The Chris Cuomo Project - Bob Costas (Part 2)

Episode Date: September 15, 2022

In this episode of The Chris Cuomo Project, Chris continues his extended conversation with legendary sports broadcaster Bob Costas, touching on Costas’ exit from NBC, what Mario Cuomo would make of the current political environment, the sportswashing controversy surrounding LIV Golf, and more. Follow and subscribe to The Chris Cuomo Project on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube for new episodes every Tuesday. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to the Chris Cuomo Project. Thank you so much. As you see, free agency still in effect. Subscribe, follow. The more of this you buy, the more money we'll have to give away. Bob Costas, so nice, we're doing them twice. He has learned so much about who we are and who we're not, and not just through watching baseball, which is often a metaphor. Sport is often a metaphor. But what he's seen in world dynamics and political dynamics, he's been in the business and at the top for so long. He's wise, and he's also curious. So what do you say? A second serve of Bob Costner. Support for the Chris Cuomo Project comes from PrizePix. I got to tell you, there's a reason PrizePix is America's number one fantasy sports app.

Three million members. Why? Easy, plenty of action if you're into DFS, and it's just you against the numbers. You pick more than or less than on two to six player stat projections, and if you're any good, the winnings will roll in. The big game is right around the corner. You got a little side action on Tay-Tay, do you? Prize picks is the easiest, most exciting way to turn every game-changing moment

into like 100x of your own betting cash with as little as four correct picks, you can turn 10 into a grand. DFS is cool, but I can't help the feeling that I'm getting played when I'm trying to be a player. You know what I'm saying? And that's why I like prize picks, okay? I'm not in there with a bunch of sharks. I'm able to control the flow.

I'm able to tailor who I want to bet on and what I want to bet on. You know, for me, it's so much better than just the game, but this is personal to me. And PrizePix gives me the options and it's fun. And I don't feel like I'm going to get exploited or played by some system that's afoot that I don't understand. So go to prizepix.com slash CCP and use code CCP for a first deposit match up to a hundo. Again, go to prizepix.com slash CCP and use code CCP for a first deposit match up to $100.

PrizePix, pick more, pick less. It's that easy. When I left NBC, under circumstances that people misunderstood, it had just reached a point of diminishing returns. We both recognized it, and we settled what remained of my contract. I wasn't fired. I didn't quit.

And in fact, there was a clause in the settlement that said that if they ever reacquired baseball, I'd come back and do the World Series. So if you're getting rid of somebody, that's a very strange clause to put in. But part of it, part of the discomfort was my speaking out about certain issues that pertain to properties they held, the Olympics and especially football.

So what bothers me now a little bit, I can't do anything about it, is when people say, oh, now that he's not at NBC, he found his voice. Well, I'm not saying I was at the Howard Cosell level, but part of that was because Rune Arledge not only allowed but encouraged Cosell to be Cosell. He didn't care if half the audience hated him and half loved him, and Cosell was a unique character. He was great great and he was a cartoon character at the same time. But anybody who was truthful in NBC sports would have said that to

the extent that there was journalism and commentary in their major properties over the last 30 years, it was because I put it there. I was often the only one pulling on the end of that rope. Now, does that make me Edward R. Murrow? The real heroes are people that are in Kiev now or the people doing real investigative work. But considering what my job was, I was trying to put some journalism into it and trying to recognize the elephants in the room. And so when people said,

oh, you know, he did a commentary on HBO, his first show about the IOC, the only difference was I could take six minutes to do it on HBO. No one's going to give you six minutes in prime time on NBC. But my criticism of the IOC being in bed with authoritarian regimes dates to 1996 when I started talking about China. 1996 when I started talking about China and when they were so pissed off that they demanded I either be fired, this is the Chinese rule, the Communist Party in China, I'd be fired or that I deliver a sincere public apology in prime time. Now, if I wasn't saying anything, why were they so ticked off? Exactly. You know, if, if I, if I, I couldn't go on every Sunday night football game and start talking about CTE or franchise relocations or whatever it might be, but I slipped it in there when I could.

Yeah. I look, I also think that so much, I mean, it looks, all pain is personal. So you're much more aware of this than most of the people who are watching and listening. And I will tell you as an observer at the time and of someone who is very entrenched in the business, there's never been any meaningful criticism of what you've done. And that's good. You know, be careful because now we're in a crucible where who knows where you could do something that is fine and they'll decide to try to kill you. But there are two reasons

that it is fair to say that the media is set up left. And one of them is good, one of them is bad. The good one is that the media was set up in this country to be a voice for the voiceless and to take on the powerful.

