Insight with Chris Van Vliet - Scotty 2 Hotty Is TOO COOL, The Worm, Rikishi and Brian Christopher, Life After WWE

Episode Date: January 4, 2022

Scott Garland (@TheScotty2Hotty) is a professional wrestler best known for his time in WWE as Scotty 2 Hotty. He joins Chris Van Vliet to discuss how Too Cool was formed, the origin of the iconic Worm signature move, memories of Brian Christopher (Grandmaster Sexay), The WWF Attitude Era, getting back into the ring at 48 years old, being a coach in WWE and knowing exactly what they want from a new recruit, his love of theme parks and more! Get 20% off your next purchase at True Classic Tees with the code CVV20: https://trueclassictees.com/discount/CVV20 If you enjoyed this episode, could I ask you to please consider leaving a short review on Apple Podcast/iTunes? It takes less than a minute and makes a huge difference in helping to spread the word about the show and also to convince some hard-to-get guests. For more information about CVV and INSIGHT go to: https://podcast.chrisvanvliet.com Follow CVV on social media: Instagram: instagram.com/ChrisVanVliet Twitter: twitter.com/ChrisVanVliet Facebook: facebook.com/ChrisVanVliet YouTube: youtube.com/ChrisVanVliet TikTok: tiktok.com/@Chris.VanVliet Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

All systems are gathered. Ladies and gentlemen, Chris Van Blit! And here we go! Happy New Year, my friends. Welcome back to another audio adventure here on Insight. I'm CVV, Chris Van Fleet, super grateful to have you here with us for an amazing conversation. And I know that when you saw the name Scotty Too Hottie in the title, it was just a rush of nostalgia for you because, let's be honest. Too Cool was one of the best tag teams of the Attitude era.

And Scott Garland, that's his real name, is just an amazing guy. And this was an incredible conversation. And he had been working in WWE for the last bunch of years. Actually, he'd been working there up until about a month ago. When he asked for his release, he had been working in the Performance Center, developing some of the up-and-coming talent that we've been seeing. But as you'll hear in this interview, he just wanted to get back into the ring. And that's exactly what he's.

doing now in 2022. Give him a follow on Instagram. He's the Scott Garland. On Twitter, he's the Scotty Too Hottie. That's the number two. And if you don't follow me already, I'm at Chris Van Fleet. Our fan of the week is Buda Man 1086 who says, an industry leader. CVV brings you one of the best interview styles. His genuine personal approach is so great at getting people to really open up. The content is evergreen as well. So you can easily go back. back through the back catalog and enjoy older episodes whenever you want. Keep up the great work. Well, thank you so much for the kind words, and I read a review on every single episode. So if you're listening on Apple Podcasts, go in there, leave a few words, or if you have left a review,

go back in, leave a few new words, change something up, and it'll go right up to the top there. Also, if you listen on Spotify, did you notice that Spotify now has a rating system? So not quite a review, but a rating system on there. And it would take less than a second. If you could just go in, click five stars, it'd be so incredibly appreciated. And I've said this before, but I don't have a Patreon. I'm not asking for money on PayPal or Venmo. I put all my content out there for free.

So the very least you could do is leave a review on here and just also make sure to subscribe to the show on audio and also on video on YouTube. And let's dive right into this. I love to this conversation. check out the video so you can see how beautiful the background is. Just a gorgeous December day in Florida. He's there in like a tank top with palm trees around him. If you're in a part of the world right now where it's a little bit cold right now,

that'll warm you up. Ladies and gentlemen, Scott Garland, aka Scotty to Hoddy. Oh man, look, what a beautiful day here in Florida. Yeah, it's nice, right? I mean, half of the rest of the country is under snow, and here you are in a tank top. I mean, December is we're recording this right now, but pretty incredible. That's what I was going to say. It's hard to believe it's just after Christmas, right?

Yeah, it's amazing. By the way, have you, like, found the fountain of youth or something? You do not age. No, I don't know what it is, man. I've got a lot of compliments on that since posting some of the newest stuff, and it's really cool. I just, I don't know. I just try to eat healthy. and never been a big drinker, don't smoke,

never been a drug guy. So maybe that's it. I don't know. I train almost every day. So I don't know. I don't know. Maybe it's that Florida sun getting that vitamin D every day. It could be.

I don't know, because a lot of wrestlers go out of the public eye for two, three, four, five years, 10 years or whatever. And we see them again and we're like, oh, wow, they really haven't been taken care of themselves. And like, you're like Benjamin Button over here. Oh, thanks, dude.

I appreciate it. You put out this video, like, you're launching your new YouTube channel, which, by the way, everybody should go subscribe and the link is down in the description. And I think people went like, not only do you look like youthful, like you look like good and really happy. Oh, thanks, man. I appreciate it. I am.

Like, what a crazy time in my life. Like I'm taking this crazy step. And I know a lot of people think, oh, you know, it's this guy. I'm 48 years old and I'm going back into the ring. but I feel like, if I didn't feel like I could go and deliver, I wouldn't do it. You know, and it's, it's, it just felt like the perfect time to do it. Is it that you just missed being in the ring? Is that what it was?

Yeah, I missed being in the ring. I, you know, I never, I never said I was retired. I took the job as a coach with WWE at the Performance Center back in 2016. I had my last match in August of 16. And that was it. I never said I was retired, but I always. also never saw myself, as time went on, you know, we were five years later, almost six years later, I never saw myself really having another match again. And I was okay with that. Honestly,

I did everything. I looked back at some of that attitude era stuff in the video and it's crazier than what I even remember it. So I go, you know what? Nobody can ever take that away from me, right? Like I was, my career peaked at the peak of professional wrestling. You know, it was such a cool time with such a cool energy and such cool characters. And so I felt like I did everything that I ever wanted to do. But, you know, I missed the traveling. You know, NXT wasn't doing any live events. We weren't traveling at all.

All the TV shot in house. I wasn't traveling. I wasn't having fun anymore there. And I saw people outside, you know, from AEW all the way down to, you know, small independence having fun. And the independence are on fire right now. So I started asking around and, you know, what do you think I could make? And, you know, I was doing the numbers.

