Joe Thomas on Skipping The Draft, Being The NFL's Iron Man & Reviewing Real Life “Quidditch” | EP 136

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The show sponsored by Liquid IV.

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Brunch is really the best meal.

There's nothing better than a good brunch.

I'm a basic bitch.

I like brunch.

You're getting a

mimosa, yeah.

More of a Bloody Mary got.

You look like you just fucking house those things.

It represents you very well.

If you were a drink, you'd probably be a Bloody Mary.

Thick, a little too much spice sometimes.

Salty.

Very salty.

You have the right amount of me.

It's good, and you're happy about it.

You have too much of me.

You're like, okay, I got to get the foil of these fucking Bloody Marys.

Hey,

welcome back to New Heights, a wondrous show produced by Wave Sports Entertainment and brought to you by Suave Men.

No nonsense.

Self-care for men.

That's what Suave says.

That's what they're selling to you people.

It's good.

We're your host.

I'm Travis Kelsey.

This is my big brother Jason Kelsey out of Cleveland Heights, Ohio, Cincinnati Bearcat alum.

Subscribe on YouTube, Wondery Plus, wherever you get your podcast and follow the show on all social media at New Heights Show with 1s.

Jason!

Ha ha!

Did you eat breakfast today?

I did.

I did.

Nice.

He's in a good mood.

Let the people know what we got coming up.

We got another great episode for you guys coming up right now.

We're first going to get to the regular episode that we always give you guys.

A little bit of new news, bringing back New Heights Film Club.

Uh-oh.

A little NFL draft that's happening tomorrow.

Oh, shit.

The draft is happening.

Well, unless some type of hurricane or natural disaster starts to strike Green Bay, in which case,

they'll probably just pivot to New York City.

But yeah, anyways, yes, the draft is happening tomorrow.

And we're going to get into it with an incredible guest, Mr.

Joe Thomas.

Oh, yeah.

Two Cleveland professional sports guys back to back.

Love him, man.

Right there.

That's a son of a buck, I know.

Before we jump into it, we are going to talk a little bit about Easter weekend.

That's right.

We have...

Potentially the greatest tweet ever tweeted on Easter Day.

What the fuck?

This is the best thing ever.

This is so fucking dumb.

Listen, we don't give Jesus enough shout outs for taking one for the team if we're all

the epitome of taking one for the team.

He died for our sins.

Best leader out there, yeah.

He did.

And then he rose three days later with a giant double bird as he scented.

There's no other way he didn't come out like that, right?

He's straight out of that freaking tube.

Yeah.

Like he had to, there had to be like some Ray Lewis or WWE.

Like he didn't just walk out there with his sandals with no swag.

Like you rise after three days, you're coming out there with the greatest freaking entrance of all time.

Somebody broke some glass and he just rose out of the ground.

Out of nowhere.

They had a guitar back then.

They just

slammed a bottle of wine down.

He's got a table.

Here comes Jesus with the table.

I don't believe what I just saw.

This is epic.

Yeah, this shot, this

old tweet, famously old tweet from Travis Kelsey, happy Easter to all.

Shout out to Jesus for taking one for the team.

My favorite part of it is the ha at the end.

Yeah, well, I didn't.

I wanted to make sure everybody knew I was having a good time joking about this, but I couldn't take it too serious.

He died for our sins so that we can sin without having any type of

ramifications for it.

Yeah, and we get school off.

It's a holiday.

It's no school.

Was that why this was tweeted?

Of course.

I thought it was like a realization that this guy died for our sins.

It's a free day.

It was just about the free day.

That's so good.

That's great.

Wait, no, Easter's on Sunday.

Yeah, but usually you'll get an Easter Monday sometimes.

Our girls are off Easter Monday.

Oh, Good Friday.

That's what it was, yeah.

All righty, and now it's time for new news.

New news.

New news, we're bringing it back.

That's right.

New Heights Film Club brought to you by Reese's and their new peanut butter and jelly cups.

Holy shit.

PB and Jelly.

Peanut butter and jelly cups.

What color?

What flavor jelly?

Did I, Guys, did you guys give me some of these?

Why don't we have these?

Yeah, I want to be able to try these.

You gave us all the other Reese's.

Have they came out yet?

Could somebody answer me who's in charge of our brand placement stuff?

I'm trying.

I'm sure they're on their way.

I'm sure the good people at Reese's are shipping them as we speak.

It's grape jelly, by the way.

It's grape jelly?

Grape?

Well, I'm a grape jelly guy.

There we go.

Are you a grape jelly?

Are you a strawberry jelly guy, Brandon?

Grape.

So this is where I do think there's better than grape.

Blackberry is very good.

You know what's very underrated is

raspberry jam.

Poisonberry.

Raspberry jam.

Raspberry has like a nice tartness to it.

I don't even like raspberries.

Don't like raspberry juice, cranberry, or whatever the fuck that shit is.

But raspberry jam, goddamn, it's got just a really nice tartness to it.

It's very good.

Do you have a grandfather clock?

No.

But I do want to get one.

That noise was a grandfather clock.

I mean, it's trash.

We had one growing up.

I know what a grandflock is.

I was like, that was a grandfather clock.

We never wound it, though, so it never went off.

Oh, it did for a little bit.

It worked for a while until we stopped bumping into it.

It still works.

Does it?

Yes.

Is that the original grandfather clock that I just heard?

No, Jason, I'm not.

All right.

We are way off topic.

New Heights Film Club.

We're back.

92% is we do need some help picking movies as always.

Listen, it's the offseason.

It is the offseason.

We got to find ways.

we got to find ways to keep busy you know what i mean football there's the draft coming up this week thank god there's something to talk about so we got the draft after that you know i think we're in the middle of baseball season baseball season there's great playoffs happening right now nba nhl nhl shout out to cleveland there we go let's go calves baby one and oh hopefully get two and oh tonight yep that'd be big so i thought we were going to choose between baseball movies or sports movies in general i kind of like limiting it to baseball movies to start then maybe going sports movies.

Yeah.

Let's go baseball first.

Does that sound good?

Yeah, let's go baseball.

Let's give them, let's do our top four.

It's baseball season.

Spring is here.

Sun's out.

Feels like baseball time.

What are we got to narrow it down to four?

Do we go with iconic movies or do we go with movies that would be fun to re-watch ones that we might not have seen since we've been older?

Because I mean, like, Sand Lot's the greatest baseball movie of all time.

That and Major League, to me, are the top two.

Major League, God damn, Major League is so good.

Fuck, Major League is good.

Yeah, it is.

Completely different films, but both very good.

Another movie that was really awesome, and I'd be curious to watch it now that I'm older, is Bold Durham.

Because I feel like I was too young

to really comprehend it.

It'd be fun to re-watch it.

I'd fucking love that one from the get-go.

Oh, I loved it.

I'm not saying I didn't love it, but I think it's one of those movies you're going to watch now as an adult, then you're going to think it's like 10 times funnier or like better because you're going to be able to relate more to the characters and what they're going through.

Field of Dreams.

I mean, I don't know if there's a better feel-good movie than Field of Dreams.

Yeah.

League of Their Own.

Oh, man.

League of Their Own sneaky.

Tom Hanks.

As two siblings, as two siblings, I think,

you know, Dottie

prevails for most of the movie and then loses it at the end to the younger sister whose name escapes me now.

But if we're being honest, Dottie dropped the ball on purpose, right?

I guess, yeah.

Do you think that happened?

No, it couldn't have.

Do you think she did?

They don't really tell you.

I like movies that don't leave it up for interpretation.

Well, I mean, yeah, she literally let the ball go out of her hand at the end.

Well, I mean, catchers, people drop balls all the time.

Yeah, well, maybe she was mask on catching up.

That's actually illegal now.

You can't do that.

Well, yeah, well, it wasn't then.

Just like Brian Dawkins taking off people's heads over the middle.

That was legal then.

No crying in baseball.

There is crying.

There is crying in New Heights.

No crying in baseball is crying in New Heights.

Bad News Bears is another one we might want to throw up there.

Which one?

Which one are you going?

You're going Billy Bob or are you going Original?

Probably Billy Bob.

Yeah, the Billy Bob one is electric.

Yeah.

So which four are we going with?

You said Bull Durham, so we'll do Bull Durham.

Field of Dreams.

Can only throw that one in there.

No.

League of Their Own?

League of Their Own.

Bull Durham, League of Their Own.

Two very similar movies.

Cool.

Do we go Major League?

Yeah, throw Major League in there for the fun shit.

The Rookie's a great one, but again, it's, you know, it's another one that's like real.

Rookie of the Year is hilarious.

I haven't seen that one in a long time.

So, Rookie of the Year is the one where he actually pitches.

What's the one where he just takes over the team as like a GM, but doesn't actually play?

Do you remember that one?

It was another one that was just like fucking so stupid.

But it was great.

I say either Sandlot or Rookie of the Year.

Which one?

Little Big League was the one I was thinking.

Sandlot or Rookie of the Year.

If it's between those two, it's Sandlot.

I mean, as much as I think Rookie of the Year is great, Sandlot's the iconic movie of baseball.

And they tried to recreate it, which, I mean, big mistake.

You can't recreate a movie like that.

Like, who's playing Chunk?

Like, or I'm sorry, who's playing?

Yeah, I know.

Wrong movie, Jason.

Yeah, you can't recreate that movie.

I think that's it.

I think it's Sandlot, Bull Durham, League of Their Own, Major League.

That's a good four to choose from.

I love it.

I'm excited to watch any of these.

I haven't seen them in a while.

Let's hear it, 92%ers.

We're going to drop this poll on social for you guys to vote, and we'll let you know when that review is coming.

Once again, New Heights Film Club is brought to you by Reese and their new peanut butter and jelly cups.

Can't wait to try those out.

All right, now we got some more new news.

Jason discovered televised Quidditch.

That's right.

Jason's a big harry potter guy he uh read every book i think uh when he was little um and uh they weren't all out when i was little i started reading when i was little progressed to being a full-grown adult reading children's books yes

well you were tweeting uh that espn news had quiddage games on tv this is correct they did have so they were calling it quad ball i firmly against it being called quad ball that's quidditch.

What's happening was

they had a stick between their legs.

Do you know what quidditch is?

No, but it sounds like hobby horsing.

It was the exact same thing as hobby horsing, just now they're playing a game with a ball.

And instead of pretending like they're riding horses, they're pretending like they're riding brooms.

So Quidditch, you play it on brooms in the wizarding world, and then there's three rings.

You try and throw the quaffle through one of the rings, and that gets you points.

Okay.

There are

two balls that are like they try and attack you.

And there's guys called beaters with bats that hit the balls at you.

Trying to remember what those balls are called.

Beaters, bruisers, brown?

