The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz - Meadowlarkers 90: The Meadowlarkers Finale

Episode Date: September 15, 2023

On the final episode of Meadowlarkers, Howard Bryant, Kate Fagan, and Amin Elhassan look back at some of their favorite topics of discussion over the multi-year run of "The Meadowlarkers" including empires, luck vs. skill, documentaries, sports and its ties to economics, corruption, athlete psyche, the future of sports media, and so much more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Your Listening to Giraffe King's Network Buffalo, New York has transformed itself into one of the best destinations in the country for art and culture. With an amazing collection of modern art at the Buffalo AKG Art Museum, restored architectural treasures like Frank Lloyd Wright's Martin House, an epic music scene that rocks you around. Neurles by some of the greatest street artists in the world, and classic comfort food you can sink your teeth in too.

So, if you're dreaming of a change of scenery, try Buffalo. It's the perfect place to get away. See you in Buffalo.com. This is the Dunlabel tour show with the Stugat Spatcast. Welcome to Metal Archer's number 90. I'm Kate Fagan here with Amine Elhasson and we will be joined by Howard Bryant. And I mean, I don't know, this is the top of the show where Howard likes to riff on number nine Jersey numbers. I mean, I feel like Drew Gooden wore number 90

for like a split second. Am I right about that? He might have. He had late in his career, he had a bunch of weird Jersey numbers in Washington and in Cleveland. I can't remember if whether it was 90 specifically or not. And then I mean, I know how it's gonna have like a handful

of linebackers or defensive ends or what, yeah, defensive ends and then maybe hockey players for us at the number 90, but more importantly, even then the final jersey number of metal lockers is the simple fact that this will be the final metal lockers. And we're gonna touch on a variety of topics today, but right at the start, I think what we were talking about offline was just thinking back on two years of this show.

And we've touched on a lot of different things. Some of them were actual storylines. Some of them were documentaries or shows that we all watched together. But there were a lot of throughlines to this podcast that kept coming back again and again. So I mean, I'll share with you one of the through lines that I really enjoyed on this show. And I'm sure Howard's gonna chime in on it.

But afterward, I want to know kind of like what shows stick out in your mind. You know, actually, one of the first shows that we did that I really, really enjoyed was the Malice and the Palace episode, where that was the first doc we did. And at first, I was like, I don't know. I mean, I'm not a movie reviewer. I'm not a critic, but it was really seamless to be able to jump off of that into through lines to the NBA and historical ideas and how that tied into like the broader NBA. But the main one that I think stands out to me, how was it going to say empire building,

but for me it was this idea that we kept touching on, whether athletes in luck and whether champions and titles were through the sheer grit of the athletes that we watch and the coaches and through genius or whether there was so much luck involved and that all athletes kind of reached a certain level and then you're really talking about coincidence, luck, just happenstance. And I feel like that was something that we kind of talked about as a through line throughout the two years of this show. Yeah, I mean, I think the general perception people have of sports is manifest destiny, right?

Anything that happens, it happens because this guy wanted it to happen and he wanted it so badly It was harder than the other people, you know, you know, she was more dedicated whoever it is and not enough is given to the And not enough is given to the, I mean, luck probably doesn't capture the actual word, which is something like serendipity. Not destiny. It's just, there is a level of like things have to line up in a way that has nothing to do with the actor in question. And oftentimes in a way that is not even made apparent to the actor in question, right?

The things that allow, for instance, a Michael Jordan to become Michael Jordan, some of that stuff is things that he's aware of. And some of it has nothing to do with him, right? The NBA going from tape delay to live TV in 80s had nothing to do with Michael Jordan. Magic and Bird did that, right? The explosion of the internet towards, or the, I was just an explosion, the inception of really of widespread internet access towards the end of its career.

