Episode 69 - Sports Talk at 80's High!

The boys and I do a bit of a sports hodgepodge with special guest Kevin Shaw.

Please share your picks with us at pta80h@gmail.com

Thank you all so much for the continued support!

Welcome to Past Times at 80's High

Thank you for listening to Past Times at 80's High!

Transcript

SPEAKER_25 0:36

Spanning the globe to bring you the constant variety of sports. The thrill of victory. And the agony of defeat.

SPEAKER_11 0:50

This is ABC's Wide World. Hey y'all, welcome to another episode of Past Times at 80s High. Got a little bit of a sports episode for you today. Kind of a sports hodgepodge, I guess. But of course, as always, I have the boys here with me per usual. Brother Mark.

SPEAKER_10 1:11

Hey, how's it going, AJ?

SPEAKER_11 1:13

Lovely. Dongo, you iceul. Hey, what's up, Iceols? Hello and Kevin? Hello. Hello. And on top of that, last but not certainly least, we have a guest today, and that would be Mr. Kevin Shaw. How's it going, Kev? Good, eh? How are you, buddy? Awesome, man. Awesome. I was gonna say, before I mess anything up, why don't you go ahead and tell us about yourself?

SPEAKER_27 1:39

Yeah, thanks for having me aboard today. I uh listen to the show every uh, I think I've heard every episode, so I'm psyched to be here today. And the sports episodes are right up my alley. So again, AJ mentioned, my name's Kevin Shaw. Live in the Lakes region here and grew up with uh these guys, and except for Kevin, so know a lot about him. So super psyched. I'm in the real estate field, and I'll also have a uh nonprofit organization called 603 United, and that's it for me.

SPEAKER_11 2:08

Awesome. Cool awesome. Well, like we do here at Pastimes at 80s High, we get going, but of course, Kevin loves to do the shout-outs.

SPEAKER_09 2:19

Absolutely want to say hi to some new fans in Rapid City, South Dakota on the eastern slopes of the Black Hills. There, we got Hyalea, Florida. Hyalea is actually a Muscogie seminal word for pretty prairie, in case you didn't know that. Beek Bergen Genderland, the Dutch province. Yeah, you know, you go there all the time. Uh Dutch province, but I like that. I looked it up, and it's it's a lot of camping and and vacationing, so I think it's and small population, so very similar to where we all live. And then we've got uh Herbil government. It's the Kurdistan region of Iraq, and it's the oldest continually inhabited city in the world. Wow, wow, man. And they're listening to us. Oh my god.

SPEAKER_11 3:08

Fascinating. Big burger. Was that what it was called? Big burger?

SPEAKER_09 3:12

Beakbergen. Beak Bergen. Beakbergen.

SPEAKER_11 3:17

Awesome. Right. Uh sounds cool to me. Well, so as we have two Kevins today, I'm gonna say Kevin Shaw and Kevin. So just to differentiate a bit. And Kevin Shaw is gonna have the honors today. And what we're gonna start out with at number seven is your favorite sports announcer. Have at it, Kevin Shaw.

SPEAKER_27 3:42

Yeah, this was a tough one to decide. You have so many uh old school announcers, but I boiled it down to um John Madden.

SPEAKER_01 3:50

The last thing I'd say when I was coaching Raider before we went out on the field is don't worry about the horse being blind, just load the wagon.

SPEAKER_27 3:57

Football announcer, past player, and coach in the NFL as well. I love Madden.

SPEAKER_26 4:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_27 4:03

That was a tough one. We've got some good choices there. So I won't tell you who was second place because you guys probably chose him.

SPEAKER_11 4:10

I know. I'm worried about a few repeats.

SPEAKER_09 4:14

What's his name? The uh the mad TV guy, Frank Calendo. He duh he did a great mad Madden impersonation. Yeah. Hilarious.

SPEAKER_02 4:23

Hey folks, John Madden here from Quick Pop Popcorn Popper. Hey, John, how's it work? It's simple, Fred. You just plug it in, open up the butter packet. Screw it up, guys. I'm sorry, but the packet won't open.

SPEAKER_10 4:40

We got a butter packet. Madden does have one Super Bowl that he doesn't deserve because the Patriots got screwed out of that game that they won. And they would have won the damn Super Bowl. I we talked about it last week.

SPEAKER_26 4:51

Oh, he was the coach on the pass interference call? That that one, Mark?

SPEAKER_10 4:56

Rough in the past, sir, yes.

SPEAKER_26 4:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_10 4:58

Yeah, that was John Madden.

SPEAKER_27 5:00

Yeah, really how I chose Madden in the end is you've got to be an absolute legend if you have a video game named after you. So he's got his own video game. So says he did okay. You know what he's also got the background as a player. He was an offensive lineman and a Super Bowl-winning coach. And he's just such a character.

SPEAKER_10 5:16

Wait, well, uh don't get me going if you're not sure. That's like Niagara Falls.

SPEAKER_27 5:22

Well, if you think about him, he didn't like to fly, so he had the Madden mobile. So you know, you know he's a character. And I just always remember the the Thanksgiving football games. He'd bring out the turkey and hand out the uh turkey legs to the player of the game.

SPEAKER_26 5:39

I wonder if they actually scheduling choices because of him not flying. Like were they gonna have a Monday night football in you know Miami and then a Monday night football in Seattle or whatever, you know, or would they just say, let's not do the Seattle game right after, let's do, you know.

