The Hustler That Changed The AAU Game Myron Piggie

Speaker 1 And I got a call from some people, and they was like, Man, we're never, ever, we're never, ever. If you say this out loud, we're going to deny it.
If you bring

Speaker 1 your kids to ABCD camp, you'll walk out of New Jersey with a million dollars in cash.

Speaker 2 All right, welcome to another episode of Throwbacks. Don't forget to go give us a like, a follow, subscribe on YouTube.
It's free, so don't be afraid to hit that button.

Speaker 2 Maddie Ice, how we doing today?

Speaker 2 You got a tremendous week going on.

Speaker 4 I'm living every husband, father's dream.

Speaker 3 You're McCall.

Speaker 4 Oh, yeah. I'm home alone, dude.
I've been home alone since Saturday night.

Speaker 4 Yeah, it's glorious. I miss my kids.
I miss my wife. They're in Orlando for Thanksgiving week, big family reunion, doing it right.
Obviously, I can't go because I have work and all these things.

Speaker 4 But man, it's like, I'm not sure there's anything better, dude. I'm not sure there's anything better than a house that is silent.

Speaker 2 I think that's the one thing I would ask for. I hope my wife's birthday or Christmas would be.
Well, it's not, look, it's not so much that like you're doing crazy. It's just, you're right.

Speaker 2 It's the silence. It's the peace and quiet.

Speaker 4 It's just peace and quiet, dude. I mean, it's just literally waking up.
And by the way, I've every morning, I haven't slept in.

Speaker 4 Like, I don't sleep in anymore, so that's fine, but it's just waking up, making my coffee. I'm not in a rush to do anything to get the kids going.

Speaker 4 Obviously, Josie does a lot, but I like mornings are chaotic, as you know. Like, you got two boys, like, it's just chaotic.
There's a lot going on.

Speaker 4 There's like, yeah, like, get your, we got a time to brush your teeth. We got to take, you know, like, there's just no, there's no rest.
That is the greatest part.

Speaker 4 Like, I could, I've, I've worked out multiple times a day. I've saunaed it up multiple times a day.

Speaker 2 You mentioned Orlando, and you sent chills through my spine because I just came back from Disney World.

Speaker 3 And

Speaker 3 I need what you have.

Speaker 2 I need like seven days, six days alone to recover.

Speaker 4 Well, what you did is just dad of the year stuff. I mean, it's just legendary stuff to go to Walt Disney World for a week.

Speaker 2 Well, I posted that picture of me napping at the bippity boppity thing where they made my kids into knights or whatever.

Speaker 2 And I put it and it got a lot, it got a lot of views to the point where like the next day at one of the parks, I had dads coming up to me going, keep it going, man.

Speaker 2 Like, they were cheering me on, like Rocky training in Philadelphia.

Speaker 4 That was one of the funniest posts I've ever seen. I was like, oh, dude, Jerry is in bad, right?

Speaker 2 And that wasn't a setup. I was sound asleep.
Might have even been snoring.

Speaker 3 I was out cold.

Speaker 4 Yeah. I mean, good for you.
Hey, listen, also, big week.

Speaker 4 We just celebrated your birthday.

Speaker 2 Yeah, I just turned

Speaker 2 46.

Speaker 4 You were on the back half to 50, bro.

Speaker 2 It's one of those things, too. Like, do you know how I know I'm old? Do you know when you go book a flight and you got to scroll down to the year you were born?

Speaker 2 I used to be like two scrolls, maybe two. Now I'm like scrolling.

Speaker 3 You just, you just scroll one big one and it just rolls.

Speaker 2 I'm like, God, I'm still not at 1979 yet. This is crazy.

Speaker 3 That's how I know I'm old.

Speaker 4 You're in 70s, dude.

Speaker 2 November 79. So I saw the last month and a half of the 70s.
So I guess

Speaker 4 listen, you don't look a day over 40. You got a great family.
You live a young life. You golf.
It's good, bro. You're living the dream.
You're living the dream.

Speaker 3 Well, happy birthday, buddy.

Speaker 2 I appreciate that. We have an interesting show for you now because speaking of, you know,

Speaker 2 46 years old, grew up in the 80s. And then obviously the 90s were where I really started like watching and loving sports, all sports and playing sports.
You a little bit younger, but similar.

Speaker 2 We have someone that in the 90s, early 2000s is, I guess you would say he's self-proclaimed, but I think we could all proclaim him the godfather of aau myron piggy yeah what does that name mean to you matt have you ever heard that name before we're having him on the show today i i heard the name

Speaker 4 the answer is yes would i could i tell you a detailed you know version of like who he was no i've been around the au game um enough playing when i was younger with like the pump brothers who everyone knows and pat barrett who's a local like who's a legend in the AU game back in the day.

Speaker 4 And, and then obviously with Cole and just that experience, but really fascinating story about Myron Piggy who ended up going to jail for

Speaker 4 this.

Speaker 4 Kind of changed the game, you know, and what and his upbringing was crazy.

Speaker 3 Um, I'm excited for Kansas City.

Speaker 4 Yeah, I'm excited for people to hear this story. He's got a book out, you know, we're going to talk about it.
And, and, um, and now with like

Speaker 4 NIL and uh you know athletes being able to get paid for all of these things it's just a fascinating like back then to now and the shift and all of this and he was really like you said like the godfather of au basketball and helping kids and all this and i'm i'm i'm excited to kind of hear his story you know yeah the name of the book is the hustler that changed the game myron piggy co-wrote it and uh look i remember Crumming up in New York.

Speaker 2 I mean, AAU basketball, New York City is one of the mechas. I mean, I'm sure even LA LA2 obviously has had unbelievable players.

Speaker 2 I, you know, everyone from Stefan Marberry, Kenny Anderson, like all these guys, like the gauchos were really the team in New York.

Speaker 2 I think they're still going on that they were essentially high school NBA teams. So to hear Myron's story and also like you mentioned something interesting that I want to respectfully ask him.

Speaker 2 It's like you kind of went. to jail for a lot of things that are now very, very legal.
And that's got to be a frustrating thing because,

Speaker 2 and when you even start to see some of the numbers reportedly that, and we'll ask him about this, that like he famously had the Rush brothers, Kareem Rush, Jeron Rush.

Speaker 2 Some of the numbers that these guys were paid, air quotes, I don't think he'd ever fully say, you know, 2,700 bucks, 200 bucks, 1,200 bucks, and somehow he got connected to a wire fraud, mail fraud.

Speaker 2 We're going to actually ask him what he officially went away for because it's kind of murky. I think it was one thing to get out of another.
But anyway, excited to talk to him.

Speaker 2 I mean, his story, they'll probably make his story into a movie one day.

Speaker 3 I'm like, it'll be a doc. Halfway through the movie.

Speaker 2 So I don't want to get too many spoilers for him, but the book is outstanding. It's definitely one of those things that might be turned into a movie or a doc, like you said.
And

Speaker 2 yeah, I'm excited.

Speaker 2 Don't forget to, right after Myron, we have Annie Agar joining us. We'll do some more twisted trivia.
Maybe Matt will go easy on me for my birthday week because he's been uh

Speaker 2 you know like the kids say, I've heard like several like 18-year-old athletes say no, six, seven, but like belt to ass.

Speaker 4 Oh, belt to ass is a new one.

Speaker 2 My nephew hit me with that with Madden. We're gonna play Madden.
He sent me a belt emoji.

Speaker 3 I'm like, belt to ass.

Speaker 4 I'm like, I've seen, I've seen, yeah, that's like, that's not necessarily like a new one, but it is the way they specifically said people say, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 So hopefully you won't go belt to ass on me.

Speaker 4 I'll keep it easy on you.