Anyways, those balls are kind of like you're hitting them at them with baseball bats.

Bludgers, bludgers.

All right.

The last bit of Quidditch is really

there's also goaltenders protecting these rings.

There is a little thing called a snitch, which is a golden ball with wings, and it flies around.

it's really hard to catch and there is a seeker for each team that tries to catch the snitch if you catch a snitch i forget it's like 100 points or something like that so basically who in the in the real quid it's whoever catches the snitch wins the game most frequently so it has nothing to do so you why do people even try and throw in the rings well there is like a little bit of if you're over 100 points you would be in a conundrum of if you're losing you wouldn't want to catch the snitch because the game's over if the snitch is caught if you catch a snitch, you'll get 100 points, but you'll still be losing points-wise.

It's just usually that wasn't the case in the books.

Usually, Harry just caught the snitch and he won the game.

The real-life version of this has men and women.

It is a,

what's that called when men and women play the same sport?

Um, co-ed.

It's a co-ed sport, they have a stick between their legs.

Big problem I had was that it was not an actual broom.

If we're going to do this make-believe stuff and bring it to life, I want a real broom, wizard clothes.

I don't want regular jerseys and a make-believe stick.

Yeah, if we're going to LARP, you got to go full go.

Exactly.

Somebody responded and said that the bristles were causing like chafing or irritation.

Don't give a fuck.

That's something you got to deal with.

Wear some fucking compressor shorts.

I don't know.

Yeah, I don't want to hear that nonsense.

Put a goddamn broom between your legs.

Otherwise, what are we even doing?

Right?

They still had the coffle.

People were throwing that through.

Goaltender.

Instead of the beaters beating with bats, they had the balls.

They were playing dodgeball, right?

So they could just hit people with the ball whenever they wanted to, which was pretty fun.

The funniest goddamn part of this whole thing, the snitch, was just a person with a yellow shirt on and the word snitch written down his clothes.

And he had a towel in the back.

And in order to catch the snitch, you had to get the towel off of the guy's back, the flag.

Do you get 100 points for grabbing somebody's towel?

Well, it was different in quad ball or real life quiditch made-up word.

You only get 30 points.

So the snitch is worth way less so not as not as fun

i think if i played i i'd get that snitch in a heartbeat that guy was struggling he was getting like passed off the guy the seeker that was trying to get it was just getting pass blocked and he like had no moves like dude

you got to get a little swim and a fucking get his hands off of you it was embarrassing he was getting it took him a long time to get that snitch you sat here and watched this honestly it was the most fun i've had watching a sport in a long time it was fantastic and i want to participate Yeah.

All right.

But we're going real broom.

I'm going Nimbus

2000.

I think it's Nimbus 2000.

What is that?

Don't worry.

It's a really good broom.

It's the best.

Oh, nice.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So anyways, that's what I did this weekend while I was watching ESPN.

Jason, not a joke.

You have been invited to quad ball nationals happening in Richmond, Virginia.

I mean, listen, I don't know when it is, but if I can make it, that's not that far.

I would love to potentially play.

Is there like an exhibition before the Nationals game that I can partake in?

I would love to try and get out there on a broom and see what I can do.

I've always wanted to play.

Sweet, nerd.

All right, here we go.

April 26th, 27th.

So

get ready.

It's like two weeks.

Yeah.

It's pretty soon.

It's coming.

That's this weekend.

Yeah.

And the last bit of new news would be.

Unfortunately, I won't be able to make it.

Thank you to everyone who voted for the 2025 Webby Awards, New Heights took home, the award for best video series, and was honored for

best co-host.

So there we go.

Nice.

So we aren't really the talent here.

Our editing team is the talent here.

So thank you guys for voting.

And shout out to

our team that edits all the video stuff because you guys just want a Webby.

And that does it for new news.

Hey,

let's get to this Joe Thomas interview.

Cleveland's finest.

He's not from Cleveland, but he is Cleveland's finest.

I mean, he was there for long enough.

He counts.

Wisconsin's finest.

Yay!

There he is.

Joe Taylor.

What a warm welcome, my friend.

Yeah, looking good.

What's up, dude?

What's up, guys?

How are we doing today?

Jason's trying his hardest to pull off the Joe Thomas, have a Hall of Fame career, and then just turn into an action figure afterwards, dude.

Dude, look at that guy.

You've made me extraordinarily jealous with them guns showing up on my screen.

I'm going to call the cops here in a second.

This is dangerous.

Holy shit.

So good.

What you got going on?

Not much.

Just out at the farm today, you know, doing the cattle thing,

hanging out and enjoying some beautiful weather, getting ready for heading up to Green Bay for the draft.

So, nice, busy week.

Nice.

Yeah, baby.

Well, let's talk about it.

Love that.

Let's do it.

Let's talk.

All right, here we go.

Jason.

All righty, our guest today is NFL Hall of Famer from Brookfield, Wisconsin.

Tight-time Pro Bowler, sixth-time first-team all-pro, NFL 2010s all-decade team, a member of the Cleveland Browns Ring of Honor, and the record holder for most consecutive snaps played with 10,363.

God damn, 92%.

Please welcome NFL legend, Mr.

Joe Taliban.

What's up, guys?

Hey, hey, hey, hey, thank you for having me on.

It's a true pleasure to be here with Cleveland's two finest gentlemens of all time.

I'm so happy to be here and have a chance to chat it up with my boys.

We have got a little bit of a long history together.

So this is great that we get a chance to chill and uh hopefully those guns that you're showing me here on the screen jason don't jump through and shoot me i'd like to make it to the draft this weekend so i know

i know you're being funny here but you're covers up you got some guns under there i know you do oh yeah yeah baby how much how much weight did you lose right away when you retired yeah so watching a bunch of guys that had done it before me i knew like hey i'm either going to lose this weight right now or i'm going to go the other way and be like 400 pounds so i lost like like 60 pounds i think in the first six months after i retired 60 pounds golly

and you did that keto right i think i remember talking to you before yeah yeah we chatted a little bit uh after you retired and um i i was like hey what's the fastest way to do it you know i talked to our nutritionists a bunch in cleveland and uh you know reading online trying to figure out okay you know how do i do this quickly because i would like to feel better a big reason why i retired uh even though i tore my tricep my last season it was really because i had a real bad knee And the doctor was like, hey, man, you need to lose some weight.

And for every pound you lose, it's basically three less pounds that goes through that knee.

So the faster you can get it off, the better that knee is going to feel.

And I felt horrible, like walking down the stairs on my butt, like going backwards.

Like I was, I was hurting a lot.

Oh, man.

I think I only practiced like three times my last season in the NFL because I just couldn't do it.

Right.

So I wanted that knee to feel better.

So it was easy to get that weight off quick.

Well, that's what 10,000 snaps in the NFL consecutive will do to you.

I mean, it's going to be hard on the joints.

Yeah.

So does the knee feel good now?

It's great.

Yeah.

It was weird because, you know, just playing left tackle, you get like very specific joint issues playing for sort of offset.

You know, one leg forward.

Yeah, exactly.

Always turning like that.

So I have like bulging discs all on the right side of my back.

I've got, I just had my right hip replaced and my left knee, the outside of my left knee was really like shredded cheese.

So that was really the issue that was causing all sorts of pain was just being in that stance, that stance that I always kind of had with my left leg really tucked up under it.

And so now that I don't do those left tackle things anymore, like I can function very normally and my knee feels great.

Fuck you.

Did you just say you had your right hip replaced?

Yeah, like three weeks ago.

What?

Why?

What happened?

Already back working on the farm.

This guy's fine.

Yeah, football.

Hey, the cattle ain't the same for anybody, man.

How does it feel?

It's feeling great, actually.

Like, I did a couple posts on my Instagram because, you know, a lot of people have hip problems and they're kind of putting off the hip replacement.

But all the players that I talked to that had gotten hip replacements early in their 40s were like, dude, do it right now because it's like three, four weeks.

You'll be back on your feet.

You'll be doing most of the normal stuff six weeks about perfect health.

And you will never look back because, really, basically, the rest of your life, you'll never have to deal with those hip problems that you had.

So it's been even better than I kind of anticipated.

Day one, walking around, and now I'm three weeks out and chasing after cattle a little bit and chasing the kids at home.

So it's been awesome.

Hell yeah.

Let's go, baby.

Let's go back to where it started.

Well, I guess where the NFL started.

You mentioned you were going to the draft in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

Wisconsin Badger himself says the draft is tomorrow.

What was your draft day like?

We know you jumped on the water, you went fishing with the family, right?

I remember that day in 2007, watching because Cleveland was our, like back in 2007, was our team.

You know what I mean?

That's our pride and joy right there.

So we knew the story and everything, but tell us a little bit about why you did the

boat and instead of going to New York City and how fun it was to be on the water.

Yeah, you guys were in short pants there back in Cleveland with your full old bronze gear on.

Hell yeah.

Yeah, it was awesome.

So I really never had grown up watching the draft because, you know, when I was a kid, like the draft, maybe it was on TV, but I couldn't find it.

I mean, I didn't have cable, so I never watched the draft and dreamed of that moment.

Of course, as a kid, I wanted to play in the NFL, but to me, the draft was just like getting the answer, you know, the results of your test in science class where it's like, hey, you either did a good job or you didn't do a good job.

And then, you know, this is where your life's going to go from there.

And so I always had a tradition on Saturdays as a kid growing up that I would go fishing with my dad.

Like, that was our thing.

That was our time together.

So cool, man.

And you go through the whole pre-draft process, right?

So you got the combine and the workouts and you do all these things you don't have a whole lot of time for regular life and then the draft comes and you have a very very small window before they whisk you away to whatever team drafts you and you got otas and minicamp and you go right into training camp so this is like your only little window to reconnect with family and friends before you're pretty much uh deep disconnected for like a year right and so i always had it in my mind like hey i got a little time i'm gonna go fishing like i don't have to be anywhere right now he's in the barn as far as training and stuff so i I was going to go fishing.

And then at that time, they invited five players to the draft.

So they would kind of pick the top five guys that they thought.

It was only five.

Only five, right?

Wow.

Very interesting.

And so I didn't even really think about like, hey, they might ask me to come.

I knew I was going to be a high draft pick, but Bill Brandt, the Hall of Fame scout from the Dallas Cowboys, he was in charge at that time of being able to decide, all right, you know, who's going to go to the draft, who's coming, right?

So he calls me up and he's like, hey, Joe, congratulations.

I want to let you know that you're going to be going to New York for the draft.

You know, we'll get somebody in touch that can do the logistics, but we want you to fly out there like on Wednesday, and then you got this thing to do and that thing to do.

Make sure you get a couple pairs of suits, and uh, and then like Saturday is the big day, and you can be, you know, bring a couple of your family members and get to go on stage with Roger Goodnell and all this stuff.

