Green Light with Chris Long - The Last Dance Producer Jon Weinbach & Reflections on 1st Year of NFL Retirement.

Episode Date: May 20, 2020

0:50 - Open and Thank you for 1 MILLION DOWNLOADS. Reflections on 1st Year of NFL Retirement. 6:04 - Sex Dolls and Soccer. 10:39 - Jon Weinbach on the making of the Last Dance, his favorite interviews, and Michael Jordan's Editing Process. 1:01:23 - Quick Hitters with Jon Weinbach. Green Light with Chris Long: Subscribe and enjoy weekly content including podcasts, documentaries, live chats, celebrity interviews and more including hot news items, trending discussions from the NFL, MLB, NHL, NBA, NCAA are just a small part of what we will be sharing with you. 🌍🏀🏈SUBSCRIBE NOW ⚾🏒⛰️ http://bit.ly/chalknetwork Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Happy hump day. This is your host, Chris Long. This is the Greenlight Pod. And I got a fun show today. The main event, I'll just get it out of the way, is going to be John Weinbach. He is one of the producers, along with Mike Tolan, on The Last Dance. They did a magnificent job, stating the obvious. And they did a great job under a time crunch.

They finished ahead of schedule and then like warp speed on top of that to get it out remotely. As my producers are sitting on the other end of this thing, listening to me to a pod, they're probably nodding in agreement that doing a pod remotely is really fucking hard. Doing the last dance remotely is insanity. And I can't wait to tell him how appreciative I am of what they did, because this transcended just something on TV. I mean, it really did. We will always remember this time, and we will always remember the last.

stance. There's a lot I want to ask him about. We'll get to that in a little bit. By the way, he's been nominated for a couple sports Emmys. He's done a couple 30 for 30s. He also did, and this one's a little personal to me because it's the Raiders and my pop Sarah, but straight out of L.A. So John did a great job, so really honored that he would come on the pot. And we'll get to that in a bit. A couple housekeeping items here yesterday happened to be, and I didn't know this until I saw it on Twitter, one year for me outside of the game of football, one year retired, although I was mentally outside of the game of football before. Before I retired, that was the day I announced it.

So sort of a significant day for me, and on that same day, coincidentally, and I put these two things together today, we exceeded the one million download mark on this pod, which is pretty awesome and that's more of a thank you than it is a congratulations to myself because y'all are the ones listening downloading so i appreciate you if you're if you're listening and you like what you're hearing uh subscribe or tell a friend share the pod you know like maybe for my one year out of football present you can pass the pot on to somebody that you think uh might like it and if you don't think anybody would like it i'm wondering why you're listening but uh you know it's funny i might start celebrating, what is it, May 18th was, as I record this Tuesday night, was my first day

as a retired, normal human being. And it's pretty cool. It's been an awesome year. I'm not a big birthday guys I've ranted on before. I think that when you're born, it's undoubtedly the thing that takes the least effort in your entire lifetime. I mean, it takes zero effort, yet we celebrate it, post about it, and pat ourselves on the back about it. it when we should just be calling our mothers. I'm going to celebrate my first day out of football like it's my birthday, starting next year. I'm not going to do a late party this weekend.

Although, listen, I didn't even mention it to my wife yet, my lovely wife, Meg. I might, I might with any luck walk downstairs after I finish this pod and bring it up and say that I owe myself a night of drinking this weekend on a Zoom call with my friends. Maybe I will celebrate. But I got to say, you know, when I'm a day I'm going to say, you know, when I'm a I retired from football when I considered retiring for football. There was a lot of fear there. There was a lot of anxiety.

Late in my career, throughout my career, I often feared what, you know, stepping off that ledge would be like to hear horror stories. You hear anecdotes that just make you feel like you have this really dark destiny. And maybe that's down the line for me. I don't know. But I got to say, so far, so good. Been one of the best years of my life, save for my child. I mean, this is the life. I got two healthy kids. I love them very much. I got a wonderful wife,

my lovely wife, Meg, and I got a job that excites me. I mean, learning new things. I'm closer to a whole person than I was my entire career, being able to just follow leads that interest me and talk to more people and kind of widen my, broaden my horizons a little bit more, widen my scope of knowledge and i got a long way to go a lot to learn but you guys have helped me a lot along that way pushing me when i wake up in the morning and i get ready to do a pod i am thinking about the fear of failure just like when i played um you know i was on busting with the boys last week with will and taylor uh shout out to those guys and they asked me jokingly are we competing you know our pods and i really do believe this i don't track where we are

from a ranking standpoint, like where we are on the Apple page or any of that shit, like, I have no idea. I literally just try to do the best I can and try to be myself because I would hate to be misrepresented and climb the ranks. Like, so competition is not a thing. You know, competition would only be a thing is that if I wasn't getting the job done and I molded what I was doing or saying to catch up to whoever it was I was competing with. This isn't a win or lose thing like football where there's one outcome where it's a, you have to

you have to score more points than the other team. Like that's the only significant marker of success. For me, it's enjoying my job, being pushed mentally, and delivering a product that people enjoy. So thank you for the downloads. Thank you for listening. And thank you for telling a friend one year out of football, a million downloads. Coincidence, I think not. Thank you all.

All right. So hard right turn here. Naturally, we're going to jump from existential crisis. surrounding the fear of retirement and my deepest gratitude to our listenership to sex dolls. I didn't bring it up. It just, it was on my timeline today by way of Scott Van Pelt, by way of Midnight SportsCenter, one of the most popular sports shows in the country. And that's how much we've run out of shit to talk about, although I think we talk about

this at any given point during the calendar year under normal circumstance. FC Seoul, this is a major soccer club from everything I know, not the Philadelphia Soul, not John Bon Jovi here. FC Soul, South Korea, filled their stadium with sex dolls, or as they called it, premium mannequins. FC Soul insisted they were premium mannequins rather than sex dolls, but did admit they came from a supplier that produces sex toys. That's one of those things, okay?

First off, we know why they're doing it. They're trying to create an atmosphere. But there's a thin line between an atmosphere and an ambiance. And for some guys, that's an ambiance. For some dudes, they just walked into an orgy. I was like, these dolls are disgusting, okay? I'm not going to kink shame. I'm certainly not going to kink shame during a pandemic.

Times are tough. I'm not going to blame a soccer club for busing these things in and filling their stadium with them. I mean, to create a little bit of an atmosphere or the illusion of an atmosphere. It's all a game. Just like what they're intended to do, it's all make-believe. It's the fans with the fans in the stands. It's the same thing.

What are we mad about? I don't think anybody's mad about it. I think people are legitimately amused, but FC Soul has apologized. And as I said, I'm not going to king shame. I get it. You're trying to get creative. It's going to take ingenuity to pull out of this thing. No pun intended.

It's bizarre. though. It's pretty fucking bizarre that you didn't quite realize that they were, that this was going to happen when you did it. But you did it. And I'm intrigued with this topic. I always have been and by intrigued, I don't mean like I'm going to pop on Amazon or wherever you buy these bad boys and order a few. I'm intrigued at the phenomenon that people are turning to sex dolls. Like, what's the demo here? And where do we draw the line? Again, not kinkshaming. I do draw the line, however, at sex robots. I talked about that at length in a pod in the fall.