Speaker 2 All right. And before we bring on Myron Piggy, because this is related to his story, let's do our Wendy's.
It's not the fresh take of the week anymore. We switched it up.

Speaker 2 It's basically we're joining team tendees and we're joining a lineup like never before. Crispy, juicy tendies now at Wendy's.
So thank you for sponsoring this segment.

Speaker 2 Matt, it got me thinking since we have Myron Piggy on AA basketball, high school sports. You played at every single level, the highest, some of the highest levels.

Speaker 2 Me, not so much, but I've seen a lot.

Speaker 3 Who is

Speaker 2 the best, whether it's AAU or just high school in general, the best high school AAU athlete you have ever seen?

Speaker 4 Well, I'm going to give you two answers. One, I'm just going to shout out

Speaker 4 Coa Pete,

Speaker 4 starting freshman for Arizona. He played with Cole's team a couple of years back in middle school, AEBC, made hoops, the whole deal.

Speaker 4 Then I was like, this dude is going to be a top 10 pick in the NBA draft, and he's certainly going to do that. So seeing him in person play with my son was awesome.

Speaker 4 The greatest high school basketball player that I ever saw in person was Shay Cotton. Shay Cotton was

Speaker 4 a 6'5

Speaker 4 lefty. I saw him play as a freshman.
He was the same year as my brother. So that was five years.
So he was, you know, 16 years old. I was 10 or 11.
My brother played basketball.

Speaker 4 This was Modern Day when Modern Day was a powerhouse. They won national championship with Miles Simon.
They won with Reggie Geary. Those teams, they won a couple championships in the 90s.

Speaker 4 This kid was a freshman starting on Modern Day, averaging like 25 a game, which was unheard of. It was Modern Day was like Duke, right? Like everyone averaged 12 points.

Speaker 4 No one ever, like, you know what I mean? They were so many good players.

Speaker 4 I mean, the stroke, he would take off from like mid-free, like mid-key, dunk on people. He was the greatest.

Speaker 4 And I would just finish this by saying, I think there's, there's pods out there where like Paul Pierce and all the local, like Paul Pierce went to Inglewood, like Tyson Chandler, all of the local kind of LA legends would say the same thing.

Speaker 4 They're like, bro, Shea Cotton was just different. He was a beast.

Speaker 4 And I think he ended up going like to like, I think he transferred out of Modern Day, ended up going to like Long Beach State to play with his brother for a period of time and just never, I don't, like never made it.

Speaker 4 And it was one of those things, like, man, like he was the greatest, one of the greatest athletes I'd ever seen in person.

Speaker 2 Well, that's something you always talk about that stays with me is, you know, all these guys.

Speaker 3 are great.

Speaker 2 And then you look at a guy like Shay Cotton, who at the time, you'd think, this guy's a shoe-in for the NBA. It just doesn't happen.
And it's not for a lack of talent. You cannot say Shay Cotton.

Speaker 2 So many other factors. And that's going to kind of coincide with mine.
Because, well, my honorable mention,

Speaker 2 I saw him in high school, not AAU. And I got a close look at him because our school was rival.
Our rivals were Stefan Marberry.

Speaker 2 And it was just so clear that this guy is way better. And my school was really good.
And his school was really good. He was significantly the best player in the court.

Speaker 2 Similar to like LeBron's run, they had to start putting Marberry's games at MSG. That's how many people were trying to come see his games.
They moved them to freaking Madison Square Garden.

Speaker 2 But my number one, the best player I've ever seen, and I saw him on the AAU side, did not see his high school games, Felipe Lopez.

Speaker 2 And youngsters out there, if you don't know who Felipe Lopez is, go do a little Google YouTube deep dive. So I went to a Gauchos, famous AAU team that I'm sure Myron Piggy knows well about.

Speaker 2 I went to a gauchos practice one time i was a little younger and they laid out like i think 20 balls in different spots all over the court like the elbow the three-point line the corner half and they were doing this drill and felipe lopez was running up and back grabbing each ball shooting it and the dude went 20 for 20.

Speaker 2 he had every shot of every ball that was placed on that court and um He, you know, local story, Dominican kid from New York. So he went to St.

Speaker 3 John's, right?

Speaker 2 Then he went on to, he played at Rice University. He went to St.
John's. He stayed home, essentially, you know, Bronx, Queens.
He stayed home, went to, and it was good St.

Speaker 2 John's career just didn't, his game didn't translate to college. And he got drafted.

Speaker 2 He played in the NBA for quite a while, but you just would have, he was up there with LeBron in the sense of a high school athlete at that time.

Speaker 4 Well, so like out there too, like Sebastian Telfair was the other one, right? New York kid.

Speaker 3 Marberry's cousin. Marberry's cousin.

Speaker 4 I'll tell you what.

Speaker 4 I had a conversation with Luke Walton once, who who was on our pod last year and a good friend.

Speaker 4 And I played, I remember playing him in the rec league, like a really competitive rec league, and he was getting 30 a game. It wasn't even close.

Speaker 4 And like playing against a couple of Drew League players. And he goes, Matt, the difference between like,

Speaker 4 he said the NBA, and it's like football too. It's hard, but like the talent only gets you so far, man.
It's like the mental part.

Speaker 4 It's the grind. It's all the other little things that you have to do.
Cause I'm sitting there watching this kid. I'm like, God, this kid is good.
And he's like, Yeah, dude.

Speaker 4 But he's like, there's a million of those kids. They just won't make it because they don't have the mental that they can't, like, there's just something missing, you know, and you see that.

Speaker 4 It's unfortunate. But I was like, damn, dude, like, basketball's got to be another level.

Speaker 2 Wow. Shout outs to Wendy's.
We were officially on Team 10s. And let's

Speaker 2 go.

Speaker 4 Oh, he sees this. I want to know what Shay Cotton is doing now.

Speaker 2 I wonder if Meyer Piggy knows that and must know us. Oh, I'm going to ask.

Speaker 4 I'll ask him. I've guaranteed that's the 90s.

Speaker 4 Shea was the man on the circuit.

Speaker 2 Let's bring on the godfather of AAU.

Speaker 4 Hey, we're so we'll get, we're, we're happy to, to do this, man, and just shoot the shit, tell your story, anything you want to get it, just go. And, um,

Speaker 4 and uh, yeah, man, we appreciate you coming on. Thank you.

Speaker 1 I'm open book, man. I'm open book.

Speaker 3 No, I know.

Speaker 1 I'm open book. I just, uh,

Speaker 1 you know, it's, it's just a blessing, you know, to be able to really kind of,

Speaker 1 you know, get, get it, you know, get this, get this story out, you know. Um,

Speaker 1 we, we, we, we, we very, very pleased to be on your show and um yeah i mean

Speaker 1 we came when we came around when we came along it was uh new york riverside had the best powerhouse team at that time and that was uh ronnie or test elton brand uh lamar odin uh jesse and and them boys them boys was monsters man and they just

Speaker 1 we brought them we brought it We brought them in Kansas City for a tournament, and them dudes smashed us by 50.

Speaker 1 and your team was no joke i'm guessing no no but our team was younger but they still wasn't no joke but they smashed us on our home court by 50.

Speaker 1 and when i when i when they smashed us by 50 that's when i had to i had to regroup man i'm like man i gotta go out here and recruit some players to play against these big boys and that's what we did we started that's when i started going out recruiting but um

Speaker 1 new rock riverside was the powerhouse then 205 in three years.

Speaker 4 Was that your record?

Speaker 2 205. Dang.
And one of those five is the Artest game, I'm guessing.

Speaker 1 Yes, that was the first, that was the first whooping we got.

Speaker 2 So, all right, so you get beat down by Artest, and then you're going to start recruiting.

