Good News York by Growth Mode Content - GNY EP.66 | Talking Local Comedy with Guests, Dylan Werts, Mike Terry, & Abdulkadir Hadi!

Episode Date: July 16, 2025

Comedy Throwdowns and Champion Tours: Good News York Interviews with Dylan Wirtz and Guests In this episode of Good News York, the host kicks off with a plug for 'Ads on the Go' and shares a personal anecdote about recent traffic troubles. He then introduces Dylan Wirtz, a comedy promoter in Syracuse who organized the Cue Comedy Throwdown, a successful event that sold out quickly and benefited the Golisano Children's Hospital. Wirtz discusses the upcoming 'Night of Champions' event featuring top comedians from the Throwdown. Guests Abdul, Mike Terry, and Tommy Armstrong share their experiences in comedy and discuss the importance of social media in promoting their acts. Mike Terry also highlights his impressive 30-day, 30-state, 30-open mic tour, sharing the challenges and adventures along the way. The episode concludes with final plugs for social media handles and ticket details for the upcoming comedy event. 00:00 Introduction and Sponsor Shoutout 00:17 Traffic Woes and Zach's Billboard Innovation 01:22 Introducing Dylan Wirtz and the Cue Comedy Throwdown 02:12 Dylan's Journey into Comedy 03:07 The Success of the Cue Comedy Throwdown 04:24 Upcoming Night of Champions Event 08:22 The Role of Social Media in Comedy 11:20 Venue Details and Ticket Information 12:55 Shoutouts and Closing Remarks 13:20 Wayne Wiggle Bottom's Hilarious Report 13:39 Mike's 30 Days, 30 States, 30 Open Mics Journey 13:54 Open Mic Memories and Comedy Venues 15:15 The Spiritual and Logistical Challenges of the Tour 17:43 Unexpected Obstacles and Determination 22:32 Documenting the Journey and Future Plans 23:15 Final Thoughts and Where to Find Us

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If you're into podcasts, chances are you have something to say too. With RSS.com, starting your own is free and easy. Upload an episode and we distribute it to Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, and hundreds more. Track your listeners, see where they're from, and start earning from ads like this. Even with just 10 listeners a month. If you've been thinking about starting a podcast, this is your site. Start free at RSS.com Hey folks, welcome to good news.

York brought to you by Ads on the Go. Get Ads on the Go.com is the website. Check that out. Go talk to our man, Zach, and get your face on the side of a truck driving around 31. Absolutely. Which I did that recently.

I was up on 11 and was going to go to 31, and it was the worst traffic I've ever experienced my whole life. I've never experienced that before. I know people, the traffic's always a little tight there, but it was insane for no obvious good reason. So I think people are avoiding the 81 traffic and trying to take regular roads. So one thing Zach's doing now so that his truck doesn't get stuck in traffic just with like one person getting, you know, berated with ads is he's like working out arrangements with local parking lots to be like a digital billboard. Nice. I can go to the most like populated area at a point.

Like he was out in Burrude for the fireworks. Dude, the most brilliant young man I've encountered in a long time. I really like Zach. By the way, you might have noticed, that's not Mike. Mike will be joining us a little later. He's got another guest that's going to join us in the studio. He's going to do an incredible interview with them, so stick around for that. But first, I am joined by my good buddy, Dylan Wirtz.

Hey, what's up everybody. Dylan is a, I guess you'd say, newfound comedy promoter here in Syracuse. He put together this event called Acuse Comedy Throwdown. Did I get it right? Correct. All right, cool. A couple months back now. April.

Incredible event. First one he's ever put on, sold it out in, I don't know, 20 minutes or something crazy like that? A couple weeks. And it was a competition. So there was a number of comedians that came on. I was lucky enough to be a judge for the event. It was really cool. And they got points.