And he was hyping it up, like, I was going to be all excited.

And there was a big pause on the phone, and I was just like, Hey, bad news, Gil, but I already got plans on Saturday.

I'm going fishing with my dad.

I'm going fishing.

He was like, wait, wait a minute.

Nobody's ever said no to the draft.

He didn't even comprehend it just the way I didn't comprehend ever going to the draft.

And I think he was like, all right, just a minute.

I'll be right back to you.

And I think he probably like called up the people in the draft.

And, you know, at that time, they were trying to make a big show out of it.

Right.

So they needed the actors to show up for the show.

Oh, yeah.

And so he calls back the next time and he's like, hey, Joe,

I know you said you have plans, but we really need you there.

You know, we got the TV there.

You got an opportunity to market yourself, get your face out there to NFL fans and corporations where you can, you know, do some stuff and start making some money.

And I go, hey, Gil, I'm an offensive lineman.

I don't exactly think that I'm going to make any money marketing or endorsements.

Have you looked at me?

I'm like, if I make money in the NFL, it's for how I play.

So thank you for the offer, but I'm really not interested.

So he was, again, taken aback.

So then he calls back like a day later and he's like, hey, you know, we really need you there.

Like some scouts have been talking that you're a prima donna, that you don't want to go to the draft.

That you're going to hurt your draft style.

And at that point,

the prima donna from Wisconsin.

Exactly.

I'm like, okay.

The prima donna going fishing with his dad.

Sorry, I don't want to spend some time with my dad.

I went to the damn dude.

Get the fuck out of here.

That's such a joke.

So he's like trying to play that.

And you guys know how it is.

Like us as athletes, I think generally like we try to be kind people because we were always the biggest kid in the class.

You know, we didn't want to like beat anybody up, get in trouble, you know, unless we had to.

But when we had to, like, we were going to throw some shit down and then it was going to happen.

And now all of a sudden, it's like, fuck, fuck me, fuck you.

You know, so I was like, all right, I'm definitely not fucking going because you're trying to pull this prima donna shit.

And so, like, sure.

Don't even call me back.

I'm not interested.

Like, don't waste my time anymore.

I don't want to waste your time.

So I called my agent and I'm like, look, I'm not going.

And he's like, well, I totally get it.

It's no problem.

But we just need to make sure whatever you do that day, you need to have self-service because we need to be able to call you.

It's important.

As you guys remember, maybe on your draft day, I think you probably did.

Like they want to call you and talk and just make sure, have you been arrested?

Make sure you haven't gotten hurt and nothing's happened last second.

Yeah.

Exactly.

Like everybody, not everybody, a lot of people party a little bit, you know, the night before their draft.

They got family, friends or whatever.

They want to make sure everything is the same.

You know, you're not in handcuffs.

You know, nothing's happened.

And so I was like, all right, I can make that concession.

I'll fish close enough to the cell phone towers that I think

and I can talk to the whoever drafts me.

And so he's like, okay, great.

I'll handle it from here.

Like, you don't need to stress about this anymore.

And so, like, I didn't hear from him for a while, like, a few weeks.

And my agent, he handled it, Peter Schaefer, did a great job.

And then, like, finally, I think Gil came around and understood, like, he ain't coming to the draft.

So I finally got a call, like, hey, I'm sorry about that.

You know, don't worry.

You don't have to come to the draft.

It's okay.

You can go fishing with your dad.

And it was kind of like he was trying to smooth things over.

So that's the story.

I ended up going fishing with my dad, got drafted third overall by the Browns.

And the ironic thing about it all was I I was doing it just to spend time with my dad, get away from the cameras and stuff, and like didn't want to make a deal about it or a big story.

But now it's like every time the draft comes up, that's what people want to talk about.

The funny thing is, is that this made so much more headlines for the NFL doing this than going to that.

Like,

how relatable is, and first of all, like.

Do you know how much this entrenched you right away in Cleveland?

Like, Midwest Tower drafted you.

And it's like, this dude's going fishing with his dad and telling New York to fuck off.

Yeah.

Sign us up for this guy right now.

This is so relatable for so many people out there, right?

Like, this guy's having the pinnacle of his entire athletic career is about to happen.

He's about to realize his dream and play in the NFL.

And how is he going to do it?

He's going to do

he's going to have a moment with his dad fishing and doing something that he's loved his whole life and stay true to his roots.

So good on you.

How was the day, though?

What'd we catch?

Did what we catch?

Was the waters good by the cell towers or were we,

you know,

we made it work?

You know

the humble brag in me says you know i didn't have to wait too long so the fishing trip was not as likely as long for some other people because i got drafted third overall so we ended up catching a couple brown trout which i thought was kind of cool you know

the nice brownies and then the browns draft you and um the only downside of being drafted early was they cut the fishing trip short and then my agent did step in he's like hey look you got to go to cleveland now and like they're going to bring their jet like randy lerner was the owner at the time.

He's like, they're going to fly to you, like Waukesha, Wisconsin, tiny little airport.

They're going to pick you up.

They're going to turn around, take you to Cleveland because you do need to finally get a suit, put your suit on, go to Cleveland.

They need to have this introductory press conference.

It'll be great.

You'll love it.

And so I brought my, I think my, my fiancé at the time, Annie, and then my parents and stuff.

And we flew out and did all like the dog and pony show and stuff.

And in the end, it turned out, it worked out a lot better for me and the NFL, like you mentioned, because, you know, what's better for the NFL than like, hey, there's some down-home guys that are shunning the spotlight that just want to be all about football and family.

Absolutely.

Hell yeah.

Bait and tackle?

You a fly fisherman?

What's your, what's your preferred fishing style?

Yeah, so I love all fishing.

My favorite type of fishing is like bobber fishing, honestly, or like little jigging.

You know, I grew up fan fishing and going on Lake Erie when I was playing for the Browns, like I would go out every chance I got.

And if I could cast for walleyes, like drifting cast or like throwing, yeah, like the old eerie deeries and stuff like that.

Like anytime I can be connected to my bait where I'm feeling that hit, that strength.

To me, that's fishing.

Like I do a bunch of trolling and that's how you collect meat.

If you're out on Lake Erie, you troll for walleye.

You troll for steel air.

Correct.

It's not as much fun, just really.

You're going for trophy fish, big fish.

You got to troll.

But yeah, it's definitely, I hate trolling, if I'm being honest.

I've only done it one time.

It's not my style.

I like feeling it.

So I remember watching your draft day highlights because obviously we were both Cleveland fans.

We had the third pick.

We're all geared up.

Like, who are we going to take?

And everybody kind of knew we were going to go after you.

There was all these highlights of like, not only is he strong, but he's out here on a receiver screen kicking out a court.

Like, there was athleticism showed.

Yeah.

What is your prototypical lineman that you think of?

Like, if you're evaluating guys coming out of college, what is the like the tackle?

What are the traits that you think every like a premier tackle should have?

Well, it was interesting because like the late 90s to me was like the golden era of offensive tackles, like Jonathan Ogden, Walter Jones.

Like,

there was Willie Rofe.

There was such a big group of

enormous human beings that were 350, 360, and they were great athletes.

They were ballerine on their feet, and nobody got through them.

And they were great run blockers.

And I always kind of saw myself as an undersized tackle.

Great athlete.

I could move.

But the thing that I had to learn the most when I got to the NFL was how to stop the bull rush, right?

Because you've got guys like Demarcus Ware screaming off the edge, Terrell Sugg screaming off the edge, James Harrison.

They're trying to run you over, right?

Especially as a rookie.

Like they want to see if you can have any lead in your ass and you can fully stop the bull rush, right?

And so I got a lot of that early on in my career.

And it took a little while to figure out how to react, see the bull rush, to sit quick, but also to be light enough where you could react to that second move.

But to me, if I'm looking at like today's NFL, I'm like Trent Williams is like the prototypical, like the best.

If I could look and have the athleticism and the strength and power of trent williams that'd be perfect like 325 but still running that 4'8 still running that 4'3 pro agility like

oh my gosh to me that is exactly what you want in a tackle but you're seeing a lot smaller tackles nowadays than when i first got in the nfl i think because it's much more of an open game right there's there's not as much of a focus on can you grind people out in the run game let's talk about a little bit of what you're doing in uh in green bay for the uh for the browns you're you're announcing the browns second round pick pick.

That's right.

I'm pumped.

Have you kind of stayed around the organization?

You mentioned you were in Germany last year, but have you kind of stayed around the organization in terms of, I don't know, just kind of

keeping the relationships and

getting around Cleveland when you can?

Yeah.

So even though Kevin Stefanski is a coach that I never played for, I have a really good relationship with a lot of the coaching staff.

Andrew Berry, the GM, he was actually an assistant GM when I was there.

So a little relationship there.

And obviously relationship with with the Hazms and a lot of the people that are still there in the organization.

And when I retired, I was like, you know what?

It would be really hard to transition to a post-career without having football in my life, without having the Cleveland Browns in my life.

And so they were really lucky.

Sorry.

I was really lucky that they were willing to open up a space on the media side for me.

So I do their preseason games.

I do a radio show during the week with them

after their games.

And then throughout the season, I just do like fun content with them right which is yeah it's just fun more than anything just staying plugged in and going out there for a week in training camp every year which gives me the opportunity to be able to do a little bit of that media stuff but also get in there watch practice meet the guys maybe give some coaching points to a few of the players and you know try to just give some of that wisdom that I've learned all throughout those years to the guys that, you know, I really want to have that success throughout their career.

You got to pass it along, man.

Was there anybody when you came into the league that was like the one giving that wisdom, whether they were on the team or just

kind of a phone a friend type deal?

I was really lucky because when I was a rookie in Cleveland, a lot of the linemen were older guys.

And, you know, one of the guys that really, really helped me was Hank Fraley.

He was our center.

Yeah,

old

honey buns.

Beg of donuts winners from the bottom.

Honey buns.

Yeah, honey buns.

That was him.

And he was so helpful, right?

Because when he was a center, he was really, really smart.

He understood technique.

He played with Trey Thomas and John Runyon and Philly.

And those guys are two all-pro, Pro Bowl tackles that he learned a lot from.

But he was also super smart, like super cerebral.

And so he helped me see the big picture because that's what you have to do as a center.

And when you come in as a tackle, especially a rookie, like I'm just trying to figure out who the fuck I'm supposed to block.

I'm not worried about everybody else, but understanding through his eyes.

When you see the big picture, it makes you, the puzzle that you're trying to put together on every play, it makes it so much easier.

So, even though I don't know exactly what I'm supposed to do, like I can use deductive reasoning if I see the big picture to be able to figure out, okay, how does this work together?

Right.

And it just makes your brain work faster when you're reacting on the field.