Speaker 2 That's why I want to ask, I'm halfway through the book, obviously, but I know a lot of the story because I knew about it before the book. And the book is unbelievable.
Congrats to both of you.

Speaker 2 And we're going to talk about it. But when you make that decision, okay, I'm going to go start recruiting.
Now, this is, there's no social media, there's no YouTube, there's none of them.

Speaker 2 You can't just sit in your home and scroll through. You have to get out and they're like, how are you finding players? Obviously, there's word of mouth, but you got to go beat our test in Elton Brand.

Speaker 2 You got to widen the search a little bit.

Speaker 1 Yeah, well, what we did was

Speaker 1 we got on, we got, we do, it was a little internet. And, you know, like back then, you had guys that had,

Speaker 1 they had them a uh, what you call them service? The recruitment services. Yeah.
So you go on the recruiting service and see

Speaker 1 who was the top players. So what we did was we had an unlimited budget.

Speaker 1 So we would go up there and if I needed a big man, what I would do is I would go out here and see the top big men in the country. So what I'd do is I would fly out there and see if they was available.

Speaker 1 If they were available, I would bring them in. for practice over the weekend and then I would test them in the tournament.

Speaker 1 And if they wasn't good in that tournament, then we would just, no, we can't do this.

Speaker 2 So that's like a tryout, essentially.

Speaker 1 It was like a tryout

Speaker 1 because playing against them boys was, man, it was crazy. But one thing I just say, I did

Speaker 1 was able to put a team together. And we played New York Riverside two weeks later in University of Washington, D.C.
And we ended up beating them by seven.

Speaker 1 So we turned that thing around real quick.

Speaker 2 That's real quick to go from losing by 50 to winning by seven.

Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah, yeah. I went out and got some, I went out and got some players, man.

Speaker 4 I'd be curious, Myron, of

Speaker 4 then, you know, that time in your life as A, you, you know, the godfather and putting these teams together. And we were just talking before this, like, I've experienced that with my oldest son, Cole.

Speaker 4 He's going to be at SMU next year playing football, but he was a big hooper, like, did the whole, all the circuits that you were a part of and all that. And

Speaker 4 I used to see kids, like, the recruiting process. I used to see kids like play for one team and go play for another team in the same tournament and go play for a third team in the same tournament.

Speaker 4 I'm like, what the shit is going on? Like, this is wild. Is it what? What was the biggest difference? Because I'm sure you still follow the AU and you still know a lot of these kids.

Speaker 4 Like, what was the biggest difference back then as opposed to now, you think?

Speaker 1 Well, back then was it.

Speaker 1 It was more, it was different because it wasn't no

Speaker 1 Nike teams playing in Nike Nike tournaments, Adidas teams playing Adidas tournament, Rebound team playing a rebound tournament. It was

Speaker 1 that everybody played everybody.

Speaker 1 You know what I'm saying? So the difference was too, where

Speaker 1 it wasn't no parents involved a lot.

Speaker 3 Interesting.

Speaker 1 You know, so where it's parents now involved because parents is paying kids to train their kids.

Speaker 4 Yep.

Speaker 1 So now they're spending money. So now parents got a mouthpiece.
Back then, parents wasn't not,

Speaker 1 we was not, parents were not paying to be in that, in that, in, in, in that, in that, in that space. So, like, I never had parents come in my gym.

Speaker 1 I would have my parents drop my kids off, which is how it should be.

Speaker 4 Yeah.

Speaker 1 And if you ever came to me about playing time, then you take your kids and go somewhere else.

Speaker 3 Right.

Speaker 1 It was about putting a system together and the kids learn how to play basketball.

Speaker 1 Then now kids is looking at when the parents don't, when the kids ain't playing, the parents go in there and talk to the coaches. The system is a whole different system now.

Speaker 1 And when I travel, my parents didn't travel with me.

Speaker 1 We travel,

Speaker 1 you know, they put their kids in my hands.

Speaker 1 And it was my responsibility to teach them kids as young men how to be,

Speaker 1 you know, try to get them to be men. But the whole system today is

Speaker 1 Nike's playing Nike, Adidas playing Adidas, Reebot's playing a Rebot.

Speaker 1 I don't even know if it's Reebot now, but

Speaker 1 everybody, the parents got to say so now.

Speaker 1 Where back then, the kids, that's what made the kids tougher and stronger when the parents weren't involved. And I'm not knocking the parents.

Speaker 4 You can, because I'm one of those. And I tell them, I said, I said, dude, I love, like, I wish we had more of you in today's world because it's such a different thing.

Speaker 4 And I want to, like, your story is remarkable because

Speaker 4 I just, I've been in that world. I've just seen a lot of stuff.

Speaker 4 And you talked about the kids, and you obviously left such a positive imprint on all of the kids that came across your program because there's quotes out there, all these players saying like what you were able to do for them.

Speaker 4 This book, The Hustler That Changed the Game and your experience, and we're going to dive into the story.

Speaker 4 what why for you is it important to to kind of get this out now and tell this story like what do you want to accomplish telling this story myron well what i wanted to accomplish was

Speaker 1 you know and in this story was that

Speaker 1 back then when we was when we when i was involved in aau

Speaker 1 it was different because

Speaker 1 we used to travel and be in five-story hotels. I mean, we traveled, we had the best everything.
But when the kids came home,

Speaker 1 them kids went back to the ghetto, to the hood. Them kids didn't have gas in their houses.
They didn't have lights on. They didn't even have food to eat.

Speaker 1 You know what I'm saying? So my job was, I'm not going to put you out there and you're going to travel and you're going to live big for three days, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

Speaker 1 Then you come back home. Then you got to get up there and you don't know if your next meal.
I couldn't do that.

Speaker 1 so that was my job as a coach and i basically was kind of like a dad to make sure when they went home they was able to have lights gas and food and it wasn't about paying kids it was about just helping kids that wasn't able to uh

Speaker 1 go home like me and my son when we left i go home i got everything They didn't have nothing.

Speaker 1 So it was important for me to get this story out where it was like, oh, he was paying kids to play basketball. No, I wasn't paying kids to play basketball.

Speaker 1 I was just trying to help kids to get out of the hood because I used to dominate the hood and I knew what the hood was. And a lot of them kids wasn't built to be in the hood

Speaker 1 because they couldn't survive it.

Speaker 2 Also, too, I imagine like.

Speaker 2 I guess the question is too, so where were you at when you kind of made that decision? You talked about like you lose to our test and all that, but you were already in the AAU space.

Speaker 2 Where were you at when you made that switch in your life into AAU basketball? What was that turning point for you?

Speaker 1 You know, I'll just be honest with you. I really never made a full switch.

Speaker 1 I was still dipping and diving in the streets.

Speaker 3 Right.

Speaker 1 But I had a son. My son was in that area.
with Jeron Rush and Corleon Young and Corey McGeddy and Mike Miller. So what I was doing was

Speaker 1 the AAU team was really dropped in my lap because I was a parent and I went to a game and the guy who used to coach them,

Speaker 1 the sponsor fell out with him. So we didn't have a coach and then the parent was like, well, let Marin coach.

Speaker 1 And then when I got, when it got dropped in my lap, my whole, I was going to put my program like my demeanor on the streets.

Speaker 1 If I'm a top on the streets, I got to be top in this field too.

Speaker 1 So that's how I was thinking, you know, so yeah.

Speaker 2 No, I was saying you mentioned earlier, you talk about Nike plays Nike, Reebok plays Reebok.

Speaker 2 Something that's in the book and you talk about a little bit is you yourself found yourself being courted at one point, right? By Nike and Adidas are getting pitched.

Speaker 2 And, you know, I know it's mentions of like Sonny Vaccaro and all that. I'm fascinated with that.
with that era because I don't think we'll really ever see it like that again.

