Pod Insights Pablo Torre Finds Out The Legend of The Paul Finebaum Show (PTFO Vault) About this episode His callers are a portal to the college-football universe — and the American South today. As Finebaum himself says, "We found this audience before Donald Trump did." We're talking poisoned trees, an on-air heart attack... and one Alabama super-fan with a truly haunting past.
(This episode originally aired December 19, 2024.)
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Transcript 7,953 words · 24 speakers
Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
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2:05 Pablo Torre? Okay, so hello, it is me Pablo, entering, invading even your ears because I have done something I have not done before, which is, take the advice of someone who once told me that if people wish to support you financially, if they wish to support your journalism, your very strange future of journalism, meaning your newsroom, your ambitions, your desire to investigate things people don't want you to investigate, you should let them. And so I am. On Substack, my newsletter, at www.pablo.show, we'll put a link in the show notes of this episode, I have turned on paid subscriptions. And if you didn't know I have a Substack, guess what? It's free. And that's still there for you, and it's worth it. But
2:50 Pablo Torre? the paid subscribers who support this show and us will get legitimately cool, personalized benefits to come. We will make it worth your while. Pablo.show is where you sign up, click the link in the show notes, help support us, please. Thank you, thank you, thank you on that front. And this, this episode today, is a handpicked episode from deep inside the PTFO vault that we sincerely hope you enjoy. Welcome to Pablo Torre Finds Out. I am Pablo Torre, and today, we're gonna find out what this sound is.
3:25 Speaker 04 I am Paul Finebaum. He's the reason for this monster.
3:30 Pablo Torre? Right after this ad.
3:38 Pablo Torre? This is surreal, though. The setup we have right now, I do feel like a caller on your show, which is...
3:44 Speaker 05 Well, you're a FaceTime caller.
3:48 Pablo Torre? Yeah, I'm a first time, long time. That is also true. I was thinking about how to explain you and your show to people in my life who don't already know the legend of your show, so to speak. And I realize that it's hard because I have to explain that I spend time with Paul Finebaum early in the morning on MSNBC quite a bit.
4:12 Speaker 06 CSV's Paul Finebaum, thank you so much. Good luck today. It's gonna be rough. Pablo, so last night... Are we gonna talk about the Mets?
4:21 Pablo Torre? And then, Paul, you go off and you do a show that I would dare say is not exactly the same audience.
4:29 Speaker 07 You're jealous? That's the bottom line. You're jealous. And Bama's coming back. Bama has not lost. The dynasty is not over. Do you hear me, Count Ern? Bama's dynasty has just begun. Kiss my butt. Roll tide.
4:50 Speaker 05 We don't have a lot of, uh, New York Times-reading, NPR-listening Pablo Torri podcast aficionados.
5:00 Speaker 08 My teacher came up and took everything from me because I was supposed to be doing my math sheet. I told her it's okay, though, because the tide just hired the Boar and I smell a natty in 24. Roll down tide, Paul. See you later, buddy.
5:16 Speaker 05 But we have tapped into something, Pablo. Uh, we've tapped into the culture of America.
5:23 Speaker 09 West Virginia is where Saban is from, and they fought with the Union. Uh, Saban is a Yankee.
5:30 Speaker 05 I frankly think we found this audience before Donald Trump did.
5:36 Speaker 04 You know, Paul, going from Coach Saban to Coach the Boar is like going to bed, married to Beyonce, and waking up with Whoopi Goldberg laying next to you, brother. Is this acceptable Alabama fan? Is this Alabama football? Is this what we signed up for?
5:58 Speaker 05 I understand what's going on in this country because we deal with it every day. And these are, these are hardworking people who love college football and love to express themselves on it.
6:14 Pablo Torre? So if you're already wondering here why the most popular and influential sports radio show in the entirety of the South, beloved by those voices we just played for you, happens to be a program called The Paul Finebaum Show?
6:27 Pablo Torre? I get the question. Paul is a bald, 69-year-old Jewish guy who is not from Alabama, although he has lived in Alabama now for 45 years. And those same voices you heard have taken to comparing Paul's general look to Mr. Burns from The Simpsons, for instance, among other things. But The Paul Finebaum Show, to be very clear, is a singular cultural institution. And this particular holiday season, Tuscaloosa's first without Nick Saban, arguably the greatest college football coach who ever lived. There is no radio show that I would rather hear.
7:08 Speaker 05 There was almost a sitcom done on this program. I was in DC about seven or eight years ago. I was on Kornheiser's show. Some guy heard it, who used to be the, uh, the final EP for Cheers. We went to Hollywood with this concept, uh, 25, 30 years ago, me starting as a talk show host from, from New York, in Alabama. My, my family's all from New York.
7:32 Pablo Torre? Yeah, yeah.
