#1161 Jon Finkel | The Author Documenting Your Sports Heroes

Jon Finkel is the author of a number of books across the sports industry, everyone from Charlie Ward, Nate Robinson, and more. He also writes a newsletter every week 'Books & Biceps'. In this conversation, we talk about greatest athletes, best sports moments, writing process, the rise of social media in sports, and much more. ======================= Announcing LYCEUM | Miami, a day-long event on March 4th in Miami Beach hosted by Pomp. We’re gathering an explosive group of experts to engage in a series of bold discussions, covering topics from investing, emerging tech, longevity, space exploration, entertainment and more. The speaker lineup includes names such as investing legend Cathie Wood, NYT bestselling author Vivek Ramaswamy, billionaire Christian Angermayer, master of Contrarian Thinking Codie Sanchez, Modern Wisdom host Chris Williamson plus many more. Listeners will receive an exclusive 40% discount on VIP and Insider Pass tickets with code POMP40. General Admission tickets are free of charge. Spots are limited so head to lyceummiami.com to buy your ticket today. ======================= Pomp writes a daily letter to over 200,000+ investors about business, technology, and finance. He breaks down complex topics into easy-to-understand language while sharing opinions on various aspects of each industry. You can subscribe at https://pomp.substack.com/ =======================

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:02Anthony Pompliano?

  What's up everyone? This is Anthony Pompliano. Many of you know me as Pomp. You're listening to the Pomp Podcast, which is my effort to find the most interesting people in the world and sit with them for hours while I ask questions in an effort to learn. We have no advertisers on this podcast, so it would mean the world to me if you would subscribe to the show on your favorite audio platform, watch episodes on YouTube, and tell your friends and family about the podcast. My goal is to help millions learn from the world's most interesting people. So let's get into today's episode. John Finkel is the author of a number of books across the sports vertical, everyone from Charlie Ward, Nate Robinson, and much more. He also writes a newsletter every single week, Books and Biceps, which I highly suggest that you go ahead and subscribe to. In this conversation, we talk about it all.

• 0:47Anthony Pompliano?

  Who are some of the greatest athletes? What are some of the best sports moments? What's his writing process? Where exactly was he when certain sports events occurred? And what does he think about today, given all of the rise of social media and the increased access for different types of athletes? I really enjoyed this conversation with John, and I hope you guys enjoy it as well. Once you get done listening, jump on Twitter and let us know what you liked, what you didn't like, what you agree with, and what you disagree with. The feedback is always helpful, helps us create better episodes. Okay, here's my conversation with John Finkel.

• 1:16Speaker 01

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• 2:40Speaker 04

  Anthony Pompliano runs Pomp Investments. All views of him and the guests on his podcast are solely their opinions and do not reflect the opinions of Pomp Investments. You should not treat any opinion expressed by Pomp or his guests as a specific inducement to make a particular investment or follow a particular strategy, but only as an expression of his personal opinion. This podcast is for informational purposes only.

• 3:03Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, guys. Bang, bang. I'm here with John. You wrote a book that ranks presidents based on their athleticism, which just the premise of that alone is absolutely absurd and awesome. Where did that idea come from? And who is the most athletic president in history? And who is the least athletic president in history?

• 3:20Speaker 05

  Awesome. Yes, a good place to start. So that book came from an article. I used to write for Muscle and Fitness Magazine for a long time. For seven or eight years, I did all their big cover stories. WWE guys, UFC guys, football players, anybody who was jacked enough to kind of fit that mold. And I hijacked an issue during 2012, and you'll love this. I wanted to do like athletic political issue, but not politics, basically like politicians, but no politicians, like just sports and athletes. So none of it happened, by the way. But I mocked it up with a couple of guys. It was called "The Big Cover Line," picture of big jacked dude, was red, white and huge.

• 3:59Speaker 05

  The taglines were like "Freedom of the Bench Press." And like instead of Medal of Honor, metal is M-E-T-T-L-E, like tough guy Medal of Honor, all this whole thing. I mocked it up. And the centerpiece of the whole thing was this article that I did ranking the athletic presidents. We basically did the article, me and a couple of my writers who were younger, like this is going to be so awesome. Like everyone's going to love it. It's going to be like a buzzy thing a little before Twitter, but like people are going to talk about it. Gets to New York, we were in LA, the, the, the big publishers look at it and are like, yeah, no, we're not putting red, white and huge. Like, we're not gonna talk about politics, even, even like tangentially about their muscle or stuff, like, we're out. So the only thing they kept was this top 10 piece and they cut it down like, like hurt my soul

• 4:41Speaker 05

  as a writer, anyway, right? Like, you just believe in this idea and there was no real automatic feedback. So I was gonna get like emails later and they cut everything out. The only thing I had left was the top 10 ranked and they gave me like 80 words to talk about, like why Abraham Lincoln was a street fighter and, you know, Gerald Ford actually played football, all that. So that comes out, people love it. They're writing handwritten emails. Like, this was really funny. It was great. I start to pitch a book idea and nobody, like, I don't have any idea. No one wants it. I'm pitching it to New York. I'm pitching it to LA. I pitched all the publishers. I had a loose like agent. This is 15 years ago. No one wants it. 2012, so 10 years ago. And I decide, do some research, I'm gonna put this fucking book out. My, I like, people talk about this stuff. I'm gonna put this, I already did like other books, but like, the technology had gotten to the point where you could, I first of all, I'm at a magazine,

• 5:26Speaker 05

  so I have people who can design the book. I have people who can edit the book. I have people who can lay the book out. I can write the thing, like, I just need a printer. And Ingram just came out with this thing called Ingram Spark at the time and Kindle had a, it was called like Kindle Direct Publishing or CreateSpace, I think then. And I was like, I'm gonna print like 50. And I'm like, it's not gonna cost me much. And if I sell 100 books, like, we'll see what happens. So I get into it. And it's like, man, there's a lot of presidents. They've, a lot of them have like done nothing but a lot, have done a ton in the, in the sports world. So then I realized, the only way this is legitimate is if I take myself out of it and I come up with like an objective ranking system. Like, if I like Mel Kiper the shit out of this, and I call it Jox and Chief. So I come up with like five categories, like what they did in athletics before they were president, what they did in athletics during,

• 6:10Speaker 05

  how strong were they overall as a person? How tough were they? And then what was their legacy athletically? And I came up with a one through 10 scale and I'm like interviewing, like researching Rutherford B. Hayes and calling like the Calvage Coles Library, like, did he really have these dumbbells and all this stuff? And so, yeah, so that was, that was how that book came out. And it was nuts.

• 6:28Anthony Pompliano?

  When people read it today, what is their take? Is it like, hey, you should just keep updating it with each new president?

• 6:34Speaker 05

  The beauty of it. So from a business standpoint, every four years I have a new book. I added, I added Trump when he came in. I have to wait. So the other day I have to judge. He was like in the twenties. See, people don't know as much as people can't stand him. Like, he was actually a very good high school athlete. He was looked at in baseball. He threw in like the high eighties, played on the football team. And then he had a weird thing like after, after all it was over, he has this ridiculous notion of like conserving energy. Like he doesn't, I found, it's in there. Like he, he doesn't exercise because he believes you only have so much energy in your life. So he looks obviously not like someone who exercises. So.

• 7:06Anthony Pompliano?

  That is an insane theory.

• 7:09Speaker 05

  It's a quote, there's a quote in the book where he's like, I, you know, I just, all the people I know who exercise are getting new hips. And I don't want that. You only have so many heartbeats and I don't want to waste it exercising. You look like him and you walk around like him and that's.

• 7:20Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 7:20Speaker 05

  That's what happens when you do that. But for a brief time, he's a decent athlete. No exercise in office, no focus on activity. So he was in the. He's a big like overweight kind of guy, not in the Taft sense or even the Clinton sense, but he was up there. Um, but the beauty of this story is, so I write the book. And I have enough people through the magazine world that I can get it out there. It gets picked up in the New York Post. New York Post friend of mine, Kirsten Fleming, I'll give her credit forever. It was like, this is a really cool idea. I want to interview about, how'd you come up with this? I tell the same version of this story. She reads it, gets picked up, bunch of places because in the post, I get a call like driving home to like get my kid to soccer. It's CBS This Morning. Somehow got my number from her. Can you fly here tomorrow to do a live show on CBS This Morning?

• 8:04Speaker 05

  And I'm like, yeah. So I call my wife. I'm like, hey, we gotta figure this out. Like, she's like, what are you doing? I'm like, I'm flying to New York, living in Texas at the time. I'm like, they're gonna put me like live to talk about this goofy book that, because it was in election season. I timed it right. I'm not an idiot. Like, it's gonna come out during the primaries and everything, or during the election. And so they fly me up and all of a sudden I'm sitting there, New York City, CBS, you know, Anthony Mason and like. The book cover is up there. The green room has a copy of it. Like, people are asking me to sign it. And I'm like, four months ago, like not a single publisher on earth. I got, I got forty rejection letters. No one's gonna read this. No one cares. It's a listicle. It's something in BuzzFeed.

• 8:39Anthony Pompliano?

  Yep.

• 8:39Speaker 05

  I sold like nine hundred books by the time I flew home. And so that was where the idea came from and that was sort of. The cool feel good story of like bet on yourself and every it still sells a couple hundred books here. I don't do much with it and every four years I put it out. So I have to wait till Biden's done because a portion of the rankings is on how they were fit in office like Reagan was notorious. Like he did circuit training. He did Nautilus stuff. He rode his horse like he was into it. Obama like always like exercising playing hoops like he had a nice gym that it's like probably the coolest White House gym they had all the way ranking down to other guys who didn't do anything. But so once, once Biden's out, I can add another one. But every four years, I'll just keep updating it and it'll just keep selling.

• 9:18Anthony Pompliano?

  With Biden, he rides his bicycle. I know he does that. Is that considered like strenuous activity or not?

• 9:24Speaker 05

  So I did. I put in the front like this is a book for like actual athletes. I'm not going to be like, oh, you know, Harry Truman walked two miles a day, 2.2 miles a day at a certain pace every day. Like, okay, but who cares? Like John Quincy Adams swam two miles in the Potomac in the winter nude. I give that a lot of credit. Like that was badass, right? Like

• 9:44Anthony Pompliano?

  He was cold plunging before it was cool.

• 9:46Speaker 05

  Yeah, and swimming. Like there's stories of him going like two miles, like going off course, like his staff, like can't find him, like they're running along the edge with his clothes, like you gotta come out, you gotta come out.

• 9:54Anthony Pompliano?

  Can you imagine today the New York Post being like the president is naked in the Potomac swimming?

• 9:59Speaker 05

  There's a great, one of my favorite quotes from the whole book. So Taft, big guy, like, he gets hit a lot, always like knocked out, the fattest president. But you know what? Like, he worked really hard. He was a wrestler in high school. He tried really hard to stay in shape. He hired fitness people. He just was a big dude. As he got older, it was really hard to keep the weight off. So he also was a big like swimmer type because it was easy on his joints. So he goes to the ocean. I think he was in like Cape Cod or something on like a president's retreat and he starts waiting out the big guy who got stuck in the bathtub. And then he's about to go in, a bunch of his staff are going to go in, they go, wait, president's using the ocean. Only one man has no room for anybody else.

• 10:35Anthony Pompliano?

  That is absurd.

• 10:37Speaker 05

  It's like the best staff joke ever about a president.

• 10:41Anthony Pompliano?

  All right. So you wrote another book. You've written a lot of books, but there's a couple I want to specifically talk about. 1996 is the best sports year of all time.

• 10:47Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 10:48Anthony Pompliano?

  Why?

• 10:49Speaker 05

  All right. So I wanted to write that book since I was a kid. It's 96 is the year I graduated high school. And my kids are now nine and 11. My son is really into sports. My daughter, not so much, but like, everything we talk about now, if you think about it, like the whole world changed in 96, the whole sport world changed in 96. So I originally had the idea called like decade of icons. I was going to focus it on all the nineties. And then my agent and I were kicking it around and he was like, you know, these yearbooks of like the year. And I was like, yeah, let's do, I'm going to do a biography of a sports year, not that it's like never been done. And no one's really tackled it that way. It's always like a year in review or a look back, but I was like, I'm going to do a biography as if the year was a person. So if you think about it, just from a, from a sports perspective, and actually I think I talked to your brother Joe about it, like on an email chain once, like so before in 1995, I'm in high school.

• 11:34Speaker 05

  Nobody cares about Tiger Woods. He's just an amateur person, the few people outside of golf I've ever heard of. Allen Iverson is in high school. I mean, I was in college Georgetown. He has a large madness, but like that's the first time he shows up. He's not a household name, nothing. Kobe's nobody, the high school kid that's supposed to be good at basketball. Outside of people who follow it, no one cares, right?

• 11:51Anthony Pompliano?

  U circuit or whatever.

• 11:52Speaker 05

  Shaq's on Orlando. So there was no Kobe and Shaq right there. Okay. You've got no The Rock, no Stone Cold. Both of them were screwing around, just hadn't gone on to sports yet. No major league soccer, no WNBA. You've got, Mike Tyson's still in jail, hasn't come back yet. So like, when you look back at now, everybody, you can't talk about sports. Every athlete now, and I've interviewed, done it, books of them, they look back. Who are your icons? Kobe, Iverson, Tiger, Shaq, the Kobe Lakers, like MLS now soccer matters, you know, WNBA is now huge. People actually follow it. Before in 1995, none of these conversations happened.

• 12:27Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 12:27Speaker 05

  They didn't even matter. So if you look at like, it's like a line of demarcation, like before 96, none of that happened. And then after, and then the second part of it is if you look at the people who were huge in 96, right? So you've got the Cowboys win their third Super Bowl. Like look at that team, right? Like Michael Irvin's still on TV, Deion as big, popular wise, probably as ever, Aikman, the number one announcer. These guys have been on TV on Sundays for like 25, 26 years, right? Commercials now, now he's doing Geico with Nick Saban. He was doing like Domino's with David Robinson. Like, these guys have not left. They haven't left the scene. Tiger is as influential as ever. And so if you look back, like there's this line. Everything I talked about in high school was cool, but from then on, it's all these new people

• 13:10Speaker 05

  who came into existence in the sports kind of universe in 1996.

• 13:13Anthony Pompliano?

  I remember Allen Iverson. He was like literally my, one of my childhood like heroes in sports, right? And I remember as he was becoming more popular in the NBA, I was in middle school around like the late 90s and we convinced our coach who had zero power, I'm pretty sure he was a volunteer, to mandate, which really meant we were mandated, that all of the team got the first Allen Iverson shoes. I think they were the answers that they had a little zip up. I think those came out before the questions. The questions came out later, if I remember correctly. And so remember, there's like 12 to 15 white kids in a random, you know, middle school in the middle of North Carolina,

• 13:58Anthony Pompliano?

  which is huge basketball, like all stuff. And we all get these Allen Iverson shoes. And I remember parents being like, who's Allen Iverson? Right? Cause I mean, he was like really just starting to become popular. And then they go and they look and they're like, I don't know if we're into like the whole team wearing the Allen Iverson, right? And he had the armband, like he was starting to put it all together. And then I remember as our parents fought it, we became more obsessed. He got on the cover of Slam Magazine and like, as soon as all that hit, it was like, Allen Iverson cannot be fucked with. And then of course, practice? And then it exploded. And our parents were like, what is going on? Who is this guy? Why are our kids always trying to watch sports that

• 14:40Anthony Pompliano?

  are every single night to see who we crossed up? Like it just snowballed into this huge thing. And it's like, yeah, you don't remember, like I definitely don't remember really before that. Like that is like a seminal moment for me of his like big explosion onto the scene and he changed how basketball really got played.

• 14:54Speaker 05

  Yeah, because we were, so I'm a little older than you and it was like Bird Magic, like, you know, all those guys, Michael, like when you're watching the 92 Olympic dream team was like the biggest thing ever. And like you're moving on, those guys are all retiring. Then obviously Jordan won 97, 98, like still big, but from an influential standpoint, like those guys were clearly at some point moving on. And then you have Like Iverson and the beauty of Iverson is like he came almost out of nowhere. He was your size. I mean, I covered him a bunch when I went for hoops high since some other places like. He was six foot. He was 160 pounds and he was in this land of giants. It had just this fight in him. And you didn't have to be from anywhere to just watch him and be like, this guy is different and he's awesome.

