An Army of Normal Folks - Jimmy V: Laugh, Think, Cry

Episode Date: April 4, 2025

For Shop Talk, we dive into the late Jimmy Valvano’s speech at the ESPY Awards, which he delivered only 58 days before losing his battle with cancer. Support the show: https://www.normalfolks.us/premiumSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hey everybody, it's Bill Courtney with the Army of Normal, folks. Welcome to the shop. Thanks Vita. Shop talk number 48. It's March and I'm time stamping this a little bit. I don't think it'll be March in this airs, but I will. Well, it doesn't matter. It'll be close, March Madness.

And probably not the national champ. Well, if the national championship's been decided by the time this airs, still in the honor of March Madness, we're gonna talk about laughing and crying. And thinking. And thinking. Jimmy Valvano. We're gonna talk about laughing and crying and thinking and thinking Jimmy Valvano, Jimmy V, many basketball fans will remember him but those who don't he was American basketball player coach and broadcaster his coaching career culminated at North Carolina State where his team won the 1983 NCAA Division I

men's basketball title against really improbable odds and Alex I think about the clip of right after the game of him running all over the floor just looking for somebody to hug and how excited he was and I mean it was a David versus Goliath story. So it was the Houston Cougars? It was the you know the five slam a jamma group I think Clyde Drexler, Akima Lajuan, it ended up beating with a bunch of no names who eventually became a bunch of NBA Hall of Famers and at the end a guard shot the ball and it came up

woefully short and a guy named, last name of Charles, I think, caught it and put it in right at the last second and the place went crazy. It's really what makes March madness. So mad. What it is, yeah, so mad. In June 92, Jimmy V was diagnosed with cancer and on March 4th, 1993, he gave a now famous speech at the ESPY Awards that's been called the Don't Give Up speech.

As one person's commented on YouTube, he died 58 days after giving the speech, but those 11 minutes of that speech, he was more alive than anyone in the room. After the break we'll play for you one of our favorite parts of that speech and then tell you what we kind of want to share with you in honor of March Madness, in honor of this time of year, and in honor of an amazing man and motivator, Jimmy Valvano, right after these brief messages from our generous sponsors. Have you ever wondered if your pet is lying to you? Why is my cat not here? And I go in and she's eating my lunch. Or if hypnotism is real?

You will use this suggestion in order to enhance your cognitive control. But what's inside a black hole? Black holes could be a consequence of the way that we understand the universe. Well, we have answers for you in the new iHeart Original Podcast, Science Stuff. Join me, Jorge Cham, as we tackle questions you've always wanted to know the answer to about animals, space, our brains, and our bodies. Questions like, can you survive being cryogenically frozen? This is experimental. This means never work for you.

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It's the 1920s, Prohibition is in full swing, and a lot of people are mysteriously dying? Assistant Attorney General Mabel Walker Willebrandt is becoming increasingly desperate in forcing prohibition. She was a lone warrior. I mean, how could Mabel not be feeling the pressure? Her bosses are drunks, her agents are incompetent, even Congress is full of hypocrites. So if Mabel is going to succeed in laying down the law, she needs to make the consequences for drinking hurt a lot more.

Which she does, arguably a little too well. Find out more on season three, episode four of Snafu Formula Six. Listen and subscribe on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. In 2020, a group of young women in a tidy suburb of New York City found themselves in an AI-fuelled nightmare. Someone was posting photos.

It was just me naked. Well, not me, but me with someone else's body parts on my body parts that looked exactly like my own. I wanted to throw up. I wanted to scream. It happened in Levittown, New York. But reporting this series took us through the darkest corners of the internet and to the front lines of a global battle against deepfake pornography.

This should be illegal, but what is this? This is a story about a technology that's moving faster than the law and about vigilantes trying to stem the tide. I'm Margie Murphy. And I'm Olivia Carville. This is Levertown, a new podcast from iHeart Podcasts, Bloomberg, and Kaleidoscope. Listen to Levertown on Bloomberg's Big Take podcast. Find it on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hi, I'm Bob Pitman, Chairman and CEO of iHeart Media. I'm excited to share my podcast with you, Math and Magic, Stories from the Frontiers of Marketing. This week, I'm talking to the CEO of Moderna, Stéphane Bancel, about how he led his team through unprecedented times to create, test, and distribute a COVID vaccine all in less than a year. It becomes a human decision to decide to throw by the window your business strategy and to do what you think is the right thing for the world. Join me as we uncover innovations in data and analytics, the math, and the ever-important

creative spark, the magic. Listen to Math & Magic, stories from the frontiers of marketing on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Are we ready to fight? I'm ready to fight. As you are fighting. Is that what, I thought it was, oh, this is fighting words. Okay, I'll put the hammer back.

