The Breakfast Club - All The Smoke: How Skip Bayless Changed Sports TV Forever (& Made A Lot of Enemies) | Full Episode | ALL THE SMOKE

Episode Date: December 25, 2024

The Black Effect Presents... All The Smoke! Skip Bayless steps into the new ALL THE SMOKE studio with Matt and Stak. The OG sports media provocateur sits down for a two-hour interview, taking us behind the curtain of his wild ride through ESPN and Fox Sports. Skip keeps it a buck about everything, from his relationship with Stephen A. Smith to his recent split with Shannon Sharpe. The man who turned sports debate into must-see TV opens up about his approach that's had everyone talking for decades. He gets into the real story behind those heated LeBron James takes, his back-and-forth with Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook, and what it's really like being one of the most loved and hated voices in sports. But there's more to Skip than just the hot takes — he breaks down his unlikely friendship with Lil Wayne, shares stories about the legends he's covered throughout his career, and takes it back to his Oklahoma City roots. This is Skip Bayless like you've never heard him — unfiltered and in his bag, telling the stories that never made it to air.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Sometimes when it comes to your personal fitness goals, you just need a plan. Peloton can give you the plan. Absolutely. And Steve, you've got a Peloton. I sure do. And Steve benefits from things like a variety of challenging classes. There are four week strength building classes, running, cycling, everything in between. Peloton can adapt to any goal in this season of your life.

And by the way, the holidays are around the corner. Now is when you need to be on the Peloton. Find your push, find your power with Peloton at onepeloton.ca. What's up y'all? So in a recent episode of Quest Love Supreme, my co-hosts, I'm P Bill and Sugar Steve and I sat down with the king at rock of the Beastie Boys.

We talked about the early days of the Beasties, thinking for records around the globe, and how he makes music these days in a cabin in the mountains. Oh, and this jewel. I was trying to start a band in the 90s called the Nasal Tongues. Me and Q-Tip and MC Milk and B-Real.

Listen to Questlove Supreme on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The forces shaping markets and the economy are often hiding behind a blur of numbers. So that's why we created The Big Take from Bloomberg podcasts to give you the context you need to make sense of it all. Every day in just 15 minutes, we dive into one global business story that matters. You'll hear from Bloomberg journalists like Matt Levine.

A lot of this boomstack stuff, I think, embarrassing to the SEC. Follow The Big Take podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen. Hi, this is Alex Kanczewicz. I'm the host of Big Technology podcast, a longtime reporter and an on-air contributor to CNBC. And if you're like me, you're trying to figure out how artificial intelligence is changing the business world and our lives. So each week on Big Technology, I bring on key actors from companies building AI tech

asking where this is all going. They come from places like Nvidia, Microsoft, Amazon and plenty more. So if you want to be smart with your wallet, your career choices and at dinner parties, listen to Big Technology podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. It's hard to read the news these days without asking yourself, how did we get here? Fiasco is a history podcast from the co-creators of Slow Burn. In our first season, Bush v Gore, we examine an unmistakable turning point in American politics, the 2000 election, which resulted in a high-stakes stalemate, ended with one

of the most controversial rulings in Supreme Court history. So if you're trying to make sense of the present moment, check out Fiasco Bush V Gore. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Welcome back to all the smoke day two in our new building. It's still pretty naked, but we just met with the designer this morning to get some final touches. It's, it's going to come alive. Trust me. Um, Jack, I was really excited about this one because one, first of all, I have a lot

of respect for what he's done to this space and, and, and the longevity he's had, but also I've been outwardly. Um, what's the right word I can use? critical, critical. We're gonna we're gonna roll to that I could tell you're already finishing my sentence. I've been critical of sometimes some of his critiques, but you know me. Yeah, I'm someone that wants to learn and have conversations about people that I may disagree with or, you know, stuff like that. So before I pick my bone with you, Mr. Bayless, I want to really give you your flowers

for what you've been able to do. I really got a chance to kind of study up on you and your journey with your family and just kind of the way you grinded to the absolute top of this business. If there is a hall of fame for this, I'm sure you will be in it one day, but really just what you've met and the inspiration you've been to a lot of people,

you know, you gave Jack his first opportunity and we'll talk about that in a little bit, but really just wanted to let you know, you know, now that you're officially kind of off TV, still in the game, but off TV, that we really appreciated everything you've done in this space. Honored by everything you just said. Much respect for you and the man to your right. I've been on TV with both of you

and I'm looking forward to being in your space with both of you. And I hand flowers back to both of you because you have blazed a new trail and I'm in awe of it. And when I first heard about it, I thought interesting because you both have wisdom and edge that you brought from many, many years

of playing on the edge and you brought it together here. It's a great pairing and you broke through both of you pairing and you broke through both of you and you're on the rise and rising and you haven't seen the top yet and you should both be congratulated because as players you both had to fight your way up. That man went, where'd you go, Australia, Dominican, where else? Venezuela, right? Just to get to the league. And you did your G League time and then you both broke through in the league in different ways, in different places. And then you recreated here. And this is more successful than either of you ever were

to me in the league. No question, no question. So congratulations. Thank you. And fire away. Let's get to the shit. So obviously again, you guys changed the dynamic with Debate TV, but I felt like the last three years

and where I kind of was outwardly critiquing as you would critique was, I kind of felt it went from critiquing the game, it went poor play, shitty team, to personal attacks. And two people in particular, I felt kind of it got personal at times, was with Russell Westbrook and LeBron James. From your experience and understanding who you were, your role,

how you really found your niche, and again, a sail to the top. What, at one point I felt like there was a line. Again, it was critiquing, because that was the job, and then I felt like the line kind of got erased and it was more personal attacks. Can you kind of address your thinking during that

and reasoning or the way you looked at it? Okay. When we got to go one at a time, they're very different situations and circumstances for both of those players. Do you want to start with LeBron? Whoever you would like to. Okay, I say what I see. And I still believe to this moment, LeBron has been the most overprotected superstar in the history of the game. I have thrown him many, many, many flowers

when it's time to throw flowers. I have constantly consistently, though nobody wants to hear me do this, but I've said to this day, to this moment, he's still the best passer in basketball. On a nightly basis, as I always say, I watch every dribble of every game, he will take my breath away twice a game with a pass he'll make where I'll say, that's just special. That's a gift. He's a generational passer of the basketball. And I've said a thousand times, sometimes to that man,

he is easily the greatest driver of the basketball I've ever seen because he's ambidextrous at 6'9", whatever we give him now, 260-ish. And obviously an explosive athlete with the highest IQ in basketball. It's somewhere between him and Magic with the highest IQ ever to me. That's just me and I know that's pretty subjective.

I frame all this with the positivity. And obviously what he's done off the court is stellar. It's not Ali, but in this day and age, it's close. We know all the racial social justice, what he just did with Kamala, highest marks. OK, so now we take this man who is the greatest score in the history of this game.

And let's start with this. By his standards, he's a poor three point shooter. And by his standards, he's a pathetic free throw shooter at 74 percent for his career. Jordan was 84%, Magic Bird, they're 90-ish percent, KD 90-ish percent. There have been so many flame out moments for LeBron in his career. And remember, on TV, I was often thrown up against Shannon Sharp, who loves LeBron like a brother. I mean, like like a stalker.

Yeah, right. No, it's a little scary. I mean, it got a little scary for me sometimes. It was scary. All right. But he's just proclaiming LeBron better than Jordan. Well, I'm the biggest Jordan fan in his. I'm with you. I'm with you. I'm with you. I'm with you.

I'm with you. I'm right there with you. Okay. Like I get goosebumps talking about Michael Jeffrey Jordan because I got to know him. I was there in Chicago in 98 for the last dance season. Listen, this man is he's in another universe to me from LeBron Bleepin James. So if you're going to compare them, I I'm gonna say Jordan never had any epic fails in anything he did in the playoffs, even when they lost when he didn't have Pip yet. He'd score 63 in overtime at Boston

and Larry Bird would say, I just saw God in sneakers. You know, like, okay. All right, so that's the framework of what I'm doing. Again, do I hate LeBron? I don't know LeBron. I'm actually happy I don't, because I'm afraid if I were around him very much,

I think he's a really good guy, a really nice guy. Sometimes nice to a fault, because I was around Jordan a lot, not a nice guy all the time. He was a bad MF, man. And he wore it on his sleeves. And when it was time to be a bad MF man and he wore it on his sleeves and when it was time to be a bad MF, he scared the hell out of the rest of the league. I don't think LeBron scares the hell out of the rest of the league because I think they

all really like him and he wants to be liked to a fault. Can you give us your reasoning behind the Westbrook situation? Okay. So, this runs deep for me. There we go. And there is some personal here. I will admit. Okay.

I was a Kevin Durant fan since he was at Texas. Okay. So I was on a show called cold pizza in 2004 in New York city. I start watching this kid from DC and I say, this is something man. This is going to be revolutionary. this is something man. This is going to be revolutionary. He looks like he's seven feet tall and he's long and he can shoot the hell out of it from mid-range. I mean, shoot the hell out of it like he's shooting little free throws, you know, like it's just, it's gimmies where nobody can touch it because he's shooting it up so high that you try to defend him. And then I can do, Hey, there's no you can try. What are you 68? Okay, on a good

day. So you can go up as hard and as high as you go. Don't matter. Right on time. You can time it perfectly. You can get as hot you can hit your apex of reach. And if he goes up correctly, you got no shots. Cause it's over you. And he's too damn good at what he does. And he works hard at it. And he shoots a billion shots. He's just one of those guys.

He just loves to be in the gym. He's a gym rat. And he loves to practice 15 feet, 14 feet, 13 feet, 17 feet, automatic. So I'm watching him at Texas and he's already a man among boys and he's playing against some kids who are 20 years old, 21, 22. And I'm saying, wait a second, this is, this is going to revolutionize. Right. So I

started saying it on cold pizza. I'm on with Woody Page and Jay Crawford, they are laughing at me on the air like stop it. It's way too soon. You're overreacting then we had Bill Self on coach at Kansas, obviously and Jay Crawford our moderator is interviewing him. It's not on with us It's just Jay and Bill and Bill says could I take a left turn here? I'm paraphrasing how he said it But he said I just wanted you to tell skip he's right about Kevin Durant because we can't deal

with him. Kansas couldn't deal with Kevin Durant. Okay, so he winds up in Seattle, but then okay, I'm from Oklahoma City. So they he plays a year in Seattle, but they wind up in OKC. I never in my life could have imagined my hometown would have any pro sport, especially an NBA team of magnitude, because they land in Oklahoma City and they got Katie and Russ and James. Are you kidding me?

You have three Hall of Famers there and you got Serge. I don't know. It's like you got to deal with, you had to deal with. Okay, so right away, what happens is little brother starts taking more shots than big brother. Russ starts taking more shots and UCLA guy, you're a UCLA guy, but I didn't see Russ coming at UCLA, stayed for two years.

And I watched him in the playoffs and the Marsh madness and finals, the NCAA finals or the final four. And I could, I don't know if you did, but I couldn't see it coming. I didn't see this coming, right? No. Cause go back and look at what he is averaging like six or seven points.

Coming off the bench at times. Just coming off the bench. I could, he didn't even catch my eye, right? It's Kevin Love and Collison and you know, like. That was a good team. It is a good team. Okay, so night after night, I'm watching my Oklahoma City Thunder

and Russell Westbrook is taking more shots. I can just go back and show you the numbers. He's taking more shots than Kevin Durant. I know Kevin's the most efficient scorer we've ever seen, but still I'm saying that's not right. And so I start to criticize Russ for taking more shots. Now I'm on first take and Kevin didn't like it because it was bad for their unity,

for their camaraderie, for their chemistry. Because you can't- Even though you might've been right. Okay. It was bad for the team. It was bad for the team. Everybody in the world know that though. Okay.

If Russ and KD on the team, KD should be taking more shots. That ain't no shot at Russ, it's just, we just conversation. Okay, all right. So KD one evening before a game, he calls over the reporter from the Oklahoma and he covers the team and he says,

I got something for you. And he blasts me and they put it in the Oklahoma. And then I have to go on TV the next day and defend myself because Kevin said, Skip doesn't know shit about basketball. And I'm like, yeah, I do. I actually do. And what I'm saying is completely true and fair. Kevin, I'm your biggest fan.