Michael Jordan had nothing to do with that. My buddy, Ethan Strouse, like some point out that oftentimes we remember everything fondly that happened in a time of economic prosperity. So the late 90s, with the economy booming and everyone feeling good, is a feel good era. So of course we're gonna think of Derek Jeter

and Michael Jordan and Brett Farve and all these guys that represent that era of American sports, yeah, we're gonna remember them very fondly because life was good for the country. And then from there you get the explosion of the internet, Web 2.0 and the mythology building and mythology, you know, the myths

that were built a few scant years ago are now propagated. So that now generations are appreciative isn't the word, worship at the altar of a Michael Jordan, even when they weren't even alive for it. And don't you think some of this is, I think about this a lot, the age of the storytellers. And by this, I mean, like, you and I are generally of the same generation. We grew up with the same cultural references,

the same athletes, a lot of the same memories. And now we are in positions and people like us, right? Who are around like 35 to 45. We're now the people who are doing the storytelling, or making the goods. It's like, I feel like there's a reason why we have this proliferation besides just capitalism, of movies about things, products from the 90s.

It's because of everybody who is in the position to hit the yes button on making content or storytelling was of the age where those flaming cheetos were their favorite snack as a kid. Or Tetris was their favorite game. And I feel like, right now, we have this moment where like, the myth making around the history and the stories that people are age-loved is really big.

And I think in a generation, people who grew up watching Steph Curry will have a certain level of myth-making that they'll be doing 20 years from now, because 15-year-olds right now, 25 years from now, will be in the position to make the movies they want to make and tell the stories they want to tell. And I think about that a lot, about we're in the moment of our nostalgia. Right. And I think an episode of Metal Larkers that hit home for me harder than any other one I think we've done was the Woodstock one. Woodstock 99. Yeah. Woodstock 99.

And it was the feeling of Watching it and saying remember that I remember that I remember that I remember that and then seeing these people on the screen and that was For me it was so weird like all these people look so old. Wow. They were teenagers during what segment They're like wait a second. I was 20 I'm older than these people and it hit me in that moment like, oh, I mean, you're not watching this because it's interesting. You're watching this because it's giving you all the field goods of another time of a time when I was in my formative years.

Yeah, and I think even this idea of the luck in storytelling. Like, it's even relevant right now in this exact moment where the biggest news is Aaron Rogers because I'm like I'm thinking about how if that injury happens to Aaron Rogers the first drive when he's a rookie What is Aaron who is Aaron Rogers to us then like who is he now that it has happened? What could be the end of his career? It tells a different story about him, but it all brings up the way his foot was on the turf. To me, that's, you could say it's age,

but some of that, you look at it, that could have happened when he was 23 as well. And just pure happenstance, that nothing like that really happened to him until the end, and it just kind of ties together in my mind how much more luck is involved in sports than we want to allow for because if we allow for it then what would be the point of paying GM's millions of dollars what would be the point of all of that if really the

biggest card you had to play was one completely out of your control Howard you're here. And here I've arrived I'm looking at you live in direct from Fort Myers, Florida. Where exactly I am here on assignment. My apologies for being late and we didn't even really get it. You guys just took over for this and I appreciate that. And absolutely the reason why I had suggested, I just loved this the fact that I was walking out today to go get my car and there was a guy who was there at the valet. A man named Reed, I'm going to shout Reed out today.

And he said, big fan, I can't wait to listen to your metal lockers. And I said, we're going to talk about luck, incompetence, and skill. And one of the things I wanted to talk about this was because one of the things that we've always discussed in this is how difficult it is to succeed. But also, how difficult it is to fail in all the things that exist in between. The first thing that hit me to your point, Kate, on this was the New York Jets have not been to the Super Bowl

since 1969. Do you know how hard that is to do in a sport? Yeah. It is designed for every team, especially post 91 with the Plan B salary cap and all of that type of stuff. This game is designed for everyone to win at some point within a five-year period or so. And then you get Aaron Rogersgers, arguably the great,

one of the greatest quarterbacks of his era, clearly. And in some ways, in terms of just raw skill, some people say he's the greatest quarterback of his era, in terms of what he can do as a quarterback. And for snaps in, this doesn't just happen to Aaron Rodgers. It happens to the New York Jets. Mm-hmm. You know, and I'm thinking,

you really can't make this up. Is that incompetence? Is it 51, 54 years of it? Am I doing math correctly? 54 years of incompetence? Or is it just a bad streak of luck over a long period of time. Both.