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That's why we are great. We are the greatest culture makers in world history. Listen to Fighting Words on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Everybody, welcome back to Shop Talk. So, from an amazing speech by coach Jim Valvado. Thirty-second clip for you to listen to before we comment. People say to me, how do you get through life or each day is the same thing? a 30 second clip for you to spend some time in thought. And number three is you should have your emotions moved to tears, could be happiness or joy. But think about it, if you laugh, you think, and you cry,

that's a full day, that's a heck of a day. You do that seven days a week, you're gonna have something special. Laugh, think, cry every day, and that's a full day. You know, it's so true, and what better things to do than to experience the raw emotion of real laughter and the raw emotion of crying and you know as we all know crying can be sorrow but it can also crying can be extreme gratitude emotion being moved and I have I tell people I have three happy cries when I watch undefefeated. Three happy cries? The scene where you guys tell him,

you just got a full ride to college. Yeah. And then somebody is gonna pay for his tuition. The scene, I'm always blanking on the players, but at the very end after the game, that you guys are hugging and basically telling each other how much you love each other. Yeah.

And I'm forgetting the third part, but I always jokingly tell people Harry Potter said that he cried four times Daniel Radcliffe's favorite sports film and he cries four times in the last four. But I mean, that's actually a good example of a really happy cry that you've been. He and I spoke about that and, um, he ranks it his best sports movie ever, which is kind of a, you know, on the one hand it's, you know, an honor on the other hand, we are talking about a wizard. So I don't know. He's a real human being, Bill.

I guess you wouldn't know when I cried first time I ever saw it. Where? Well, I think I actually know, but go ahead. As when we were walking off the field and I was holding Max's equipment, I had no idea they dev they, I didn't even know the cameras are there. I'd never, I didn't remember doing that. But it was such a juxtaposition of me as a father versus me as a kid. And holy smokes, I bawled like a baby. And I, you know, only an idiot laughs at his own jokes.

So I guess only an idiot gets moved by a movie he's in, but I did. Anyway, good, good for the directors and editors for, for doing that. Laugh, think, cry. The third one's think. Um, and you know, to spend a little quiet time and thought and the thought about what you can do in the world, especially, is really good advice. So as I think about what we do as an army of normal folks,

you know, if, if we can tell stories or we can make challenges to our listeners that make them laugh, that make them cry, and that make them think, then we've done our job. And if we haven't, we've missed the mark. Likewise, if you can engage in things outside of your life, outside of your busy normal lives that make you laugh and cry and think Odds are you're doing something worthwhile

Not not make the people you're serving laugh cry and think but make you are engaged in something that makes you happy and smile and laugh and joyous and cry because you want to do more or cry because of the successes that you see in the people you serve, and then make you think about what next, about maybe are the people you're serving changing some preconceived motions in your mind. Laugh, cry, think. If we had an army of normal folks engaged in things that make them laugh, cry, and think, I think we reach the world. We think, Alex. Amen, brother. You know, you show certain conversations with people every day. And you know, there's like a line,

never talk to people about politics and religion. And in my family growing up, we're like, screw that. Yeah, so it's two of the three things I like talking about the most. Politics, religion, and sports. Well, the sports is about to be a part of my negative riff. Like, what, do you just want to talk about the weather in sports all day?

Like, that's, I mean, and now that there's anything wrong with that, but like having actual meaningful conversations with people. And as you always say, if you do it respectfully, my dad actually says this, you know, so he's in the finance world, right? And he talks about politics and religion with his clients. A lot of people would say you're nuts. Like, why would you like jeopardize, you know, so he's in the finance world, right? And he talks about politics and religion with his clients. A lot of people would say you're nuts.

Like, why would you like jeopardize, you know, a potential relationship with somebody, but. I would argue that if you do it civilly and in a non-threatening way, you're not jeopardizing relationships, but you're actually building them. Absolutely, and they respect them. Even if they differ with you,

if they can garner respect for your viewpoint and they recognize you're not crazy for thinking the way you do, even though you differ, you can build a relationship on those differences. And so when you're wearing conversations with people, what can we add to our conversation that's gonna make people laugh, think, and cry? And think. And what can we do in our lives that make us laugh, cry and think?