7:33 Speaker 05 And all four networks passed on it. We, we fired the guy who came up with the idea, went back to Hollywood the next year in 2019. ABC bought the sitcom. Jason Biggs, who did the American Pie trilogy, signed on to play me. And it was in the early stages of development. I had already signed a contract to be the executive, uh, one of three executive producers. Covid happened.
8:05 Pablo Torre? And so all we're left with now is a mental image, I suppose, of a young Paul Finebaum fucking a pie. And you're welcome for that. But what I did want to find out today is how Paul got into this mess, so to speak, in the first place.
8:27 Speaker 05 I'll spare you the long explanation of how I got here. I was a sports writer, much like you, except at a much lower level, I might add. And it eventually led into talk radio at a time when talk radio was blossoming.
8:41 Speaker 10 Greetings to you, conversationists all across the fruited, plagued Rush Limbaugh raring and ready to go. And Eager Bieber couldn't wait to get to the EIB microphone today, ladies and gentlemen. Once I started perusing the news.
8:58 Speaker 05 The first time this show really started resonating, we followed Rush Limbaugh on a news talk station in Birmingham. So Rush got the audience ready for us, and then we took them and fed them even more red meat. We weren't feeding them red meat about Bill Clinton and Congress, or Barack Obama. We were feeding them red meat about Alabama and Auburn football, primarily.
9:21 Speaker 11 Let me tell you something. I do not agree that Alabama should have went all the way to the number one spot. That is the most ridiculous thing that could have happened. Wow, they are all the way to the number one spot. Who has done that yet? Nobody. Oregon, why did he jump Oregon? There's no reason for them to go.
9:39 Speaker 05 Tammy, have you ever thought that this is just not going to be your year? Everything you wanted to happen hasn't happened.
9:45 Speaker 11 Oh my gosh, it's always my year when I replace them.
9:48 Pablo Torre? Among all of the rabid cultures across the South and the Midwest, why is Alabama the place where this show is like this?
9:58 Speaker 05 I know this is ancient history, but you have to go back 42 years when Bear Bryant died. He was the most famous coach in college football in the modern era. And I say the modern era, but the previous most famous was Newt Rockne at Notre Dame. And then Bryant took it over. He won six national championships. And I got there, I covered his last two years, and that was the badge that I wore, that I covered the bear. Because those next 25 years were a disaster. Alabama had coaches by the name of Mike Shua, not Don Shua, but Mike Shua, and Mike Price, and Mike Dubose. It was a wasteland until Nick Saban showed
10:41 Speaker 05 up. So you go from 1982 to 2007, where nothing good happened, and then Saban shows up and only wins six national championships.
10:51 Pablo Torre? Yeah, and now I come to you in the post Nick Saban era. At a time when I think I am more interested in you and your audience than I've ever been. It's been a hell of a season for your show in all of these senses.
11:07 Speaker 05 Let me take you back to September 28th.
11:29 Speaker 05 Alabama beat Georgia. It was a major upset, even though the game was in Tuscaloosa. It was just one of the wildest games. Alabama got off to something like a 28 to nothing lead. Georgia came back. Alabama won by one touchdown.
11:54 Speaker 05 I said on the show with you and Joe Scarborough, who's an Alabama graduate, and I was joking, but I said it anyway. I said, Would it be blasphemous for me to say here on Morning Joe that it looks like Kaywin DeBoer is doing a better job coaching than Nick Saban did even a year ago? Can I say that? Oh, come on. Okay, I just wanted to try that out. What happened on that Saturday, Pablo?
12:30 Speaker 05 It was the first time in 40 years Alabama lost to Vanderbilt, and I swear, I don't think I'll be reporting when the world comes to an end, but I was alive that night, and it felt like that had happened.
12:45 Speaker 12 He can't control this thing. And isn't it amazing when the Urban Myers and Harsons and the DeBoers and all these other guys come in from around the country? They just don't get Southeastern football. They don't understand the religion, Paul. They don't understand the dedication. They don't understand the terminology. They don't understand the opponents.
13:08 Pablo Torre? When I tell you, though, that I first became aware of your show in earnest in about 2010, I imagine you can guess why.
13:15 Speaker 05 There we go.
13:17 Pablo Torre? The saga of Al from Dadeville, Paul. I struggle to begin to summarize the Shakespearean and then criminal drama that was that story. How do you tell it for people not familiar with the lore?
13:45 Speaker 05 It was a Friday game right after Thanksgiving. Alabama led 24 to nothing. Here comes Cam Newton.
13:54 Speaker 05 Leads them back.
14:10 Speaker 05 And in the aftermath of it, a couple of weeks later, we got a call from Al from Dadeville. Al is in Dadeville, Alabama. Hey, Al.
14:21 Speaker 13 Hey, Paul. How you doing?
14:22 Speaker 05 Well, thanks.
14:23 Speaker 13 When Bear Bryant died, I was living in Texas.
14:27 Speaker 05 Auburn rolls what's called Tumors Corners after a win. Toilet paper on the trees. They're iconic oak trees, a national landmark.
