1-on-1 with DP – 93.7 The Ticket KNTK - DP is in Philly... What is Your Primary Bucket List Event in Sports?: March 19th

Episode Date: March 19, 2025

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It's time to go one-on-one with D.P. Coming at you live from the heart of Lincoln America, a 93-7-the-ticket and the ticketfm.com. Here is your host, Derek Pearson, brought you by Canopy Street Market. Boom, Bach. In your face. In your face. Live from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania,

which is hosting the NCAA wrestling. Championship. I'm thrilled to be out here. I'm going to have dinner with the big guy with Mark Manning this evening. And we'll talk about and set up a pretty incredible weekend here in Philly for the Huskers. And wrestling, I want to thank the folks for Stevens and Smith as well, and the folks from Canopy Street Market for helping us out and sponsoring us and making sure this happens. We're live so you can jump on. the start of Hammondex line 402,

464-5-6-8-5, hit me with the what's up. Hit Bach with the what's up if you got questions. We're going to, Bach, you know how we do, man. We're going to spin the wheel and we could end up in a variety of places. That's right.

So I warn people in advance that we're going to be all over the place. In the second segment, I'm going to go through the first round matchups that the Husker 9 that qualified are going to face. and kind of give some breakdown for what that's going to look like. But nine of the 10 traditionally starting lineup roster,

Husker wrestlers, qualified for this tournament. And the seatings are according to Bach, this is a fascinating accumulation of sports fans. Wrestling fans are their own breed. They're their own breed. This is, it, Bach, you ever walk into a place where every man, woman, and child look like they're waiting for something to jump off? Like they're all walking around, fully fit, always yoked, and ready for somebody to make a misstep so they can take them down. Oh, that sounds like walking on some thin ice there.

Oh, it is pretty remarkable that everybody, everybody walking around. I mean, it's just super jacked and fit. And, you know, I'm probably the most unfit person that I've run into since, even on the flights, right? I flew out through Chicago to beat the storm. And I end up being sat next to by an Iowa fan. and an Iowa State fan. Ooh. An Iowa wrestling fan and a Iowa State wrestling fan.

And then across the aisle was a Penn State fan and another Iowa fan. Directly in front of me was a wrestler and a coach from Northwestern. So I was getting the full impact. And I jokingly told Austin Ormond last week that at the Big Ten basketball tournament, I was trying to avoid Iowa fans at all cost. Like I just, it was just like, no, I don't, I don't have that in me. But nice enough gentlemen, all of them former wrestlers, all of them now dads of wrestlers, right, guys who wrestle around the country. They're all uniform in celebrating Penn State and what they've done just from an athletic standpoint, from a dominant standpoint,

applauding Penn State without giving them too much credit because you don't want to, you don't want to empower the villain, right? Because everybody, everybody, it's Penn State versus the world here in Philadelphia. And it is, it's a home meet. Like, imagine the national championships being a home meet. Well, this is a home meet. And Penn State fans are everywhere.

I would say that next, it's Iowa fans, Iowa State fans, and then Nebraska fans. And Nebraska will have some pretty good support at Wells Fargo starting tomorrow morning for session one. And there are eight mats. I got to walk around Wells Fargo this morning. There are eight mats side by side. It's a great room. Of course, this is where the Sixers and Flies play.

But Bach, it's pretty fascinating to just breathe it in. The practices were today the Huskers will practice from 3 to 4.30. Today, so 2 to 3.30 central time. They're going to practice and get their looks and everybody's pretty healthy. And we'll talk about that over the course of this hour. But Bach, the weather, it's 60 degrees here. Oh, it's got nice weather there. Oh, oh, thank you, Mother Nature.

