it's. It's going to go on. And the thing that I noticed what's really tough is Brian and I, we were at dinner on Sunday night. He was nice enough to take me to dinner with his radio crew. This is the first time that I've really noticed my appetite for it has changed. Not because kids are getting paid. Kids are getting paid long before it became formal.
0:18:34 - (Brian Estridge): Sure, sure.
0:18:35 - (Mac): The thing that's made it so hard is I don't know who's on the teams. I have no clues on the college basketball teams.
0:18:41 - (Brian Estridge): Right.
0:18:41 - (Mac): None.
0:18:42 - (Brian Estridge): Right.
0:18:42 - (Mac): But with the football teams, I'm like, how do you sell and market a team beyond just the logo and the tradition? When your roster changes more than professional teams. Yeah, right. The turnover. Now 33 of your roster. 33. 33 of an NFL roster changes year to year. I bet in college it's even more than that now.
0:19:02 - (Brian Estridge): Oh, I'm sure.
0:19:03 - (Mac): So I don't know, like, what are you selling? You've got to have some thread from year to year, other than, you know, coach. But I. It's hard in the sense that it's. It has affected my thirst for it, for sure.
0:19:16 - (Brian Estridge): I think it'll hurt things in the end, though, in this regard. I think it hurts things for schools in that for years we've had affinity for our program.
0:19:24 - (Rhyner): Yeah.
0:19:24 - (Brian Estridge): You know, your alma mater, that's who you pulled for. And the players all came along. But what's happening is. And we see this with fantasy football, too. I'm a team fan. I'm a fan of a team. Okay. My son, who's in college is a fan of players because of fantasy football and building their draft and things of that nature. So he doesn't pull for a specific team team. He pulls for guys. He pulls for baseball players. He pulls for football players.
0:19:50 - (Brian Estridge): He has no affinity for a team. He pulls for players. And I think in the end, that's going to hurt, you know, the universities of the world who all of a sudden, hey, I'm not a fan of. I'm not a fan of tcu. I'm a fan of Josh Hoover. And wherever Josh Hoover plays, that's who I pull for. And I think that's bad.
0:20:05 - (Mac): Well, the one thing that I've. I've thought about this a lot, like there was some kid who announced he transferred. I just happened the other day. He's on his sixth team.
0:20:14 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:20:15 - (Mac): And the one thing that. That set you apart as an NCAA Division 1 athlete, or just an NCAA athlete, was if you stayed for four years. And I realize some of this is, you know, old people talk, but you could have value to your community if you developed a name there in three or four years. Right. And you could be a part of that community and they would reward you. And it's a give and take. And I'm sure SMU's loaded with guys like that. Right.
0:20:39 - (Mac): And they use that relationship and all those friendships that they made in their three or four years and their celebrity and their fame to enhance their. Their worth and their life after they graduated. Who the hell is going to do that now?
0:20:52 - (Rhyner): What do they do? I mean, you're talking about three or four years. Nobody got time for that now.
0:20:57 - (Brian Estridge): What do they go for homecoming, you know, if they're in six different schools.
0:21:00 - (Mac): Seriously.
0:21:01 - (Brian Estridge): Seriously. Where do they go back for homecoming? You know, where. Where we won't retire any more jerseys.
0:21:07 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:21:07 - (Brian Estridge): You know, because nobody's there long enough.
0:21:09 - (Mac): So I was at Duke on. On Monday. No, Tuesday I went to Duke. They were nice enough to let me in. Camera.
0:21:14 - (Brian Estridge): Beautiful.
0:21:14 - (D): Yeah, it is one of the best. I wanted to go to Duke. That's where I wanted to play.
0:21:18 - (Mac): I wanted.
0:21:18 - (Brian Estridge): And then they looked at her resume.
0:21:20 - (Mac): Yeah. Would you have gotten in?
0:21:23 - (D): Yeah.
0:21:24 - (Brian Estridge): As an athlete? She could have. Yeah.
0:21:26 - (D): Yeah. Barely, but I would have.
0:21:27 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:21:27 - (D): I had a 32 on my ACT and they wouldn't let me into Georgetown.
0:21:30 - (Mac): So I had 32 when I took it three times.
0:21:33 - (Brian Estridge): Exactly 32.
0:21:34 - (Mac): So I'm at. I'm at Duke. And they let me into Cameron Indoor Stadium, which is. It's really neat place.
0:21:40 - (Brian Estridge): Really.
0:21:41 - (Mac): It's really cool. It's really cool. And I'm looking up there, looking at all their jerseys. They're retired. The last Jersey retired was J.J. redick.
0:21:49 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. Might be the last one because he graduated.
0:21:51 - (Mac): And they've held on to the. You have to graduate from Duke for us to retire your number. And I'm like, who the hell's gonna stick around for.
0:21:59 - (Brian Estridge): They're not to graduate. Think about. Remember the. Remember we used to think about thousand point scores in college basketball?
0:22:05 - (Rhyner): Yeah.
0:22:05 - (Brian Estridge): Nobody will score a thousand points at a school anymore.
0:22:07 - (Mac): No, they will now because some guys will get paid, some guys will stick.
0:22:11 - (Brian Estridge): Just stay for a couple of Years.
0:22:12 - (Mac): Oh, yeah. They'll stay longer now because it.
0:22:14 - (Brian Estridge): You're not going to have the number you used to have. I mean, thousand points used to be a big deal in college, and there's nobody. Nobody's gonna get there anymore.
0:22:20 - (Rhyner): It's crazy.
0:22:22 - (Brian Estridge): God, I know. It's a weird world.
0:22:25 - (Rhyner): It's a whole different dynamic.
0:22:27 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:22:28 - (Rhyner): And, man, I'm really having a hard time getting my head around.
0:22:30 - (Mac): Well, when you were. When you were in the 80s and you lived in Dallas and SMU was rolling and everybody knew what the score was. Yeah. Was it better then.
0:22:42 - (Brian Estridge): Because guys were getting paid.
0:22:43 - (Mac): Yeah, guys.
0:22:43 - (Rhyner): I mean, yeah, those guys were getting paid and everybody knew it. But at the same time, it was not something that. Well, when I was going to say it's not something that you heard talked about. But you did hear it talked about, did you?
0:22:58 - (D): It just wasn't so blatant. Like.
0:23:00 - (Mac): Yeah, now even.
0:23:01 - (D): Even when we were playing. I was 10. I was 15 years ago. Gosh darn it.
0:23:05 - (Rhyner): It just wasn't a part of the order of things. Back.
0:23:08 - (Brian Estridge): Back then, we weren't talking about principle anyway. Yeah, we weren't. We were. And you didn't. You didn't know what they were making.