I thought, dude, I think I can go out there and kill it. And there are very few guys from the attitude era who's still going. You know, Al Snow, the headbangers, Billy Gunn, you know, Valvinus does a little bit. Godfather does a little bit. But there's very few that are going. So I was like, man, I can still deliver, you know, so I'm excited. It's a really great time. bought went into this because, you know, it's got to be tough leaving a sure thing, which is the job

you had at the PC. Right. Yeah. No, it was maybe just seriously the last couple months probably from, you know, from the pandemic, once the pandemic happened, you know, all the releases started happening. I think the releases took a big toll on me as a coach. You know, I never had any idea how much how much I would love that job in coaching people. And they become almost like your children, right?

And then, you know, you see them getting released. You have to create these relationships with these people and, you know, they get released. And, you know, you're finding out about it on Twitter with everybody else. Here you are. You've built this relationship for years. You're their coach. And, you know, I have my buddy from Nashville who's not even in the wrestling business. Text me going, hey, releases are happening again.

So here I got. Jump on Twitter. And then there's somebody that's in my class that I was sitting with three hours before, you know, and that's how I'm finding out. And I'm like, this is not, this isn't cool. So you're finding out at the same time that everybody else is finding out? Yeah, yeah. There's not like a company-wide email that's sent or anything like that?

No, towards the end, they started doing like a group text where they would let everybody know. And that was one of my, well, that was one of my beefs when I left. I don't ever want to know before the talent that's getting released knows. I don't want everyone to evade somebody. But I just felt like, hey, once it's done and they know, can't you send something out, you know, to have an intern who's sitting beside the person who, who's doing the cuts, send a text to their coach and go, hey, I just want to let you know. Because me and other coaches had had talent texting them, hey, thanks a lot for everything.

And we reply, oh, you're welcome. You know, it's great having you. It's great having you in class. And we think they're talking about, you know, being in class today. And they're talking about it. No, I just got cut, you know. So I think that took its toll on me. And just, I mean, just so many, so many releases.

And again, I was just, I just wasn't having fun. And, and I saw people outside. having fun, which appears to be fun, you know? And some people like, from the outside looking in, Chris, you go, okay, this guy's leaving the largest wrestling company in the history of the world to go back and wrestling bingo halls and nice of Columbus halls. And I, you know, and those are the bad, you know, some of them are the bad ones. You know, you never know, it's gig life, right? You never know what you're going into when you take a booking. But you know what, dude, at this point in my life, If I get to go wrestle in a bingo hall and Poland somewhere on somebody else's dime,

I'm there in a second, you know? Well, this is the thing. Like, everybody who watched you in your career saw how much fun you were having in the ring. And for you to say that you weren't having fun in your day-to-day life, I mean, it feels like a real disconnect from the Scotty Too Hottie that we all know and love. Yeah. And it was, so don't get me right. It was like the last month, you know, six months to a year where it started to get that way.

And it wasn't like it was every day and it was just horrible. It's just, I don't want, I don't want that to be what people think about when they think about me. Because I had an awesome career, like 30 years from day one, you know, from the first time I stepped into a ring, a WWF ring in 1991 to now. It's 30 years. And I did some, you and I wouldn't even be talking if I hadn't got there. You know, so, so they gave me a platform to make a name.

They gave me a platform to be able to go out and do what I'm. going to do now. And I'm thankful for that. You know, I just don't know if the, if the thought is reciprocated. I don't even know if Vince McMahon knew I worked there. You know, so I mean, five years on the contract, you know, they never did. And dude, like, they never did anything with me. You know, those five years as far as the sky two haughty characters, you know, so I don't know. I don't know. You would be in the perfect Royal Rumble return. You would think, but I don't think, I don't think, uh, they or he believes that. So. for whatever reason. And, you know, that's, it's his company. It's his opinion. And, you know, and that's what I keep saying. You know, like, anything I disagreed with is, you know, is whether it's the way they wanted us to train the new talent or whatever is, it's their company. So it's either I train their way and do their thing and just take the paycheck, or I walk away. And, you know, I chose to walk away. And honestly, like, it's one of the, the most proudest moments of my life to being able to say that I walked away on my own.

Yeah. And congratulations, because there's a lot of of people that hear that voice in their heart or feel that feeling in their gut and then they just don't listen to it. And like, you should be really proud of yourself that you, you are following your gut here. Yeah. No, thank you. I am. I am. And I think it's, I don't think I was, I was being a good example to my kids to just go in and do something. Because I've always told them, don't do something for the money. You know, do it for the love. And the money will come if you love it because you, that's what happened with me. I never did it. I never wrestled for money. You know, of course you hope to be rich and famous. and all that good stuff, right? And, but that wasn't why I did it.

I just loved professional wrestling from the time I was 10 years old, up until now. Yeah. I still love good. Does the conversation have to happen with Matt Bloom? Is that who you have to talk to? Yeah, that's, that's who, you know, I had my final meeting with and, you know, gave me, gave me the release. I went into his office, told him I wanted my release, and they gave it to me pretty easy,

honestly. And, you know, I really think. think they probably thought that I was going to AEW or something, but that I had, I have no, I had no solid plans other than like asking around to my friends, you know, what do you think I can make on the independence, you know? And, and, so here I am, you know. So if the independence are the next step, have you thought about, you know, what the step after that's going to be? You can't wrestle forever, right? Right, right. Well, now, so, so again, like, almost six years, I've been a coach at the performance center, one of eight to ten coaches, right? And so now I

have that in my back pocket where I can go in. I do these independent shows, and then, you know, I'll tell Humora, I'll do a, you know, do a seminar during the day. And there are very few people out there that can go, hey, this is what they're looking for in there right now. You know, all these coaches and whoever can tell you, if you want to go to WWE, this is what you want, you know, I'm one that can tell you what it actually is right now. And of course, that changes from day to day. So maybe I'm wrong, but, but, you know, I don't, you know, I don't know. So this is a thing with that. Like I, I've struggled with that for when I was 40 years old. I was like, I saw 40 coming, you know, and I was like, oh, man, like I'm still wrestling and

doing independence. Like, what else am I going to do? I went, I put myself through fire school and EMT school and I thought, you know, what a great transition because most firefighters work 24 on, 48 off, so I could do that job, have a pension in 20, years and then still be able to take my bookings. You know, it's because you can move your schedule around pretty easily with that job. And so I went through that whole thing with a fire EMT. And then I started volunteering to try to find a job. And it just, my heart wasn't in it, you know.

And then I ended up going through real estate school, got my real estate license. And, you know, again, that wasn't it. And then right after that happened, that's when the Performance Center thing happened. And I went back there. So again, so here I was at 48, you know, you getting older, like you said, like, what are you going to do after? And it's, I don't think when you're in, when you go on 100 miles an hour at WW, it's hard to think about anything else, right? So I go, okay, this will, I know I can make some solid money in the wrestling business over the next couple of years. And it'll give me a lot of free time to figure out, okay, what's that next step?