How can you do this to me? Well, I didn't matter to Kevin, but Russ your, I'm your biggest fan. How can you do this to me? Well, I didn't matter to Kevin, but Russ really, really mattered to Kevin. He won no division in the locker room. Okay. So God bless him because you would have done that. You would have done that because in the end, all that matters is that basketball. And remember, Kevin chose to leave Russ and I was told by somebody very close to Kevin Durant, the main reason he left OKC going into his 10th year, that was 10 years, that's a long time,

he left because, this was the quote I was told, he finally decided he'd never win with Russ as his primary decision maker because Russ is dribbling the ball up the court. And it's like Russ gets to choose every time near you, near you, because Kevin's usually just over there like, can I have it? No, I'm going solo. And sometimes you get to the rim and slam it and you say, my God, that was spectacular. And sometimes the ball's flying into the ninth row and you're saying, poor Kevin Durant. And he finally said, you know what? You can shame me all you want to shame me.

I'm going with those guys because I'm going to go get me a ring. And did he not do that? Did he not rise and shine in two straight finals and take the finals over? I loved it because they knew Steph and Clay and Draymond and Steve Kerr knew full well they were not gonna beat LeBron and whoever was left with them. We didn't know about Kyrie at that point or Kevin Love, but there was no way that they were going to beat LeBron

without Kevin. And Kevin tilted the playing field, man. He just like, now he's too good. It's not like, like now they're he's too good. It's not that Steph's too good or plays too good. Kevin, that guy you you tried to guard and did a very you did the best job on him. Seriously, I've ever seen anybody do over what was it? Six games?

Yeah, six games. Okay. Because is he just going to wear you out mentally and physically because you can give all you want. But that that's the best I've ever seen anybody do on him. Because nobody can deal with it. Yeah, nobody. I agree with you on some certain things too

about LeBron and the clutch moments and the Russ situation. But I can see how some people take it personal. Me, I think I'm Russ' biggest fan. I talk about Russ more than everybody. And I'm high on Brun too, but sometimes people gotta to understand not to twist what they easily twist your words. But if they just look at the play and talk about the game, a lot of things you're saying

are true. Yeah, I think you say about them are true because when you talk about the game, we're not making it personal when it's about the game. You watch the game. A lot of players feel the same way. We think Bronx should take over sometimes in games like I remember one game he passed to Kyle Korver. He did for three, you know, I'm saying that I got to Instagram and say the same thing like, Braun, you got to take that shot.

It's not a personal shot at him. But me, if I was on that team, I would have told him, bro, take this. I don't care if I'm open. You got to take this shot. Absolutely. So I said, you do be saying just for your for your side. I agree with because as a basketball player, you want those stars to make those plays. OK, do you have a photographic memory? want those stars to make those plays. Okay. Do you have a photographic memory?

You just fucking love it that much. You studied it that much. I lived this. I was, you were given, you were given the night Friday nights, game three. I'm just like, you said, do you remember something? I'm like, fuck no, I don't remember. I mean, Jesus, I love it. That's a hat off.

Down to a T. She remembers it. Question. I mean, obviously being in the NBA, you know, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in the NBA, you're in Jesus, I love it. That's a hat off. Down to a T. Like I said, she remembers it. Question, I mean, obviously being in this space for such a long time, when did you realize that your words really started to carry weight and it really kind of,

whether it was a positive or a negative, it really kind of had people talking. At what point in your career? I take what I do like crazy seriously. I'm obsessed with it to this moment. I'm more obsessed than ever as I just demonstrated. But off camera, I don't think like that. Like I'm important or my words carry weight. I don't know. It started in 2004 at Cold Pizza when I would be shocked

when Bill Self would take a detour on live national TV and say, hey, Skip was right about Kevin Durant. And I'm thinking, Holy shit. Bill Self knew that I said that about Kevin? That's interesting. Because I actually covered Bill

when he was a coach at Illinois way back when, and I know him a little bit, but he's really good at what he does. I know he's had some issues and whatnot, but he's just really good. So if he said that, he knows basketball and he knows that I know basketball. So that had gravity to me, that had foundation to me

where I said, okay, people are listening, watching, taking me more seriously than I take myself because I'm just spilling because I'm a fan. Nobody loves the game you played more than I do. Nobody trust me on this. I just feel it every night. I like tonight I already looked at the schedule. I'm gonna watch I like the thunder way more than I like the Westbrook Durant hardened thunder. They were hard to love for me just because Russ and then James and it was just a lot of different personalities. Hey, this thing that what they got going right

now. Hey, and if they got an unprotected pick next year, right? Is it Clippers unprotected? Yes, yes. Yes. They do. And I have been so hard over the last 20 years on white American centers being taken in the lottery. Anybody seven foot and above who's white and American, I can just show you chapter and verse, they're disasters. You know why? You know why?

Because they're classic, they're classic stiffs. They're just, all they got, all they got is that they're seven foot one. That's all they got, but they can't play basketball. I can do a whole long list of those. But the one I got, I just did on my podcast this week, you remember Myers Leonard? Okay, all right.

So you crossed his path. Okay, you did, didn't you? Okay, that was Okay. All right. So you cross his path. Yeah. Okay. You did. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. That was the one where I got in trouble at ESPN for saying on draft day, cause the rumors were he was going to go late lottery.

I said, no bad idea. Really bad idea. And I used on the air because he's white American. Now the Euro centers, you know, Joker and we can just go on back to Valentine's and all the way back to Sabonis's dad and all those. So the point is that the white American centers have been disasters until I saw this video, what, two years ago, this kid up in Minneapolis whose father played at Minnesota and was probably a white stiff at Minnesota. But this kid named Hongren, he could jump like quick

jump. And he was long and like beanpole skinny, but but he could run. I mean, he can run. And his shot is textbook, pure stroke, like pretty stroke. Like you couldn't teach your kid to shoot it much better than he strokes it from three. And he shoots it like he means it with conviction. I'm saying, hey, that kid can play. And the thunder wind up with him. And listen, he's off to a rip-off start this year because he went to Joker on opening night in Denver and busted his ass. He did a number on it. You know I mean as great as Wimby is and obviously we

don't know the future but we had a debate with Kendra Perkins and can you possibly see Chet being just as good if not better than Wimby. And then obviously they both have long, great career. Long, great careers. Very, very talented. But Chet out played Wimby the other night and then Wimby plays at Utah last night and they haven't won a game and Markan didn't play. And Wimby puts up five, where he's got five steals and five rebounds blocks.

Check out a better team. Well, obviously. Well, I mean, and yet, you know, I'm gonna do this with you just real quick, as you know. I've long been a Spurs fan back to George Gerben because his finger rolls and all his magic at the basket. It just, I was mesmerized by the Iceman, but I can't wrap my arms around Pop.

I just can't. my arms around Pop. I just can't. You had your issues. He's just like Belichick to me with Brady. I think Pop was in large part a product of Tim Bleepin Duncan, because Timmy was such a great locker room leader like Brady was, that Pop could be old school tough,

you know, hard ass and all that like Belichick. But Tim would tell her like, it's cool. It's cool. Just, just, just tune it out or whatever. We're going to win a whole bunch of games. And obviously Ed, Monica and Tony, but once remember pop used to say, when Timmy walks out that door, I will be right behind him.

Well, guess what? Ladies and gentlemen, that was eight years ago. And pop signed for another three years because that was bullshit. That's what that was. And people swallowed that bullshit from pop. And ever since Timmy walked out that door, show me what pop has done. Do you see the goat coach because I don't see it. And with Wimby last year, he ran away with the blocks lead, crushed

Chet and blocks last year. And he was obviously by the end of the year, he was extraordinary. And they only won 22 games and they're not off to a great start this year. And you say Chet's got another better team. Sure he does. I mean, they're just loaded. They're like 10 deep, but the Spurs have some talent on that team and I don't see it reach any fruition. And I'm wondering how long is the honeymoon for Pop? Right? What I will say about that is if you look at the coaching staff and I was there with Mike Brown and Coach Bud,

they both went off to have great careers and great coaches in NBA to this day. Okay. So I would say Pop is not a great basketball coach. Good, I'm with you. He's a great leader of men. All right. Because for me.

You gonna take some heat for that shit. But that's fine. That's okay. That's fine because he had great coaches up under him. I think Pop was a great leader of men. You know what I'm saying? Putting guys in the right position. Perfect example, I would say this.

If I didn't go to San Antonio at the beginning of my career, I wouldn't learn how to be a professional. I understand. I wouldn't learn to San Antonio at the beginning of my career, I wouldn't learn how to be a professional. I wouldn't learn how to be a pro. I appreciate that. I wouldn't learn how to prepare. And that's what Pop does. He brings, he makes everybody buy into a championship idea of what should happen, what a championship team

or organization should look like. And he brings the right pieces around. That's why he had Mike Brown. That's why he had Bud Luz. That's why he had PJ Carlisle, all these guys. He even brought Sam Preston in. I'm like, what's Sam Preston doing in OKC? So he's good at bringing the right people around

and leading men together. Were you afraid of him? Not at all, I'm not afraid of nothing but God. I was not afraid of him. Because most guys are afraid of him. And I challenged him a lot. I challenged him a lot because a lot of things he was doing, it wasn't because I wasn't a good basketball player.

He was trying to he was trying to make me a mature man. Right. Being in games and mad because I didn't get the ball or something like that and arguing with my teammate. That wasn't that wasn't the winning way in San Antonio. So he was trying to raise me as a man. I didn't understand it at the time. OK, I thought he was just being just picking on me. But I fired back at him enough times.

He finally said that's enough. I had enough. Yeah, yeah. Actually, you know, he didn't give me my big contract. I do want a championship. That was his way of saying I'm in control. You know what I'm saying? So things like that that that bother you with pop. But as a leader, I don't think you're going to find a better leader.

I appreciate that. Sometimes when it comes to your personal fitness goals, you just need a plan. Peloton can give you the plan. Absolutely. And Steve, you've got a Peloton. I sure that. Sometimes when it comes to your personal fitness goals, you just need a plan. Peloton can give you the plan, absolutely. And Steve, you've got a Peloton. I sure do. And Steve benefits from things like a variety of challenging classes. There are four week strength building classes,

running, cycling, everything in between. Peloton can adapt to any goal in this season of your life. And by the way, the holidays are around the corner. That was when you need to be on the Peloton. Find your push, find your power with Peloton at OnePeloton.ca What's up y'all? So in a recent episode of Quest Love Supreme, my co-hosts, I'm P Bill and Sugar Steve and I sat down with the king at rock of the Beastie Boys. We talked about the early days of the Beasties, thinking for records around the

globe, and now he makes music these days in a cabin in the mountains. Oh, and this jewel. I was trying to start a band in the 90s called the Nasal Tongues. Me and Q-Tip and MC Milk and Be Real. Listen to Questlove Supreme on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

The forces shaping markets and the economy are often hiding behind a blur of numbers. So that's why we created the big take from Bloomberg podcasts to give you the context you need to make sense of it all. Every day in just 15 minutes, we dive into one global business story that matters. You'll hear from Bloomberg journalists like Matt Levine. A lot of this boom stock stuff is I think embarrassing to the SEC.

Amanda Moll, who writes our Business Week buying power column. Very few companies who go viral are like totally prepared for what that means. And Zoe Tillman, senior legal reporter. Courts are not supposed to decide elections. Courts are not really supposed to play a big role in choosing our elected leaders. That's for the voters to decide. Follow The Big Take podcast on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen.

Hey, I'm Gianna Predenti. And I'm Jeme Jackson-Gadsden. We're the hosts of Let's Talk Offline, the early career podcast from LinkedIn News and iHeart Podcasts. One of the most exciting things about having your first real job is that first real paycheck. You're probably thinking, yay, I can finally buy a new phone. Mm-hmm.

But you also have a lot of questions like, how should I be investing this money? I mean, how much do I save? And what about my 401k? Well, we're talking with finance expert, Vivian Tu, aka Your Rich BFF, to break it all down. I always get roasted on the internet when I say this out loud, but I'm like, every single year, you need to be asking for a raise of somewhere between 10 to 15%.