You can check that out in a shared tweet yesterday. I really ranted for a bit on those sex robots. I think that's where we're getting into really scary territory, especially for the guys, because, you know, you're going to get like some Jean-Claude Van Damme-looking sex robot, and he's just going to monopolize your entire sex life at home because he can do everything you can do him more. and if he's the Jean-Claude Van Damme version, he knows karate and can protect the household

and satisfy your wife. Like, it's just a slippery slope you're going down there. It's a lonely road to inadequacy for everybody involved, and we don't need to go down the sex robot Westworld type. I mean, like, Westworld, that would be kind of cool. But sex robots, at least in the stages that I've seen, I'm not a fan of. And, you know, I'm okay with people and their sex dolls. If that's what you're into, I wouldn't suggest like getting used sex dolls, like play it against sports type sex dolls off the table.

I also think that there's some things in life you don't seek discounts for and those would be one of them. Whatever site you're getting on to get your sex dolls, sort that by price. And the one with more dollar signs at the top, the $4 sign sort option, click that bad boy. It's like tattoos. I got people who are like, I don't go to that tattoo artist. He's too expensive. Okay, we'll go get a discount tattoo that's going to be on your body for the rest of your life, the rest of your life.

So yeah, that's where I draw the line in the sand. I draw it at Sex Robots. I'm not King Shaming, FC Salt. Thanks for that, Jim, Scott Van Pelt, curator of really good art hitting sports stuff. So now out of sex robots, we go to a very accomplished producer. And he has been one of the main guys behind what's been gracing our television screen in the past almost two months. It's been keeping me alive, man. John Weinbach, let's get him on the line.

So I've said this a number of times on Greenlight Pod. This is the best guest I've ever had. And due to the circumstances for just saving sports fans' sanity and our sense of hope, I appreciate John Weinbach for coming on. One of the producers on The Last Dance, certainly a great ride. We're sad it's over. John, welcome. Thanks for having me.

Yeah, man. Thanks for coming on. I was saying like the other night as I finished watching, I was interacting with some fans on Twitter of the show, obviously, because who isn't? But I wondered how many like post-Super Bowl hangover sadness is this? Is this like half a post-Super Bowl hangover when the last dance ends for sports fans? I guess for you, it's unique.

You don't, like you've been so immersed and it's hard for you to watch it like a normal fan. But for us, it's at least a half Super Bowl for me. Well, you know, it's funny because, you know, I saw all the episodes in various stages, but I will tell you, except for episodes 9 and 10, because we were so pressed for time that we edited those. I mean, some of your listeners may not know, like, you know, you edit in low resolution so that, you know, of all this media. And you don't see the actual final version unless, you know, Jason saw it our director and the team in New York. but I actually didn't get a chance to see the final, final versions of the show mixed and colored. And with all that 1998 footage, really looking great.

So it was kind of cool, you know, seeing it that way. And obviously, even if you're inside, you don't know what's going to resonate with people. And you don't know, like, what I think none of us, I mean, I don't think any of us expected this kind of reception. But really, you know, what you could never predict is what are the things that are going to make it go viral? like the John Wozniak thing or the lower third that said, you know, the Barack thing, yeah. Yeah. And so, you know, became this thing.

Like before seven and eight, I texted with, you know, Jason and Jake Rogal, you know, fantastic producer and Matt Maxon, great part of the team. I was like, what do we think it is like, what's the leader in the clubhouse for what's going to become the viral moment from seven and eight? Is it going to be, you know, Matt Michael talking trash about Gary Payton? Is it, you know, the conspiracy theory? like what's going to be the thing. Y'all should have gambled on that.

That was very funny. And honestly, I was thinking that one of my questions was, you know, how on point, or was anybody on the team most on point about what was going to go viral? Because there was obviously woes in the act. There were a lot of moments. There were cameos that just hit, hit it, you know, struck gold. But the Pacers lady from the other night. You know, by the way, you know the story.

Apparently that's Luke Horn. It's mom. That's what I heard. That's what I heard. And then I heard it's not. I don't know if that's true. I heard that. I heard and then I heard it's not.

And then like I heard she got on like the fan yesterday and and was ready to explain what was going down. And she's like, yeah, me and me and MJ, we were cool. He just looked and nod and like shake his head. But like me and Robman, we were battling. And I'm like, yeah, this is this lady's day in the sun. So she didn't effectively know. Imagine being that famous and not knowing you're going to be that famous or internet famous for 22, 23 years. Well, the best is I would love to find the kid.

It's in the section when he's in minor league. I think the footage was shot in Birmingham, but I actually don't know precisely. There's a little kid who's getting an autograph with Jordan, and he's on the street, and Jordan's rubbing off. And the kid is all nervous. Yes. I love to, like, who is that kid? You're talking about the Ferrari scene.

Yes, yes. Yeah, no, that scene started out to me. I watch everything, like, and I'm looking for the little things. I mean, it's like ADD, so I can't focus on it. But I'm thinking to myself as that's happening. Who the fuck honks at Michael Jordan? Like, did y'all mix in that honk sound? Or was that something honking at him and truck?

Who does that? Michael Jordan's in Birmingham. You wait. You sit there at the light and wait for him to sign the autograph. And then you go on your way. There's so many priceless little moments, you know, along the way. Just little things in the footage. I mean, look, I'm biased.

I love all the episodes. But, like, there's little archival moments. And just to, I have to give a nod to Nina Christ. who's the archival producer. She just did a little project called OJ. And then we were lucky enough to get her on this project. She's the best in the business. And the moment, I think it's an episode,

I don't actually know if one or two, we have Bob Costas current day talking about the Bulls and how they were kind of a mediocre franchise in the 70s and the 80s. And then we cut to Bob Costas, WGN, Chicago. With that hair. The hair, it's so great. I remember it. I had it written down. We talked about it on my pod.

You know, it was all the little things like that. It's a great point because, you know, we're all, we're all on the edge of our seats focused on the main character, but there were so many great characters. Not just, you know, it's almost like for somebody who was born when I was born, and anybody who was a sports fan in the 90s, you knew the players on the court. So seeing a Ron Harper in an interview, seeing, you know, even John Stockton, which, you know, you guys shot at the height of COVID in Spokane, like, or any of these guys showing more personality than they were given an opportunity to have in the 90s was, it was truly remarkable. It was like seeing something adapted to a big screen.