• 15:36Speaker 05

  And then some of the stories like that I that I had uncovered for 96 are incredible because so he was a Nike guy. Nike high school, John Thompson's Georgetown's Nike, Thompson is on the board of Nike. Everybody is like, he's going Nike. Reebok is like, you go to Nike. Jordan signs Iverson. You go to Nike. It's like, oh, you know, maybe the penny, maybe Penny will give a little, they'll push to Iverson in the little penny commercials. Iverson's like, no fucking way. I want my shoe. He goes there and they come up with this huge campaign. I can't remember the name of the two guys, but they were watching Mark Madness and they're like, we need him. We're basically going to say to our guys, uh, we're going to put our entire marketing budget on this guy. Basically what Nike did with Jordan way back when and and we're going to give, we want him to be him.

• 16:20Speaker 05

  We don't want to polish him into Nike or into Reebok. We want to make Reebok what he wants. And Iverson was like, that, that's who I am.

• 16:26Anthony Pompliano?

  Get behind that.

• 16:27Speaker 05

  Get behind that. He comes out and he's got, he's in, you know, inputting, designing the shoes. They let him be who he wanted to be. And it was like the most brilliant sneaker decision you could ever make from a company perspective.

• 16:36Anthony Pompliano?

  I um, I always say that the questions still to this day, I think are the best shoes ever made.

• 16:40Speaker 05

  Yeah. 96 was cool because you still had Jordans.

• 16:42Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 16:42Speaker 05

  His shoe comes out, Shaq had the hypnosis, like which, which it looked like, you know, it was weird. And then the pennies were cool and Pippen had his own shoe and like some of these shoes that came out then were great, but, but there was no, there was no answer to the Jordan. It was like to Jordans in general. There was nothing as cool. There were shoes that were like, definitely like Penny, Shaq, whatever. But there was no athlete who you were like, I'm going to rep these shoes because I think he can stand up and be as cool as Jordan. And that's what, that's what Iverson meant. So from 96, it's like, how do you even talk about basketball in 2023? Without Kobe and Iverson, because every athlete you talk about LeBron, pick them, Kevin Durant, their favorite athlete was either Kobe or.

• 17:21Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah. The other big moment I remember, uh, where an athlete kind of broke through. With a bunch of my friends was Carmelo Anthony in March Madness when he and Syracuse went on the huge run. And everyone was just like, dude, who is this guy? And it was the same type of ingredients though, right? It was like, it was a kid who just like, obviously size wise, he was different, but it just like, this kid is not gonna quit. And he's just tough as shit.

• 17:42Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 17:43Anthony Pompliano?

  And I think that there was something about that entire like, kind of mid nineties to like, early two thousands. Where kids who that were like, maybe college down to like, middle school. And if you were into basketball, you were just like, things are changing.

• 17:55Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 17:55Anthony Pompliano?

  And these guys are like, the leaders of this new wave.

• 17:58Speaker 05

  Yeah, you had, you know, there was, it was almost like they had that passing the torch. It skipped over, because it's really not Jordan to Kobe and all these guys. Like, there was an error in the middle of like, Marbury.

• 18:07Anthony Pompliano?

  Yes.

• 18:07Speaker 05

  Garnett, Chris Webber, and some of these guys that were, they were awesome. But they didn't, you know, McGrady, like, they didn't capture your imagination. Vince did. Vince did because of the dunks and that was sick. But like, he never had the, you know, the playoff stuff. He never made a finals. He kind of never pushed over there, over that hump of being like, the cultural icon.

• 18:26Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 18:27Speaker 05

  But it was Iverson and it was Kobe. And it's an unbelievable thing to think about, like, in your city in high school. It's like, that conversation of who's, who's Allen who? Like, he plays for where? Georgetown? He played football somewhere in high school? Like, Kobe, like, who the, you know, the Hornets want him or the Lakers are gonna get him? Like, okay, what a bust. Another high school guy nobody cares about. And now it's changed completely forever.

• 18:46Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, so LeBron played football in high school. I think he broke his finger or something, so he stopped playing. But his team either won the state championship, like, they're like, good.

• 18:54Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 18:54Anthony Pompliano?

  And obviously, if you've got a 6'8" dude running down the sideline, it's pretty hard not to be good. Allen Iverson was a quarterback in Virginia. He claims he was better at football than he was at basketball.

• 19:04Speaker 05

  I have a great story.

• 19:04Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay, go ahead.

• 19:05Speaker 05

  He gets to Georgetown. He gets in a lot of, I'm sure people listen, he got in some trouble. Got in a fight at a bowling alley.

• 19:10Anthony Pompliano?

  And there was like, legit violence, not shooting, but like.

• 19:13Speaker 05

  Real fight, real fight.

• 19:14Anthony Pompliano?

  They were throwing chairs.

• 19:15Speaker 05

  Unfortunately, like, you know, back then, the South, like, only the white kids got in trouble. All the black kids got arrested, especially Iverson, like, ruining his future. At the time, and it's cool how some of my books intersect, like, I did a biography on Charlie Ward. They were looking at him as the next Charlie Ward. Because he was an incredible quarterback, great arm, elusive, all the same stuff Charlie could do. And it was a couple of years after Charlie had just. Won the Heisman and also taken his basketball team to the Elite Eight. So they're like, can build a college offense around him. Florida State looked at him, a bunch of schools looked at him. Gets in trouble, no one's looking at him. In like the greatest mom move of all time, Iverson's mom drives up to Georgetown, talks to John Thompson and is like, help my son. Like I, he, he has, he cannot, this can't ruin his life.

• 19:56Speaker 05

  Thompson takes him, brings him up, like you will listen to every goddamn word I say, and I will, I will bet on you and you will just listen to me. Iverson says, great. So the first year, unbelievable. Second year Iverson's like, he's becoming who he is, a little bit of a star. Sides to roll into Big John's office and test his weight and says, I want to play football. He says, get your ass out of here.

• 20:18Speaker 05

  I brought you here to play basketball. And it's a great story and it's true. And so Iverson was that good. He was being looked at for, for both sports.

• 20:27Anthony Pompliano?

  When I think of his story, and then you compare him to Charlie Ward, I don't actually think most people would think of those two as the comparison, because then it was the comparison. Now I think it's Deion and Charlie Ward, who's more athletic?

• 20:43Speaker 05

  So this is, I get, when the book came out, this was like the number of question. Like, it's like, all right, Bo Jackson, Deion Sanders and Charlie are the only ones to have. So this is what, this is my, this is my answer. And I think this is the way I've, I've thought about it, I promise you like way more than anybody else. All right. So Bo Jackson, if you've read Jeff Pearlman's books, it's incredible. It just came out like, he was born a physical freak and he used that to be like a mythological character in football and baseball and track, actually also. He was unstoppable. He could jump over five foot fences, five hundred foot home runs. Like there's stories in there and the research he did is incredible. Like he was an unstoppable force. He could get out and run anybody. He was a singular talent. He handed him the ball, he ran, put him at bat, he hit. Deion, same thing, like fastest could be returning punts. The team didn't rely on him.

• 21:27Speaker 05

  The quarterback got him the ball, you know, in, in football, in baseball pitcher pitching the ball. Charlie, Charlie was the quarterback and point guard. He wasn't just some guy who was getting by on speed, although he had world-class speed. And he wasn't just some guy getting by on like athletic ability, although you know, his father was an exceptional high school athlete. He clearly had the genes for it, but he was a brilliant. Athletic mind and he had to run the offense. Every play went through him, shift gears after football and then go play basketball and take that team to the lead eight. And he plays a start, you know, starting finals like NBA point guard. So to me, the best team athlete, the best leader is Charlie Ward. Obviously Bo is probably like in a, in a, in a decathlon, Deon and Bo might be better.

• 22:05Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 22:06Speaker 05

  If you're asking me, I think Charlie's the most impressive.

• 22:09Anthony Pompliano?

  What about somebody like a Myron, uh, Myron Roll? So Myron Roll, uh, for those that don't know, I think he played at Florida State. I don't think they won, uh, they won bowl games. I don't think they won a national championship. Right? And then he got a Rhodes Scholarship.

• 22:22Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 22:22Anthony Pompliano?

  And if I remember correctly, there was like some controversy because it was like, is he going to go take the scholarship and go, uh, and, and do that? Or is he going to go to the NFL? And he chose to go do the scholarship, uh, and he wanted to become a doctor. And I think that he's actually become. Yeah, I think he's become a neurosurgeon. And so like, when you look at somebody like that, that's not two sports, but like, that may be harder than playing football and basketball. Is being on Florida State's football team, winning bowl games and also like becoming a neurosurgeon?

• 22:48Speaker 05

  Yeah, the classwork is crazy. And, and one of the themes of all these guys that, that I end up talking to is like, at some point, the, the work needs to be done. The film room has to get done, like, especially if you're a quarterback, especially if you're a point guard. Even in high school, uh, some of these guys who are playing all these sports are shifting back and forth constantly and school, right? And so the mental agility, I think, and that's again, why I put Charlie a little, a little head in terms of just an overall picture of like, running an offense on both of those. Yeah, like he jumps into college basketball at like January. And like, he's playing against guys who all they do are, are, you know, five star recruits, McDonald's All Americans from North Carolina. You know, NC State, like the best schools in the country, Duke. And he just came off winning the Heisman National Championship.

• 23:30Speaker 05

  And within a month, they are a well-oiled machine. Okay. He had a Sam Cassell on his team. He had some players, so it wasn't like he had no one there. But, uh, but he's a point guard, immediately comes in and like picks up the stride, elite eight. So it's like, when I think about being able to do that, and then the same thing, the flip side, he, while everybody's doing spring football and spring practices, he's in the March Madness. And then he's like shifting gears back into like running the offense for Bobby Bowden. So to me, I, I put that just as like a little bit of, I don't know how you want to. Measure it, but I put that as just a little notch above.

• 23:57Anthony Pompliano?

  So in high school, I played football, basketball and baseball. And I had obviously friends who just played football, friends who just played basketball.

• 24:04Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 24:04Anthony Pompliano?

  Uh, in college, I played football, uh, and we at one point played unofficially. Some of the basketball players in basketball.

• 24:13Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 24:13Anthony Pompliano?

  Uh, didn't go so hot for them. It just, you know, there's a physicality that they just weren't used to.

• 24:18Speaker 05

  Especially in the middle of football season.

• 24:19Anthony Pompliano?

  Yes. Um, but one of the debates all throughout high school and into college that we'd have over and over again. Is it easier for a football player to go play in the NBA? Or is it easier for an NBA player to go play in the NFL? Which one do you think?

• 24:32Speaker 05

  So I would say that, um, from a sheer like physical standpoint. The NBA, the guys don't stop moving. Like if you watch, I've, I've done the articles on like training for the combine and all the stuff. The physicality NFL is unmatched, but like you do your 20 second, 10 second route. Or you're running back, you're thing, you may be off the field, maybe not, you may be back on, you're maybe not. You don't have that in, in the NBA and a lot of the guys pick probably which one they're going to be absolutely best at. But from a conditioning standpoint in game, uh, I think it might be harder for some of the, especially like tight end. Maybe by position, it's probably a better way to do it, but I think overall.

• 25:05Anthony Pompliano?

  This is part of the debate, right? It's okay. The NBA player, like what are they going to do? They can't be the quarterback.

• 25:09Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 25:09Anthony Pompliano?

  Most of them are like, I'll be a receiver or tight end.

• 25:11Speaker 05

  And that's it.

• 25:12Anthony Pompliano?

  Like that's pretty much the only two options on offense. Uh, and then on defense, they're like, oh, you know, maybe, uh, I'd be like a, a D end or something.

• 25:20Speaker 05

  I have a comp.

• 25:20Anthony Pompliano?

  All right.

• 25:20Speaker 05

  I covered the summer league in 2001 or two, when there was a, um, they were doing like, uh, there was an NFL strike.

• 25:27Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 25:28Speaker 05

  Tony Gonzalez, who played basketball at Cal.

• 25:30Anthony Pompliano?

  Cal with, uh, Jason Kidd, right?

• 25:32Speaker 05

  Yeah, man with Jason Kidd. And then, and then he goes into the, you know, obviously NFL, he's really good. I watched him in the summer, he played for the Heat. If he was, he was saying if the NFL wasn't going to come back, he was going to play for the Heat. If you look at him on a football field, he's like this unstoppable dominant jacked force. He's just a dude on the basketball court. He's five inches shorter than Amari Stoudemire, who's there. The other power forwards, Coran Butler looks like, he looks like he's his big brother. Hey, how you doing? Like Tony, like that's a big deal. These NFL guys, especially the running back, they can't play, they're too small.

• 26:03Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 26:03Speaker 05

  Some of them, uh, but I would say like from a direct comp, having watched him again, he was only, he was coming off the NFL, the NBA. If he's a lead athlete. I mean, he was a bench player like trying to make it in the so I'm not knocking him like obviously Hall of Famer football and amazing that he could do all that but if we're looking for maybe an apples to apples comp like size wise and speed wise he wasn't with those guys and that might be might be the difference.

• 26:25Anthony Pompliano?

  You wrote a book about Nate Robinson, speaking of size, and I think it's called Heart Over Height.

• 26:30Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 26:31Anthony Pompliano?

  If I remember correctly.

• 26:31Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 26:33Anthony Pompliano?

  Is his legacy ruined after Jake Paul knocked him out?

• 26:36Speaker 05

  It sucks because he's one of my favorite athletes ever.

• 26:40Anthony Pompliano?

  He's the man in terms of the basketball.

• 26:42Speaker 05

  If you leave, if you leave, I blame, I've texted him about like, I blame his trainers. Nate, at that point still, is one of the fastest, he should have not got hit for five rounds. And that's all, I don't know what their plan was, but if I were by, I've covered a ton of boxing, I interview boxers, I like boxing, you like MMA boxing, like, nobody can touch him speedwise. He should have just spun around and worn him out, maybe, you know, just lasted. The last thing I think he probably would have wanted to do is what happened and just get stone cold knocked out in front of millions and millions of people. But it hurts as someone who's a friend of his now because this kind of happens when you do these books with these guys, you just get invested in their lives, you start to know them and their wives and their kids and like you root for them.

• 27:24Speaker 05

  Again, when I do, when you do like a co-author thing, you're kind of putting your journalism hat away. So if I did like a biography on it, it'd be a little different because you're really coming at it from all angles, but Nate was the first guy to give me like a shot to like co-write a book with him. So I'll always be grateful to him for that. And he's awesome. We've had fun. But for, for anyone listening who doesn't kind of know in a 30 second story, like Nate Robinson, Seattle, Rainier Beach, comes up, he's 5'7", 5'8", even as like a sophomore, he's a phenom in football and basketball. And then at 5'8", he is the Mr. Basketball and Mr. Football in the state of Washington. Now, just, he's 5'8" and if high school, he was probably 5'7" ish and a legit, I mean, I stood next to him, I tower over the guy. He could have played track, like ran track, he got recruited for Steve Carroll's USC team, Reggie Bush, Lendale White, like did his visit.

• 28:09Speaker 05

  He could have gone to Arizona, could have gone to Michigan, got looked at everywhere for football, got looked at at a ton of places for basketball.

• 28:15Anthony Pompliano?

  What positions did he play?

• 28:16Speaker 05

  He played point guard and he was a corner.

• 28:18Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 28:18Speaker 05

  He was a ridiculous punter. Like if you have time. Youtube like Nate Robinson, high school highlights like just every punt was like touchdown, touchdown, touchdown, kick touchdown, like picked everybody off and he decided he wanted to stay home, Washington, he's like a big like loves his hometown, like so he goes stays home in Washington, freshman year, plays both sports, has like a huge interception in the Washington, Washington State game. Everybody's like you, you're going pro, like you're gonna go to the NFL and he's like, I just, I want to play basketball. And they're like, you're nuts, like you're, you're five, eight and he's like, this is what I want to do. So after his sophomore year, he quits folks on basketball, first round draft pick, you know, averages 16, 17, 18 points for the Knicks, three dunk contests, only got to win three dunk contests. So like, to me, that is his legacy, like an unbelievable, phenomenal, one of the best athletes we've had.

• 29:02Speaker 05

  And it sucks that like a generation of people are like Nate, the guy who got punched in the face and.

• 29:06Anthony Pompliano?