14:35 Pablo Torre? Famous.
14:36 Speaker 05 He starts off on this Bear Bryant thing. The night that Bear Bryant died, Auburn fans rolled Tumors Corner. I said, no, they didn't. I've looked into that urban legend. Now, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop. I just have the most difficult time ever believing that Auburn students rolled Tumors Corner when the news broke that Coach Bryant died. Does anyone else remember that? I don't.
15:00 Speaker 13 Do you want me to send you a copy of the news? I still have the newspaper clipping.
15:04 Speaker 05 And he just kept arguing with me. He's a former state trooper in Texas. And he finally just blurted out, "Tell you what I did."
15:12 Speaker 13 The weekend after the Iron Bowl, I went to Auburn, Alabama, because I live 30 miles away, and I poisoned the two tumors trees. Okay, well, that's fair. I put Spike 80 D L in them. Did they die? Do what? Did they die? They're not dead yet, but they definitely will die. Is that against the law to poison a tree?
15:35 Speaker 05 He said, "Do you think I care?"
15:37 Speaker 13 Okay, I really don't. Okay. Roll down, Todd.
15:41 Speaker 05 A week later, we got a call from somebody asking if we could hand over the tape, which we did. Two weeks later, I get a call from a friend of mine, Pat Smith, my producer, actually, got the call from a guy on the Senate Homeland Security Committee in Washington, saying that they were investigating this for terrorism to the water system of Lee County. Next day, they arrested this guy, whose name was not Al, but Harvey Updike.
16:09 Speaker 14 And just a day after announcing that the oak trees and tumors Connor up in Auburn were intentionally poisoned, police there made an arrest in the case. 62-year-old Harvey Updike Jr. was taken into custody early this morning.
16:22 Speaker 05 I got to know him afterwards. I said, "Why did you do it?" He said, "I had to do it for Nick Saban. I couldn't let Scam Newton beat Nick Saban." And he finally admitted, he said, "I guess I just had too much Alabama in me." Anyway, he later spent time in the Lee County Penitentiary.
16:41 Pablo Torre? Yeah, sentenced to three years in prison, pleaded guilty to criminal damage of an agricultural facility. And it would be one thing if it was the story of your show, if that was like the one thing people talked about. I think it was the next year when a gentleman named Smokey calls you, and he has a predicament.
17:05 Speaker 05 Well, I mean, you've been in radio studios often, and you have the name of the person and what they want to talk about. And I kept looking down, and it said, "Smokey in the ER." And I... Just didn't quite register what that meant. Finally, after about thirty minutes, I hit Smokey. And I said, "Smokey, what's going on?" And he said, "Paul, I just wanted to tell you how much I love you."
17:29 Speaker 15 I'm in, I'm giving to AKG, they said, "I've had a heart attack." "Paul, I love your show. I goppy your show. You know what I'm saying. I love all of your listeners, and I'll end up being your best caller."
17:43 Speaker 05 So, Smokey, are you telling me that you're listening to the show while you're having a heart attack?
17:48 Speaker 15 Yes, I am. That's stupid, I know.
17:51 Speaker 05 I said, "So, what's wrong?" He said, "I'm dying. I'm in the ER." I said, "Is it serious?" I mean, not a smart question, by the way. Um, he said, he said, "Yes."
18:04 Speaker 15 "I've already had five bypasses and two stents, and I've had a heart attack."
18:08 Speaker 05 Okay, but you wanted to call us while this is going on?
18:11 Speaker 15 Kind of a death wish.
18:14 Speaker 05 Well, I'm glad you did, and certainly, Smokey, we wish you well. And at that point, I remember Howard Stern having a bit like this once, and he asked for confirmation. I said, "Smokey, is it possible you could put a nurse on?" I mean, I just wanted to confirm this guy wasn't just some quack.
18:32 Speaker 15 Tell her who you are, it's Paul.
18:34 Speaker 09 I'm a nurse in the ER at Trinity.
18:37 Speaker 05 Okay, I'm speaking to a nurse right now at Trinity Hospital, right? She said, "Oh, yeah, I'm Jeannie Jones. I'm an LPN in the ER." I said, "Is he really having a heart attack?" She said, "Yes, you know, he's had six heart attacks on his chart." And I'm like going, "Has a Hippocratic oath not made it to the state of Alabama yet?"
18:59 Speaker 15 Hey, can you get up, folks? They told me I gotta hang up the phone. I love you, Paul. Bye.
19:06 Speaker 05 He survived. He did not die, and I wasn't really sure if I was happy or sad about that, because it would have been a great final phone call.
19:14 Pablo Torre? But, okay, hold on. What I'm finding out immediately is that Smokey still today is... All right.
19:19 Speaker 05 He's still around, and I'm still milking that story on any podcast I can find.