Discomfort the comfortable. Now, you are right. That is the adage that you comfort the afflicted and you afflict the comfortable. I don't like that because no, it's not that you're rich, I'm coming after you. You're powerful, I'm coming after you. But that has happened. And it's cultural. The good reason is it's set up to help those who cannot help themselves. And that's good. The bad is a culture

where they think that the group think is righteous. And it doesn't make them lie. It's about influence. and it's about degree uh and the remedy was never to have an outpost from the right because this is all the left it's not that they're the left they'll attack the left as far as fast as they'll do anything else but there is a culture and one of the reasons i'm excited to do the News Nation thing is there's, you know, I don't mean to say there's no culture, but it is new. And so there is no entrenched culture that I feel is going to be a problem for me. So we're creating culture.

And I think that there's a value in that. And it's very appealing to me. I hope I'm not being impertinent by asking you this question. Only because I don't know what that means. Yes, you do. Yes, you do. I'm sure that you have thought,

what would dad make of our current travails? What would his advice to us have been, both before the fact and after the fact? Good question. I thought about it many many many times i don't think he would have understood i mean he would have understood it intellectually that was a genius but it would not have made sense to him fervor without any sense of fairness. I think his problem with the dynamic would be this is a crowdsourced consequence

based off accusations of some kind of amorphous behavior without a standard. Those things didn't work in his head. You know, it's one of the things I really liked about your dad, not unique to your dad. This country's politics, there were always been bumpkins in American politics, but there were a lot of people who were literate and educated men and women with a world view. Your dad didn't wear it on his sleeve, but he was a well-read man. And there was a humanity about, you know, you can be a humanist and be a conservative, a liberal, or anywhere in between.

And I was on a plane with your dad once, and we were sitting next to each other. And I forget what prompted this. And he said, yeah, it's sort of like Abu Ben Adam. And he was stunned that I knew the poem of Abu Ben Adam because my father was not a religious man. And the priest at his Greek Orthodox funeral delivered the poem of Abu Ben Adam, May His Tribe Increase,

the point of which was that in the end, the angel of death blessed the man because God approved of the man who loved his fellow man. And in return, God would bless him. And that's what everybody hoped was true at my dad's funeral, because he never went to church except on Easter and Christmas. And in between, he did some things that no religious figure would approve of. So I happen to know, right? I mean, your father was a much more educated man than me, but I happen to know. And in that moment, there was a further connection. Baseball was the original connection. Oh, yeah. No, look, the connection was the right one he respected that

you bring intelligence to what you do pop didn't care how smart somebody was he cared about what they showed in terms of what they understood about how to be what we now call decent he would have called it doing the right thing yeah um but you know you know what you know you don't have to tell me um but you make sure you figure out what you don't know and treat people right. Treat them the way you want to be treated. Attack their ideas. Don't attack them as a person.

If you have a better idea, say it. Don't just say theirs is no good. And try to get things done for people. You know what the playbook is. And I'm not saying it doesn't happen on the left because it does. But it's the standard playbook in the most consequential and influential places on the right in MAGA media. It isn't even so much as a disagreement of ideas.

You immediately go to discrediting the person. First, you may misrepresent what he or she has actually said. Then you assign to them a constellation of beliefs that just make them an easier straw man type figure. And you assign to them an unworthy motivation for what they have done. I happened to be watching Fox News last week, or maybe this week before, after Liz Cheney gave her concession speech. She alluded to Nixon. I'm not, I'm not, sorry, that was a Freudian slip. She alluded to Lincoln. Okay. She alluded to Lincoln, losing elections before he eventually rose. And they're all over Liz Cheney because how

presumptuous, how arrogant, think of all the things that Donald Trump has said that would get you laughed out of the corner bar. They're so ridiculous and so arrogant and conceited and absurd, but they never call him on any of that. And there were four people. They were all of the same mind. No one questioned anything that any of the others said. And here was the conclusion. Everyone wants Liz Cheney to go away because the Wyoming Republicans have chosen and they've sent her away. And her motivation for this was that when Trump came down the escalator, that was the end of the Bush-Cheney Republican Party. Well, it took a whole long time for that to happen because she voted with Trump more than 90% of the time.