And, you know, you had some top three. Now you're having a championship, and if you wouldn't mind, talk about that, and then also introduce our other guests for us, if you wouldn't mind. Yeah, so it all came together. Should I be looking at you or looking at the camera? Anywhere, buddy. Okay, cool. So basically how it came about is less than a year ago I had just decided on a random Thursday

night to go try a local open mic. I went out to Average Joe's in Ballonsville, kind of wrote some chicken scratch jokes and went out there and really enjoyed it. I had a coffee meeting with a friend Robin Cortiz, who you probably know a few months later. And she had just asked what I'd been up to. I'd mention I was doing some stand-up comedy. The thing about doing stand-up at local open mics is it's a bit of a mixed crowd. There's some folks there that just want to have a beer, some of the comics who just want to get their jokes off,

and then a few people that are kind of actively paying attention. So it's hard to get that feedback and if you're actually doing well. So I had mentioned to Robin that I was hoping to try out a competition sometime soon so I could really figure out where I was at with things And she said hey, how about you just throw a competition So one thing came became another We booked the Syracuse Polish home I reached out some buddies who knew a lot of comics in the area Got in touch with as many people as I could find

And the show came together really quickly I think the The format of it really sold itself Yeah The Polish home kind of has this like rabid fan base of people that just want to like like get drunk on the weekend. And they're good folks over there. And then the comics were inviting their friends and their family. Sure.

So the show kind of sold itself. We put together that panel of judges and the night came together better than I could have imagined. My best friend traveled up from New Jersey. It was just a really cool night. That's awesome. So we raised some money for a Galasano Children's Hospital. That was a charity show.

Nice. So the Polish home was able to make some cash. We made a significant donation to Galasano. And we, as you saw, we made it as fair as we've possibly could. We had different categories for the judging and we had eight judges and we were telling those. There's detailed criteria I had to pay I had to like think about it. I know holy shit. Yeah, it was serious. I tried. I wanted to make it fair. Yeah, so we did that and then we had the three winners. We had Mr. Mike Terry in third place, Tommy Armstrong in second place. And then

Abdul took the crown as the Q's comedy throwdown champion. And a few weeks after the show, The idea came to mind like, hey, let's throw like a private, more intimate show. Yeah. The winners of the competition. And we reached out to CNY Jazz Central, got the room booked, reached out to these guys. They were all down right away. We have two other comics that placed highly in the competition, Screech Monroe and Phoenix Thomas. Nice.

We got some musical support from Theo Curtin, who is, we're not roommates for housemates. Okay. And Theo is a super talented improvisational pianist and guitar player. Damn. He's done solos at the Boston Music Hall, and he travels all over. And because he can do improv music, he's a part of a number of local groups, because he can just hop on there and kind of feel the vibe of the music and then play his thing. Yeah.

Yeah, so that's what we're doing. And it's on Thursday, July 24th, at Doors at 5, show at 6, and it should be a good time. That's awesome, man. I'm really excited for this show. Gentlemen, like I said, the competition was tight. It was incredible. There was so many comedians.

Yeah. But of such high quality. Like, we were laughing all night, which was really cool. But you all really pulled it out. And I guess we'll go to Abdul first. As you were going through your performance there in the competition, how did you did compared to some of the comedians? Um, I don't know, usually like every time I'm on stage, I just usually think, but that was fine.

So as like as soon as I got off the stage, I like, I wasn't thinking about placing or anything. Yeah. I was just happy. I had a good set. And, uh, yeah, I was just, I never, like, my mind's usually just thinking about the next joke or it's just always a blank. I love this guy. I've seen him around for a few years now in the local comedy scene. He's never not been funny. Oh, dude. Seriously.

It was always like, this dude is made for comedy, and I'm glad to see him do it. And you can see it as he pulled out the win. Thank you. Mike, tell me, so in this next event, you know, that last one was kind of a quick showcase where you did a short set. This one, I understand, is going to be quite a bit longer, right? Where you're going to get to do a lot more material. What's it like preparing for that? Or did you have a longer set and you had to cut it down for the previous show?