I mean, the Detroit Lions have been around since 1920. I believe they've won 10 games like seven or eight times. It's been a hundred years. I mean, this is really, really, really hard to do. I remember one time, when I was covering the A's and I was talking to all the executives or whatever, and they were talking about how the A's in 2000 lost the Yankees in five, lost to the Yankees again in 2005, and then lost in 2001 and five, then lost to the twins in 2005, and then lost in 2001 and five, then lost to the twins in 2002 and five, and then lost to

the Reds, not in 2003, and they kept saying, how can we couldn't just run into one? You know, why couldn't we just have that Cinderella where things just fell in the right, you know, the right way, and it's like in sports, we pay these executives all of this money and we expect them to have that sort of special sauce. And then the New England Patriots go and make the playoffs like 20 years in a row. I mean, all of this is really, really difficult to sort of consider. I kind of feel like the more we've done these metal arcors over the last couple of years,

one of my biggest takeaways has been this reframing of what our jobs actually are. And that is like, our jobs seem to be to place stories upon teams and athletes that either make sense of their long streaks of bad luck or incompetence or ineptitude that make it whole somehow. Like we can't just write a column or put out a piece

that's like, hey, the jets have just been bad for two generations and we don't know why. We have to come up with a reason and sometimes they're legitimately our reasons and other times it's just a retroactive story we have to put on a team because we have to make sense of it. And in the same way, we do the same thing on the positive side. Like we can't just say, they were good because they stumbled into it. It's like, no, no, we have the reasons for you. We're going to tell you why. Yeah. Tell you and a meme, you know that you worked

in front of offices is that the dealers you make and the deal you don't make. Let's not forget that in 2003, in 2003, in I believe April, the Boston Red Sox were a hair away from trading David Ortiz to the Montreal Expose for Harvey and Askins. Yeah. Why didn't it happen? Because Jeremy Giamby, I believe, hurt his hamstring and they inserted or teased into the line up and then he went bananas and the rest as they say his history. So the example I think of is the Dallas Mavericks were supposed to trade Mark Aguire to the

Lakers and it was already a done deal. It had been agreed to by Jerry Bus and agreed to by the owner of the Mavericks and Jerry West said, well, then you better call two press conferences. One announced Mark Aguayers coming to Lakers and one announced I'm retiring as General Manager. And so they killed the deal. Mark Aguayers, of course, goes on to get traded to Detroit. Detroit wins two titles. Now, that had nothing to do with how great McCloskey

or Chuck Daley or Isaiah Thomas were. That was all because Jerry West felt infringed upon by Jerry Bus doing deals behind his back and basically made an ultimatum that Jerry Bus stepped down from. That's luck for the pistons. Because if if not for that there goes Mark Aguara and maybe he's helping the Lakers win a couple more titles. Are you really saying that Adrian Danley wasn't going to take it home for the pistons? It didn't it didn't feel

like they had a whole lot of chemistry going on there. That's right but you know it I mean Kate we we've talked about the different elements of this on this show. And you, one of the things that you said that has always stated me in the past, you know, however many efforts have been 89 previous episodes we've done is, let's be get lists. And then glory, glory begets glory. Suddenly, there's heat culture. And then there's the patriot way. And then there's self-decry This is the way we do things and you know, and then of course there's the Yankees and all of it and and in some ways You do tend to believe it because and the Yankees have went in World Series since 2009 and been to the World Series since 2009 and yet at the same time

the world series since 2009. And yet at the same time, there's something about Aaron Rogers getting hurt as a member of the Jets that just makes you say, this wouldn't have happened if he had stayed in Green Bay. And of course, that's ridiculous. No, no one knows what's going to happen. It was going to happen. But there's real grass in Green Bay. There's real grass there. Are there teams that you just believe? I just know good if they're bad at what they do and they deserve what they get. Yeah, I tie this to ownership all the time. I say, if you want to know why certain teams seem to be always bad, regardless of who the star player is, who the head coach is, who the general manager is. You don't have to look much further.