You know, I don't know what it is, but I don't think you can really figure it out until you have that time to do. that, you know. Yeah, I'm so curious. You mentioned you're the guy who knows what WWE's looking for because you were there. What is WWE looking for right now? Today? I mean, I left there a month ago. So when I left there, it was like they want young. You know, they want younger. You know, they want, they want young. And I don't know. I don't know, dude. Like how old are people that have like have been in a ring before? Does that matter? It doesn't seem like it, right? You know, I know they're, they're the two. doing tryouts for people who have never done this.

They're hiring these college athletes, you know, and I have always said you can't teach passion and you need passion to do this because no matter how much money you're making, if you're on the road doing 200 shows a year and then you're traveling at the end of that loop every weekend. It adds another, you know, 52 days a year. You're looking at 250 to 300 days a year on the road. So no matter what you're making for you. for money, you need passion. So I don't, I honestly think it'll swing back the other way at

at some point. They go, ah, where all the men at? You know, we need men. And then you'll see this wave of, you know, guys who look like men are a little bit older and have a little bit of experience, you know, like, I don't know, putting green on green in there is, on live television, it's a scary gamble, you know. Yeah, well, there's this clip of Triple H out there that I think rubbed people the wrong way where he said, as weird as it sounds, we're not looking for wrestlers. We're looking for the X factor. We're looking for it. And I think a lot of wrestling fans went, what? What do you mean you're not looking for wrestlers? You're right. I mean, I think probably what he meant, I haven't seen it, but probably what he meant is, is what I've always said, like, wrestling doesn't sell tickets.

It's the moments, it's the characters, it's the storylines and sell tickets. If you look at every boom in the wrestling, whether it's the Hogan era or the attitude era, it's based around awesome characters and great storylines, you know, just like any movie. And it doesn't matter how old they are, you know, and that's, I've struggled with that a little bit as I go back out. Like, do people really want to see a 48-year-old guy trying to look like 2000, Scotty, Too-Hoddy, and, you know, as fun as it sounds, and I think there may be some situations where that would work, you know, certain appearances or whatever. I don't think, I don't want to be that guy, you know. So I go, maybe I kind of recreate the character.

I mean, they, you know, don't get me, I know they own the character and I know all that stuff, right? But there's always, there's bits and pieces of it that were me, you know? Can you still use Scotty too haughty? Not legal. So you're going to be like Scott far too attractive? Yeah, I always say, no, I'm lukewarm now. What are you going to go by, just Scott Garland? I've got Scott Taylor.

I've got Scotty Taylor. I've got Scott Garland. I thought about S2H. You know, just Scotty. Like, here's the thing, Chris, I think, like, you know, 20 years ago, if a guy left, they, oh, no, like, you can't, what do you call him? But now is social media, and everybody has their own platform to be their own promoter. You know, and that was part of what the YouTube channel was for.

And what the latest video that I put out on all my, on the YouTube channel, you know, kind of showing my career, bits and pieces of my career. it's just it gives me a platform to be my own promoter you know and i can put out there whatever i want to do zach rider or mac cardona he's dude he's the king of it all right like he kind of you know and i've talked to him a lot like you can you can promote yourself you know yeah and when you when you talk about passion your story is incredible like the idea that you wanted to be a wrestler so badly as a kid that you were writing letters to the wwf to basically be like Hey, how do I work there one day?

Yeah, when I was like 15 years old, and I got a reply from Sue Aitchinson. You know, I still have the letter that Sue worked out. She still works there, you know, which is crazy. But, yeah, I mean, my first memories are like right around the first WrestleMania, you know, and I can remember going to the video store. You know, it wasn't a blockbuster, right? You go to the, you know, like everybody had the mom and pop video store

and going to get in the VHSs of WrestleMania and WrestleMania 2 and watching those. And I can remember my dad taking me to the Cumberland County Civic Center in Portland. The very first show I remember was Andre was there, and I was like five years old. So this was even before the WrestleMania's, you know? And then the first show I really remember was right after the first WrestleMania, where I was really into it. The main event, I think it was Orndorff and Steamboat versus Morocco. And who else would have been in that? I'll think of it.

But it was in that same group, you know. And from that point on, dude, I was hooked, like, hooked. Like, I played baseball and football a little bit, but wrestling was all I ever wanted to do. And then, you know, seeing Savage, Steamboat, WrestleMania at 3. I'm like, that's what I want to do, you know. And then when the Rockers came along, you know, compared to everybody else then, they were probably, what, 225, 230 at the time, but they looked like small guys on TV compared to everybody else. Like, oh, those guys are my size.

You know, they're about my size. I can do this. And then I met him in person and like Sean towered. It felt like he towered over me and was like a giant. But once those guys came around in that style, like Pat Tanaka and the Rockers and Owen Hart, the high-flying guy started to come to the States. And you see more of that.

That was it. I mean, that was done. You've got a little bit of a Sean Michael's look, I think, going on right now with the straw from the hat. I get it all the time. Yeah. And then a couple weeks ago, I knew I was going to have lunch for the Rikishi for the, I seen for like the first time in six years. So I said, I know we're going to do a pitcher.

So I'm going to dye the goatee up. So it looks like I did before. So I do the goatee, but the hair is like this, right? It's the long blonde hair. And every comment was almost, looks like Tiger King. So I was like, all right, do I want to look like Sean Michaels? You know, when you were coming up, there wasn't this path to be a pro wrestler like there is now.

You know, if someone wants to be a pro wrestler, there's probably a wrestling school within driving distance from where you live. Where were the first steps that you took? Well, Kowalski had a school, you know, like I said, I grew up in Portland, Maine. Kowalski had a school just outside of Boston. And that was about two hours from us. And I had a couple of friends that,

were looking to do wrestle too. We drove down there a couple of times to see his school. And for any reason, we didn't end up having much to do with it. I don't know what it was. But I remember we worked out there one time with him. But what we ended up doing was we built a little makeshift ring in my mom's garage with like 18 mattresses. We found all these mattresses, built a ring, like three rows of three. Then we laid down sheets of plywood, then another three rows of three, used my dad's workbench as a top rope and had another mattress in each corner so we could go into the corners. And it was a tape called Secrets of Pro Wrestling Out that kind of taught you the basics, you know, and then we just went from what we saw on TV. And then we went from

there, you know, I always say, like, I was a backyard guy before there was a word for it, you know. Yeah. Where did you officially like find a wrestling school, though? I never did. We never went to I never went to a wrestling school. What happened was we met this guy from WWE who at a WWF house show who was standing in line to get food. And he was behind us and he had a ring crew shirt on. So we started talking to him. We got to know him over the years. And so we would go and help him set up the ring.