  By the YouTuber. So I, I have a controversy about the dunk contest.

• 29:10Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 29:10Anthony Pompliano?

  I don't think that they should have various heights participate. Cause it doesn't look the same when a guy who's 610 does a windmill and then Nate Robinson does a windmill. You're like, dude, that guy jumped higher. You're like, no, he just had to go higher to get to the same rim.

• 29:24Speaker 05

  I know. I mean, that's like.

• 29:26Anthony Pompliano?

  They have an advantage. If, if they can dunk, if you're shorter, it just looks way cooler than a guy who kind of doesn't even look like he's trying.

• 29:32Speaker 05

  It does. Remember Dwight tried the 12 foot one and it just still didn't look cool. It was like, you're so big and, and it's not moving. And yeah, it is, it is interesting. Cause like, you know, Spud Webb won against Dominique. And like, if you watch those old 85, 86 dunk contests, Dominique was like an artist. I mean, the, the moves he did, the movement of the ball, if you slow it down, like a full 360, like eight foot radius dunk. But then Spud would do like a, a, a 360 and you're like, whoa, like that dude's like four feet off the ground. What the hell?

• 30:00Anthony Pompliano?

  He's like hanging up there.

• 30:01Speaker 05

  Yeah. So Nate was a power dunker too, which was cool, like in game, in traffic dunker, which was great. But I hear your point, like it always looks more pleasing. Uh, you know, he, he dunked over Dwight Howard, which is really cool. And he was like really creative. He had the, the green crypto Nate shoes to go over Dwight Howard in his Superman costume. And Dwight was a pretty good sport. I don't know if the nineties athletes would have been like, yeah, yeah, we're competing. Sure. Dunk over me. That'll be great.

• 30:25Anthony Pompliano?

  I do think that there's a little bit of, of change there.

• 30:27Speaker 05

  Yeah. I don't think the guys had much camaraderie there, camaraderie there, but you know. LeBron never done a dunk contest.

• 30:32Anthony Pompliano?

  He's scared.

• 30:33Speaker 05

  He's a punk. I don't know.

• 30:34Anthony Pompliano?

  Oh, you don't like LeBron?

• 30:34Speaker 05

  No, I like LeBron. I think he should have done a dunk. I think it's like, if you look at the legacy of the guys he is, who he, who he's in line with, you know, Jordan did it one, amazing. Kobe did it once, even though he wore his little warm up and won, like, you do it once. I, I think LeBron's, you know, there's undisputed, whatever, third, fourth, he's not, I don't think he's better than Jordan, whatever, who cares about that argument, but he's in the top, whatever, two, three of all time. But he should have done it once. The fact that he never did it, it's like, yeah.

• 30:55Anthony Pompliano?

  If he had done it as a rookie?

• 30:56Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 30:57Anthony Pompliano?

  I, no one would have beat him.

• 30:59Speaker 05

  No, no, he would have won. They make you, they make sure, they would have made sure he won. And he had the ability. I mean, the dude could jump, he could touch the top of the backboard, like, he should have just done it, that's all. I'm not, I'm saying he's a punk only because like, I don't know who got in his ear of like, you're too cool for this, especially at like 19.

• 31:12Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 31:12Speaker 05

  But he should have done it once and won it and then like, I did it once.

• 31:14Anthony Pompliano?

  Is it a too cool thing or was he scared of like, if you go up there and you embarrass yourself because you're trying too hard?

• 31:20Speaker 05

  I can't imagine him being scared. He's the ultimate like physical specimen, like his first game when he did that dunk, I think it was against Sacramento or whatever, like, he had been owning dudes his age since he was like 12. Like, I can't imagine fear would have come in. I, I think somebody was like, hey, you know, if you don't win, he would have won. And I think he had all the dunks to win. I, I don't know. It's one of those things where.

• 31:39Anthony Pompliano?

  When he was in high school?

• 31:40Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 31:41Anthony Pompliano?

  It, like, I don't remember, I was probably too young when Kobe was in his senior year, like some of the, I, I watch the videos now, but LeBron in high school was just like, not fair.

• 31:52Speaker 05

  No.

• 31:53Anthony Pompliano?

  Like, just literally watching him and they, and they'd be like on national television, you'd be like, oh, there's like a game, right? And you could watch it and you're like, dude, they got a 5A white kid guarding LeBron and LeBron literally is toying with this kid.

• 32:03Speaker 05

  Catholic prep school.

• 32:04Anthony Pompliano?

  Literally.

• 32:05Speaker 05

  Just rotated in.

• 32:06Anthony Pompliano?

  And this guy is like trying, right? Cause he's like, hey, I'm on, I'm on TV. I can't let LeBron dunk on me. And then there you go. Just literally dunks on the whole team at once.

• 32:13Speaker 05

  And they were cool because like, I mean, no one's going to build like a uniform and a look for a team around me or you. But it was like, do you like these green jerseys, LeBron? Oh, we can get different. Oh, you like them big and baggy now with no sleeves? We'll do that. Like, he had the cool shoes, the chosen one cover. Like, if you think, the most amazing thing to me about LeBron is all the height. Everything. Now, me or you, I would have been the biggest asshole. I probably would have done 50 things in my twenties that I'd be embarrassed about now, or like been written off.

• 32:39Anthony Pompliano?

  We probably did do those.

• 32:40Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah. The fact that like, he has all of that. And like, good dad, good, you know what I mean? Like, good husband, like, smart in business, gives back to the community, no real, like, trouble, no fights. Like, it's pretty incredible, like, that from a, from a character perspective, that he never went off the rails. I was like, I'm a 25-year-old millionaire, everybody loves me. Like, it never happened.

• 33:01Anthony Pompliano?

  The two biggest, I've always said this, right? It's like, he's, he's probably the one person with the most hype that lived up to it. And I would argue, he probably surpassed it, even though he had the chosen one and all the stuff. But if you think of other people who were like, similar vein, Sebastian Telfair, remember when he was coming out, and like, and everyone was like, this is the next point guard?

• 33:20Speaker 05

  I'm a Celtics fan, like, we had him, I was like, we're gonna get the coolest, like, and it just doesn't happen.

• 33:24Anthony Pompliano?

  Didn't happen, yeah. And then, in football, there was a kid, Tavon Austin, you ever hear this kid?

• 33:30Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 33:31Anthony Pompliano?

  So, him, and there was a kid in Florida, I forget his name, but Noel Devine, I think was his name.

• 33:37Speaker 05

  Yeah, I don't know.

• 33:38Anthony Pompliano?

  And so, both of these guys had highlight tapes that went like, these are like, the first viral, like, high school football highlight tapes. And if the kid's name is Noel Devine that I'm thinking of, it's like, the state of Florida didn't know how to tackle. Like, literally, he would like, run into a pile, it'd be like, 15 defenders, right? And you're like, there's only 11 on the field. Like, no, I think it was 15. And he comes, he just pops out the other end. And so, just, I remember being in, like, high school and college, being like, what the fuck is this kid doing?

• 34:05Speaker 05

  It's nuts.

• 34:05Anthony Pompliano?

  And then, Austin, his highlight tape, the first five minutes, is him literally dancing on the field of music.

• 34:11Speaker 05

  It's awesome.

• 34:12Anthony Pompliano?

  Like, you're just like, you have to be good. Right? Like, if you put on your highlight tape, just you warming up, dancing to music, you have to go to a top D1 school, because if any coach watched all of that, like, they're like, okay, I gotta have the kid, right? And they all fizzle out, they don't make it.

• 34:30Speaker 05

  It's hard. I mean, it's really hard, especially when, I mean, now it's even harder. But I mean, you're putting LeBron on the cover of Sports Illustrated, you've got like, you've got cautionary tales of guys who, you know, that happens to, and you never hear from them again. I mean Kwame Brown, you never hear from him again. Like even if they're not that level of hype. Um, and just it's what it's his 20 20th year. Like it's insane that he's still where he is and he's gonna end up being the greatest. I mean, the guys he's compared to didn't come out like that. They were high draft picks or whatever, but they weren't the anointed as like the greatest basketball player of all time or whatever it was in their sport. And then like, when you watch them dominate other sports, the greatest what if I ever see is, um, so in, uh, in a high school, West Virginia, Randy Moss was like a basketball player, like a point four point guard. I mean, sorry, a power forward and J will was his point guard.

• 35:14Speaker 05

  And then in football, Jason Williams was the quarterback and he was the wide receiver. Like, if you could have somehow let both of them do both, like obviously we've been a basketball, football, whichever one, like they play different sports, but like, can you imagine if they like somehow like you two are like, can you have five years to both go play football on the same team in the NFL or college or like or college? And then you can both actually go play basketball together. Randy Moss was an unbelievable basketball player, greatest receiver of all time, arguably. But like, I would love, I love those stories of like the, the what ifs of who could have been and what could have happened if they just stuck with a different sport.

• 35:44Anthony Pompliano?

  Randy Moss literally was so good that mossed became like a verse, like, like literally became a verb. Like you are very good. And then also I remember, uh, there was a, a song that came out when I was in college. Uh, some DJ had like remixed it and, uh, they took, remember his interview where he was getting in his, uh, car and he was like straight cash homie.

• 36:04Speaker 05

  Oh, yeah.

• 36:04Anthony Pompliano?

  Right. And they, and they remixed the whole thing and they would just play it. And he, and he literally, you're just like, this guy is amazing at, uh, at football. Um, but it's, uh, it's cool to hear how good he was at basketball as well. Hey guys, what's going on? I hope that you're enjoying this conversation, but I wanted to interrupt for a quick second and tell you about a brand new conference that I'm hosting on March 4th at the Miami Beach Convention Center. The event is called Lyceum Miami and tickets are completely free for anyone who wants to come. I'm bringing together many of the most popular guests from the podcast over the last couple of years. Some of the guest speakers that we've already announced are people like Vivek Ramaswamy from Strive Asset Management,

• 36:44Anthony Pompliano?

  or Delian and Mike Solana from Founder's Fund, Chris Williamson from the Modern Wisdom Podcast, Cody San- From Contrarian Thinking and billionaire Christian Augermeier, among many others. I've got a number of amazing surprise guests as well. Some that you definitely will not expect and others that come from walks of life that you will be scratching your head as to how I even got them to show up. But come check out Lyceum Miami on March 4th. The Lyceum was a public gym in Athens, Greece, where people used to come together, talk about ideas and debate topics that were important to society. I want to meet people in person, in real life.

• 37:26Anthony Pompliano?

  Once again, after three years of a hiatus from real life events. And so I'm hosting the event and as I mentioned, anyone from anywhere can come to this event completely for free. All you need to do is go to lyceummiami.com and you'll be able to pick up a free general admission ticket. Make sure you claim your ticket in order to get in through the doors. Lyceum Miami is going to be a great time. So come check it out. Come hang out with me, many of the popular guests from the podcast and other like-minded individuals. Lyceum Miami, March 4th, Miami Beach Convention Center. I hope to see you there. All right, let's get back into this conversation.

• 38:06Speaker 05

  Yeah, I love those stories like when I, when I ever do books on a lot of these guys, I always look for that other, what was that other thing? You know, Vince Carter. Vince Carter was an all-American and it could have been an all-American volleyball player. He was all-state. He was, I mean, if you think about it.

• 38:21Anthony Pompliano?

  Volleyball player? Can you imagine that guy?

• 38:23Speaker 05

  You're just some dude who only plays volleyball with your nice little like 24-inch vertical and your, you know, you're 6'2" jumping up. And Vince Carter, mid-sanity, future like ridiculous dunker over everybody, jumps like 42 inches and puts the ball in your face, right? And they're like, he's going to go to the Olympics, like he could be the future of American volleyball. And he's like, yeah, I'm not doing that.

• 38:45Anthony Pompliano?

  He's like, I'm gonna go and play basketball.

• 38:47Speaker 05

  But I'll play volleyball in the spring because we have a volleyball team. And like, who knows? He's never going to do it. He goes on the beach, like Chase Budinger, who was in the dunk contest, went and played. I used to see him when I lived in LA, like he played on the AVP tour, like it translated over for him. He was really good, but like those little glimpses of like, what if Vince was like, I just want to be the greatest volleyball player that has ever played volleyball. I want to be known as the baby with the volleyball, the Michael Jordan volleyball. That is going to be what I'm going to do. It'd be crazy.

• 39:13Anthony Pompliano?

  But like would anyone know who he is?

• 39:14Speaker 05

  Nah, that's why I didn't do it. Like UNC or volleyball like?

• 39:18Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, I don't, uh, I'm not even gonna apologize for this, but I don't think I could actually name a single volleyball player.

• 39:24Speaker 05

  Well, I, I lived out there, so I was into it. Karth Karai is like the guy. Um, Dahlhauser and Rogers. And then honestly, the most famous is Misty May, you know, Kerry Walsh, or that probably if you asked anybody just volleyball.

• 39:34Anthony Pompliano?

  But do they still play? No, right? Or yeah, maybe?

• 39:36Speaker 05

  Kerry Walsh might, I don't know if he's retired yet, but they played, I mean, for, funny, one of the coolest, uh, in-person events I've ever seen. It's very small packed house on the beach in Hermosa Beach, the CB, the, uh, the, the volleyball AVP would allow anybody to go. They couldn't, California, you're not allowed to, at least if you couldn't charge tickets on sand because it was public property. So they would build the stadium and you'd have to just, anybody could show up, walk on. And Kerry Walsh and Misty May were about to beat the, the record, I don't remember who it was, for the most wins by a doubles team. And it was the place like this, these are diehard, like 1200, that's it, like diehard in the wool volleyball fan, beat volleyball fans who grew up watching these guys. And it was nuts. And I remember thinking like, man, if you just get to the thing that you are supposed to be doing.

• 40:19Speaker 05

  And the fans didn't get acknowledged, like obviously they got the Olympics and all that. But it was one of like the coolest just moments to see for them. It was like, you know, like Cal Ripken breaking Lou Gehrig's record. It was huge. And for that crowd, it was amazing.

• 40:30Anthony Pompliano?

  Did, uh, Ripken, they pulled the lights?

• 40:34Speaker 05

  What's that?

• 40:34Anthony Pompliano?

  Did they pull the lights? You ever heard this story?

• 40:36Speaker 05

  No.

• 40:37Anthony Pompliano?

  So I, I'm pretty sure, uh, no, I'm sorry. Is it Cal Ripken or Lou Gehrig? And maybe there's a story about both of them, but, uh, one of them, I thought it was Cal Ripken. Uh, he was, uh, on his way to the stadium or something, something happened and he was gonna miss a game. And supposedly, uh, the lights on the stadium didn't work same day.

• 40:55Speaker 05

  Uh, interesting. Yeah, I heard there was a few of those with him, couple of one at bat type deals and, uh, and things like that. To me, that record, I was in, in like, you know, that was probably when I still really followed baseball.

• 41:06Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 41:07Speaker 05

  Yeah, it's awesome, but. The last few years, he wasn't doing it. It was really just like, and he was still, he's an amazing athlete. He also could play basketball and other sports, but like, kind of just, let me get my at bats. Like, I'm not, not batting 340 anymore. Let me just get, let me just get through this record. And everybody can, you know, clap and be excited about it.

• 41:24Anthony Pompliano?

  Who, who's the athlete that you are like, man, this person was just absolutely dominant at their sport? And like, if you're into the sport or not, you can just sit back and be like, that is amazing.

• 41:35Speaker 05

  So I grew up, my best sport was always swimming. And I have an appreciation for Michael Phelps that I, I can't have in other sports. I'm below average at basketball. I play one on one, I play all the time, but like, I was not, I didn't even make my high school team. I was all county, all state swimmers. It was the only sport I was really good at. I played football, punted, you know, fullback, like bullshit, whatever. But I was good at swimming. I understood what it would take to be like a good swimmer.

• 41:58Anthony Pompliano?

  Every fullback is like, fuck this guy.

• 42:01Speaker 05

  Yeah, it's like.

• 42:01Anthony Pompliano?

  Mike All Scott is like, dude, get out of here.