Speaker 2 Tell us a little bit about that time in your life life where you have all these shoe companies wanting to be involved. And I think you said publicly regret signing with Nike over Sonny Vaccaro.

Speaker 2 Is that true? Did I get that right?

Speaker 1 That's a true story.

Speaker 1 When I took over, I had took over

Speaker 1 later.

Speaker 1 The season, the AAU season, the first year I took over. It was in the end of the year.
So the next year it started, then I started getting calls from Jim Harris Jr.

Speaker 1 and Sonny Bacuro and George Ravelin. So Nike started, you know, they

Speaker 1 wanted us to wear their gear. And then all of a sudden, when I started talking to them, I used to go home and I had boxes and boxes of gear on my porch and in my yard.
Now,

Speaker 1 I'm living in the hood now

Speaker 1 and I'm coming home with all these boxes. in my yard.

Speaker 1 Now, if I was somebody else, them guys would have took them boxes out of that yard right they weren't taking it out of your yard no yeah and but they weren't gonna do that

Speaker 1 it just that wasn't happening so i had a conversation with um

Speaker 1 no i was courted real heavy i was courted they was uh they offered me they offered me so much

Speaker 1 and as as of the day i send sonny mccurl scriptures every morning and he respond back to me every day amen we still talk Wow. But it came down to, I had told Jim Hare Jr., because he was at Reebok.

Speaker 1 I was like, you know, and I always ask the kids, I was like, what do y'all want to wear? So, you know, kids don't want Nike.

Speaker 3 They don't want Reebok.

Speaker 4 That's for sure.

Speaker 1 So, so it was, it was, it was, it was funny. They were like, Coach, we aware of this

Speaker 1 when we get playing ball in the gym, but we're not wearing this on the circuit.

Speaker 3 That's so true.

Speaker 1 It came down to

Speaker 1 Sonny and Raven.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 Sonny was never in the conversation, but he had people.

Speaker 1 And it was beginning to be Nike camp and ABCD camp. And I got a call from some people and they were from Sonny's camp.
And they was like, man, we're never, ever, we're never, ever.

Speaker 1 If you say this out loud, we're going to deny it.

Speaker 1 You know, and he was like,

Speaker 1 if you bring your kids to ABCD camp,

Speaker 1 you'll walk out of New Jersey with a million dollars in cash.

Speaker 2 What year is this? This is 90s, right?

Speaker 1 Yes, we're in the 90s.

Speaker 2 And damn.

Speaker 1 The next day, Raven called me and flew me out to Indianapolis. That's where Nike camp was.

Speaker 1 and um

Speaker 1 we sit there and we talk we talk

Speaker 1 true story

Speaker 1 he sit down and he start saying piggy this is my first year coming to nike

Speaker 1 um

Speaker 1 i need to put mikey nike back on the map if you help me out man you uh we'll take care of you and everything and This guy got on his knees and cried.

Speaker 1 Now,

Speaker 1 I'm not prejudiced

Speaker 1 but

Speaker 1 i to see a black man like that getting on his knees crying knowing that he needs you

Speaker 1 i turned a million dollars down damn to go to nike

Speaker 1 to help him out

Speaker 1 and that was one of the worst decisions i ever made

Speaker 1 because

Speaker 1 Sonny was always loyal to his people rather than what.

Speaker 1 And at the end of the day, my kids wanted to wear jump man, and they were just us in Riverside was wearing jump man at that time. So they gave me all the gear that I wanted,

Speaker 1 travel anytime I wanted to travel. They gave me everything that I needed,

Speaker 1 and I decided to go with Rad

Speaker 1 then Sonny. And I'm gonna tell you how good Sonny is today.
Me and Sonny still talk today,

Speaker 1 and he don't never hold that against me.

Speaker 1 But that hurt me man because i've thought rabbit was going to be loyal to me rest his soul rest in peace

Speaker 1 but he wasn't he wasn't loyal to me

Speaker 4 is that one of you think that's one of the

Speaker 4 i think you've been quoted so you don't have a lot of regret on on how like is that one of the biggest regrets that was that was in a you and a you that was the biggest regret yeah that was my biggest regret just because just because i mean kind of laid it out just because

Speaker 4 you thought George was a certain way, it was going to be this way, or was it, I'm assuming, I mean, a million dollars is a lot of money back then, and that could do all other things, but is it because

Speaker 4 you, I mean, you just maybe had blinders on, you didn't see it?

Speaker 1 I didn't see it. I didn't, I'm new in the game.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 I'm new in the game. I'm up here trying to be loyal

Speaker 1 to my, and again, I'm not prejudiced. But I see a black man trying to raise something, that black educated man trying to do something.

Speaker 1 And when you get on your and you start crying, and I mean, he actually got on his knees crying and begged me.

Speaker 2 Yeah, it's hard to,

Speaker 2 it's hard not to, it's hard to turn that down.

Speaker 1 You know, then he's like, I give all your kids all the gear you want. You know, we are, we're,

Speaker 1 I give you $50,000 a year.

Speaker 1 As soon as you bring the kids, Nike flew in, gave me a $50,000 check. Every year, every summer, they gave me a $50,000 check.
And then I had all the gear I want.

Speaker 1 All the kids never ever, I had enough gear

Speaker 1 to

Speaker 1 close

Speaker 1 20 organizations in Kansas City.

Speaker 2 And it's being safely stored in your yard because nobody was going to touch it.

Speaker 1 No, but it was for my surprise. No, nobody's going to touch it.

Speaker 3 Nobody's going to touch it.

Speaker 1 Nobody's going to touch it. And it came to the point where I would come home and my wife was like, Man, what is

Speaker 1 she? Got mad because we looked like we were like we were in a junkyard or something.

Speaker 2 You opened up a store,

Speaker 1 yes, you know. But I regretted that because

Speaker 1 y'all, you never heard nothing bad about Sonny taking care of his people.

Speaker 1 And then, even me, me and the pump brothers that got together and we talked back then, and I was thinking about really doing it, but Rad,

Speaker 1 my biggest regret was with rad was

Speaker 1 my kids was important to me

Speaker 1 and i had the number one number two and number three kid in the country

Speaker 1 at that time

Speaker 1 rad was telling me that uh and trace mcgrady had just came out So Nike didn't have no high school kid coming out.

Speaker 1 At that time, then they was like, well, Corley Young is going to come out of high school. So I transferred Cornelly Young out of Wichita East and I put him in Hard Grade Military Academy.

Speaker 1 And him and my son went there.

Speaker 1 So my understanding was that

Speaker 1 Corley Young was going to be Nike's number one guy.

Speaker 1 And they was going to give him a three or four million dollar shoe endorsement.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 he was going to be okay.

Speaker 1 But to come to find out that that rad was just blowing smoke on my ass

Speaker 1 so one thing that worked with your kid corleg

Speaker 1 right young could have went to college yeah

Speaker 1 and corleon was more suited to go to college than jeron rush because jeron rush should have been the one that came out

Speaker 1 and that's a whole different story

Speaker 2 of him not coming of him going to college instead of coming out yes and you must, so that's the other thing. It's like, you're not just simply coaching kids on the court, right?

Speaker 2 You mentioned what you're doing behind closed doors, trying to make sure that kids have stuff to come home to, but also you're, you're, and Matt and I were talking about this off the air.

Speaker 2 It's like the level of skill with some of the kids that you're coaching,

Speaker 2 you know, their lives are being decided. Some of these kids do have pro abilities.

Speaker 2 So you haven't, you're having those conversations with these guys about college or at the time going pro and how much did these young kids kind of rely on you?

Speaker 2 Because I feel like you still talk to Sonny. We even mentioned Shay Cotton hit you up not that long ago.
I feel like your loyalty is why, and people are still talking to you to this day.