Yeah, I mean, you know, you are literally exactly the target audience. I mean, I would say people from, you know, 20 to 35. I mean, I'm 44. I grew up, you know, in the 80s, in L.A., massive Laker fan, Dodgers, Raiders. UCLA. But, you know, I grew up watching all of this. And so I had an appreciation for what I was already in college, you know, when the second three-peed happened. But, you know, I think, you know, sort of gets to the essence of how the project came together. You know, Mike Tolan, who's my partner and my boss, Mandalay Sports Media, we did a big lookbook for the, for the project. And this goes,

you know, back to 2016. That's how long this has been in gestation. But as sort of the entry point to the deck, Mike wrote kind of an open letter to Michael. And the essence of it was, you know, every year we have college interns and we have young people who work at our company. And we have a Monday morning meeting every week. And we talk about things. And oftentimes, it's like talking about stuff that happened in the 90s and like the intern's eyes glaze over. And with Jordan, they all know him because they all have his shoes or they know him as the brand, but they never saw him playing. And it's just like, it's time. I think, I think you made a great point though, and this was my main takeaway in the beginning about the entire purpose of this

thing. I mean, not only is it going to be inadvertently, and in a good way, synonymous, the only positive thing we're probably going to associate with this terrible time, people will remember this time forever, one way or another, they'll always remember this doc. I know it's not how you drew it up, but it did give everybody a lot of comfort and community that everybody can get online at the same time and watch the same thing. Like in an era where none of us can spend time together, we essentially are as we would with sports all the time. But also, what you mentioned, I'm the target demo, but there's really three functionalities to watching this, in my opinion. You've got people who are younger. And for them, it's like education. And also, unfortunately, they only

consume things through a first take type of comparative lens. But this is the first time they really saw this. Now, there's people like me who, interestingly, for me, watching the second three peep was this rush of nostalgia. Now, the first one, I'm five, six, seven years old. You can't expect me to watching sports like that, it was almost educational. And then for you, for an older person who's 10 years older than me, it's a rush of nostalgia all the way through. And it's like, I was there, which is really cool. You can hit three audiences and they all have different functionality.

Well, it's incredible with time. The characters, the significance of them. I mean, there were great stories even then, but you think about a Steve Kerr, you know, Phil Jackson, Phil Jackson went on and won five more championships. You know, and the significance of that team and that time, you know, I'm old enough to remember like a pre-internet era. And so Jordan sort of straddles this really interesting time. Like I told you, you know, I grew up in the 80s with Magic and Bird. And that's a, let's call it the rise of the cable TV era.

Jordan straddles like this kind of analog cable TV, internet starting, but nothing like social media. So, but it was the first time that it was kind of global and, you know, look, the rise of the internet. national NBA is entirely, you know, attributable to Jordan, the dream team. And I just think with time, these things, these guys have become only more interesting, only more significant. And, you know, you mentioned about like, you know, the nostalgia. I mean, there's so many very, I remember I watched the flu game or the pizza game, you know, with my uncle in northern New Jersey in 1997. I was starting an internship and we just watched the game and, you know, neither. He was a hardcore Nick fan.

He hated the Bulls. You know, and I was a Laker fan. And I hated the Jazz. Oh my God, did I hate the Jazz? But I kind of hated the Bulls too, but you had to appreciate Jordan. And it was so spectacular. And like, I remember, by the way, I was randomly, I was in Israel in 1995 watching that magic team with, you know, Shaq and Penny and Horace Grant beat the Bulls at 95. It was like, three in the morning.

It was like, Jordan lost. And I'm like, walking in Jersey. Jerusalem being like what the earth is shifted its axis and honestly looking back at that because that was a time in my life where I'm straddling like being unaware in my sports fandom and just casual to like I'm watching all the NBA games I'm getting the bottle caps for the Gatorade bottles in the mid 90s that were like if you got Bulls and six yeah it was a sonic series so like at each step there were like you know and I remember where I was I remember I was in my buddy Philip Posse's basement when he hit that shot of Brian Scott.

And I remember where I was during the flu game. It's just you bring up a great point. And you also brought up a point about Phil. This ruined a question I had for you later. But I think if there's a better call Saul type spinoff on anybody, it's Phil, slam dunk, to me, at least. He's fascinating. You know, I had a chance as a reporter to do a piece on him.

This is probably 2009, 2010. And I can't remember the reason for it. There must have been maybe, oh, Tell you what it was, it was like maybe the 40th anniversary of the 1970 Knicks championship, kind of a random thing. But, you know, Phil was part of that great Knicks team from the late 60s and early 70s. But the first Knicks championship was 1970. And Phil was actually injured.

And Red Holtzman, who was the coach of the Knicks, he already knew Phil kind of had the mindset, even though he was kind of a Maverick to be a coach. And he encouraged Phil to, you know, sort of get into coaching. And at that time, there was not like these huge steps. There was one coach. And Phil became a kind of player coach assistant. And he said he would go, you know, at the time, he would go to NBC, which at the time had, or ABC had, I don't even know who had the NBA rights. And he would watch film.

That was the only way to do it. Right. You do? Yeah. And he was just a fascinating mix. You know, this guy grew up like hardcore religious, you know, but in the middle of Native American country in North Dakota had all these great mentors. And, you know, goes to Puerto Rico. How great was that?

Oh, my God, there were people calling for a spinoff right there, you know, him down in Puerto Rico. It's just otherworldly. The footage of him playing ball, I think, caught a lot of people my age even off guard. I mean, I knew he played. But seeing, and by the way, Phil, okay, so I, every summer my entire childhood and now into adulthood, I go to Montana in the summer for over a month, Flathead Lake. So not far from where you guys interviewed Phil. So my antenna goes off because I've seen Phil at the Hoop Fest up there. It's a three-on-three tournament, a bunch of white kids and Native American kids from the Pacific Northwest, descend on Pulse in Montana, and Phil would roll up.

Steve Kerr, I wrote a jet ski with Steve Kerr. He's been on Flathead Lake. Frank Brickowski, if you remember Frank. Come on. Frank Brickowski was on the Lakers in 87. Yeah, I know. How do you think him and my dad met? They're like best buddies.

I used to go to Lakers games because him and my dad were tight. And then I'd go to like Bucks games and Spurs games because he bounced around a lot. But I remember watching the finals and Frank and Robin getting into it. I was hoping that that would show up. But Frank made the dock in one dunk against the bucks. Jordan dunks over somebody, Frank standing in the background like, what the fuck? And I texted him. But I guess starting from the beginning, 2016, okay, this was the key year.

This was when you guys made some contact with Jordan, right? I mean, why 2016? I've read the long form stuff. But like, do you really think that Jordan is thinking, okay, I'm seeing a trend in long form documentaries. This is the time. No, I think that's what, in fairness, Curtis Polk and Esty Portnoy understood. I mean, they're extraordinarily sharp people. And, you know, there is a long time, business partners, advisors, gatekeepers.

You know, we had known, I mean, I can't speak for Mike Tolan. I had heard about this trove of footage in 2001. when I was producing a show called The Life on ESPN. There was a guy we worked with who had shot a lot for the NBA, and he said, you know, there's this great stuff with Jordan, like from the 98th season. And what's going to happen with that? I mean, this is in 2001. And so a guy we had worked with at Mandalay had actually met SD,

Portnoy, on a trip, and sort of we sort of circled the wagons. And, you know, and this is a huge credit to Mike. He was just like, let's take a shot. So we went to Toronto for the All-Star game. Coldest I've ever been as a human being. And we were sitting in the lobby, Mike and I were sitting in the lobby at the hotel and sort of dreaming, hoping, helped me in this meeting with Curtis and Esty goes well. Mike went away. I came back.