0:23:14 - (D): Well, and it wasn't million dollar contract.
0:23:17 - (Mac): They all, like Eric Dickerson and Craig James were a thing the other day at smu and they were talking about. And they're very honest now about what they got. And it wasn't that much.
0:23:28 - (Brian Estridge): What was it? It was like 35 grand.
0:23:30 - (Mac): Not even that much.
0:23:31 - (Brian Estridge): Really.
0:23:31 - (Mac): It was less than that. Yeah. I mean, these weren't big numbers. These were, you know, four or five hundred dollars and things like that and cover meals and gas. And now Eric, you know, famously got the Trans Am, which would have been worth a lot, but Eric is really honest about. No, this is what I got. That was. It was more than that guy. But it won that much.
0:23:49 - (Brian Estridge): You know, free shoes and.
0:23:50 - (Mac): Yeah. Swag.
0:23:52 - (Brian Estridge): 100 bucks in a pizza box.
0:23:53 - (Mac): Yeah. I mean, stuff like that. And now. Now you look at what these guys are getting, and you're like, you got $2 million and you're not even going to play in the bowl game because you think it's a dog crap game. I'm like, what in the hell?
0:24:06 - (Rhyner): These guys are 20 years old. They're getting $2 million.
0:24:08 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, well, without. Without really binding contracts either. That's the other thing, you know, like. Like Mac was saying, Mike, they could be getting paid depends on the early stages of nil, especially. They weren't forced to play in a bowl game even with that contract. Are they now, Some of them are being written to where. Yeah. Which is real kind of gray area. But I mean, they could still opt out of a game and get paid, you know, and it's like, how does that work? You know, and. And then you know, it. Of course, this is a pro game too.
0:24:42 - (Brian Estridge): All of a sudden you're paying a guy $400,000 at center who all of a sudden is averaging four points and four boards and thinking, I'm not getting my money's worth here.
0:24:49 - (Mac): Sorry. Well, that's the one part of it. And I think they'll figure it out. But I'm like, well, then you've got to prorate these contracts. I understand. If the kid says, I really don't want to play in that game. Right. I get it. So if you don't and I, yeah. Deduct like, okay, that's fine, then we're.
0:25:06 - (Brian Estridge): Not going to give you your final problem. Then it's pay for play. And that's illegal.
0:25:11 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:25:11 - (Brian Estridge): Pay for plays. Illegal. Yeah. You know, I always thought you can't, you can't pay them to play. Well, then you can't separate a game like that.
0:25:22 - (D): I will say this. Pat McAfee said it very well, or I.
0:25:26 - (Brian Estridge): Or at least very well. Yeah. He tried to get it out.
0:25:31 - (D): How they talked about, you know, this isn't meant to be for playing. This is meant to be for marketing. This is what look like. But there is no marketing.
0:25:39 - (Mac): They. They did an end around on that.
0:25:41 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:25:41 - (Rhyner): I mean, I mean, what kind of marketing do they do? I'm not seeing billboards of SMU guys everywhere.
0:25:47 - (Brian Estridge): No. And the little bit that there is just the market for it, the market for the marketing is so small that it doesn't matter.
0:25:54 - (Mac): Well, then there's some, there's. Well, there's. And I'll say this, the one part of it I remember the TCU coach, Jamie Dixon, the basketball coach, he and I were talking about the whole nil thing. And I remember you and I had talked about this when they first kind of started it, like they're going to be small opportunities. So they had some social media.
0:26:11 - (D): Chicken express.
0:26:12 - (Mac): Yeah, right. They had some social media expert come and talk to the team and they said, this is what it's going to be. They said they're going to be the high end players like your quarterback or your star basketball. Cooper Flag made a lot of money.
0:26:24 - (Brian Estridge): 28 million.
0:26:24 - (Mac): Yeah. Duke meant a lot. And let's just say half of that number Is real. That's still $15 million or $14 million. He said this is going to come down. He said you're going to be on a high profile program, going to be a great player with a lot of small social. Social media followers. Or you're going to be kind of quirky and funny. You do weird things on social media so that'll make you stand out. Or you're smoking hot.
0:26:45 - (Mac): You're. You're a glorified model.
0:26:47 - (Brian Estridge): Right.
0:26:47 - (Mac): And that's why you look at the LSU gymnast Livy Dunn, who really wasn't that good. And she got hurt a lot, but she's still Division 1 gymnast. That's pretty good. Yeah, but she wasn't that good. Like, they weren't winning championships because of her. She was beautiful and she dressed extremely provocatively.
0:27:02 - (Rhyner): His girlfriend is she.
0:27:03 - (Mac): Paul Skeens, the Pulse.
0:27:05 - (Brian Estridge): A picture.
0:27:05 - (Rhyner): Okay.
0:27:06 - (D): Did y' all see the new girl? The girl at lsu? That's an only fans.
0:27:09 - (Mac): She has an only fans account.
0:27:11 - (D): And she's going. She's gonna be a gymnast at lsu.
0:27:13 - (Brian Estridge): Really?
0:27:13 - (Mac): Yeah. Wow.
0:27:14 - (Brian Estridge): What's going on in lsu?
0:27:16 - (D): I have no idea. As soon as I saw that in.
0:27:19 - (Mac): The world.
0:27:22 - (D): I didn't realize that, like, to me that would be off limit.
0:27:25 - (Mac): Well, and then like the Cavender twins, the. The play of the women's basketball players at the University of Miami.
0:27:30 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:27:31 - (Mac): Like their whole bit, like they're pretty good players.
0:27:33 - (Brian Estridge): They're good players.
0:27:33 - (Mac): They're pretty good.
0:27:34 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:27:35 - (Mac): But their bid is they barely wear any clothes and they're models.
0:27:39 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:27:39 - (Mac): And they're making a lot of money off of it.
0:27:41 - (Brian Estridge): It's crazy.
0:27:42 - (Mac): So. And you can do that now. And that. That is what nil is supposed to be.
0:27:48 - (Brian Estridge): But it's just not a market for it. There's not enough of that.
0:27:51 - (Mac): There is.
0:27:52 - (Brian Estridge): And then what do the dudes do? I mean, what's the equivalent on the men's side?
0:27:55 - (Mac): Oh, is there.
0:27:56 - (D): They're too young.
0:27:58 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, yeah, I know.
0:28:00 - (Mac): I think, I think. I think for. If you're a guy. You said I'm a football player. You know, University of Texas. Hit me up, girls. I'll listen.
0:28:09 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:28:09 - (Mac): And that's it.
0:28:10 - (Brian Estridge): That way.