• 42:04Speaker 05

  Yeah, every single one, they're like, this guy, like, why, why, you know? I, my thing was, you talk about funny jokes for, for being like an athlete, like playing through sports. I was a really good swimmer and I got on like our high school story. And this is a funny thing is like, so it's all these like nerdy swimmers, swimmers are nerds. Like they're all, oh, they can't talk and I'm coming from football. I have to, I had to lose 20 pounds. Like, I'm on this thing, high school sports talk with this guy, Jimmy Cavallo. And he's like, John, I'm 19 or 18, like this cocky, just douchebag. And he's like, John, you, you came from football. It looks like you one of the, you know, is there anyone else that you know of on your team or in the county? Who, who goes from football into swimming and, and it has this success? And I was like, no, I don't think anybody can do that. And I like dead, dead stare, like two shot into the camera.

• 42:46Speaker 05

  I get home and my message machine is, you know, we have cell phones, like just, hey asshole. Oh, you're the, like my friends just, we are going to use this for the rest of your life. Like who the hell, like staring into the camera, like, like I'm a WWE, like throwing down the gauntlet. Like, yeah, you try to punt and do butterfly, like, yeah, nobody can do that. So, so that is my little swimming moment, but Phelps. When Phelps won the, uh, I believe it was the hundred fly, goggles full of water. I understand swimming, swimming. He's blind. He dives in. I mean, it's the most frustrating thing when you have a little water in your goggles. But for him to have the muscle memory, count the laps, know the strokes, hit a wall, ideally hit the wall perfectly. He's behind.

• 43:30Speaker 05

  He can't see anyone in either lane. His muscle memory and his actual like stroke count, where he is, what he has to be, he's swimming completely blind. And he out touches. So it's not even like he just hits the wall. Like, he actually does a perfect touch, gets up and anybody, you watch the video, he pulls his goggles off, water pours out, he turns to bow him in his coach and goes, couldn't see. Dude, I don't care what sport you're in, what you do, if you just try to swim one lap with goggles full and just, I just say touch the wall. You couldn't do it, let alone beat the rest of the best in the world at that event. So for me, it's Michael Phelps.

• 44:02Anthony Pompliano?

  So when he did that specific race, he went down, touched the wall and came back and touched and it was over?

• 44:06Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 44:06Anthony Pompliano?

  So down and back, basically, and touched the wall. So it's really a turn and touch the wall and he did it all with water?

• 44:11Speaker 05

  Insane. Butterfly. Not like even we can kind of maybe like, he couldn't catch, you have no

• 44:15Anthony Pompliano?

  Well, see, listen, I jump in the pool. I don't get water in my goggles. What's going on with this guy? How to get water in his goggles?

• 44:19Speaker 05

  Dude, I know.

• 44:19Anthony Pompliano?

  You're in the fucking Olympics.

• 44:20Speaker 05

  Right? You think you have goggles that works. It never happens. I mean, everybody who swims at some point, you just, the angle hits wrong or you think they're sealed and they're not, especially then, like, the Olympics, you've got your cap, goggles and the cap over the goggles, like to triple check, like you're double, triple sealed. I don't know how it happened, but the panic mode of the Olympics, like, oh shit, I just, I can't see. And then like, focus, calm down and just swim your race that you've swan four billion times in practice by math in your head. It's the most insane, I think it's the most insane.

• 44:50Anthony Pompliano?

  Is it better to swim with the, with the water in there or just take them off?

• 44:53Speaker 05

  I think you take them off if you could, because at least when you're up, you can kind of gauge where you are. I mean, I have contacts, so I'm screwed either way if that happens. But like, assuming he can see.

• 45:01Anthony Pompliano?

  I can't even swim down, let alone down and back. But yeah, just swim on a drink.

• 45:04Speaker 05

  He can see, but like any swimmer listening now is like, yeah, that, you know, you look at all the other feats and there's a million things. I mean, the flu game and all the stuff that people did and you can come up with.

• 45:12Anthony Pompliano?

  Oh, come on, the flu game, he was hungover.

• 45:14Speaker 05

  Yeah, you can see, yeah.

• 45:16Anthony Pompliano?

  I'm joking, no, no.

• 45:18Speaker 05

  But whatever you want to point to as like the thing, to me, the level of difficulty on that is higher than almost anything else.

• 45:23Anthony Pompliano?

  What, what is the greatest sport? Moment in history for you and and not in terms of like everyone has to agree, but for you like personally, what is the greatest?

• 45:30Speaker 05

  So the greatest moment for me is going to be the Sox winning in oh four, the Red Sox winning oh four. So I grew up Red Sox, right? I know, I know Yankees and all that, but I'm going to see the greatest moment in person. And it's mainly because, and I wrote a piece about this because of who's involved. So in order to have a great moment, like if you're sitting at home on your couch, you weren't there.

• 45:49Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 45:50Speaker 05

  It's like you're high fiving your friends or your brother or whatever, but it has to be in person first, I think. And it has to matter a little bit more to you guys because of who's there, where you're at and what you're with. So the 999 All-Star game, my dad somehow through work gets tickets for me, him, my brother. Diehard Red Sox fans. We grew up in Boston. We're all going there. My grandfather's a diehard fan. My dad is I am. Pedro is like rejuvenated franchise, like the most fun, like incredible charismatic pitcher I've ever seen. Favorite playing team. And we go to the game and we're in the locker room. Ken Griffey Jr.'s there like we did. This is like the only time ever. We just had like full, you know, Willy Wonka passes. Like my dad just made it happen and I'm with my dad and my brother.

• 46:31Speaker 05

  We go to the game. We go to the All-Star game. It starts and magic Pedro starting, of course, at Fenway Park. And he strikes out the first five guys in the National League. Now it wasn't a championship and it wasn't all that.

• 46:41Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 46:42Speaker 05

  But like hugging your brother, like, oh my God, we're watching this happen live. It always is the first one that comes to my mind.

• 46:48Anthony Pompliano?

  That's a pretty good one. Uh, you'll appreciate this because you have a brother. When I was in like maybe late elementary, early middle school, for some reason, like there was no decision making in our family. It was like, you are going to be a Giants and a Yankees fan. And I decided that like, I'm not going to do that for like a two year period. And I'll say, I'm going to be a Jets and a Mets fan just to piss off my dad. And Subway Series happens 2001 and I'm the oldest of five boys and pretty much the only one who like should probably go to the game in terms of like, I'm like 11 or you know, whatever it is. And he doesn't take me, he takes my brother and I asked him years later, I said, why'd you do that? And he goes, I wasn't going to sit there and listen to you talk shit to me the entire time.

• 47:32Anthony Pompliano?

  And I'm like, you know what? That's probably the like best. That's argument you could have made like you definitely should not have taken me to that game.

• 47:37Speaker 05

  I did the same thing.

• 47:37Anthony Pompliano?

  I would sit there chirping the whole time.

• 47:39Speaker 05

  You vibrate you like you you kind of like move around the other teams that your dad would hate.

• 47:43Anthony Pompliano?

  Yes.

• 47:43Speaker 05

  Remember like my brother became a Bills fan for no reason like I was an A's fan in the 90s because of Ricky Henderson and all those guys and like eventually. You kind of migrate back to like it would be cool to root for the same team and if they suck they suck but like. They were right around the time of like like I said it was right around when they got players and it was like oh we maybe we had Nomar we had all these guys it was fun so.

• 48:04Anthony Pompliano?

  So for me, I think the Olympic, uh, there's an Olympic moment that like I wasn't there or anything, but it it uh. Resonates so much is um what's the guy Johnson I think is his last name who he's running he pulls his hamstring. And uh he's hot he's like hopping around and his dad comes out and those types of moments I always think like. Nobody's running on the track in 2023 right or 2024 like there is way more security now. And so like we're kind of robbed of a lot of those types of moments when you look back on sports there's a bunch of different things that happened where. Um, I think there is uh, uh, some guys ran on like the golf course or whatever. There's like a famous video, right? And they're like celebrating smoking cigarettes.

• 48:43Speaker 05

  Hank Aaron, the guy's running around with him shaking his hand. It's like what guy would have been like bulldozed and he probably stays at this point.

• 48:51Anthony Pompliano?

  Literally, right? And and so I do think that there's like this element of sports that like. For security reasons, they can't do it anymore, but uh, that's pretty cool to see, right?

• 49:00Speaker 05

  It was also, I mean, I didn't live it like in a city close enough, but like when I interview a lot of like the the older, older generation, there was a lot of sneaking into games like. The love of the game was like sneaking in, moving up in your seats, going up and scalping instead of having to worry about if it's on Ticketmaster, did you use StubHub or whatever like. It was a bit more of like, it's kind of like free flowing, like you could go and move seats and do things and and I think, yeah, it's now it's. Super corporate and also this is to me the biggest part of that is like. If I want to know what any of the assets we've just talked about are doing or any of the athletes are doing, I can just get their Instagram posting. You didn't see them. If you were at the game, you saw them and maybe SportsCenter, but that was it. If I wanted to see Larry Bird, we had to go to Boston Garden and watch him play if. If I wanted to, you know, in the 2000s, if I wanted to see Griffey.

• 49:44Speaker 05

  I had to wait till the Mariners came to Boston to go watch him play like the access now is in a certain way has ruined the like the exclusivity that kids have like if my son wants to see Luka Doncic highlights he's just instantly on Lucas feed there's four zillion Twitter accounts YouTube accounts showing all this stuff so when I finally do take him to the first time he's gonna see that athlete he's literally watching highlights in the car on the way there whereas it used to be you were going to see Larry Bird I was gonna see Michael Jordan for the very first time

• 50:12Anthony Pompliano?

  The the other thing that feels a little weird is a lot of these guys when you get the I don't know the special like feeling or whatever taken away is that they act differently as well like we we're recording this and there's a story out that Ja Morant was potentially in a truck like in a car with other players and they were like there's a red laser that people think might have been a gun or like like like all this stuff that now is coming out and you're just like would people be doing some of this stuff if Instagram didn't exist yeah right like like yes we get more access but also it feels like some of the athletes do shit and you're just like why like what are you doing you you have like I think it was Shannon Sharp was like you have a $200 million contract like chill out you're not hard

• 50:54Speaker 05

  And you know what else happens like you lose perspective so one of the good things that a lot of the best sports writers can do the you know the Bob Ryans the Howard Ryans the guys who write these big books and it followed over for years is like you put the athlete in their perspective how good they are historically what they might mean to a city and that's why I really like Ricky Henderson biography that he used to because it really places where Ricky came from in Oakland where why he was how he was with his cockiness and confidence but also like what molded him to be who he was and now there's no context it's just crazy play or athlete does this and there's no one unless you know athletic I know there's places that have it but you're so exposed you're gonna see them the next day they're gonna go on Twitter and talk about it or go on Instagram and talk about it

• 51:34Speaker 05

  there was a little bit and again I am all for athletes doing whatever they want but we've lost a little bit of context of like there was somebody like this his name was Babe Ruth by the way like you know it's like when you talk about oh the the first guy you know what LeBron does in branding it's amazing Babe Ruth did all of it the guy had his name on like 150 things he had ghostwritten books he had plays he was in the movies he had movies that he was producing he had tobacco coke gum like horses like he hit he did everything it was 120 years ago right 110 years ago so it isn't that crazy what these guys are doing it's just you see it all the time and you know all the behind the scenes stuff

• 52:09Anthony Pompliano?

  What's the flex factory?

• 52:10Speaker 05

  Yeah, man, it's my pride and joy.

• 52:12Anthony Pompliano?

  This is how I found you.

• 52:13Speaker 05

  I have, I have my son and my daughter and my flex factor.

• 52:19Speaker 05

  It is the garage gym. It is like a thing that I always wanted to have. So I spent a lot of time writing for Muscle and Fitness, Men's Fitness. That's my, my writing background. I came up writing for those two magazines and GQ. Well, GQ is a bit of an outlier, but whatever. Anything that had men's or muscle or fitness or like dudes I could write for in my, in my twenties. And, uh, and all these athletes, whenever I'd go travel to interview them, they just had these badass home gyms. Like full home gyms. I know like The Rock now with the Iron Paradise is probably the most famous version, but like, I did a story with like Batista and John Cena and he's got like a barn on the side of his house. That's like a full gold gym. That's his gym and like Brock Lesnar, I went and did a piece on it. He's got like this huge hangar that is a full gym. You walked in, you'd be like, oh, does nobody go to this gold gym? It's like, no, it's just Brock Lesnar's. That's why no one's here.

• 53:04Speaker 05

  Right? So I always wanted like, I'm not going to have that, but I always wanted my version of it. And then you have kids and like, working out is just hard. It's important to me. I'm a meathead at heart. Like I'm not going to not lift, but like you try to put it at lunch at work and then, you know, I was just, I was just telling earlier, like, you know, you're trying to time it right. And then you, you take your pre-workout at like 11:15 and then get called into a meeting and you're like,

• 53:28Speaker 05

  you guys don't want me in this meeting right now.

• 53:30Anthony Pompliano?

  Do it!

• 53:32Speaker 05

  You don't want me here. And like it times off wrong. And then you're just like, your heart rate's jacked, but you're just sitting there like, yeah, no, that's a good power play. That's awesome. You're like, you're under the table with like your legs moving. So like, I wanted to make it so that-

• 53:42Anthony Pompliano?

  How often does that happen?

• 53:43Speaker 05

  Not now I work from home, but it used to happen a bunch. I used to work for, uh, the Constable Hall of Fame and like, I loved it. It was great. It was all football stuff, but like, we had a gym right across the street. And I brought my kids to school early and all the stuff. I live in Texas and I used to go to those in LA Fitness. It was great. And I would try every day. It was a joke in the office. Like I'd try to time and they're like, have you taken it yet? Cause we, we might have a meeting and I'm like, Fine, I won't, I'd, you know, put it back down.

• 54:05Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 54:05Speaker 05

  And then, but some days just wouldn't work. I'd be like halfway out the door, be like, hey, can you come in? We're gonna go over this thing with this thing. And I'd be like sweating already, like, gosh.

• 54:12Anthony Pompliano?

  Faces tingly.

• 54:13Speaker 05

  Yeah, like, yeah, red, red.

• 54:15Anthony Pompliano?

  I, I always used to, uh, so obviously college football, like everyone's trying every concoction they could possibly come up with. Um, and, uh, uh, the pre workouts like dominate, right? Um, and there was guys who'd be like, hey, try this one because, uh, you get all the energy, like all the stuff, but like it doesn't give you the jittery feeling. Yeah. And, and I used to be like, nah, man, I don't know if that shit's working. Like you need, your face needs to be on fire. Like you need to literally feel like your skin is melting. And then you're like, I don't know what's going on in my body, but like, let's go to the gym.

• 54:47Speaker 05

  I remember, I don't take it anymore. It's funny because now that I have my own gym, like all the science behind like, you know, when you get up, I work out really early in the morning, like five, 5:30. And like, you don't want to be jamming caffeine and creatine in your body right then. So I actually don't really, I don't take any pre workout any, at all, ever. Um, but when I did, like you just, you feel like the Hulk, man. Like the good ones where your heart rate would jack up. And like, I remember one time I was like racing down the banister and like I did a swing around the banister old house, like rip the banister off. And I was like, first of all, like, that was awesome. Second of all, like, I should probably not take this. I was like, what was that? And I'm like, nothing. And I'm like, ah, I just tore our house apart with my bare hands.

• 55:24Anthony Pompliano?

  So in college, uh, you, you know, there's always like these memories that you have where you're like, oh, this is like a different level. And, uh, uh, there's two specifically, but one that, that, uh, just cracks me up to this day is, uh, the strength and conditioning coach. There's this other guy, uh, who was actually our running back slash fullback or whatever, uh, and his name is Paul Forcellini. If he hears this, he's gonna fucking die. So, uh, I'm moving into college. I got my dad with me. We're moving like whatever bullshit in. And Paul and his dad, they're moving in and I swear to you, this dude literally walks up to the elevator. He's got like a fucking refrigerator and like, and I'm like, Okay.

• 56:02Anthony Pompliano?

  Different world, right? Like, I probably should go lift a little bit more before we get on the field. And so he gets hurt. And at one point, uh, um, he says to me, he's like, hey, you should come down to the weight room. Uh, we're going to try to bench press. I think it was 135, like 100 times in an hour or something. Like, like some, you know, like ridiculous thing. You got a strength coach, you got this guy. And so they get started, they're going, they're going, and they keep going around like the corner. And I'm sitting there like I'm a young kid, whatever. And all of a sudden I'm like, what the fuck is around this corner? And I go and they're literally going into the cleaning supply closet. And the strength coach is like sniffing the fucking like chlorine or whatever. And I literally remember saying to myself like, oh, I thought that was a joke. Like, I didn't think people really did that.