SPEAKER_27 5:56

They they I wonder if they made scheduling decisions based on his his they uh scheduled it around his schedule and made sure the bus could get there, but in the fall, he was just on the road nonstop in the Madden mobile.

SPEAKER_26 6:10

Yeah. All right, that's cool.

SPEAKER_10 6:12

Awesome pick, Kev. All right, brother Mark, that's off to you. Okay, I'm going with an oldie. Uh this is Kurt Gowdy. Um he would he's a little before you you guys' time. Do you guys recall him? Kurt Gowdy? I mean, he was with Tony Kubek on baseball. He did football. He was the Red Sox announcer before I started watching. You know, he was the one that says, Hey neighbor, have a Ganset.

SPEAKER_33 6:38

We think the new Narragansett jingle is great. It'll be a big hit. I hope you agree. And don't forget to join us for Red Sox Baseball.

SPEAKER_10 6:48

Brought to you by Yeah, he was such an iconic guy. I mean, he was really good friends with uh Ted Williams, and they they would go fly fishing all the time.

SPEAKER_19 7:02

And Ted Williams has Homer in his last time attack in a red dot universe.

SPEAKER_10 7:09

Kurt Gowdy was on. You knew it was a a big game. It's just old school. He called the 75 World Series, even though he did not call Bernie Carbo's tie-in Homer, and he did not call Fisk's game-winning Homer, which um I would be more celebratory about that if it, you know, they didn't have Game 7. But anyway, Kurt Gowdy and he just called many, many World Series, many, many Super Bowls. In fact, he called all the World Series until uh they started switching networks every year, you know, and they brought in a CoSell and those pencil neck geeks. But anyway.

SPEAKER_11 7:46

All right, so no mentioning other names.

SPEAKER_10 7:49

Oh, that's true. I forgot he's in an house there, too.

SPEAKER_09 7:52

Did he did he do any country kitchen ads with uh with Ted Williams? JJ Nissan. My dad would have just hanged you, Kevin.

SPEAKER_07 8:00

Yeah, I was missing.

SPEAKER_09 8:01

Well, it's a good thing Salty's not here then.

SPEAKER_11 8:05

As a matter of fact, I have the JJ Nissan baseball card with Ted Williams fly fishing on it.

SPEAKER_10 8:11

Oh my god. Yeah, and not only did he do that, he also flew planes in World War II.

SPEAKER_11 8:17

Back when they were real men. Exactly.

SPEAKER_10 8:22

I didn't wear a helmet in hockey, speaking of real men. All right.

SPEAKER_11 8:28

So we're off to me. And I'm gonna pull a Donnie here, and I'm gonna break the rules if I can. Can I use a team here? Like a duo? Well, whatever. I'll just say Fred Cusack and Derek Sanderson. There is to me nobody like it. I just I can hear it now. Back in the day here in New England, we have Nesson, of course, and the home games were on Nesson, which my family couldn't afford back then, and then later on, we didn't have the opportunity to have for a while we didn't correct. But then uh Ricky and I would go to the mug for every single home game, and just that's back when I was so tied into hockey, and I can hear those guys just incredible announcements. Derek Sanderson was always a snide, biased smart ass. But then just to hear Cusack with the shots gone!

SPEAKER_19 9:30

Fire the misses, rebound, go, Bobby!

SPEAKER_11 9:34

They were incredible together. Cusick. Isn't that what I said? You said Cusak. Well, anyway, Fred Cusick and Derek Sanderson. Off to you, Dongo.

SPEAKER_26 9:46

Well, I was going to pick uh Fred Cusack, and I knew that he might have came up, so my second was gonna be Derek Sanderson, but you cheated me out of it. I am sorry. So I'm gonna stick with Fred Cusack. I loved him. He's the reason why I loved hockey in the 70s, eighties, like his iconic school. Like he got so into it. You know, it could be like a mid-season game that was meaningless and he'd still go crazy for it. And uh, you know, he was an announcer for 45 years, uh, both radio and TV. He was with WSBK 38 from 71 to 97. Uh so just an amazing run and reasonable.

SPEAKER_11 10:32

Channel 12 to us New Hampshire rights.

SPEAKER_26 10:34

Like I stopped watching the Bees after kind of he he finished up, just wasn't the same to me. But no.

SPEAKER_11 10:40

Yeah, I totally agree. Incredible. Yeah. Sorry, Dongo. Now how do you like my rule breaking? It's fair.

SPEAKER_26 10:49

And I I thought about it, and it's like I you know, he's my favorite by all time, and I I wasn't gonna put in a alternate, you know. Yeah, you can't do the audible when it's love that much.

SPEAKER_10 11:01

I might have picked him too, but I mean I knew that I knew AJ would have him, and I figured you would, Donnie. I'm surprised that Kevin Shaw, you didn't have him.

SPEAKER_09 11:11

All right, Kevin, to you. All right, bringing up the rear, Kevin too, happening right here. Uh I had to go with Howard Cosell. I mean, he was such an icon. He started when people were very sycophantic to sports athletes. It was like, oh, you're so great, and everybody, they just drooled all everybody. And Cosell was the first guy to just, I call him as I see him. He would talk smack about them. He would go, I mean, the famous battles with with Ali, just going back and forth. I always I love the one where where he says, You're pretty truculent, and Ali says, I don't know what that means, but if it's good, that's me.