And does it not matter the events of January 6th and what we're continuing to learn, what led up to it, and what he has continued to insist upon subsequently? Didn't there used to be some sort of universal understanding about honesty and fealty to basic American principles? But no, we have to assign to Liz Cheney, because she's among the very few Republicans who has stood up to Trump, we must discredit her as a person. We can't really discredit the idea that Trump is a liar who tried to engineer a coup. The big difference between Trump and the way he's now viewed by his MAGA constituency and Richard Nixon is this. First of all, Nixon won the second. The first one with Humphrey was close. The second one was a genuine landslide over McGovern. So he had a mandate, and he squandered it with Watergate.

of people who were Republicans said, what a shame. He was a good president. He was, well, that was their point of view. He was certainly capable of being president, was qualified to be president. Nobody tried to justify what he did. Right. And Republicans said he had to go. In the end, they took longer to come around, which is natural. That's their side. But in the end, they did not try to justify it. Here, with a mountain of evidence that makes watergate seem trivial you have people not only trying to justify it they still remain in thrall to this man yeah and what i don't understand is why can't they just divorce themselves from that because there's ample reason to do so without divorcing themselves from legitimate conservative principles. And if some of what happens on the left, concerns or outrages them, as it does me, why not find an honest, capable, decent person to lead that movement?

Instead of throwing in with this guy, who by the way, would throw every one of you under the bus if it meant an extra nickel to him, just ask Mike Pence. This is really cultish behavior, where you worship somebody who has no use for you, except in the sense that a con man has use for his marks. You think he runs again? Yeah, I do. Unless the legal troubles build up to the point where it's not viable. I mean, if that hasn't happened yet, you know, people chirp at me about this. I don't see what they're going to indict him for because it's so hard to prove in a courtroom,

because you only know what you can show, that he said, I want to take these documents. Or he said... You're the lawyer. What I've read recently is that the obstruction case is an easier one to prove. Yeah, it's just such low fruit to go after a former president for obstruction. You know, it's almost like going after a mob guy for tax evasion, that it's going to cause so much, you know, disruption that you got to think about it. And I'm not saying that, you know, no one's above the law or whatever,

but I just, I don't see it going that way. What is more interesting to me is does Governor DeSantis in Florida have the knackers to take Trump on in the primary? Everyone that I know in a position of power around Trump and of influence in the party says no, and they say it. Like, that's not a question. If Trump runs, DeSantis is out.

Okay, but as a running mate, maybe. No. Not a running mate. He waits. Yeah. And. Not a running mate. He waits. Yeah. And I find that so extraordinary. He's young enough to wait. And to be associated with Trump,

that idea of everyone around Trump eventually pays the price for being around Trump, at least with reasonable people. It's worked well for DeSantis. Think about, he almost lost to Andrew Gillum. You talk about the different way the vagaries of fate take you. Look, he has to be playing a little bit of a convenience here. This guy's Harvard and Princeton. He's a Jag guy.

He's a seasoned guy, a traveled guy. Like's a seasoned guy a traveled guy like i just said an educated guy a lot of the things he's doing have to be articles of convenience well he's calculating you know where the balance which is a big part of politics i just can't believe he would let trump just push him out of the way like that. It just seems to me like, I can't believe how confident people are. Well, because he's young. They don't even say that, that he's got time. They just say, no, no, no. He's governor of Florida.

They may know something that you don't and certainly that I don't. Oh, they know a lot that I don't. I could certainly see, especially if it is in a large field and if it's essentially DeSantis and Trump, I could certainly see him looking into the camera in a large field and if it's essentially DeSantis and Trump, I could certainly see him looking into the camera and saying, ladies and gentlemen, I agreed with much of what President Trump put forward policy-wise, but there's so much baggage here. We can't risk losing this election and we don't need the soap opera that ensued not just during these four years but

subsequently. It is time to move on. during these four years but subsequently it is time to move on here's the gold watch it's time to move on all the policies that you care about they're what i care about without the drama without the dishonesty without the threats of the constitution and democracy itself i'm your guy desantis i love, I love it. Compelling. Plausible. DeSantis has a little bit of trouble on the last part of the statement because he hides, right? He doesn't even go on Fox that often.