• 56:48Anthony Pompliano?

  And he's like, no, it's better than pre-workout. And I literally were like, I don't care that much. Like, that was the moment where I remember thinking to myself, like, I care, but I don't care enough to smell chemicals to lift. And so I was like, there's a trajectory change here that is gonna end up with me doing something else with my life than trying to like go do this.

• 57:05Speaker 05

  It's hard, man, especially when you cover these guys. The levels are insane. The nutrient timing, they call it of like, I remember I did a feature with the strength and conditioning coach for the University of Florida when Tim Tebow was there his senior year. And this was like one of the most athletic teams you'll ever find. They had Emmanuel Moody transfer from USC. They had Tebow, um, they had Aaron Hernandez at the time, but they had a bunch of dudes who were just like.

• 57:26Anthony Pompliano?

  And this is when he like, it's just like, like fucking up.

• 57:29Speaker 05

  By the way, like, in that interview, all of them, to a man, like, he's the most impressive athlete we have. Like strongest dude as a quarterback, like a couple of linemen, but like stronger than all linebackers for sure. Hardest worker like out there. And he was talking about like, you know, they would do the, uh, they'd go to the swamp at five in the morning and do their sprints and gassers and then go and do their gym. And it was interesting because, um, Ryan Lochte went there. He was like working out for the Olympics in, in the gym there. So it was kind of cool. And he would talk about like, here's when we take the creatine, so it kicks in here and here's the glucose and here's this. And we're watching heart rate for this. And that was when I was kind of realizing like, and I think they started having trackers for heart rate monitors. It wasn't like the, you know, the Apple Watch or whoop yet or anything, but like. It was like, okay, so, so they know like 15 minutes from now, this is when's the best

• 58:13Speaker 05

  time to do strength or stretch or whatever. And like you learn all these things from interviewing these like elite, elite trainers. And so that's when like you understand that there's, there's actually a whole entire philosophy and science, people dedicate their lives optimizing their strength and conditioning. And it's like, yeah. So if you're just the guy benching your pre-rocker in your garage, like it's great. But like, if I really wanted to do it, I could have a team of guys like.

• 58:35Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah. The, uh, the two stories with Tebow that I, uh, always remember is, um, I think it's in his book. He says that he's at like a high school, uh, summer camp and one night in the dorm, they're like, uh, getting competitive with each other. And they're like, hey, let's see who can, uh, curl this bicep bar, uh, the most. And so there's like a line of all the campers and he keeps trying to move to the back, to the back, to the back, to the back. And he says he eventually gets a second to last, but the last guy won't let him get behind him. So he's like, I stepped up and I was like, I have to do this so many times that he doesn't pick it up. And so the most anyone had done is like 30 or 40 times. And he claims he did it like 250 times, like some stupid number, right? And so the guy literally doesn't pick it up, whatever. He, he, he wins.

• 59:18Anthony Pompliano?

  But he's like, but I was the quarterback at camp and I couldn't throw the next day.

• 59:23Speaker 05

  You gotta step up, man. Yeah.

• 59:24Anthony Pompliano?

  And then the other story is, uh, uh, they were doing like a tug of, tug of war type, you know, like workout where it's you versus one other guy. And for those that don't know, like usually they kind of, uh, literally do tug of war, but like you pull somebody, but it's not just like pull the flag across the line. It's like you pull it until the coach literally hits, uh, the whistle. And so you like play to the whistle was like the whole thing. And, um, so when they were doing it at Florida, supposedly he was up against a lineman or linebacker or whoever he was going against. And he starts pulling him and he literally is like just yanking this kid and he pulls him down the hallway into the bathroom supposedly. And he pull, and he like gets into the bathroom. He's like, I literally couldn't go any further back. Like I just like ran out of space. And then the coach like blows the whistle and they're just like, yeah,

• 1:00:07Anthony Pompliano?

  the quarterback is bodying right now. Like not just doing it, but like embarrassing them. And so when you look at that, you're like, yeah, that takes a special type of person to not just have the physical ability to do it, but to almost be like mentally in a state where like that's the level that you want to go to in order to, uh, assert your dominance and like leadership in the team, right?

• 1:00:26Speaker 05

  Yeah. He, he really impressed me. I was, so this is what maybe 10 years ago, whenever it was. And I flew out there, I'm, you know, just the guy and he was the most like sought after name in maybe not all of sports, but definitely college football. And like he was, his Q rating was through the roof. Like he was about to win the Heisman, like he was the guy. And he's a young kid. Again, like we talked about LeBron, like I would, if I was that guy, like there's a real good chance I would be an asshole all the time. And everybody like this punk, like he just was born with this amazing ability, but he, they all talked about how great he was and you know, the first and last to leave, all that cliche stuff. But when I finally got a chance to interview him, it was like, at the end of the day, he'd been working all day. I'm sure he had stuff to do. And you know, their media guys like, hey, you got, you know, you had 15 minutes solo. Cause I interviewed a bunch. The whole point was like, it was about the team.

• 1:01:07Speaker 05

  But I did get interviewed with him. He said, hey, how you doing? And he was like off, like it was so polite and like endearing. It was like, I was like, what? He's like, where did you fly in from? And the first 10 minutes, I'm like, I don't want to waste all of it, but I found myself being interviewed like, but in a very polite, really caring way of like, how long was the drive? Cause I lived in Florida. I was like, live here. I was like, oh, you get any traffic? Yeah. It's tough around there. Um, what, you know, what do you live with your girlfriend? Like just the whole conversation. And I was like, yeah. And then I'm like, all of a sudden like, hey man, let me, uh,

• 1:01:36Anthony Pompliano?

  Let me ask a couple of questions.

• 1:01:37Speaker 05

  Yeah. Like you're awesome and you're nice, but like, if I don't get these quotes out, this whole story sucks, but you're really great. And I'm going to say that you're great. But like, he left and the guy was like, you know how often that happens? Like one of the media people, they're like, he just, whatever it is, you can't bullshit that. There's no way. I don't care. You don't care. You're not going to just talk to some random guy who you said you have 15 and I've, and the reason I know this is because I've had so many athletes over the years who are just assholes. Like who you, who give you that 15 minutes and aren't even remotely putting their thought or focus.

• 1:02:02Anthony Pompliano?

  Who's the biggest asshole?

• 1:02:04Speaker 05

  Um, biggest asshole. There's a guy, I'm going to say it because, uh, there was a guy who I did a cover story with. And it was supposed to be from Muscle Fitness and I don't even know if he's in sports now. I have no idea. And I think he would own up to it because he was a jerk. We flew there to do an actual cover story shoot with him. We had a photography crew and it was a guy, uh, he played for the Rays for a while, Evan Longoria. And whether he, whether he was having a bad day, some of these guys have them, some of these guys don't. He'd been in the league for a while. So it wasn't like a rookie type of thing. And he was just like, Wasn't into it and we're like, we need just, we're gonna put you on the cover and he wouldn't, you know, look, I always

• 1:02:39Anthony Pompliano?

  He wouldn't answer questions or?

• 1:02:41Speaker 05

  He was just not really posing for the stuff. He was like, all these guys are here, they'll be gone soon. And like, you know, what do you work out? He's like, I don't really work out. Like, it was muscle fitness. I'm like, well, what do you do? Weight training? He's like, I hate weights. That kind of stuff. And I'm like, you realize like, you could have just said no to this whole piece. Like, he wasn't really in great shape at the time. And I always

• 1:03:01Anthony Pompliano?

  So maybe he was being honest.

• 1:03:02Speaker 05

  I always, always, always put out like, they are allowed to have bad days.

• 1:03:05Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:05Speaker 05

  We're there for a job. Maybe something happened. It's like, I always say that. I don't, in life, he may be great. But for that four hours, and my photographer, I did a ton of shoots with, all the WWE guys, we left and he was like, dude, something's up. Like, that was rough. Like, we're not gonna use, there's nothing to use. We called our home and they're like, what? And I was like, we don't have, we didn't do the cover. So like, maybe a great guy. But in terms of like, and I don't want to even call him an asshole. In terms of a rough, rough experience.

• 1:03:27Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:28Speaker 05

  That was the toughest thing. And he'll, listen, you have a huge following. Evan, I'm sorry, but like, that day was brutal. Like, we flew all the way out there from LA to Tampa. And we didn't get the cover story. And who knows, maybe he's jacked now, we'll do it again. I don't know.

• 1:03:39Anthony Pompliano?

  I love it. You also wrote a book about dads and their ability to continue to work out. You have kids. What is, you said you wake up early and you work out 5:00, 5:30. Like, what's your daily schedule?

• 1:03:52Speaker 05

  Yeah. So the reason I came up with the, or the reason I had the garage gym, I always wanted a name of the flex factory. Like, it just always

• 1:03:58Anthony Pompliano?

  So you had the name before the gym?

• 1:03:59Speaker 05

  Yeah. I'll tell you that, so I interviewed Triple H. This is a true story. I interviewed Triple H for a cover story for Muscle Things.

• 1:04:03Anthony Pompliano?

  Legend.

• 1:04:03Speaker 05

  Legend, right? Yeah, the whole thing. And I was talking, he had kids and

• 1:04:08Anthony Pompliano?

  You know, I almost got suspended from middle school for doing it?

• 1:04:11Speaker 05

  Yeah, that was a big thing. Like, I was out of school, but like, I remember hearing

• 1:04:14Anthony Pompliano?

  I was literally in middle school. And like, for those that don't know, WWF at the time, there was a group and they were basically going around and they were taking their, yeah, they were taking a cross across their crotch area saying, suck it. And if you're a young, impressionable boy, you see that, you're like, that's awesome. And you would do it to like, each other, like, as a joke. It was like, kind of like an endearing, you know?

• 1:04:36Speaker 05

  You only think of the guys you like. You wouldn't actually do it to start a fight.

• 1:04:38Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, no, no, no, definitely not. But of course, teachers see it. Then it becomes like a thing. The parents like, what's going on?

• 1:04:44Speaker 05

  Like all up like any high school, college where you went to kids scored a touchdown.

• 1:04:47Anthony Pompliano?

  They're all doing it. Yeah, of course. It became part of culture to some degree. And I was in, I'm pretty sure it was like late middle school and kids were like doing it all the time. And I think I like did it like at a friend down the hall, but of course it's like classic like out of a movie, right? The no, like the teacher is like coming around the corner and like sees it, right? And you're just like, now you'd be like, whatever. Like, obviously it wasn't directed towards you.

• 1:05:12Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:05:13Anthony Pompliano?

  But there can't be any disrespect in a middle school. And so I remember I had to like have a meeting and like do all this stuff.

• 1:05:18Speaker 05

  Don't you know Triple H?

• 1:05:19Anthony Pompliano?

  No, and I literally was like, oh my God, I'm gonna like get in trouble for this. And so I always remember thinking back like, dude, schools are so stupid, but also like they have to keep some element of control. So that I'm kids running up and down doing suck it.

• 1:05:33Speaker 05

  Yeah, well, true story. So I but my son is into wrestling now and we watch all Friday night SmackDown and Monday Raw. And they did a 30th anniversary of Raw two weeks ago and they brought those guys back. And for the first time ever, my son sees the socket and I can't get him to stop walking around.

• 1:05:50Anthony Pompliano?

  How old is he?

• 1:05:50Speaker 05

  He's nine. He's perfect.

• 1:05:52Anthony Pompliano?

  Literally like nine to 13 is like, you got him.

• 1:05:55Speaker 05

  He has a whole like, you know, kids have like, you know, ring entry. He has like a ring exit to go to school every day. He came up with. It's awesome. And like now he does this added to it. It's amazing. And so it's.

• 1:06:04Anthony Pompliano?

  It reminds me of the Mark Cuban. You ever seen the video Cuban at a, he's on the sidelines, like he walks off the bench or something to a kid? And a kid is trying to like shake his hand. And so Cuban walks over, he like begrudgingly like walks over and he's like, all right, I'm gonna give this kid. And then the kid dabs on him and Mark just looks at him. He's got this look of like, are you fucking kidding me? And the kid's like 10, right? And it's an amazing video because you're just like, in that moment, he's just like, I can't be mad. Cause like this probably the highlight of this kid's life right now that he just dabbed on Mark Cuban, but also like kid.

• 1:06:38Speaker 05

  Yeah, my son will like get in field like fight with my daughter and end it with this. And you're like. Good job. Like you use it correctly and I'm kind of proud of you, but like you really can't do it now. It's old, first of all. People will be, what the hell? Where'd you come up with that? But it's, it's awesome to watch them take, uh, take all this stuff in. So, um, so Triple H, I was interviewing him for a cover story. And, um, he switched the time a bunch, which happens, whatever, all the time. And he finally calls, he's like, yeah, I'm just, uh, I had to move things around. And I just made a joke like, oh, you know, trying to get the gym in, because a lot of these guys, um, they travel 300 days a year, whatever. Like the, the move to get over jet lag for almost all of them to a man is hit the gym immediately. Like, get off the plane, hit the gym, like get your sweat in, get your stuff in, you get it done.

• 1:07:21Speaker 05

  And then you can kind of figure it out. So I just threw that out. I was like, no, I'm actually, because he was already kind of an executive already. Um, homie's like, actually work out at like midnight too. And I was like, what? And he's like, ah, you know, I have kids now and I want to be home for them in the morning at breakfast. And like, there's no way, he's talking like, Triple H, he's like, there's no way I can do this. And I can't leave the house in the morning during the day. I can't live. So I just, I think it's James Franco. He has, he's a big like, uh, big power lifter helps train him. I'm probably boxing name, but whatever it is. Anyway, he, so he works out. So I was like, man, that's what happens to me all the time on a much smaller scale. I'm not running the WWF, but like I run out of time. So I had started like bringing exercise stuff home for random stuff. So I had some dumbbells, some cables, you know, some bands, a couple, uh, you know, a couple like ropes to do stuff, jump ropes.

• 1:08:06Speaker 05

  And then I was like, I'm going to do like, I want to be able to just work, get it done before the kids are asleep. But this is my kids were like one and three, two and four, like they're finally sleeping through the night, which is, as anyone knows, like

• 1:08:16Anthony Pompliano?

  Amazing.

• 1:08:16Speaker 05

  You can't complain, you can't do anything or plan an early morning workout if you're up three different times because of night terrors or potty training or whatever. So when they finally, I could count on that. Um, I just like slowly added shit. Like I got like a squat rack and then I got like an inclined bench or an inclined decline bench. And then I got like heavier weights and then I got a set of plates. And then all of a sudden I was like, this is the greatest thing ever. Like I started going all in. I got a hex bar and like slam balls and the on it kettlebells with the gorilla on them. And like, I was like, I gotta, you know, I have all these posters from growing up, like my Reggie Lewis poster and Mike Greenwell and the Sultan's a Slam. I'm like, I'm going to, I'm going to like make this, I don't need a man cave. I don't want some room to watch TV. I don't care. Like I can watch it wherever. This is gonna be like my room.

• 1:08:56Anthony Pompliano?

  My spot?

• 1:08:57Speaker 05

  Yeah, and I had this stuff. I have Larry Bird posters from when I was like 10, like, so the whole wall now is basically like frozen in time, like 1991. And, uh, and I get up every day about 5:15, sometimes 5:30 and I till 6:30, full hour. I do like powerlifting and on stuff one day and body weight stuff and dumbbells. Switch. I have, you know, from all my time muscle fitness, immense fitness, I have a zillion workouts to pull from. So I just kind of rotate through. Um, and then I finished 6:30 ish, 6:40, I wake up, my kids, my daughter's already up now. My son, it takes like 15 minutes to get him out of bed and do all that shit. Um, then we have breakfast and I'm making my smoothie, driving to school, walk the dog and you know, start the day at like eight o'clock.

• 1:09:37Anthony Pompliano?

  It's not bad.