There's one constant. It's the owner. And probably the most stark example of that in NBA history, other Los Angeles Clippers. And Donald Sterling, who was not only an awful human being, but also just an awful owner. He could have been the nicest man in the world. He was bad at this. As far as managing, as far as financing, funding, supporting,

all those things, he was terrible at it. And as a result, the Clippers by and large for the majority of their existence were awful. And Steve Baumel comes in and he didn't necessarily have a basketball IQ that was through the roof. He was a rich guy who said, what do you need to be successful? And I know people are going to say, I mean, they've only made the conference finals one time in their history. They're not losers, they're not 14 years.

They are not the butt of jokes in terms of being one of the worst franchises in all of pro sports. When you talk about the Lions, there is a common thread there. There is a family that's owned that team for quite a while. The Ford family and they're not good at this. I mean, I think we can say that now safely. It's not small sample size. They're not good at this. So it doesn't matter.

And I say this a lot. I think that if you're thinking about this, that's because you're a small-minded guy. Matt, if you think of the entire millennium, 100 years, it's a drop in the bucket. Yeah. But the reality is there was, I want to say, was the Browns and some other job.

And someone said, which you think is a better job, better coaching job. The Browns job or this other team that was, oh, it might have been the Packer's job, actually none I think about it. And the conversation at the time was, well, Aaron Rogers is getting older, but here you got Baker Mayfield and he just had a great year and he's growing and he's going to be a franchise quarterback and I said, it doesn't matter. That franchise has a track record of being awful.

And so basically what ends up happening is you might have blips of success. Hey, Larry Brown took the clippers to the playoffs one year. You might have blips of success here and there. But over time, it is unsustainable because there's a reason they've been this bad for this long. It's not luck in that case, although luck does play a part, it is more likely ineptitude. I say to you, Kate Craig, what do we do with incompetence? How, instead of facing incompetence head on as incompetence must be faced, what do we do? We create the supernatural. We create the curse. The curse of Rocky, Calavito is what they used to say up in Cleveland

as the Cleveland Indians having won the World Series since 1948. The curse of the Billy Goat Tavern is the reason why the Cubs had never had won the World Series since 1908. The curse of the Bambino famously is why the Boston Red Sox hadn't won the World Series since 1908, that curse of the Bambino famously is why the Boston Red Sox hadn't won the World Series since 1918 before 2004. So that's what we do within competence. We turn it into the supernatural. Which makes me feel like the franchises we're talking about that are saddled within competence,

have risen past the excuse of a curse. Like they have to be so incompetent. we can't, like we've, we've, we've, we've actually gone through the idea of a curse and to the reality of their incompetence, right? Like that's how bad the clippers have to be. That's how bad, you know, Nixon, James Dolan have to be. Like we can't even call it a curse. We just have to face it. Well, we don't even face it head on because there's not much we can do, right?

Most of the time, there's just not much you can do. But I mean, can you think of any counter examples? Like, I'm thinking like, I mostly believe this premise that ownership will lead to bad luck in competence, bad ownership will lead to those things. But are we missing the examples of championships that were won even with terrible ownership? Well, again, I think you can get a blip out of it.

You can get a good year where everything comes together. They win. Yeah, because talented people, I mean, again, that's part of, last while we play the games. The idea is that the specter of bad ownership over an extended period of time will show itself in a lack of sustainability. They'll make the wrong decisions.

They'll back the wrong people. They'll pressure their people at the wrong times. They'll give the wrong people all the latitude and leeway in the world. That's what bad ownership looks like. And so, yeah, I'm pretty sure there are examples of teams that were poorly managed that won a championship. The reality is the overall sustainability just

isn't there. I think one would argue that Dan Gilbert is an example of someone who, when he had the greatest player in the world, perhaps in the history of the game, he managed to have a good team, and outside of it, they've had basically one year, which was last year, where they were decent. In that case, the evidence is damning that without a truly once in a lifetime generational talent, Cleveland and Dan Gilbert are not capable

of building a sustainable franchise that is competitive or at least just playing good year to year. Q the next song and load up on Tim's loaded bulls packed with hearty ingredients for a satisfying meal. Our four flavors hit the right notes. Choose from Chipotle's steak, barbecue crispy chicken, habanero chicken, or cilantro lime chicken. We're sure you'll want an encore.