Context clues.

Yep.

I remember when Hank went in there when he was in Cleveland.

Who was the center?

So he came in, the starter got her.

Was it Fane?

Was it LaCharles Bentley?

I think

it was first, but La Charles with a huge free agent signing, right?

All pros, best center in the league.

And he comes into Cleveland.

First walkthrough.

The first, like first thing of uh training camp, and he blows out his patellar tendon and never played another down of football again.

Just a terrible story, damn.

And he was a hometown hero because he went to St.

Ignatius, like, he was from the Cleveland area, had come back.

It was any, but yeah, Hank played pretty dang good, I thought.

Like, he was a as somebody who didn't really know much about the game at the time.

I he stood out to me.

What was it like getting drafted to the Cleveland Browns?

Man,

did you know anything about the city?

Um, Did you like, what were your, like,

like, where were the first places you went in the city?

I'm so curious on everybody's like first introduction to Cleveland.

Tell us about it.

Yeah.

So with three Cleveland guys here, this is easy to

pump the tires of the Cleveland area.

But man, I was so happy, dude.

Let's go.

Because one, my dad's side is all from the Toledo area.

So I used to come down to Toledo every summer and we'd go out there for the family reunion.

We'd see all my dad's side of the family and we'd go fishing on Lake Erie.

And, you know, obviously, fishing is a big part of my life.

So being drafted and being able to live right on Lake Erie and go fishing in my free time, I was so pumped.

And then I think also for me, at that time, it was really important for me to stay in the Midwest.

I was really interested because I think that, you know, East Coast fans are incredible.

There's a lot of them, right?

They're super passionate.

But I think there's something about like throughout the Rust Belt in the Midwest, like that's all they got, right, is their team.

And they just love it, and they just absorb every single little thing, little detail that comes out of there.

And they're ride or die, no matter what happens.

And I knew that's how the Browns fans were.

And I had known a little bit about their history because we had a guy on the Badgers with me, Dante Sanders, who's a Cleveland guy.

He's a Bedford guy.

Yeah, he is.

Bedford, wow.

He's back there coaching now somewhere.

But he was a huge Browns fan.

So he'd always turn the Browns games on in the locker room in college.

And so I knew that they had this incredibly robust, proud history of championships with Jim Brown and Otto Graham and all these guys.

And since the Super Bowl era, they haven't won a Super Bowl, haven't even been there.

And then since they came back in 99, they've been kind of poopy.

And so for me, it was understatement.

Yeah, yeah, right.

I've always enjoyed like building something from nothing, right?

They take a lot of pride and really just sinking my teeth into something and being part of like, let's build this from nothing, from the ashes, and make these champions.

And we didn't do that.

But when I got drafted, I was just full bore ahead thinking, man, this is great.

This is exactly where I want to be.

It's in front of the fans that appreciate offensive line play.

You know, they're not booing me because you drafted a tackle, number three overall.

And just being able to live in Cleveland amongst people that I understood, like, it was just a perfect fit for me.

Why didn't they do that?

What do you think has been going wrong in Cleveland?

Not as of late.

I guess let's just talk about your career.

Like, you guys are close.

You guys had some great offensive lines during your time in Cleveland.

Yeah.

Never played in a postseason game.

Like, what, what was that process like playing?

I mean, you played on a winless team in Cleveland.

I can't even imagine that.

Travis hasn't had one losing season.

Like, you're talking to the most

lucky fucking guy on the planet.

One head coach.

I mean, anyway, so yeah, I don't know.

What was that jealous?

We're very jealous, too.

Trust me.

Trust me.

Talking to guys, guys with multiple Super Bowl rings on the other side, I'm very jealous.

But, you know, it was tough.

I mean, there's no easy way to put it.

Losing in the NFL is so hard.

And I think the Haslams took over in, I don't know, 2014, 2013, somewhere in there.

And, you know, in 2016, 17, that was the two years we went, one in 15 and 0 in 16.

And I think their philosophy at that point was like, hey, guys, we don't have a team that's good enough to win right now.

So we're going to trade back.

We're going to collect draft capital.

We're going to collect salary cap space.

And then we're going to get a bunch of young talent.

We're going to let them play together and kind of go through

the challenges and the difficulties that when you have a young team, you deal with.

But then year three, we're going to be a lot better.

And we're going to have all the salary cap space to spend on free agents.

We're going to have these draft picks.

And I don't think they fully understand or at the time understood how painful it is to lose in the NFL.

You only get one chance every week.

And how you feel that whole week is 100% related to whether you won or lost.

And when you lose, you feel sick the whole week.

And in Cleveland, you guys know it.

Everybody in town feels sick that whole week when you lose.

It is so painful.

It is so miserable.

And to go 1 in 15 and then go 0 in 16.

Well, you can imagine it was not a lot of sunshines and rainbows in Northeast Ohio and certainly not in my house there in Westlake Lab.

It just sucked.

Like you hated going to work

every fucking day.

The fans booed you.

They still showed up because it's Cleveland, but they were there to boo you, not to cheer you.

Yeah.

Damn, man.

One of the hardest things.

to kind of weather is is how many quarterbacks you guys went through.

And obviously the notorious jersey of like long list of names that's that

could how many of them could you name, do you think?

Very few.

I'm trying to remember very few of them.

Uh, not exactly the greatest memory ever is all the different quarterbacks.

I think I played for like 20 and 11 years.

So, well, who are your uh, who would give us give us your

top five?

Who you played for?

My rookie season, we were actually 10 and 6.

It was my only winning season.

So, Travis, let that sink in.

One

season in 11 years.

Derek Anderson was our quarterback.

D.A.

He didn't even start this season.

We had Charlie Fry as the starter week one.

Yes.

I should have just retired after week one because going into that game,

Charlie Fry was our starter.

He was also the captain and he was the hometown hero.

We played the Steelers at home, my first NFL game, going against James Harrison, who will be in the Hall of Fame soon.

And that was tough enough, but we were getting our ass kicked.

He got sacked.

Charlie did like six times in the first half.

At halftime, they benched him.

Okay, Derrick Anderson comes in, doesn't do much better.

Monday after the game, mind you, this was our starting quarterback and our captain.

And I came from Wisconsin where we had a lot of success.

And, you know, if you have a quarterback and he's your captain, like, he's your dude.

Like, he's basically a rider guy.

He's your rider guy.

Like, you

would do anything for that guy.

And you're spending all offseason trying to build camaraderie and relationships and see the same things that he does.

And on Monday, they traded him to the Seattle Seahawks for like a six-round pick.

So I was like, what the fuck is this NFL stuff?

Like

our starting quarterback, who was our captain, just got traded and benched in the first two days of ACM NFL season.

It's aggressive.

It's an aggressive, pretty aggressive.

Yeah.

You guys ended up going to get another quarterback that following year and Brady Quinn, though, right?

Brady was actually in my draft class.

So

I got drafted third by Cleveland and a lot of people in Cleveland, because he was a Columbus guy, you know,

but the other hometown-ish guy.

He grew up at Brown Sand, loved Bernie Cozar.

So, a lot of people thought they would draft Brady third.

Well, he slid in the draft,

and then they traded back up, I think, with the Cowboys to draft him like in the 20s.

So, we came in together, and he had a couple years as a starter, like year two, two, and three of my he was the most jacked quarterback I had ever seen.

That was probably what held him back.

Like, his arms were bigger than Jason's over there.

I'm not sure if that's even possible, but kind of hard to throw when you got pipes like that, bro.

All right,

man, gets in the way to watch.

I remember that was the first college game I ever saw was Brady Quinn versus,

oh, it was Pittsburgh.

It was Notre Dame, Pittsburgh.

I forget the Palco.

Oh,

yeah.

Tyler Palco.

Yeah.

Shout out to Casey.

Either way, man, Brady was a, Brady was a stud.

You played, fuck, man.

You played with a lot of fucking QBs, man.

Remarkable, to be honest with you.

Yeah.

And still had the Hall of Fame career you did.

How did you, did, did it ever get to the point where you just stopped introducing yourself to quarterbacks when they walked in?

Well, I did have one time in my career.

It was like, I don't know, year five or six.

Another spoiler alert.

We weren't very good.

I think we were 4 and 12 that year, but we were playing the Steelers the very last game of the season.

It's in Pittsburgh, right?

And of course, you hate Pittsburgh.

You want to fuck them up, even though we're not going to the playoffs and they are.

And so it was actually kind of a close game down the stretch at the time.

Thad Lewis was our starting quarterback.

So there's another one I remember.

Great, I should say, proper introduction.

The great Thad Lewis was our quarterback.

The great.

And it was like a six to 10, 6 to 14 game.

Either way, it was like a one-stop.

Typical AFC North game.

Oh, yeah.

It was a slugfest, you know, December 31st.

Holy shit.

You know, I got my long underwear on,

my fur and my helmet.

And I'm like, holy cow, we may actually win this game.

Like, we're driving down the field.

It's in the fourth quarter, and we're just getting into the Heinz red zone.

You know, we're going towards the river there and the old Heinz field um i don't know what the they call it now but it's not heinzfield it's called akrachure it's still heinz field to me something i can't say it's heinzfield for me yeah so we're going there we're going in the river and i'm like damn we can win this thing and um my left guard who is a backup he uh as you'll give some appreciation it was his first like couple games as a starter and we have just a two jet protection just super basic like we're sliding left like this is the first protection you install in your playbook no doubt and alex max my center he says lion which our our call then was like, hey, dip shit, even if you didn't hear lion, like two jet, we're going that way, bro.

Find the mic.

So what does he do?

He goes to the right.

And so they're playing a 3-4 at a time.

Opposite of a lion.

Okay.

Opposite of a lion.

Opposite of a two-jet.

Like, this is not possible.

So he goes to the right.

And James Harrison's outside linebacker.

So I'm sliding out to him.

And I think it was maybe Brett Kiesel was playing DN or Fourth Technique.

I can't remember for sure, but he's unblocked now, now, right?

Because left guard, that's your dude.

You're keeping it the other way.

Left guard goes the wrong way.

Yep.

Yep, goes the wrong way.

So he steamrolls Thad and, you know, detaches his head from his body.

So Thad's laying there.

Thad's already our third string quarterback.

All of a sudden in the huddle, we're like, damn, this is not good because we actually don't know who the next guy in is, right?

Like we had heard that week that we had signed a guy to be the backup emergency quarterback, but I didn't know who he was.

So we looked at the sideline.

Of course, this guy's like panicking.

He's like, you know, trying to warm his shoulder up, get a couple throws in, and the trainers are taking their time on the field, you know, because the quarterback's down, but they don't want to hurry up because we got to get this other guy like up to speed and warmed up a little bit.

It's a cold day in Pittsburgh.