How's that where? Yeah, so that's like when you do competitions, you want to give people like a good taste, whatnot? You want to give them your best five minutes? Yeah, yeah, your best five minutes. So you might not do a whole bunch of long jokes. You might, you know what I mean, chop it up, hitting with a bunch of 30 second jokes but with this upcoming set

you can take your time you know what you take your shoes off yeah you got a little comfortable do some crowd work you know I mean too comfortable yeah right right

got to make sure the socks smell good yeah yeah yeah but yeah you know tell a little bit more stories get to know the people that you're talking to take your time your demeanor is more relaxed yeah yeah so

and and it's a exciting. It's exciting. I'm not having a blank. I thought about something completely different. We are still having to record it, I believe. Say it again. We are still having to record it. The Night of Champions? Yeah. Yeah. Okay, yeah. We don't have it recorded. So, I mean, that's another way to continue to promote ourselves. Yeah. Whether we take that, that footage and shop it to comic clubs and try to get into comedy clubs, or we just posting, you know, gives us the avenue to post more YouTube clips or whatever and spread more reach. I'm so glad you mentioned that.

I'd love to ask all you fellas. You know, back in the day, when the internet YouTube, all these things started, there's a lot of comedians. I felt like the last thing they wanted was their set or their jokes posted. Right. And now I feel like that's flipped and they see the promotional value. Is that accurate? And what do you guys think about that?

I mean, I do agree that like posting clips has gotten like a lot. lot of people far in comedy. Like, like, I, like, I, like,

I, like, I, like, I want people to be more aware of who I am. Sure. And, uh, my only issue with it is just, like,

I see a lot of comics, like, especially young comics, like, posting, like, like, jokes from, like,

an open mic and stuff and, like, yeah, these jokes are, like, way too new. Like, like,

let them settle. Like, let them, like, breathe a little bit before you, like, post them out in the, world.

All you're doing is just like posting a really good premise and that's it. Yeah. But like, yeah, it's crazy that like back in the day, like all you had to do was just work hard, like keep on working and then I just waited until someone noticed you. And like it's very empowering to see comedians just like, you know, I'm just going to take this in my own hand, throw it on TikTok. And if like if they like it, they like it, if they don't, then I guess I can. I got to stick with my day job.

You always want to keep writing, too. So that helps you to, because, you know, me, no comedian, as we brought up, no comedian, you don't want to host your best up. Yeah. Hey, come on out to the show. Come on out to the show. And they'll wait, this thing. They've seen it.

Yeah. No, you tricked this. No, you don't want them to have that reaction. So you always want to keep writing. And that way you can, you can mix it in. You can mix in your new stuff with your old stuff. Sure. And try it and true if you want to call it that.

I love that. One thing I've noticed, and I'm relatively new to this, is I feel like a lot of comics they use their social media as proof that they're funny. Whether it be like sharing funny memes or doing sketch comedy, like I've seen your sketches. I know Tommy is very popular for his sketches. So it's like if you can make the Instagram or the Facebook or the TikTok

be a proof that you're funny, then it'll get people into the show to hear those actual jokes. And I feel like as I've been promoting the, the Knight of Champions specifically because it's been a bit more of a grind, is I'm trying to get sillier and just kind of immune to embarrassment online. And like the ticket sales have picked up, the interest is picked up as I get sillier, as I get a little funnier online.

You're doing a great job of really just having fun with it and promoting it in every way you can. Yeah. Telling goofy stories as they come up. I mean, that's really the formula. And I love to see that you've figured that out. It's taking a lot of people. There's a lot of social media experts that spend lots of money

and haven't figured that out. You're nailing it, buddy. I love to see it. Thank you. It's awesome. The venue is Jazz Central. Is that the name of the place? C&Y, Jazz Central.

So I've never been there before, but just the look of the place from the outside looks super cool. Yeah, and the stage is really set up like a comedy club. Oh, wow. Comedy Club, you typically have that little tiny backdrop that people are in front of, like, a brick wall or something.