SPEAKER_16 11:51

You're being extremely truculent. Whatever truck I mean, if that's good, I'm that. So I just love the SNL skit with Eddie Murphy.

SPEAKER_26 12:00

He's like, after all I've done for you, I made you Kosell.

SPEAKER_07 12:05

Right.

SPEAKER_26 12:06

He was talking to somebody else. It wasn't Howard Cosell, he was just playing uh Ollie that was a little punch drunk drunk or whatever. Yeah.

SPEAKER_09 12:15

Sadly. But yeah, so just an icon. And because I get to bring up the rear, the joy of being last, everybody's picked, so I get to throw one other thing out there. And you guys just made me think of the greatest inning in baseball history, as far as the play-by-play entertainment, was when uh Remy and Arsulo had Dennis Leary and Lenny Clark in the booth for one inning, and it was one of those innings that went on and on forever. They just couldn't close it out.

SPEAKER_31 12:51

We have the psychological advantage going into the playoffs, if we're even if we're the wild card, because we've already won. We know Arod's gonna choke because he's afraid of us. Well, he's having problems at home. At least that's a rumor I'm starting.

SPEAKER_09 13:02

What do I don't know him? They just killed. I think it was about the time he was doing the um Oh, rescue.

SPEAKER_10 13:09

Remy was just that was a great show. Oh, he was killing him, and I was in tears. I couldn't get away. They were riot.

SPEAKER_09 13:17

They had to I like Remy, I didn't care for Ursula. But anyway, but that inning was just I just I don't think I've ever listened to I'm sure there's more epic innings of baseball, but I've never listened to a play-by-play that was more hilarious than than those guys. It was fantastic.

SPEAKER_10 13:35

Oh, Remy lost a tooth on one game.

SPEAKER_11 13:38

Awesome. I think it was great pick, Kev. And I gotta say, that was one of my audibles on my announcer. Looking Jerry Remy loved him. Nice.

SPEAKER_10 13:48

When that guy was he started in 88, so that would have worked.

SPEAKER_11 13:52

So now we're off to category number six to you, Kevin Shaw, and that is gonna be your favorite professional boxer.

SPEAKER_27 14:01

Yeah, favorite boxer. I had uh a couple in mind, but at the end of the day, I had to go with uh Mike Tyson. In his prime, I don't think anybody was more vicious than Tyson. He was just an absolute beast.

SPEAKER_04 14:14

Please welcome the former undisputed heavyweight champion and the current defending WBA heavyweight champion of the world. Here he is, ladies and gentlemen, introducing the one and only fire, Mike Tyson.

SPEAKER_26 14:32

Came out like a mad bull.

SPEAKER_27 14:34

Oh, yeah. You look at some of those fights, you know, 15 seconds, 30 seconds, so many of the others were just grace and they'd go the distance, but you never wanted to catch a Tyson fight late because you might miss it. It was just tell you.

SPEAKER_09 14:49

Don't take a piss. Yeah, don't go grab a beer because it's over. That happened to me. Yeah.

SPEAKER_10 14:55

I met my wife the night that he fought uh Holyfield, the ear match. And I I wasn't going to this party. It was at a uh a work friend of my brother David, and um I decided to go. I got the keg tapped right now, so I went. Got back for the fight. I met somebody else, didn't think much of it, and well, here I am. So worked out well. Yeah, well, I don't know. Yeah.

SPEAKER_11 15:24

Awesome pick. All right, well to you, brother.

SPEAKER_10 15:27

All right, well, I have to go with this guy, and I know he's gonna come up again, but he was the one boxer that I really truly took on as my own, and it's Marvelous Marvin Hagler.

SPEAKER_13 15:39

Middleweight champion of the world, marvelous Marvin Hagler.

SPEAKER_10 15:46

Obviously, uh I felt the pain that Kevin did last week or two weeks ago when we did the cast, uh, you know, about him quote, losing to uh Sugar Ray Leonard. And he was the local guy, and he was vicious, you know. He'd it was no nonsense. He came out and he took it to you. And that's how Sugar Ray tended to win his match was by running from him the whole friggin' time, getting a few jazz. Exactly. You know, and uh but yeah, he he he was great. When he fought, I took it like watching the Bruins of the Patriots, you know what I mean? So awesome.

SPEAKER_11 16:24

Awesome pick. We went pretty in depth last week too on that one. Yeah, I know.

SPEAKER_10 16:29

I'm not gonna get going on it.

SPEAKER_11 16:30

All right. Well, I don't know if you saw me, this is to me now, and Kevin Shaw, I don't know if you saw me flipping you off. Yeah, he does have got it. Anyway, I had to go with it. I I just because to me it was so big back in the day where, you know, back then I think it was an average of like 50 bucks for a pay-per-view, and we'd all kick in. And it's so funny because everyone would bitch that it was you know, you'd watch the undercards and then you'd see the you know, the seven-second fight. First of all, that uppercut, and I must bring up Mike Tyson's punch out on Nintendo, but just to see this guy that look when he came in the ring, and like the four punch combinations that he would throw with that speed being a heavyweight, just and then to end it with that uppercut or whatever the you know the connected punch was, it was just fearsome, and he just decked so many people. Yeah, it's awesome. You go down the YouTube rabbit hole and just just unbelievable. But um but those pay-per-views, it was just incredible just getting together with friends to watch him, and of course, he went down a different road for a while, and now once again, he's pretty awesome. So I had to pick him. Watching him on Rogan the other day. It was an older one, but pretty funny dude. They're both sitting there smoking pot in the studio. So fucked up.