Speaker 3 So it all connects.

Speaker 1 My kids was like my sons.

Speaker 1 Like they was my son.

Speaker 1 I treated my kids like I treated my son. Me and Jeron, Corley Young, we still had the best relationship ever.
You know,

Speaker 1 it was important to me.

Speaker 1 I wasn't going to make the decision for the kid.

Speaker 1 I was going to put the kid in the position to go where he wanted to go because it wasn't me that had to live on the college campus.

Speaker 3 Right.

Speaker 1 It was going to be them.

Speaker 1 I had all the offers from big-time coaches.

Speaker 1 I could have took assistant coaches job.

Speaker 1 And honestly, if my kids would have went to KU, I would have been a millionaire today.

Speaker 1 And by not them kids, not one of them kids touched KU,

Speaker 1 that's when the target got on my back.

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Speaker 2 Well, that's the other thing, too. Well, you know, and I'm reading the book and obviously knowing that you're coming on.
I still don't quite understand

Speaker 2 everything that you, and I'm like air quoting, like got in trouble and went away for. Cause, and now you see like so much of this stuff nowadays is, and we'll talk about that in a minute, is, is

Speaker 2 not even an issue anymore. You know, I guess I didn't even really follow the connection of, you know, stuff with players being the thing that you got into trouble for, you know?

Speaker 2 The NCAA. It seems very convoluted.
It seems very convoluted.

Speaker 1 The NCA, man, they

Speaker 1 figure I was getting too big.

Speaker 3 And they figured.

Speaker 1 They feel like I had too much power.

Speaker 1 And when the NCA seen that,

Speaker 1 and then

Speaker 1 I had a history,

Speaker 1 a street history.

Speaker 1 So it's easy to target someone like me.

Speaker 1 You know.

Speaker 1 But my kids, my kids was my kids. They was my sons.

Speaker 1 I always told my kids, don't take a piece of bubblegum from nobody. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Because

Speaker 1 that's how much them kids meant to me.

Speaker 1 You know, and my kids never, ever took a piece of bubblegum to nobody. And then all of a sudden, it came out to

Speaker 1 that I was putting $17,000 in a shoebox. giving Geron $17,000, giving Corleon this and giving Corleon that.

Speaker 1 I was just taking care of my kids like on the the weekends when they wanted to go to

Speaker 1 a dance or a prime whatever $15

Speaker 1 that's all them kids couldn't handle that kind of money but when they came after me it I couldn't I couldn't fight it because of my history right

Speaker 4 I uh it's interesting because

Speaker 4 you know there's all these quotes like you were kind of the scapegoat right for NCAA and they came after you and singled you out and

Speaker 4 you know I lived that with Reggie with Reggie Reggie Bush and USC. I'm sure you're familiar with that whole deal.
And I remember,

Speaker 4 you know, at the time, we were, you know, we were on top of the world. We're dynasty and all these things.
And people were sniffing around. And, you know, Reggie has a story and all those things.

Speaker 4 And I love my boy. I always support him.

Speaker 4 But I remember kind of like SC kind of sticking their nose up to the NCAA and saying, like, you know, fuck you guys. You guys can't come after us, blah, blah, blah.

Speaker 4 And they were like, oh, yeah, well, we will.

Speaker 4 to this point, and it's just, I just feel like there's a lot of parallels with YouTube, just like to this point, I'm just like, man, like whatever Reggie did or didn't do, like the Heisman, all of these things, it was complete bullshit when a lot of kids, a lot of people were just kind of like kind of trying to survive and all this.

Speaker 4 But like, you just said, you know, don't take a piece of bubblegum.

Speaker 4 Man, I remember all the time, like, I couldn't, you couldn't go out to lunch with someone unless you knew him like prior to high school. Like there was this like your like relationship thing.

Speaker 4 Um, I just found it interesting. There's a lot of parallels with like Reggie was a scapegoat for the NCAA at the time.

Speaker 4 They made him an example, which I thought was just highly unfair, similar to your situation.

Speaker 1 Yeah, it, and and I agree with that because

Speaker 1 um

Speaker 1 uh Reggie didn't do nothing that nobody else did, but in at the end of the day, I didn't either. It was it was just about me um

Speaker 1 in Kansas City, taking care of my kids, trying to make sure that

Speaker 1 when I go home and lay my head down on a soft pillow, I wanted my kids to be able to have the same comfort.

Speaker 1 And the kids were so important to me,

Speaker 1 it got to the point where college coaches used to come in town, big name coaches, that could stay at a five-star hotel. and would sleep on my couch.

Speaker 1 I mean, would sleep on my couch. They would come to my home in the hood and sleep on my couch and hang out with me.

Speaker 4 I mean, that's the impact you had, yeah.

Speaker 3 Yeah.

Speaker 1 You know, but nobody's NCAA to say that was illegal.

Speaker 1 You know,

Speaker 3 I had,

Speaker 1 and I'm going to say this, and I don't care what he say. I had Roy Williams.
People would call me and say, hey, I'm going to be on the plaza.

Speaker 1 Is it okay if

Speaker 1 you and Jeron walk by?

Speaker 1 Okay, yeah, we walked by. We did that.

Speaker 1 I used to take Jeron Rush up to KU every day for three times a week to play against Paul Pierce and Jock Vonham. Was that illegal? The NCA didn't say nothing about that

Speaker 1 because it was Roy.

Speaker 2 Different rules for different people, right, in that scenario.

Speaker 3 Different people.

Speaker 1 Different rules for different people.

Speaker 3 I mean,

Speaker 1 I had a chance when, I mean, I walked to the airport one time and a guy came up and gave me $30,000 cash and said, don't look into it until you go home.

Speaker 1 This is for you.

Speaker 2 And you never seen this guy before?

Speaker 1 Not ever, but then I know I found out who he was.

Speaker 3 Who he was? Like Bagman, right?

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 1 And Matt,

Speaker 1 it came close to your home.

Speaker 4 I mean, shit, you could tell me. I mean, I was, yeah.

Speaker 1 Yeah, but no, it's not be real. You know,

Speaker 1 George Rabbin was a USC guy.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 1 Jerome Stanley was a USC guy.

Speaker 1 You know Jerome Stanley, right?

Speaker 4 Yeah, well, I mean, he's Sean Johnson's agent.

Speaker 3 Oh, yeah.

Speaker 4 Well,

Speaker 4 Tim Floyd got in trouble at USC.

Speaker 1 Me and Tim Floyd had a bad. bad breakup, man.

Speaker 4 Did you? Oh, I had nothing but a positive experience with him because I was there for a couple of years with like

Speaker 4 Nick Young and kind of like that, like that era. And then he got out.

Speaker 1 But yeah, he called me one night and said, if Earl Watson don't see, I think he was at Iowa State.

Speaker 1 Earl Watson don't sign with me. Earl Watson ain't gonna be nobody.

Speaker 1 I was like, what the hell you mean he ain't gonna be nobody? He needs to sign with me right now.

Speaker 1 And then we kind of fell out. So he Earl didn't go to Iowa State when he went there.

Speaker 2 I've said this story

Speaker 4 is i remember when i was uh i don't i don't think i've ever told you this jerry so like i remember i think i was done so like technically i didn't do anything wrong but like we were se i think it was tim we were recruiting oj mayo oj mail oj mail was this

Speaker 4 yeah he was a star and i'll never forget i was i was on a i think i was done so i was getting ready to combine this was like maybe january february whatever and he was on like a little recruiting trip and i was in a golf cart with him i think it was his dad and someone else.

Speaker 4 And they had asked me, like, hey, we like, we want this kid. And I don't know what other shit happened outside of that, other than I was on the golf cart.