19:25 Pablo Torre? Look, it's Smokey, it's Al, but really Harvey. It's Phyllis from Malga. I mean, Paul, like, these are characters that I feel like I know, and of course, Phyllis, God rest her soul. Her call in 2017 about Jim Harbaugh is still seared into my brain.
19:44 Speaker 07 Harbaugh, you ain't better than nobody. And don't you be actor, Paul. And don't you dare come down on the University of Alabama. I will eat your ass for lunch, and I can make that a promise.
19:59 Speaker 05 Phyllis could have put out her own Christmas CD. And I say CD for a reason, because Phyllis is of the era of the eight-track tape and the CD. She was amazing.
20:11 Pablo Torre? There's an aspect of your show, of course, that is both therapy, that is confessional booth, that is frankly Occupy Wall Street when it comes to just the populism, taking control of what feels like a very top-down bureaucracy otherwise. And in this scenario, like the person, of course, who has most grabbed my attention all season this season is a guy who goes by a single name.
20:41 Speaker 05 Legend.
20:43 Speaker 05 My favorite three words during the football season on a Monday after a loss by Alabama that's his team, legend is next.
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23:11 Pablo Torre? All right, so Legend. Okay. You may recall Legend from like 15 minutes ago, actually, because Legend happens to be the caller whose analysis of a team coached by Nick Saban's replacement, Kalen DeBoer, after losing to 5-5 Oklahoma earlier this season, Bama's third loss of said season, was this.
23:33 Speaker 04 You know, Paul, going from Coach Saban to Coach DeBoer, it's like going to bed, married to Beyonce, and waking up with Whoopi Goldberg laying next to you, brother.
23:45 Pablo Torre? And so the first thing I wanted to find out about Legend was simple. Do you ever call Legend his real name, Paul?
23:53 Speaker 05 Uh, no. I believe his real name is Gary.
23:57 Pablo Torre? And it is. Gary Wilson, it turns out, who has otherwise been working all sorts of jobs in Birmingham, Alabama. And so I decided that I should probably call up Gary myself.
24:13 Speaker 19 Hey, bro. Can you hear me?
24:15 Pablo Torre? I can hear you. I can see you. I can... Are you always wearing the glasses when you do this? When you make calls, when you talk? Or is this just for me?
24:24 Speaker 19 Yeah, I always wear them. I have like a little eye problem I've had since I was a kid. Anytime I'm in a bright room, I kinda have to wear some glasses. Kinda like Jim McMahon. Got the Jim McMahon syndrome, you know?
24:36 Pablo Torre? What's your day job?
24:38 Speaker 19 Uh, my day job is I work at a steakhouse. A few years ago, I was working construction. I had worked construction for 20 years. About two years ago on a construction site, I was working on an exhaust fan when a restraining bar broke and shattered my front grille. Shattered it. I still can't have a conversation with any of my parcels in the front. So I'm toothless in Alabama this morning for one reason, brother. On this show, because I love Paul Freiburg that friggin' much that I'd come all toothless from Alabama to tell folks how much I love this man. This man has given...
25:22 Pablo Torre? Paul, when did you realize? How long did it take you to realize that Legend was gonna be one of these special callers? Maybe even special in a way that no one could quite replicate?
25:32 Speaker 05 After that aforementioned Vanderbilt game, he unloaded on the coaching staff.
25:40 Speaker 19 Paul, I'm in sports hell, brother. I'm in sports hell. I never thought I would utter these words. Vandy is my daddy. Can you believe that?
25:53 Pablo Torre? The call went viral.
25:54 Speaker 19 Let me tell you how pissed I am, Paul. Can I tell you, brother?
25:58 Speaker 05 Wish you would. Go right ahead.
26:00 Speaker 19 My neighbor gave me a picture of Costa Bora last Thursday, a signed picture, eight by twelve and a frame, and I put it in the fire pit Saturday night and did that and set a match to it.
26:13 Speaker 05 You burned it.
26:14 Speaker 19 You don't lose to Vanderbilt. That's the ugliest little sister on the block. You don't lose to Vanderbilt. The honeymoon's over and we need some damn marriage counseling. Legend has left the damn building.
26:30 Pablo Torre? When did sports radio become a thing that you knew you would enjoy?
26:36 Speaker 19 Two thousand eight, I'm riding down the road, I'm listening to rock radio in Birmingham, and you know, it was just sucking. So I got flipping through the dial and came across somebody talking. It was Tim Brando talking to Finebomb. You made some crazy statements this year concerning Alabama.
26:58 Speaker 05 That sounds like a beat down, Tim.
26:59 Speaker 19 And I just wondered if you'd be willing to admit now that you were wrong concerning several statements that you made over the last year. But he was talking how Alabama should keep Mark Godfrey. And I said to myself, well, that's the dumbest thing I ever heard in my life. So just off the top of my head, I told the guy that picked up the phone, I said, I'm the legend and I want to talk to that moron, Tim Brando, about Mark Godfrey. They sent me through that day and it went viral that day, me attacking Brando and telling him what an entity he was for wanting to keep Mark Godfrey. You know what the funniest moment of this football season was to me, Tim A.