And then he would go to lunch or whatever after he finished up. And he said, hey, you know, I didn't say you can get in the ring. And he would leave us there. And we would just get in the first real ring I was ever in was the WWF ring. This is like 14, 15 years old. This would never happen now. Oh, my God, right? Like it sounds like a legal problem is written all over it.

Right. So we would get in there and mess around until somebody came in and tossed us out. You know, and I can remember. So this is, again, this is in the Cumberland Civic Center in Maine. And, uh, WWE had an afternoon show. but the traveling show of Cats, the Broadway show Cats, was in the same building at night.

So, like, all of the casting crew were out in the arena just sitting in the stands, and we were in the ring having a match, you know, messing around. So, like, that was our first, you know, performance in front of a crowd. But what happened was it was this guy who had bought Rocky Marciano's,

so he says, boxing ring. And he was converting into a wrestling ring and he was going to start doing shows. And he saw us in there, messing around. We exchanged numbers and kept in contact. And sure enough, sure a while later, he said he was going to do a show and booked us. And it just snowballed from there. We did his show, a couple of the wrestlers on the real independent wrestlers and met them. And then, you know, they helped us get a book done other show. It just snowballed. And then that's how it forever went.

Man, I think most fans are obviously going to know you best as Scotty Too Hottie. But who is Scott Taylor before Scotty Too Hottie? What was the character? Yeah. I don't know. I guess I don't know. Like, it was, you know, the generic wrestling guy. Kind of a Sean Michaels wannabe, I guess. You know, definitely a Sean Michaels wannabe.

It's all coming full circle here. Yeah, for sure. Dude, and then I end up working a day job with him at the performance center. Exactly. Like, talking about a crazy. And I said that to him, I go, this is crazy. I work a day job with Sean Michaels. And you know what is, you know what is.

You know what his reply was? He goes, I work a day job. He was crazy. I think I work a day job. So true. But what I mean, what a crazy life, man. Like, you know, and like he was like, he was the guy for me. He was like my idol, you know, growing up through my teenage years.

And so to be able to, you know, get to work with him at the performance center and be around him and you get to know him. And it was just awesome. You know, it's a, you know, just crazy life I've had, you know. Yeah, whose idea was it to make you go from singles wrestler to tag team and pair you with Brian Christopher? That was, we were just thrown together at that WrestleMania. Was it 14 in Boston? No way. We were just thrown together as a team and at Battle Royal, which was also crazy because he had been a heel up to that point.

And I'd been nothing but a baby face, you know, and then all of a sudden we're just thrown together. I have no idea why, you know, I was going to, I think it was supposed to be a one-off. But I had actually wrestled as Scott Too Hot Taylor on the Indies a few years before. And I pitched the idea to Vince McMahon in catering at WrestleMania 14. I said, hey, you know, thanks for putting me on the show. Like I know, you know, Brian and I together to, you know, he's too sexy. You know, he'd been wrestling as too sexy forever. And then, you know, I used to wrestle with Scott Too Hot Taylor on the, on the independence.

And then sure enough, you know, like next TV, we were thrown together. in a match on like shotgun Saturday night or whatever that show was at the time and and they called us too much and then it started evolving from there was there ever a conversation where they were like Scott how good is your dancing? No they just said hey we want you to do this celebration dance with rikishi after and dude still to this day I have never danced in public as myself like I'm terrified like if like you say you know never never never never I skipped like my high school dances, you know, maybe like a little slow dance with some girl as a teenage kid, you know, but never like a fast dance. Like I'm still like, so, so what you saw was me basically making fun of like the drunk white guy in the clubs.

Like trying who thinks he can dance at like 1 o'clock in the morning. That's what I was doing, you know. And so I was like I did get into the break dancing, you know, when break dancing was big back in the 80s or whatever. And that's where I learned to do the worm and the backspend. moon lock and all that stuff. You know, that's, so I, I incorporated that in. And it was all just kind of started as me goofing off on live events where I just try to pop the other guys and get a reaction out of them by, you know, doing the worm and then a little

match or, you know, doing the moon lock or whatever. And it was, but it was getting a reaction from the crowd, you know, so I knew I was on. When did you decide the worm should be a signature move? It was once too cool started. Yeah. And I just started, again, like, I'm just. lay the guy out by the ropes and I would hit the other ropes. I would stop, put on the brakes and just drop down and warm across.

You need to drop an elbow or head butt. I was toying with all this different stuff. But I was getting a reaction from the crowd that I knew I was on to something. And then once they really started with the two cool stuff, I was just high. I laid the guy out and I was hopping to the other side of the ring. That's how I started doing it. Then, you know, there weren't four hops. It was just hopped.

And one night on raw, Jerry Lawler said, W-O-R-M and then I asked him if he would keep doing that. Sure enough, you know, a few weeks later, a month later, it was, crowd was doing it along, you know. Wow. So did you watch it back and see Lawler doing that and going, oh, that works? Yeah, I heard the playback. And I just, I went to him and I asked him to keep doing it, you know.

So it's kind of crazy. You know, Brian's dad is the one that helped get the worm over, you know. Well, and it's so funny. you always hear so many stories like this where it's the little things, right? And here we are 20 years later talking about the little things that happened back now. Dude, it's still, it's still about the moments. And the wrestling has to be solid, but it's the characters and it's those moments that people don't forget. You know, you think like Hogan Rock WrestleMania, right? Like, what do you remember? I was there. I talk about it all the time. I was

too. But what do you remember and what gets played back? It's the same. stare down between the two, right? Like, they weren't even touching each other. I get goosebumps literally just talking about it. Right, right? It's it's it's those moments that people remember. Like I watched the match, you know, over the last couple years and, you know, they go outside. They brawl around the outside. I think they use like the bell or something that they're over by the bell, a chair or something like just his brawl. Like I don't even remember that. They didn't even remember that part of the match, you know. Um, you know, for us, it's the worm. It's the dance. It's the stink face. It's, you know, like I said, now more than ever, the wrestling part has to be solid,

but people want those characters. They want to be able to relate to somebody, you know, and feel, if you, whether it's wrestling, you know, music, comedy, whatever it is, if you don't have a connection with that crowd, you don't have anything. That's the most important thing. Like, you've got to be able to connect with that crowd and make them feel what you're feeling. If you can do that, look at, dude, look at Hogan. Hogan never did it.