0:28:10 - (Mac): That's the bit. I'll just listen for an hour and a half.
0:28:14 - (Brian Estridge): I'm a good. Listen me.
0:28:15 - (Mac): I'm a great listener.
0:28:16 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. Try and see.
0:28:17 - (Rhyner): Hell, I could do that.
0:28:18 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:28:19 - (Mac): I don't know.
0:28:20 - (Brian Estridge): Can you pass that?
0:28:22 - (Rhyner): I could fake it.
0:28:23 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:28:23 - (Mac): Right.
0:28:24 - (Rhyner): So does all the. And I know I got you guys in here to talk about other Stuff. No, no, we'll get to it, I promise.
0:28:29 - (Mac): All right.
0:28:30 - (Rhyner): But. But does all of this stuff come under the, I guess, auspices, for lack of a better word, of the school, or is there some outside concern or agency or something like that that handles.
0:28:46 - (Mac): It and, I mean, they changed it.
0:28:47 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. The answer. The answer is yes.
0:28:49 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:28:50 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. I mean, it is kind of. It is both. For.
0:28:52 - (Mac): For.
0:28:53 - (Brian Estridge): For the most part, it was these external groups called collectives. They were out there raising money for.
0:28:59 - (Mac): Athletics, and it's very important to denote they were technically not affiliated with the school, that they were working in conjunction.
0:29:07 - (Brian Estridge): Exactly. Yeah. And employed former employees or whatever they did. So that's the way it was set up. But now that this house settlement has occurred, $20 million is going to come from the schools themselves to student athletes in this revenue sharing that's taking place. So it's just. Mike, it's a mess, man. It really is. It is. It is a mess. And, you know, you said it's not Pandora's box, and I'm just not sure it's completely open yet.
0:29:35 - (Mac): No. You think it get worse?
0:29:37 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:29:37 - (Mac): Do you?
0:29:38 - (Brian Estridge): I think it could get worse. I just. I'm not. I don't know. I just don't know that in 10 years that we're all sitting here doing this podcast talking about college athletics anymore.
0:29:49 - (Mac): I. I think we will.
0:29:50 - (Brian Estridge): You think so?
0:29:50 - (Mac): Yeah, I. I think the. I think there'll be. The dividing lines will keep. The gaps will keep getting bigger.
0:29:56 - (Brian Estridge): Right, right.
0:29:57 - (Mac): But I still see in 10 years, Clemson playing LSU, and are those Clemson.
0:30:03 - (Brian Estridge): Players students at Clemson?
0:30:05 - (Mac): That's. Yeah. I think they're still going to be tethered to that in some way, or.
0:30:11 - (Brian Estridge): Are they just, you know, I don't know how 65 guys are paying.
0:30:15 - (Mac): Well, maybe because I guess technically, I. Technically, I guess if you wanted to. If you're a university, if you wanted to, you could say, okay, they're employees, which I. That's a big deal. Mike, none of these schools want to make these kids.
0:30:28 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. They don't want to make employees.
0:30:30 - (Mac): So that would have to be. That would be the crossover.
0:30:32 - (Brian Estridge): Right.
0:30:33 - (Mac): And then. But the part that I don't understand is if everybody's a member institution of the ncaa, which they are still. I mean, they're still hanging on to that. They're not allowed to enforce basically any rule.
0:30:44 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:30:45 - (Mac): So what's the point?
0:30:46 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. And you never hear. Remember when we were growing up, you are coming along, or in the business, you hear this story about. Or you heard this phrase progression toward A degree that you're progressing toward.
0:30:56 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:30:57 - (Brian Estridge): No one talks about it anymore.
0:30:59 - (Mac): But their graduation rates are through the roof.
0:31:01 - (Brian Estridge): Oh, it's ridiculous. Yeah. Because they're taking all their classes online.
0:31:04 - (Mac): Yeah. Or something.
0:31:04 - (Brian Estridge): Or somewhere. But literally no one talks about progress.
0:31:07 - (Mac): Toward a degree anymore.
0:31:08 - (Rhyner): God, I can't. I can't imagine how many times I heard about my lack of that.
0:31:13 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, exactly. You're ineligible.
0:31:16 - (Mac): Was that one of those Define progress. That's kind of a gray area.
0:31:19 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:31:21 - (Rhyner): All right. This is Brian Estridge, the play by play voice of TCU football. You do basketball too?
0:31:27 - (Brian Estridge): I do basketball too, yeah.
0:31:28 - (Rhyner): All right. If it's TCU sports, he's your guy. Mack Engel of the Ford Worth Star Telegram and the Eagle angle with us here. You still are with the Star Telegram.
0:31:41 - (Brian Estridge): Exactly. Are they still printing?
0:31:43 - (Rhyner): Hey, you have to ask these days?
0:31:46 - (Mac): Trust me. I, I, I. You're not the first person that's asked me that in the last week.
0:31:51 - (Brian Estridge): Who'd we lose? Last week was the Atlanta Journal Constitution.
0:31:54 - (Mac): Yes.
0:31:55 - (Brian Estridge): Stopped printing.
0:31:56 - (Mac): Yep.
0:31:56 - (Rhyner): Really?
0:31:57 - (Mac): That's coming.
0:31:59 - (Brian Estridge): AJC stops printing. The Atlanta Journal constitute great paper.
0:32:02 - (Mac): Paper that's coming. That's industry wide gone.
0:32:03 - (Rhyner): Wasn't there another one a couple weeks.
0:32:06 - (Mac): Time pick you or the New Orleans. The New Orleans paper did it. They're all going to do it eventually. It's very expensive. And you know when I go. When I go to airports. I was an airport yesterday. I was in Raleigh. I saw a few people reading books. Like a physical book. Everybody was on their phone. They're all reading stuff now. Mostly people are just watching stuff now. Yeah, but I would be in the next, you know, eight to 10 years. I think most physical newspapers will be gone.
0:32:34 - (Rhyner): Raleigh yesterday, your Dark Companion today.
0:32:39 - (Brian Estridge): Glamorous.
0:32:41 - (Rhyner): All right, this is Brian Estridge. This is Mack Engel and it's time now for the most exciting part of any your Dark Companion episode. The dreaded and feared mid show read.
0:32:57 - (Mac): Brian, you've done these?
0:32:58 - (Brian Estridge): I've had before, yes.
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0:34:04 - (Rhyner): Begin your healing at the House of Healing. And effective now, all vape products will be sold online only. Go to cbddallas.com for more or stop in there and see it for yourself. Man, what the heck? Why not? You got nothing to lose. Do I have another one here, Ashley, or is that it? That's it. Okay. All right. So we can get back into wherever the hell this is going here. How long you been on the gig now?