Speaker 4 And I said, I said, bro, like, you're one and done. You know, you're going to be one and done.
Come here. You're in LA.
You're going to get whatever the hell you need.

Speaker 4 And the conversation kind of went like that. I was on a golf cart showing him around campus and all this.
And he signed like a month later. He's one and done and he left, man.
Yeah.

Speaker 4 That was my only recruiting story that I had to help USC basketball.

Speaker 3 But that was Tim Floyd was there.

Speaker 1 Yeah, Tim Freud, you know, he did what he had to do. But like I said, the only regret I had with the shoe company was

Speaker 1 they misled me on Corle Young.

Speaker 1 And when they mismaned me on Coille Young, that messed up that kid's life.

Speaker 1 And my whole

Speaker 1 intentions was never to

Speaker 1 mess up none of my kids'

Speaker 1 future.

Speaker 1 And when Quelli Young got drafted, I had to fire Jerome Stanley.

Speaker 1 And then I had to hire the Pulson Brothers, which at that time, they had Penny Hardaway, and he was the hottest thing in the NBA, Lil Penny.

Speaker 1 And just thank God that the Pulson Brothers had a relationship with the Detroit Pistons.

Speaker 1 And that's why, that's how

Speaker 1 Quell Young ended up getting drafted.

Speaker 3 Yeah.

Speaker 1 And then

Speaker 1 when I got,

Speaker 1 when I got, when that indictment came down, Cole Young and Jeron didn't have no, they didn't have that, their foundation was gone.

Speaker 1 So they didn't have nobody that they, that could put that iron fist on them, tell them, you need to go to class, you need to get in the gym or whatever.

Speaker 1 And that's what hurt them.

Speaker 2 So what's it like for you now when you see

Speaker 2 NIL?

Speaker 2 And I ask Matt all the time, like, because I think a lot of people ask former players, like, I'm sure, Matt, you've been asked a million times, how much money would you have made?

Speaker 2 Reggie Bush, how much money, millions, right?

Speaker 2 Um,

Speaker 2 but I don't know if anyone's asked someone like you in that, you know, because again, you were about guiding, and now it's you know, we're seeing college athletes and commercials and ads everywhere, and everyone's making a lot of money.

Speaker 2 How does just what's your view on it today when you look at the landscape?

Speaker 1 You know, I'm glad that it's like that

Speaker 1 because

Speaker 1 by me getting hit back then, and they changed all the AA rules, calling the piggy rules and stuff now,

Speaker 1 it's important that the kids get what they got coming.

Speaker 1 But in my era,

Speaker 1 Jeron,

Speaker 1 Corey McGetty,

Speaker 1 and Earl Watson, Earl,

Speaker 1 and Jeron, and Cole Young Young, they would have been millionaires, man. Millionaires.

Speaker 1 Before they touched the campus. Yeah.
You know?

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 it's um,

Speaker 1 it's NIL, man, it just blew it away. But

Speaker 1 by me having to go through what I had to go through, they didn't realize something that

Speaker 1 Labar Ball changed a lot of stuff. That's when kids started getting paid.

Speaker 2 That's a great point. That's a great point.

Speaker 1 Everyone thought he was crazy, but he, yeah, but they wouldn't mess with him.

Speaker 4 Yeah,

Speaker 1 you know what I'm saying? They was able to do me because

Speaker 1 of my criminal history and who I was.

Speaker 1 But the NIL now, man, it's just, wow.

Speaker 3 We're rich, man.

Speaker 1 I would have been rich.

Speaker 1 Me and you wouldn't even be talking today.

Speaker 1 We'd be talking in a restaurant when I run by. Hey, man, how you doing?

Speaker 4 You and me both, man. We'd be having a steak dinner with some nice, nice wine or tequila.

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Speaker 3 Oh,

Speaker 1 what would be, you know,

Speaker 4 you, you've obviously, God, you, you've seen it all. You, I mean, going back to the 90s and now,

Speaker 4 what would be the best advice that you would give these

Speaker 4 young men and women? You know, all these adults.

Speaker 3 Young millionaires. Yeah, young millionaires.

Speaker 4 I'm actually curious, Piggy, because my son is kind of entering the NIL world with the RevShare model now and they're getting paid and all of these things.

Speaker 4 What would be the best advice that you would give? And now that parents are way more involved

Speaker 4 now as opposed to then to

Speaker 4 these young kids.

Speaker 1 Well, one thing I will always tell them that they still have to continue to get in the gym and work out

Speaker 1 because

Speaker 1 you don't have high school kids coming out going to Division I now.

Speaker 1 Sometimes high school kids got to go to junior college now. That's division one for a lot of kids

Speaker 1 because of the NIL.

Speaker 1 You know what I'm saying? Where kids were going, the top kids were going to different top universities. If you look at the college

Speaker 1 rosters now in basketball, you brother selling will find a freshman on a roster.

Speaker 1 So what you have to do is you have to continue to work hard. You have to continue to just stay focused.

Speaker 1 And then the parents got to

Speaker 1 the parents got to really think about their kid. Just because somebody knocked on your door and your kid had a good high school,

Speaker 1 don't take the first money that come to you.

Speaker 1 Because once you take that first money and tie your lock yourself in to these agents and all them, you're not going to get out. And then when your kids get, when your kids don't make it,

Speaker 1 then how do you look at your kid in the face and say,

Speaker 1 it's my fault?

Speaker 1 I think that

Speaker 1 kids today

Speaker 1 just need to be more patient. And I think parents today need to quit trying to live through them kids

Speaker 1 because every kid is not going to make it.

Speaker 1 And every kid is not going to play college basketball. Every kid is not going to play college football.
You're going to have to take a longer route now.

Speaker 1 You're going to have to go through junior college. And then you still might have to, then you might have to go to another college before you can get to the big colleges.

Speaker 3 Piggy,

Speaker 4 before, before, you know, know, we'll wrap this up in a couple minutes. I want to ask you this.
I was actually asking Jerry this, or I was telling Jerry this, and I'm curious your take.

Speaker 4 What separates, because you, I mean, elite athletes, basketball players are some of the most elite athletes in the world. What separates someone from making it and not, in your opinion?

Speaker 4 Because we all know talent can only get so far, but you've seen it. And there's such a razor-sharp line between,

Speaker 4 hey, he was great, but he just didn't make it

Speaker 1 what separates that kid today is

Speaker 1 if his parents step get out of the way

Speaker 1 and let somebody that knows the game

Speaker 1 just train them and do like

Speaker 1 old school when my kids came in the gym my kids never touched the basketball sometime for two hours yeah and there wasn't no parents they wasn't able to run to the parents and cry

Speaker 1 if you really want your kids to make it to separate it

Speaker 1 you'll see the parents who will hand their kids over to somebody know what they're doing and get out of the way

Speaker 1 from the kid that parents stay in the way

Speaker 1 long as your parents in the way and i'm not knocking parents because i know they love their kids but you got to make your you got to make that kid today earn everything that he got and everything that he get in that gym one-on-one

Speaker 1 without them in there watching and without them in there critiquing.

Speaker 1 Because if it's in their heart, it's going to be in their heart.

Speaker 1 You can't make a kid have heart. A kid either born with it or want it.

Speaker 1 You can't pay for a kid for heart. You can't pay money and say, this kid is going to get hard.
Either that kid wants it or he don't want it. And it's got to be up to the kid how bad he wants it.

Speaker 1 Some kids will tell their parents, I don't want you there.

Speaker 1 And I think that's the difference today.

Speaker 4 Well said, yeah.

Speaker 2 So, last thing I wanted to ask you, too, I also, in addition to reading the book, I read

Speaker 2 the piece in the Kansas City Star, Toriano Porter. It's a great piece.
I encourage everyone to read it too. And he said something very interesting.