That's the depth of an army of normal folks. And that's how you build relationships, and I think that's how you change the world. So... Two other things from his speech. He said, as Dick Vitell said, I'm a very emotional and passionate man, I can't help it. That's being the son of Rocco and Angelina Volvano. It comes with the territory. We hug, we kiss, we love. And I just, you hear his voice say it too. It's so good, the Italian voice that just, hey, we live life in this very vibrant way. I don't know if, actually, I once told the story with the biographer of Sam Phillips.

Yeah, Sam Phillips, Sun Studios. Yeah, I mean, you could probably tell the story better than me, but what he did, Johnny Cash and Elvis and all these people. Jerry Lee Lewis and Patty. Roy Orbison. Roy Orbison, all of it. But he grew up in like- Half the traveling Wilburys he recorded.

And like Florence, Alabama or somewhere out there, where a lot of those musicians came from. And he would actually say that, like, he would stand outside the black church and just like how raucous it was. Here's this white guy standing outside the church. He's even got some line in the book, like they're allowed at church, they make love loud.

Everything is just vibrant and loud. And that's kind of what Jimmy Vee said too, like we hug, we kiss, we're not ashamed of it. This is, let's live this vibrant fun life. We're emotional, but that's what creates laughter and tears and makes you think. And it's, uh, it's awesome. What's my other funny Jimmy Vee thing. So at the very end, he's going over time and he's like, this clock keeps telling me I'm 30 seconds left, but frankly, I don't care that the guy in the back of the room is saying this, I'm about to die. What? What?

What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What?

What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What?

What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? What? the speech. It's called the don't give up. Don't give up. Speech is from the SPs. I think in 83 and uh, Google it. It's 11 minutes. And if you want to laugh, think and cry, recognize that the man was dead 58 days later when he gave that emotional speech with a smile on his face. Um, so happy about every moment that he had. So that's it. Shop Talk number 48.

Engage in things that make you laugh, think, and cry. And share those with around you. And see if your life and the lives of those around you aren't deeply enriched by those three things. That's Shop Talk number 48. We'll see you next week. Imagine you're scrolling through TikTok, you come across a video of a teenage girl,

and then a photo of the person suspected of killing her. It was shocking. It was very shocking. Like that could have been my daughter. Like, you never know. I'm Jen Swan. I'm the host of a new podcast called My Friend Daisy. It's the story of how and why a group of teenagers turn to social media to help track down their

friend's killer. Listen to my friend Daisy on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. In 2020, a group of young women found themselves in an AI-fueled nightmare. Someone was posting photos. It was just me naked. Well, not me, but me with someone else's body parts. This is Levittown, a new podcast from iHeart Podcasts, Bloomberg, and Kaleidoscope about the rise of deepfake pornography and the battle to stop it. Listen to Levittown on Bloomberg's Big Take podcast. Find it on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey there, Ed Helms here, host of Snafu, your favorite podcast about history's greatest screw ups. It's the 1920s, Prohibition is in full swing, and a lot of people are mysteriously dying? Assistant Attorney General Mabel Walker Willebrand is becoming increasingly desperate in forcing Prohibition. She was a lone warrior. I mean, how could Mabel not be feeling the pressure? Her bosses are drunks, her agents are incompetent, even Congress is full of hypocrites. So if Mabel is going to succeed in laying down the law,

she needs to make the consequences for drinking hurt a lot more, which she does, arguably a little too well. Find out more on season three, episode four of Snafu Formula Six. Listen and subscribe on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Have you ever wondered if your pet is lying to you? Why is my cat not here? Can I go in and she's eating my lunch?

Or if hypnot pet is lying to you, Why is my cat not here? And I go in and she's eating my lunch. or if hypnotism is real, We will use this suggestion in order to enhance your cognitive control. But what's inside a black hole? Black holes could be a consequence of the way that we understand the universe. Well, we have answers for you in the new iHeart original podcast, Science Stuff. Join me, or Hitcham, as we answer questions about animals, space, our brains, and our bodies. So give yourself permission to be a science geek and listen to science stuff on the iHeart Radio

app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My name is Brendan Patrick Hughes, host of Divine Intervention. This is a story about radical nuns in combat boots and wild-haired priests trading blows with J. Edgar Hoover in a hell-bent effort to sabotage a war. J. Edgar Hoover was furious. He was out of his mind and he wanted to bring the Catholic left to its knees. Listen to Divine Intervention on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.