I don't know exactly what it is, but it looks just like that. Nice. And then the seats kind of like ascend upward. So the crowd's not on top of you at all You have like, I don't know, maybe the size of this room to walk And then the crowd goes up from there 75 people so yeah, it's gonna be cool

That's gonna be a great night Yeah I'm excited to see it It's anytime I think of a jazz club All I can think of is Ron Swanson playing the sacks You know? You gotta get him to come out That's it That's awesome fellas

What's the website for tickets I know you might have mentioned it already but I love to get those plugs as many as I can. Absolutely. It's a night of champions. Dot card with 2Rs. Dot co with no M. Awesome.

Yeah. So that's awesome. That's the website. And there's probably Facebook things to check out for that too. Yeah. So there's an event page. I think the game plan for this is that annually we'll do the throwdown as a charity show.

Uh-huh. And then the Night of Champions as a private show. Uh-huh. And I think with that in mind, it'll kind of raise the stakes of the throwdown a bit. Yeah. Like knowing that there's a show on the horizon. So I think after the show, I'll establish formal social media pages for both.

But right now it's just an event page and my private page at Dylan Words. Okay, cool. You're listening to a podcast right now, driving, working out, walking the dog. If you're into podcasts, chances are you have something to say too. With RSS.com, starting your own podcast is free and easy. Upload an episode and we distribute it to Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, and more. Track your listeners, see where they're from, and start earning from ads, just like this.

If you've been thinking about starting a podcast, this is your sign. Start your new podcast for free today at RSS.com. Cool. This is awesome.

Awesome. Real quick, shout out to Dylan for putting all this together. Absolutely. All this hard work. You standing near the,

what's that highway where all the crashes have? Yeah, the parkway. I'm like, oh, man, I'm proud of him, but you will not see me

standing out of it. You know, I'm like... Yeah, consistent too, man. Trying to be funny. You're out of you, man. Oh, yeah. We just dropped a new one yesterday, Wayne Wiggle Bottom. Was reporting, did you see the video?

I don't think I saw that one yet. There's a local man dressed in a pickle costume, making everyone laugh hysterically. That's... That's... Yeah, Wayne Wiggle Bottom was on the scene. That's incredible. That's incredible. We'll mix that in the episode so folks can see that.

While we're shouting people out, I just wanted to plug something that you might find interesting. Sure. Mike just went 30 days and 30 states and did 30 different open mics. Holy shit. Documented the whole journey. So I thought that took a lot of courage. Wow. That's, you know, here's what's wild.

You guys mentioned open mics. And I went to probably a decade ago now. Phil Farda and I went to O'Days back in the day when that was a place. I missed that place. And that open mic, dude, it's where it's now the rooftop bar. on tip hill. Yeah, it's so big. Before they renovated it.

Got it. And it was downstairs. And we walked in and there was, I don't know, maybe a dozen comedians. The place was dark as hell. And it looked like an opium den like right after everybody got high. And I was like, this is the most depressing fucking comedy room I ever seen my whole life. And people would get up and tell their jokes and the other comedians would be like pissed off at them that they were funny. It was the weirdest, wildest thing I had ever seen.

And I'm like, damn, these open mics are rough, man. Sad. No days was different back in the day. It was wild. Then again, I will say, I also remember going to ones at the Funk and Waffles that used to be on the hill. Okay. That was an awesome venue. If you remember that, it was sort of downstairs and I had that cool stage the way it was awesome.

But that was an open mic where people couldn't be happier and it was a great time. And, you know, even the people that weren't funny got cheered because. people were being kind, you know? Like it was, it was an interesting vibe. But Mike, tell us just a little bit about this tour. Where'd you get that idea? Yeah, so it is, there's definitely a spiritual aspect to it. Like, I try to make it short because I don't, you know, I mean, I want to take an hour.

Is that how long the story's going to take? No. But like, so like 2022, when they all just like driving and, And my mind was on like something that was stressing me out. And then just boom randomly, I had like a visual of me making that initial post. Hey, for 30 days, I'm traveling to 30 states, getting on 30 mics. And I was like, yes, Lord, I'll do that. Like, I'll go ahead and do that.