So load up with loaded bowls today at participating restaurants in Canada for a limited time. It would be a tragedy if we were losing one person to drug overdose every day. Even five, seven, or 12 people. It would be unimaginable if 15 families a day received news of a lost loved one to overdose. But in Canada, we lose 20 people to overdose every single day. That's a crisis. At CAMH, we won't back down until

there's no one left behind. Donate at CAMh.ca to help us farm agent today to learn how you can bundle and save with the personal price plan. Like a good neighbor, stay farm is there. Prices are based on ratings plans that vary by state, coverage options are selected by the customer, availability, amount of discounts and savings, and eligibility vary by state. One other key topic that we have like really dug into here on Metal Lockers and how where this is like your topic is just the idea of empire. And I think one of, we've got like, that has been woven through so many episodes and tied

to it often was where we are in the world of sports right now, and the tug of war between individual empire and collective sport, and how we've been pulled much more toward individual empire. And we've also talked, I mean, we've even called the men's sports world broken on the show numerous times, or breaking and heading toward being broken. Howard, when you're thinking about like right now, Metal Lockers 90 and where we are compared to, two years ago when we started this show, what is the sports world?

Does it look like it's broken to you? Well, the very first thing that comes to mind, it's, and I don't think it was in existence when we started this, was it? But clearly that the clear and present of the Saudis, clear and present is everybody, I mean, I don't think they work as we would have been talking about it from the start. So this, this, the existential threat of where we are is the, you know, was live golf. And we, you know, realized that,

and now it's even greater because they're talking about incorporation to college sports, incorporation of live into the live model into basketball, the corporate view, the tennis players are thinking, okay, when are we gonna get some of the Saudi money? And so there's no greater example of empire than being able to bend the entire industry of

sports to your will. And that's what's happening right now. And I am fascinated to see how sports leagues deal with this because I was having a conversation with someone about this a couple of weeks ago and the response was, you know, they can always say no. Right? They don't have to say yes and the cynical amongst us will say, of course, they have to say yes. Everything's for sale. It's these capitalism. Exactly and so I'm wondering and I don't think it's not even saying I don't I don't think it is you're just being a polyanna. I think

that at some point if you do care about your values, if you have any values, if there are certain things that are lying to the sand at some point, you have to say no. And there are examples, of course, of people laughing about this, right? I mean, how many times after every super bowl, there's some x-rated company that sends us, that sends us, you know, the blast email about them trying to sponsor or get naming rights for some stadium. Well, you wouldn't do that because you wouldn't put a foreign company on your building. But you are saying no to certain amounts of money. There are certain things you're saying no to. But what I'm fascinated by right now is the idea that the Saudi numbers are creating an inevitability. And that wave is coming and nobody can do anything about it. It comes Howard from, I don't think

when we have that conversation about, well, I have a line, there's a line we won't go to. All of that kind of takes into account that everyone is acting within reason, right? I won't accept money from a porn company that everyone is acting within reason, right? I won't accept money from a porn company to sponsor my stadium because the reality is the porn company's best offer

may be the greatest, but it's still within the neighborhood of all the other good offers. It's not live golf, right? I mean, it wasn't this the case also that consternation during women's world cup, it's like, okay, right? I mean, it wasn't this the case also, the consternation during women's world cup. It's like, okay, this is a human, they are a human rights nightmare,

and especially a women's rights nightmare, and yet what do we do when the Saudi money comes to the women's game? And what do we do about the communication about it? Because with the porn example, you can't get away from the fact that it's a porn company. Every step of the way, for every month, every year, every time somebody sees that name,

they know exactly what it is. When you talk about live golf, nowhere on the face of live golf, does it say like, you know, sound, whatever, like all of the reasons that we may know about oil money, human rights, women's rights, like, you know, whatever, like all of the reasons that we may know about oil money, human rights, women's rights, like you have to educate yourself or be educated, you have to be a lot of reading.