SPEAKER_10 18:11

Well, when Customato died, that really did a number on him.

SPEAKER_26 18:15

Yeah, because he kind of kept them, he kind of kept them reined in a little bit. Right.

SPEAKER_09 18:20

He was an animal before he started, he was robbing little old ladies and just out of control. Yeah. But you're right, AJ, that uppercut was like picture perfect. It was the whole body punch. He used everything. You it started at his toes and went all the way up through his back, and just I can't even imagine what that would feel like. Being on the wrong end of that punch would just be I don't think any of us would walk away from it.

SPEAKER_10 18:46

AJ faced him a few times and he beat him a couple times.

SPEAKER_11 18:49

On Nintendo, I did. Well, that's off to you, Dungo.

SPEAKER_26 19:02

I gotta keep him. Uh I gotta do a repeat because I grew up before I moved to New Hampshire, I grew up in East Bridgewater, which was right next door to Brockton, so marvelous Marvin Hagler was the guy who was my favorite growing up.

SPEAKER_30 19:16

Two years later, another race riot broke out, convincing Hagler's mother to move the family to Brockton, Massachusetts. Hagler dropped out of school, working in a factory to help his mother make ends meet, before he was beat up in a street fight with a local boxer named Dornell Wigfall. The fight inspired Hagler to seek instruction in the sweet science. He began hanging out at the Petronelli Brothers' gym for a few months before telling one of the brothers that he wanted to be a fighter. Goody and Pat Petronelli were childhood friends with Brockton's favorite son, heavyweight champion, Rocky Marciano.

SPEAKER_26 19:49

Um he had the highest knockout percentage, 70% middle weights. And uh Joe Fraser used to say to him, because uh he would complain nobody wanted to fight him because he was good, you know. And uh Joe Frasier said they don't want to fight you because one, you're black, two, you're a southpaw, and three, you're good. And that's why people didn't want to get in the ring with him. But he finally got in the ring and it was a fighter, and I can't remember his name off the top of my head, but Fraser he was tied in with Fraser, whether Frasier was sponsoring him or and uh he gave him a fight and and got him into you know getting championships and defending championships and going on his run. But yeah, it was pretty cool. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_11 20:30

Hard notch pick, man. Yeah, he's just the blue collar fucking. Blue collar guy awesome pick, Dongo.

SPEAKER_09 20:37

Off to you, Kev. All right. So I mean, I get where you guys are coming from, but this is one of those things where I could go on forever because there were so many that I loved. I can't believe Mohammed Ali is not on this list because he was poetry. He was amazing to watch him fight the the way that he just danced around the ring, his footwork, everything. Then, you know, Donnie mentioned Frazier, um Duran. There's just so many of them. But I had to go with the guy that really like, I don't know if it was the time and place, but I just remember Alexis Arguello moving up and winning three divisions until he finally got to, I think it was light featherweight when he ran into Aaron Pryor. And at this point, he's like my hero because I've been watching him for a few years. He was just, I mean, he had he had sixty-eight knockouts out of seventy-seven wins out of eighty-five fights, and I think the losses all came at the end when he tried to fight well out of his his class. I mean, he's like a hundred and thirty-five-pound dude when he started out, but he threw combinations, he danced, he was just amazing. Um, and then that fight with Pryor, the first one that I saw him lose, Pryor came out and he was just like doing this thing where he's putting his fist out, his you know, his glove out, and just you know, like giving him the stink iron. I'm like, oh, he's gonna nail this guy. And that thing went. And Arcoya was known as a 15-round fighter, and it went deep, and then and Pryor was just too much weight for him, you know. But I mean, how many how many super light feather weights do you know that throw knockout punches?

SPEAKER_28 22:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_09 22:12

You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_28 22:12

How do you knock somebody out with with a pencil for an arm? Standing five foot ten inches, fighting at 126 pounds, Alexis had height and reach in almost every fight. His jab alone was hard to get inside of. Behind it was one of the most complete offensive toolkits in history. His ring craft was masterful. What truly set him apart was a straight right hand like a bolt action rifle.

SPEAKER_09 22:42

Right? I don't get it, but if you guys ever get a chance, if you're not familiar with him, but you ever get a chance, a lot of the fights are on YouTube, and it's amazing to watch that guy. He was and then later became went back to Nicaragua, became a mayor in Nicaragua. Then there was a little bit of trouble with the Contra and the Sandinistas and all that fun. And he allegedly committed suicide by shooting himself twice in the heart. So pretty sure that was Daniel Ortega using the killery method.

SPEAKER_11 23:10

I was just gonna say it's pretty tough to get that second shot up right.

SPEAKER_10 23:16

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_09 23:19

Kind kind of my hero back in the day. I love I love that guy.

SPEAKER_10 23:22

What was his name again? Alexis Arguello. Alexis Arguay.

SPEAKER_09 23:31

He did beat Boom Boom Mancini. Had a better record, longer, longer career and a better record than Mancini.