Thank you, Mother Nature. 60 degrees. It's supposed to rain tomorrow, but it's supposed to be 60. you know, 50 lower 50s at night. But the city, I mean, Philly's a big city anyway. It's a busy city anyway. But it is,

this is chaotic because there's a lot of Midwestern folk walking around trying to figure out, figure out where they can go, where they can't go in Philadelphia. I had to explain to them. Philadelphia is not Ames, Iowa. It is not Iowa City. So you got to,

You got to get in your lane and stay in your lane. Have you been to Philadelphia quite a bit? It's one of the, I mean, one of the places I got to go. I haven't been east too much, but I would love to go to Philadelphia. There's so much going on for, especially as a sports town. Yeah, it, okay, so Philadelphia's sports fans, there's certain iconic groups of sports fans. And we tend to think of, you can think of on a college level,

or you can think it on the pro sports level. Philly is a pro sports town. Like it has its Villanova, it's St. France. It has its St. Joe's. It has its collegiate work. But it is a pro sports town. And you can spot a Phillies slash Eagles slash Flyers fan anywhere. anyway, look, they don't have to, they don't have to talk.

They don't, it's in the walk, it's in the posture. And being a D.C. kid, we would come to Philly quite a bit. One, I had some folks on my dad's side who were from Philly. So we would go up to family reunions on weekends and that sort of thing. And it's a pretty short drive from D.C., but because of the NFL, the NBA, NHL, you would make the trip from D.C. to Philly, but you did it with a whole bunch of rules in play. Like, you knew there's some stuff that I can't do here on the road in Philly that I would do at home.

And to compare it, and if you took Cowboys fans, Eagles fans, Giants fans, Commander fans would rather give the business to Coway and Giants fans before Eagles fans. Eagles fans are the ones on the pyramid that you just went, you're making a business decision. If you're going to go left, this is going to be a thing. So much that most of the Washington franchises set up political blocks on ticket sales to fans from Philadelphia area. So if you're a Phillies fan, you were trying to go to D.C. to watch them play the Nats.

Nationals had set it up so that you couldn't buy tickets online. If you had a Pennsylvania zip coat. Like it was, I mean, you know, I mean, the, the old joke about them, you know, throwing snowballs at Santa. It's real. Yeah, they turned on Santa. Right. Like they turn on Santa and they have a jail in stadium. Right? Just because, you know, it's stuff's going to happen. Like it's not a matter of if things are going to happen in Philly.

They're going to happen. Then it's just how are you going to deal with it and are you going to participate? And then you add to it that football feeling often has bad weather. So they're feisty and they're cold. Like they're double mad. They're double mad. And then add to it, here comes the Midwest. Here comes the Midwest.

And Philly is kind of imagined Omaha as, as Philly proper. And then how quickly if you go outside of Omaha in any direction, how many fewer people exist and how many different other cultures are are surrounded. Well, that's Philadelphia, is that the Dutch, the German, the Italian, you know, the black, you can go in different directions and get culturally a whole bunch of other things in a hurry. So again, the conversation for, again, for Midwestern Iowa folks, Midwestern wrestling folks who are coming to town, they're hyped, they're pumped, right? This is their event. I'm amazed at how many of the people I talk to

this is one of their vacation events for the year. This is one of the, the thing that they buy, I don't think of, I could, I would say 30 wrestling fans just talking to in hotels and on airplanes and airports, but all 30 of them have season tickets wrestling at some university. They all have season tickets.

This is their thing. This is their Super Bowl, which led me to ask, and I'll ask you this thing, Bach, and the text on you guys can chime in. But what if you could, if you could only go, let's say you could go to two sporting events a year,

two annual sporting events. What two would it be? And you can go through the list of those events. Of course, we're in March Madness. And there's men's and women's, and those are two entirely different events, right? women's March Madness, while not in the full scope normally with, you know, pre-Catlin Clark, in this day and era, it has full reaching and its fans are more tightly tentacle to it than the men's game.

Women's college basketball fans are fanatical in a high level. And I put them on the same level with wrestling fans. But where would you go, if you could pick two events, right? Two annual events. And we can include WrestleMania and, and, you know, Royal Rumble, that sort of thing. You can put UFC in there. I think if you said, you know, World Series, World Series versus World Series, game seven is different.