You know, he hides. He's never done a Sunday show. Very unusual for a guy who's been through what he's been through at the position that he's in. He hides. He's the kind of guy I'd like to give an hour to and sit down and go through things and then see where he is on truth,

where he is on consistency, how he explains things, and how often he has to rely and resort to tricks of attacking the question. But I like the pitch except then what happens now trump starts to swing for you right because he's only got one um club in the bag which is in fact a club yeah and he starts to say you we which he would first of all he'd say he's small right so you know he's not you you mini me, you know, you think you're here without me? A, that's played out, except to the hardcore of MAGA world. It's played out. And, you know,

you think about this, and somebody should say this, Donald Trump, worst thing you could possibly call as a loser, lost by a combined 10 million votes to two of the most compromised candidates ever. Hillary Clinton, whether you're Republican or Democrat, clearly qualified by experience and by intellect, but a whole lot of baggage. And she ran a poor campaign. Biden is only president because he's not Donald Trump. And he certainly is not an inspiring choice and should not be the candidate in 2024. And he lost to him as an incumbent by 7 million votes. So what happens when he's face-to-face with someone he cannot bully? You know, Hillary was constrained somewhat by the Clinton story. And Biden was constrained by the fact that whatever fastball he once had,

he's lost a whole lot of miles per hour off of it. You need somebody who either directly or by presence and implication is saying, hey, you want to meet me behind the schoolyard, behind the schoolhouse? I'll kick the shit out of you. You know, you need somebody, and the Democrats should be thinking about this too, all too. It's nice to check every demographic box that has concerned people like you and me out of a sense of fairness and justice our entire lives. But there's nothing wrong if the best candidate for that purpose right now, either against Trump or DeSantis, happens to be a 50-year-old white guy from Ohio, maybe right, maybe who served, you know, sort of a Democratic Adam Kinzinger? That's your answer. Someone who can stand on that stage and not be bullied, either directly or by implication. Like, look at Donald Trump and say, you pathetic, sad, cowardly, empty man. Hillary couldn't do that. Biden's not capable of stringing those sentences

together. And if the best person to do it doesn't check every woke box, too damn bad. We'll get to that later. You also have to get past the, if it's a guy, you almost need it to be a woman. Cause if you're a guy and you say that you'd be toxically masculine on the left and the, you know, they're not really really they're not really celebrating that right now it's not toxically max masculine just to be forceful i i'm totally with you remember what you're talking um you know what what came over me but the uh you know i that i don't know that the left would embrace that uh right now but i don't disagree with you except for one aspect of the dynamic, which is it's not just telling Trump, you know, you got to be kidding me. I remember Rubio had a funny line about it. I don't know who gave it to him, but it was like, you know, this guy wasn't standing on this stage right now. He'd be selling watches on 34th Street. it was a funny line um but he didn't have the balls to stand up to him over time but it's not just him

the problem is he's got this army of angry people and people who aren't angry they are disaffected to the point that they want someone to go in and kick ass for them. Everyone said, oh, he was the antidote. He was the cure. No, he was a virus to inject into the political corpus and make it sick in the hope that the resulting fever would make it better. What we like best about you is who you are seeming to do battle with. Yes. You tweak our enemies or our perceived enemies. So they come for you. When you go for him, they come for you. That doesn't happen.

That's part of it. The only other guy I've ever seen that with recently was the Yang gang. You know, where when you said something about Yang, you were going to get 15,000 people chasing you on Twitter. Someone asked me, it was on CNN. It was on with Breonna Keillor and John Brennan, and they were asking me about Live Golf and Trump. And I made the point, look, can you imagine

any president, Democrat or Republican, virtually in the shadow of the Twin Towers, this Saudi-backed enterprise, 700 of the people who died from New Jersey, some of them from the Bedminster area. And he's going to host this tournament backed by Saudi blood money over the objections of the 9-11 families. He's then going to say, you know, we never got to the bottom of who was behind. Really? We didn't? Seems like the CIA did. You know, we never got to the bottom of that because you'll say anything in the moment that justifies it. And the whole kind of stick to sports crowd, live golf is not just a Saudi thing now. It's in part a MAGA thing because they had the event at Bedminster and their last event is going to be at Doral. Can you imagine any former American president thumbing their nose,

especially someone who cloaks himself in some kind of warped idea of patriotism, thumbing their nose at the 9-11 families that way? Okay, so they wrote about it in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, because I still have a St. Louis connection, and it didn't get a whole lot ofatch, because I still have a St. Louis connection. And it didn't get a whole lot of response. 300 comments is not a lot. And normally I wouldn't read them, but this is my hometown. And gratifying that probably 80% of them were, you know, Bob speaking common sense. But the 20% that weren't, what a shame. I used to like him, but now he's so filled with hate for Trump. He's got Trump

derangement syndrome. There is Trump derangement syndrome. You've got it. You've got it. Oh, that guy was a never Trumper. Congratulations to the never Trumper, a 12 year old whose eyes were open when he descended the escalator would have seen this person is intellectually, emotionally, psychologically, and ethically unfit to hold any position of public trust, let alone the presidency. That's an insight. It's not a bias. That's an insight, period. And in truth, it should be most concerning to Republicans and true conservatives. This guy cannot carry our banner or snatch the banner away from us and warp and distort our party and our principles the way he has. Just as, and Bill Maher is the only example I can think of right now,