And it took some time. So like I was telling Dylan before we got on here, it was like three aspects to having that thing work out. Like the faith that God will do it, the money to fund it, and then the plan to see it through. Like from 2022 to 2025, those three things didn't line up. But like, so like I broke my finger. Oh, dear. I can see that. It was December 20th, 2025.

2024, my bad. Wow. I love what you looked at us. It says like we would remember the day. Right. But short stories, I broke my finger. And then I was on, I was on, not unemployment. I was on workers' count.

Yeah. Out of work and stuff like that. I had a couple surgeries, and I was like, you know what? Let me just put the plan together as if the money's coming. Yeah. And let me just start there. So prior years, I had jumped in a bunch of Facebook groups and stuff like that. So just started to, like, do it the hard way.

The ones that had lists, I wrote down the list and all that, and just put the plan together. And then, like, around, I'd say late February, around March, found out, okay, I'm getting like a couple of lump sum payments. Sure. And I had like a disability on my disability insurance on my auto loan. And then also shout out to Abdul. He let me know about empty and out of 401K.

Not to put all your business out there. But it's a couple of aspects. It's the thing you can do. Yeah. And I was like, you know what? I think I might have the money to do this. So I'm like, the plans falling in the place. And the whole just getting it to line up, just, you know, to make it in 30 days when there wasn't like that night and you can get to another state the next day.

That part seems to blow my mind by itself, man. Yeah, that was, there was definitely a grind. And initially it started off rough. I ain't going to lie. So, like, it was putting it together all right now and then quit my job, gave him two weeks and said, you know, I was going to tell them the day of. Like, all right. But I was like, no, man. But, yeah, so, like, day one,

I didn't know that June 1st was the start of Pride Month. Oh. So they pretty much took over downtown Philadelphia, and it was, it was, uh, it was a little thoughtish. I know, it was a lot of butt shaking and, um, beads and... That's a wild. Coco butter everywhere.

But, um, so, yeah, I'll leave some of the details. Yeah, I'll leave some of the details out. But the open mic got canceled. So, I mean, you know, I continued to try to look for it somewhere to perform. And, you know, I'm working on that story. But I just kept hitting roadblock after roadblock. But I'm like, all right, this is day one. And then day two was Rhode Island.

Okay. That worked out. I hit two mics in one day. Oh, wow. You got your average in, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Got the average back up. And then next day was Boston.

then it was Delaware, then it was Maryland, then I had a show in Cleveland. So that was like I got four mics in or six mics in and then. You didn't necessarily go in order these states. You kind of jumped around, man. Yeah, it was like in my phone and heartbeat. Heartbeat, yeah. So it was definitely like a whole loop around.

Wow. The goal was doing an open mic each day. Yeah. It was like how close can I do that for each state if possible? I wanted to do it in one circle, but that's not how everything worked out. But my longest drive was 15 hours. Wow. That was from Denver to Austin, Texas.

And the reason why it was 15 hours and not 14, like if you Google it. Yeah. Oh, wow, that made it shorter. Yeah. If you Google Denver, Colorado to Austin, Texas where I was going, it was 14 hours. However, when I was in Denver, on the journey, my tire blew up. Of course. Yeah, potholes. Aggressive.

Potholes, blew my tire out. That was the whole thing. I had to put a boot on it. So I was like, all right, you know, this is a part where somebody would be like, you know what, tire blew out. You know what? It didn't work out. Fuck that.

I'm sorry. Can we care? Yeah, yeah. All right, my bad. After that, I kept going. I went to the over mic. Yeah. Short story is, my bad.

This is all supposed to be a short story. No, you're good. But, um, adventure. So, yeah, tire blew out. And then I'm like, all right, let me just post real quick. I put my name on the list. Post real quick. Um, and I do all the posting.

I get there back to the venue and it's empty. Everybody left. I missed. Oh, shit. I was pissed. And then, you know, talking to the person, running the mic, uh, they let me know, well, it's actually another one over here. I was okay.