SPEAKER_10 23:36

Well, you know the famous fight with Boom Boom Mancini and Duck Koo Kim.

SPEAKER_09 23:40

Do Koo Kim, yeah.

SPEAKER_10 23:41

I was watching that live. Yeah.

SPEAKER_26 23:44

That was crazy. Did ABC was it Wide World of Sports that they used to have boxing on? What was on it was on the weekends on Saturday. I just remember watching boxing on regular ABC TV or whatever. Right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_10 23:57

It was on Wide World of Sports, Donnie. I'm pretty sure of that. Yeah. Yep. That was a great friggin' show that you'll never see on again. Yeah. Anything else? Incredible.

SPEAKER_11 24:06

Yep. That intro alone, man, that we of course talked about last week. Kevin, um, by the way, awesome that you went outside of the box there a bit.

SPEAKER_09 24:18

Where you guys were watching baseball and football with your dads, I was watching boxing.

SPEAKER_10 24:23

So I I watched it with my dad constantly. And I'm glad I thank everybody for not picking Sugar Ray Leonard. I'd appreciate it. Deep hatred.

SPEAKER_27 24:33

That's back in the day when people actually watch boxing. I don't think you people watch boxing. Boxing is like irrelevant. They don't have the personalities they had back then. No way. True. No.

SPEAKER_26 24:44

And a quick shout out to Todd Carmelia, who was a big Tyson fan, who would draw him and did the most amazing pencil drawings of him ever. Incredible.

SPEAKER_09 24:55

The detail in those fucking things were unreal. You've got one of those on the um preachers page, right?

SPEAKER_11 25:05

It's the kiss picture, though, but just incredible with a pencil. All right. Now, speaking, where before when we were talking about Sugar Ray Leonard and speaking of deep hatred, our number five category is your most hated sports team or athlete. And that's to you, Kevin Shaw.

SPEAKER_27 25:29

This one's an easy one for me. Uh growing up in the 70s and 80s as a kid, always following the Red Sox. The Yankees were the hated nemesists, and whether it was the team, their manager, their ownership.

SPEAKER_20 25:45

Something that Met fans and Red Sox fans can agree on.

SPEAKER_27 25:49

They were just easy to hate. And that's when they were winning World Series. The younger listeners may not really remember those days when the sucked and the Yankees always got the best of us. It never, it never mattered. It just in the end, they always they were always the top team. And then they they'd go on to win the uh the World Series. But of course, back in that day, you didn't have the wild card. Exactly. So to sneak in, which some of the Red Sox World Series have come from the wild card. So I think today it makes for a better playoff series. It's more interesting. The pennant races are better at the end of the season. But they were just loaded top to bottom. And it's funny, one of my most hated players on that team along those years was Thurman Munson. And then he died in the plane accident.

SPEAKER_25 26:37

Wow, some devastating news was just moved on the AP wire. It just came over the wire about three or four minutes ago.

SPEAKER_24 26:45

That Thurman Munson, the Yankee catcher, has been killed at a private aircraft crash near Canton, Ohio. He has been flying his own plane back and forth to his home, and that would be really devastating.

SPEAKER_27 26:57

At that time he became one of my favorite players because he could no longer do damage.

SPEAKER_26 27:11

He was good.

SPEAKER_27 27:13

But the Yankees just loaded top to bottom, whether it was management or ownership or the players. They were unbelievable and they were easy to hate as a Red Sox fan. So before we get into it further, some other single games or series may come up later on.

SPEAKER_10 27:29

So I would like to bring up something on this because you brought up the wild card, Kevin. Let's go back to 1978. You know, the big comeback, 14 and a half games, the one-game playoff. Winner goes to the postseason, right into the ALCS, and the loser goes home. Well, let me bring you forward to the year 2005. I'm sitting out in Vermont somewhere watching the ball game with my wife, and the Red Sox and the Yankees ended up tied again for the division, and the Yankees came out celebrating. Wait a minute, how did they clinch the division? What's going on? And it's like, oh, wait a minute. Both teams made the playoffs, so it didn't matter. So that game never would have happened. The Red Sox would have got in as the wild card. They were playing incredible baseball at that time, and they could have easily won that World Series. So that was a great point. Yeah, you could name one player, which I won't name because it may come up.

SPEAKER_27 28:28

Deep the left. Yastry will not get its home run.

SPEAKER_13 28:33

Hey, three-run home run for Bucky Dim. The Yankees now hit it fast for three to two.

SPEAKER_27 28:39

We all know his middle name starts with a middle. I almost said it, but I won't go.

SPEAKER_10 28:48

Oh, that was a good one.

SPEAKER_27 28:50

Not even in Little League yet, and it broke my heart. Which may also come up later, Kev. And Mark brought it up to blow a 14 and a half game lead and then lose in a one-game playoff on such a heartbreaking home run, barely over the monster down the line was just that was a lot for a uh 10 10-year-old to handle.

SPEAKER_10 29:12

Yeah. It's funny because I was devastated.

SPEAKER_11 29:17

Very thing you said, Kevin Shaw, is could tie into like three or four of my future picks, but it didn't, but it could have.

SPEAKER_09 29:28

Well, hatred and Yankees, that could be a 30-part, a 60-party. It could be, you know, it could go on forever.

SPEAKER_27 29:36

All right, Mark. They had Hall of Famers at every position. It was just wild. Yeah. Wild how good they were.