Bill Maher catches all kinds of heat from the left now. Oh, he's turned conservative. No, he's in the same spot as he always was. But what's happening in some precincts on the supposed left should be of concern to lifelong left of center people. And I if I'm the fact that you lost to Trump. Should say everything that the Democrats need to know. That's that, you know, if in terms of, you know, you're supposed to do that, by the way, when an election is over, you're supposed to look at it and figure out, you know, that's what happens in actual campaigns. To lose to him with all of the advantages that

Hillary Clinton had should have really made them think in a way, other than just demonizing the people that voted for Trump. You know, and I had to deal with that. No, no, no. Don't ever explain them. Don't ever. We don't have to cater to them. They're terrible people. They're all bigots.

And this is what they get. I don't see that as- There are some deplorables, but basket of deplorables was a huge mistake. But by the way, that's the way she said it also. She said it, they didn't give her the benefit of context. That's politics. Of course not.

When you say that, I want to talk to you a little bit about live golf. Because I don't get why you're so upset about it. But the the interesting pushback would be, what about when Biden went and shook Mohammed bin Salman's hand? Yeah. And that guy killed Khashoggi. Right. And he's as dirty as any Saudi. So, well, he's the guy. So Biden's the guy responsible for public executions. Well, here's with Trump. It's just golf to me. Here's no better. He's the guy responsible for public executions. With Trump, it's just golf. To me, here's the distinction.

He fist bumped him, which could have been a COVID thing or could have been that he was trying to get away from the handshake. But we're in a position where I guess he felt he didn't get much out of it, but I guess he felt he needed the oil. He needed to maintain that relationship. And I'm not an expert on this, but the Saudis are also a bulwark against Iran and et cetera. And there's a lot of real politics stuff. Why were we in bed

with the Shah before all that stuff blew up? So that kind of stuff happens, right? There's all kinds of photos and newsreels of Roosevelt shaking hands with Stalin or whatever it was, and they were allies for a while to defeat the Nazis. So the difference here is this, and apparently there are a number of companies that do business. They're sponsors with the PGA, but they're also in business with the Saudis. We don't know who any of those people are. Every live golfer, whether they acknowledge it or not, is an ambassador for the Saudi royal family.

They're not in this because they love golf. I'm talking about the Saudis, not the players. And they're not in it to make money because they have to put out so much money to get these guys to leave the PGA. They can't make any money off this. The crowds are not large. I mean, it may build over time, but it's not for profit. It's a sports washing thing. The same way the Olympics in Sochi or the Olympics twice within a decade or so in Beijing or the World Cup in Qatar. Those are sports washing things. So the difference is that you're not compelled either by politics or by some larger business interest. You're part of a corporation. You have no duty. You have no duty to do it um you're doing it by choice and

everybody who's doing it can make a very handsome living or has already made a very handsome living on on the tour because a lot of them are past prime who are the big right dustin johnson got 150 million and he's still in the prime of his career right but he's you know he would have been a multi-millionaire probably into nine figures pretty easily. So that to me is the difference. This is a different kind of choice. It bothers you. Yeah. Yeah. The people who say, well, oh, if they offered you Tom Brady type money to comment, to be a comment, no, I wouldn't. I mean, I've never been that associated with golf, but no, I wouldn't.

Now, do I have any problem with a guy who's a cameraman, a guy I might've worked with in the 90s on the NBA finals? He's trying to feed his family or get to a point where he can retire or put his kids through college. I have no problem with that at all. But someone like me who's been rewarded, would I go just because they offered even more?