He never did it. I insult or anything, right? He just, he was the best at being able to connect to an audience. Yeah. And this is why you are going to knock it out of the park on the Indies, because you are selling a very large slice of nostalgia to everyone who's just going to eat it up. Yeah. And I'm looking forward to it.

And like I said, like how do I reinvent this whole thing? And I don't have a problem at all playing, you know, like I said, I'm 48 years old. I don't have a problem playing that in to the whole, the whole factor of the character. Like using this whole, you know, if they were. want to call it a comeback or whatever they want to call it. Like, I keep calling it a continuation because I hate that. A comeback just feels so, like, overused and like, uh, like, but I don't mind using any of that.

Whatever, whatever, to make those people feel something and feel like they're part of something special, like, whatever it is, man. Like, that's, that's my job now. The United States Soccer Federation present the U.S. soccer podcast. My name is David Goss, and I'm joined by my co-host, Megan Clevenberg. And now we're giving people an inside look at the, World Cup. Times ticking. I think you can feel the intensity. All the guys

are wanting to really stake their claimant and they want to be on that World Cup roster. There's no doubt about it. Hosting the World Cup on the home soil comes with its pressures, but we're just really excited just as the people are. The U.S. Soccer podcast, presented by Hencoe. Follow and listen on your favorite platform. Have you been booked for RussellCon yet?

I don't believe so. When is that? It's the WrestleMania weekend. Oh, yes, I am. Yes. Well, then I was going to say, if you're not there, this is a huge missed opportunity by whoever would be bringing you at it. Yeah, no, I'll be with Dave Hero and Al Snow and that whole crew. I will also be with you guys. Oh, good, man.

Collar and elbow and Fandu belts. Yeah, awesome, dude. That'll be fun. It'll be fun. It's amazing. Why, we should have, we will do this in person then. Yeah, for sure. Yeah.

Oh, this is so exciting. I'm looking forward to all that, like, I don't know, maybe some people look down on it, but I'm looking forward to all that stuff. Like, I was so excited, like, to get my cameo set up and to get my, you know, pro wrestling t-shirts store set up like all that stuff just sounds so cool to me that this is just stuff that was never there yeah even five years ago i mean i guess like pro wrestling t's was coming under the scene around that time but it's just all these platforms now for for guys like me to to make money and and still make a living at this you know and and dude as long as i can do it as long as i can

deliver and not feel like i'm a shell of myself like i don't want to be that guy you know i don't think anybody wants to be that guy but yeah but um i will keep doing it like i'm pro i'm booked right i'm booked pretty solid into april with a um a bunch of days in the uk um but right had four four countries in the four countries and four days and uh i was like that i contact my buddy uh is promoting a well uh show in wales and i was like dude do you mind moving that show to the weekend before because four shows and four you know four four countries and four days like Like, that's going to be rough. And I want to be a part of doing this.

That's like a WWE schedule. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Be like, okay, I don't even know where I'm at right now. I want to be able to go out and enjoy this. So I'd rather do a show here on Saturday, have a day off, you know, see some stuff, hang out, you know, find a coffee shop. Go talk to somewhere. Like, that's the cool part about doing this for me now is just being able to enjoy it a little bit more where it's not going 100 miles an hour. So that's what I'm doing.

You know, Wales, Ireland, Scotland, and England. And I hope all those are in the UK. Every time I post something, like, it's so worried. Oh, yeah. Maybe you just say in Europe. Yeah, somewhere on planet Earth. I have four days. Was there a specific moment, Scott, where you were like, oh, this tag team they just threw together with me and Brian Christopher is really taking off?

I think it was, we were getting good reactions when we were doing. doing the too much stuff. You know, we were getting good reactions then, but it still didn't feel, every match we ran, it didn't feel like it was for us. It felt like we were there to help somebody else, you know, progress and get along,

put them over, whatever. Once we switched to Too Cool, and they put Rikishi with us, that first night that we did the dance together, I just remember coming in the back, and I don't even remember what, I want to say it was upstate in New York. I can remember being out of the loading dock

of the arena after we were waiting for the cars to leave and uh talk about rikish and be like that was that was magic it's like something was special about that like and then as soon you know just it's that that snowballed fast you know and it was it was it was just it was crazy because the three of us were um i mean on the on the chopping block i think at the time you know brian myself rikish They weren't really doing anything with any of us. And then they put us together and it just clicked. I mean, from the outside looking in, Rikishi, it didn't feel like that would work with what you guys were doing. And for whatever reason, it was lightning in a bottle.

Yeah. And that's something I would tell my guys, too, guys and girls, you know, as a coach, is don't ever, because if I said to you, hey, Chris, I'm going to lay this guy out by the ropes. And then I'm going to stand over him. and I'm going to run in place for like 10 seconds, and then I'm going to hop to the other side of the ring, and I'm hoping they're going to spell out the word worm. And I'm going to drop down, and I'm going to do, remember the old breakdancing move the worm.

I'm going to do that across the ring, and I'm going to stand over, I'm going to go, who, who, who, and I'm going to drop this lousy-looking chop across their chest. On paper, that sounds awful, right? So what I would tell my guys, just don't tell anybody about it. Just go out there and do it,

because sometimes you don't know if you feel something's going to work, or you have an idea. don't let anybody shut it down. Just go out there and do it. And probably 90% of the time, it's going to fall. You might fail, but it's that one time. All it takes is that people's elbow or the people's eyebrow or the worm or the stink face or whatever that thing is.