27:39 Speaker 19 Brando, is when they came to you at the halftime of the Ole Miss Alabama game and you realized that Alabama was kicking the fire out of your Ole Miss Rebels. It looked like somebody had hit you in the face with a big mouth bat. And that's how the legend was born, ladies and gentlemen. Blame Paul Finebomb, he's the reason for this monster.
28:06 Pablo Torre? But there is something else that I needed to clarify about legend, Gary, that is critical to understanding the broader Finebaum community of callers, and also how it is mathematically even possible that college football is the second most popular sport in the United States, right behind the NFL, and easily the most unhinged. Which is that legend never actually attended the University of Alabama.
28:35 Speaker 19 Well, I was born in Annapolis, Maryland. My father was from Alabama. And it's pouring down rain outside. I hope it don't start leaking here in the little legend cave. My father was from Alabama. He was in the military. My mama was from Maryland. We spent the first 10 years of my life right outside of Baltimore, Maryland, and Glen Burnie, Maryland, and Rivera Beach, Maryland. So I grew up in a sports fanatic family in Maryland. But the whole time, my father's influence of Alabama. My first rattler was an Alabama Rottweiler Rattler. My first words were "Rottweiler!" Daddy, but "Rottweiler!" That was my first words.
29:17 Pablo Torre? All of which qualifies legend, according to his own personal estimation, for a very special form of office, a leadership position in a truly startlingly enormous community. And it's the kind of office that, by definition, you cannot pay for.
29:38 Speaker 19 I'm president of the Sidewalk Alumni. You know, and a lot of good people with diplomas love me, but there's a lot of people in Alabama don't like the legend. I am that fan that the administration don't want to talk about. The one that never went to school, that never got a diploma, and never been in class. You know, "How dare him talk for the old Bubba Cusentown!" And they don't like that, because they think, "You know, that old fan, Sidewalk Alumni fan, he's stupid. The only thing he knows about is flag football. He don't know nothing about real football!" Shut up!
30:14 Speaker 05 I can make it really simple. Uh, Legend is the president of the Sidewalk Alumni and your colleague Joe Scarborough is the president of the Upper Crust Elite Alabama Alumni. I love Joe, but I gravitate more toward the sidewalk. That's, that's what I do. You know, some of them have been to Tuscaloosa, some of them have actually even been to an Alabama game, but that doesn't matter to me because those folks have always needed representation. I think, I think you can look at, you can bring a political scientist in here and, and this is really where the country is. And I think there, we have heard in, in, in elections that they're, they're not being paid attention to. Uh, and I really believe that we give them a voice and, you know, it may make the athletic
30:59 Speaker 05 directors and the chancellors and the, the bow tied crowd in the ivory towers uncomfortable, but I really don't care.
31:05 Speaker 04 I can say whatever the hell I want to. I worked my ass off today. I might've made a hundred and twenty dollars. Don't you agree? I can say whatever the hell I want to about somebody that makes ten billion dollars a year. Wouldn't you agree with that, brother?
31:21 Speaker 05 Legend, if somebody told me, we can't allow that, it will, it would be my last day here.
31:27 Speaker 04 Hell, yeah. We can say whatever the hell we want to say, and I got a few things to say.
31:34 Pablo Torre? It's an unbelievable asset to hear from a guy like Legend. What he did after Tennessee, after Alabama loses to Tennessee.
31:44 Speaker 04 You know, they say that a team takes on the personality of their coach. Well, our team is undisciplined and soft. And no guy, you, Coach DeBoer, are undisciplined and soft. Strike frigging dude, man. Strike frigging two. We about to go to the Birmingham Bowl. I ain't left the building. I've kicked the damn door down because I'm pissed off at this crap. This ain't Alabama football and any Alabama fan that accepts it ain't a real damn fan.
32:21 Speaker 05 Tony Kornheiser said this to me once, and I'll, I'll clean it up for this family podcast. He said, how come you talk to those effing people? And of course, he did it with, you know, with the Long Island accent. Um, and I, you can't explain it. I mean, Tony, you don't have to talk to them. I mean, you, you pontificate. You used to have a show in Washington where you got James Carville and all these muckety mucks around the table. And then you sit around with Wilbon and Opine for 30 minutes. And don't laugh. I saw you co-hosting that show yesterday.
32:57 Pablo Torre? The ivory tower still has a nice padded cushion in my seat. Yeah.
33:01 Speaker 05 I love it. And I, I feel like whatever, whenever they take me away. And I say, I, I hear, I hear the barbarians at the gate right this moment. That's, that will be my legacy. It won't be, you know, yelling at Stephen A. Smith or Greenberg or, or anyone else. It will be that.