I'm not saying you're going to get 15% every single year, but if you ask for 10 to 15, and you end up getting 8, that is actually a true raise. Listen to this week's episode of Let's Talk Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. In the aftermath of a transformative election like the one we just had, it's hard to read the news

without asking yourself, every five seconds, how did we get here? That's exactly what we're always trying to figure out on Fiasco, a history podcast from the co-creators of Slow Burn. In our first season, Bush v Gore, we examine an unmistakable turning point in American politics, the 2000 election, which came down to a recount in Florida and ended with one of the most controversial rulings in Supreme Court history. In many ways, it's the beginning of the story we're living through right now. So if you're trying to make sense at the present moment, check out Fiasco, Bush v. Gore, and

find out how a statistical tie in the Florida vote count put the nation into an unprecedented holding pattern, during which American voters waited with bated breath to find out whether Al Gore or George W. Bush would be the next president of the United States. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. RC Buford, you played around and under him as the GM of that team. Yep. I'm going to remind everybody RC Buford did not play basketball. He was a walk on college football player at Oklahoma State, and

he talked Larry Brown at Kansas into letting him be a gopher on their basketball staff. I don't even know how that started, but it did. And that led to one thing after another, and he winds up in San Antonio. And you can make a case. He was the greatest builder of a dynasty we've ever seen because it's after another and he winds up in San Antonio and you can make a case he was the greatest builder of a dynasty we've ever seen because it's pretty easy to take Tim Duncan but it wasn't easy to take Tony Parker at the end of the first round and it was definitely not easy to steal Manu Junoble at the bottom of the draft right and it was not easy to go steal Kawhi Leonard from Indiana for

George Hill remember it was basically that Leonard from Indiana for George Hill. Remember it was basically that was the trade. It was George Hill and the 17th pick and you get Kawhi. Really? You got Kawhi Leonard? That's how you build a dynasty. So was Pop not blessed to have RC Buford, right? Okay, so it all came together.

But ever since Timmy walked out that door, I'm not seeing a whole lot from him. I'm not seeing special where there'll be a night I'll be watching Wimby and I'll say, you know what, they got something cooking here, you know, because strategically, they know how to play defense or whatever, I don't see any defensive commitment. And Wimby is still taking way too many threes, he's shooting 23% from three and he's got a beautiful stroke,

but it's just like to say, he's seven. Are you really seven, four? I don't want him just standing out there all the time taking eight threes a game. He took 13 last night at Utah and made four of them. Way to go. But what, a lot of what Pop lack Tim Duncan picked up on, like you said, you know what I'm saying?

A lot of stuff, like they worked hand in hand. So, you know, he's definitely, everybody knew it wasn't gonna be the same once Tim walked out that door. We all knew that. You were in that locker room with him. Was he not as powerful a quiet force as there ever was? By far.

Yeah. By far. He ran everywhere. Because he didn't say a whole lot, You just knew. Yep. And he set that tone that you had that he demanded that respect. You know what I mean? I think that's why they had so much success because if you got that respect at the top, it's going to trickle down and everybody's going to buy in. I've been to a lot on his organizations where you never know who the owner is. One and no, and everybody's not buying in. You've got coaches with their own way

of doing things. You got coaches talking behind each other's back. That don't happen in San Antonio. Everybody's buying in on the same page. That's the only way you have that much success. Okay, you said it, I didn't. You said not a great basketball coach, right? No, he's a great leader though. Your point about leader of business.

But he's not a great basketball coach, he's a leader. Because he might, he comes from a military background, am I right or wrong? Pop comes from him. So that alone, being able to put people in the right place and to lead guys. And like, that's not easy as you think. He's not an exit. That's why he had bud.

That's why you see the coaches that lead from him or email you, doc, all these coaches that leave him become great coaches on their own because they were great coaches under him. You know what I'm saying? He was just leading them and putting them in the right position. It's a good quality to have. Absolutely. Yeah, he's a great leader. Probably the best. Who was the strongest coach you played for? The most powerful force in the locker room, somebody you really looked up to.

Phil Jackson. Really? Quiet, though. Quietly. But I only got a year of him and I got the end the end of his run. Which year was it? Well, 10 or 1111 where he announced he had cancer and he was going to step away from the game but the aura of his in his presence was strong. You know what I mean? We and I came in the year. They had just one tune we're going for a three p and that you know hurt myself and towards the end of the playoffs but the trust he instilled in you if you put you out there he

trust you. He's not going to be a coach. I mean we know he's not up there screaming and doing all kinds of the playoffs, but the trust he instilled in you, if he puts you out there, he trusts you. He's not going to be a coach. I mean, we know he's not up there screaming and doing all kinds of shit. When he puts the guys out there, he trusts them and he allows you to play through mistakes and makes mistakes and wants you to figure it out on the court. And I was not a timeout. Yeah, yeah. So I really, I really know and I got a chance to play for you know, a lot of good

coaches. But I think Phil is the one that jumps to the top as far as because I'm really mental too. You know, I love the mental side of it. Yeah, absolutely. When I tore my knee, he was calling me after the game like, what'd you see out there? And I'm like, what the fuck? Who is this again? Is my coach asking me what I saw with Kobe and big Drew and Paris? So yeah, it was interesting. Well, because he respected your acumen, your view, your knowledge, your eyes. So did you ever challenge him?

I didn't need, there was no need to. All right, we interviewing you, Skip. Don't start that. No, I'll just. I'm fascinating. No, I'll say the reason why there was never need because the way he talked to Kobe set the tone. He wasn't going for Kobe's shit. And He wasn't going for Cove's shit.

And Cove wasn't going for his shit. But the fact that he could say that to Cove made everyone else just like, well, shit, if he's gonna say that to Cove, what the fuck do we have to say to him? We ripped him in a book before the- That was before, yeah. But in person.

And the way him and Ron are just go at each other was a layer, oh my God. They would talk real shit. Ron started talking about Phil's feet one time and how fucked up they were and then we lost. Well, go ahead. Well, 2007. What did you see in Stephen A to give him a shot? Okay, we go way back before that. Okay. First time I laid eyes on Stephen A Smith was at the United Center, the house

that Michael built 1998. I'm at the Chicago Tribune covering the Bulls. Philly was in town. Steven, I was covering Larry Brown's team at that point. I think it was covering the Sixers, the Philadelphia Inquirer. And he came in the media room before the game and he was suited and booted. Coat and tie sports writers didn't wear coats and ties. And I was impressed because he was trying to send a message. I'm legit, I take this very seriously.

I'm here to do a job and I'm dressing appropriately. He later told me that Larry Brown was the one who suggested, well, why don't you, because I'm gonna wear a coat and tie. You should wear one too. And Steve Stephen A didn't have coats and ties. And Larry, I think, hooked him up at a mall, at a shop in a mall where he had some discount or something so that Stephen A could go buy enough suits

to last through a road trip. So that impressed me. Then probably 2000, we're here in LA now, but there was a network pre-FS1 on that same Fox lot, not too far from here, called Fox Sports Net, and Jim Rome had an afternoon show, a TV show called The Last Word, and I don't know how this happened,

but fatefully, we got paired on a show with Jim as the wingman. So Jim would sit in the middle, Stephen over here, I'm over here. He would, Jim would throw up a topic and we'd start going at it. And right away, I just liked him. And we clicked and connected off camera because he started to a respect me and B trust me in ways that me coming from Oklahoma City and him coming from Queens was a billion to one shot but we just clicked and we were both we had newspaper hearts sportswriter, so we come from the same business

and he respected my ability to write and I definitely respected his ability to report. And all of a sudden, Jim Rome is saying, it's like watching a tennis match where his head's just on a swivel. Boom, boom, boom. And Stephen A would let me go hard at him and he's got a huge ego,

bigger than my ego, which I love about him because that's who he is and what he is. That makes him Stephen A. Smith. I love that he called himself Stephen A. Smith. That was just a cool name to me because Steve Smith, you know, it's not that great. We know some Steve Smiths and it's okay, but you're not going to be quite as big

unless you're Stephen A. Smith, right? Smart branding. It was brilliant branding, but I could go hard at him in ways that there's no way he's gonna let anybody else go at him on camera, on air, because he knew in the end, I still had his back, and we can go hard about a basketball topic,

because that was his forte, I'm football, basketball, whatever, but it's mostly basketball and it would be explosively great to watch and we both knew it and it wasn't like it was contrived. It was real. It was natural. We just naturally disagreed on just about everything. So Jim got in a contract snafu and left, and they wanted us to replace Jim with a show PTI had just launched. It was maybe three or four months old, obviously on ESPN.

So they wanted a PTI-esque show with Edge. That's how they proposed to us, with Edge. And a producer, still a close friend of mine and Stephen A's name, John Johnston came up with the title sports in black and white. This is 2002. So we're way ahead of our sort of time. And we did a pilot. We did sort of PTI. Just you two. Yeah, just the two of us going back and forth with a guest

that we brought in just for the pilot. Ray Mancini, the boxer. George Greenberg ran the network, came flying out of the control room when we finished and said, I could put this on the air tonight. Okay, so we're starting to talk to John about moving to LA and we're going to launch. This is a long time ago. This is 22 years ago. So this would have changed history. And it ran up the flagpole to the top and I'm not going to name names, but somebody way upstairs said no to Stephen A because he was just too edgy for them at that point. And I'm like, he's not edgy. It's just, he's a showman. People don't take it that seriously, that like they're not gonna overreact to it.

They'll love it because that's what you want. You want this kind of edge. I'm edgier than he is to all the questions you ask me because Stephen A doesn't take it quite as seriously as I do, but we're a great clique. Okay, so we got left at the altar on that one. So when I got to ESPN, Cold Pizza, we started to overlap. He was doing Quite Frankly. We were both based in New York, so we would be on each other's shows. And then his plug got pulled, and then they took us up to

Bristol and rebranded us first take. We had about a three or four year run where Stephen A got pushed out the back door in Bristol. I mean they did not renew him and I don't know you'd have to ask him the real backstory but he came out here to Fox Sports Radio and he was here for two years. you can ask my wife about this, he would call me every day and say, can you get me back on the worldwide leader? And I would beat on every door in that building. You can ask them all if I didn't just keep saying,

what are we doing? This is ridiculous. He's gifted, he's a force. We gotta get him back here. And finally, I think it took two years, they imposed their will on him because he was too full of himself, I guess, and made him sort of crawl back, if you will. And they let him ease back in on New York radio and writing for NewYorkESPN.com. I was just ashamed of it.

But I kept fighting because then I was going solo on first take with a rotation of guest debaters. We had all kinds of people coming in, Jamal Hill, Michael Smith, and Two Live Stews, and Chris Broussard was in the mix, and we had all kinds of different people coming in. And we had a run in the T-Bow season which was 2011 where we just were just raiding through the roof but at the end of that season I told Jamie Horowitz who

was our showrunner we they would let us have Stephen a once a week for one segment at the top of the second hour and that was it because he was still being punished or whatever. And I said, just give me him. The rotations fine and our ratings are great, but I need him daily where I can wake up thinking I got him. Because that's where you don't lose any sleep because I got a new, you know, new opponent so to speak the next day. I wonder how he's gonna be. I wonder what this is gonna be. We got a whole new dynamic tomorrow. Wonder how that's gonna day. I wonder how he's going to be. I wonder what this is going to be. We've got a whole new dynamic tomorrow. I wonder how that's going to work.

I wanted to be able to sleep peacefully because I had my man back. So to your question, that that's how we fought through that and finally got him back full time and the rest is what year, what year did you guys reconnect and finally back full time? 2011. He became at the very end, it was like we were, I went to the Super Bowl. It was the Brady, it was in Indianapolis, the Brady Giants second Super Bowl.

So it was right in that week, that was the first time he came back on full time. And we launched, we relaunched. Even I said this, who knows where I'd be if Skip didn't put me on first take. I don't know, I just still, I look back at that time, you push him out the back door. No, seriously, like it's the dumbest thing ESPN

has ever done in the history of ESPN. I know some dumb things have happened, that was dumb. They making up for it now, They taking care of him now. Okay. Well, good. He deserves it. He's worth every penny out. And ain't he up for some more money, right? He'll get it.