• 1:09:38Speaker 05

  It's pretty good. The dog walk's my favorite part. Cause like workout done, kids are like off to school, you know, never know what's gonna happen with them. They eat breakfast, don't eat breakfast, forgot their homework, need five bucks for a field trip. Like it's chaos even on the ride. Like, oh, you know, I always tell my kid like, telling me you had a homework to do today in the car on the ride to school is not telling me you had homework to do. It's telling me you forgot to do your goddamn homework and there's nothing we could do about it. Cause I'm pulling into the parking lot in five minutes. So like, it's always that kind of stuff. So I get home, the, the 20 minute dog walk, we have a lab, she's great. Like on one line, ready to go. Get home, you know, shower real quick. By 8:15, 8:30, like it's time to write, time to get to work.

• 1:10:16Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah. The, um, uh, my daughter is not old enough yet for homework, but, uh, when I think about anything to do with homework, I'm just like, dude.

• 1:10:25Speaker 05

  I put out a tweet a while ago, it was one of my best ones. I wrote, Finkel, hating homework since third grade, hating homework since college, hating homework, helping a third grader, hating homework since the beginning of homework, stop it. And like every parent was like, yes, yes, yes, yes.

• 1:10:38Anthony Pompliano?

  I mean, like literally, right?

• 1:10:39Speaker 05

  So much work. It's so stupid.

• 1:10:41Anthony Pompliano?

  When we used to get home from school, my, uh, mom used to make us sit at the table and like do our homework before we go outside or like do whatever. And, uh, I would, I mean, we like would cheat on the homework in front of our mom. Not like cheat, like in like cheating in school, like we would be like, we're done. So he would sit there for three minutes. Be like, no, no, I'm done. I, I finished it all. And we'd be like, uh, they'd send you home with like the assignment, you know, thing, whatever. We'd be like trying to like erase shit, like whatever we. Could possibly do to make convince her that we were done, we would try. And I think back, I'm like, we probably should have just done the homework and it would have been done faster.

• 1:11:11Speaker 05

  Know how to do it.

• 1:11:11Anthony Pompliano?

  That, well, forget knowing how to do it, which would have been done quicker than if we had spent all that time trying to trick our mom into thinking our homework was done.

• 1:11:18Speaker 05

  See, well, now, the whole new thing is now is like, I'll be in my office writing or working, like, you guys are doing your homework, same thing at the kitchen table. All of a sudden I hear like, Alexa, what's 43 divided by 17? I'll be like, you can't, you, that's not, well, you're, I don't want to bother you. It's like, okay, wait, so you're just gonna completely cheat and ask Alexa all the answers because you don't want to walk 15 feet? I appreciate it, but like, you know, so I'll go in and, you know, help, but like, there's so many, you know, tricks and stuff now. Who knows what chat, what was gonna happen when they're older, but like, they ask Alexa everything. Alexa, what's the capital of Senegal? And it's like, you can't, you have to, this is what the book's for. This is why you're supposed to be reading.

• 1:11:51Anthony Pompliano?

  So like, I, I go back and forth on this, this is like, yes, I've seen the like, you know, whatever, the, the second grader or whatever being like, two plus two, Alexa, like whatever. And it's like four, you're like, ah, you probably shouldn't know that one, but, uh, 43 divided by 17, like, yeah, I might ask Alexa. I might double check if it was, if it was recorded, like no public math.

• 1:12:10Speaker 05

  My son, my son got ahead of it. He goes, Alexa, am I ever gonna need to know what an isosceles triangle is? And I was like, now this is a kid. He's got, he's gone past what it is. He's gone right to, do I need to know this shit, Alexa? Cause you know everything.

• 1:12:26Anthony Pompliano?

  Alexa's like, uh, kid, do your homework.

• 1:12:28Speaker 05

  He's like, uh, your parents in the room? Okay, if your dad's not there, then no, this shit's weird. If your dad's there, then we, we have to have that conversation.

• 1:12:35Anthony Pompliano?

  And also I think that like, most people's jobs, they just Google anyways.

• 1:12:39Speaker 05

  Everything.

• 1:12:40Anthony Pompliano?

  Right? Like, I spent, I don't know, a more time than I admit, looking shit up all day.

• 1:12:45Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:12:45Anthony Pompliano?

  So like, actually, if you know how to do that, maybe asking Alexa's cheating, but like, you know, if you could use Google, then maybe you're actually prepared.

• 1:12:50Speaker 05

  They cut you down, cause like, my, my, my boy will come home and be like, dad, I had to write a paper today, like, really wasn't hard. Is that just what you do? Write stuff?

• 1:13:00Speaker 05

  Yeah, I do. You little shit. That is what I do.

• 1:13:05Anthony Pompliano?

  It wasn't hard?

• 1:13:06Speaker 05

  Yeah, it wasn't hard. I mean, I just had to like, think of things. I'm like, yeah, that's it. He's like, so that's, that's, that's kinda it. Now he's, you know, now I'm like, you see this 300-page books, like, you know, pulling out the, do you know, look at the references, like, trying to find a way to impress him. And he's like, eh, no, I can do that. I would just have to sit down at Conso times.

• 1:13:21Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, just think about it.

• 1:13:22Speaker 05

  Yeah, just think about it and put it down. I'm like, let me see what you wrote. You know, it's like Daniel Boone War. I'm like, okay, you know what?

• 1:13:28Anthony Pompliano?

  That's good. Yeah, you spelled it right. You spelled it right.

• 1:13:33Anthony Pompliano?

  When you think about the intersection of your life, you got this newsletter, Biceps and Books?

• 1:13:39Speaker 05

  Books and Biceps.

• 1:13:39Anthony Pompliano?

  Books and Biceps. All right. I mean, perfect name, right? What is the, like, the, the goal of this? Is it to find books for meatheads? Or is it actually to expand past that?

• 1:13:50Anthony Pompliano?

  Hey, guys. I hope that you're enjoying this conversation. As you probably realize, we don't run any ads on this show. That's right. All the other podcasts, all the other YouTube shows that you watch, they have advertisers. We don't have any direct relationships with advertisers, and we simply create this because we enjoy doing it. Now that we do that, though, we have a team. And if you'd like to support us, one way you can do that is to go subscribe to the Pomp Letter. It's a daily letter that I write to about 235,000 people about my personal opinion on financial markets, business, technology, and Bitcoin. Just go to pompletter.com and you can sign up there. I'd love to have you join us, and it's a great, easy way to support the work that the team and I are doing on a daily basis. All right, let's get back into this conversation.

• 1:14:35Speaker 05

  Yeah, it's like, so I always like newsletters that share people's processes. So anybody can do like the wrap-up stuff. I love your book reviews. Like, what did you get from this stuff? Well, I come across, when I'm researching a book, I might find 50 books for that book, just touching upon it, or articles and things like that. Or I may find a concept in the book that I want to explore more. And then also, I happen to have written for all these fitness magazines, and I work out a lot. So it's like, just sharing a little bit of what goes on behind the scenes in putting a book together, and sort of the lifestyle that puts the book together. So I always say, it's like, imagine you're like, Educated meathead friend was like recommending workouts and books to you every week. That's it. It's like the smart guy, like the idiot guy who you think is in the gym who also reads.

• 1:15:18Speaker 05

  He's got some things that you might want to check out. That's kind of the ethos of it. And so every week, like I share a book, like why I liked it. A lot of times I do get to do author interviews, which is cool over all the years. I know like so. A lot of people have books coming out that I'm gonna read. They'll do three or four questions for me and I try not to ask like lame ass questions. It's more like, do you write in a coffee shop? You're right here. Like, what do you listen to when you're like real author-y type stuff? And then the biased part is I'm a meathead man. I just post pictures of my garage gym. I do put a lot of stuff in there that helps me, especially as I've gotten older, like you know, posture stuff, hip flexor stuff, like things will help you as you, you know, like to recover. If you're trying to get strength, if you're trying to do these things. So it's really what I'm doing now or what I've read now.

• 1:15:57Speaker 05

  But what I found is there's a huge contingent of guys like us who grew up working out, exercising, who are now have kids, kids are getting older. They don't have time to read. They don't want to look for stuff. Is this a good book that's coming out? Oh, cool. I have a filter for it. And you know what? I do want to start benching again. Like a lot of the things that I write on the fitness side, I'm just responding to questions like, I want to start like benching again. Like what's a good program or what's a basic like powerlifting program to do? And I'll be like, oh, the five by five and here's why. And actually, here's an article I wrote eight years ago that will help you. Or, you know, I want to start swimming, which I swim, a big one. Like I've done a bunch of like starter swimming workouts. So it's really just to help out. And then also, you know, you build over book, over book, you build readership. And they don't really always cross over. Maybe somebody who read 1996 isn't going to read a fatherhood book who might not be into the Macho Man Randy Savage.

• 1:16:39Speaker 05

  But like, they've all bought a book from me and it kind of gets a little through line. I think it's smart to have them have a little bit of knowledge about who you are, how you put books together and how you live.

• 1:16:47Anthony Pompliano?

  It's interesting because James Clear, I was listening to an interview he did with, maybe it was Tim Ferriss or somebody. And he talks about, they picked three segments of people when they launched Atomic Habits. And one of them was CrossFit. And so he sent free books to a bunch of CrossFit influencers. And his point was like, if you're in CrossFit, there was like a four week period where everybody in the CrossFit world was posting this book. And he was trying to unpack in hindsight, why they all accepted the book and posted or whatever. He's like, because everyone always has sent them workout shit.

• 1:17:18Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:17:18Anthony Pompliano?

  Right? He's like, I was the one who sent him a book and they all wanted to have their audience think they were not just a meathead.

• 1:17:24Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:17:24Anthony Pompliano?

  So like, hey, here's this book that I'm reading about habits and like everyone in the crowd and like it like makes sense in hindsight. But it was like fascinating that he was like, that led to kind of the initial spark that eventually led to, you know, one of the bestselling books in the last couple of years.

• 1:17:38Speaker 05

  Yeah, I think that's a huge thing and he's brilliant with those insights and it's right when you see it in practice because you get how many people start living that lifestyle a little bit with you, right? Like I did a giveaway of stickers. It's just a nothing thing, but like gone 50 of them gone in like 10 minutes within the second the newsletter gets out and you realize that yeah, people who work out a lot and are into it, they're not morons. Most of them, there's the bros always juicing whatever, but like a lot of them are just dads and dudes trying to stay safe moms too, you know, and women trying to get in shape. And what are books that might interest them? A lot of people don't read a lot. And I think what you do is great. You pick a lot of cross sections of maybe people who aren't into investing or into Bitcoin, but like this is a great philosophy. This is a great lifestyle thing to think about. This is just a great way to look at life new, a new, new direction.

• 1:18:22Speaker 05

  And so I'll put like, it's definitely sports and maybe history-ish heavy, but a lot of it is like really good writing, really good writers that I like. Have you read this new book that just came out? Here's why I bought it. Here's the author. Here's why I admire this author. And the emails that I get back, people respond pretty regularly are, you know, that's great. I love that. I think I'm going to buy this book or whatever it is. But also it's the same on the fitness side. So to the same thing as CrossFit, anyone who's like grew up loving these sports is gonna like the books. And if they're that niche of like that Venn diagram of like, you know, I have like books, you know, biceps, like meatheads, like if you're in there, it maybe it's not 50 million people, but it might be two, I'll take it. Those are my, that's my group. That's my crew.

• 1:19:02Anthony Pompliano?

  I love it. You said that you start working 8:00, 8:15. So after you've kind of done all the morning routine, what do you do during the day?

• 1:19:08Speaker 05

  Yeah. So I have a bunch of like creative consulting where I do a lot of copywriting. So I used to do like a ton of stuff for fitness brands, Muscle Milk, Cyto Sport, Gatorade, all those kinds of things. So I do a lot of work for brands around, you know, around local and national, just on helping them with their products. Helping them like, you know, go through and, you know, put like the copy for how are we going to market? Get this protein shake to this or this cryo center that we're putting together for this. So I do a lot of those sort of client work and then the bulk of what I do is books. So I have, um, right now I'm like deep in the weeds on a macho man Randy Savage biography. So that's like the bulk of my time. I actually ghost write too. So I usually have one or two ghost writing books with pretty usually professional athletes, like kind of elite entrepreneurs, CEO types.

• 1:19:50Speaker 05

  So, um, I usually have a couple of those take longer because you're only talking at their schedule, maybe once every week or two, um, 45 minutes.

• 1:19:57Anthony Pompliano?

  So walk me through, if you're writing a book like the, uh, macho man, uh, book, what does that process look like? How long will it take you?

• 1:20:02Speaker 05

  So the, you know, that one's going to end up being over a year. So it's like, if you're talking from idea, like I've always wanted to write a macho man books as I was like 12, but like you put a proposal together, um, it's really in depth. It's like everything you would do for the book, uh, who the audience is, why they would want it, you know, who are comp titles, um, what you're, how you're going to present it? What are the platforms you, you know, promote it on, not just your social, but like, who are all the places that would like it? Who's going to review it? You know, whole thing. Sometimes a sample chapter, sometimes not enough books now that I can just like, here's Charlie Ward, like here's how I write or whatever. But sometimes a sample chaper, a chapter of what you're going to do with it and you pitch it. And then, you know, hopefully a traditional publisher wants it. Or like I do with Jackson's teeth, I'll just put it out macho. I wanted to go with a legit big publisher because I want it out in stores.

• 1:20:46Speaker 05

  I wanted to work with a, a publisher, uh, who has done wrestling books before particularly. So they can reach that really rabid, crazy wrestling audience. And so, uh, once you get past all that, the publisher says yes, and you have an advance and you're starting, the beginning is just absolute research, like finding and interviewing every possible person who ever had anything to do with this person. And then going through and archiving the interview. So you know what specifically to ask these people about. So the beginning, it's almost just like fire hose of like, I'm just Googling and I know the things, but like, you know, you go in, there's a couple of resources. One of the best is a place called newspapers.com and like somehow they've archived every newspaper, maybe 80% of them all the way back to like the 1800s.

• 1:21:28Speaker 05

  So you'll just do like 1952 Angelo Paffo, right? And Macho Man's dad. What comes up and just go, I will seriously go year by year with certain keywords, wrestling, this, that, just to get a feel of that. Then look at like, I know the list of people I want to talk to, Hacksaw Jim Duggan and Ricky the Dragon, Steamboat, and Million Dollar Man. And like, you know, I know that major list that everybody else can name. But this books, anybody who writes biographies will tell you, like, it's the other people. It's the guy who sat next to him on the bench in his high school baseball team. It's the minor league baseball player he lifted with at, you know, in the morning before games. Those are like, those put the stories together. So I'll spend months-

• 1:22:01Anthony Pompliano?

  How do you find those people?

• 1:22:03Speaker 05

  In questions. Really, it's like pulling a thread. You get one. Facebook groups are actually like really good. So like the class reunion group for the Macho Man, Macho Man went to Downers Grove High School in Illinois. There's, they just had their 25th reunion or whatever, 35th anniversary. We'll do public math as you say. Whatever it is, they just had a reunion and I found the Facebook page for it. And I was, you know, just messaging, here's what I'm doing. And one or two people got back to me. And luckily, one of them was like one of the social leaders. Now they're all in their 70s. And you had a, had a great conversation. He actually, uh, he played baseball or basketball with him his freshman year. Knew Lanny a little bit. Lanny's his brother, Leaping Lanny Poffo. Um, you know, here's who else you should talk to. Who, that's the, the key for anyone. I mean, the question you have to ask yourself is, when you're done with the interview, you say, who else should I talk to about this? What else? Is there something I'm missing? What else should I know?

• 1:22:47Speaker 05

  Like those two questions will get you like 50% of the better stories in your book. I'm sure you do it even with this. Like what, what is the other thing? Who else was on that team that you might know that might still be around? And you just pull that thread and all of a sudden that one phone call will lead to two, will lead to three, will lead to five. You know, some of them are just work. Like, Macho Man was in Spider-Man as Bonesaw McGraw, everybody remembers, you know, like, it's awesome. And, uh, you know, I found a couple of interviews he did while on set. But I like went through Instagram and scoured and I found the, he was Bonesaw McGraw. In the movie, there are some like sort of extras, but they kind of have bit parts called the Bonettes. These, these four girls who accompany him to the ring. Well, I found some Bonettes.

• 1:23:26Anthony Pompliano?

  No way.