I'll snow with head. Like, whatever that little thing is, like, you'll feel it. And the audience will feel it and the office will feel it, you know. Yeah, and it's those moments. It's like that this is something now that, you know, this will be your trademark thing. for the rest of your life because it's not just the worm it's not just too cool it's the hair it's the goate it's the dancing it's the sunglasses it's everything right yeah i always joke that i'm going to be like 75 years old doing like wrestle cons and they're going to be there go scotty too

hoddy's here and like i roll up in the wheelchair so so i would have maybe picked a different name at 27 if i thought about that part of it now see the great thing about scotty too haughty is single person named Scott has now been called Scotty too haughty at some point in their life. Yeah, it's crazy, right? I can't tell you the people I met over the years of tell me, oh, that was my nickname when I was growing up or, you know, so it's good school. You know, and it's just something that I can remember, I think it was like Road Dog and Adam Baum calling me Scotty Too Hottie, just in the back, you know, way before I ever used it. And then one night, when we were too much, we were doing some,

something where Brian had a match and I was on commentary. And then we did it again the next week. And when I came out the next week, I said, Scotty Do Hoddy is back on Sunday night heat. And from that point on, it kind of stuck. And then a while later, we started the two cool thing. And I remember saying, and Vince Russo, hey, if we're going to change the team name, why don't we change our singles names too. And that's when it all happened. What is your favorite memory of Brian?

I had this picture from, we were never close, never close. And the first, after I was released in 2007, we did a weekend for Hermie Sadler in the Carolinas. And we did like the Rock and Roll Express, some tournament, rock and roll express tournament. And Brian just, the very first night, it was three days long, the very first night, he showed up and he was in a bad place. You know, I could smell it on his breath, you know. He was just like, he was a mess. But by the time Sunday rolled around, we had a big fight in the locker room, not a physical fight,

just a verbal argument. And I was like, dude, I don't need this. Like, it's, we were just very different people. And we went ourselves, we didn't speak for five years. And then, and then, with a very first appearance back, after that five years, he pulled me aside and apologized for everything. And, and, you know, we both apologized. And, and then, you know, over that, that, the next few years, I felt like we got closer than ever, but I had my, I brought my son. It was me, Rikishi, and Brian in the UK. We did a bunch of shows together. And, uh, I had my son with to me and who was like probably 10 years old at the time and I have a picture of Brian showing my son Keegan how to use the pay phone it was an actual pay phone you know and he's

putting the coins in and I have a picture so it's from behind of both of them but I was like this is cool like you know that that other Brian like and see him work with my son like he was he was in a good place you know he was in a really good place he'd clean himself up And so it was really towards the end that we got closer than ever. And I also was just kind of taking it, everything with a grain of salt. Because he was always late. You know, if we said, hey, let's meet the lobby at the hotel at 1 o'clock to go to the show. You know, I'd be down there at 1 o'clock.

No, Brian, no, I'd go up knocking his door. You know, he'd answer the door like half asleep. But, you know, but so like, but I just didn't let it bother me as much as it once did. You know, it was sad, man. I knew, I knew, you know, towards the end, it was, it was getting worse and worse. And, you know, he had to fight with, it was the dude from, he had to fight with somebody from one of the TNA original guys. I can't think of his name. I've talked to my head now. Beat him up real bad. You know, and I don't know the whole story behind it, but whatever happened happened. He got beat up real bad. I saw the pictures of that.

And then, you know, he was arrested again. I saw that last mugshot that I saw of him, I knew he was in a bad place, you know, because Brian always knew that his mugshot was going to get publicity. So he would always be smiling, right? Because he knew the news, especially in Memphis, where his dad was king. Like, literally, like, you know, like, he's so famous in Memphis. Yeah. He knew it was going to get publicity.

So you'd always be smiling or laughing in his mugshot. And that last one, he just looked weathered and beat. down and I just said, man, he's not in a good place. And then that's when he ended up passing away in jail, you know. So you were never close with him when you were on the road? No, we never, we never, I've always said we never room together, but then I just remembered that we did room together at Owen Hart's funeral because the company paid for us all to go out there. So they doubled everybody up in rooms and they just, because we're a tag team, I guess they just threw us in the same room together. But that's the only time that I can remember, never rented cars to, never. Him and Rakeshi traveled together a

little bit. But for me, I was always with Kane or Edge or Fanaki. Was this just the case of like your personalities just didn't mesh or was there actually issues when you guys were a tag team? No, there were really, we were just different people. You know, he liked to go out. He was a party guy. I was never a party guy. He, I think part of Brian's problem, what, and this, you see this happen a lot is he, I think, liked Grandmaster Sexe better than he liked Brian all. So he liked to live that character, you know, 24-7. You know, we would do shows where he would leave in his gear. Like he would have the two cool stuff on.

We'd be sitting in a restaurant. Like, dude, what are you doing in Paris? You know, like, but that was, you know, that was Brian. And I think he just, he went down that bad road and just could never get away from it, you know. But we never, you know, I just, I was never into that lifestyle or I was a theme park nerd, you know. You still are. I still am, bigger than ever, you know. Hey, you're living in the right place for that.

Right, right. That's why I'm here. Yeah. Do you think you could tilt your camera a little bit? It's just all sun now. Yeah, I just going to say that sun's killing us. Yeah. I think you can block it with your head.

You say my head's that big? There we go. There we go. You're right. What is the best theme park in Orlando? My favorite now, just because I live here, and I do them differently. than you do if you're here on vacation.

Can you probably do them differently when you have kids too? Yeah, yeah. But like once you live here, you go all the time. You don't like, there's times I'll go and just we'll go get dinner, walk around, people watch. And so for that,

it's Epcot, which I hate it as a kid because there aren't a lot of rides. Yeah, there's not a lot of rides. But there is drinks. Yeah, yeah.

But we do Universal a lot now. Magic Kingdom is just so crazy. packed all the time. It makes it hard to enjoy, but I love them all. You know, SeaWorld, we went to SeaWorld Christmas Eve. Like, we always, we have fun at all of them. I have a feeling that SeaWorld's not going to be existing in the next handful of years. I don't know. It was packed the other night. They're doing pretty good. Yeah, there's something about going to Epcot, especially like, I'm a Canadian. So I always go there and like, like, oh, it's a little slice of Canada, or at least a slice of Canadian

stereotypes here. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's what's fun about there as you go around to all the different countries and get all the different foods and everything. So I love it. What is your favorite ride? I like the Disney, the classics at Disney, like the haunted mansion, a Pirates of the Caribbean, Caribbean, how we say it. But yeah, and then, you know, the Tower Tower at studios or Rock and Roller coaster at the studios. The older I get, the lesser roller coaster guy become. I think you start to think more as you get older. Man, I wonder if they'd tighten that bolts today.