So he trots out on the field after they get Thad Lewis's lifeless body off the field.

He comes into the huddle, and it's still a TV timeout.

And I look around the huddle, I can see in everybody's eyes, like nobody knows who this fucking guy is.

And I can feel the tension.

I can't wait to hear this cadence for the first time.

This is going to be exciting.

I guarantee this will be a sack.

You're blaming me.

The guys watching in Japan are thinking that the Bozo left tackle doesn't know the staff counter.

So Minuel is a fucking quarterback, but I can't say that.

As a captain, I'm like, okay, I got to do something here, right?

There's a lot of tension being built here, and it's just rising as this timeout keeps going on.

And so I like, I was like, all right, I got to say something funny.

So I'm like, hey, nice to meet you.

I'm Joe Thomas.

I'm your left tackle.

Let's go down the field and get a fucking score and win this game, you know?

Everybody laughed.

And I learned in that moment, his name was Josh Johnson.

He ended up playing like a long time.

He's still playing.

He's still playing.

He's still probably playing somewhere.

I think he played for like 14 teams.

But anyways,

next play, it was third down.

And I think he threw it in completion and we lost the game.

But in my mind, that speech led us to victory.

And if nothing else.

In a parallel universe, that worked out perfectly.

Absolutely.

When I write my biography and they do the movie, like we go down and score and win the game.

And like, somehow, like, maybe we have a parade because we beat Pittsburgh for the first time.

But, uh, but that didn't happen.

But either way, I got a fun story out of it, and I learned who Josh Johnson was.

Shout out to Josh Johnson.

Shout out to Josh.

Thank you for coming in for one play.

You played against some absolute monsters on defense in your time in the AFC North.

Who are the guys that were either like, you're welcome to the NFL moment or like, just like you're playing them in their prime and you think of as some of the best best defensive players in the NFL from that time.

Yeah, so when I was a rookie, the other three teams in the AFC North,

it was I was going against Justin Smith, who I think

was like one of the first dudes ever to be named first team all-pro at two positions in the same season because he was playing in the 3-4 in San Francisco.

And he got named as an all-pro at defensive tackle and DN, you know, because he played that 4-4-I.

So he got most of the time.

Nicole is the D-tackle and Bates, he's a DN.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, so I was going against him.

So that was the second game of my career.

The first game of my career was James Harrison.

I was like, okay.

And then the third guy will be future Hall of Famer Terrell Suggs.

So

within the division, I was playing against like three Hall of Famers, potentially.

I don't know if Justin will make it, but like the other two guys for sure.

And it was not, it was not pretty.

But, you know, you better buckle up your chin strap, like, and get your shit right, rookie, because there's no easy days here in the AFC North.

I'm glad you brought up Justin because that was one of the first games I played my rookie year, but he was in San Fran.

Yeah.

And I had never really heard, like, I don't know, he was like high pick for Cincinnati.

And for some reason, he didn't have like a big name around him.

And we're getting ready to play the 49ers when they had that front where it was like they had him, they had Ray McDonald, they had Navarro Bowman, Patrick Willis.

Alden Smith on the edge.

It was a monster.

They were unreal.

And this dude is bull rushing every snap.

Like, you know, bull rush.

That's all you have.

How do you even do?

How do you even have the endurance to do that?

Because typically, like, a bull rush, you're like, all right, I'll stop it.

I'll get that like once or twice.

I'll get like a real good one from this guy.

The rest of the game, we're going to be playing a different type of game.

It was ever, I'm like, this dude is amazing.

This guy's the best player I've ever seen in my life.

I don't know how we're going to block this guy.

And we didn't.

Yeah.

He played every snap as a D-tackle DN.

Like, he never came off the field.

Like, he's as much of an Iron Man as anybody in the NFL.

And we always said, like, if there was a train wreck and 200 people were involved, like 199 would die, and Justin Smith is going to dust himself off and walk in

a Brentweiser at the bar down the street.

He was just that old school, like, he had an Anheuser-Busch tattoo on his arm.

He was just an old school country boy.

Like, all he knew was just playing ball.

Gosh, he was good.

That's good shit.

I mean, obviously, Trail Suggs, I mean, the biggest head I've ever seen, I think, on a defensive end.

I mean,

came through Kansas City and catapulted us into

the Super Bowl, man.

There you go.

sizzle was uh i was not trying to be in uh

advanced protection against him no thanks there were some of those old school dudes like harrison and and and suggs i mean don't get me wrong it's not like they were ever out of their prime they were good until they stopped playing but man some of those dudes could just literally pick me up and move me over just like Excuse me, little guy.

What was your strategy to stop James Harrison's dip and rip?

It was like the most unstoppable move I think I've ever seen anybody have where he would just bend real low and then he had the biggest biceps in the world that he'd just like lift up on.

How do you stop that move?

Jason, you were doing that just to show off the guns, baby.

Trust me.

This is what you do.

You get an O-lineman on, he's going to humble you real quick.

We take each other on.

Awesome.

I love it.

I think that one of the things that really helped me as an alignment, like I wasn't as big as a lot of guys, but like I took a different game plan and strategy on how I would block every single person I went against.

And even the same guys from like year to year, I would maybe attack them differently, right?

Because I knew that in order for me to maintain the upper hand, I had to be different than what they saw on film, different what they practice for.

So with James, the big key on that dip and rip was like you had to keep space, right?

Because the only thing that James really didn't have, right, he was super powerful.

He was very short and squatty, which allowed him to get under your pads if you let him get into your body.

And he was really quick too, but he didn't have length.

Didn't have that length.

So I knew that that was my advantage.

So I just was really, really super conscious of picking my spot on his shoulder pads or on his bicep to be able to hit that spot and extend and keep him away from my body because the rip only works is if he's in your body and he's able to get that arm kind of up under your armpit.

Exactly.

I mean, it makes so much sense.

And I've always thought about it similar.

It's almost like you're a boxer.

Like when you're a shorter boxer, you want to get into the body.

When you have the length advantage, use that advantage and keep that guy away from you.

And I've always drawn that comparison.

I was always the undersized guy.

So I'm, let me get in this body.

All I want to do is get in the body and grab these tits.

Nothing changed for me.

Made a career for me.

Yeah.

A lot easier to do that inside than on the edge.

But, anyways, when you were blocking a defensive end or an edge rusher, what were the things that you struggled with most?

What was like the combinations that gave you the most difficulty in trying to defend?

If that is a

sensible question.

Yeah, yeah.

I think we'll go with it.

I'll try to make some sense out of that.

Please, please.

Make a chicken salad here.

So what I found really hard was if a guy tried to break down your feet and then tried to beat you with power.

So, for instance,

if you get a guy who's wide, right?

Because everything's about angles when you get on the outside.

So you got a wide rusher, right?

Yeah.

If they just try to beat you around the edge with speed, like I'll be able to keep up with them and push them past the quarterback, no problem.

That's what I wanted them to do, right?

They're already further away, and now they're just trying to outrun me.

And in a foot race, I can go backwards pretty fucking fast.

What I struggled with though is if they were wide, but they rushed from that wide rush position straight at my inside shoulder.

Because now what that does, it doesn't allow me to kick back.

Because my advantage was like, I know the snap count, and my first two kicks are going to be really fast and long.

So I can get depth.

And then now when I get to that spot, now the quarterback eventually is going to get to his spot.

And then now they got to beat me.

And they've already wasted a second and a half to get to this spot.

Yep.

But if they rush right at my inside shoulder, I can't kick deep because otherwise he just keeps running on a straight line and beats me to the inside.

So it made me stop my feet.

So I take, I basically would only get one kick, stop my feet.

And as he's getting closer to me, give the head and shoulders.

So that kind of usually would break your hand.

Really less you drop your feet, drop your hips, your center of gravity.

And then when that happened, now he can, now he's basically on my same level.

And now if he decides to run around me to the outside, he's faster than me.

He's shortened the edge, he's shortened the edge, he's got a better angle to beat you around to the outside.

And it's really hard for a lineman to go from basically being in a static position in a static spot to all of a sudden accelerating really quickly and trying to pick up to a guy that's running already full speed.

Because if you imagine a defensive end, he's running full speed.

Now he's just got to change the angle that he's running full speed on, where my feet are stopped.

I am in one position, and now I got to rapidly accelerate to get to the speed that he's going as he's he's already running forward and I'm running backwards.

And so it was really, really hard when guys would do that.

Because also if they try to give you the head and shoulders and then now they fake like they're going to go outside, you're trying to accelerate backwards and now they can go beat you back to the inside.

Or if you get on your heels, they can just run you over by just steamrolling you.

And they've got a lot of momentum built up from being wide and starting to run really fast and really powerfully right at you.

You're such a technician, man.

God, just to be able to hear you talk about these kinds of things.

That's awesome.

And the fact that you approached each game, each player differently, man, it's fascinating stuff, dog.

Appreciate it, man.

Yeah, and I love it because I feel like a lot of.

A lot of, I feel like it's like Kevin Green, speed to power, get the tackle moving back and then go through him, get him off his, like, get him moving backwards and retreating.

This is like the tilted guy who's running right at you where you can't go back, shortens that edge.

The shushush, I hate that, like, I don't want to see this.

I don't want to see all that.

I don't want to see all that.

You love it, Grinstein.

Dude, we already talked about the 10,363 consecutive snaps.

We got to talk about the first time you weren't out there on the field, man.

How hard was that?

Because you're the Iron Man.

You played through so much.

You did so much for your team.

Those teams up front for the Browns, the O-line was never the issue.

You guys, you always had those guys rocked and ready to play.

How was it just not being able to be out there with the guys for that first time?

It was really tough.

My best friends were my linemen, right?

John Greco, Alex Mack, Joel Battonio, Mitchell Schwartz, your boy in

Basin City.

Like, those are my dudes.

And we played a lot of seasons together.

And we had really good offensive lines.

Never really got probably the credit we deserved because we just weren't on very good teams.

Never ran for like a ton of yards because we never had that dude as a running back.

At one point in my career, it was me and Joel.

I don't know how many Pro Bowls we got between the two of us.

Alex Mack, I think he made six or seven.

Greco should have made a pro Pro Bowl.

And then you got Mitchell Schwartz, who made like four or five all-pros.

So like, we had a lot of, we had a lot of hardware there between all of us.

And some of them.

Studs.

The hardest thing, like line, linemen, they're so close, and tight ends are sort of an extension of the offensive line.

And, you know, those are usually the closest rooms on a football team.

And so I almost.

You have this like feeling inside of you, not that you betrayed him or you let him down, but like that was almost the feeling and the emotion that was coming out of me when I couldn't be out there anymore because it was just such a thing that I took for granted.

I didn't even think about like, hey, do I go and strap it back up and play this week?

I don't know.