Hey, it went well. So we got together, we got putting together this pitch book. And, you know, I can tell you, oh, we, everything in that pitch book is. in the series. No. What's extraordinarily gratifying is that, you know, the vision of it was, hey, let's use this spine of the 98 season and use it as a way to take departures into telling stories about Rodman and Phil and Kerr and the Pistons rivalry and the Air Jordan brand. So, you know, I think those factors that you mentioned, you know, the market opportunity of long-form documentaries, that helped make sense to Michael.

and also to the creative side because there had been an attempt to make this as a one-hour doc or two-hour doc and the feeling was it could never work because never and by the way if i'm michael jordan i wouldn't do it either because he knew what was on that footage maybe not to the extent but it was going to be unflattering and without the proper context it would maybe just come off looking like he's an asshole you know and so um wasn't flattering to you because i i feel like I think in the wrong context it could be. Yeah, without context. I think that's the biggest thing because nowadays,

it's so easy to get taken out of context. And for you to have control over the creative process, the editing as an athlete with somebody's brand like Jordan and you have to appreciate the brand equity that you put into it, like I get the fact that you want final say on editing. I want that on my podcast. If somebody asked me to come on a podcast, I ask you to come on, you're a pro,

but I generally tell people, if you say something that you really didn't like saying, and then they're a friend. Hit me up and I'll edit it out. Like Michael Jordan deserves that. And it's not like it's out of line. I know that like Ken Burns comments and all that. And there's people that are like, well, it's a documentary.

What you're watching in sports, whether it's a football life or something else, it's generally guided by the subject of the documentary. And what you see on people's social media is their highlight tape. That's how we look at athletes unless they get arrested or unless something gets leaked. Like it's all fair. It is what it is. and you know what, I mean, it was brilliant. So I don't care if I didn't see every Jordan low point that, you know,

we don't see that about a lot of people, period. Well, I'll tell you this. Look, I was a reporter with the Wall Street Journal. I still kind of look at the world through that lens. I think it's, first of all, I think to the extent that it exists that, oh, Jordan had final cut. Let me tell you something. He was not saying take out that quote.

He really wasn't. And they are savvy enough to realize that if, If it's all sanitized, if it's all just a big congratulatory thing, it's not going to be good. And that's not, you know, I think, you know, Jason has said it really well, which is like Michael came to play, you know. And I think that that comes shining through in the candor of the interviews. And it's not like we don't go there. I mean, name the issue, gambling, his father's death. Republicans don't, yeah, Republicans.

You know, the shoe controversy of politics. And we go there. I mean, this is not a page one Wall Street Journal story in terms of an expose, but it is a, I think, very thorough and balanced to the extent that we needed to be in this kind of format. And so there's not a 60 minutes piece.

And by the way, if you want to do that, I think you're going to end up digging nowhere. I really do think that. But also, then what do you have? I think the only thing that was probably left out was his very personal life. And, you know, like, as far as, like, what he did when he went out, like, who shows that? I mean, who does that?

And then, you know, probably just more shit talk, like, just more iterations of the same shit talk. Another opponent who snubbed him and he dominated. Yeah, exactly. Like, you know, we all have personal sides as athletes that don't see the light of day. And, you know, I think it's unfair to hold Mike to that standard. We're not doing, you know, a World War II documentary here. I understand that some people, you know, I think it depends on the lens you look at it through, too.

I think when he said, you're going to hate me, I thought, I don't think he was purposefully under promising over delivering, but I also think that he was understanding that a lot of people, and this goes back to, well, that's because you never won nothing, that comment. A lot of people who are not athletes do not understand that that stuff is commonplace, the way he talked to Scott Burrell, the way he motivated himself, even the way he isolated himself. And like with the brand, okay, we're talking about the brand. Consider a world today where everything is documented. Like LeBron has a production company.

He has social media. Taco Tuesday. It just doesn't fucking stop. Jordan's brand was guarded with such red tape for such a long time that I feel like almost ironically, him doing less is more, and this was mentioned by his team, paved the way for guys now to prescribe to the more is more brand strategy. I think that without Jordan denying people access for so many years,

We don't have the reward for continual access that we have now for athletes. Well, there's not much mystery left. I mean, it's good and bad. It's great for people in my world because there's an access. There's a business model. There's a way to tell these stories that probably wasn't there before. But it does take away a little bit of the mystery. I mean, it's just also a different media age and a different set of expectations.

You know, the reality is there weren't any. athletes, certainly of Michael's stature, taking social justice position. They didn't have that platform. By the way, we didn't ask that of John McEnroe. We didn't ask that of, you know, Howie Long. We didn't ask you of Stockton, Pippen. We didn't ask of any of the guys in the documentary. And I thought that, like, there's heavy as the head that wears a crown.

I get that. And I've been involved in activism and political conversations and whatnot. And that's an ugly thing. And you're almost going to lose every time, no matter how you come out. And I understand that like in the 90s, if you're looking around it's not the norm, why are you expecting that he has to be the best basketball player of all time and then a 90s trailblazer at the same time? I understood that the race in North Carolina,

but the background around that, you know, there were some circumstances that, as he explained it, made a little more sense. I think people only look at it through a 2020 one. Well, and by the way, what is, why does everybody have to be an activist? You don't have to. What may work for you or me or what my impulse is, isn't what just because he's a big athlete. We didn't ask Magic to do that.

And by the way, magic got a lot of crap for that initially, if you remember when he was, quote, not doing enough for HIV, you know? And so I think we sort of put these weight on guys, athletes, because musicians or actors have traditionally been more forthright in that way. But like, you know, it's okay to be sort of a gladiator, you know, and that's what you do. It doesn't have to be a politician as well. And nowadays, you know, there's a number of our favorite players that don't open their mouth about stuff like that.

And I'm pretty sure if they did, you'd be either disappointed depending on what you believe or you'd think they didn't do it well enough or they weren't well versed enough. Where does Jordan have the time to immerse himself in things like social justice or politics unless he's doing it on a surface level? And from somebody, and I can tell you from somebody who's had to speak on things, it takes more than like diving in on a surface level. or you're going to embarrass yourself, which is why, like, I pick my spots. Like, so I get the Jordan thing with that. Is there something you were surprised to learn about working with him, like his personality of PetPeeve?

Did it take a lot of get over the walking on eggshells part? Well, it's hard because, you know, it was always, I, you know, Jason did the interviews. I, what my, my, my, um, POV on it is watching and watching the body language and the spaces between. Michael Jordan has really not done that much media, and he's been, you know, most of it is, you know, just enough to get the media, you know, sort of what they need, but not really, you know, forthright. I don't know if I was surprised at just the detail of, like, how he would invent these motivations, you know, like LaBradford Smith.

Dude, the poor guy. He had no idea. He had no idea on that thing. He's probably watching with his family, like, oh, I love Jordan. Probably barely remembered that game. And then he's like, oh, shit. Well, that and I did not know the, I knew some of the origins of the Jerry Krause sort of relationship. I did not know that chapter from 86 where he was injured and Krauss like was so dead set on not using him.