Good for him. What do you have to say about people who feel like first take debate and high take format was bad for sports media? I don't have any respect for that because- Yeah, they didn't kiss ass, huh? Yeah. As Stephen A would say, they can kiss ass, huh? Yeah. Yeah, it's all ass and work.

As Stephen A would say, they can all kick rocks, right? Yeah, kick rocks. Okay, so I know we spawned a million imitators, but I already explained to you what we had. You wanna talk about rare chemistry. I can't make it up. You can't make it up. I can't coach it, I can't teach it.

I can say thank you God for it, and that's all I can say. Thank you God, because we connected. And they all tried and failed, whatever. Because if you don't know how to do it, or you don't have any rapport with your debate partner, it will flop miserably, and it'll be hard to watch, and it will be contrived and tricked up. And you have to have natural disagreement

or it won't work because I'm not sure Stephen A really, really disagreed with a lot of what I said. He just, it just pissed him off that I was saying, right? You know, we're just irking. It would just, as he would say, you get on my last nerve, you know? And I would get on his last nerve and we'd be off to the races. He, as opposed to Shannon,

it was very different with Shannon, our chemistry, because Stephen A would always say, you go first. You go first. Because he wants to do this. Do his shit, yeah. Yeah, he wants to sit back and listen to me because he knows I'm gonna prep harder than him. I got the photographic memory.

So he's like, just spew, just go ahead and just regurgitate all over the table. Just vomit everywhere. Throw all your stuff out. And he would sit back classically, greatest gift of gab I ever experienced, arms folded and say, wait a second, did you just say so-and-so is so-and-so? And I'd say, yeah, I did. What of it? And boom, we go. But he would pick a little like part C of

my ABC argument and jump all over it. And the control room is saying, what the hell are they doing? Because we've left the topic way behind and we're going way over here. And magic is happening. OK, I can't I can't teach your coach that. You were able to catch lightning in a bottle twice. The magic you and Shannon had, how did, how did that partnership come apart or come together?

On undisputed, I needed a new partner and faithfully, unfortunately near the end of my run with Stephen A, there was a week in which Stephen A had to go do something somewhere. He was always gallivanting all around the country doing whatever he did being Stephen A Smith. And we tried Shannon Sharp, I think for three days. And I really liked him in a very different way than I loved Stephen A, but I liked our click and it was a whole different dynamic because he's out of

your mold, obviously he's in the hall of fame. So now we had ex player, we didn didn't have journalist-journalist, we had an ex-player-journalist. We both are fitness obsessed, so we had that in common. And he right away respected me because I'm like a workout addict. I just like it, I'm sorry.

I apologize for it. I'm crazed, but I just do it because I like it. And so does he. And he used to say to me, we're way more alike than people think. And so does he. And he used to say to me, we're way more alike than people think. And I believe that's true. I'm coming out here because Jamie Horowitz, do you guys know Jamie? I do.

Okay. So Jamie's here and they're struggling. They're going to try to relaunch this FS1. And Jamie's point to me was, I just need you to come here or we're not going to make it. And he had given me a start. Remember, when we first went up to Bristol when it was still kind of cold pizza-ish, we had four segments of show, but it was still that show they tried to launch in New York in 2004, which was a bad idea, but it was the idea of kind of a GMA, Good Morning America, of sports where it's loosely based on sports. But we'll have these four debate segments to spice it up and bring back the sports fans.

And what we found when we got to Bristol was the only thing that rated an old show were the four we'd have four spikes of show, because that's all anybody cared about was the debate. They didn't care about the pet segments and ballpark food segments and the cigar segments and all those segments. Nobody cared about that. Jamie was the one who took over a year before Stephen A joined full time. And, and Jamie said, hell with all this, I'm going to blow out what's left to cold pizza. And we're going to

go all debate for two, it's a two hour show, obviously there, we're gonna go all debate for two, it's a two hour show, obviously there, we're gonna go all debate for two full hours. And a lot of people in the hallway stopped me and said, this is career suicide for you and for Jamie, it'll never work and the rest is history. So Jamie then came round about, he went to the Today Show, then he wound up here.

So I felt like he gave me that show, he blew it out and sort of rebuilt it around me and the two hours of full-time debate. So it was up to us to select, should we do a rotation like we did in the beginning? We thought about it and I pushed hard for Shannon because he works hard, he prepares hard, and he shows up for work on time and loved to compete with me.

Well, I can't make that up. Maybe it's not as magical as the Stephen A kind of chemistry, but from day one, it flew and it took off. And to your point, I appreciate that. I got blessed twice because we took off. Yeah, I don't know the numbers at the time with first take and undisputed, but I would say from just a fan perspective, you guys were right there if not above. Like I said, I don't know the numbers, but the chemistry you and Shannon had kind of overshadowed

whatever Stephen A was doing on ESPN. Well, I'll remind you when I left, first take was still on ESPN 2 which has maybe a fifth of the eyeballs that regular ESPN has and as soon as we launched here took a month they moved from they moved the show up to the big eyeballs to protect it because we were going to catch it and pass it. Absolutely. Obviously great chemistry. Even Shannon had a great run. Any regrets on how that partnership ended for the show and any regrets on how the relationship ended?

What did you think about the character? The Uncle Shayshae character. He didn't come on the show doing that with the black and my and the durag and the hennessey and all that stuff. When he first started it? Yeah, he didn't come on with that at first when he first got on the show. So when all that came about, what you think about that too?

Okay, it's better for you guys to respond to that than me, but I was still very close with Stephen A at that point. He did not love it. No, yeah. Okay, and I defer to you. Nobody did, so we're close. Okay, all right. But you know what?

You talk about branding, you talk about Stephen A. Smith. To be Unc was big for Uncle Shannon. And out of that, which he, I think it went away. I don't remember him doing it much over the last couple of years. I don't think he ever did it, but whatever. Unc stayed, Che Che stayed. So it ended up being positive for him.

It made me pretty uncomfortable from my seat. But look, yeah, you asked about regret. I just have one huge regret. We weren't nearly as close as Stephen A and I were close, but. I just wanted us to finish together on time, because over the last year or so, I would watch what you guys have done here. I would watch what happens to me on Twitter now, X. I would watch what happens to my videos. And I'd say the audience is starting to erode on linear, what they call linear TV shows. It's here. You guys were ahead of that curve and then right on time on that curve.

And now I want to chase you guys. You know, I want to do this because I saw it for about a year. But I wanted Shannon and I, because I saw it for about a year, but I wanted Shannon and I, because I saw his podcast was starting to take hold when he was at Fox, I wanted us to finish together. And I don't know, as God is my witness, I'm not exactly sure what happened upstairs, but it fell all apart and he got pushed out and I was Blindsided and dumbfounded by that and I don't like it to this day and I'm not a regrets type

I don't look back and say oh if only but that was one where It was just wrong. I didn't That's not how I envisioned because our contracts were concurrent So I knew when mine was up, I wanted to go my separate way, but I wanted us to end the way it should have ended because, man, we had seven really good years. We had on just pure ratings, we had about five through the roof years. And that matters to me. You guys, like you guys, I don't know if you ever have any spats or anything,

or you disagree on things or whatever, but you're linked for life now. Their respect doesn't change though. We might disagree, but they respect you. But you're linked for life because you've been in this foxhole together, and you've had all kinds of guests on here, and you have Kamala here, it's big.

And you will look back, God only knows where it's gonna take all of us in the next 20 years, but 20 years, if God is good and you're still moving, you'll look back if you're not doing this anymore, and you'll have a deep connection and a deep connection. Okay, that's how I feel about Stephen and Shannon. We went to, I don't want to say war,

we went to battle together every day. And listen, Shannon just showed up for work, man. He came, he's extremely competitive, and I am crazy competitive. And so we went at it in different authentic ways than Stephen A and I did, because Stephen A, he takes it seriously, but there's showmanship involved with Stephen A that is fun to watch.

With Shannon and I, trust me, it got seriously, you sat out there. I've watched you prepare for a show, Skip, and my boy, I tell you right there, it is intense watching Skip prepare for a show. Like, it's just as intense to get ready for a basketball game, bro. It's super intense.

Well, that's my basketball game. Yeah. Was it, did it ever, because like I said, sometimes you got into some heated debates with him. Did it ever feel personal? Did you ever walk away from the desk? Like, damn, that hurt a little bit. Or maybe I shouldn't have said that.

I told him from day one, yeah, I prep hard. I told him from day one. Yeah, I prep hard. I'm intense. I'm over intense. But as soon as that little red light goes off, I let it go man, and I never take it home. And if if you do, you tell me about it, and let's sort it out. And we had some sit downs where we would sort things out. But but he knew early on, I always had his back and that there's no need to, like I always used to say on first take, my slogan was no punches pulled,

but none thrown. You can't get to the point where you want to throw, come on, you know, like then nobody wants to watch that. But they like genuine heat and Shana and I produce genuine heat. And I truly love him for that. Like those are magical moments to me where I look back, we got into one time about Tom Brady, I didn't even know where it went, it just flew off the handle and we did have to have a sit down after that one and we hugged, you know, like it's okay. But I think I'm going to put his glasses back on because I remember that one because I thought because now we're getting to yeah punches thrown right like okay. Yeah. And by the way, if he threw one punch at me, that'd be the end of me.

That's like a little in a rock. You don't want them problems. Yeah. Okay. So I'm still not sure how it went there because this stuff is so unscripted. You're in the middle of it. Like there's kind of a quasi plan. You know, we kind of know what the top, the topical question is, but then it just-

Create. Goes off over here. You guys just riff off each other. I don't know. You can't, half the stuff that's happened so far in the show. You couldn't have planned right because we're just vibing off each other. Right. And with Shannon, I'm vibing and I'm it's going here. And you asked me, is it personal between

you and LeBron or Westbrook? After a while I'm thinking, is it personal between Shannon and Brady? Because he just hated Tom Brady to me. And it got vitriolic, where it started to get nasty, angry on the air. And I'm saying, and I like, I don't know Brady, I've never met him before, but he's really good.

You know, like he was, he was really good at what he did. I think it drove Shannon crazy. He's playing a position that's not even like a football position. You know, like it's, they protect him. So all these guys are playing football and you can really get hurt doing all these other things except kick her or punter,

but all these guys are doing this and they're running into each other the way humans should never run into each other. And here's this guy called the quarterback and all the rules protect him. He can slide if he wants to and nobody can touch him. And Tom Brady's just standing back there patting football. Just throwing deadly accurate passes

and just surgically carving people up it wanting seven Super Bowl I think he should have won eight Super Bowls how to continue played in Shannon's in the Hall of Fame, obviously, and I think there was some resentment of how can he be this great? Because he's not all that athletic and he can't run a lick, right? He can just speed read process poison under fire. He, he took some shots. He would get hit occasionally, but in the end, it's like Wayne Gretzky and hockey.

He's just playing this game above everybody else. And it's all finesse. It's all, you know, he's just operating on a higher plane than all these hockey goons down here running into each other. So was Brady. Well, I'm defending Brady, and Shannon went crazy. And then at some point, he's suggesting he's as good as Tom Brady or was as good as Tom Brady at that point. Still was.

He did not say that. Huh? He did not say. Well, he he did. That's I interpreted. Oh, yeah. I would have been mad to put your glasses back on. I think you say some shit like that. OK. But no one close to I'm like Shannon. And I told him on the air, I said, this guy's in another echelon from everybody else

who ever played, there's never been anything like this guy. What do you achieve? And Shannon said, I'm in the hall. I said, I got it. And then he's really mad and takes his glasses off. Okay, what are we gonna do, fight? Because now you got me. You know, like, I can't win that one,

but let's just cease and desist. Let's go on to the next topic because that's ridiculous. That's as close as we ever got to, you know, eruption, explosion. Skip, you do an hour cardio every day. You got good footwork. You can move Shannon hips bad. He can't move.

He just top heavy. Have you ever seen a chihuahua on a pit bull? He just top heavy though. Like he can't move. He just top heavy. He can't move. You don't think you wanna see a chihuahua on a pit bull? He just top heavy though. Like he can't move. He's just top heavy. He can't move. You don't think you wanna see a chihuahua on a pit bull? He had hip surgery and all that.