All right. There's still hope. And then, uh, went to that open mic. It was a little difference. So it was like a little. bucket Mike put your name in the hat and stuff like that and yeah

so if you did good it was like it called you in three so if you won that round of three people I got you you won $20 and stuff like that oh that's cool like that and then like you get called back almost like a almost like a kill Tony sort of situation where they call you up randomly and give you a few minutes that deal

yeah so it's interesting I was going to Texas to to do kill Tony and after that 15 hour drive was a long The longest. Reason why it was 15 because I was driving gingerly, I ain't want to bust out that donut. I'd be messed up. Yeah, man, you got it starts to shake around 50. Right, right. We got all the way to Austin, Texas, and they said, oh, now, no kill Tony tonight. Oh, damn. Damn. All right, all right, and I just looked up the list. All right, where else did they have? They got all their open mics. And every place that I went to, it was a closed door. It was one place wasn't even open. Damn.

Like, they even had a light sign and that, like, they opened the day. Like, I just kidding. I didn't know that was the Kill Tony night. That's crazy. Oh, yeah, yeah. So that was, that was, but they had another open mic. Like, there was an open mic before Kill Tony. They were having that, but you had to be there, like, you know, a couple hours before I got there.

But, yeah, so, but. That's incredible. And side note, he got a good. I got a bunch of, or not. I got a bunch of footage on this thing right here. That's awesome. But also I got an external hard drive and got some of it on my phone. So I documented the journey working on and putting it a documentary together.

Yeah. So afterwards, if y'all wouldn't mind, I'll probably like do a video with you or something. You guys got to talk to our man Brian Inc. If you don't know, you know Brian, of course. He's, I really love how he's taking it seriously and doing, you know, Of course, you were on his special that he recorded and learning about that whole world of shooting your own special and then shopping it around to these different places. I didn't even know that's a thing. It's pretty cool what he's got going on.

Yeah, it's really dope. Before we go, Abdul, where can folks find you aside from the show? Anywhere in particular, they should go to follow you and all that fun stuff? Yeah, you can follow me. I'm on Instagram. My name's Oscar winner, Sean Penn. It's a hilarious Instagram, too. I'm just going to say that.

I don't like the actor. That's mainly... My whole comedy goal is just to get a cease and desist letter from it. And I'll quit comedy. Nice. But, yeah, Oscar winner, Sean Penn on all forms of social media. Nice, nice. And Mike, you as well.

Where can they find you? And so Instagram, Mike Terry, 7, Facebook. my and my k-e-e-t-e-r-r-y-r-one some people call me mike perry and stuff like that mike cherry i don't know where it gets confused but yeah facebook it's pretty simple name yeah right i'm on youtube mike on youtube at mike on youtube and then tic-tok mike's voice seven nice i should probably get one name also make it a lot smoother but uh it's all in the process man Dylan, and one more time, where can folks find you and give the details for the show one more time, too, if you could?

Absolutely. So Dylan Wirtz on Facebook, W-E-R-T-S, on Instagram, Dill Pickle, 37, and then the show is The Cuse Comedy Throwdown presents the Night of Champions on Thursday, July 24th at CMIJazz Central, and you can get tickets at night of champions. Dot card with 2Rs.co with no M. Nice.

Thanks for having us on, Matt. Appreciate it. Absolutely, man. And, of course, the links will be in the description for all the videos as well. So people don't have to do that R-Math in their typing. Guys, thank you so much for joining us. Thanks for having us.

This has been awesome. Come back any time you got any of you guys, got shows going on, anything you want to talk about, you want to just shoot the breeze and spread the good news in New York State here. We'd love to have it. I feel like I could sit up here all day. You're made for it, buddy.

You're good at it, dude. Makes you feel chatty, these headphones. That's what's up. That's how it works. Folks, this is good news, York. I love you guys. Thank you so much for joining us. This has been good news, York.

We will see you tomorrow. Peace, oh. Peace.