You know, by the way, in hindsight, I, you know, nowadays all GMs would have, they would all shut down their stars. They would be like, what are you? What are you crazy? You know, that you're going to come back for a team that's maybe going to get into the first round and get balanced immediately. You know, play for the lottery. Some of those details, I didn't know some of the extent of the relationship with his brother and his dad and how, you know, he was constantly competing for his dad's attention and affection. So that drove him.

So, you know, some of these nuggets that came through in the interviews, I think were maybe the most surprising. Yeah, you know what, and you mentioned that, the Jordan psyche part of it, which was, you know, kind of the main event, because everybody wants to get inside his head. And you mentioned the competitiveness. I heard, I don't know if you said this. Somebody said, he's the coolest guy in the room. I mean, that was illuminating. I mean, it's hard not to be cool when you're Michael Jordan. I feel like if you tell a joke, your teammates have to laugh, you know, that sort of thing.

But I also did think, not in a traditional cool way that I was impressed by him, but I thought he was an old soul. I also thought he was angry. I thought he was insecure. And these are all very normal things for great athletes. And I think some of the childhood stuff, obviously what he'd been through, that's part of why I like the later years, because he had this coat of armor, this Teflon, built up just these calluses emotionally, personally,

that made it so raw. And he probably appreciated everything late. But he was on an island, I felt like. Did you get that sense going through all the old footage? Well, very much. One of my favorite pieces of footage is when his rookie year, and we show them ironing the clothes. You know, I was talking about this the other day.

I mean, it's all, you know, what you know. And so I, you know, say I grew up here in L.A. And maybe for life, my role model was magic, right? And that's the energy that I still connect to, which is like this infectious, charismatic personality. Not that Jordan isn't those things, but his energy, they're complete opposites. Magic was about propping people up.

Right. you know, and like the joy of winning. And I think for Michael, you know, at least it was a much more, obviously equally, if not more effective, but his thing was just ruthless killer. The way to win is to kill the soul of the other guy. And if these guys can't hang with me, F them, you know. But I'm going there, whereas magic, at least outwardly,

and obviously magic is an intense competitor too. But there's a different energy. There's different ways to lead. You know, and LeBron, interestingly, I think, is more like magic that way. You know, he's much more about the lift-up of others. And obviously, he can be a killer too. And Kobe is more like MJ. Right.

I just think with the leadership piece, everybody's enamored with, okay, I'm just going to go out as an athlete and be like Michael Jordan. Well, that can only happen if you're damn near perfect. So, number one, if you want that leadership style and you're like a seven out of ten player, people are going to get real tired of you. I don't think Jordan was inappropriate for acting that way. I think that he knew what he possessed, and he also had that fire in his belly to lead that way. Now, some guys, it's just not their personality. I think the number one rule of leadership is to be you,

because if you're not, athletes, sniff, bullshit. As to people in the professional world, if you're not yourself, people don't respect you. So that's why they probably respect magic and LeBron in their own ways. But I thought beyond the leadership, I did get a sense that, like, he had funny friends. Like, he gravitated in this part of the old soul thing, I feel like, to guys that you wouldn't expect him to be tight with. You'd expect to see him and Scotty hanging out.

You'd expect to see players on the team, other NBA stars. And he did, but it was the security guys. It was Wozniak. It was Gus. It was his best friend. By the way, did he petition to get Michael Jordan's best friend? Good question. I don't know.

I think he's just, he's earned it. He's right. When you earn that fucking lower third and you're Michael Jordan's best friend, that's pretty cool. Yeah, no, I mean, I think, you know, also there's Buzz Peterson, you know, who was his freshman year or his college roommate. Yeah, I mean, I think also, again, there's sort of a change, you know. I mean, a lot of guys in the media would talk about this, like early Michael, young Michael, kibits with reporters and he would like to, you know, who's doing what around the league,

and that changed. And I think there's clearly a line of demarcation between, you know, when his father passes away and before. And also before they went a title, because, you know, he was not Michael Jordan yet. I don't care. Yes, he was a marketing star and he was obviously the best player in the league or, you know, most, quote unquote, most talented player in the league,

but not the most valuable, you know, until he won the championship. And so I think that, you know, as he became big, I mean, that is to me one of the most, you know, impactful parts of the project is like, You see his world is so huge, but it's also so small. And it's like, you know, that glare is closing in. And it's, I, you know, I remember having this conversation in college. And, you know, 96, 97, 98 is like, okay, if like the three most, if you went anywhere, the three most famous faces, right, you could show anywhere, we like, I don't know,

Bill Clinton, the Pope, and Michael Jordan. Yeah. I mean, he made celebrities seem like total fanboys. You had a Leo, a Seinfeld. These guys are looking like they're in lights that they've never seen. Almost like, it's Michael Jordan, so they're not embarrassed, but if it was anybody else, they'd probably like, fuck, I look pretty, I look like a fan boy there.

If you were an athlete today and your father passed and people, and this was another thing, the journalists got, you know, they weren't spared either because there were a lot of anchors that looked very bad in retrospect. Some of these columns, you're a journalist. You know, that's just not the way you write stories. You don't connect dots in a really. Like, first off, you don't speculate on something that serious.

Unless you're the president. Yeah, unless you're the president. Exactly, exactly. But he's not a fucking journalist. I don't know what he is. He's barely, he's not a president. But yeah, I just thought, like, if I was Michael Jordan and that happened to me, yeah, I would never want to speak to the press again.

And actually, as I watched him, and I think today's, I think it's, I don't want to sound like an old man's yelling at a cloud, but I'll do it. Like, I think today's stars are a little bit sensitive. I really do believe that. And I think that you look back at Michael, and I'm watching him answer tough questions after losses and that sort of thing. And all things considered, I thought he was very good with the media after what they burnt him through in the mid-90s.

And I thought that was impressive. But also, to your point, the character development. This isn't a TV show. There was a character development a la Breaking Bad, you know, in a different way. But, you know, he starts off as that kid who doesn't want to walk in the room because he doesn't know what's going on there in the hotel room to, you know, the elder statesman that's just calloused and he's seen it all. And, you know, his motivations are different.

He has to retire twice. Like, the character development is amazing. And all you guys have to do is piece that together. Yeah. I mean, and it's, listen, it's easier said than done. And, like, you know, the editing on this is fantastic. You know, for me personally, one of the most powerful moments in the show, I mean, there's several that I love, episode seven. You know, we hit all the hot button issues, the retirement, the gambling, the conspiracy theory is the father.

And it ramps up at the end with this incredible ending, you know, Michael calls break. And you have to remember, that moment in real time was 45 minutes into the first interview. Yeah. which is unbelievable. And, you know, Jason has a great story about this. And it's just like, you know, you don't know. Does this mean like, we're done? Or like, are we on a path to greatness?

Does that, does seven end with the Father's Day win? No. That's eight. Yes, seven ends with Michael calling break. I got skills just thinking about any of those. I mean, like. Well, so, you know, by the way, I'll return on saying. In eight, like this is, you asked about watching us.

a fan. I never saw the final, final, final audio mix and color correction on 8 until I, until the show came. And, you know, I'd seen that footage of him heaving, you know, after they, you know, crying, but I hadn't heard it in the same way. And so when, you know, it was just like, I finally heard the crying and it was just like, whoa, and I, and it's just so great. Way more human than just watching it with no sound and just. Exactly. Not only was, seen that footage before. I never heard it. The score was great.