Skip do our cardio. He can move a little bit. You can stick and move, Skip. Okay. He couldn't catch me. Right. There you go. I know he couldn't catch me. But that MF is-

He's strong. He's strong. He is ripped. Yeah, he's strong. He's a big boy. He's big, big boy and works hard at being a big boy. And it's just hard to, okay, I can't compete with that, but it's funny, right before we launched, he would send me videos, he sent me a video of him

in spin class, so he's on the bike, just killing it, and just dripping, I mean, like, dripping wet. And caption is, I'm gonna kick your ass like he's telling me I'm gonna kick your ass time. And I showed my wife Ernstine I said, I do this every day. What? Really? I'm not I'm not at all intimidated by that. So I laughed when I saw him. You're not gonna get me that way.

You can get me on TV, you got me. You can't get me that way. There you go. So I don't know. I could, maybe I could land a little jab here or something. Yeah, stick and move. Yeah, stick and move. Don't let Jack get you fucked up, Skip.

Stick and move. Stick and move, Skip. you fucked up, Skip. Take a bow. Take a bow, Skip. Take a bow, Skip. Sometimes when it comes to your personal fitness goals, you just need a plan. Peloton can give you the plan. Absolutely. And Steve, you've got a Peloton. I sure do. And Steve benefits from things like a variety of challenging classes.

There are four week strength building classes, running, cycling, everything in between. Peloton can adapt to any goal in this season of your life. And by the way, the holidays are around the corner. Now is when you need to be on the Peloton. Find your push, find your power with Peloton at OnePeloton.ca. What's up y'all? So in a recent episode of Quest Love Supreme, my co-hosts, I'm P Bill and Sugar Steve and I sat down with the king at rock of the Beastie Boys. We talked about the early days of the Beasties, thinking for records around the globe, and how he makes music these days

in a cabin in the mountains. Oh, and this jewel. I was trying to start a band in the 90s called the Nasal Tongues. Me and Q-Tip and MC Milk and Be Real. Listen to Quest Love Supreme on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The forces shaping markets and the economy

are often hiding behind a blur of numbers. So that's why we created The Big Take from Bloomberg podcasts, to give you the context you need to make sense of it all. Every day in just 15 minutes, we dive into one global business story that matters. You'll hear from Bloomberg journalists like Matt Levine. A lot of this Bumstack stuff is I think embarrassing to the SEC.

Amanda Moll, who writes our Business Week buying power column. Very few companies who go viral are like totally prepared for what that means. And Zoe Tillman, senior legal reporter. Courts are not supposed to decide elections. Courts are not really supposed to play a big role in choosing our elected leaders. That's for the voters to decide. Follow The Big Take podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen. Hey, I'm Gianna Prentiti.

And I'm Jemei Jackson-Gadsden. We're the hosts of Let's Talk Offline, the early career podcast from LinkedIn News and iHeart Podcasts. One of the most exciting things about having your first real job is that first real paycheck. You're probably thinking, yay, I can finally buy a new phone. But you also have a lot of questions like Like, how should I be investing this money? I mean, how much do I save?

And what about my 401k? Well, we're talking with finance expert Vivian Tiu, AKA Your Rich BFF, to break it all down. I always get roasted on the internet when I say this out loud, but I'm like, every single year, you need to be asking for a raise of somewhere between 10 to 15%.

I'm not saying you're gonna get 15% every single year, but if you somewhere between 10 to 15%. I'm not saying you're going to get 15% every single year. But if you ask for 10 to 15 and you end up getting eight, that is actually a true raise. Listen to this week's episode of Let's Talk Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. In the aftermath of a transformative election like the one we just had, it's hard to read the news without asking yourself every five seconds, how did we get here? That's exactly

what we're always trying to figure out on Fiasco, a history podcast from the co-creators of Slow Burn. In our first season, Bush v Gore, we examine an unmistakable turning point in American politics, the 2000 election, which came down to a recount in Florida and ended with one of the most controversial rulings in Supreme Court history. In many ways, it's the beginning of the story we're living through right now. So if you're trying to make sense at the present moment, check out Fiasco, Bush v. Gore, and find out how a statistical tie in the Florida vote count put the nation into an unprecedented holding pattern, during which American voters waited with bated breath to find

out whether Al Gore or George W. Bush would be the next president of the United States. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Let's go back early, bring it early up, bring in Oklahoma City. Yeah. I'm a dad owned a random barbecue spot. Yep. You a big barbecue guy, the Hickory House. Never ate it after I was forced to all the way through high school.

Never touched it after that. I had my fill and I can't even look at ribs anymore and I got nothing against them, but I grew up on them. Seriously grew up on them. I got forced to work in that little hole in the wall, barbecue place on the South side of Oakland city, which is the wrong side of town. This tough side every summer, every Christmas break, every spring break, no questions asked.

I'm working at the restaurant. I hated the restaurant. I have a brother two years younger who loved the restaurant and he became a big chef and restaurant tour in Chicago and won the James Beard Award for best restaurant in America and best chef in America. Obama, it's his favorite restaurant in Chicago called Topol Obampo Room. So my brother literally ate it up being in the restaurant and I despised it because I was sports obsessed and nobody in my family liked sports.

So they couldn't understand why I wanted to play football, basketball, baseball. And my father, who never liked me and was a hardcore alcoholic, said, you're gonna learn this so you'll have something to do with your life. And so I'm forced to do crap I don't like, which is preparation work,

cutting up green peppers to put in a potato salad. And then every lunch and dinner rush, I had to clean off the tables. Busboy, yes sir. It's some nasty business when you're cleaning up after people, because everybody's smoked. So it's just smoke and ashes and butts, and it's disgusting.

With barbecue sauce and bones. If you do that for a two hour lunch, and then he says, take your lunch, you're not gonna be real keen on eating anything, trust me. Especially barbecue, so after a while, and they did a good job, and it would come and go. Sometimes we'd have a little money and sometimes we'd be bust

because that's the restaurant business. But that was my life. You still talk about your dad being an alcoholic, complicated relationship with your mother, with him being an alcoholic. Can you talk about that a little bit? They both had alcohol issues very differently. My father was a functional alcoholic.

He could wake up in the morning. I saw this every morning. He would march to the kitchen and he would pour himself a vodka and orange juice and just gulp it. And then when we were coming home, if I worked the lunch and dinner, I'd have to ride home with him. I had no choice. I don't know, you know, I, nobody wore seat belts. I don't know how we made it, but functional alcoholic. He would also take, always take a big cup, just a soft cup, fill it with half Coca-Cola. And then we'd go to the car and he'd pull the vodka from under the seat and fill it as a big gulp cup Big gulp. Damn.

And he's drinking this via straw all the way home. And I'm not even thinking, as I don't know enough to know, you're driving drunk, but he seemed to be able to function. He lived. He lived. Mom slowly fell to the bottom of the bottle, but she was a fall down drunk where when she got drunk, she got silly, sappy, lovey, crazy,

can't function drunk. And so I'm the oldest and I'm dealing with two of them. He left when I was 16, ran off with the woman three doors down who was my mom's best friend. They eloped to Tulsa up the road from Oakland city. And I was kind of left running the household, but it was just tough on me because I was the first coming up and you have to figure it out.

You guys know what, you have to figure it out. You have to figure it out. You know, how do you do this? How do you survive? How do you do this? Cause I got no guidance. The other, the good part was I had no rules. I had no curfew. I had no guidance. The other good part was I had no rules. I had no curfew.

I had no guidance. I could do anything I wanted. And the weird part was when I turned 14, my mother made my father buy me a motorcycle and they weren't expensive. It was a Honda 90. They're tiny. It's like a sewing machine engine and it'd go like 40 miles an hour. But she said, I don't want to take him anywhere anymore. He wants to go to all these practices and all this stuff. Just kidding. Just get him out of my hair. Just give him the motorcycle. So I go down on my 14th birthday. I aced the test, made 100 on the written test, and he takes me right to the Honda shop. And I'm off to the races and it's December the 4th and it's

cold. I got a church league basketball game and I literally strapped onto the banana seat, my back, my basketball bag and it's freezing cold and I'm going to first Christian church to the gym to play basketball and I was free man. And so that was fun where I could do whatever I wanted but you, the problem with it is you can't trust anybody at home That's the problem. Yeah somewhat similar upbringing my parents were functioning drug addicts and I saw a lot of abuse and violence and Times where we had no money and times we felt like we had a little bit of money What's your dad do my dad was a butcher by day and sold drugs by night

Wow, and my mom was a stay-at- home mom. Did he do well selling? He did well enough to make ends meet. I wouldn't say well, but well enough. But you know, my mom, I was born in 80s. I was a cocaine phase and error and a lot of different things. I just saw a lot at a young age. Where were you in the packing order? I'm the oldest of three until three years ago, I found out I have two older brothers. Everybody in the 80s. Everybody was doing and doing nobody's just dealing with everybody was on. But I say all that to say, I mean, I read when I was going through your stuff that, you know, and I was wondering if that was the reason you're tough upbringing. Was that the

reason why you chose not to have children but me on before you answer on the flip side. I think I saw a lot my mom was super mom and my dad and my relationship are great now my mom passed in 07 and I felt like when I lost my mom I gained a dad and now we're great needs a great grandpa. He did start it's in his DNA Russell I never fuck with heavy drugs but I say all that to say like I saw a lot of not what to do for my dad. My dad had now now that we're closer and he told me his upbringing, I understand he didn't know how to love was no examples of loving. I wanted to be the greatest father ever because I didn't feel like I had a dad there. Although he was there every single day. I just didn't feel like I had that connection with them. What was your reason for choosing not to have children?

I didn't want to turn into him. I was afraid I would because I got his genetics. And he tried rehab twice because he was a veteran of the Air Force. So we went to VA hospital to meet with psychiatrists twice. The first time a female psychiatrist asked me as the oldest, do you drink alcohol? I was 13-ish maybe. No, no, because he had forced me to drink alcohol when I was like four, five, and six,

when they would throw parties at home for their little clique. And their party trick was to get their oldest son to come in and they would give him give me hard something bourbon you know because it's just bitter i mean it's foul it's like castor oil taste to me so i would sip it spit it out and they would all laugh it didn't bother me at all but it actually saved me because i'm thinking i don't, what do you want that for? You put that in your mouth? That's disgusting. So she said to me that day, you're doubly predisposed.

You got double alcohol genes in you, alcoholic genes. So you better be careful, you better not start. So you say, why do you do an hour of cardio? Because I've channeled all that, whatever that obsession, compulsive behavior, obsessive compulsive, it all goes into this. So at least it's a positive addiction or I'm probably I could go right down your dad's path, your mom's path. How instrumental as someone myself again,

and we all probably had our own versions of childhood trauma at my age of 44. Now, you know, seek counseling and my fiance is very instrumental on me kind of unpacking my childhood and learning how to not be a man because I feel like I've been a man for a long time, just deal with shit different. If you don't mind me asking how, you know, obviously instrumental has your wife been in that process for you? And do you seek outside? Help to kind of deal with some of the older shit or what is your way of dealing with it?

Sometimes she says maybe you should I don't I feel like I'm good with it that I've worked through it Mm-hmm. I have to point this out and you guys can laugh at me if you want, but my saving grace in my life, what centered me and saved me was a black woman named Katie Bell Henderson. And the reason I hate to bring it up is because you guys probably dismiss it as,

oh, it's like the help or it's plantation mentality. Trust me, it wasn't. She worked for my grandmother who was not a wealthy woman, but she traveled for her work. So Katie Bell ran her household for her by day because she wasn't there a lot. So because my home life was such a wreck, I got left at my grandmother's a whole lot more

than I wanted to get left at my grandmother's. And because of that, Katie Bell Henderson, a black woman born in near Birmingham, Alabama, but raised on the south side of Chicago. So she was Chicago tough. She wasn't deep south. She was more Chicago, you know, Chicago. Both of you do. Okay, so she saw what was happening and she was, she was my mother. She just took over and- What age was this?

Like five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10. All in there in my formative year. I don't even know when you formed completely. In four years, that's in four years. In those, right in there. It's Katie Bell taking over my life. She's my role model. She's my guidance counselor.

And she was hard on me. She was not afraid. It wasn't like she's playing like the old black lady, you know, like that's not how it was. She would treat me by the shoulders and shake me. She taught me the word hypocrite when I was seven years old, which I did not know. She said, you're being a hypocrite, shake me.