I'm kind of banged up.

I got MCL sprained.

Like that never crossed my mind.

It was just like, I got a job to do.

I'm going to show up and do my job.

And I can use all of my brain space now to think about how I'm going to beat this guy rather than wondering like, ooh, am I healthy enough to play?

Can I go out there?

I don't know.

Should I sit down?

Like that never crossed my mind.

And I think it helped me.

But then that moment, it's gone.

There was like some mental health issues that I had to deal with of feeling like I let those guys around me down.

And, you know, even though the team sucked, like I still had that really strong connection with the fan base.

And I had that same feeling with them.

Like, you know, I felt like I always owed it to them to go out and give my best and do whatever I can to try to turn this thing into a winner because they're so loyal, so passionate.

And I wanted to give them that gratitude by going out and playing great ball.

So it was, it was really, really hard dealing with that.

And I did whatever I could with the team, trying to help the other linemen, you know, prepare for games, watching film for them, taking notes and the one benefit i would say for me is it was miles garrett's rookie year so i was able to really spend a lot of time with miles and help him see the game from an offensive tackles perspective right so damn you joe damn you joe

i wasn't going to do that until i was definitely out of the league

But yeah, I would write him scouting reports and I would give him like, hey, okay, this is what this guy's good at.

This is what he's not good at.

This is the rush I think he should feature.

but don't do it at the beginning of the game.

Set him up first two quarters, and then in the second half, when the game's on the line, now you pull out your best stuff and then you give him what you've been giving him, and then you'll probably beat him.

And then, you know, turns out he's also a really ridiculously fucking good athlete.

So he can kind of do whatever I ask him to do, which is a good thing.

Just go out there and have fun, Miles.

Yeah, go out there.

Frick him, he's like a scorpion.

A girl, like, it's all good.

But

to that point, though, it is fascinating how much guys come into the league and they don't necessarily understand what guys on the other side of the ball are being taught.

It's one thing to understand what coverage they're in, what front they're in, but it's a whole nother

level of preparation to understand how you're being defended in routes, how this guy is going to use his hands or

use his moves throughout the day in terms of pass rush.

And that really,

that 100% took my game to the next level.

Asking guys like Eric Berry about coverages, about his leverages, asking DBs, you know, what are you thinking in this sort of coverage?

You know, going up to a guy like Spaggs,

defensive coordinator in KC, and asking him, you know, later in the game, what are you thinking in big-time situations?

It's just,

you ask the right questions to the right guys, and you're going to see yourself progress down the line.

And Miles had a fucking Hall of Famer sitting right there telling him what they could.

I mean, that's a fucking cheat code in itself, let alone how athletic that dude is, man.

Yeah, man.

I tried to be a psychologist, right?

I wanted to know what that dude was thinking.

I wanted to know who his girlfriend was.

I wanted to know what he ate for breakfast.

Like, because I felt like that's how you slow the game down.

And as you get older, you get to be a shittier athlete.

But, like, if your brain's speeding up, you can play faster.

And that's how guys are able to stick around, especially on the old line, a lot longer than their athletic ability should allow them, is because the game's just moving so slow for them because they know everything that's going on and they can see things before they happen.

Absolutely.

Let's talk a little bit about international football.

Fuck you.

You've been in Germany for

almost a full year, right?

Yep.

Yep.

Where you in Ravens, baby?

There we go.

How was the experience?

Amazing.

Yeah.

Amazing.

Was it?

Okay.

I was trying to twist your arm to come over and trust me.

I know.

I wanted to so bad.

Lots of stuff going on, but a great time.

And Munich is just an incredible city.

It's in southern Germany and Bavaria.

It's right on the edge of the Alps.

So, like, when I wanted to go over and coach American football in Europe, obviously I wanted to scratch the itch of coaching.

I wanted to allow my kids to experience living abroad, living international, like challenge them, put them in uncomfortable situations.

Like my kids made them play rugby when over there with my daughter, my 10-year-old daughter playing rugby with the boys.

So that's awesome.

Like I wanted to do all those things because I thought it would make them better people.

We'd have a great experience.

We'd be able to travel.

But I really wanted to have an opportunity to go and coach professionals, coach adults without having the time commitment that it takes to be like an NFL coach.

I really wanted to impact players that love the game and it was really, really fun because

these guys are basically playing for peanuts.

You know, they're not getting paid but a few hundred euros every month to go out there and they're working regular jobs.

And so it was so joyful because these dudes had talent.

They just didn't.

have the coaching.

They didn't have the resources growing up.

So you could take a guy that was here and throughout the course of the season, you're seeing significant improvement every single week.

And not a single time do you ever have to ask them for more effort.

You never have to ask them to focus, right?

Because they're signing up to do this for nothing.

They wouldn't be there if they weren't obsessed with the game of focus.

That's awesome, man.

So, were all of these guys like German football players, or were there any like international, like U.S.

players playing over there?

Yeah, so go ahead.

Sorry, I'm sorry, cut you off.

That was poor guesting right there on my part.

Cut his ass off.

Fuck that.

Come on.

I'm an idiot.

Don't worry about it.

In the ELF, European League of Football, so every every team is allowed four Americans.

Typically, it's quarterback, receiver, and then two DBs, right?

Because those are positions that are harder to find in Europe.

Sure.

But all my offensive linemen were German guys.

You're allowed a certain number of players outside of the country that your team is based in.

But linemen is what Germany does best.

That was the reason I wanted to go there, right?

So, yeah, baby.

Yeah, all German guys, which is cool because you got to get a little flavor of the German culture, take up a little bit of the slang, the language, and started to understand them a little bit more.

And you filling up on those schnitzels or what, dude?

Lots of schnitzelmitts, lots of Hellis Veer.

You were living in that country, which is such a pillsner.

Yeah, then if you're just vacationing or just traveling as a tourist, I love it.

Is Europe ready for the NFL?

What was your takeaway from Germany?

Do they love football?

Oh, man, they are obsessed with football.

Really?

Obsessed with the NFL, dude.

Well, we played over there.

It was fucking, it was pretty.

It was through the roof, and that was Frankfurt.

So I can only imagine what a big city like Munich is.

Yeah, man.

Like, you guys are freaking heroes.

Like, I didn't get noticed much over there, but like, you two guys are fucking kings over there.

It is so cool just seeing how popular the game is, right?

They love it.

They're obsessed.

And the NFL has done a great job putting games over there, giving them a feel of what an NFL game looks like from a fan experience, but also like on the field, what we do every day, the gladiators that we are, or I used to be going out there, putting your body on the line for your team.

Like, they totally get it.

Like, it really resonates with the German mindset, the German culture, the teamwork aspect, the sacrifice, the toughness, the way that the game is violent.

Like, it's just perfect for them.

And I think that was really what sparked my interest in going to Munich because I worked the Munich game for the NFL network.

And I got to be in that stadium, Alianse Arena.

And I was like, holy shit, these dudes love this thing.

Like, I got to get over here to be part of it.

Yeah.

That's awesome.

Did you do Oktoberfest while you were over there?

I just got to ask.

I've always wanted to go.

We got to ask.

We got to ask.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah.

We did a couple times.

Tell us about it.

Tell us about it.

It's a great party.

Oktoberfest is so fun.

It was cool.

So you got to buy tables.

Like, it's really hard to get.

Like, you got to know somebody.

And thankfully, our special teams coach over there, Tom, he was head of security.

It's always the teamers, isn't it?

That's right.

It's always the teamers.

He's the head of security for one of the big beer companies.

And so he had a couple tables.

So we, it was right after our season.

So actually, I was there and had all of our team got them all together, you know, bought them all the beers and stuff because these guys are basically poor college kids.

So we did the whole deal.

We had like 20 or 30 of the guys from the team there and we celebrated the end of the season the way you're supposed to with good

German Hellis beer, polka and some Schweinzel and Schnitzelbomes.

We blew it up.

It was a tremendous time.

And when you get that experience with the locals, like you're getting the proper experience.

Hell yeah.

That's fucking awesome.

Dude, you're our only Connect to Oktoberfest, so we might be hitting you up here in a few years.

Yeah, let's go.

We might be coming back in the fall.

Let's do this.

Let's do it.

All righty.

We're going to get to a section we call We Gotta Ask.

During this section, you don't have to answer.

You can tell us the fuck off.

We're just going to do like a rapid-fire list of questions.

Ready?

Nice.

Were you ever going to play a position other than offensive line?

So in college, I played some defensive end and I played tight end, but they saw how fast I was.

So they moved me to offensive line.

That's how it always works.

Fairly quickly.

was it always going to be football uh i was actually more of a basketball guy until i stopped growing up and started growing out so when i was 14 i was six seven and then i never grew another inch so i realized damn

were you i was about to say were you getting looks uh through high school or so i had like some small offers like walking on wisconsin marquette like some um small offer scholarship like holy cross and some other holy cross

like okay i could go play hoops at holy cross or i could play football at notre dame or wisconsin or miami you're like you are see I'm like, okay, I get it.

You're telling me without telling me that it's going to be football.

But do you think you could have played in the NBA?

Hell no.

I was not that good.

I was just a hustle guy.

I could get some rebounds on.

You're the meanest.

Solid six-man.

You're a good mainer on the block or what?

That's awesome.

Coach, who had the biggest impact on your game?

Probably George Warhop.

He was the offensive line coach.

I had the longest during my career.

He was tough.

He was very technically sound.

He forced you to just do an unbelievable amount of homework and notes and extra individual, like, you know, probably like Stoutland, like all those things, right?

But at the end of the day, you respect him, you love him like a father, and he can be safely say like he had an outsized impact and you wouldn't be where you were when your career is over without him touching your life.

You're inducted to the Hall of Fame in 2023.

How did you find out you got in?

It was a very special day.

So Walter Jones, who was my idol growing up, came to the door, knocked on the door, had no idea that I was going to have the messenger man show up at the door at that time because

up until that moment, they used to bring you down to the Super Bowl in a hotel room and then they would knock and like say congratulations or they call you and say, Sorry, you didn't make it, which sucked because your family's there and everything.

Then you got to fly home.

So they changed it my year where they actually called your wife, talked to her, like set it up, make sure you're at home so they could surprise you at home.

And so I was

actually, she told me me we're going to go to dinner.

It was Friday nights.

We're going to go to a fish fry with the neighbors, you know?

So I was kind of like always got fish involved.

Always got to be fish involved.

So I was out at the farm doing my cattle stuff for Hall of Fame beef during the day.

And I got home and I was kind of dirty.

So I was just in my underwear.

And she's like, hey, we got to go to dinner.

You got to get changed pretty quick.

I'm like, don't worry about it.

Like, she's like, come in, come into the kitchen.

We got to talk about something scheduled.

And she's like, but put your clothes on.