0:34:35 - (Brian Estridge): 26 years.
0:34:36 - (Rhyner): 26 years.
0:34:38 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. It has been a good run. Yeah, It's a lot of bowl games. I was thinking about that the other day. I probably should add it up. I think it's like 22 bowl games. 22. 23 bowl games.
0:34:46 - (Mac): Oh, no, no, Mike. Speaking of bowl games, you need to ask Brian. You should be very proud of this.
0:34:50 - (Brian Estridge): What?
0:34:51 - (Mac): Brian's done a really good job of cultivating his own side hustle. I hope I'm not letting the cat out of the bag here in the bowl. The bowl world. Yeah, he's got his own little deal. It's not little. Your own deal where you. How many bowl games do you.
0:35:04 - (Brian Estridge): 21.
0:35:05 - (Mac): We. 21 bowl games.
0:35:06 - (Brian Estridge): And we produce, syndicate, and sell 21 different bowl games on national radio.
0:35:12 - (Rhyner): Really?
0:35:13 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:35:14 - (Rhyner): I did not know that.
0:35:15 - (Brian Estridge): I know. Cold bowl season radio. Yeah. I had to keep it on the down low when we were working for that company, but since I don't work there anymore, I'll have to keep it on the down low, you know, so. Yeah, you had to be the silent partner back then.
0:35:26 - (Rhyner): Good for you, man.
0:35:28 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, it's fun.
0:35:29 - (Rhyner): How did that get going?
0:35:30 - (Mac): Did you just.
0:35:31 - (Rhyner): You start that?
0:35:31 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, started it.
0:35:33 - (Rhyner): Just connections you made along the way.
0:35:34 - (Brian Estridge): Yep. And just every year we've. We've added bowl games and now we're up to 21. So we do the same number as those as Four Letter Group does. We do the same number of bowl games they do. So, yeah, it's pretty good.
0:35:46 - (Mac): And you know, Brian was part of the. The DFW morning talk show scene for how many years did you do WBAP?
0:35:52 - (Brian Estridge): Thirteen. With. With how. Yeah. Did seven with Galloway in the afternoon and then 13 in the morning with Al.
0:36:00 - (Mac): That's pretty impressive run. What time are you getting up in the morning?
0:36:02 - (Brian Estridge): 3:45. Yeah.
0:36:03 - (Mac): Mike, you did morning talk at some point, right? So what time did you get up?
0:36:07 - (Rhyner): I did morning radio.
0:36:08 - (Mac): Okay.
0:36:09 - (Rhyner): I got up at 4:30.
0:36:11 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:36:12 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:36:12 - (Brian Estridge): It sucks.
0:36:13 - (Mac): How many years did you do it? Does.
0:36:14 - (Brian Estridge): And people go, oh, you get used to it. No. Hell, yeah.
0:36:16 - (Mac): You don't know.
0:36:17 - (Rhyner): You don't. You never get used to it. I mean, I'm a lightweight compared to that. I only did for like, you know, seven, I think.
0:36:24 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. And then said that. No, Moss. Right. I mean, that's enough, man.
0:36:27 - (Rhyner): Well, I'm gonna. Kept doing it forever, if I could have. But they told me that my services.
0:36:31 - (Mac): Were no longer required, though, when you, like. I remember when you left because you and I talked about it. I only did it for two and a half.
0:36:38 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:36:38 - (Mac): And I felt like, oh, thank God.
0:36:40 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:36:40 - (Mac): Did you have any relief when they said, oh, yeah.
0:36:42 - (Rhyner): Oh, yeah. I mean that. And I mean, you may miss a lot of the rest of it, you know, because like anything else, there is the good, there's the not so good. And the good is really good. And the good, something that you like and you take with you for the rest of your days on this planet.
0:36:59 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:37:00 - (Rhyner): But the not so good when it comes to that, when it comes to those hours, that weighs people pretty strong.
0:37:06 - (Brian Estridge): Somebody asked me after I quit. They said, and they'd seen me a couple of months after I stopped doing a morning show. They said, hey, how long have you started sleeping in yet? It was like three months afterwards. I said, yeah. They said, how long did it take you to sleep until like seven or eight. I went two days. I mean, because that's when you're supposed to be sleeping, you know, I'm not locked into 3:45 now.
0:37:30 - (Rhyner): All of a sudden you can.
0:37:31 - (Brian Estridge): Exactly. That was work.
0:37:32 - (Rhyner): It doesn't take long at all to shift into that gear.
0:37:36 - (Brian Estridge): And then, you know, and then when you're, you know, you're still trying to stay up and watch games or do games or you got family and all that stuff, and you're going to bed at 10:30 and get up at 3:45, you're not worth a crap. And then you don't realize it at the time. And then when it's over with, you go, life's a little better, man. Yeah.
0:37:51 - (Rhyner): Yeah.
0:37:52 - (Brian Estridge): You know, I admire those guys that can do it for 20 or 30 or 40 years. Like how, like how I You know, I'm like, how. I don't know how you do it, but good for you, man.
0:38:01 - (Mac): House, Steve Lamb. There's a bunch of them. I did it. That was a game. I'll never forget that phone call. I'm like, oh, thank God.
0:38:09 - (Brian Estridge): Well, you were relieved.
0:38:10 - (Mac): Yeah, it was. I mean, I missed part. Like Mike said, that was a good way to put it. I missed. I missed parts of it.
0:38:15 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:38:15 - (Mac): But I don't think I had any idea what it was doing to my.
0:38:19 - (Brian Estridge): The rest of your life.
0:38:20 - (Mac): Oh, my God.
0:38:20 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:38:21 - (Mac): Sleep all day.
0:38:22 - (Brian Estridge): And you know what did it for me, Mike, was we were. We did 416 straight shows from my home studio during COVID And then. And then management said, oh, by the way, you got to come back to Dallas. I said, no, I'm not going back to Dallas. And they. They truly thought I had another job that I was gonna. That I was leaving for. And I said, no, I'm not. I'm retiring. They said, you can't retire. What do you mean I can't retire?
0:38:50 - (Brian Estridge): You can retire, but you can't retire till the end of your contract. Well, I can retire, right? And if you retire, we're going to sue you for the rest of the contract. What? I just. I'm like, I'm not going back to Dallas.
0:39:02 - (Rhyner): So they're going to sue you for something you haven't gotten?
0:39:04 - (Brian Estridge): Exactly.
0:39:04 - (Mac): Right.
0:39:06 - (Brian Estridge): I mean, I've got the letter. It's hilarious to read it. It's like, what are you talking about, man? And so.