• 1:23:27Speaker 05

  What was it like being on set with him? What was it like walking in? What was it off behind the scenes when you weren't filming? What was the director, Sam Raimi was the director? Like, how did he interact with Macho? Like, that kind of stuff. And you just dig and dig and dig. And it's these little moments that make it all worth it. When you, it sounds goofy, but like when the Bonette DM'd me back and was like, I'd love to talk about Randy. He was great. And it's like, I have, I have eyes onto a major movie that he was on awesome. And then she had someone else to talk to. And so you do that with every little scene in their lives. And eventually, you know, you talk to hundreds of people. And then you start pulling the articles about those things. And that's, that's how you go. When you finally have enough for each section that you're comfortable with, and there's no limit. You just eventually get to a point where you're like, I think I've exhausted his high school baseball career. You just start writing.

• 1:24:10Anthony Pompliano?

  And when you start writing, how much of it is like, I already have all the information now. I just got to kind of play editor versus like you sit down, you have it in your head and you just start writing.

• 1:24:20Speaker 05

  So I like to start every chapter as if no one's read any other part of the book. I mean, for the most part, like it could stand alone so that they'll come in different spots. A lot of writers that I've always liked do that. And so like, for, for instance, Randy Savage, like people, people may or may not know, he was a really, he was a minor league baseball prospect. Like he played for the Reds, he played for the Tampa Tarpens. He was good. He made it a single A All-Star team twice. Like, so you want to talk to people all through that. And at a certain point, you're hearing the same stories over. You're like, I just probably not much more here. In this case, um, his brother, Lanny Paffa, who, who, you know, unfortunately passed away last week, I was talking to him a lot and I'd banked a bunch of interviews with him about Randy's life. And so, um, once I have a, during those conversations with these people is when I'll start pinning like this is a great place to start.

• 1:25:05Speaker 05

  I try to start on action. Sometimes you can't always start in like the middle of a, you know, flying elbow drop off the top rope. Or like when he's getting in a baseball brawl, it can't always be like jumping in the middle of an action movie. You sometimes need context. But I always try to start in that, like, what is the inciting incident of this chapter? What is the thing that if I'm reading at night, because I always put myself like very few people at two in the afternoon, like I'm going to have an energy drink and sit and read all fired up. It's like you're winding out the end of the day. Maybe they're lying in bed. Maybe they're, you know, sitting wait outside of their cars thing. Like what's going to get them like this chapter is exciting. They're in it. All of a sudden they're two pages in and we're going. And so usually I have a little good radar now after 10 or 15 books of like, I'll make a little highlight.

• 1:25:43Speaker 05

  And even in the conversation, like, and I'll just do it in bold, like badass, badass. Like, okay. And then as I go through my notes, I'll just search like, find, search badass. And it's like, okay, this is a good story to open this chapter. This is a good story to open this chapter.

• 1:25:55Anthony Pompliano?

  What about? Uh, when you're writing or you're doing it at home?

• 1:25:58Speaker 05

  I do a lot of coffee shops.

• 1:25:59Anthony Pompliano?

  Coffee shop, okay.

• 1:26:00Speaker 05

  I do, when I'm at a coffee shop, uh, there's a local one I have that I go to a lot, which is, I think I, I, I wrote it the other day, like in Twitter, like, I reached the final boss level of coffee shop writing. I walk in, I get a head nod and they roll over and meet me at the table with, with, I just get like a small coffee.

• 1:26:17Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah. And they know.

• 1:26:18Speaker 05

  And they know, and I just pay for it when on my way out, like that is, you know, it used to be, and the best part about this coffee shop is because I have my Macho Man shit spread everywhere and, and a couple of the guys don't speak English great, they just call me Macho. So not only like have I reached like, here's your coffee, it's like, hey, Macho. And I'm like, this is, I'm never leaving here.

• 1:26:37Anthony Pompliano?

  All right. And do you listen to music or you just like the background?

• 1:26:39Speaker 05

  The coffee shop, I'll just, the coffee shop sounds are good. They actually have a pretty good like nineties station they put on or whatever. Um, at home, funny enough, I used to listen to music like Explosion in the Sky or Jimmy Hendrix. I like a lot, like Three Little, Three Little Birds, some of these like over and over again, or Bob Marley, I'm sorry. Uh, over and over again, but, uh, I found this goofy YouTube thing that is just, but coffee shop background noise.

• 1:27:01Speaker 05

  Dude, it's the weirdest thing. It's got like millions and millions of views, so I'm not the one who's found it.

• 1:27:04Anthony Pompliano?

  I was just gonna say, there's some of these, there's like that, there's one, uh, uh, I've seen they have different locations, like the sounds of a certain place, there's fire.

• 1:27:12Speaker 05

  Uh, I don't like the fire, they do fire, they do like warm rain mountain. And that's one of the funny things about like becoming an authorized, I am like, growing up in movies, it's like, okay, when you write, like you go to a house in the Hamptons or like some beautiful cabin in the mountains, it's secluded.

• 1:27:24Anthony Pompliano?

  Nah, just put on fucking YouTube.

• 1:27:25Speaker 05

  For three weeks away, no one's bothering you. And now it's like, yeah, I wrote at the mechanic today. I wrote outside of my kid's taekwondo. I wrote at the call, like it's not like that. Uh, but the coffee shop sounds, it's weird. I listen to the same one over. I've tried a bunch, like I know the cadence of this one hour. I know where I am in writing, like, oh, the hour is up. I know the people in the background weirdly like, oh, that's the person's gonna come in in five minutes and talk about like their finals getting canceled or whatever. It's really weird. So weird so that I caught myself the other day, listening to the coffee shop background noise at the coffee shop. And then I knew I'd, I'd like crossed over into some metaverse where like I need to pull back.

• 1:27:55Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I, but I do think everyone has like, uh, music specifically or like sound, I think.

• 1:28:01Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:28:02Anthony Pompliano?

  Uh, you always remember where you are and. Like what you're doing.

• 1:28:06Speaker 05

  Yep. When I wrote the Charlie Ward book, I spent a week in Thomasville, Georgia, his hometown. And they had an amazing coffee shop. I think it was called like the Greenville Coffee Shop or something. And they had a great coffee. And I don't even be, I had one cup of coffee a day. I just would have it while I'm, while I'm drinking, while I'm writing. And they had, they would always play this, and I had to find it. I'm blanking on it now, but it was like, it was like Beethoven or Mozart, one of, one of those. And it was always in the back and it was very relaxing. And I would write after the end of the day of doing interviews and stuff, I'd go there and have like these amazing like pre leans and cream cookies or whatever. And you know, for a week they get to know you a little bit. Oh, he's the guy doing the Charlie Ward book, whatever. And I listened to it when I finally got home. And again, I changed it up for every book just so, because it does bring back stuff. I want, it sounds stupid, like I want to get into like, when I listen to this, this is what I listen to.

• 1:28:46Anthony Pompliano?

  Yes.

• 1:28:47Speaker 05

  While I'm writing this, like, Life of Dad book, for some reason I was into like Dave Matthews from like college. I listened over and over like the same three songs. Whenever I hear it, I'm like, I finished that book. So in the Charlie Ward book, for the rest of it, when I got home, I was listening to like Beethoven's, not the fifth, like the big one, but it was like a background one. And every time I hear it, because it's in movies and all that, it takes me immediately back to that cafe. It's weird.

• 1:29:07Anthony Pompliano?

  I, um, the only time in my life that I have this like specific recollection is, uh, I was a catcher in baseball for like, uh, years and years and years. And one of the coaches was like, hey man, you should pitch. And I was like, uh, why? And he's like, well, there's like a two-way relationship here and you already got one side down. It's like, uh, so I remember being like, all right, fine. And for whatever reason, uh, I had like, remember the, uh, uh, kids now would be like old, old school, like boombox things or whatever. And we had got like a super cheap one or whatever. And we had, you put the CD in there and you like, put it kind of perfectly so that it doesn't fucking rock or anything. And the CD skips the whole thing.

• 1:29:44Anthony Pompliano?

  And, uh, Limp Bizkit had, uh, had come out and, uh, whatever the song was, and I just remember like, whenever I would hear that, I'd be like, I remember being in the backyard, fucking throwing a baseball, being like, well, the coach is stupid enough to put me up there. Like I better just not hit the, hit the batter. Like as long as I don't do that, I'll be good. And it is funny how like you do kind of through your life, have these sounds that always resonate and you remember like what you were doing when you either first heard it, or you heard it on, on repeat or whatever. Uh, and it's a cool way to bring those memories back.

• 1:30:12Speaker 05

  Yeah, I just had that with, so I drove up to, um, Tampa. For so Macho Man lived in Tampa the end of his life. And when he, when he died, he had a heart attack while driving his car and he crashed into a tree. And he'd already died, but it was like a pretty crazy moment like his, his wife was in the car like she had to pull the tree like they were going to oncoming traffic like she reached for the wheel because he's like a 220 pound dude who just like slumped over. And she hit this tree and this tree has become kind of like a de facto memorial memorial for Macho Man like, uh, so I always had to go visit it, see it. I want his house was close to there. I wanted to go get a feel for it. So I drove out with my daughter and you know, the deal was like, I let her come on the road trip with me and she just like, I just want to listen to my music like my brother, you know? Worst thing ever is I let them rotate songs in the car in the morning and it's just a fight. It's like Metallica and Taylor Swift just back to back jarring each other.

• 1:30:55Speaker 05

  So she just listened to Taylor Swift over and over and over again and Shake It Off like they take it off.

• 1:31:00Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 1:31:00Speaker 05

  And over on, and I would zone out without ever talking. And now it's all, it's been like a couple of weeks and as I'm writing like forever Taylor Swift Shake It Off. Well, for me will be linked to the Macho Man Randy.

• 1:31:11Anthony Pompliano?

  Obviously, what he would have listened to.

• 1:31:12Speaker 05

  He would have loved it. Yeah.

• 1:31:13Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah. The, the other piece, uh, that's like very fascinating to me about all of this is, uh, you write about sports or sports related topics, but you also have written a bunch of blogs and kind of articles and things like that. One of them I was reading and I literally was like, this is me and my brothers is 250. Which is a driveway game that you all, uh, created.

• 1:31:38Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:31:38Anthony Pompliano?

  And I'll put some context around this. So my daughter just got, um, uh, like a child basketball, uh, hoop. And so of course, you know, first thing I literally got put together. The second I was done putting it together, I got the ball and I said, Hey, come here. And she kind of waddled on over and I put it right underneath the basket and I dunked on her just to.

• 1:31:56Speaker 05

  Tom Hogg or windmill or just?

• 1:31:58Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, just don't stand under the rim. Like rule number one of life, don't stand under the rim. But I was explaining to my wife, I was like, look, if we had this in our house as a kid, like we would have made up a game. She's like, what do you mean? I'm like, well, if you see here on the tile, like, you know, the three tiles away would be certain points and like I started, and she was like, are you just fucking psychos? And I was like, I'm pretty sure every boy.

• 1:32:16Speaker 05

  Everyone.

• 1:32:16Anthony Pompliano?

  Who has a brother, something similar. And I was reading your piece and so 250 is a game you guys created.

• 1:32:22Speaker 05

  I'm so happy brothers, this is the greatest thing I'll ever write. No matter what I do ever, this is it because it touches on, I mean, I've had guys write me like, I'm crying as I'm writing this, like this brings back my older guys, maybe my son or whatever, something happened. So it's probably the piece that's resonated the most and it's the one that resonated the most with me. So growing up, as I have a younger brother and I have best friends, my dad and I are close. The three of us are very, very close and one of the games we came up with, you know, eventually, as you're doing on your daughter, like you just start working your dad, right? Like you're playing three, you know, two, two, we play, you know, hustle or 21, the three of us and friends would come over. But like, once you hit like 13, 14, 15, even if you're like, I think I'm in pretty good shape, but I'm pretty sure my son's 15, he's going to just be bodying me up and killing me.

• 1:33:01Anthony Pompliano?

  The first time you beat your dad, you're on.

• 1:33:03Speaker 05

  Right. And we literally are legends. Family is the same. Nobody is ever allowed to win. Like you win, you won by your own like grit and guts. Like nobody's ever like, oh, hey, I mean, and like, and to this day, like my son doesn't win unless I, unless like he wins wins. And so as we got older, like we'd start switching from like hustle and one-on-one or two-on-one, wherever we play. And my dad was never a great athlete, but an amazing eye-hand coordination.

• 1:33:24Anthony Pompliano?

  I think you said specifically in the piece that with the foul line, he couldn't jump over.

• 1:33:29Speaker 05

  Couldn't jump over the foul line.

• 1:33:31Speaker 05

  Yeah, he couldn't jump over the foul line, darts, pool, like anything where you're standing, eye-hand coordination was great. And so as we got older, like it became, we're going to even play horse anymore because we would all be too competitive and go all the way around. Or my brother and I would decide to play so far away that my dad just couldn't get it up there. He's like 45 or now that I'm almost at like 50, 55 years old, he couldn't reach.

• 1:33:49Anthony Pompliano?

  When you're a kid, by the way, you, you definitely like do all the things that your dad can't do. Like three dribbles with your right hand crossover, jump off your left foot and then like hook shot. And he's like, I can't even fucking remember this.

• 1:34:00Speaker 05

  All we would do is jump and touch the back with our left hand and lay up with the right. And he'd be like, I can't do this shit. Why? You know, I can't do this shit, you know? Every time my brother who could jump higher than me would then pull it on me and be like, I'm going to grab the rim and lay up. And they'd be like, I can't do this shit, right? So it was like, I was just an ever in a game. So we came up with this game. It's the perfect equalizer. Anyone who has a driveway hoop, daughter, son, I play, we play with both of them now. It's to 50, very simple rules. All you do is the first person to 50 wins, it's like baseball rules, you get up first, shoot till you miss. Next person goes, first person to get to 50 wins and you get your last ups.

• 1:34:30Anthony Pompliano?

  It's all like free throws.

• 1:34:32Speaker 05

  Free throws at the free throw line. That's all you do. It's perfect. Because you can do it after dinner, like everyone's just relaxed. You don't have to get sweaty. Just had a couple of cheeseburgers. You're hanging out. No big deal. And so we started playing this game my last year being home in high school. And my brother's three years younger, so he was a sophomore and then forever home every college. We played thousands and thousands of this game. And my dad, as he got older, the thing that used to kill us about this was he would always be like in his recliner inside watching like a Red Sox game or Seinfeld or whatever. And we'd like knock on the window like eight o'clock in the summer as the sun was going down. After we played like real games, we had to 50 and he'd come out. And it used to be so frustrating because he would come out in like Doc Siders. And my father, he's like six one, a husky guy. Again, not a great athlete, but I had, for some reason, he was gifted with an unbelievable ability to hit free throws.

• 1:35:19Speaker 05

  This guy who, who couldn't like do a jump shot, like could not like come around a screen, would stand up having not shot. He used to do this thing. Every time I could do it now, rub his hands and hit 25 in a row, 30 in a row, cold. And he used to be like, I don't need any warmups. And my brother, who was an excellent high school basketball player, captain of high school team, captain of his high school team, and then me just, okay. Would just, just be like so frustrated. And him and my brother would win all the time. I to this day have never won.

• 1:35:47Anthony Pompliano?

  You've never won?

• 1:35:48Speaker 05

  With my dad involved.

• 1:35:48Anthony Pompliano?

  Okay.

• 1:35:49Speaker 05

  On Christmas day, I beat my brother and both our sons in a legit to 50 game for like the first time I've ever beat my brother. I'm not a good.

• 1:35:57Speaker 05

  But my dad would probably win like 70% of the time.

• 1:35:59Anthony Pompliano?

  How pissed was your brother?

• 1:36:00Speaker 05

  This Christmas furious because it was the first time, our sons are both nine, they're two months apart. And it was the first time we all played. Me, he, me and him built his hoop at his house like the end of the summer. Kids weren't really old enough to play with a real ball from real foul line. They just got strong enough. And it was the first time for the record, we ever, the four of us played to 50. And I, and I won. And he was like, my brother's like an awesome athlete. It was very, very pissed off. So Craig, it's on posterity now. It's on the pop pod.

• 1:36:25Anthony Pompliano?

  Literally, I'm imagining my brother and I playing something where like, if I knew I was better than at it, they know too, right? And vice versa. And like, they won't admit it, but like, whatever. And then if in front of our kids, they beat me and now our kids think that like they're better.

• 1:36:41Speaker 05

  Yeah. Well, what's funny is we play that.

• 1:36:43Anthony Pompliano?