I'm like, why?

Like, I'll do that after we have our little meeting.

She's like, No, you can't come in here unless you have your pants on.

I'm like, All right, whatever.

Like, it's always got to be your way, doesn't it?

So, like, got changed.

I went in there, and she was just trying to get me away from the door because she didn't want me to see like all the cameras show up, and she wanted like that surprise factor.

And it was so cool because my kids were in the kitchen with us, we were having a family meeting, and uh, so the kids run around the hall, and they see everybody through the door.

So, they see Walter Jones, he's wearing his gold jacket, They see the film crew, and they just burn back to me and started screaming, Daddy, you made the whole thing.

I was like a couple of people.

It's cute as the waterworks.

It was just so special.

That's awesome.

Fuck yeah, man.

Man, that's awesome.

Damn, that's a good story.

What is the best great lake?

Lake Erie.

Best fishing, man.

There we go.

It's a fish factory.

It is.

That's all I can say, baby.

I love it.

Those perch fry.

Oh, come on.

Let's go.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison was named one of the nation's top party schools.

Something that a lot of people wouldn't necessarily assume.

Earning the number six spot on the Wall Street Journal's list of best party schools in the U.S.

for 2025 does it live up to the reputation.

It does.

I'm disappointed that it slipped because when I was there, we were number one every year.

I guarantee I had an outsized influence on that rating.

It is awesome, man.

The people there, they just want to have a good time and they're not afraid to drink some beer.

Hell yeah.

You got shit for playing with baggy pants.

Are you aware of this, Joe?

Yes, I loved it.

Can you explain why you chose to wear baggy pants?

You said I loved it.

I wore baggy pants because I'm all about function, not fashion.

As you can see, I am all about, all right, how do I get this fat dude to go as quickly as that skinny fast dude?

Yes.

And if you're wearing those tight pants that show off these, these great legs and great ass that I never had, I had an ass at all.

Like there was, there was no ass in those pants.

Uh, like, it's kind of hard to move, especially if you throw like the knee sleeves and the knee braces and all the gear and the kit you're wearing underneath.

Oh, yeah.

Uh, it slows you down a lot.

So, I always thought, you know, what's the quickest, most nimble thing on planet Earth?

It's the ninja, right?

Yeah,

and

those nice, comfy, baggy joggers, right?

So, I was like, give me,

gotta go in the quit room, give me the largest pants you have.

And we had a guy named Ishmaeli Kitchen, who was like a nose guard, maybe 5, 11, 6 foot, 350-ish.

Big boy.

I wore a pant size that was two bigger than him.

So

you know that I was really, really stretching it.

And I actually had to have him put like elastic, sticky, like

sew-on on the inside of my pants so they wouldn't fall down.

They wouldn't fall down.

That's fucking money.

Shout out to all the equipment guys making it work, man.

I was doing the same thing.

Right now, they don't make pants big enough.

No.

Even if you go like a, like a size 40 or 42 waist, they still ride up over your knees.

And I'm a big, my fucking knees have to be covered.

All dudes are doing, like, guys are fucking putting their helmet right on my fucking big ass.

I need that.

I need those fucking things covered.

And I still wear those old school pads that look like thigh pads in the knees.

But no, they were, they were like extending them like an extra like three or four inches because they weren't fucking making them long enough, man.

Shout out to all the equipment guys.

Yeah, by all these young Gen Xers, Gen Z's, whoever they are.

Like, are they teasing you for your pants?

They more so tease me for fucking throwing a fit when they shrink.

Just like, oh, you're because the fucking old guy getting all pissed off because his pants don't fit.

I'm just like.

Oh, it's so good.

All right.

You've said it took you four hours to play for a game.

What was your pregame process?

Well, I won't waste all four hours telling you what it was, but it was very long because I was always one of the first guys that got there.

And I would always make sure I I go on the field first because I wanted a little moment of serenity before anybody was in the stadium to go on the field and just absorb it and just appreciate the fact that I get to go play in an NFL stadium.

Fuck it, man.

So few people in the world that get to do this and they're going to pay me to do this today.

You know, that was sort of me like telling myself, this is worth it to go out and like.

shred your body for destroy myself.

Yeah.

Go out there where there's absolutely no upside whatsoever.

If I play the world's greatest game as a left tackle, nobody knows.

Or 0-15, but it's worth it.

What do you have one stack?

I've been talking about it for three fucking years.

So it was that one moment at the beginning where I'd be like, all right, this is really cool.

And I would just kind of walk around, didn't have any of my stuff on yet, and just take it in, check the field too.

That was important, like trying to figure out exactly, you know, how my cleats were, like, was everything proper, you know, how cold is it?

Where's the wind?

Stuff like that.

Then went back inside, took a shower.

Then it was a long time in the training room, you know, hot tub if they had it.

And then putting all the equipment on just took forever because I was wearing two knee sleeves, elbow sleeves or elbow braces, you know, all the other stuff that you normally put on, taping the ankles, the whole deal.

And then I even took it a step further.

The only other thing I'll mention out of all the stuff that

I usually did was, you know, the QDA, the quick drying adhesive that they spray on your ankles before they tape it?

Yeah.

So I took a bottle of that.

And I would spray the bottom of my feet and then I would spray my legs so that when when I put my knee sleeves on, they wouldn't slide and then my socks wouldn't slide down, right?

Because there's nothing more annoying than your socks sliding down and have to deal with it.

So worse.

I'd be fine you for one.

I don't want to give up my money to Roger Goodell.

But then I also sprayed the bottom of my socks because inside my shoe, one thing that happened early on in my career that I fucking hated was like.

It gets hot, you're sweaty, and your feet start to be hard.

You start sliding.

It's the worst.

They slide and then you can't feel the ground the way you need to.

Like I always thought of myself like an eagle.

Like my feet were the talons and I was gripping the ground and that gave me the balance and the agility that I needed.

And so, when I figured out how to like spray basic my whole body and sticky stuff, so I wouldn't slide at all.

That was that was the next level.

And then, on top of that, I would do like a bunch of tape on my hands so that I was like a boxer, you know, I was like a ninja turtle, taping the fingers together and then taping the thumbs so your thumbs don't get screwed up.

Um, so it took a long time just putting all that stuff on, just spraying the sticky shit on you like it's sunscreen or something.

Just

well, that's stunk, that's stunk, too.

Like, there's definitely some cancer warnings in that shit.

Oh, yeah.

We've done worse, right?

Dude, I used to do something.

I would also set like little alarms.

I would have my phone.

I would set alarms at every 15 minutes to like, all right, now I'm going to get my ankles taped.

Now I'm going to take my pre-workout.

Now I'm going to take my fingers.

Now I'm going to like warm up.

Now I'm going to do this.

And

speaking, I used to hate that foot thing.

Under Armour made.

a cleat insole that was like rubber for like a couple years.

Oh, yeah.

And I just like scoured all of these cleats just so I could get this like, I hate the cloth that's on top.

Why would you like cloth?

It doesn't make no sense.

Exactly.

Stupid.

Yep.

Dumb.

All right.

Well, we agree on that.

Speaking of dumb, we're going to get to our next segment.

No dumb questions.

Pick your favorites.

We can either do liquid out of fingers.

What the fuck does this mean, Brandon?

Kentucky Derby or something.

Nobody knows anything.

All right.

We can choose what you have this one.

First off, tell us Joe what this is.

Tell Joe what the segment is.

These are questions for fans.

Thank you, Brandon.

You're the best, as always.

And then you also got your friends are here.

You're my best friend.

What is that steel still rocking?

Still kicking.

All right, there you go.

Still kicking.

From my local liquor store.

Love that.

How many bottles of booze do you got to buy to get a free t-shirt from the local liquor store, bro?

My parents watch this show, so we're not going to answer that one.

Don't worry about it.

Don't worry about it.

They have a wonderful wine club.

All right.

So no dumb questions is fans submitted questions that are usually really stupid, but we call them not dumb to encourage people to feel comfortable enough to submit really stupid questions.

We have one question that's going to be related to Liquid Out of Fingers.

We have another question that's going to be related to Kentucky Derby horse name.

We have another one related to NFL team of other pro athletes.

I don't know what that, okay, or Scottish sports.

Which one of those is speaking to you most, Joe?

Let's go Scottish sports.

You know, just getting back to your sports.

This is where we go.

This is why we need more linemen on the show.

All right.

Scottish Sports.

Hit us, Brandon.

Hi, Jason Travis, Colin from Glasgow, Scotland, here.

Just a dumb question is, what would you do if you would come to Scotland?

What sports event would you undertake?

Cheers.

All the best.

Wow.

First of all, I love the accent.

I mean,

if we have Scottish people calling in, Brandon, they get first right of any of the questions.

I don't even care what they're asking, just so I can hear that.

All right.

Joe,

you're the guest.

You have the honors.

How do you want to answer that?

Yeah, if you're going to Scotland, what sport are you playing?

Yeah, I mean, golf is the easy one, but I was over in Ireland for Alex Mac's wedding a few years ago, and they play this game called like hurling.

It's kind of like a rugby.

Dude, lacrosse.

Yeah, dude, that game is fucking lit.

I was trying to

go ahead, please.

Dude,

we were talking about like bucket list items.

One of my bucket list items is to go to like, I was thinking about it afterwards, didn't say it in the show, but to go to one of these games, but like the Olympics version of this, like the like the World Cup version of this.

Like I want to see the best of the best go at it with this shit because it is absolutely electric.

Jason, do you know what he's talking about?

Actually, so where I live in Philadelphia is one of the biggest Irish

collections of like a population, like direct descendants.

descendants so they have like leagues of hurling and actually another sport in Ireland that's really popular called Gaelic football which is like yeah so you play it with like a ball you kind of have to kick it every two steps where that's their version of dribbling but then you I don't know I don't really understand all the rules behind I watched it once pretty cool uh but hurling is very interesting seems really hard I played lacrosse yeah seems like much easier to put that ball in a net than like balancing it on a wooden stick I don't really understand how that's possible yeah yeah and it's probably incredibly derogatory and offensive that we've just taken Scottish sports.

I wasn't gonna say it,

there's a dude in Scotland, I wasn't gonna say it, but I'm like, I'm pretty sure this is not the same area.

The only Scottish sports I know are golf and um the Scottish strongman games.

I forget

games, thank you.

Yeah, that would be sick.

I would love to see that, like, throw the pole in the kilts and they're like throwing it over their heads and they got to get it to like flip.

I'd be into that for sure.

Trav, what do you you got?

That sounds like a renaissance fair.

I'm just going to go golf since you guys didn't go golf.

I'm going to play there, play some fucking golf, man.

All right.

So, liquid out of fingers, Kentucky Derby horse name or NFL team of other pro athletes, which liquid out of fingers, because I'm very curious.