SPEAKER_10 29:44

Yeah. Easy to hate.

SPEAKER_09 29:45

So bought and paid for.

SPEAKER_10 29:47

All right, Mark. That's to you. All right. Well, this one was pretty easy for me, also, and it's the Miami Dolphins.

SPEAKER_16 29:54

And the Dolphins manhandled the Patriots this afternoon by a score of 28 to 13.

SPEAKER_10 30:00

There's so many reasons that I hated the Dolphins. One of the biggest ones was, well, of course, they we couldn't beat them down in the Orange Bowl. Every time going down there was a it was a death trap. I mean, it they lost all the time. It was a burial ground. But uh, of course, we ended up beating them in the uh the squish to the fish game. But there was other reasons. I mean, I was jealous of the frigging weather they had down there. And the biggest reason was so many fucking people, especially in Guilford, rooted for the Dolphins. I'm we're sitting here in New England for God's sakes. It's like the Patriots didn't even exist. All these stupid Dolphin fans. And ever since I see that friggin' uniform, then you got the 72 Dolphins running around. Remember when the Patriots were going for the 19-0 season? We're not going to talk about that Super Bowl. But I mean, Don Schuller was on when they were playing the Ravens, and he's on there openly rooting for Baltimore. And so are the friggin' guys in the booth, Tony Corniser, whatever, Cornell, what stupid name that clown has. But I hated Mercury Morris. Oh God, Mercury Morris. No, I I hated the fucking Dolphins. Hated them.

SPEAKER_11 31:18

Very fair. As a matter of fact, moving on to me, that was my audible.

SPEAKER_10 31:25

The girls always thought they were so cute, their uniforms, nice aqua.

SPEAKER_11 31:34

I'll make mine very brief, but it's the Montreal Canadians. Just fuck them.

SPEAKER_32 31:41

Well, I'll tell you, the Bruins no sooner get one man out of the penalty box than one goes in, and there's Hodge going at La Rose here at Center Ice. They're both dropping their gloves.

SPEAKER_11 31:52

They always beat us and they bugged me for some reason. Patrick Road just always pissed me off. It might be a Ben Blease thing, but fucking he would always play them in uh Sega Hockey 1984, that greatest game in history. Which they still, by the way, I must add, they put that version on their latest release when they release it because it was that fucking good. You had one timer, it was so much easier. You're not using all the joysticks for the sticks, it's just buttons. God, I loved that game. Uh uh, you brought up a movie in the past too. One of you guys, John Favreau, was in the movie.

SPEAKER_30 32:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_11 32:40

And there was a great scene where they're playing that. And I can't was it singles, Donnie? Yeah. Yeah, it was singles. Fucking incredible. But anyway, I hated the Canadians, and I'll leave it at that and go to you, Donald. All right, so I'm gonna go with Horseface, John Elway.

SPEAKER_07 33:00

Oh god.

SPEAKER_26 33:01

That was one of my as the athlete and then the Denver Broncos, but it was pretty much him because he was good. I mean, he was really good. He didn't win uh he got one Super Bowl, I think. Two uh you know, he could have had more, but he just didn't have the teams in Denver. But he single-handedly won a lot of games for them. But he was they were 10-0 with Elway against the Pats. Yeah, we could not beat him there, we couldn't beat him here. Um he just owned us. So no matter we had a great team or a crappy team, they always beat us. Yeah, he was like one of the first like mobile kind of quarterbacks, you know. Yep. Um that just we got him, we got him.

SPEAKER_10 33:43

First down.

SPEAKER_27 33:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_10 33:44

He'd won.

SPEAKER_27 33:46

There's a great Netflix uh special on him that just came out recently, too. It's really in-depth about him as a person. It's really good. Cool. Yeah, I gotta check that out. Is he a decent person? He's a complicated person, without a doubt. Even his kids are interviewed, and it was all about football. And you know, when they were younger, they didn't have the best relationship, especially the way he treated the mother at times. It was really interesting. His mother lost without football, and he went back as an executive, and that's when they brought in Peyton Manning, won another Super Bowl. But he lives in uh Idaho, Wyoming on a beautiful lake. I mean, it's it's it's an incredible setting, but it just talks about struggles of walking away from football. You have all the action and all your teammates, and then you have nothing. So somebody's really out in-depth about him.

SPEAKER_11 34:38

I'm sure he has nothing. He did okay. He did what everybody can't be Ryan Leif.

SPEAKER_27 34:44

And remember, he could have been a professional baseball player too.

SPEAKER_10 34:47

He played the Brady got drafted by the Montreal Expos, and he's having a lot of trouble adjusting to being a non-player. Good lord. Yeah.

SPEAKER_11 35:02

Awesome, Donnie.