Like the selections, but the game six win, the shot over Brian Russell, the shot over Brian Russell. I think I looked it up, Zach Hemsey, the song is Vengeance. I mean, like the score was flawless. And with the Father's Day thing, it was the right balance to me as a viewer of bringing that to life on a human level. You've all seen the footage, but have you heard him heaving and wailing on the ground? and the audio from the music comes down just enough.

And it was like you were walking a thin line between blending those together, and I think it just stuck beautifully. Yeah, no, I mean, nine has the Kerr pod. And we interviewed Steve Kerr in New York on the day of the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting. It was raining in New York, and it was a heavy day. And Jake Rogal, who was, you know, Jason's sort of day-to-day producer,

just an incredible guy is from Pittsburgh. And he, you know, he grew up going to bar mitzvahs at that synagogue. And Steve Currino is such an intelligent, insightful. I mean, when he runs for office, I want to make the film about it. But that interview, Jason did, you know, just a marvelous job. And the whole time, I'm in the, you know, in the back of a hotel room listening with headphones. I'm looking at Mike Tolan. This is unbelievable.

And he went there about the fathers. and the parallels, you know, both these guys, very different guys, different paths to greatness or to the pros that having their fathers murdered, you know, how powerful that is. And so then when you see it in nine, that Kerr hits the shot, and then he gets the sort of the approval from Jordan. He had earned his stripes. And it's just, it's just so powerful. And I was crying in the interview when we shot it. And when, you know, I had seen. it in various forms in the edit, I knew it was going to really land. No, the Kerr thing, I thought there were so many great sequences, just like Michael's moments,

there's such an abundance that some of these moments get buried by the other ones because they're all so great. I mean, like Michael hit shots that for everybody else, that would be the Pantheon, their existence as athletes, but they're buried. And there were so many moments and sequences. So I want to hit the sequences before we get out. And that naturally lends itself to talking about the people. But the Steve Kerr thing, you know, I don't think a lot of people know that story in detail.

I don't know if it's the fact that he hadn't talked about it at length in a public setting. Everybody knew the Michael thing, but for somebody like me who knows it happened, but didn't know the details, as soon as they said, and there was that thing they had in common, I turned to my wife, and my wife's never heard the story. And so you had the effect of illuminating that for a lot of people, the sadness, the happiness of him hitting the shot, all rolled into one and then educating some people. I think a broad part of the population didn't even know the story. Well, yeah, and the thing that's so, you know, again, unique, surreal about the project

is that even if this had been, in this project was never going to be ignored, it was Michael Jordan. So had we, you know, released it when it was going to be released in June, maybe it was the Lakers against the bucks or whatever in the finals. And it wouldn't got, it would have gotten promoted. But you wouldn't, people just wouldn't have had the chance to consume it in the same way. And by the way, the episodes would have been over in June. Sports Center would not be talking about the episodes. They would have been talking about the NBA finals.

Right. And so you have that. And it probably would have been a big deal here, but maybe not the rest of the world. Now everyone's going through this. So, you know, I've got, you know, family and friends and Chile and Argentina and Israel and England and Canada. A dear friend of mine from college from Canada sends me a screenshot, number one in Canada today.

It's just like, you know, Totally surreal. And I think that's the part, obviously, we could never have predicted. But I think it's a real credit. I mean, first and foremost, a massive credit to Jason and this unbelievable group of editors who did this all remotely. I mean, we had to copy the project five times. And then, you know, I give a lot of credit to ESPN. You know, A, hey, let's figure out what's the best way to release this. And, you know, I think the two a week kind of is the best way. I mean, I almost, we could have done 10 weeks in one episode. Maybe that would have been too long. You know?

This was unique. It was good because you can binge it and you can binge it, but you're still teased with the next week. Correct. And that's, by the way, one of the things, a hidden, just massive thing about the show, the ramp up at the ends, to give you these cliffhangers on every episode where you're just like, you know, I can't wait to see the next one. I got that as a, you know, member of the production team. Yeah.

And, you know, it's just a little story. When that episode seven, we were editing it, It was like early February, late January, early February. And there's a moment when Michael retires when I think Andrea Kramer, whose interview we shot at one of my best friends from college's house. He and his wife were very happy that he got a lot of play. But that edit was coming around. And Andrea says, you know, the day Michael Jordan retired in 1993 was a day,

you know, it was just one of those days you knew where you were. and I'm watching this edit while my son's doing a baseball practice on a Sunday morning in the valley and I'm watching it on my phone and this is maybe four or five days after COVID died and it was like wait that's a memory where you know exactly where you are and and like just these strange things and I remember texting Jason and Jake being like it's in it just so surreal and it was like they're like yeah we had the same thought like it almost feels perverse to kind of say that. Like when everybody in our age or in the world was thinking about Kobe, and it's just like that's the sort of behind the scenes stuff that goes on when you make these things, you just

don't. Well, David Stern, it's Kobe. It's obviously most notably Kobe, but these are two very central figures in this entire narrative with the NBA and not only ascending to the most popular point in the sports growth internationally in America, but also coming out of it. And Kobe He was the air of parents. So I think for you as an L.A. fan and somebody who worked on it heavily, and you're seeing the footage for the first time at different points in the editing process, was it hard to see? When was that shot?

You know, I was thinking about this. I got to look. Kobe we shot in 2019. I mean, it was not. The last, last interview we did was John Stockton. And it's a funny story. Jason could not go because he couldn't run the wrist. of, you know, at the time, coronavirus, the epicenter was in Washington.

So they called me and they said, would you be willing to go and do the interview? And I was like, oh, my God, I'd love to. Then I talked to my wife. She said, wait a minute, you're going to go into the epicenter of the coronavirus today, March 14th. So that didn't happen. We ended up saying, great producer, you know, we know from Seattle who did the interview. But that's how late into the weeds we were on this project. I'm just trying to think David Stern was relatively early.

I think that was in 2018. Yeah. 2019 at some point, maybe in the summer with Kobe. But, you know, it's very poignant for me. I had the opportunity to interview both guys in my career, David Stern on, you know, three or four occasions. And, you know, I sort of nicknamed him the rabbi. I mean, he's just sort of like, he's like my sports rabbi.

Yeah. But, you know, the fact that we are, you know, probably two of the final interviews they have ever done, certainly the most high-profile project, very poignant. And it's like, look, this is a project that has super, super deep NBA roots. I mean, this is a project for the guys, Andy Thompson, and, you know,

who's Michael Thompson's brother and the uncle of Play Thompson, it doesn't happen without them. Greg Winnick, who was the executive producer of NBA Entertainment, his two brothers were basically the main two cinematographers. His son, Max, was on our production staff. So it's a lot of people and an incredible team. And it's just like timing, opportunity, destiny, whatever, it all came together. And so just very grateful to be a part of it.

