The Joel Klatt Show: A College Football Podcast - BEST BITE: Joel Klatt shares his story with Dan Orlovsky at Lions training camp

Episode Date: April 18, 2024

Fox Sports lead CFB analyst Joel Klatt dives into the mailbag to answer some of your questions. He gives some advice to a father expecting a second child and how his life will change once the second child comes. Joel helps a D3 college football coach looking to maximize his career and player success. Lastly, he shares a story about Dan Orlovsky from Detroit Lions training camp. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Let's get to some mailbag. Remember, anybody can write a mailbag question about any topic that you want. All you got to do is send it into the Joel Clatshow Mailbag at gmail.com. And I've got three here today that I wanted to get to. And yeah, I'm excited for this. So let's get into it. The first one says, hello, Joel and your fantastic team. I am writing to ask if you can provide advice to a young father who's about to add baby number two this spring.

Congratulations. What was the biggest change in your life when you and your wife went from one to two kids? Any and all advice is appreciated. P.S. Love the show. An advice you give, you can tell us genuine, which is what all of us need in 2024. And all we can control is our own effort. Yes, that's exactly right. Hunter W. First of all, thank you. And here's my best advice. Buckle up, Hunter, because what you thought was life-changing, with baby number two, or excuse me, number one, buckle up.

Buckle up. Because here's what you don't realize yet. And Hunter, it sounds like you're a great father because you're seeking out advice. You're concerned about being a great father. Step one to being a great father. Be concerned about being a great father. And Hunter, you clearly are. So kudos to you.

Kudos to you. I respect that. Now, baby one, it was awesome, right? And it was probably really hard. You're like, boy, you talk about it. Change. Yes, under your lifestyle changes with baby number one. But what you don't realize is that you were more of a spectator to that change than you realize. And you're about to find out what it means to actually go in the game. You see, as much as we want to support our wives when they have children, we are mostly spectators. Even if you get a bottle of formula or even, you know, if your wife pumps her breast milk and you're doing midnight feedings, you think like, man, this is hard.

The woman is sustaining the infant's life. It is a totally different role. And we are there to support, in large part, our wives when that happens. Okay. Now, yes, you are loving that child. And you have a vital role in the infancy stage for your children. But it's a different role. It's not a sustaining role.

All right. That's what your wife is about to dive right back into is the sustaining role. She is about to have an infant that can't do anything and will rely, completely on her. Their sustenance is totally dependent on the mom. And guess what? Now there's another human involved. And you're in.

So listen, this is what's so great. I will always remember when we, Henry is our oldest and when we had Samuel, our middle child now, but when we had Sam, I got to spend so much time with Henry. I no longer had my own time. I was no longer a spectator. If I wasn't at work, I was in it. Because guess what? Sarah was with Sam.

All of us know that the infant stage is very hard. So I was with Henry and I was taking care of Henry. I did Henry's baths. I read him all of his bedtime stories. I did all of those things. I woke up and cooked him his breakfast. I would get him his lunch if I was home. I would help him with dinner.

I would clean him up. I'd do all these things. Why? Because there's an infant attached to Sarah. She can't do those things. So you are in. you're going to go from spectator mode or even teammate mode to end the game. So buckle up, Hunter.

And guess what? You're going to do great, man. You're going to do great. That's my advice. All right. Quinn S writes in to the Joel Clatchell mailbag. He says, Dear Joel, I love listening to the show and watching Big Noon Saturdays.

Nice. Thank you, Quinn. I appreciate that. He says, I am a young D3 football coach and with aspirations to coach Division I football. What advice do you have for a young college football? coach to maximize their career and player success. Man, I love this one. This is really good.

And you know what? I do think that the advice that I'm going to give, one part of this is going to apply to everybody out there, not just coaches. And then the other part is going to be very specific to coaches. Okay. Okay. So the first one is network. Network, network, network.

And that's for all of us all the time. treat people the right way and network. Now, here's some advice when you're networking. And this especially is true Quinn in the football coach world, okay? Culture, community, whatever you want to call it. As long as you are not taking advantage of people's time, as long as they don't feel like you're trying to shortcut or steal or fast, fast track ways to success. And as long as you are humble and genuinely want to learn,

most people will help you. And the other thing I would say is like, if you don't have an ego, you see, what happens in the coaching world, and by the way, if you want to tie this to any business venture, if you're a young person in any business whatsoever and any career path, I think that this applies to you. One, people hire people. So in order to move up, in order to get new opportunities, in order to get new jobs, you're going to have to have the right relationships. In order to have the right relationships, you're going to have to network. Okay, so you've got to do that. But nobody wants the person that when people, let's just put it like this, if someone contacts me and wants something from me and I can tell all they want to do is climb the ladder or all they want to do is take advantage of me.

or all they want to do is move, I'm less likely to help them. But if they're humble and I think that they just want to learn, I'm very likely to help them. And it's the same with coaches. If you don't have an ego and you call coaches around the country, they will help you and you will learn and you will grow. Now, the next one will be more of specific advice to a coach.