No, she would tell me the evils of alcohol. You can't start, just look what's going on. It was all through my family, extended family. Don't start, just don't, don't. And she taught me right and wrong and I have good right and wrong in me. I have decent character and it all came from that woman. I'm telling you, as God is my witness, I would not be the same. I would not be stable without what she brought into my life when it really mattered. And it also

helped me. She had a granddaughter named Audrey, who would come every summer and stay with her for three months of the summer from Chicago. So I got left over there. And so now I'm six, seven, and eight, and I'm making up games in the backyard with Audrey, my age from the South side of Chicago. You want to talk about education because Oklahoma city was still segregated but it's not deep South. It doesn't feel like like wrong band, you know, like it's that's not the sort of the mood of the city. And so for me, even though it was segregated, I got to interact with this

black girl from from Chicago. This is gold, because I'm getting it. I'm feeling it. And the main thing Katie Bill taught me was, we're all the same, we're pieces of God. Every one of us. You're that color, you're that color, I'm this color. Okay, pieces of God. And if you could just- He was just left in the oven a little longer,

but go ahead. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Okay. It's okay. That's okay. Yeah. Alright. So, final piece to my puzzle was my wife, Ernstine sitting across from us five years ago, she had a,

what are you calling? A shaman, a mystic, okay, named Joseph. A black man from New Orleans living in New York City that she had connected with, and he really enlightened her. Over the phone, he could see things in her life that she was blown away by. So she said, just try it. I said, I don't buy it.

I'm not there. She said, just open your mind up a little bit. This isn't like therapy. Just see what he has to say about your life and times. Maybe he'll give you just a tidbit that will really open you up somehow. So I get on with Joseph. I don't know, it's kind of awkward.

How do we start? What do we do? He says, well, tell me what you wanna know from me.. I said really nothing. So we're just going back and forth and it's It's not it's not cool. Uh-huh. And all of a sudden Joseph says and there's no way he could know any of this he says Somebody wants to join us. I'm like Somebody wants to join us and he said yeah, yeah, it's a woman. And my first flash is, it's my mom. If you're buying into this, what we're doing. And I don't want to communicate

with my mom. I'm good. I put that to rest in bed. God bless her. I made peace with that. I don't need to redo all that. And he says, it's a black woman. And I'm like, what? Because I, you know, we lost Katie Bill when I was in college. So it's been a long time, you know, since I really thought I mean, she's in my heart, but I don't think about her on a daily basis. I said, Katie Bill, he says, Yeah, it's Katie Bell. And she wants you to know how proud she is of you. That's the God's truth. She wants you to know how proud she is of you. Well, I just, I got tears in my eyes because of all the things that have ever happened in

my whole life, nothing from my father, my mother, even from Ernestine, my wife. Nothing could mean as much as me being told, whether you buy this or not, but it rang true at the moment. She wants you to know how proud she is of you. And I don't think Joseph could have had any idea because my wife barely knows about Katie Bell and all the details of it. So it's not like she could prep him,

tee him up for this. That was the spirits. Yeah, it was spiritual. It came from somewhere else. So when you say, do I need therapy? I got Katie Bell in my heart. And you can laugh if you want, but that's the God's truth.

Thank you for sharing that. I mean, obviously that was very personal. I appreciate you opening up and sharing that with us. After college, you quickly became a star journalist. Dallas Morning News columnist at 26 years old. What are your best memories of covering the game as a youngin'? Man, I had so many good ones.

I've been so blessed. Well, you and I share something, Mr. Jackson. A misguided love for the Dallas Cowboys. Yes, and it's not misguided. You know, it, a misguided love for the Dallas Cowboys. Yes, and it's not got it. I know it's very misguided. It's not misguided. We won a championship more recently than y'all, but we've been there enough. We sniffed it.

Y'all been there, but y'all lost. Yeah, y'all haven't even been close. We count losses now. Are we doing that again? Yeah, we won the championship more recently than y'all. Fact or fiction? Facts, but y'all still suck. But go ahead, skip. It's not about you.

They don't like the facts though. They don't like the facts though. Hey, I'm being interviewed here. Thank you. Thank you. It was like a God thing. I wind up as the lead columnist of the Dallas morning news right on time for what was actually the beginning of the end of the Landry dynasty.

And I got to live inside it. I got to know Roger Staubach really well. And those teams had huge star power. Yes. Tony Dorsett, Charlie Waters and Cliff Harris. I don't know if it goes back a little before your time. You're kind of being molded as a cowboy diehard. Yeah, I went to my first game when I was 10.

My uncle in Dallas took me to the old Cotton Bowl to see the Cowboys play a team that was my favorite team at the time, because it was the only team we could get on television in Oklahoma City was the then St. Louis Cardinals. They were a high flying offensive juggernaut. And so I wanted to see them play this cowboy expansion team. And of course I sit in my seat and within five minutes, I'm looking down at those stars, they had them on the helmet and on the shoulder pads. And I'm saying, I want me some of that, man. Right, and then you're just, you're lost. Who's the first player you fell in love with? First cowboy player that you attached to cowboys to,

that you fell in love with? Mine was Bill Bates. Really? Yes. How interesting, I knew him very well. He was an animal. Well, he's crazy. Yeah, flying down the field.

Yeah, that was my guy, Bill Bates was my guy. Okay, well, Staubach was my guy. Just because, listen, I know he's before most of the times that the people who are watching our show right now, but Roger Staubeck was it. He was beyond Aikman, beyond Don Meredith. He was the ultimate competitor. And speaking of basketball,

later after he retired back in my 20s, I played with and against him a lot of basketball and he was completely psycho as a basketball player. Like crazy competitive, like scary crazy. Like a good crazy. I don't know if you wanna call it good. He wasn't good, he was just. I had a friend, you won't know this guy named Pat Tumay,

who's a great writer, played for the Cowboys. This is a defensive end. He was really good. It's before your time, but but he was He was a good basketball player and he's six six So we used to play Roger two on two with a guy from his his work He just easing into his real estate career at that point And one day we just beat the hell out of him because Pat would come set picks for me and Roger couldn't get to the pick because he's a mountain of a man and I would just get off the pick and make shots and it was driving Roger crazy so he rescheduled another game against us and brought Cliff Harris do you remember Cliff Harris it's again before your time but he was

Bill Bates before Bill Bates and he was certifiably crazy. They called him crash because he had no scruples, you know, like he didn't care about his body. So Roger brought Cliff Harris to guard me, which is hitting a nap with a sledgehammer, right? And that's what happened. You know, it was sledgehammer on Nat, but that was Roger because he's not gonna lose to the sports rider, the sports con.

He's just not gonna do it. He's gonna take me, Cliff's gonna take me out. Okay, so he was, I was in awe of him, but I had the blessing of just getting to know him in those teams. So even before that, I was at the LA Times out here, right out of college, and I was in the middle of stuff right and left

that the Steve Garvey Dodgers were huge at that point with Ron Say and David Lopes. And they didn't like Steve Garvey and they didn't like his wife. So I got, they came to me and wanted me to write the story. So I was always in the middle. Like controversy found me a lot in my writing career. And I don't know why, but I didn't run from it.

I tackled it. You embraced it. Favorite team to cover? Most favorite team to cover most favorite team to cover Of all time. Yes, 98 balls I mean glass dance. I'm dancing man. I'm there. Yeah Michael Liked me and he didn't like many in the media But I don't know why I think he liked me because I was my own guy straight shooter and I I didn't care what anybody thought and he liked me because I was my own guy. He was a straight shooter. And I didn't care what anybody thought.

And he got a kick out of me. And he opened to me and would call me. If I left him a message, he would call me back. And listen, that championship run with that team, watching that stuff unfold, because they went against Reggie's Pacers. And it was a battle a battle royal, man. It was seven games with controversy

just spilling right and left because Phil would get into it with the referees and Reggie and company, they forced it all the way to game seven. Chris Mullen was on that team and the Davises. Schmitz. Yeah. Duncan Detsch.

They were legit now. And Reggie was obviously a legit shooter-scorer. Right. And they got it to game seven and then Michael said, no, not in my house. So that was the end of that. But that's my favorite team by far. Which player was your best interview, you think?

Your favorite interview. You know why I've been thinking about this? Because the World Series just ended. Reggie Jackson. Yeah. Do you know? Do you do? Do you have a feel? So I just got to get you off. I just got a chance to play in his celebrity softball game. And it was the last game in the Coliseum last Sunday. That the baseball game he played it. Oh, yeah. The one. Yeah. Did you incredible? Just his energy is or the passion he still speaks with.

Like he was really cool. Gave me his number. So let's go golf. Did he? Yeah. Really? You should take him up. Yeah, definitely. Definitely. Down in Orange County now. Really? Wow. Yeah. OK. So I'm the last name. He was coming off.

A game six at Yankee Stadium, in which he had hit three straight runs on three straight pitches. Never seen anything like that. There in Fort Lauderdale for spring training, the LA Times assigned me to do a big sit down, if I could get him to sit down. And I'm a nobody kid reporter. I'm 24-ish, four, probably. And I caught him as he was entering on a Sunday morning before an afternoon game in Fort Lauderdale. You know what, it was in Baltimore. I mean, Baltimore is in Miami,

because the Orioles were in Miami, so it was at their ballpark, an old municipal state in Miami. Anyway, I caught him, introduced myself, and he couldn't have been nicer to me, and I don't know why, because he was big. He was, because baseball was way bigger than it is now. So he was NFL, NBA stature.

He was liftoff, you know, he was the biggest name in sports because he was always into it with his Billy Martin and he said, let's do this and he sat down in his locker and I just caught him, you know how we're all in moods and I caught him in a good mood and he just gushed to me. And that man is brilliant about sports, life, what's really happening and I was just mesmerized but I got lost, I was just taking notes and I

would get lost in what he was saying because it was so pure to me and it was so enlightening and then I would see him occasionally because I was in Dallas and he would come to play the Rangers at old Arlington stadium. And he would always remember my name. And so he's my, that's my guy. We had him on undisputed at least one time. And I'm in awe of his presence. Just his aura. You can feel it. Right?

Without even saying anything, you can feel his energy. You want to talk about a powerful human being. Oh God, to watch him swing and unleash the game we played in. I think a rod asked me a question of what he went through when he was playing. Yeah, that went viral. He broke down really broke down and broke it. What he went through as a player. Yeah, we played at some charity softball game in Alabama at the first ballpark. What was it called? Damn it.

Burmans in Birmingham. Yeah, yeah. I watched it. Yeah. You had a quote saying I made some money on TV. Now it's time to make my mark. You obviously transitioned off a very successful linear journalistic career. Yep. You're transferring over into this new form of sports media. I guess it is it's the new wave. What do you expect? How you liking it? and have you kind of found your footing yet? I am more excited than I've ever been because I'm challenged like I've never been. You guys know this landscape way better than I do and I'm serious. I'm like chasing you guys now, but I needed this. I wanted this. I know I can do it. We're taking baby steps. We're developing three other shows than my current podcast, which is solo podcast. Never even had a guest on it, but we've got three in the works and we're expanding and we're excited.

So it's a brave new world and frontier. Again, I'm learning from you guys. I'm watching closely how you do it. It's been educational to see what scope you have here, and how your crew operates and how this show operates. I'm learning and I'm starting fresh. And I like it that I'm against all odds because that's when I'm at my best. I like that. Where do you think you know, I always feel like you

know, in this space, there's been a huge shift. Athletes, voices are more present than ever. Where do you feel the ESPNs and Fox kind of sit in this new era, I always feel like they'll be there, but they're not necessarily the you have to be there now to be heard or be seen Where do you feel like traditional or I hate to say old-school but almost old-school ish media sits compared to this new wave Yeah, digital media. I think you answered your question as you asked it because you guys voices are much more powerful Your your platforms are more powerful and visible than they used to be.

Right. And it's everywhere because of digital. So your voices can resonate and echo louder than they used to. And it's a beautiful thing to watch. But is there still room for people who didn't play, who also have a different perspective on it? Sure there is. So do I think studio shows will go completely away? I hope not. I'm not going to work for my friends in the business but this is the new way and this is where you have to go if you're going to survive in this business. Wow.