No, I wouldn't. Well, you're assuming the cameraman can't get a job anywhere else. I take your point, and you are correct. But I think that when it's about doing the right thing, unless you can't get a job anywhere else, and you've got to work there. Well, think about the people who work at Fox News. You know there's a lot of people who work at fox news that don't share the philosophy stage manager whatever it might be you know that they need the benefits they need the pension they're

trying to break into the business if they're younger i think that the decision look i made the decision okay again fox when i went there was not what it is now it wasn't even close it really wasn't even anything it was just started um 98 6 96 so when i was there i think like i said before they had a chance to do something really good yeah they started i think in 94 but they anyway why did i go there i could not get a job in the media anywhere else. New York One would not hire me. Because, well, you're Cuomo. You got to do Democrat stuff. You could be Annalise.

No, that's not my thing. That's not what I do. Yeah, but it's the name. Cuomo and New York One. Yeah. But no, I'm saying I couldn't even get a job there. I'm saying after all the big networks and everything else, nobody was going to touch me

because they wanted me to live to the name right um and he said all right you say you're not like that uh we had a couple of lunches and he said all right i'll give you a shot um and we'll see what you do and i took the shot And then I was there a little while and then I got an offer to go to ABC News. I went and I was there 13 years. He told me when I left, you shouldn't leave. I'll make you a big star here. They're always going to have problems with you.

I gave you a shot and do it. And you know, I'm a loyalty guy. So that was like a little bit of a thing. But I'm saying I made the decision and I didn't need the job because I could have stayed in the law. But I wasn't going to get another job in the media. And as soon as I could have got out of it, I think... Here's what would have happened, forgive me for interrupting,

if you had stayed, to become a big star. And Ailes could make anybody who had star possibilities into a star if he chose to. The only way is to be one of their primetime guys. And then you would be, even if you were relatively centrist, you would be striking an entirely different chord. You know, I'll give O'Reilly this. O'Reilly's show had a different texture to it. Was he coming from the right? Of course he was. But it had a different texture to it than Laura Ingraham or Sean Hannity or what you see now.

Ingram or Sean Hannity or what you see now. There was just something to me that, that was more, that was more legit. But you would have had to, you would have had to have been kind of a wild card in the deck. And eventually they would have figured out, look, this is your, you're serving pizza and this is a burger joint. As good as it may be, get out of here. Oh, I would have never made it. But it was clear to me then,

and I didn't even know really what direction I wanted to go with my career. But my point is, I think the responsibility is on everybody. Yes, there are certain things where it's just necessity and you take care of your family saudi money all corporate money is dirty one way or another and the pga is not a bunch of uh nuns either um okay but i think if you if you if you want to live um by what you think is right you should um the live golf thing i i thought it was really interesting to see how wound up you got about it when i was reading and why you've been around a lot of shit like this well here's the thing it was a little shady you know like you talk about the olympics and stuff like that yeah but this well here's here's the thing if someone

goes to china to compete in the Olympics because they're a gymnast or a pole vaulter or whatever, that isn't a stamp of approval. That's where the Olympics are taking place. You have to. Soccer player, FIFA decides, for whatever corrupt reasons, they're going to Qatar, you're going to go compete in the World Cup.

But this, you're signing on, you're directly being paid by the Saudi royal family. If this was simply a challenge to the BPGA, with which many veteran players have issues, and they've already had to respond to some extent and up the prize money and make some changes, if it was just an ABA challenges the NBA, AFL challenges the NFL, no problem. Or if some other country or entity was throwing a huge amount of money if if um bill gates decided i just love golf and i got money to spare so boys i'll give every one of you even at least you've got 100 million and the best of y'all if you give me a billion i'm going

to start my own tour i'd say boy this is, this is some crazy shit, but I'd have no moral issue with it. It's who's underwriting it that I have an issue with. No, I totally get it. I just like how vocal you've been about it. And, and I'm not saying that you have to, that that's what you do, but I just, cause I think it matters what it is that bothers you or doesn't bother you. it is that bothers you or doesn't bother you. And I think that, you know, I appreciate that about you. And that's why I've always appreciated having you on the show, talking to you on the phone, having you here. It's nice to have people who still matter. And yeah, you're going to get stink on you because of what you say about politics. But you remind us that people can be intelligent, have a perspective, and be

respected. You know what I think in closing? Whether it's MSNBC, or whether it's CNN, whether it's Fox, you need people who will question what the general tone is. Not necessarily be aggressively in opposition to it. I'll just give you, as an example, when I've mentioned before the four people talking about Liz Cheney, wouldn't it have been useful if one person said, wait a minute, isn't it just possible that whether you agree with her on other issues or not, that this is a question of honesty and integrity? But nobody did that. of honesty and integrity, but nobody did that. During the summer of George Floyd, someone on CNN says, I'll remind you that Martin Luther King said,