And that is, at all times, coach with information and not volume. I think it's very prevalent in coaching circles to think that you've just got to shout all the time and say things like, let's go and yell things like finish. That's not information. I believe that humans react to information, not volume. So, communicate the why. All right. You're teaching what you're doing. You're even teaching them how to do it. Tell them why. When you get all the way to that third level of why, now you're really coaching with information. Okay. Try to abstain from just yelling, let's go or come on. Those things are not information. Coach with information, not volume. Quinn, good luck, man. If I can ever help you, help you. Let's go. Let's me know. Last one, Patrick D. writes in, says, hey, Joel, big fan of the show. Dan Orlovsky was on the

Pat McAfee show. That's right. He was. He goes on there all the time and told a story about how you and he were in the Lions training camp together, which, yeah, that's true. Dan and I were teammates for a short time. You guys went to the baseball field together after practices and you cooked him. Oh, my gosh. I don't realize he told that story. What do you remember about that day? And was it a as bad for Dan as he said it was. Oh, wow. Patrick, let me just tell you my version. I haven't heard that Dan went on Pat's show and told this story.

First of all, yes, in 2006, I was in training camp with the Detroit Lions. John Kittner was the kind of the starting quarterback. Josh McCown was in that quarterback room, Dan Orlovski, and myself. It was a great time. And every one of those guys was very close. Classy, professional, awesome dudes. And so I remember that camp fondly, and I remember this day if it's the same story. So here's the story.

Well, as you know, I was a minor league baseball player. Okay. And then I went back to football and then I played at Colorado. And so at this point, in 2006, I am four years basically removed from playing minor league baseball. And I got right, you know, like some high A, some things like that. Like nothing to write home about. I was a very good baseball player, but didn't work out for me. So Dan starts running his mouth in training camp about how good a baseball player he was

and how for sure he could have been a minor league baseball player, but he wanted to focus on football. And I just was kind of laughing. And I was like, you know, like, no, like you don't understand. Everyone thinks that they can play another sport, but no, like you can't. And I know that because I did it. I played it, right? I know what it takes.

I know how hard we all worked and I know what it looked like. I saw it right up close and personal. Heck, I hit second behind Ricky Henderson for a full week in spring training in 2001. Two. Was it two? It was 2002. Anyways, like I've seen it up close and personal. So Dan's run in his mouth.

Oh, man, I could throw a bowl right past you. I could strike you out for sure. And then he's like, I'm six four. And he was running his mouth. And so finally, it wasn't even me that gets sick of it. It's Kitna. John Kitna, who's the best? John Kitna is one of the classiest best individuals I've ever been around in my life. I love John Kitna. And John finally, like, takes my side. And he was just like, Dan, would you shut up? There is no way that you could strike Joel out or even throw a pitch by him. And I'm like, That's accurate. There's no way he could do that. And he was like, nope, for sure I could. However much you want to bet on it. And so John, he's like, prove it, done, let's go.

And he's like, get in the car. And so we left the facility. We went and got baseball bats. I can't even remember from where. Maybe John's house or something. And baseballs. And we drove the local high school. This is during camp, during training camp.

And we go to the local high school and Dan's got his football cleats on. And I'm worried about it. his arm. I'm like, he's a quarterback. We're all trying to make the team. You know, they thought highly of them in the organization. And I'm, like, worried about, like, I don't want him to try to overthrow and throw out his arm. But sure enough, he starts loosening up and, like, getting really loose. And he's, he's like, in a lather. Because he's like, oh, I'm for sure going to throw it right past clap. And in the back of my mind, I'm like, I don't care if I'm four years removed or not. Like, this is, he doesn't understand. I can hit a 98 mile an hour

fastball. The hardest he's going to throw is 90 or 91 at most, which is like batting practice. And so sure enough, I'm like, okay, are you ready? And I dig in. And then just as like a slight at the end, I was like, where do you want it? And now he's really pissed. He's like, oh, whatever, man, hit it to right field. I'm right handed. And so I'm like, okay, fine. And he rears back. And he, I mean, I can see the veins. He's like, and he throws this ball as hard as he can. And I hit it basically off the right field fence. I think it one hop the wire.

Like, we thought it might go out. Just right to right. And Kitna is on the side. Be like, yeah. Needless to say, Dan was humbled. Oh, man. I love you, Dan. I can't believe you told that story on McAfee's show.