NBA finals, NBA finals versus NHL, Stanley Cup playoffs versus. game seven, right? So what are the ones for you that you would dive in the pool for? Well, I think that should just have my two favorite sports would be, you know, college football. So to be honest, I love rivalries and stuff like that. So the playoff, like the championship game would be something on my bucket list at some point. But I'd almost rather go to LSU, Alabama or Michigan, Ohio State or, you know, find a, my favorite college football game of the year, if you will, would probably be up there.

And then kind of similar to when you're tied to a team, if the Celtics make the finals, then I'd like to go to an NBA finals game. But if they don't, just the Celtics playoff game would probably be two events I'd pick more than any. Have you been to the new Boston arena? No. Like I said, I really need to travel east some point because I've been, I've seen both oceans, I've been to Asia, but I have not been to the East Coast. I need to go to Boston and New York and Philadelphia, all that I've not,

Washington, D.C. It never been to any of them. Yeah, that, I mean, it's a real thing, right? That, that traveling and cross one, meeting the people, right, meeting the people. And then being in the venues during those events, it used to be, so if you asked me 15 years ago, there was nothing in sports bigger than, than Washington, Dallas. anywhere. There was never anything that was going to match that. That often Washington versus Dallas had more meaning than Super Bowl.

Even if Washington was playing in the Super Bowl, it wasn't as big of an event, emotional event, as Washington, Dallas. If you asked me 25 years ago, boxing, a heavyweight or a prime type. I can tell you having seen Tyson Live, having seen Sugar Ray in Vegas, you know, Sugar Ray Leonard and Duran. I hate to tell you, there's no Super Bowl that measured to that. You know, and that's having been to 11 Super Bowls,

and it doesn't, but I can also tell you going to Vegas and seeing UFC with, with Jones versus Miochich or Connor McGregor, you know, it's a different level. Yeah. It's a different. It's a different thing. And I'm not sure.

Like, WrestleMania, you know, there was a rock Hogan, WrestleMania. Pretty big, right? Pretty, pretty big. So I don't know what to. I don't know if there's, I don't know because of the way college football is now that there could ever be a college football game matchup that would give me the tingles the way some of these things would do. I would ask you, so let's say if it's Celtics Lakers and it's Red Sox Dodgers, if it's let's say Nebraska catches lightning in a bottle, right? Even if they're not

favor to win, but they make a playoff game, right? So they're one of the top eight. Where does that rank? Where would that put? Where would you put if you could go ringside, Russellmania, whoever it is? Huskers in the first round of a playoff, so let's imagine they make the first game, right? They make the first game. They make the NCAA tournament, basketball. right? Yeah. And their favorite to win the first game. Somehow they're a higher seed at some point.

Right. Like if they're a five seat, right? Because I think five C puts you in the top 20, right? Well, you kind of feel like it would be more. I'm not sure. I'm not sure top 30 moves the needle. Top 20. Is that fair?

Top 20 makes you feel pretty good about that. So what would be the ideal? Boy, that's tough. You're making me choose between my children at this point. But, I mean, because I think about the nuance, and there would be obviously a nuance to Nebraska basketball winning a NCAA tournament game. It's crazy. And, you know, just throughout my life expecting that at some point I will see that.

And I still do. And they're close, right there almost made the tournament this year. It can happen in a year. but we've been saying that for years. I mean, not to make it too gloomy here, but I grew up watching basketball with my father. My father watched Nebraska basketball for 60, you know, 60 years, and he passed away.

And, you know, we watched last year's game together. And it was like, because I knew, you know, he had stage four cancer. So it was going to be his probably last opportunity to see it. And it's just like, man, some of the stuff just might not ever happen in your lifetime. So some of that stuff that you're talking about, it's like you really, the nuance, of it could be very important.