33:20 Pablo Torre? No, you will be forever the guy who brought me the caller who said that losing to Oklahoma was like going to bed with Beyonce and waking up next to Whoopi Goldberg.
33:32 Speaker 05 I, I thought that was the line of the year and I was not surprised at all that the next morning on ESPN, they edited that out, knowing that, that Whoopi was probably watching. And I think she's employed by the, by the family.
33:47 Pablo Torre? Oh, sure. The larger, the larger, the larger family of networks.
33:50 Speaker 05 I think, I think, I think The View should have had, should have both of us on after this is published and, and let us, let, let the group hear that call.
34:00 Pablo Torre? I concur. In terms of just the callers and their own views of themselves, you know, I was talking to Legend and Legend wanted to be very clear about this. He said, I am not Harvey Updike. Harvey Updike is a criminal. That's not me.
34:16 Speaker 19 It's not a performance. I'm a fanatic in the sports world. I'm not a criminal. I'm a fanatic. There's a difference. A criminal poisons trees, hurts other people. A fanatic might cuss his coach out, might cuss the quarterback out, might cuss the general manager out, the owner. That's what a fanatic is, but he's doing all that and the fact that he loves his team.
34:39 Pablo Torre? And of course, in my mind, I immediately went to, of course, Legend's own past.
34:45 Speaker 05 Well, I knew there was a story behind Legend. Legend was part of a group called Sons of Saban.
34:55 Speaker 05 I'm like one of those groups in New York that go around and keep the law.
35:00 Pablo Torre? That's right.
35:01 Speaker 05 So we had lunch and I said, Legend, what's the deal? I know you've alluded to your past. And he looked at me, he said, there's nothing to run away from. He said, I've been to prison. I said, okay.
35:15 Speaker 05 Couldn't really counter that by saying, well, so have I.
35:19 Speaker 05 I said, what were you in for? He said, murder.
35:35 Speaker 16 Hi, I'm Jenna Oshkowitz. You might know me from Glee. This is At the Table, the food allergy podcast, a show about food, connection, and what it really looks like to live with food allergies. Each episode, we hear stories from real people like Daniel.
35:49 Speaker 17 People would always think I was lactose intolerant. So I just kind of shortened my explanation to I'm deathly allergic in a big way that defined a lot of my childhood.
36:00 Speaker 16 And while there are challenges, there are moments that remind you you're not alone.
36:05 Speaker 18 One of the best guys that I dated, he made a point to memorize all my food allergies.
36:11 Speaker 16 So join us and hear their stories and more because living with food allergies isn't just about what you can't eat. It's about still having your seat at the table. Brought to you by Genentech and Novartis. Listen to At the Table, the food allergy podcast on America's number one podcast network, iHeart. Follow At the Table and start listening on the free iHeart radio app today.
36:31 Speaker 02 At Humana, our Medicare Advantage plans are easy to understand and easy on your wallet. Like offering more benefits than you'd get from original Medicare alone and including dental, vision, and hearing coverage in every plan. And the best part is every plan has a $0 or low monthly plan premium, which makes it easier to save, too. So this Medicare planning season, plan well with Humana. Learn more at gethumana.com. Humana is a Medicare Advantage, HMO and PPO organization with a Medicare contract. Enrollment in any Humana plan depends on contract renewal.
37:09 Pablo Torre? On paper, it is grisly, right? I mean, what we're talking about with legend is a story of him when he's 17 years old. It's Winston County, it's Northwest Alabama. The argument with his cousin over a girl, I believe, he also mentioned.
37:23 Speaker 19 We were distant cousins, you know? We grew up in a little town where there wasn't but 30 people in the whole town, you know? We grew up around each other all of our lives. And then when we got up to about 17, you know, I was already deep into drugs, you know? And so when we got to that age, we got into a fight over a young lady. And it escalated from the fight over the young lady and to the incident that happened.
37:51 Pablo Torre? And he goes to his father's gun cabinet. His dad's out, his dad apparently working in the coal mine. It's a 22 rifle. And he takes his cousin out to the woods and he shoots Randy Barton, also 17, twice in the back of the head.
38:08 Speaker 19 When I was 17 years old, I took a young man's life, another 17-year-old young man. It was an act of a coward. Anybody that takes a gun and takes a life is committing an act of cowardice. You know, God gave you a brain and we ought to be able to use it. I killed a man, destroyed his life. I threw my life away as a young man. I destroyed many families associated. It was a horrible, horrible thing. I'm very ashamed of it. I faced the elected chair for 18 months. And at the time, in the state of Alabama, Charles Graddick was running for governor.
38:52 Speaker 19 He was the attorney general of the state of Alabama, and he wanted to lock everybody up and throw away the key.