Sometimes when it comes to your personal fitness goals, you just need a plan. Peloton can give you the plan. Absolutely. And Steve, you've got a Peloton. I sure do. And Steve benefits from things like a variety of challenging classes. There are four week strength building classes, running, cycling, everything in between. Peloton can adapt to any goal in this season of your life.

And by the way, the holidays are around the corner. Now is when you need to be on the Peloton. Find your push, find your power with Peloton at onepeloton.ca. What's up y'all? So in a recent episode of Quest Love Supreme, my co-hosts, I'm P Bill and Sugar Steve and I sat down with the king and rock of the Beastie Boys.

We talked about the early days of the Beasties We're thinking for records around the globe and now he makes music these days in a cabin in the mountains Oh and this jewel I was trying to start a band in the 90s called the nasal tongues me and Q-tip and MC Milk And be real listen to quest love supreme on the I, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The forces shaping markets and the economy are often hiding behind a blur of numbers. So that's why we created The Big Take from Bloomberg Podcasts, to give you the context you need to make sense of it all. Every day in just 15 minutes, we dive into one global business story that matters. You'll hear from Bloomberg journalists like Matt Levine. Every day in just 15 minutes we dive into one global business story that matters.

You'll hear from Bloomberg journalists like Matt Levine. A lot of this boomstack stuff is I think embarrassing to the SEC. Amanda Moll, who writes our Business Week buying power column. Very few companies who go viral are like totally prepared for what that means. And Zoe Tillman, senior legal reporter. Courts are not supposed to decide elections. Courts are not really supposed to play a big role in choosing our elected leaders. It's for the voters to decide.

Follow The Big Take podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen. Hey, I'm Gianna Prenti. And I'm Jeme Jackson-Gadsden. We're the hosts of Let's Talk Offline, the early career podcast from LinkedIn News and iHeart Podcasts. One of the most exciting things about having your first real job is that first real paycheck. You're probably thinking, yay, I can finally buy a new phone. But you also have a lot of questions like how should I be investing this money?

I mean how much do I save and what about my 401k? Well we're talking with finance expert Vivian Too aka Your Rich BFF to break it all down. I always get roasted on the internet when I say this out loud but I'm like every single year you need to be asking for a raise of somewhere between 10 to 15 percent. I'm not saying you're gonna get 15% every single year, but if you ask for 10 to 15 and you end up getting eight, that is actually a true raise. Listen to this week's episode of Let's Talk Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. In the aftermath of a transformative election like the one we just had, it's hard to read the news without asking yourself every five seconds, how did we get here? That's exactly what we're always trying to figure out on Fiasco, a history podcast from the co-creators of Slow Burn. In our first season, Bush v Gore, we examine an unmistakable turning point in American politics, the 2000 election, which came down to a recount in Florida and ended with one of the most controversial rulings in Supreme

Court history. In many ways, it's the beginning of the story we're living through right now. So if you're trying to make sense of the present moment, check out fiasco Bush v. Gore and find out how a statistical tie in the Florida vote count put the nation into an unprecedented holding pattern, during which American voters waited with bated breath to find out whether Al Gore or George W. Bush would be the next president of the United States. Listen on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Just the other night, we saw a huge meltdown by Dylan's Yankees in the fifth inning. They gave the Dodgers six outs that inning and gave them the World Series.

Just thoughts on that series. I really thought Yankees had a sloppy season. I feel like very talented, but I think their, you know, their sloppiness caught up to them. But I really felt like there's a lot of great baseball in this actual World Series. Okay. Is that the worst World Series half inning ever? Yes. I haven't gotten over the fifth inning of what became a closeout game that I did not see coming

because it's five to nothing. Judge has found his stroke. He's escaped his slump. It looked like he was back. It looked like he was back. It looked like they were back. Stanton was back. Soto was back and it felt like they were taking charge. And so I couldn't wait for more taping on Friday, what was going to be tonight, a Friday night, game six, because it was going to get really interesting, especially

if somehow the Yankees could maintain the momentum and get it to a game seven, then we could talk all time classic. And it's five to nothing. And it felt like 50 to nothing to me, because Garrett Cole invincible to me, he looked untouchable to me and he was so poised and so in command and control that I'm saying he might just go nine and just shut them out and do something that we hadn't seen since the days of my all time favorite baseball player, Bob Gibson of my old St. Louis Cardinals

who would just shut you out in two hours and two minutes and you'd be the next game, right? It's what we used to call a can of corn fly ball. It's as routine as it gets to Aaron Judge. And he just muffs it because he took his eye off it for a split second. But it's something little kids don't do when they're seven or eight years old. It's just, you just can't do that at that moment. But that now the floodgates still haven't opened yet. Then it's a pre routine ground ball to Volpe and it's a pre routine force out at third and and he just he gets a little too fine with it and just dirtballs it

and it's it's like a 10 foot throw it felt like you know, okay, but you're still, you're still okay. And it's ground ball to first. And Garrett Cole just loses his mind for a second, and he doesn't cover first. And now the floodgates have opened because you've done three things in one inning that I didn't think you were capable of doing one thing in one inning. And you've done three things in one inning that I didn't think you were capable of doing one thing in one inning. And you've tripled it. You've gone triple jeopardy to the point that you could just see the body language of the Dodgers. Like, you're going to give us this seriously? And the floodgates open into the Yankees credit. They fought back and took the lead again. But you just knew what was coming, that was coming.

Okay? After every year they made, I was telling Dylan, the baseball guys don't like this, Dylan. The baseball guys don't like this, Dylan. They just don't like it. The baseball guys don't like this, Dylan. Hot topic, obviously coming off of what, from the outside looking in,

was a very successful season for the WNBA with the growth of the game and the young stars coming in the game. But when you look at the numbers, the league lost over $40 million. Do you see light at the end of the tunnel? Obviously, because you were around, do you see any similarities to where the W is at this point and where the NBA was in their 27th or 28th year? I'm trying to step back from it and comprehend what just happened to this league. I wasn't a big Caitlin Clark fan when she was at Iowa, though I got into it a little more in the final four and certainly the final game. I found myself captivated watching her. And I don't, obviously she brought a lot more

of white people back to watch the game, but it seemed to all swirl around her. Whatever new popularity, like, I'm not sure she saved it, but she changed the game. And I still can't quite explain why because I thought she was just a three-point shooter and I didn't see this at Iowa but she's a LeBron-esque passer of the basketball. Yes. Okay so I didn't see that coming and she led the league by far in assists but she shattered I mean like obliterated

the all- time turnover record. And it wasn't, she did it by like 75 turnovers because she will try anything at any moment, thread the needle where there's 17 hands in between and you're not gonna get the basketball through and she tries to get it through. But every once in a while she'll throw some lead pass like Wes Unsell used to, you know, Kevin Love's good at it while, she'll throw some lead pass like Wes Unsell used to, you know, Kevin

Love's good at it. But she'll throw some lead pass and just it's a touchdown, you know, where she'll hit somebody right in the hands for a left, you say, that's, that's Lebron-esque. She has an effortless distance stroke from the logo where she jumpshoots. And a lot of the women before weren't jumpshoots, they're set shooters, they're like feet on the floor shooters, but she can actually leave her feet and hold the pose and flick her wrist and get it,

and as you guys know, it's a long shot, man. That ain't easy. It's not that easy to get the ball to the basket, and she'll make an occasional logo shot where I'll say, huh, that is obviously Steph-like. Yet she's not a very good, consistent three-point shooter logo shot where I'll say, that is obviously Steph like, yet she's not a very good, consistent three point shooter because her percentage was like 33%. It was way down the list

of three point shooters plus she's high volume low make. And yet she completely changed the way that team plays basketball. And I got addicted to watching that team not just because of her because all of them, because it worked. Now they fired their coach because they're going to bring in a better coach they think they're going to get the Connecticut coach I guess. So my answer to all the it's a great question but all I know is I started watching because I was mesmerized by how great she was and how bad she was all at the same time And it was captivating to my eyes. I don't know.

So she became it. She's not very strong. She needs to get a lot stronger and they're taking the ball away from her. But help me out. Would you watch her? Yeah. Absolutely.

Yeah, I'm a big fan of Carol. Really? Okay. I enjoy the W as a whole. And we're working on kind of a little bit of a passion piece, kind of comparing where the W is now compared to where the NBA was then, you know, in almost comparing not because we still yet to see what these women are going to do, but kind of how Magic and Bird brought some light back to the game. No, they did.

How Caitlin and Angel brought some life to the game. How there's a Juju and an MJ were coming down the pipeline with new breath and fresh air in the game. Agreed. there's a Juju and an MJ were coming down the pipeline with new breath of fresh air in the game. So I think there's a handful of similarities to where they are in their respective times. Quick hitters, man, this has been amazing. First thing to come to mind, let us know, your, this is gonna get spicy, top 10 NBA players of all time.

Of all time? All time. I wish you'd warned me and I would have brought my list in. My man, Tyler's over here, maybe he could help me. He probably, Tyler probably remember. Yeah, okay. So I think we all can agree on the number one name on that list.

MJ. Jeffrey. Yes, thank you, Jeffrey. And I've got Magic Two and now I wish I had my list. I think I had Shaq three, Kareem four, Duncan five, okay, Bill Russell, Kobe seventh,

Larry eighth, and LeBron is ninth, okay, and Wilt is 10. There you go. Thank you, Tyler. Nice to meet you. Any Larry Bird stories? Can you give us one?

I'm a huge fan of Larry Bird. Two quick ones. So I'm at the final four, 1979 Salt Lake City. Gil Brandt, then the Cowboys GM, would always run a hospitality suite for the college basketball coaches. Under the auspices of, he's trying to find the next Steven Jackson,

who can be a tight end for him that can sort of transfer height, speed over into football. Allegedly. I think he just wanted to be a power broker, but he would have all the best coaches come through the suite because they weren't all participating in the final four. So on Sunday ahead of the Monday night game, which was going to be Bird Magic, Indiana State, Michigan State, I'm in the hospitality suite and Gill pulls me aside and he said, listen, I've talked to all the best coaches, Dean Smith, the Bobby Knights. They don't believe Larry Bird can play at the next level.

I said, seriously? Because I hadn't been able to see, I saw him in the semifinal, but it wasn't enough. I think they played DePaul, Mark Aguirre, who I got to know in Dallas. And he said, yeah, the quote I keep hearing is Larry Bird is too slow footed to make it in the NBA. So I wrote a piece for Monday morning's Dallas Morning News newspaper in which I said that there are coaches here who don't believe Larry Bird can play. I didn't say it, but I said there are those here because I don't think he was making that

up or exaggerating that. They lose obviously the magic and Gregory Kelser, who was, they were just too good for what Larry had in Indiana State. And that was real, like really, really wrong because he could really, really play for a thousand other reasons than slow feet because anticipating steals, he got his hands on a lot of basketballs defensively where slow feet didn't really come into play.

And obviously he's shooting it back behind his head and it's like Kevin Durant, you just, he's 6'9", you're not gonna be able to bother that shot a whole lot. And he was just deadly, especially when it mattered the most and a great passer. So I'm in Dallas at Reunion Arena. I don't know if you ever played at old Reunion, it's probably before your time,

but he came to play and was at a shoot around and I just went up to him and apologized to him and said he didn't care who I was or what I around and I just went up to him and apologized to him and said you he didn't care who I was or what I was but I just apologized to him. So then we fast forward to the 86 All-Star games played in Dallas and it's the one in which he's in the three-point contest where he shoots the last one and puts his finger up in the air while it's in the air. the last one and puts his finger up in the air while it's in the air. I got you. Okay. And I'm told from a Mavericks insider who was in the locker room. And remember this is 1986. There's only one human who could get away with this. But do you know this story about what he said

to the, his opponents? I've heard a little bit before it. Okay. So he walks into the locker room and it's only that how many guys are in the three point 20 yard coming in. Okay. Okay. And all the rest of them are not white. And Larry Bird says to them, this is what I was told, which of you and you know that one of you huh emfers no no no no word the word least word in the history of the human language should be abolished is going is going to finish second which one of you is going to finish second with that then wins that bitch. That's what they say. Okay. There's only one human, and this is 1986,

who could get away with that to me. And it's that guy. That's what I was told. But it's that guy. Yeah, it would be. And they already knew what he was because he's winning championships and MVPs. So I assume, I think it's Craig Hodges

was the best of his opponents. and they're probably just like. Damn you. Okay. Fuck you too. Yeah. I mean, to Burr's credit, he used to get white, I mean, get mad when white guys garden him. He said that was an insult.