I wonder if they welded that track back. Coming from a guy who jumps off the top rope and, you know, bumps around the rig. I don't even do that anymore. After my neck surgery, I barely went to the top rope anymore. You know, I didn't feel like I had to do it. You know, I didn't have anything that looked all that good off the top rope. Also, for anybody who's listening right now, you're at a dog park, right? That's what we're hearing.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, sorry. Is your dog back with you now? No, I don't know where she's lost now, too. Oh, my girlfriend has the dog, so. Is there anything you can't do in the ring now at 48 that you could have done at 28? Probably not. I mean, I mean, there's stuff I could do that I just wouldn't do, like, I used to do the, the own hard entrance on my off the top rope you know the backflip land on my feet and uh i just it's

just not worth it you know one of those deals where it's just is you know everything we do is is risky anyways it just it's the risk the reward is not worth the risk on some stuff you know i could do it i'm sure i could pull it off you know because i'll do it every once in a mess around on the pool or the kids or whatever just you know do a backflip off the edge and i know i can do it but it's just is it worth it you know when you were spending that time in the performance center, who was one of your students who you really developed a connection with and then you were so happy, you felt like a proud father when they made it? Easy.

Ria Ripley and Raquel Gonzalez, my two that I feel like I helped the most, you know, I mean, you know, you talk about a reward. I see Ria doing interviews now. People will tag me and stuff where she'll say, like, you know, I was like a father figure to her. I mean, dude, how much, you know, how much better can you get than that? You know, so, so cool. It could just, the certain people you do, you gravitate to, and you create a relationship

with, and you see them grow. And, you know, she was a 20-year-old kid, something like that when she came in. And I've seen her grow up over the last few years, you know, both her and Raquel, you know. And it was my last show that I produced for WWE was the WrestleMania on sale, just over a month so ago in Dallas in Cowboys Stadium and the last segment of that show was Ria and Raquel standing in the middle of Dallas Stadium and they're in together and that was my match

you know so I mean talk about awesome closure it couldn't be any better than that you know what's the advice that you got when you were coming into the business that you're now passing on when you're working with these young stars probably slow down. And you don't understand that until you understand it. Like, he's just an old guy.

He doesn't know what he's talking about. And, you know, even thinking back, I can remember, oh, you got to slow down. Don't do this. You know, like you think they're trying to hold you back, I think, when it's happening. Like, oh, he just can't do it. So he doesn't want me to do it, you know.

But even when you say slow down and I always wonder if I explained it correctly, when I'm telling people to slow down, it's not slowing down the way at the speed you're running across the ring, slow down in between stuff so that the crowd can digest it and enjoy that moment. Like if you do a huge moonsault to the outside or whatever, you can do it, but give them a moment to react and, you know, look at their buddy and go, holy, did you see that, blah, oh, that was great, and react from it, you know. But if you go, oh, moonsault, pick them right back up, throw them in the ring, go to something. Like, you didn't give them time to react. It's almost like a comedian telling a joke. If you set up a joke and you hit that punchline, but you don't give them time

to laugh and you rush to the next one, it's the same thing, right? And that's hard to, that's something that's risk, it's hard to teach because when you're new and nobody knows who you are, the only thing you're really getting reactions from is the moves. You know, so if you do a move, oh, I got to do this move because I am getting a reaction from it. Yeah, you're getting a a reaction, but are you getting it for the right reasons? Like, you know, you can take them on a, on a ride and tell a story throughout the match and get the big reaction as a payoff. You know, that means so much more, I think. Yeah. People often refer to the WWE style of wrestling, which is when you were teaching for six years. Right. It's what I grew up on. How different is it from

the AEW style that we're saying? Um, I think, it's, you know, their EAW is a bit of what I was just talking about. Like they're, they will do a lot of stuff where they don't, if they slowed it down just a little bit and gave the audience a chance to digest in between. And it's not everybody, some of the, you know, the older guys, they get it, you know, but it's just some of the younger guys. And it's everywhere. It's not just there. It's just given those moments in between and also create moments. You know, it doesn't have to be wrestling. The Hogan Rock thing was a stare down. And now you talking about two guys who are super over. So I understand. But there's still, like, that's what people

remember other moments. For me, I will, on my entrance, I always go through that curtain. Even now, like when I left WW in 2007, I went back to the independence for 10 years. I always went through that curtain with a mindset that nobody out there knew who I was. And I have to win that crowd over. I have to tell them that I'm the good guy. You want to cheer for me. So I'll start making my entrance. I'd be slapping hands as you're coming down the aisle. And I would always grab, you know, like a little kid's hand or wrist or somebody's, you know, and make it look like they're grabbing me and pulling me back to them. You know, and then you can go back to them.

Or I would do this where I would pick out a little kid halfway down and I would intentionally miss them. Stop when I got to the ring, look back and see the little kid and now go back, pick his hand up, give him a high five. And now you just created a moment, you know, not only for that kid, but for... for that whole audience like wow that guy from wwee just took just he just stopped his whole entrance to go back you know and that's the that's the art of what we do and that's the stuff that it takes time to learn you know and i think for me um that's kind of becoming a lost a lost art you know that kid will remember that moment forever sure right right i heard a great phrase that i think is so applicable here it's the little things are the big things and i think that's exactly what you're

sang. Yeah, yeah. They're not going to remember. I can go in there, I can take a chair, do a moonsault. They're going to see a hundred of those throughout the night. You know, and they're going to see, you know, 25 to 30 characters throughout the night. So how do you make that audience remember you? They're not going to remember your name. Because if you, if you win, they hear your name on your entrance, they hear your name on your exit. If you lose, they hear your name at the beginning of the match. So they're probably not going to remember your name, right? Because I always go in with a mentality that everybody there is seeing a wrestling show for the very first time. So you have to, you have to spoon feed, you know,

you have to spoon feed your audience, your character, your story. And now more than ever, because people are on their cell phones throughout the match. So if you're going to do something where the heel, you know, you go to lock up and the heel slaps the baby face in the face, you have to do that two or three times before you pay it back as the baby face. You know, you can go have the heel slap, you know, bully them around, whatever. Then you go to go to something. and then the baby face ends up getting it back on the heel, you have to really get that slap over from the heel because of people being on their phones.

And I know, like, I don't know if everybody does this now, but I know NXT and WWE does it, where they'll go, hey, you know, Tampa, make sure you're going on social media and hashtag in NXT Tampa tonight. So they're driving people to their phones. And Disney does it too, Universal does it. Everybody's doing it, you know,

while you're in the theme park. You can't enjoy the theme park because they drive you to your phones. to make reservations, to make fast passes. So when I go to the theme parks now, I feel like I'm on my phone the whole time on there. You know, we do it in wrestling now too. So you really have to slow everything down now

and just spoon feed your story. You know, again, like, do people want characters and storylines that they can relate to? Yeah. We've talked so much about the amazing moments that you've created with Brian and Rikishi has Too Cool. What is your favorite too cool match?