0:39:12 - (Mac): But they know you. They wanted you.
0:39:14 - (Brian Estridge): Well, I. I don't know if they did or not, you know, but when the contract ran out, I didn't. I didn't re up. I was like, I'm not going. I'm not going back to Dallas, man.
0:39:24 - (Rhyner): How. Jay is just a.
0:39:25 - (Brian Estridge): He's a wonder. Oh, he's a great. Yeah, he is a machine. He's the greatest dude on the. On the earth. Yeah. You know, that's what happened. You know, now he's on heart number two. That's what happens when you have a big heart. You know, you're a good dude. You get two, you know, and so. And good for him, and he's doing great with it. So, you know. But I mean, you know, guys like you and Hal and. And Galloway, I mean, those.
0:39:48 - (Brian Estridge): We're not making those anymore, unfortunately.
0:39:51 - (Rhyner): No, they don't seem to be.
0:39:52 - (Brian Estridge): Do they know. And that's, you know, all of us, we're going to miss out. We're going to be the ones that you know, are my. My kids will never know anybody like that.
0:40:02 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:40:02 - (Brian Estridge): And that's sad.
0:40:03 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:40:04 - (Rhyner): It was a lot of fun having Mr. Randy in here.
0:40:07 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:40:07 - (Mac): That was. I mean, I need to see.
0:40:09 - (Rhyner): I really didn't think that he would do it, and so I. I mean, I would have asked him way early on if I would have thought he would do it, but I didn't. And finally I just reached a point, so I said, all right, screw it, man. What's. What. What's the worst that can happen? He says, no.
0:40:26 - (Brian Estridge): Right.
0:40:27 - (Rhyner): But we asked, and he was all about it, and I feel really honored because he doesn't do anything.
0:40:34 - (Brian Estridge): No. I know.
0:40:35 - (Rhyner): For anybody.
0:40:35 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. Play golf or whatever he's doing now.
0:40:37 - (Mac): Yeah. You know, like. And I started watching it, and I done. When I. When Brian. I were together at the other company where Ashley was. I had done one with him, and I said, you should do a book. I think some of his. Like, his daughters have said that you should write. He's like, I'm not writing a book. And it's too bad because there's so many story. And I'm sure we all do in our own way, but his are just a different str.
0:40:59 - (Rhyner): It's a different level.
0:41:01 - (Mac): And like, he had one with Muhammad Ali and all these other ones. I'm like, they need. We need to record this in some way. And like you did with the documentary that you did a little bit. And we needed one with Randy, but he's just. Nah. And I'll give him credit about this. When he said, I'm retiring, he meant it.
0:41:20 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. He walked away from it.
0:41:22 - (Rhyner): He did. Me. There wasn't gonna be no podcast.
0:41:25 - (Brian Estridge): No.
0:41:25 - (Rhyner): Or nothing like that.
0:41:27 - (Brian Estridge): Man.
0:41:28 - (Rhyner): When he's done, he is done.
0:41:30 - (Brian Estridge): You know, the one thing I admired about him the most. And. And you guys are like. I think you're like this, Mac. I think you. I hope you are. And. And he used to talk about it. Not not only here as much, but he used to talk about. He would rip a guy in a column. I mean, he would rip a guy.
0:41:46 - (Rhyner): Oh, yeah.
0:41:46 - (Brian Estridge): And he would be in the clubhouse the next day.
0:41:48 - (Rhyner): Yes.
0:41:49 - (Brian Estridge): Because he said, you have to. If you're gonna rip a guy, you got to show up.
0:41:53 - (Mac): Yep.
0:41:53 - (Rhyner): You got to show.
0:41:54 - (Brian Estridge): You gotta show up. Yeah. I mean. And he would. He would. He was. He was legit about that, you know, And. But then he also, like, he would remember when Quincy Carter was going through all of his crap.
0:42:05 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:42:06 - (Brian Estridge): That's. I was doing a show with him at the time. And we. And, you know, he would rip on Quincy as a player and just. I mean, and. And we would all rip on him. And then Quincy got in that trouble. Remember? Got arrested.
0:42:17 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:42:18 - (Brian Estridge): And Randy bailed him out.
0:42:19 - (Mac): Yeah. Yeah.
0:42:20 - (Brian Estridge): Quietly, you know, just, you know, it's like.
0:42:23 - (Mac): And Quincy. I saw Quincy earlier this year. Yeah, he always mentions that.
0:42:27 - (Brian Estridge): Does he?
0:42:28 - (Mac): Oh, very much. Quincy's been through a lot.
0:42:29 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:42:30 - (Mac): Good. I was not.
0:42:31 - (Brian Estridge): So is he coaching? What is he doing?
0:42:32 - (Mac): He's living in Georgia, doing some coaching. He's, you know, he's had some real highs and lows. Yeah, he's doing okay, though, and he's very grateful for that. And he's. I think that's a guy who's just trying to live straight and clean and kind of boring. Yeah, he is doing some coaching.
0:42:47 - (Rhyner): Is he around here much?
0:42:47 - (Mac): No, he comes back occasionally. He's got kids all over the place. And he's very open. Open about that. I'm not. I'm not speaking out of school here. He's very open about all of it. He's gone through the 12 step program towards sobriety. So he's. He's been a speaker at certain engagements, recovery groups. But the last I heard. Yeah. He was living in suburban Atlanta doing some coaching.
0:43:07 - (Brian Estridge): Imagine a pressure that guy was under. I mean, you think about. I mean, drafted way too high.
0:43:12 - (Mac): Way too high.
0:43:12 - (Brian Estridge): Thrown in as a starter. Way too high. Expect. I mean, it's just. Dallas Cowboys for the Dallas Cowboy. That ate him up. Just ate him up. If you're not ready for it, man.
0:43:22 - (Mac): And he wasn't. But he was. You're talking about Randy and. And Randy's ability to do that. It's something that I've. I've tried to emulate.
0:43:29 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:43:29 - (Mac): Like if I'm going to bury a.
0:43:30 - (Brian Estridge): Guy, got to show up.
0:43:31 - (Mac): And I've. I've made myself available to guys. I'm like, listen, I buried you. If you want to sit here and. Pardon my French. I said, if you want to sit here and me, go right ahead.
0:43:39 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:43:39 - (Mac): But let's do it and get it over with.
0:43:40 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:43:41 - (Mac): And it doesn't always work. No, but it works more often than it doesn't.
0:43:45 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:43:46 - (Rhyner): Anybody ever do that?
0:43:48 - (Mac): Yeah. I tell you my Tom Herman story.
0:43:51 - (Brian Estridge): No.
0:43:51 - (Mac): You know. Remember the old Texas coach?