riots and violence are the voices of the unheard. And I'm sitting there saying, somebody say this. He was explaining that, not justifying it. He was the symbol of nonviolence. Plus, when he said that in 1965, it was Watts or whatever, truly African Americans were unheard. You could scan the dial forever and not see a black face. The perspectives weren't there. Not only are African Americans represented in the media, the media itself has so many more platforms than it once did, and a large part of the media is in basic sympathy with their cause, as I believe they should be. So the idea that this is the same thing as some sort of spontaneous outburst in Watts or in the aftermath of Martin Luther King's assassination is bullshit. And somebody should have said that.

But I think a lot of times we, and I call myself a liberal, I don't even know what the hell I am. I mean, I think I was a liberal because if you're in college in the 70s, you believed in civil rights, you believed in women's rights, you believed in civil rights, you believed in women's rights, you believed in gay rights, you believed in a more humane and open-minded society, and you thought the war in Vietnam was a bad idea. If that makes me forever a liberal, I guess so, but I don't even know what the definition is anymore. But I think a lot of times, those of us who want to make sure that we're not misunderstood, we either nod in assent or we bite our tongues when something is just logically or factually dubious. This is a baseball thing, but I think it illustrates a larger thing.

So go with me on this. When people talk about steroids in baseball, and it's come up again now because Aaron Judge might hit 62 home runs. And a lot of people think 61 in a season and 755 in a career, Roger Marris and Hank Aaron, are the legitimate, authentic, non-PED records. And so it comes up again. I'm not one who wants to see, you know, Barry Bonds or Mark McGuire or Sammy Sosa vilified. But I've said from the beginning, these records are inauthentic. That doesn't mean they should be thrown out of baseball or that Barry Bonds wasn't on his natural merits, one of the greatest players of all time. But he never could have done what he did in the latter stages of his career without steroids.

Just look at his numbers before, which were great, and after, which were supernatural. And then somebody says, well, you know, Babe Ruth never played against black players. And we're supposed to like nod in solemn assent. Wait a minute. The record belonged to Hank Aaron, a legitimate civil rights hero. And the three guys most prominently associated with steroids, one's black, Bonds, one's white, McGuire, one's Hispanic, Sosa. And on the other end, the two that are certified Hall of Fame worthy, Clemens is a white guy with seven Cy Youngs. Bonds is a black guy with seven MVPs. Does everything have to be about race? And then when people say, well, Babe Ruth never faced black competition, that's true. Now, I've never talked about this on the air. You have to begin with this stipulation.

Segregation in baseball, especially because sports is supposed to be a meritocracy, and baseball then and for a long time after was the true national pastime, and baseball then and for a long time after was the true national pastime, is worse than if every player in baseball was on steroids plus all their wives and all the bat boys. It's by far, it's worse. It's a terrible injustice. And it kept a lot of the greatest ballplayers ever out of the public eye, away from recognition.

And when Jackie Robinson was then followed by others, the game was enriched, not just because justice was served, but because some of the greatest and most appealing players of all time were brought into the game. But no one ever says this. If you're trying to invalidate what Ruth did, then Josh Gibson didn't face Christy Mathewson. He didn't face Lefty Grove. Do we then think, well, I can't be sure if Josh Gibson or Cool Papa Bell would be any good? Of course, I'm sure. And if you're just talking about it from a baseball standpoint, if justice was served from the start of the modern major leagues in 1903, and they stayed with 16 teams, and it was fully integrated, here's what would have happened.

Average black and white players would become bench players. Bench players would go to the minor leagues or the bushes. Would Ty Cobb have been better than Oscar Charleston? I don't know, but he still would have been great. And Oscar Charleston still would have been great. Would Josh Gibson in some seasons fit more home runs than Babe Ruth? Yeah. But would Babe Ruth have stopped hitting home runs? Makes no sense because after Willie Mays and Hank Aaron showed up, did Mickey Mantle stop hitting home runs? Did Harmon Killebrew stop hitting home runs? Did Bob Gibson and Juan Marichal stop Sandy Koufax and Tom Seaver from being great? This is just a matter of logic. It's not a matter of, oh, no, no, no. I don't think it's all that important that baseball was segregated. Of course I, no, I don't think it's all that important

that baseball was segregated. Of course I do. But I don't think you get to make any sort of ridiculous logic-challenged assertion without pushback. There's my pushback. Well, but also, pushback doesn't mean that you have to be a bad person. Right. You can have a bad take. You can be off on the facts. You can be weighing facts in a way that is not as compelling as you believe it to be. But it doesn't make you bad.