Yeah, like so. It's a shell corporation. So it's like, there's a complete difference there in terms of the trust you have to have in the general population who's consuming that sport to say they're going to care about this issue, even if it's complicated to understand, or even if it's not complicated,

but you have to hold it and keep it front and center for them because the name itself won't, and the clear reasoning is not ever present. You have to care about it day after day after day, and I think if it's just one thing we've shown in our world over the last generation, it's like, or ever, forever. It's like, we're not going to care about something day after day after day.

It has its moment and you got to care about it and you got to care about it as much as you can in the moment it has. And then we can't hold it in our minds for the next 25 years of us playing sport. Also, let's point out that if the NICS were offered a trillion dollars to be poured hub arena, they changed the name. That's all right.

Like part of it is your right, Kate. Like the shell corporation of giving it a name other than what it is allows people to just hope on the most blazy side. I just hope nobody looks it up at the most kind of engaged side, even if they look it up, how long are they going to be mad before they just want their sports. But then also what the Saudis and the cutteries and all these other entities are doing is saying, oh, by the way, here's a shit ton of money.

That's right. Not more than any other bitter. It's so much more that you could not even begin to, like, start to clutch pearls or hem and hog this. And so there is a number where pornovarino will exist. It's just not at a place where probably pornober would find it financially viable for themselves. And that's what makes the oil money different. Is that this is the equivalent of James Harden getting fine,

200 grand or 150 grand, 250 grand for saying, saying that the Dalmore is a liar, but in China, but then being able to sell 100,000 bottles in 30 seconds of his wine. At some point, it's like, yeah, sure, find me whatever. Whatever was the price. Just blank check, fill it out, because I know it is a drop in the bucket compared

to the thing that I'm dealing with as far as benefit. They have all thought you were going to get on metal lockers. You never thought that you'd know that porn how it was taking copious notes of this problem. Okay, how do we get those naming rights? What do we have to do? What's that number? There is a number after all.

Yeah, and I tend to think, I mean, that the idea of values is probably more overblown than we want to admit, and simply the fact that the numbers until now had allowed us to stay within. They just, the numbers weren't big enough to even to allow us the question whether or not values would come into play, but now they do.

I don't even think the average American, and I certainly, okay, let me back this up. I'm watching Lioness by Taylor Sheridan show on Paramount Plus, right? He's guy who did Yellowstone, and I bring it up because at one moment in it, it's about the leader of like a female CIA, he's running an agent,

and they're trying to locate, they're getting close to the daughter of a Saudi that they want to then find. And there's a moment in it, and I didn't even know this where they're like, the oil money for this one corporation in Saudi Arabia is like, triple, apple and Amazon combined, right? Or whatever, like some insane number.

Like I am learning these things, and then I went and Googled it, and obviously it's accurate. Like when we talk about the future of sport and we talk about what we kind of understand about the realm of like the level of business that we do here in the US for a company like Apple and Amazon or that the Lakers do.

We are talking about a level of money that is unfathomable and that can change the complete landscape of women's sports, of all sports. Like it's not, oh, Amazon's getting into the TV business. This is a completely different, like they're in a completely different, whatever it is, the difference between the minor leagues and the major, it is a completely different, they're in a completely different, whatever it is, the difference between the minor leagues and the major, it's a completely different league that they're playing in.

The difference sport is because, again, the assumption that we've been going under for decades since the inception of the technology of television is that these people want to make content that they can either convince people to subscribe to, to consume this content specifically, or we can get advertisers to sponsor to content and it's by saying, look at how many people are watching it, right? And then you get Amazon and it's like,

no, I just want you to buy your toilet paper from us. Yep. And if this is what keeps your Amazon Prime subscription, so be it. Well, I think when we think about all of these different areas of future of where we're heading as an industry, obviously the delivery systems are going to be in front of that. I still as an old man don't understand how people can watch full games on a on a phone screen. I don't get that.

But that's where it's headed. And if you want to understand where this is going, you've got to get that into your head, that people don't watch TV the way we used to watch TV. The delivery systems are going to shift everything. For example, you saw it with the NCAA tournament. You turned the game on, or you think you're turning the game on, you're like, okay, what station is this game actually aren't? Oh, it's on True TV.