It's an insult. He said that was an insult. Nobody can fuck with him. Okay. Eight mile race, you, Braun, Tariq Hill, and Mookie Betts, who wins? Who are the opponents? You, Braun.

Oh, Braun. You, Braun, Tyreek Hill, and Mookie Betts. Eight? That's a hell of a question. Eight mile race. I'm going with you. I think I might beat him by a mile. Yeah, I'm going with Skip.

Well, I mean, when any of those humans, as different as they are, they never ran eight miles. Three miles. Yeah. It's different mindset. It's what I do every day. It wouldn't be fair.

And it says nothing about me, athletically whatsoever, except I'm in really good shape. Yeah, yeah. Okay? But athletically, it says zero, but they would have no chance. And if any of them would like to do it, if any of them, if they're listening, watching now,

let's go, I'll be there and bring your wallet. He ain't hard to find. And I'm betting on Skip. What makes Skip Bayless happy? I don't understand. My wife does make me very happy. Yes. I must admit.

Yes. And my dog, Hazel makes me very happy as she knows our little Maltese is she eight now eight and she's eight, but those two Keep me right that they keep me upright they They make me very happy Tonight is date night and I'm looking forward to it. And I can say this about my wife, God's truth, not once in my life with her, and we started in 05, we got married in 16, but so, we're almost 20 years together. There's never been one moment with

her I've been bored, not one moment. I do play golf, but I don't play cards with the guys on Wednesday night. I don't go out with the guys on Friday night. I just wanna be with her. I'm obsessed with what I do. And it makes me very happy because it's satisfying. But I only look forward to the time with her because every second I have

not doing this thing, this microphone is dedicated to her and to Hazel. And so she does make me very happy whether she believes it or not. And half the time she doesn't. Well, games for day night. No, Oklahoma City's at Portland. And we're going to watch them. They are. We're gonna watch the Thunder. You like the Thunder. Come on. I love it. Top three Jordans to wear.

Oh, God. You like the ones. Yeah, I mean. You a big one guy. You know what? My top three are all these. We used to compare shoes when I was working with, well, I used to check his drip every day, drip Bayless. I do like the Concords, the 11s, both high and lows.

And so they would probably be high and low would be my second two, because they're way beyond all the others that I have. I like it. Quickly explain their relationship between you and Lil Wayne. And then you guys seem like you guys are really good friends. Yeah, he loves Skip.

I think that's my boy, he loves Skip. You know that, he loved our show. This is pre-Steven A. And I think you helped get him, my wife helped book this, but somehow she connected with his people and because he was playing a concert in Westchester County and outside of New York City, it was a fairly handy two-hour bus ride. He was on his tour bus to come to Bristol and he wanted to come to Bristol and be on first take and he came to the pre-show

meeting which started at 730 in the morning. I don't think he went to bed. No. Right? No. But they literally pulled their tour bus right up to the door. And we start talking across the table about Steph Curry. And it was before the Steph Blake draft

and everybody at ESPN loved Blake Griffin. And I didn't because I'm an Oklahoma fan by birth. And so I'd watched Blake for two full years at Oklahoma and he could make a shot from like a foot away. Seriously. But he was, as you know, extremely explosively athletic at whatever 6'10". athletic at whatever 6'10", could jump, you know, to the next county as an explosive dunker, but I don't know, I just didn't love him. He reinvented himself as a three-point shooter and extended his career shooting threes, but I was in awe of little Steph at Davidson because I said, this is revolutionary, and I kept saying his handle is way better than people.

He can play point guard because he's not a flashy passer, but he's a really good passer with a great handle. So forget just about the shooting. He can run the basketball team. So Wayne is agreeing with me, and no one had agreed with me at ESPN. And we clicked over Steph at Davidson because it's before the draft and we agreed we would both take Steph number one in the draft

above Blake and one to go seven in the draft like come on really okay so that started it and then he took me after the show out to the tour bus where he has a recording studio. It's like a bathroom size studio on the bus. Did you get a contact on the bus? Did you get a contact out of the bus? I think I did. I don't do that. Yeah, yeah. I don't do that. And so I'm pretty susceptible to contact. Yes. And I was feeling real good. We could we could reenact that feeling. I'm sure we could. I should try that sometime. Maybe that would sort of calm me down. The point is, then we just clicked. I don't know, but it's pure sports. You wanna talk about coming from opposite ends of the earth? So it was that when he moved out here four years ago,

my wife and I would go visit him. I don't know, every couple of months, we'd drive out to Hidden Hills out in the Valley. And I know people won't believe this, but we would sit and talk. The three of us, he would include her because he does love her and is like a big sister. And we would just talk about, not about sports

because she's not the biggest sports fan, we would just talk life stuff, show stuff, I don't know, music stuff, behind the scenes stuff, a little sports, she says. Somehow it worked its way in there. Yeah, it would work its way in. But we would talk for four straight hours with no bathroom breaks, no food and no drink,

but occasional puffs, you know, right? Yeah, okay. I love it. But we would sit outside because Ernestine doesn't deal great with the smoke. We just sit out on the back porch and just talk. Love it. Okay, so that's how it happened.

And whatever people don't know, wherever Wayne is, he's in the studio normally from like eight in the evening to like nine in the morning normally. Whatever he is, basketball, sports is on every TV. There's no TV, no shows, there's sports on every, whatever game is on, ESPN, like that's all he watched. All night long. That's why he knows so much about sports.

He is obsessed and also brilliant, like deep brilliant. Very smart. My favorite communication with him is text because we kind of play, can you top this when we're going back and forth? And I would look at the text chains and I would say, damn, this could be a book, seriously. He knows shit.

He knows what he's talking about. And it's like deep, deep passion of what makes somebody tick tick, you know, like what's really happening with so-and-so. So he didn't see in a lot. You covered Mike Tyson in this prime thoughts on the upcoming fight with him and Paul at Jerry's world. Where Jerry's world. Okay where? Jerry's World.

Okay, you're welcome. I'll be there too. No, I know, I told you he was coming because any otherwise you couldn't come down there. None of y'all. You either, you either, J-Mac, none of y'all couldn't come. I called him like, Jerry, I'm bringing some 49ers fans from Cali, they cool?

He was like, yeah, they cool because it's a boxing match, but if it was a game, y'all couldn't come in. Okay, cool. Exactly. Two-share. Skip with the call in too. The closer we get, the more fascinated Come in. Okay, cool. Exactly. Skip with the call in too. The closer we get, the more fascinated I get by it because at first I scoffed like everybody else did. And then I start to think that guy, there's some special guys, you know, who are just special, special, whatever they're made of. Obviously, Mike didn't take care of himself when it was time to take care of,

or he could have done whatever he wanted to do. But when he was right, he was the baddest on the planet and arguably the baddest who ever walked. Ever walked. And whatever that quality is, is still percolating inside there. There's still residue with that in his blood. And he looks like he's in pretty good shape

because I'm in really good shape. And so I look at it and I say, he's 58. Okay. Okay. So at first I thought there's no way he can beat this kid because this kid's pretty athletic and is decent. And he trains hard. He does. Then I start watching it.

I don't know what Jake's doing, but but he looked like he'd put on a little weight to me. Just just punchy excess weight that he does not need. And I start thinking, is Jake really taking this as seriously as you better take that man? I hope he is. I hope he is. Or I know they're wearing big old pillowcase gloves, you know, like pillows. But still, Mike could hurt him. If Mike goes like haywire screwy, you know, like where he calls upon that thing that's locked deep down inside, then he could do some damage.

But that's why I feel scared for Jake, because the best boxers are the ones that can inflict pain, but also mentally in control. The best ones Floyd, Terrence Carver, those type of guys. So Mike is more at peace than he's ever been. That's what's scary. Yeah. That he's going, he's not showing up to the fight. I want to eat your kids. He's showing up to fight. That's what's scary. So if you think Mike not showing up going

crazy is more frightening than the calm Mike, you better think of that. It's another thing you need to look at about boxing. Roy told us he wasn't, Mike was supposed to, they were supposed to kind of go supposed to chill. I know, I saw it. And Mike unleashed, his head movement, his power, that shit still there bro. No, he can't help himself. At first, I thought Mike wasn't taking this very seriously. And then Jake started to insult it like personal shot insulting. And after a while, you could see Mike's eyes and they're going crazy eyes like, like good crazy. Like Mike had time to get his health right. Like you want to play J. Okay, give me some time to get my health right. Yeah. Now I'm gonna come knock your ass out. We shall see.

If you could see one guest on all the smoke, who would it be but but you have to help us get your answer on the show. Donald Trump. Oh, nice. I like that. Nice. I would definitely sit down with nice. I can't help but yes. Yeah, that's that's a good one. That's like that. Okay, I want to see that. Okay. Well, skip man. Thank you very much. And before we get out, I just want to thank like I said, I've always had a lot of respect and been a big fan and in this process of finding out we were going to get a chance to interview I got to dig deep and Do my research and kind of find out what you're about and who you're about and and and hear you out and it just made Me more of a fan of what you do

it was honored to get a chance to work with you early on and definitely looking forward to seeing what you do in this next step. As hard as you work, I know you'll be successful, man. So we just really wanna, on behalf of both of us, extend our biggest gratitude. And appreciation for opening that door, you know it, undisputed for us too.

That was big for both of us at that time. We appreciate that. All that means a lot. I love both of you. She knows this. My wife knows this. Because of how you fought, because you're both your own men

and you believe so passionately and deeply in what was down inside of you, that you fought back and you have true edge to both of you why this is exactly working now. I have deep edge in me because by nature, if you know me at heart, I'm a fighter, I'm a competitor, and I have kindred spirit to what you're achieving on this show, so God bless both of you. what you're achieving on this show.

So God bless both of you. I remember reading you stop fighting high school though. That's when you gave it up. Skip used to scrap. I was reading on it. I read about the fifth grade broken nose and the two black eyes. You still went to school the next day. I took one shot from Jamie Staley in fifth grade. I took one and my nose was flattened.

I did. You remember his name. Yeah. I do. He wrote about it, that's how I do it. I read that piece, I love that shit. I'll never forget it. Skips like in high school, I said, ah.

Yeah, but it was a sucker punch. Yeah, oh hell yeah. That was really okay. Before we get out of here, could we, we're gonna bring some merch. We got some gifts for you, from our guy Ray. Shout out Ray. Hey, thank you.

We've launched the fight side of our company. So we got some all the smoke fight some all the smoke, a shirt and all the smoke over there. Look who's looking over there. And then we're you know, most proudest, you know, we teamed up with Simon and Schuster to do our first ever podcast first podcast ever. Soulja Boy can't say that. Yeah, So why you ain't got the table book. So again, in honor of just your greatness and taking your time with us, we want to make sure we get all this to you and thank you for being on the show today.

Privilege. Thank you. Yeah. Give it up. Yeah. Hey man, now what can you catch this episode? Yeah, man. That's a you. Amen. Now, what can you catch this episode? Yeah, man. That's a wrap.

Amazing. I had a great time today sitting down with Skip, but you can catch this on all the Smoke Productions YouTube and the Draft Kings Network. We'll see y'all next week. See y'all? So in a recent episode of Quest Love Supreme, my co-hosts, I'm P Bill and Sugar Steve and I sat down with the king at rock of the Beastie Boys. We talked about the early days of the Beasties,

thinking for records around the globe, and now he makes music these days in a cabin in the mountains. Oh, and this jewel. I was trying to start a band in the 90s called the Nasal Tongues. Me and Q-Tip and MC Milk and Be Real. Listen to Questlove Supreme on the iHeartRadio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The forces shaping markets and the economy are often hiding behind a blur of numbers. So that's why we created The Big Take from Bloomberg podcasts, to give you the context you need to make sense of it all. Every day in just 15 minutes, we dive into one global business story that matters. You'll hear from Bloomberg journalists like Matt Levine.

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