0:43:53 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:43:54 - (Rhyner): So I haven't thought of him.
0:43:56 - (Mac): Yeah. Gone for a number.
0:43:57 - (Brian Estridge): Florida International or whatever he is during his first year.
0:44:00 - (Mac): Well, one thing. And Mike, you know this. Brian, I know you know this. All the coaches and players who sit there and Say, yeah, I don't read that stuff.
0:44:06 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, right.
0:44:07 - (Mac): They all do. And if they don't, their mom does, their dad does, or their wife does, or girlfriend or brother.
0:44:13 - (Rhyner): Yeah, One way somebody gets back to.
0:44:14 - (Mac): Absolutely. And they're keeping score. Like, I like the guy. Tony Romo kept score. He was very aware of who said what. That's just the way it was. And that's. That's. He's human being. And the reason was Tony had never been knocked in high school. He'd never been knocked in college because he's playing it Division 1 AA, North Eastern Illinois. Eastern Illinois. So that's pretty common. So with Tom, I had written a column, and I called him Tommy Boy, and it just kind of took off.
0:44:47 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:44:48 - (Mac): Randy used to call, you know, John Boy Daniels.
0:44:50 - (Brian Estridge): Oh, yeah.
0:44:51 - (Mac): I thought Tommy Boy fit. Well, apparently got back to him, and he didn't like it. And so, you know, I was killing him. Because, remember, when Tom was the head coach at ut, he had some behaviors and did some things where you're like, what are you doing? Right. So I called him out on it. So then he gets fired, then he gets rehired at Florida Atlantic University. And I thought, I need to go say hi to him and introduce myself, because I had buried this guy. But I'd never been down to Austin, right? And one time he had called me out on a press conference, which I totally deserved. It was a teleconference conference call. So then I go, he's the head coach of Florida Atlantic. They're doing a media day in Arlington at Globe Life.
0:45:30 - (Mac): And he knew who I was. And so afterwards, we have an exchange, and he says, hey, do you have a minute? I want to talk to you. I'm like, okay. So we sit down and chat, and the first thing he said to me was, why do you hate me so much? I'm like, tom, I don't hate you. I don't even know you. He said, well, why did you write all this stuff? I said, because that's my job. So we proceeded to have a great conversation for about 30 minutes.
0:45:55 - (Rhyner): Friendly.
0:45:56 - (Mac): Yeah. Very, very meaning. I remember. I remember the. The Texas AD had told me, the guy who ultimately fired him said the problem was he was really young. And they handed him to the keys to a Ferrari.
0:46:07 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:46:08 - (Mac): And. And he was young when he took the job and probably a little naive about certain things and a little.
0:46:13 - (Rhyner): Where'd he come from?
0:46:14 - (Mac): Well, he's from Texas. He coached at a small school in Texas, but he'd been at the University of Houston and done really well.
0:46:20 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:46:20 - (Mac): But Brian, he said some things, even in Houston, and he just kind of got in the deep end. But the point was, I gave him a chance. I'm like, if you want to sit here and dog cuss me, I've earned it. So. So go ahead. And we had it out, and we have a great relationship now. I text him occasionally, and he's living in Florida with his kids, and he got fired again. But sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Didn't work with Baker Mayfield, but I totally come from that school of. It's one of the things that drives me crazy about this new area of media, which is a lot of these guys are sitting there dog cussing this guy and that guy, and they never see their face. You go see their face, would you say it to their face?
0:46:55 - (Brian Estridge): Yep.
0:46:55 - (Mac): Well, then, yeah, maybe don't do it.
0:46:57 - (Brian Estridge): You have to do that, man.
0:46:59 - (Mac): That's. That's.
0:47:00 - (Rhyner): Yeah, you do. You do have to do that. But.
0:47:01 - (Mac): Yep.
0:47:02 - (Rhyner): Now you don't have to do it.
0:47:04 - (Brian Estridge): No.
0:47:05 - (Rhyner): I mean, you can get away without doing it. So. Yeah, that's just where we're at. So how many years for you at the start? Telegram Now?
0:47:13 - (Mac): I. I think I'm almost on pace with Brian. I think I'm at 25 or 26. I mean, I'm. I'm one of the old guys now. I look around.
0:47:21 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, you gotta be the. The oldest guy there.
0:47:23 - (Mac): I'm not the oldest. I think I'm the second or third oldest. In terms of editorial staff, Bud Kennedy has been outpaced by quite a bit, but institution in that town. And then. Yeah, I'm one of the older ones there. I mean, I try not to ask.
0:47:35 - (Brian Estridge): You gotta be the oldest guy in sports.
0:47:37 - (Mac): Oh, by far.
0:47:38 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:47:38 - (Mac): You can take multiple employees and add them up, and I'm still older than someone.
0:47:42 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
0:47:42 - (Mac): But, yeah, I am. It is weird. I mean, I, I. When you said 26 years, I remember.
0:47:47 - (Brian Estridge): Your first year here. Yeah.
0:47:48 - (Mac): And if you would have told me then that, you know all this stuff later, I don't think I would have believed it.
0:47:54 - (Brian Estridge): Think about this town, though. Back in the day, Mike, when you had the three columnists of both papers, and, I mean, they were churning stuff out, and now it's.
0:48:02 - (Rhyner): It was awesome.
0:48:03 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:48:04 - (Mac): Multiple papers.
0:48:05 - (Rhyner): Yes, yes.
0:48:06 - (Mac): How competitive.
0:48:07 - (Rhyner): The Dallas Morning News, you had the Dallas Times Herald, and then over in Fort Worth, you had the Star Telegram.
0:48:11 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:48:12 - (Rhyner): And before that, you had the Fort Worth press as well.
0:48:15 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. You know, I mean, they were churning.
0:48:17 - (Mac): Out people oh, yeah, Good.
0:48:18 - (Rhyner): Like they were.
0:48:19 - (Mac): And Sherid.
0:48:20 - (Rhyner): And they went hard, man. They really went hard at each other.
0:48:24 - (Brian Estridge): But look at all the guys around the country, too, man. You. Who started here? Oh, that.
0:48:29 - (Mac): You know, Gary Myers was here.
0:48:30 - (Brian Estridge): Everybody was. It feels like everybody was here.
0:48:32 - (Mac): A lot of those guys at ESPN were at the Morning News. Ed Werder was on Telegram.
0:48:37 - (Rhyner): Yeah.
0:48:37 - (Brian Estridge): Morning News.
0:48:37 - (Mac): I said, back at wfa, there's a. There's a ton of those guys.
0:48:40 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:48:42 - (Rhyner): And the thing all those guys have in common is sports. Dave.