Speaker 2 And I don't even know how someone would go about this. So I don't even know if it's something you have actually walked down that line.

Speaker 2 But he wrote and basically said his belief is you should receive a pardon because of how laws and rules have changed. Everything is now wide open.
Is that something that you've even looked into?

Speaker 2 Is there any movement on that? Because

Speaker 2 it left me with the article saying, yeah, he should get, at least look into it, get, you know, get his day.

Speaker 1 You know, first of all, I'll just take a minute. First of all, I want to thank Mike Watson.

Speaker 3 Yes.

Speaker 3 Your book.

Speaker 2 Yes.

Speaker 1 Because

Speaker 1 Mike Watson sit down and he played for me and my system for, you know, when he's younger. I want to thank Mike Watson because

Speaker 3 he

Speaker 1 took time

Speaker 1 and he investigated everything. Because when we wrote this book, we wanted to make sure that everything was accounted, factual, yeah, you know what I'm saying? Factual, yep, yep.

Speaker 1 And he did his due diligence. And

Speaker 1 if it wasn't for God, put Mike in my life to write this book because I've been trying to get this story out for 20-something years.

Speaker 1 And it comes down to by him writing this book and then Toyano writing that piece.

Speaker 2 Piece was great. Yeah, both are great.

Speaker 1 It was great.

Speaker 1 But when it comes down to

Speaker 1 a pardon or whatever,

Speaker 1 I feel that the

Speaker 1 only reason they were able to do that because I feel that they gave me a life sentence.

Speaker 1 And when I say a life sentence, where If you hit me with $350,000 restitution,

Speaker 1 how would I pay that not if I go back selling dope?

Speaker 1 And right now,

Speaker 1 and right now in the day, if it wasn't for Mike Watson writing this book and it's out there,

Speaker 1 you know, right now they ain't taking my social security.

Speaker 1 You know what I'm saying?

Speaker 3 So

Speaker 1 if God's will and the pardon come,

Speaker 1 we'll be grateful, we'll be grateful for it. But I don't sit up here, man, God's in control of my life.

Speaker 1 You know,

Speaker 1 I know that I didn't do nothing wrong.

Speaker 1 And at the end of the day, man, I just got to live with who I am and what happened.

Speaker 1 It would be nice to get a point, though.

Speaker 2 I think God put people like Michael Watson in your life, though, too. So if it does happen, that's definitely part of it.

Speaker 4 Yeah, we're pushing for it, man. Yeah.

Speaker 2 And the book is, like I said, I'm halfway through and I put it down to get the chance to talk to you. And I'm going to dive right back in.

Speaker 2 And I encourage everybody, again, out there, the hustler that changed the game, go buy it. However, listen to it.
However, you consume books these days.

Speaker 2 It's an unbelievable story in an unbelievable world. And you're still here telling it.
And I thank you for the time. And

Speaker 1 I'm,

Speaker 2 you know, I just thank you for sharing your story. I think it's a very good story.

Speaker 1 It's a great honor, man. And me and Mike, we're really grateful for y'all giving us the opportunity.
And yeah, yeah, push that for us.

Speaker 2 Is Mike still is Mike still here? Mike, jump in for a second, Mike. Sorry.
We had you in for a second.

Speaker 3 We weren't set up to capture both audiences. You're good, bro.
This is my dude. I love this.

Speaker 1 You're good, bro. You're good.
It's all good.

Speaker 3 My man. Mike,

Speaker 4 I'd like to ask you one thing before we hop off. What,

Speaker 4 you know, what inspired you to tell this story and just

Speaker 4 the relationship that you and Piggy have? I'd be curious.

Speaker 7 Absolutely, man. I think what inspired me was he gave me the opportunity.
He put my life on a trajectory by being able to play for his program with my big brothers, Earl Watson, Jeron Rush.

Speaker 7 You know, those are guys in Kansas City. Those are heroes and legends.
And so I came up a few years after them.

Speaker 7 And so when I got to play on that national stage, it really put me there from a Division I level. And so what happened, we lived a block apart from each other and didn't know it for seven years.

Speaker 7 I had lost contact with him. I went off to play pro for 12 years and then I came back home to Kansas City and we ran into each other.
He was just telling me what he was doing.

Speaker 7 And I was like, man, how can I help? How can I help get the story out there? We were looking for writers to write it and everything like that.

Speaker 7 And one day we sitting there, he's like, Mike, why don't you just try and write it?

Speaker 1 And I'm like, bruh, it ain't no easy.

Speaker 3 You know what I mean?

Speaker 7 But sitting there with the man, I have over 90 hours of just in the audience talking to him, hearing his stories, man, hearing his heart, hearing his transparency.

Speaker 7 I wanted to get the story out there to tell the truth. You know what I mean? Just like Matt, I heard you mention Reggie.

Speaker 7 It's a lot of, you know, stuff behind the veil of college basketball and high school basketball. I wanted to make sure his story was told.
So that's how I got involved, man.

Speaker 7 And it just kind of snowballed. And a year later, man, it's where we are.

Speaker 2 Well, the book book is fantastic matt and i were even talking off the air it's like this is a movie or a documentary at the very least in addition to a great book so uh we should definitely talk off the air as well because this again i think this is a story that could not only you know it's part of the history of how we got to where we are today but also i think it's a good uh i think it's a good point for parents and young athletes to hear this in the moment as they're going through their journey too.

Speaker 2 So

Speaker 3 respect to you. Absolutely.
I appreciate your jersey, Matt.

Speaker 2 Well, respect, man. We appreciate you guys.
Appreciate your boys. And we'll talk again soon.
We'll get you back on here soon, and we'll keep up with you.

Speaker 2 All right, Annie Agar joining us courtesy of Twisted Tea. Grab a refreshing Twisted Tea today.
Andy, you look in a little holiday spirit.

Speaker 3 It's like a Christmasy red.

Speaker 3 You got a glow in you.

Speaker 6 Thank you. It's not for the Packers game.

Speaker 3 I'll tell you that.

Speaker 6 Yeah, I'm feeling a little holiday-ish today.

Speaker 2 Must be things.

Speaker 2 We're going to run a little twisted trivia today.

Speaker 3 But real quick, guys,

Speaker 2 is there anything? What are we thankful for this NFL season? And I'll ask you, Andy, because it's definitely not the Packers and the tie.

Speaker 3 Maybe you are grateful for the tie.

Speaker 6 I am grateful for the number nine. I'll just say that.

Speaker 6 Minnesota fans know all about that. Like nine, maybe the number of interceptions.

Speaker 6 Nine is in the number of times that he held the ball way too long. It's just a great year for the number nine.
I'll just leave it at that.

Speaker 4 Is Stafford number nine?

Speaker 3 He is, isn't he? Yeah. So I'm grateful

Speaker 4 for Matt Stafford and what we are witnessing with him. And I don't, and I know this narrative, but like there's like the last of the Mohicans of kind of my age group.

Speaker 4 He's younger than me, but Roger's still playing Flacco. I think we need to take a step back and appreciate and be thankful for the career that Matt Stafford has had.

Speaker 4 I think he's going to go down as someone just said this, but he's one of the purest passers I've ever seen, I think of all time.

Speaker 4 And I think they're the favorite to win the Super Bowl. And it's my hometown team.

Speaker 2 I'm thankful for Shane Bowen, even though he just got fired, because you were able to get me five fourth quarter leads where I actually was like, wow, this team's not.

Speaker 2 And we still lost and held draft position.