SPEAKER_09 35:04

All right, Kev, off to you. All right, so this was kind of funny because I just I know that there's athletes in teams that just enrage me, and I just nothing would come to me. And and then Kevin picking the Yankees, and I just like 45 faces came to mind. But I just gotta say that I'll never forget. I don't know why, but Jorge Posada, I just fucking hated that guy to the point where I would play the MLB whatever on the on the PlayStation or whatever with a buddy of mine, and I didn't care what the and we were competitive, I didn't care what the score was. He would always play the Yankees, and if he had Posada at bat, I would throw at his head. Just because I fucking hated him so much. I don't care if I lose this game, I'm aiming at his head. But anyway, that wasn't my pick. My pick was really, it's not about his career as an athlete, it's his career afterwards, because you wouldn't know it from listening to him talk, but his career was pretty fucking insignificant. And I'm talking about Chris Collinsworth, who's the dumbest talk about Horseface. Shut up. He talks about the eight years that he was with the Cincinnati Bengals like they were some kind of dynasty, some kind of legacy. They won what, three out of the eight seasons they had winning season. No, one was a tie, and then his career was bookended with losses to the 49ers in the Super Bowl. So you suck. Shut up. If I can now there's actually people calling for him to get fired as a commentator.

SPEAKER_12 36:39

Chris Collinsworth is apologizing for comments he made on air during the Ravens and Steelers game. During the second quarter, he said he ran into a group of ladies who blew him away with their sports questions and knowledge. Later, he said he realized the way he phrased it, singling out women, insulted many people.

SPEAKER_09 36:56

And nothing would make me happier than not having to listen to him because he's so done. I mean, he's biased, and I get that. We're all biased. You try to do a better job to cover it up, but it's not only that, it's he says meaningless stupid shit.

SPEAKER_27 37:11

Yes.

SPEAKER_09 37:12

And I just would like to see him go away.

SPEAKER_27 37:14

He talks a lot and says nothing. Exactly. Exactly.

SPEAKER_11 37:19

Well put. Awesome pick, Kev. And I gotta say, he would have definitely, if we had done most hated announcer, he would have been mine. Because yeah, we're all biased, but we're not fucking sports announcers, fucking saying it on TV.

SPEAKER_09 37:36

Right. You should have some decorum when you're calling a game and not you don't call a football game as a fan of one team. Unless you're the whole game.

SPEAKER_26 37:44

If you're the local guy, go for it. But if you're a national guy.

SPEAKER_09 37:47

But on a national level, you need to have some level of of like impartiality.

SPEAKER_11 37:55

Pick Derek Sanderson, who was like, that guy's a pussy.

SPEAKER_09 38:00

Well, he had a couple before he went on, didn't he? Oh no, he quit way before then the edge off.

SPEAKER_11 38:09

All right, boys, we're off to category number four. And this is gonna be your favorite player from the big four, which of course is football, baseball, basketball, and hockey. I should have said sports, but we know that today. Kevin Shaw, what do you got?

SPEAKER_27 38:28

This is an easy one for me. Um, could have chosen a million Boston athletes, New England athletes, but we've been so spoiled over the years um with legends. But I went far, far away from Boston and chose Wayne Gretzky, being a hockey player. Yes, he kind of revamped the whole game, the way it's played, with finesse and skill. And to me, he's uh he's called the great one for a reason.

SPEAKER_29 38:53

March 20th, 1994. After 31 years, Gordy Howe's record is tied. Death. Broken. March 23rd, 1994. Wayne Gretzky becomes the NHL's number one goal scorer. He finishes the season with 130 points to win an unprecedented 10th Art Ross Trophy.

SPEAKER_27 39:15

In my eyes, the greatest hockey player of all time, and you arguably probably one of the best athletes of all time. Amazing. I actually got to see him play. Edmonton came to the garden every year, and we were lucky enough to have season tickets. And um, my dad gave a lot of them away having the business to uh vendors and employees, but those were the tickets we definitely kept when Edmonton rolled in. And they were unbelievable, you know, Messier and Andy Moog and just all those guys. What incredible Fuhrers? Yep, Grant Fuhrer. Yeah, just unbelievable.

SPEAKER_11 39:51

Awesome to bottom. Undeniable. It's Wayne Gretzky. Fucking incredible.

SPEAKER_10 39:58

All right, brother, that's to you. All right, well, I'm going with number 27 for the Boston Red Sox and number 72 for the Chicago White Sox. Um Carlton Fisk, obviously Pudge. Um just a guy that played the game the right way. He played it the right way. There was a time when he was with the White Sox, and uh Deion Sanders comes up and he puts a friggin' dollar sign, you know, he would take his bat and put a dollar sign in the uh batter's box. Fisk wasn't having anything of it. You know, he got in his face and, you know, just showing the game up, whatever he was saying, and Sanders is like, hey, I'm not no we're not on the plantation anymore, you know, and all this bullshit. But uh, yeah, I mean he he played hard all the time, all the time. You know, he had that Homer in game six of the World Series.

SPEAKER_20 40:52

And Fisk will lead it off as a single and has walked twice, and the wind blowing out the wall five if it stays there. We will have a seventh game in this 1975 World Series. A lot of body English for Fisk. I'm not watching. How many steps does he take? One, he waits to see it, hit up He knew it. There it is.

SPEAKER_10 41:20

And unfortunately, uh well, game seven. The reason he ended up in Chicago is very interesting. Uh the Red Sox did not mail the contract in time to him. So, no, no, seriously. He became a free agent because they didn't mail the contract to him on time. So he ended up in Chicago. That was the same year they ended up trading Freddie Lynn and Rick Burleson. Freddie Lynn could have been on my favorite. I well, I shouldn't have said that. It could be on somebody else's list. But, you know, he always had that big friggin' thing of Copenhagen under his lip and all. And uh he just he was fucking intense. Yes. Intense. And he wanted to win so bad. Unfortunately, he never did. Those late 70 teams, again, the wild card, they had that. Now hell now they have three wild cards. And uh they would have won one or two, I really truly believe. Uh they never had any great teams in Chicago. I I do they did make it to the postseason once and lost in the ALCS, but uh just a great player from Charleston, New Hampshire. Awesome.