Of course, it's on True TV, right? So you're heading in that direction. The other thing that's gonna be really interesting to me, as well is this idea that you're going to, as the numbers get bigger and bigger and bigger, one piece of this is especially in individual sports, how we then begin to look a greatness. I mean, you have women now in the business in tennis especially, they've decided to have babies during their career. They're not going to wait till the end anymore. And so how do you know, I think we're going to be looking at a very different athlete.

I think we are in the work-life-balanced generation. We're in the mental health generation. We're in the anxiety generation. We're in the, we make so much money now generation. We're in the, we don't need you generation. Don't need you generation. And so therefore, like when Naomi Osaka had her child, people were like, oh, you know, she don't really care enough about greatness.

And here's Serena Williams having her second child at 42 years old, and that's proof that she did care about greatness because she waited to the end, although I think it's just more of a cultural thing. And so the question for me going forward and watching some of this is going to be, one, it still work and it's still a job. How hard would any of us work if we really didn't have to? So now at 23, 24, 25 years old, maybe you're going to look at your career very differently than the person, you know, the John McEnroe's and the Dr. Jay's and the Korean to those

guys. So they had to play 20 years because you didn't, you had to play and you had to win to earn. And today you don't cocoa gop is 19 years old. So just when the US open her endorsements are going to shoot the roof. She may be making $30, $40 million a year before she's 22 years old. And what that does to your choices is outstanding in terms of the liberation, but it does change how we look at things and what we're going to be seeing over the next few years. And to bring it back to some of the things that we've talked about on this program over the last two years is with that greater financial freedom and greater reach outside of the traditional channels of access, which is television, you know, print journalism, etc., you're seeing more and more people try to control their narrative and you know we talked about it, we reviewed King Richard, which is the movie about Venus and Serena's father,

Richard Williams, all these documentaries and, you know, docu-dramers or whatever things that are based on a true story all had the hallmark of executive produced by the athlete. And because of that, they're able to subvert the usual storytelling paths and say, no, I've got to tell my own story, which on a surface level sounds great. Yeah, there you go. The unadulterated, you know, I want to get the autobiography. I don't want to get the authorized biography, the unauthorized biography.

I want straight from the horse's mouth. But then because of the reach, because of the financial might, we're not getting the story. We're getting a fairy tale, we're getting a fantasy. And it's happening more and more and more across the landscape. And the funny thing is, people listen and take it and say, yeah, it was a documentary, so it has to be true.

So we got a whole kind of generation of people are growing up, consuming content that they believe is objective when all it is in reality is, you know, a very subjective telling of someone's story. As we start to wrap this one up, I think we should continue this for our last go around next week if everybody's around, but K-Fagan final thoughts on metal-lark is 90. Wait, but isn't this the last metal-larkers? This is the last metal-larkers. I thought it wasn't.

Well, look at Jeremy, you might have to cut this all out. On that case, then that we will say a farewell, but it isn't. It is 90. We didn't even do our, we're going to finish with Jason here, Paul and Joe Juno. There it is. I said, I thought that once Drew Gooden wore 90 like once. He did. And that's what I can do. Yeah, actually did for a bunch of teams. I looked it up while we were talking. Look at the top. You bastardized the entire spirit of the owner. Oh, no.

That's just the top. Hey, you weren't here. We do what we do. Last episode. No, but as we do, like as we're kind of talking about, you know, the different topics we touched on, one that comes to mind is the, when we reviewed Blackberry and just the movie about when we reviewed Blackberry,

and just the movie about the onset of Blackberry, and then it's demise, and how the iPhone introduces this new idea of like, it's not about minutes, it's about data, and I can't help but think as we think about the future of sports and storytelling, like how are you talking about watching games on like a little screen, but it feels like we're on the verge of Apple releasing these, this headset,

goggle situation, and I can't help but wonder if like the way that we watch sports now in like a generation, people can be like, I can't believe they just stared at that flat screen, like I can't believe they just stared at that flat screen. Like, I can't believe they didn't put on a set and feel immersed in the sport. Like, you know, I know I mean, you know, you guys review old movies.