Speaker 2 I know tanking doesn't exist in football, but boy are the Giants doing a good impersonation act of tanking that might be the question like would you rather have a lead and blow it or just not have the lead at all so you're you're taking the positive route i'd rather have i'm taking the positive yeah and jameis i mean i'll live off that touchdown reception for matt could you have done that could you have done that i mean we broke no dude are you kidding me i didn't break any tackles in my career

Speaker 2 all right last thing before we do twisted trivia uh you know i give you guys one insane stupid thing that matt rolls his eyes at me every week so this is that thing i'm giving you okay i did not understand why the Bengs would want to bring back Joe Burrow in a sense of like they're out, right?

Speaker 2 And Matt always says, like, you play because you're getting paid, and I get it.

Speaker 2 But then I looked into it, and they're three games back, and there actually is a Bengals path that's probably not going to happen, but it's there. The Ravens play the Bengal, as we know, coming up.

Speaker 2 So the Bengal can get that one. Ravens go Steelers, Bengals again,

Speaker 2 Patriots. Annie, you're Packers and Steelers again.
Steelers go Bills. Ravens need a little help from the Dolphins.
Lions who will need the game.

Speaker 2 And the Ravens again, while the Bengals go Ravens, Bills, that's a tough one.

Speaker 3 Ravens, Dolphins, Cardinals, Browns.

Speaker 2 Is there a Joe Burrow Bengals path to winning that division? They're three games back.

Speaker 6 That would be wild.

Speaker 6 Well, yeah.

Speaker 2 That would be crazy. I think there's a path.

Speaker 6 They were close last year, right? It came down to the Chiefs that Chiefs game.

Speaker 2 They're doing what they do. They're going to ask them the same question.

Speaker 4 Do you think the Chiefs are going to make a run?

Speaker 2 Yeah, I think that game that they stole. By the way, a full confession to you guys, and then we're going to do the trivia.
And I feel like such an asshole for this. We know I gamble.

Speaker 2 Down 20 to 9, and then Mahomes threw that red zone interception. I had a parlay with the Chiefs of the last leg that would have won me a lot of money.
I took the buy out. No.
And then they won.

Speaker 2 I took the buyout against the Chiefs.

Speaker 6 She didn't have faith.

Speaker 2 Who does that? I took the buyout against the Chiefs.

Speaker 8 Unbelievable.

Speaker 2 Let's get to some trivia.

Speaker 3 What do you got for us today, Annie?

Speaker 6 All right, we have a little theme here. Maybe it's the holiday vibe, but we're going to do a little Thanksgiving theme.

Speaker 6 So we have three questions, two pictures, and you'll see how it all ties into Thanksgiving. Let's hope.

Speaker 6 Starting with question number one: who had the most career receiving touchdowns in Thanksgiving games?

Speaker 2 Calvin Johnson.

Speaker 6 Yes.

Speaker 1 Yes.

Speaker 6 I know. You had to assume it was some line.

Speaker 2 How to be a a lion or a cowboy.

Speaker 3 It was either

Speaker 3 a CO or something.

Speaker 6 Yeah. Okay, next question.
Good one.

Speaker 3 Good one.

Speaker 6 The most career rushing yards in Thanksgiving games.

Speaker 4 Barry Sanders.

Speaker 6 Ooh, no, good guess.

Speaker 3 Emmett Smith.

Speaker 6 Yes.

Speaker 3 Let's go. The kid's hot.
But it's the only thing you would have guessed very first if it weren't for.

Speaker 2 I also didn't think you'd give us two lions in a row.

Speaker 6 Yeah, that's true. That's true.
Okay, question number three. Who has the most career passing yards in a Thanksgiving game?

Speaker 4 In one game? Or

Speaker 3 Thanksgiving games.

Speaker 3 Thanksgiving

Speaker 3 game history.

Speaker 2 This is a tricky question. I think I know it.
Is it Tom Brady?

Speaker 8 No. Damn it.

Speaker 3 Tom Brady in Thanksgiving.

Speaker 2 Well, I just figured they put him somewhere in there a lot on Thanksgiving. Like they do the Mahomes every oh, hope I didn't just give him an answer.

Speaker 3 Care to venture a guest, Matt?

Speaker 4 On Thanksgiving Games?

Speaker 6 Thanksgiving Games, most career passing yards.

Speaker 6 It's on theme of what we were

Speaker 3 talking about.

Speaker 4 Stafford.

Speaker 6 Yes.

Speaker 2 I just didn't think you'd go there. I didn't think we'd go there.
I handed you to the bottom.

Speaker 6 I guarantee Detroit has like all of these

Speaker 6 in all these Thanksgiving games.

Speaker 8 All right.

Speaker 3 Two to one.

Speaker 6 Two pictures here. They're Thanksgiving themed.
The first one, who is this player?

Speaker 3 Levion Bell. Evident Bell.
Yeah,

Speaker 3 that's that. I got it.
I said

Speaker 2 Avion Bell because I was so I was trying to spit it out.

Speaker 6 Okay, this is the tiebreaker here. I think we're two and two.
So last picture, who is this person?

Speaker 3 Stephon Diggs. Stephon Diggs.
Yeah, that guy. Wow.

Speaker 3 Another. Wow.
I can't say it any faster. Wait, wait.

Speaker 6 Did a Giants person just blow another lead?

Speaker 3 Oh, my Jerry.

Speaker 2 Oh, Annie, you're in your video making zone right now, right?

Speaker 3 I am.

Speaker 6 Can you tell?

Speaker 2 I felt like you just put me in one of your videos right now.

Speaker 2 Shane Bowen, folks. Brought to you by Shane Bowen.

Speaker 4 You are so bad at this game. What is wrong with you?

Speaker 2 Look, I just definitely shot your wad way too early, buddy. I blew it on Le'Veon Bell.

Speaker 2 And I definitely, I said Stefan Diggs as fast as I humanly could have said it. I don't feel bad about that one at all.
And

Speaker 2 I just went Tom Brady because I just did not think you'd hit us with two out of three lines. I thought this would be the outside the box question so yep three

Speaker 2 you could have let me win on my birthday bro i know wait today's your birthday i kind not not yet but we don't know this comes out maybe on my birthday gotcha okay well happy early birthday are you a birthday week person or just like the day kind of just the day good yeah i'm not like i like to celebrate it with family and stuff but i don't go do it like a whole week you're not like nine birthday parties and a dinner and a brunch

Speaker 6 nope that's too much but well i mean not just for me and for me personally i know a lot of my friends that like to do that and i will partake in the activities if they include alcohol but not all not all of them not all

Speaker 2 wow props the twisted tea just give you a give you another loss for your birthday would you expect anything different from me you wouldn't want me to take it easy on you no yeah no okay i want exactly i want nothing but i want nothing but the heat uh well thank you annie thank you twisted tea thank you matt thank you everybody out there who listened uh happy thanksgiving enjoy the football it's a great slate finally i feel like it's all lined up chiefs cowboys it's gonna be insane chiefs so good boys so good i can't believe the cowboys won that's that that it's almost like they needed those two teams to win to make that game awesome and now it's all oh yeah

Speaker 6 yeah the nfl is happy the nfl is in a happy place right now with the uh with the ratings i'm sure Well, everyone, enjoy.

Speaker 2 Be safe out there. Give a little twisted T if you need it.

Speaker 4 Hey, I'm thankful for both of you guys.

Speaker 3 Oh, Matt.

Speaker 6 We didn't even think to say we're thankful for each other.

Speaker 3 Matthew and Brianne.

Speaker 2 Look at what we get to do. We get to do this.
Are you kidding me? We get to do this for fun. Are you kidding me? Yeah.

Speaker 2 What a great life. Matt's doing the like, look at us, guy.
He's doing the look at us.

Speaker 3 The meme, the meme.

Speaker 2 Yeah. Would you look at us? Look at us.

Speaker 3 Just look at us.

Speaker 8 Just talk to them all. That's grateful.

Speaker 2 Happy Thanksgiving, everybody.