  I would sit there and make you play over and over and over again until they know, literally I am better than him.

• 1:36:48Speaker 05

  We play one on one every Friday morning.

• 1:36:50Anthony Pompliano?

  Still.

• 1:36:51Speaker 05

  Every Friday, right now, he lives 15 minutes from me. He drives over, we play in a court in my development. Every Friday morning, we play best of three, uh, games to 11. And since he's moved here a year and a half ago, I have not won. I win games all the time, 11, 12, 13, but I never, he just, he's an inch too tall than me, better basketball player. But we play all the time. And so, winning that game to 50, I was like, am I, um, this is my thing.

• 1:37:13Anthony Pompliano?

  But you're a good brother for this because like, my brothers and I, we, that, uh, tradition would end quickly. If like, one person didn't win.

• 1:37:21Speaker 05

  I know. I think it's an age thing. Like, I, I won, I beat him plenty of times growing up.

• 1:37:25Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 1:37:26Speaker 05

  It's just, I think I've reached the point where like, when I reached out for that third year, and our games, you know, some games he just mops for me, but like, most of the time, like, I'll win one, he'll win one, and the next one's a battle, but he can always just go down low, he's way better down low. And like, I just get cold at the wrong times, I'll foul the shit out of them, I'll do all the stuff I'm supposed to do. But, and I've come, I'm right there. It's not like, I mean, I win all the time, just not that third clinching game.

• 1:37:45Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 1:37:45Speaker 05

  So, winning the 50 game was amazing. But to the piece you're talking about, going back, so on the, so after playing for years, and I'd love everybody to read it, but on the final night, we're moving, I'm moving to LA, my brother's moving, uh, to LA, and, um, my parents are moving to Florida. So, the house is empty. We've lived there for 10, 12 years, and, uh, nothing's in the house. It's like, we're all leaving the next morning. The only thing out, and this is like a movie, I swear, but the basketball. No one had ever gone to 50, ever. My dad hit the 40s, maybe five or six times, got to 30s with like, what I would say is like startling regularity. Like, almost like 30, 32, 33, it was just a regular, like, Sunday night for my dad, which is ridiculous, because I couldn't get like, seven or eight, but my brother would get a couple and win. And so, last night, we're like, alright, we'll

• 1:38:29Speaker 05

  go, we decide, you always decide who go first, we ever had a random order. And my dad steps up, and just goes, and goes. And the piece, I really build it up, but like, I won't draw it out, but like, he goes and goes and goes. And he gets like, we're all sitting there thinking and we weren't, we weren't idly sitting there watching him. Like, we're doing all the little kid bullshit, all this with throwing it at his knees, like I'm whipping it at his chest. So he has to like, like hurts, like my brothers, you know, like, used to put a hex on the ball, like throw it like 30 feet in the air. So like, if you're on the foul line, you had to like move over to catch it and move over.

• 1:39:01Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, of course. Whenever to break the rhythm.

• 1:39:02Speaker 05

  And all of a sudden, he's like 33, 5, 40, 42. And all of a sudden, we're just like, no one's talking. And it's just like dribble, swish, dribble, swish. And then my brother and I are looking at each other. No one's saying like a, like a pitcher in a perfect game hits 50. And he stops and we're, my brother, of course, being who he is, is like, you gotta keep going. And I'm like, what do you mean? You got 50? He's like, I can get 51. I'm like, no one's ever come close. And my dad's like, he's right. And he went and I think he was 66 or 67, but it was the most, it was the last night in the house, most magical moment I've ever had in my whole life of sports. And like, I get tingles thinking about it. It made it best American sports writing. It was like an honor I mentioned in the book. And like every year I post on a Father's Day and every year it gets this influx of people reading it, whatever game they played on the driveway. And my brother hit like 10 or 12 in a row. I hit like seven or eight. So no, we didn't come close, but it was just

• 1:39:46Speaker 05

  like, last night, after all the years, he's, we call it slaying like the driveway dragon. Like, it was amazing. So thank you for bringing that up because it's probably one of my favorite stories of all time.

• 1:39:55Anthony Pompliano?

  You, you ever watched the movie, uh, Basketball?

• 1:39:58Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 1:39:58Anthony Pompliano?

  Right? So like, that's the, that's the movie I think of when you're playing driveway basketball with your brothers of like all the shit talking, all the things that you can do to distract them and like all this stuff. For those that haven't watched this, this ridiculous game, we literally recreated, uh, playing that game. Like, you know, you hit a shot, it's like a single, a double, a triple, like whatever, we're just inventing stuff.

• 1:40:19Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:40:19Anthony Pompliano?

  But like, if you recreate the game, that means that it opens up the complete approval to talk as much shit as possible to each other.

• 1:40:26Speaker 05

  Totally.

• 1:40:26Anthony Pompliano?

  And, uh, I remember literally more fights from that stuff than like anything else. So to not only have your dad hit 50.

• 1:40:36Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:40:37Anthony Pompliano?

  But to do it while you guys are talking shit, like no layups, no easy games, nothing, right?

• 1:40:41Speaker 05

  And I remember like, we would do that. My dad, you know, he was older, he had like a tricky back. Like, we would walk up and place the ball like one foot in front of his feet on the ground and walk away. Total dick move for like an older guy with a tricky back. So he has to step off the line. He has to move his foot position. He has to pick up the ball. And then it was just like boom, boom, boom, just a machine.

• 1:41:00Anthony Pompliano?

  I love it. Was he, was he, uh, did he appreciate the moment?

• 1:41:04Speaker 05

  It was like, it was like the natural and I'm saying it in the clearest sense. That's what, whatever that would have felt like in real life, if it happened when Hobbs hit this like, the ball hit the ground and it like snapped us out of a trance. Cause he hadn't moved in like 15 minutes. It was like, he was just there. And we all looked at each other and we had to do our turns. And then we just sat, like I remember sitting, we, our whole house had like steps going into like the front store, the front, the sides, we had a side door in the house by the driveway. And we just sat and it was like, this weight was just, you could feel the moment. I'm looking at the sky. I'm like, I'm gonna like, there was no cell phones. You couldn't just take a picture of the three of us after the moment like, but I could, in my head, like I know exactly what that moment felt like. I remember it clearly. I can picture the ball, the hoop, like the, the square was gone. It was so faded. Like it tilted a little to the left. I remember every nuance of that and of that night.

• 1:41:49Speaker 05

  And then I did the piece, um, it was, I think we were trying to, the anniversary of it, but I did it for Father's Day. For my, like, you know, what do you get my dad? Every dad has what they need for the most part. And I published it and didn't tell them. And I asked my mom on the side, like, you have pictures of us playing basketball? I know we don't have any from that night. And so I got it and got this, uh, this cool blog that used to compete with, uh, Grantland for Yahoo Sports. It was called The Post Game, who I used to write for. And I was like, I want to use Father's Day piece for my dad. And they were like, oh, yeah, sure. And I'd already written a bunch for them. And so we posted and all I did was just send the link and like, waterworks and he shared it with, it actually went, I don't know viral is the word, but like amongst people who cared about this stuff.

• 1:42:23Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah.

• 1:42:23Speaker 05

  Like it just got picked up and it was this little goofy story that got into this, like the best American sports anthology, which is not the whole piece, but like a mention of it. And, uh, it's just one of those things that I'm so glad I wrote forever. And now as you bring it up full circle a month ago, like we're playing now with our kids and it's just, hopefully it's a through line that for, you know, hundreds of years, Finkel are battling into 50.

• 1:42:42Anthony Pompliano?

  Your, your kids are going to be like, I gotta win.

• 1:42:45Speaker 05

  Yeah. And when, and when they do, they'll have legitimately beat us.

• 1:42:48Anthony Pompliano?

  Like if your dad has the flex factory, you have to care about winning.

• 1:42:53Speaker 05

  My son's version will come in, he'll like just show up one day and bench like 325 and be like, what?

• 1:42:58Anthony Pompliano?

  It's easy. You just sit down and just press it.

• 1:43:00Speaker 05

  Well, yeah, that's totally, dad, you just, all you have to do is take the weight and just put it off your chest. I don't know what the problem is.

• 1:43:09Anthony Pompliano?

  I do not want to have smart ass kids.

• 1:43:12Speaker 05

  It actually is great because like you just, you know, when you, I know your wife, my wife didn't like, like it's just seeing go through like, I know. I know everything he's thinking like it's not the, the modern version, but you just know what's going through his head because it all went through. Your head, you know what he thinks is funny. Like he just says balls all the time now because it's funny. And I remember, I remember like. Being yelled at like, stop saying balls. Like, why? It's funny. Cause it is funny. A kid just like, what are you doing? Balls? Ah, it's funny. I don't know. I don't tell you.

• 1:43:43Anthony Pompliano?

  But like, I think I appreciate that stuff so much more now as to like. The kids who were doing all that stuff, like basically end up one of two ways, like they end up really successful and like they work hard. They like figured out whatever. And then obviously there's some that kind of, you know, end up in jail or whatever. But like, there's very much this like. Okay. You are not going to end up as like the mid-level manager of an accounting firm at like, you know, middle of nowhere, uh, Kansas. Right? Like you are going to get one of the extreme outcomes.

• 1:44:12Speaker 05

  There's a creativity of element that, that my son has and my daughter had, my daughter like, she like displays like her abilities more. She's a very like caring person. I could see her being a vet or something along those lines. Like. Who knows? But my son is like at that creative thing that like you see in people when you look back on what they're going to come up with of like entrepreneur or whatever. Like he just makes up stuff. Which is what I did all the time. Like he has his own exit. Like when he leaves for school or WWF, you picture like whatever the guys say. He'll say like, he goes, he goes, I brush my teeth. I comb my hair and I'm going to walk out the door like, oh, I don't care. And he goes. Dude, it's the coolest thing ever. Like when you, if you were 12.

• 1:44:49Anthony Pompliano?

  Where did you learn that?

• 1:44:50Speaker 05

  Yeah, just came up with it.

• 1:44:52Anthony Pompliano?

  I, uh, uh, my wife and I have talked about what's the number one thing we want to teach our daughter and it's decision-making. But the second thing kind of like, like a one A to me maybe is, um. Some people would call it negotiating. I think of it as like the, the bullshit ability, right? Like the shit talking ability. Because if you're able to do that, I've always thought that like, that's basically what you do all day long. Right? And the people that I see get the most stuff done. Whether they are negotiating with. With people they work with, whether it's people they run into in life, whether it's a business, like just all throughout their entire day, they're bullshitting.

• 1:45:26Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 1:45:26Anthony Pompliano?

  Right? And not in like a negative connotation where they're like making stuff up, lying, like whatever, but just like, it's like this like, street level version of negotiating.

• 1:45:34Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:45:34Anthony Pompliano?

  That ends up getting you stuff. And I think like a lot of it is if you're, you know, if you're doing that, walking to school, like you probably are doing some stuff at school where you're negotiating in the cafeteria.

• 1:45:43Speaker 05

  Yeah, he's a kid who's gonna like bring the like kind bars from home and sell them at lunch or something.

• 1:45:47Anthony Pompliano?

  Hundred percent.

• 1:45:47Speaker 05

  We have a, he has a super, a super drink snack stand that we set up by the basketball court in the summers to make money. Like, he just has that thought. And I think what you said is a hundred percent true. There's, you know, you sit around in the, in the, in the world of writing, like you'll sit around a, a magazine writing session room and you look around when you're in your twenties, like I wonder, is he gonna write the movie he said he was gonna write? Is this guy gonna run the magazine or start the thing that they're gonna start? And so much of the things that end up happening are just because you just talked about it and talked to the people about wanting to do it. And I remember talking about wanting to do my first book and I was just like looking for an athlete like that had a moment that I had had some relationship with that I could reach out legitimately and say, you know, and I always, when I mentor a lot of younger writers, like, do something small with someone and do a great job, especially in writing or anything creative, but probably in any field.

• 1:46:31Speaker 05

  And then hit him, like if they're happy with it, bide your time, set up, we did this, this was great. Here's how we can take it to the next level. And here's why I think it would be good for both of us. And that was me. I did a piece on like helping guys get their vertical up with Nate Robinson. And it was great. We happened to talk on the phone. We got along, you know, called up again when the article came out, did well. It just happened to be that spring when some people remember, but like for about a month, he was like the most talked about guy in basketball. Like he outdueled LeBron in the Heat. He was playing on the, the, uh, the, uh, the, uh, what's it called? The Bulls lost Derrick Rose and he was the guy and he was scoring like 24 in the fourth quarter, had two comeback wins against the Nets. And it was amazing. And then they got eliminated because, you know, ultimately they weren't that good.

• 1:47:12Speaker 05

  But about, I emailed him after, congratulated him on the run, emailed his agent like, hey, this, we should, you know, this was great. We should capitalize. And then I put the article together with, and I still have the email of like, you know, there's not many guys that have won three Dunn contests that have, uh, played football and basketball in college, that are five eight, that played for the Knicks, that, that did what you just did. Like this is a great culmination to like a real success story. I'd love to write the book. And you know, if you don't have that ability to have that conversation and know how to place into to think creatively of how can I take something that will be a win for him because he talked about he'd always want to write a book. It was like a dream thing for him. And I even want to write books in general. And I thought of other athletes, but it was just the perfect situation. And we did it. And so when I think of my son and how he

• 1:47:55Speaker 05

  just thinks of these things, I can see him on some level and my daughter too, in different aspects of like, there's an angle there. And I'm not just going to think about it. I'm going to talk to the guy who's doing it and figure out a way for

• 1:48:05Anthony Pompliano?

  You have to be crazy enough to think that you could actually do it. Like you thought that he may say yes, so you ask.

• 1:48:09Speaker 05

  Yeah, I didn't know. I mean, he did it. We talked on the phone. And, and the reason I thought he'd say yes was because like, when you, when I do those emails and anyone listening, trying to pitch things, I think the key is to like, start off with why it'd be awesome for them. Like, a lot of people don't even know, I started the email, like, you know, about 80% of Nate Robinson's fans have no idea he was Mr. Basketball and Mr. Football. I bet you 80%, 90% of the people have no idea that he could have played at USC on the championship teams with Matt Leinart, Lyndale White, and Reggie Bush, but chose to stay home because he wanted to help build the program. Like, no one knows this stuff. And I think they should know that he's not just some short guy who's got crazy hops, but here's all the things that he did. And I'd love to help him tell the story because I enjoyed working with him so much on the basketball piece. That

• 1:48:51Speaker 05

  is the most airtight pitch you can give anybody for anything. Right? And if you can do that in any field, but it works for books especially well, they can picture it. Yeah, no one does know that. 90% of the people and the fans who see me in the basketball court don't know these things. And it's my job to let them know these things about me. And a book is perfect for that. And so that's how that came about. And it's all from that ability to think and talk a little bit different than other people.

• 1:49:14Anthony Pompliano?

  Stand out.

• 1:49:16Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:49:16Anthony Pompliano?

  That's it. Where can we send people to get the books?

• 1:49:18Speaker 05

  Uh, my website is johnfinkel.com. At john underscore finkel on Twitter is where I post about everything I do. A lot of, I have a lot of pictures from a lot of stuff. I have Batista putting me in a headlock from all my muscle fitness stuff that I used to do and like, all the, you know, book signings, anything they do, put a lot of stuff out there. And, you know, if you're into Macho Man, that's the big one I'm working on now. And I put updates there too. And then go on there and sign up for Books and Biceps. It is like, every single person who likes, uh, you know, has a friend who works out, but also reads, that's me. That's your guy.

• 1:49:46Anthony Pompliano?

  Books and Biceps is very good. I highly suggest people, uh, sign up for that. And then when is the, uh, Macho book coming out?

• 1:49:51Speaker 05

  So Macho comes out next spring, actually. We're, uh, about halfway through getting, uh, the writing done. So there's

• 1:49:56Anthony Pompliano?

  You're gonna make people wait a whole year for this.

• 1:49:58Speaker 05

  I'm gonna wait a whole year. I'll come back. I'll bring the book. We'll, we'll jump off the top ropes and we'll talk about it.

• 1:50:03Anthony Pompliano?

  Awesome. Well, listen, thank you so much for taking the time to do this. I really enjoyed it. We'll definitely do it again in the future.

• 1:50:07Speaker 05

  Yeah, man. Thanks for having me.