And the Kobe thing, you know, I've never seen an interview where he quite struck that tenor to me at that stage in his life. He sounded like a kid. I mean, Kobe is this killer. You know, he is the Black Mamba. He's the guy that even when he's having fun talking about, something, there's this thin veil of, okay, I'm smiling, but under this, I'm an absolute fucking axe murderer. And in that scene, that guard was completely down.

I felt like the veil was much thicker because he's talking about somebody that truly embraced him. And the interesting thing with Jordan was you talk about that All-Star game, which was a really cool. I mean, you got Rick Smith's making an appearance in the picture, the Dutchman. But, like, Kobe is on the surface, probably. getting ostracized by the guys because he's the new dog and you know and he's he's the guy that everybody's worried about and they're threatened and they're talking shit about him in the locker room but

then great but then he says Jordan pulled me aside and offered to help me if there's ever anything I need help with so there was that duality with not only Jordan but Kobe in that situation I've never seen him like that well I you know you never know what's the private lives and and you know some guys they seem more friendly on the outside than maybe they really are and I thought Michael speech at Kobe's memorial was was very powerful and and I you know Kobe had this reputation that he would text guys and and I know that you know he he would have this you know relationship that I and I think that as as Kobe's career went on he got that from Michael that like you got to pay it forward and and not with everyone but you know with the people who are willing to seek it and who can take it

And it's just, it just very sad. It makes me sad as a, you know, someone who, you know, I, as a Laker fanatic, I loved Kobe. Never connected with his energy the same way I did with magic, but an enormous respect for his, just unbelievably intelligent guy and, like, wanted the rock and wanted the responsibility. And that was the part about him that was just like so inspiring.

And it, you know, it was very, that part of it, I think, hit me in this project which is you see, you know, when it comes to Michael, it's a whole different ballgame. When it came to Kobe, I met him twice. I'm lucky enough to say that. He's a Philly guy, he's a Big Eagles fan. So one of the coolest things was that he was really behind us on that Super Bowl run. He came and talked to our team. And he didn't just talk for 10 minutes.

He answered questions for an hour. I got to ask him a couple questions. And he was very gracious to pictures with everybody. And then also I met him at the Espies again. And I was walking by him. And we made eye contact and it's that eye contact where it's like,

okay, if he knows who I am, I'm not going to walk by him because I have to say hi. And I stuck out my hand as Kobe, what's up? It's Chris Longman. Good to see you again. He's like,

I know exactly who you are, bro. He laughed at me. That was one of the coolest things I ever. Kobe knows who I am. He watched that entire run. He remembers me.

That's fucking cool. Let's hit a couple of supporting actors before I get you out of here, so to speak. Reggie Miller. Mutual respect is what I took away. I mean, like, this is a guy.

guy that Jordan, no supporting actor survived this unscathed. Not even like Charles Barkley, he took swipes at everybody. But with Reggie, it felt like he didn't fear Jordan, so Jordan respected him. Absolutely. I think there's probably mutual respect. I think they did not like each other. And I think that it's a combination of, I don't know what may have gone on beyond, you know, the floor. but I think what you just said hit it and Reggie,

I mean, you know Reggie Miller, he didn't afraid of anyone. And like he, he, I think it was insulting to him that Michael, he should be deferential. By the way, one of the best lines in the series was from John Stockton. He's like, we didn't, you know, we're there to win, man. Like, we want to win. And he was very respectful about it, but that's the competitive nature of pro athletes. Yeah. And so I think that part was, you know, real.

And real, he was also, he was one of the last interviews we did, Reggie. It was, he was one of the more challenging ones to schedule. And I think because, you know, Michael ruined it. I mean, he tormented him. And so I think that, that is real. Gary Payton, okay, so Gary Payton to me was the one, if I had one critique of the entire thing, and I'm interested to hear this, I thought Gary got walked into a hornet's nest. okay did because I think it was a bit unfair because I thought he did a decent job on on Mike at the end of that series I think there's some validity to what he's saying but he has no idea that Jordan's going to have the iPad does he no no no that was the interview we did with Gary I want to say was Charlotte was the All Star weekend in 2019 and then that last iPad moment which is such a great you know just so so fantastic yeah I don't think he was walked into the Hornets nest but I think

the production put him there because he gave Michael the last word. And, you know, I agree with you. I remember watching that series and sort of like, oh, my God. I mean, you know, the Sonics are a good team. This kind of goes to my larger thing about the Bulls, which is, I don't think with the, you know, the Jazz were a formidable foe, no question. But like, nobody would say any of the teams they beat in the finals, whether it's the Blazers, the Jazz, the Suns, the Sonics, all good teams, no out, none of them historic teams. But think about who the Spurs beat in the finals, by the way. Obviously, Detroit was very good.

They beat Detroit in seven, but it was the Nets. It was a few other teams that did the Nix. I'm a Nix fan. That team was terrible. We've had better Nix teams. Right. No, and I think, but, you know, I remember watching that Sonic series, the game three.

I remember watching, I was like, oh, my God, they're going to sweep them. And then I remember watching Game 5. I didn't even see Game 4. And it was like, game 5, I was like, they might, they got a shot. Like, they might, they might, be able to take this to seven. And then, of course, they get vanquished in game six. But, yeah, I mean, listen, Gary Payton was incredible, great player.

But just, you know, okay, they had Sean Camp. Yeah, Sean Camp, but like, okay, Frank Percowski. You love Frank McCoskey. You know, at Sam Perkins, you know, they had big smooth. I mean, they had a good team. It was more about to me, like even the Barclay Sons, the teams they beat to get there. So I think we differ a little bit on that, but the point stands, They weren't necessarily like the world beater teams.

They weren't the 80s. They weren't the Celtics. Yeah. They weren't the pistons. So, okay. So Horace Grant, he came out as a snitch to you or? No. I mean, I think that's not true.

I mean, I think that, by the way, on the evidence, who is the one member of all of these teams who's written books? Bill Jackson. Oh, Phil. Yeah. Oh, Phil. Yeah. I was thinking player.

How did possibly have been that Sam Smith had some coaching sources? I mean, so. Phil worked the phones and worked the personal relationships and connections. So no doubt about it. That's interesting that you mentioned that. I mean, there was a whole, it was a polarizing reaction to Horace. Okay. Phil wrote a book as a player.

He wrote Maverick as a player with the Knicks. So this was, you know, the answer is I don't know who was Sam Smith's deep throat. But like, I think, hey, might have been horace, but there were other guys. How about Robman? You think he gets a pass today if he plays? do you think everybody would be on line caping for him? Like, come on, it's just practice. Like, let guys live their life.

I don't think you could be that way. I mean, he's like, it's such a moment in time. I mean, remember, like, you know, forget about athletes for a second. Like, I mean, musicians and, like, you know, military people had tattoos. But, like, this was not a mainstream thing to have a lot of tattoos or a lot of, you know, the earrings and the nose rings. Yeah, not in the 90s, especially not tattoo. he's that bad. And so, you know, I think he learned a lot from Madonna that way. Give me, give me real quick. I got two guys and three, three quick hitters for you.