I always my go-to that I always say is February of 2007 so this would have been right after the whole Royal Rumble which was like a career highlight moment I think where we danced in a rumble at the garden so this would have been right after that

was a 10-man tag on Raw it was me Brian Rikishi Cactus Jack and the Rock against Eddie Benoit, Malenko, Xbox and Hunter and then on the outside you had

I'm sorry. No, Eddie wasn't in the match. He was on the outside because his arm was broke. So it was Dean, Perry, and Van Nuwa. Hunter, Beck's block, with Eddie on the outside, Stephanie on commentary, Tori on the outside. Kane and Paul Bearer came in in the end. The New Age Outlaws came in the end.

It was in Dallas, and the crowd was just, the crowd was just electric that night. You know, it was, so that's my go-to. but a match that people bring up all the time is the Malenko match from Backlash, which, you know, I guess when we did it, it didn't seem like anything special, but I guess, you know, 20 years later,

it kind of holds up and it was, you had two different styles, you know, and that's what it was cool. That's what makes wrestling cool, you know? And that's what I think about, the danger of the performance center is you have everybody being taught the exact same way by seven or eight coaches.

They can all be right or they can all be wrong, all the opinions, right? It's wrestling. Like I said, you've got to throw stuff against the wall. You never know what's going to work or what's going to take off. So what is right? I always say the only thing to me that is right is the way that sells tickets. Yeah. Makes money. Right. You were so, so over as too cool. But I wonder, was there ever a moment where you went, I want this for myself? I want to be a single star. I could be intercontinental champion. Maybe I could be heavyweight champion one day. Did you ever think that? No, I don't remember thinking.

I mean, I'm sure in the moment, maybe I did, but I was having so much fun. Even though Brian and I, like, we were on the outside of the room, we were different people. There were times we barely talked before we went through that curtain. But when we did go through that curtain, it was magic, you know? And it was just almost unexplainable how magical it was and how we could turn it on from what it actually was to what people saw. you know and i think we i think you know there were times like i don't know if he likes me you know and i'm sure he thought the same thing but uh i don't think we could deny like that we everybody involved in i don't think you there was something there was something special about it you know

well at the end of the day it didn't matter if you guys liked each other because scotty too haughty and grandmaster sex say liked each other yeah yeah yeah and you hear about that a lot with tag teams you know like for years you know it was like hawkin animal didn't like each other and you know Marty and Sean and, you know, all these guys. Now I think it's a little bit different. It seems like guys get along a little bit better. But at the time, it was just, it was crazy. Yeah.

We talked about it off to start. But as we wrap this up, I want to remind everyone about your brand new YouTube channel, which is just called Scott Garland, right? Right now. Yeah, right now. I figured that was a safe bet for right now. You know, I can't take that away from me. So I just wanted to, you know, I was what happened was,

right when I asked for my release, I had all this free time, and I had all these home movies from my kids that I've always wanted to get converted onto digital. So I started converting all these, you know, guys, like 50 different cassettes of home movies onto a private YouTube channel for my family. And then, you know, as I'm going through these boxes of tapes, have all of these independent matches in moments from early in my career and interviews and all this different stuff.

It's like, man, I should upload this some. place. And then, and then I was like, yeah, it'd be cool to do just like short little videos, even when I go back out on the road. You know, if I'm in London, like do a three-minute video of my time in London, whatever. It just gives me a platform, a place to put all this stuff out there. And I don't want to do a ton of editing. I just kind of want to put it out there. And I don't want to be that. So whatever happens where it happens, you know, I'm not looking to make a million dollars off it. And now that many people are on YouTube, I think. But, you know, and just whatever happens, whether it happens. It just gives me a vehicle to kind of, again, promote myself and

put some current stuff out there, put some old cool stuff out there that even I forgot about, you know? Yeah. I just love the positivity that like oozes out of you. Like we need more of this in the world. Thanks, man. Thank you. Thank you. I try to keep it that way. And that's why I don't like talking about the, you know, the way it ended. You know, I could just say it ended and it is what it is. And we've got to just be thankful for the 30 great years and the platform they gave me to do my thing. Your personality is as bright as the sun that is peeking out behind your head. That Florida sun, man. You know, you talk about being thankful and I end every conversation with the same questions. So, Scott, for you, what are three things in your life that you're grateful for right now?

Oh, my God, my girlfriend. And that sounds really corny and everything I know, but I went through a, you know, I went through some tough few years through the relationship, and now I've got this girl who's just awesome and just perfect. You know, my kids, always so thankful for my kids. And just being able to still do this, started in 89. So 32 years later, I'm still doing this. And I still, I've had neck surgery, back surgery, but all that feels good. My knees, hips, all that stuff feels great.

And so I'm just thankful, like, if you told me, that I'd be able to still do this. And 2022, I said, you're crazy. You know, and I just, I have such a unique situation where I'm able to do this, go out there and deliver. And I'm just so thankful for that, you know. Yeah. What a great conversation.

Thank you so much for your time. Thank you for taking us to the beach with you today. Sorry for all the distractions. No, it's all good. I'm just glad we got a signal that works. So I appreciate you. Thanks, Chris. I appreciate it, man.

Thank you very much. There we go. What a super nice guy. And a big thank you to Scott for taking us to that beautiful dog park in Florida for this conversation. And a big thank you to you for being with us in that dog park for this chat.

Give him a follow on Instagram, the Scott Garland. On Twitter, he's the Scotty Too Hottie. And take a screenshot. Let us know that you're listening to this one right now. I'm so excited to see what Scott has in store in 2020. And I'll leave you with this quote

that I put on Instagram earlier this week. I love this. It's from FM Alexander who says people do not decide their futures. They decide their habits, and their habits decide their futures. Be great. Be grateful.

We'll see you on the next one for some more insight. Happy New Year. Jim Rome takes on sports. Why? Because I have a job to do. With rapid fire takes. So I don't want to hear from

you lava pigs on this notion today. No idea what you're talking about. You're complaining more than you like to breathe air. It's like you get up in the morning only to complain and cry and moan on social media about things that you don't even understand. He's the spitfire of sports smack. Take advantage of it. But get up in here. The Jim Rome Show podcast.

What's your beef? Follow and listen on your favorite platform. You've been warned.