0:48:46 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:48:46 - (Rhyner): Dave Smith.
0:48:47 - (Brian Estridge): Yes.
0:48:48 - (Rhyner): The editor, the overseer of the Dallas Morning News sports section.
0:48:54 - (Mac): Did you know him, Mike?
0:48:57 - (Rhyner): Yeah, we had a couple of run ins.
0:48:58 - (Mac): Run ins?
0:48:59 - (Rhyner): Yeah, we had a couple of run ins when we were at the ticket. There were some things that he didn't like, most notably our very existence and our presence.
0:49:11 - (Brian Estridge): Right, right.
0:49:11 - (Rhyner): He didn't much care for that for a long time. He wouldn't let any of his guys come on the air. And we just said, well, okay, we do this without you, you know, he said, fine, do it. And you know what? We did.
0:49:26 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, yeah, yeah.
0:49:28 - (Rhyner): I think that over time, some of that kind of wore off a little bit. But I respect the hell out of the guy.
0:49:37 - (Mac): Yeah, he did a good job.
0:49:38 - (Rhyner): I mean, he did. I mean, he came here at a time when somebody convinced the owners of the Morning News, the Belo clan, that for the newspaper to be successful, you had to get serious about two things, because this was all anybody ever read the newspapers for. One was sports, the other was business. And they took that to heart.
0:50:04 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:50:05 - (Rhyner): And they got Dave Smith in here. I don't know where he'd been before, but they brought him in here and. And said, look, just go get guys. You've got guys you want. You got guys, you know, you got guys that you think can come in here and make a difference, go get them. And, man, he did.
0:50:23 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:50:24 - (Rhyner): And Gary Myers was one of those guys, and there are a whole lot of others. But, man, I mean, if you have any regard at all for the way the sports scene is covered around here now, as well, as well as then, then it all goes back to him. I mean, even today, there's a lot of him still in the Dallas Morning News. There's a lot of his ethos that's still in it.
0:50:50 - (Brian Estridge): Think about the staff sizes back there, too.
0:50:53 - (Rhyner): Yeah.
0:50:53 - (Brian Estridge): I mean, how many. When you went To Star Telegram 25 years ago, how many people were in sports?
0:50:59 - (Mac): 70 plus.
0:51:00 - (Brian Estridge): How many are there today in sports?
0:51:01 - (Mac): 6.
0:51:02 - (Brian Estridge): 6. Wow.
0:51:04 - (Mac): 6 or 7.
0:51:06 - (Brian Estridge): How do you do that.
0:51:07 - (Mac): You just, you just a lot of. A lot of things. Like I'll give you an example. Charlton State.
0:51:12 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:51:13 - (Mac): Which is an hour southwest.
0:51:15 - (Brian Estridge): Beat Army.
0:51:16 - (Mac): Beat Army. That's a big deal.
0:51:17 - (Brian Estridge): Sure.
0:51:18 - (Mac): We did nothing with it. We don't have the staff size for it anymore. I don't and I shouldn't. I'm not picking on anybody. I don't know if the morning does. Morning news did or not, but there are a lot of those things that you'd say, well, that's. We got to do this, we got to do this, we got to do this. There's just. Yeah, there's. And now. And you know, this Mike is. You've the sports scene here as big as it was, let's say, in 1995.
0:51:40 - (Mac): Hell, it's bigger now. I mean, look at all the stuff that's going on here all the time.
0:51:45 - (Brian Estridge): Is it. This is what I've debated. I've debated this about radio. Mike is all right. It's kind of the chicken or the egg. And in radio, it feels like the big ownership group said we've got to. We've got to save money or we've got to, you know, we've got to make more money, whatever it is. So we're going to cut personalities. Well, everybody listens to the radio for personalities. You can't out Spotify. Spotify, you know, with, with, with music format. So you, you got to have personalities. But they cut all the personalities, you know, and then they wonder why they don't make as much money or the ratings aren't as big or as many people aren't.
0:52:21 - (Brian Estridge): Aren't listening to radio anymore. It was like. Well, it was a dumb management decision for one thing, and it feels like the same thing in the paper.
0:52:27 - (Mac): Oh, it was. That was.
0:52:28 - (Brian Estridge): I remember we cut all the talent out of the paper. Nobody wants to read the paper anymore.
0:52:32 - (Mac): I was at the Fan and I remember the station director is a really nice guy. I remember he said, what happened in newspapers is going to happen. It's starting to happen to us.
0:52:42 - (Brian Estridge): It's totally happening.
0:52:43 - (Mac): And I. It's a chicken or the egg thing. I know I've. I mean, I've followed it now long enough. And I'm. I know you've got knows you went through that corporate stuff. I don't know if it's chicken or the egg thing or not. I don't know if there's a market for it. But I know this. The people in charge, their first priority is paying themselves.
0:52:59 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, exactly.
0:53:00 - (Mac): Okay. I took Care of me.
0:53:01 - (Brian Estridge): Right.
0:53:02 - (Mac): You might not fit in. Sorry.
0:53:03 - (Brian Estridge): Sure. But they're going to tell you they're taking care of you.
0:53:05 - (Rhyner): Yeah.
0:53:06 - (Brian Estridge): I'm giving you the best deal I can.
0:53:07 - (Rhyner): And it all flows uphill anyway.
0:53:09 - (Brian Estridge): Yes.
0:53:09 - (Rhyner): They got to take care of Mama.
0:53:11 - (Brian Estridge): Yes.
0:53:13 - (Rhyner): And if you don't take care of Mama, then she ain't taking care of you.
0:53:16 - (Brian Estridge): Right.
0:53:18 - (Rhyner): That's just the way it goes.
0:53:19 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:53:20 - (Rhyner): This has been great, guys. Thank you for doing this.
0:53:22 - (Brian Estridge): Thank you. It's been fun. Good to see you, dude.
0:53:24 - (Rhyner): It's good to see you, Brian.
0:53:25 - (Brian Estridge): I'm glad you're still getting after, man. Can I ask one question?
0:53:28 - (Rhyner): Sure.
0:53:29 - (Brian Estridge): Johnny United's photo behind you. Why Johnny, you?
0:53:33 - (Rhyner): Why Johnny, you? When I was a kid first starting to get into the game of football, first of all, there was only one league then.
0:53:42 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:53:43 - (Rhyner): And the Baltimore Colts were the team. The Baltimore Colts were the best team. Johnny Unitis was the best player on the best team. So he's the guy that I gravitated toward.
0:53:52 - (Brian Estridge): I dig it.
0:53:53 - (Rhyner): And I was always a fan ever since. And it came. And one of the highlights of my life, let alone career, was somehow we managed to get him on the air when he was here for a card show or something.