Isaiah Thomas, how hard was it to get him to not only show up and talk, but, you know, to open up and trust that you guys weren't going to create this big thing with him and Mike? He gave us a lot of time. I mean, I think, you know, that was another just outstanding job by Jason in a film, you know, chock full of them. Not hard. I mean, in terms of he was one, he was, you know, not like our final interview. You know, Isaiah's for all of his, you know, flaws and for whatever, you know, he's also pretty inspiring character on the face of it.

I mean, you know, where he came from, all the success. So, you know, I would say that was not one of the harder ones in terms of booking. was Scotty taken out of context when he said that he would do it over again? I know a lot of people say like when he checked himself out of the game. You know, he was the most interesting to me because you went through these periods of sympathy to like, what the hell are you doing, Scotty, to like, you know, do you have the worst luck in NBA history to, oh, he got paid on the back end so it all kind of evens out and he got six championships.

How am I going to feel bad for this fucking guy? But that one statement was one that stuck with a lot of people and people were scratching. in their heads. What do he mean by that through your eyes? You mean that he would have done it again and sat down? Yeah. I didn't take it that way. I mean, it's funny. I think he understood the gravity of what he did, you know, and the Bill Cartwright of it all after that. I don't know. I mean, I think he was, he was hurt, you know, and I think he, I think my reading of that is in the mindset he was in at the time, not knowing that he would, you know, he would have done it again.

and like he felt disrespected, you know, at this critical time. I mean, I don't know, you know, would he do it again? And knowing that he had that, would have to live that down? I don't know. I think he's just, you know. We've all said it before. We even do our mistakes over. But it's just the way it came out.

It caused a lot of people to be unsympathetic. Do three quick hitters. I really appreciate you taking the time, man. Okay, number one, three people from the documentary, not named Jordan. These are players that you'd have to quarantine with. Steve Kern. well, if they could be anyone. I'd say Steve Kerr Magic and

Tony Koochooch. Cootch? Love Koochote. Really? Yeah. Plus, you feel safe. I'm, listen, I'm biased. I love, you know, international basketball. I did a film on the Lithuanian Olympic team. They got still a grateful dead.

I mean, there's a lot. Horace Grant's super cool. There's a lot of them. Gary Paten. I mean, it'd be great. Give me Ron Harper, man. Ron Harper seemed like Ron Harper. Like, Ron Harper's so much. Yeah, Ron Harper's great.

You know, by the way, another great story. Ron Harper, you know, had a terrible stutter and, like, you know, had played with the calves and the clippers. He's got one of the best, like, just dissing on, like, Craig Ilo. You put Craig Elo on him? Us players have all been through something like that. It just really, it really hit home. Okay, so you had, you had Coochooch, Magic, and Curr, that's great. What is, you know, this is unprecedented.

There's people talking about, and we've talked about this. What's the next last dance? There's no last dance comp out there from opportunity, but a team or a player that you think would actually work to be adapted. And this is fantasy world. You could have Babe Ruth footage if you snapped your fingers. Oh, I'd probably say, well, L.A. bias, I would say the Shack, Kobe Phil Lakers. the Pat, the Patriots reign, you know, from 01 till, you know, now.

And even though Belichick wouldn't be boring. I don't know. That's a, I love to see. But if you peel back the curtain, you would agree. Okay. Shack Kobe Lakers, you know, Brady, Belichick, Kraft, you know, Patriots. and just think about this. I mean, I'm a soccer fan.

It would be super cool to be like, you know, like Barcelona, you know, behind the scene of Barcelona with Messi and Javi and Iniesta and Pep Cordolia as a coach. I mean, those, maybe those three dynasties. Okay, so I got this from Reddit. I have to admit, I poached this guy's great question, but do you like the Beatles? Oh, yeah.

Okay, I'm not as big a fan of the Beatles. admittedly, you know, I'm a big fan of the Quiet Beetle, okay? So he's my favorite. George Harrison? Harrison's my favorite. His solo stuff, I think, is even better. But that's for another long argument or discussion. If the Bulls are the Beatles, who is who?

Okay. If the Bulls are the Beatles, you gotta say, I guess, Jordan is John Lennon, Pippin is Paul. Ringo is, I guess, Rodman and George Harrison is cursed John Paxson. It's valuable when it counts. You're giving me a while my guitar gently weeps moment every couple years and then, you know, and part of the team.

And super interesting. I think the dude on Reddit made a good case for Scotty being George because, you know, he wanted to spread his wings, do his own thing. You know, he was always underappreciated. So I get that. Huh? Who's Paul? Who's Paul?

I don't know. I know who Yoko is. And Phil is George Martin. So, um, so, um, so Jerry, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, Yoko and Phil Kra. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah. So, I mean, like, listen, thank you so much for the time. Um, this has been amazing. What you guys just pulled off. I, you know, I hate to make this an emotional thing.

Is it just sports? But it's not just fucking sports. And you guys were able to lift an entire population spirits in a really tough time. And you did that under a time crunch. It had to feel good to press play when it was all over. So I'm just interested to see what the next project is. Well, the next one, I guess I can, yeah, is we're doing a multi-part documentary series for Showtime on the Comedy Store. Very different kind of subject matter. But, you know, the iconic comedy club. And this is, you know, the place for comedians from Leno, Letterman, until now, you know, Whitney Cummings and Bill Burr and Christa Leah. So we're doing it. We're doing it. essentially like a 30 for 30 series.

We're going to have about six, seven films coming out in the next year. Olympic stories, a series called Five Rings Films. And, you know, we've got one coming out on the American wrestler Rulon Gardner. I'm directing one on a basketball topic that you'll hear about. And so we've got some fun stuff in the hopper. Awesome. Well, I can't wait. I really appreciate it.

That was a good time. This has been great and very gracious with your time. John Weinbach, thank you so much. And keep kicking ass, man. Keep keeping us entertained. Can you hurry up with some of these documentaries? Thanks so much. Say hi to your dad.

I appreciate you. I sure will, man. I sure will. Take it easy, bro. That was a lot of fun. It was obviously very informative. And number one, great conversationalists. There's some pods you just, they're not hard to do.

I mean, like, they're just not, they're not difficult. And for somebody who could take himself pretty seriously right now, he was great to talk to and really nice to him to join the pod. Really interesting to hear the behind the scene stuff, obviously. but through the lens that he worked on this for years and hadn't seen it in a finished product type of way until we all saw it. So I'm imagining these guys like being almost bored with it. Like a musician probably doesn't want to listen to their music or like a podcaster does not want to hear their voice. But it sounded like a lot of these guys were able to see it kind of in

its entirety and got a little taste of what we got, which was this was something new. This was something amazing and something that we hadn't seen anything like it before. So shout out to those guys. They really did a great service. It wasn't just TV. It was more than that for sports fans. I hate closing the book on this thing. I do think at some point we'll go to the well on this you know, what athlete or or professional sports team could you see actually being an interesting and enthralling enough to do a last dance kind of thing on. I think we'll do that at some point. I think we might do it sooner rather than later,

but for today, that's enough, last dance. John was awesome. Hope you enjoyed. And we'll be back Friday. Again, thank you for the 1 million downloads. You guys are the best. And we'll see you Friday.