38:58 Speaker 20 I'm Charlie Graddick. For vicious killings like this, it's been proven that capital punishment can be
39:05 Speaker 19 That was his big commercial. So they were going to intently, they was gonna make an example of me. They was intended to give me the electric chair for 18 months, from 17 to I was 18. I faced the possibility of going to what they call the Big Yellow Mama in Alabama. And it looked for a while like that is what would happen. And then we went to court and my lawyer worked out a deal for a life sentence with the possibility of parole. And we went that route realizing how young I was that, you know, there was, it wasn't guaranteed, but there was a possibility that I would get another chance in society, you
39:50 Speaker 19 know. And I'm so thankful for it.
39:51 Speaker 05 That day at lunch, when he was telling me the story, I said, so what exactly do you do, Legend? He said, I'm an electrician. He said, and by the way, if you or your wife ever need any, and I started thinking, maybe I got to get to know this guy a little bit better. But today, I would, I would, I would give him the keys to my house.
40:10 Pablo Torre? You believe that this guy who had served his time, who has come out and, and gotten to know you over the airwaves and apparently in person, that he is in fact rehabilitated? That is not a question to you?
40:23 Speaker 05 A hundred percent. Not only that, Pablo, I mean, he's, he's a genuinely good person. He, he helps a lot of people. And I think a lot of people hear him on the show. Plenty of people have had problems, as you well know. And they go, I can, I'll try to say this with a straight face, I can be legend. I mean, he is, he's a personification of what our show is all about. A guy that, that probably should be dead, but now he's a, he's a famous fine bomb caller.
40:57 Speaker 19 You know, I spent 15 years in prison, 15 hard years in, in prison. It was a rough life. And when I came out, I was determined to make it when I came out.
41:11 Pablo Torre? Paul, you say you don't know the story of actually how Legend got the name Legend.
41:19 Speaker 05 I I don't.
41:21 Speaker 19 The first few years I was out of prison, I traveled the country as an evangelist preaching the gospel and sharing the goodness of what the Lord had done in my life. And when I would go to different churches across the country, because I had been in prison, one of the things they would do is have me go into the prisons and preach in the area. So I was in Defuniak Springs, Florida, preaching at a big church, and they had me go down to the prison one Sunday night and preach at a minimum security prison. And I preached there that night, and over a hundred men came to know the Lord. And as I was leaving the prison, an inmate was running behind me saying, that guy is
42:06 Speaker 19 a legend. That guy is a legend. He's a legend. And the preacher that had brought me in with him, he picked it up and he started calling me legend that day. And before I knew it, everybody around me was calling me legend.
42:22 Pablo Torre? And that's that's how it happened.
42:26 Speaker 05 That's legendary.
42:27 Pablo Torre? He had mentioned, I don't know if you remember this, but there was a moment, I guess about a year and a half ago, I believe it was a school shooting of some kind.
42:35 Speaker 21 The first emergency calls coming Tuesday morning, and they were horrific. An active shooter at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas.
42:44 Pablo Torre? And he said that this was the thing that made him want to go and actually take his act, so to speak, out on the road to these to these prisons.
42:53 Speaker 05 Oh, he gave a impassioned speech that day on on our program, Pablo.
42:57 Speaker 19 They think, hey, legend's crazy. That might be in sports. But in real life, it's serious. Real life is different than sports. And in real life, put the guns down. Put them down.
43:13 Speaker 05 Somebody called in off the air and said that they were thinking about killing someone that day. It was a guy, I think it was in Philadelphia, but he'd had some run-in with a guy down the street and he'd gone back to get his gun and somehow he thought of what Legend had said.
43:29 Speaker 19 I grew up in a house, you know, watching my grandfather throw the remote at the television, cuss the TV, you know. I grew up in that kind of house, you know what I'm saying? But thanks to Paul and that therapy that I get each day, I managed to move on.
43:47 Pablo Torre? It does feel like Paul is giving out a kind of medication.
43:50 Speaker 19 We are the castaways, we are the throwaway fans, we are the fans that nobody says, "I'm not Kenzo, one of them Finebomb callers," you know what I'm saying? The Finebomb callers are crazy! We're that fan, we're that fanatical, crazy fan, and we are real. We are real.
44:20 Pablo Torre? Legend now, okay, his mission now, right? He has a couple of missions, crusades for the good in life. He also wants to fire Kalen DeBoer.
44:29 Speaker 05 Yeah, well, I mean, let's forget saving mankind, let's get to the important things right now. Kalen DeBoer, I'll have to keep reminding the audience, is the man who replaced Nick Saban.
44:38 Pablo Torre? Paul, I don't know if you can even begin to disagree with my assessment here. That stuff is what makes the job itself, at times, so hard, isn't it? The idea that this is a hot seat and the fire underneath, you can tune in and listen to it every time you put on The Finebomb Show.
45:02 Speaker 05 To me, it's the part of the job that probably is the most interesting and challenging. And by the way, I mean, we just went through 17 years with Nick Saban, and a week ago, I don't know if you saw, he was on The McAfee Show, and he was defending DeBoer. And he talked about how he never paid attention to the media. And he proceeded to identify me. We got criticized every time we lost a game. I don't know how many times I heard Paul Finebaum say, this is the beginning of the end. I mean, but it never was, but he said it. I always like it when a guy mentions your name in terms of, I never listened to him. But the point was, of course he listened.