I'm curious.

Hit it, Brandon.

Hi, Jason and Travis.

I just have one question for you.

If your five fingers could dispense infinite liquid, what would your your five liquids be?

So, for example, mine are fresha,

gasoline to put gas in your car, water, coffee, and Titos.

Yeah, what would your guys' five liquids be?

Thank you.

Love it.

I love it.

Awesome.

Good question.

I like that.

That's a solid question, yeah.

All right, Joe, again, you are the guest.

You do the honor, sir.

Unless you would prefer to go last.

I'll do it.

So I'm going to try to count to five.

Hellas beer.

Hellas beer.

Being in Germany, fell in love with that beer.

Coffee, that's non-negotiable.

I'm going to go diesel fuel because I spend a hell of a lot of money on diesel fuel out at the farm.

Like, that's a big check every month.

Smart.

Just put your finger in the

filling up again.

Yep, here we go.

Just going to fill up the tractor.

Another 300 gallons for nothing.

See that kids?

Dude, I love this.

Let's show you our first look.

Free diesel for life.

And then, let's see, water.

Is that four or five?

We need branding to keep.

That's four.

That's four.

And then the last one, milk, because whole milk, my kids drink an insane amount of whole milk.

I got four kids.

And so I think we go through like a gallon a day right now.

My oldest is only 12.

And when I was in high school, I think I drank a gallon every day by myself.

So that would save all sorts of Wisconsin money.

That's a Wisconsin.

We would go through about two gallons a week, but not a gallon a day.

That's pretty intense.

What?

Talk about, you brought up Hellas Beer.

The only reason I know what Hellis Beer is is because I had this like brew game on my phone, and you had to like brew different beers, and Hellas was one of the beers.

What kind of beer is a Hellis beer?

Do you play a brew game on your phone instead of like taking

it like Montreal?

That's amazing.

I love it.

I need to check out that app, but um, I'll send it to you.

Yeah, so

yeah, I thought it was awesome.

Yeah, so the Hellis Beer is like the beer of at least southern Germany, but down in Bavaria, where I was coaching in Munich, and it's fantastic.

It's like the most clean, clear, crisp refreshing.

Yeah, it's like just amazingly refreshing, like a blonde lager.

That's just fantastic.

They have the German purity laws, so they're only allowed to use a few ingredients.

So it's like very consistently awesome no matter where you go.

There's like no preservatives.

So it's not something that you can get in a lot of places.

Like it's usually out of the keg and it's fresh from the brewery and it's basically kind of it was my water that I drank every day when I was a little bit.

I love it.

All right.

I guess I'll go.

I'll go water.

I'm not going to steal diesel gasoline gasoline.

That's a freaking great answer.

I want to steal it so bad.

Yeah, that was good.

I didn't go that far.

Gosh.

All right.

So I'll go water, beer.

I'll go drink Garage beer because that's our beer.

Travis and I own a beer company.

So we got to go drunk.

Yeah.

You guys should brew a Hellis, man.

I would love that.

Ooh, all right.

You're talking us into it.

I love this.

All right.

All right.

The Joe Thomas Hellis brought to you by Garage Beer.

Get on it, guys.

So we got beer.

We got water.

What other liquids do I consume on a regular basis?

basis?

I'll go.

Gasoline was a great one, too.

Coffee.

Why did that take me so long?

Coffee.

That's because I didn't have any coffee.

I need some coffee.

I'll go whey protein because I spent a bunch of money on whey protein.

It's not a all right.

Once you mix it up, it's still liquid, right?

So

I go with the pre-made drink, whatever that is.

Yeah,

there you go.

Fair life, Fair Life protein-rich protein or whatever.

Shout out to Fair Life.

There's your free advertising for the day.

And then I'll go milk, but I'm going to go cereal milk.

I'm going to go Reese's peanut butter puffs milk.

Give me that chocolatey delicious.

That's pretty good.

That was pretty good.

Go ahead, Trent.

All right.

I'm going to the drinks that I drink every single fucking day.

So I'm going going Accelerator,

Active Energy drink.

I'm going Recover 180, which is my favorite sports hydration drink.

I'm going Zen Water because Zen Water's

got really good HP levels.

And

what else am I going?

Oh, I'm going Casa Azul

tequila.

It's my favorite tequila.

It's the most pure is Blue Agave.

No fucking added bullshit.

And my last one, Garage Beer.

I'm going Lime Garage Beer.

That's just perfect.

All right.

Travis is a walking billboard for all the animals.

Great job.

You don't know who makes all the money in the family of marketing.

All right.

That was no-dumb questions.

You can submit your no-dumb questions in the comments on social or give us a call at 929-399-7260.

Joe, this is all we got for you, but I do have one more question.

You're wearing the shirt.

We haven't talked about it yet.

How's Hall of Fame beef going?

How do you like being a cattle rancher?

Yeah, totally.

You got a seller.

Is it a rancher or a farmer?

Which so, so typically, ranchers are people that raise cattle, but in Wisconsin, where my farm is, where I grew up, like they call any land, any egg land is a farm, right?

So I am conflicted.

I don't know if I'm a rancher or a farmer, but I just generally call myself a farmer.

But it's been going great.

Like 2007, my kids told me they wanted some pet cows for the farm.

And I was like, okay, but we're going to have to eat them because I love eating beef.

And like, if we're going to raise these things, we might as well enjoy it.

Yeah.

So I started with five.

And then the first steer we raised, we ate it.

Turns out it was fantastic.

Whatever we did, we like nailed it.

Found lightning in a bottle right off the bat.

I gave it to a buddy who's a James Beard chef in Madison.

And it was just like, hey, what do you think?

He cooked it up, thought it was fantastic, said it was better than any of the stuff that he gets in the restaurant, supplied all these fancy cattle ranches.

And so then that's when like.

the brain started working overtime.

I'm like, hey man, maybe I could make this like a business.

This is too good to just keep to myself.

And so we've been just kind of going full bore since then.

We're raising Wagyu beef, which is like

five games.

Yeah, it's beautiful stuff.

We're raising Angus beef right now, and we're selling direct consumer.

We got like these amazing beef sticks for the kids.

So like, I'm getting a lot out of it.

That was my question.

Yeah.

I wanted to know, is it Angus?

Is it Angus Herford crosses?

Like, what are we working with?

Black Angus?

Yeah.

So we have Black Angus Simmentals right now.

And we're kind of shifting the herd as we're like improving genetics.

I'm trying to treat these things like pro-athletes.

I'm trying to think of like, I know what it takes to have high performance, what it takes to be at your best, to grow the most muscle and strength and power and all those outputs.

And so we're like, hey, these are our pro-athletes.

So we need to reduce the stress.

We need to figure out.

from a nutritionist what's all the nutrition that they possibly can have so that they're the healthiest beef for us and for themselves.

They have the most marbling, so the best buttery mouthfeel possible.

We raise them on the banks of the Blue River.

We got got this amazing pasture on our farm.

We keep really, really low density, so their stress is really low.

Wow.

Everything we feed them is raised on our farm and they're born on our farm.

And from the day they go to heaven, they live in our place.

So we think that we're raising some really great stuff.

And it's kind of been a passion project.

When you retire, you got to have some purpose somewhere, you know, like, hell yeah.

So many guys, they just wander in the wilderness.

They don't have that purpose.

And for me, it's like, all right, I want to see if I can raise the best beef on planet Earth.

And so we had a Hall of Famer.

I was like, hey, man, let's name this Hall of Fame Beef and see if we can find a way to raise the best beef on planet Earth.

So it's been a lot of fun.

And I was chatting up with Emily Reese, the great Emily Reese who

was working with her at Under Armour way back in the day.

And she said that you got a beef company too.

So maybe we need a good old-fashioned like beef measuring contest.

Well,

like Travis, you know, we both give him steaks and then he cooks them up and then we get a rating here.

I have a feeling you're going to kick my ass, but I would love to learn learn a lot of tricks of the trade.

We're just getting started with it.

Like you said, you need hobbies and I love beef.

You just explaining this, I want a steak so bad right now.

I can't even explain it.

So

yeah, I'm all in on that.

I would love to learn something from you in Hall of Fame beef and get together on that.

Since you haven't decided on your breed, like we've, we're gone down that genetic rabbit hole already.

So maybe I send you some embryos and some semen of the old Hall of Fame beef wagyu and then you can kind of like take that and explode it.

That'd be fun.

That would give me great joy.

So if I could send you some of my semen.

Dude, I'm in the moment you said semen.

Absolutely.

You guys are fucked everywhere.

Trevor's like, I'm not laughing at that.

That's the detail.

You guys are having an old beef off right now, man.

Dude, Joe, Hall of Fame player to Hall of Fame beef to Hall of Fame dude, man.

I remember coming on your show back in, I can't even tell you when, going on Radio Row and hanging out with you and Andrew Hawkins on Tomahawk, dude.

You've paved the way for so many guys on the field, off the field.

Keep being you, brother.

And thank you for joining us.

And thank you for everything you did for Cleveland, man, from one Clevelander to somebody who lit up the city, brother.

Thank you, man.

Thank you guys so much, man.

It was truly a pleasure being on here today.

It was the best part of my week, you know, when you get a chance.

That's what I loved about doing a podcast.

You go on with some buddies and you just have a great chat.

that's uninterrupted by phones because you got to turn that shit off and all the distractions of daily life and you get to just chop it up with some good friends.

So, truly, thank you guys so much for having me on.

It was a blast.

Oh, man.

Hell yeah.

Awesome.

Enjoy this weekend out in

old Green Bay, brother.

I'm sure it'll be a fucking blast getting back around the game, man.

All right, that wraps up another episode of New Heights.

Make sure you're subscribed on YouTube to New Heights so you know when all the new episodes are coming out.

And make sure you're on the Wonder App or wherever you get your podcasts to keep on listening.

We will be back next week with draft reactions and a huge guest.

Woohoo!

Gotta love a huge guest.

You know it, baby.

Draft reactions.

Like the draft is just a slot machine for the NFL.

It's cha-ching, cha-ching.

It's just everybody's playing, you know,

slots.

Yeah.

Like it's like slots?

Slots?

You can listen to new episodes of New Hides Early and Ad-Free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wonder React or on Apple Podcasts.

Once again, New Hides, a Wondery Show, produced by Wave Sports and Entertainment and brought to you by Suave Men.

No nonsense, motherfuckers.

Follow the show on all social media at New Heights Show with 1 S for fun clips throughout the week.

Thanks to our production and crew for those clips and for making this edit so much better than what it really was.

And thank you to the 92% as always for listening in.

Hope you love Joe Thomas.

Appreciate you.

Big Tom,

Big Joey Tom.

Shout out to Cleveland.