Like, there's a certain threshold of movie, a year where I won't watch anything before that because my mind is just bored. What year is that? It's about 88. Anything before 88 and I'm just like, no thanks. Because it's like, there's like one plot. And there's no, like.

Don't watch movies before 1988. It's about that. Like I'm loose with it. But somebody says, you know, let's watch it now for Hitchcock, you know, marathon, I'm like, no thanks. I have just felt great for every director. If you say Kubrick, next, I'm just cutting this thing off

and we're done. So, oh. But like the overall point is like, part of it is like they, they just bore me because my mind is used to like every plot point intersecting. Every character you've introduced has friction with every other character and it's not like I couldn't even watch one division because like the first three episodes

was just like somebody came over to dinner and nothing was happening. That was the point. They were they were supposed to. Yeah, the point was the point. I don't know what the point was but my overall point that I'm making is that I do think 25 years from now, people are going to be immersed in their sports as if they are, how are it's pretending like he's not even listening to me because I think I just got a one division. You lost me as well. I'm here with what you're feeling right now. It's just, it's what you say to your children.

I'm not mad. I'm just disappointed. Got it. Okay. So one division is something I should keep with I stopped after three episodes. I just was so bored That's the whole the whole point of the show the whole point is to be bored No, the whole point. I don't want to know that should I spoil it the whole point of the show was that it's trapped in her memories of watching Old reruns and so she's imagining her life memories of watching old reruns. And so she's imagining her life as a real. Yeah, and I imagine it gets more interesting

because then it's a 90s show, then it's a 2000s show, and it'll get more and more exciting. But my God, those first episodes, I was like, here we are and the boss is coming over to dinner, and that's my plot line, and I just couldn't do it. I know I'm in, I know I'm maybe there's some people who agree but now I feel like we're way beside the point now. We are way besides the point we're just lampooning you right now. Yeah and it's totally fine with it.

1988 is my cutoff point and as you can see those episodes of One Division were before in 1988. They were like 60s. Indiana Jones. Back to the future. wars tomorrow's head bite is Kate says that cast of Lanka the multi-spoken and citizen came where all horse shit not worth her time No, they might be great. They might be great Godfather 3 is okay. Godfather 1 and 2 get out of here Jesus Christ dying But no, but you get my larger point about how it was sports.

And I was going to say in two-year-large, two-year-large point about that as we wrapped this up, we had a meeting at, oh my goodness am I supposed to say this or not, we had a meeting at ESPN a couple weeks ago. And one of the things in our in our meeting that was really Fascinating was the number of different ways that Sports is becoming immersive that the players are wearing microphones now They're wearing them in the judge out there and all these things had always bothered me and it was telling me that the way I watched the game is dead And no and all of these steps along the way to your point Which is exactly your point, I think, is it's dead, you know, that you're going to sit in and watching a game

without having the right field or mic'd up is thing of the past, totally past side. And it'll all be set in Saudi Arabia. And it will all be set exactly. In the desert. I mean, we can find you at oddball with Charlotte Wilder now. That's right. You smoking on a clip this morning, I was like, is that real? Are you actually goodness? This is a smoke-free environment.

I'm eating your smoke. I'm eating your smoke. I'm eating your smoke. No, I'm not. I literally did it for the bit I Problem I thought you'd not look like a natural smoker by the way Kate pagan we'll find you where we where can we find you for all of our folks looking for you?

I guess you know both my podcasts are gone now so He'll be find me on the old traditional format that Instagram. That's on the grams. You can. I am going to hold out hope that that Dan Lepetard and Company will allow periodic musings when I have them. So I'm thinking just show up periodically, but you can also you can find me where you usually find me,

which is on a bookshelf somewhere. Go to find, go to go to go to go to an independent bookstore and read what comes next. Currently working on a book about Paul Robison and Jackie Robinson. Neither one was alive in 1988, but I'm hoping Kate Fagan will still read the book. I read books is set in all different times, anytime, any country, I'm really open to that hour. Love in that. For Metal Lockers 90, we are signing off and thank you all for listening and being a part

of it. We have enjoyed it. We hope you have as well. Bye.