And so when you, so college, I mean, Nebraska basketball is so near and dear to my heart. It's hard to pick anything over that. But to think about the nuance of Nebraska football in their first playoff game after what has seemingly amounted to a lifetime of, you know,

not being in the relevance category, I think I'd probably have to choose that football one, almost just to get back to my nostalgic feels of my childhood, of playing in a game of that magnitude. Because, again, I think it would bring me back to when I was a kid and Nebraska was top five all year long. And when they played those matchups, the eyes of the nation were on them, it would just be incredible to be in that. And then again, you know, how it's currently set up, I suppose could be a road matchup or, you know, a home game for Nebraska. So, I mean, I think I would choose those.

But then again, like I said, you may be picked between my kids because I do need to make it do a WrestleMania at some point, too. Yeah, I mean, it's fascinating, right? that you go, I would, I'm recently vested in Nebraska basketball, but I would imagine that the night when that happens, that Nebraska wins an NCAA basketball tournament game, that there are tears in Nebraska, right? Oh, yeah, yeah. Like, there are going to be people who cry at the,

idea. But on the same token, if Nebraska football makes a playoff game, the moment they clinched that or that is announced, right, if they're selected or whatever, there will be tears in Lincoln, Nebraska. I mean, think about that. Bach, like, I'm not wrong. No. And it was just like, just you saying that, it's like, we hear it from the outside and you hear it for years and years that college football would be better if Nebraska were in contention. And you hear that from around the nation, you know, people that remember it. But it's like, it really would, it would move people to that degree. And so when you think about it being better, so like, yeah, it'd be kind of more fun to watch them. It'd be like, this would be, again, generational of some of the older folks,

you know, being able to look at some of the younger people and being like, this is Nebraska football. This is, this is what we know. We are back. So, I mean, it would, it would be absolutely incredible. And yes, I'll raise my hand first for either one of those situations. There will be tears and not maybe just, you know, one or two here and there. I'll be probably crying for much of the in game if they're able to win. I mean, it's pretty fascinating to ponder that and say, okay, Bach, there's five doors that you can choose to walk through as a Nebraska fan. One is a an appearance in the NCAA football playoff. Door two is a win, a win in the NCAA basketball tournament.

Door three is a national title in wrestling. Door four is another national title in volleyball. Door five is a Husker Heisman Trophy winner. What door do you, What door do you go to? What door do you think Husker fans line up to line up at in full? And there's no unanimous choice. Like I literally know that there's no, you could add, you know,

a college baseball world series. Oh, yeah. Like you win the college world series. Not just go, not just go to regionals and play well, right? I'm talking about win the whole, as Jake from Major League says, win the whole dang day. What door do you line up at? Yeah, I was glad you said the College World Series, too, because that's another one that's

like, it's hard to explain. I went to the retirement ceremony for Shane Komenay and Darren Erstad and Alex Gordon. And in my head, I was thinking, because those names come from the late 90s, early 2000s, and some of those College World Series runs in my head. I was thinking, that's the crowd I'm going to go see. That's what I'm that I think for a moment in time. And it didn't happen.

And it was a cool ceremony. I don't mean to drag anybody down. But just kind of there's just, I always say you can't fake stakes. You can't, you can't make it up. And so when they actually happens and the pandemonium's going on and the crowds are there, it's just incredible.

But, you know, you go through that list. And I still think, you know, for each individual Husker fan, you got to make a choice. But for Husker fans as a whole, man,

So I think they might choose a playoff appearance. I would I would I would say that, right? And we'll go to break and come back and talk wrestling. But I would I would ask that question that does it have to be is it relevancy in college for Husker football, right? Relevancy. You want it to be not only relevant but for it to matter in other places. places, right?

That making the college playoff, we're not talking about winning the Big Ten. We're not talking about winning a playoff game. I mean, we're talking about just getting in. Lots of, lots to ponder and consider. All right? We'll toward a break more from Philadelphia. D.P.

Bye. One-on-one. App by searching 93.7, a ticket in your app store. You're listening to one-on-one with D. on 937 the ticket and the ticketfm.com.