0:54:09 - (D): Isn't it that picture right there with you and Grogo right behind.
0:54:12 - (Rhyner): Oh, yeah, that is.
0:54:13 - (Brian Estridge): That is right there.
0:54:14 - (Rhyner): Yeah.
0:54:15 - (Brian Estridge): Wow.
0:54:15 - (Rhyner): That's us.
0:54:16 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, I was looking at that one. How about that?
0:54:18 - (Mac): Did he charge you?
0:54:19 - (Rhyner): No.
0:54:20 - (Mac): He didn't charge you?
0:54:20 - (Rhyner): No.
0:54:20 - (Mac): Because he was. He was known to do that.
0:54:22 - (Brian Estridge): Really?
0:54:22 - (Mac): Yeah. He would charge like, he would charge Steve Sable. Remember NFL? Yes, he would. Okay. If we're gonna do this, I need some money.
0:54:28 - (Brian Estridge): Really?
0:54:29 - (Mac): Yes. And I. When I saw that when I came here the first time, I was like, I wonder if he charged him.
0:54:33 - (Rhyner): If he did, I didn't pay it.
0:54:35 - (Mac): Okay.
0:54:36 - (Rhyner): Somebody else did.
0:54:37 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah. Yeah. So you were a Colts fan kind of growing up.
0:54:41 - (Mac): Yeah.
0:54:41 - (Brian Estridge): Because of that. Because of him.
0:54:42 - (Rhyner): Because of him. That lasted for about a year.
0:54:45 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:54:46 - (Rhyner): Because the very next year, the remote yet burgeoning outpost of Dallas.
0:54:51 - (Brian Estridge): Yes.
0:54:52 - (Rhyner): Found itself smart enough to wind up with not just one, but two pro football teams.
0:54:59 - (Brian Estridge): Yes. Yeah.
0:55:00 - (Rhyner): So that was a little sports fans cornucopia then.
0:55:04 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:55:05 - (Rhyner): We went from minor league baseball being the best thing to that tell of.
0:55:09 - (Brian Estridge): A sudden you had two teams.
0:55:10 - (Rhyner): Yeah.
0:55:10 - (Brian Estridge): Wow. Norm Boulosh played for the Colts. You remember that name?
0:55:13 - (Rhyner): Oh, yeah.
0:55:13 - (Brian Estridge): He tells a funny story about this. Tells you how the world has changed for all of us. The draft today is what, four or five Days, huge production. Hundreds of thousands of people show up for it. When he got drafted out of TCU by the Colts, first round, I think, double check me on that. Gets drafted by the Colts out of tcu, they call his house Old Old man or say, I guess, right, this is before Bob. It was up way.
0:55:42 - (Brian Estridge): Whoever. Only Colts at the time called Carol Rosenblum, maybe. Maybe calls his house. His mother answers the phone, and he says, yes, is Norman Boulosh there's? And mother says, nope, he's at Love Field picking up his girlfriend. She's flying into town. And the guy goes, okay, thanks, and hangs up the phone. Norm Boulosh is at Love Field. Norman Boulosh, pick up the white courtesy phone. He's at Love Field.
0:56:10 - (Brian Estridge): He answers the white courtesy phone at the airport. And it's the owner of the Colts who says, norman Boulosh? Yeah. Who's this? It's the owner of the Baltimore Colts. We've just drafted you in the first round of the NFL draft. And Norm's like, sweet, thank you very much. I appreciate that. He goes, I'm gonna. I'll be home in about 20 minutes if you want to call me back. And he hangs up the phone. That's how he got drafted. He turns to the guy who's standing there waiting to get on the white courtesy phone for him, and he says to him, hey, I just got drafted by the NFL Colts or by the Baltimore Colts. And the guy looks at him and goes, you finished?
0:56:44 - (Mac): And that was it. Like, who cares? Yeah.
0:56:46 - (Brian Estridge): Here he is, drafted in the NFL draft. Nobody cared.
0:56:50 - (Rhyner): They didn't care then, but they do now.
0:56:52 - (Brian Estridge): Yes, they do. Yes, they do, man.
0:56:55 - (Rhyner): Well, thanks, guys.
0:56:56 - (Brian Estridge): Thank you. Yeah. Good to see you.
0:56:58 - (Rhyner): Best wishes to you.
0:56:59 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, anytime.
0:56:59 - (Rhyner): Good to see you, Mac, as always. You're awesome. Anything I do with you, you make it better.
0:57:05 - (Mac): Thank you.
0:57:06 - (D): Did you ask him about his fantasy football team?
0:57:09 - (Rhyner): No. What about your fantasy football team, Matt?
0:57:11 - (D): You get a D rating?
0:57:12 - (Mac): Oh, yeah, I did. So when we did our fan every. There's nothing more painful than to listen to somebody's stories about their kids or their fantasy.
0:57:20 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah.
0:57:20 - (Rhyner): Yes.
0:57:21 - (Mac): Or their fantasy team.
0:57:22 - (Brian Estridge): Right?
0:57:23 - (Mac): So I drafted nothing but white guys, and that was hard. It's harder than you think.
0:57:28 - (Brian Estridge): Just look for byu.
0:57:30 - (Mac): Yeah, well. And there's some gray area, and they're like, is he really white? You know, his mom's white. So I just drafted.
0:57:36 - (Rhyner): Are you doing a bid here?
0:57:37 - (Mac): Yes, totally. Okay. Well, I did it a couple years ago, and I almost won my league. So I was like, maybe I can lightning strike twice. And, like, Norm is blowing me up with trade off first. I'm not kidding. And I'm like, no, if he's not white, I'm not doing it. So I didn't know this. Like, ESPN sent me a draft eval. I didn't know they did that. And I got a D. Not good. D for dominant.
0:57:58 - (Brian Estridge): Yeah, yeah, yeah.
0:58:01 - (Mac): But it's all about skin pigmentation. That's the only way. Making drinks. Yep.
0:58:06 - (Rhyner): All right, now let me tell you this before we go. Remember, you can find all of Waters of the podcast. And while we're at it, if you're feeling what we're throwing down, how about a nice review? If you're by the channel on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, you can help others find us by leaving a review. Thank you, Ashley. Thank you, Mac. Thank you, Brian. Good to see you guys. Let's do this again sometime.
0:58:45 - (Mac): All right.
0:58:46 - (Rhyner): For your Dark Companion. Thank you for watching.
0:58:50 - (Brian Estridge): Bye. All right, I'm gonna go take pants off.
0:59:11 - (Rhyner): Your Dark Companion is a stolen water media presentation.