45:43 Speaker 05 But we never really had, we may have had six Mondays in 17 years where there was really, I mean, we would criticize Saban for losing the national championship. That's how difficult it was to find something to say about it. DeBoer took care of it by the first weekend in October.
46:00 Pablo Torre? But the influence is obvious to everybody, I think, who spends a couple of minutes listening to the people that that listen to you. And when I listen to Legend talk about what this particular holiday season is gonna be like, Paul, I mean, let's just say it bluntly. This is a weird Christmas.
46:19 Speaker 05 Yeah, yeah, if you're an Alabama fan, it's Scrooge City. There's nothing, there's nothing to be happy about. Alabama is going to the ReliaQuest Bowl.
46:32 Pablo Torre? Yes, against a seven and five Michigan team.
46:35 Speaker 05 If you go back to 2009, I mean, Alabama has practically either played for the national championship or been in the playoffs all but two or three years. And this year, it feels very empty.
46:49 Pablo Torre? Yeah, Legend, for the record here, offered me his ticket to the ReliaQuest Bowl.
46:55 Speaker 19 You can have my tickets, brother. Listen, if it ain't for Champ, no offense, you know, a lot of Alabama fans say, oh, good boy, Legend, we pull for Alabama in every game. Let me ask you something, if the Yankees are out of the playoffs, do they care about an exhibition game with the Toronto Blue Jays? I don't care nothing about it.
47:12 Speaker 05 Somebody tells me that you will not be there on New Year's Eve.
47:15 Pablo Torre? I hesitate to leave the ivory tower for the ReliaQuest Bowl.
47:21 Speaker 05 Don't do it. You don't, you don't want to be seen there.
47:24 Pablo Torre? No, no, God, no. And so the question becomes ahead of Christmas now. What do you want for Christmas, Paul Finebaum? What do you hope for your audience?
47:35 Speaker 05 I tell you what, I just thought of this, and I don't know, I think Legend is currently...
47:43 Speaker 05 Unattached. I can't do any better than Legend in my career, which is starting to creep toward... It's late autumn, okay?
47:57 Speaker 05 It's winter time.
47:59 Pablo Torre? The leaves are rustling, Paul. The leaves are still rustling.
48:02 Speaker 05 I just had this, I've never thought, I have this idea that Legend gets married again, I don't care if he gets married or not, has a child, and produces the next generation's Legend. Can you imagine 20 years from now, some guy sitting where I'm sitting, 25 years from now, 30 years from now, and going, "Legend Junior is next."
48:23 Pablo Torre? Paul, it's such a beautiful sentiment, and it may not surprise you to learn that when I asked Legend this same question, he said this.
48:35 Speaker 19 Man, I tell you the truth, man. What I wish would show up under the Christmas tree was a 40-year-old Nick Saban, ready to go back to work at the University of Alabama, baby. That's what I wish would show up under my Christmas tree. Yeah, say 40-year-old Nick Saban, ready to go kick some butt and lead this university and this program back to where it belongs, the mountaintop, the mountaintop. We're in the gutter this morning, DeBoer. No playoffs for us. Playoffs? Come on, man. Are you kidding me? Give me a 40-year-old Nick Saban, ready to go back to work. That would be the greatest Christmas ever.
49:21 Pablo Torre? So, Paul Finebaum, thank you for introducing me to your community, and happy holidays.
49:30 Speaker 05 Thank you. It's been a great pleasure, Pablo.
49:41 Pablo Torre? This has been Pablo Torre Finds Out, a Meadowlark Media production. And I'll talk to you next time.
50:08 Speaker 22 Mr. Monopoly here. Miss me? Monopoly is back at McDonald's with millions of prizes. A 2027 cheap charity, a Carnival Cruise vacation, gift cards from DoorDash and Best Buy. You'll then play in the McDonald's app. Get your bag.
50:26 Speaker 23 No purchase necessary. 50 US and DC, age 18 plus. See playatmd.com for rules and playatmd.com/amoe for info and playing without purchase by mail by November 2. Chances card game ends November 8. Game ends November 22, 2026. See rules for prize details. Monopoly is a registered trademark of Hasbro.
50:38 Speaker 02 At Humana, our Medicare Advantage plans are easy to understand and easy on your wallet. Like offering more benefits than you'd get from original Medicare alone and including dental, vision, and hearing coverage in every plan. And the best part is, every plan has a $0 or low monthly plan premium, which makes it easier to save, too. So this Medicare planning season, play well with Humana. Learn more at gethumana.com. Humana is a Medicare Advantage, HMO and PPO organization with a Medicare contract. Enrollment in any Humana plan depends on contract renewal.
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