What really has the chilling effect is when you question, it is a judgment of you as a person. And I think it's very dangerous. And when we assign isms to it yes everything's racism everything's transphobia everything's homophobia everything's whatever right and those things are serious when they're true yes but they're not always true they're not always true and you dilute the power of their truth you bet when they are oversubscribed and

look people say listen these two white guys talking about this kind of stuff. And they'll forget about ethnic reach of your own family and my family and what that experience informs you to or how open you've been to suffrage movements. What the facts of your individual life are. Some people don't grasp the sort of irony of this. The essence of racism or sexism or

anything that identifies people as primarily and only by some sort of demographic box is that it denies the individual. But you're allowed to say, oh, that's an older white guy. You mean there's no difference? So is Donald Trump an older white guy? There's no difference between you, me, and Donald Trump? Yes, there is. I mean, that's just the most extreme example. Right. But I really believe that, you know, I don't know. I just, all I know is about the effort, but I don't know what gets us to a better place. The only thing that makes sense is a huge exigent circumstance, a God forbid, which I hope it doesn't take.

I don't even know if that would work. But I just know that the effort is worthwhile. And that's what I've really been applauding about your turn towards more commentary of what's going on around us is I really respect the effort. I'll end on this. I've had a rare distinction of being one of the only people

that has not liked you in a moment. And I'll tell the quick story of when it was. You saved the best thing for last. No, no, because I'm a huge fan. So you interview Sandusky. Yeah. And he's saying this crazy shit in there. And you do a fine job of letting him talk,

which was the gift there. And that's not easy coming from where you come from because you sports guys are always talking over each other. But you let him talk. And he says enough redonkulous about yeah absolutely just by speaking um you know you didn't have to be mike wallace it was very relevant very important dateline winds up taking it doing it you know becomes news transcendent sports obviously I spend months and months of my life with Diane Sawyer on her team

and this team of producers on the J.C. Dugard case. Yeah. We put together a two-hour special that shows deep, deep threads of inadequacy that wound up changing the California child care system. It's more consequential. Hold on. I go to the Emmy Awards.

Same year? Yeah, that's right. Oh, wow. There is no Bob Costas at the Emmy Awards. Because it's the news Emmys. I look around, I'm not expecting to see Bob Costas. I know the Sandusky interview is nominated in the same category,

which was about 15 minutes of work for Bob Costas. That's right. Bob Costas wins the Emmy. True. Chris Cuomo hates Bob Costas in that moment. In that moment. No, I didn't. I respected what you did, but I, it was so hard for me to cause I've always had such a great,

you know, really the right word is just respect for why you do what you do. And I love that that moment was something where you were really able to add so much value and so many people had so much pain. But you beat me. Well, you know, so much of the world we live in, even though we draw these comparisons, and even within something like the Emmys, is apples and oranges. Yours was a deeply reported piece. Very deep.

Deeply reported piece where an interview was an aspect of it or several interviews or an aspect of it. I did one interview in the moment. Um, and because you had a villain, a specific villain, at least in the public perception, that's, you know, it was, it resonated in a way it was less complicated than, than what you laid out there, which actually had perhaps a greater effect because it changed public policy to some extent. All I know is that somewhere... I've got an Emmy that should belong to you. You have a hat rack sitting in your house somewhere with your other 90 of them that you've won. But you know what? That's the only one for news though. It was deserved as is everything else that you've done and what

is to come nobody has the reach uh nobody has uh respect and nobody cares more than you do about what you do and what you say and i appreciate you thank you chris thank you very much and now we'll wait to see how much of what we've said is taken out of context and turned into clickbait in dark precincts. Look, you can only worry about what you control. Again, a special thanks to Bob Costas. Thank you, my brother, for helping us understand what matters, for seeing it a little bit more clearly and through a different set of very intelligent eyes. Appreciate them. And I appreciate you for taking the time to listen,

spreading the word. I see your comments. I hear your comments. I'll respond to your comments. You know how to get me. And I promise, I am out to get you. So subscribe, follow. Don't forget the free agent gear.

We're getting our money together and we'll start giving back and that will feel good. I guarantee it. I'll see you next time.