SPEAKER_11 42:30

Nice. Nice. And another blue collar player.

SPEAKER_10 42:34

Absolutely blue collar. One million things bad.

SPEAKER_27 42:38

He also played baseball at UNH when UNH had baseball. Now they don't even have it anymore. No, they got rid of it. And some of you, Donnie and AJ, you remember, remember Jay? Yeah. Uh Jay's dad was his college roommate as a freshman. They didn't know each other, just happened to be assigned together. So Doug, their dad always talks about you know old Carlton Fist stories. It's pretty classic. Yeah. He still holds the New Hampshire high school basketball record for most free throws made in a state tournament. Still holds that record. So he's a stud basketball player, too.

SPEAKER_11 43:14

Awesome. So that's number four off to me. And God, I have so many audibles here, but I have to take this one. I I just it's Terry O'Reilly. Yeah. Good pick. He is just so important to me. I mean, I think, and this is gonna be a fucked up situation that I talk about, but Baron the Wears that I frequented back between like age 21 and then on, but the original nothing fancy. And they would sit there and they would play this like four-hour tape of all Terry O'Reilly fights. He was just fucking incredible, an incredible hockey player. Uh he was a badass, such a great fighter. Southpaw, I believe, if I'm not mistaken, but because he would throw that left a hundred of them in a second.

SPEAKER_19 44:14

Three and throws that left. Three by O'Reilly, four, five, six, seven. O'Reilly throwing the left bike man. As O'Reilly did get free enough. Maloney there now, and they are too tired. Heavyways, and the linemen don't want to move in. They're so big and strong, both of them.

SPEAKER_11 44:34

Yeah, he was just Awesome, but he was captain for the last two years of his career. Just amazing. And I'll keep it there and go to you, Don.

SPEAKER_26 44:44

He was gonna be my pick, but luckily I have extras. Um because I love Terry. Terry punched refs.

SPEAKER_19 44:52

And I gotta keep O'Reilly away from Hutter and uh Van Haliban does. He punched fans and all the Bruins, it seems, over the dasher and into the stands. And Terry O'Reilly was first. They were babbling, and just a wild scene at Madison Square Card.

SPEAKER_26 45:20

He he punch everybody, you know. And uh he took them to the cop and they met um uh Gretzky. That was when Gretzky and Edmonton had the awesome team that was they weren't gonna beat them.

SPEAKER_11 45:32

Um one thing I wanted to mention before I move on was I forgot to mention on Terry O'Reilly that they retired his jersey ironically on the 24th of October in 2002, and that was his number, number 24. Bobby Orr. I wanted to bring him up because I skated with him behind Burger King back in the 80s. I skated with Bobby Orr. I fucking lost that picture. I had an eight by ten with the side.

SPEAKER_10 46:05

He just happened to be out there the same day. No, it was a it was a fundraiser.

SPEAKER_11 46:10

Yeah, he was getting a fucking whopper and just happened to be there, and I asked if he'd come skate with me. No, it was like they had a big they had like a mile-long a mile-long loop out there, and it was a marathon that you got sponsors, and like we raised money for some charity back then, and we all got to all us kids got to skate with them. It was pretty fucking cool. Well, my story was cooler, but I were just there for the double cheeseburger.

SPEAKER_26 46:44

Um, so I'm gonna go with, and I know we gotta keep it 99 and below. He didn't play for the Red Sox until 2001, but he was with the Indians for in the 90s, and it's Manny Ramirez. Um I just loved how like his first at bat for the Sox, he cranked a homer.

SPEAKER_18 47:17

Remember, some pump and remembrance and pumping up on the very first pitch from room.

SPEAKER_26 47:24

He probably was like people would say he's on the spectrum kind of thing, you know, today. You know, he's an odd odd guy. And I think that helped the Sox get over the bullshit jinx stuff and help them win the World Series was just him being a laissez-faire, like I'm just doing my thing and managing the baseball. Yeah, yeah, just hitting the baseball and you know, and uh he was entertaining to watch, and I I just loved loved watching him play. So I went with that.

SPEAKER_10 47:54

Well, can I just bring up something I Donnie is uh do you remember how why we ended up signing him? Do you remember what we were trying to do?

SPEAKER_26 48:03

I don't I don't recall that at all.

SPEAKER_10 48:05

And I remember you were the one that told me that the Yankees signed A-rod. We were trying to get A-Rod from the Rangers. And yeah, there was a big trade in the works.

SPEAKER_26 48:13

It's like the consolation prize kind of thing, yeah.

SPEAKER_10 48:16

Oh, it's consolation prize, yeah. How many World Series did A-Rod win with the Yankees? I think let's start. Okay, one. And uh 09. And uh the Red Sox obviously won. Well, let's see, four, seven, thirteen, and eighteen. And now the only doesn't give a fuck about the team.

SPEAKER_27 48:36

And uh, yeah, so just a funny Manny Ramirez story when he moved into town. He was looking at a uh, and this goes quite a ways back, you know, money had a different value then. But he went out to look at real estate with his agent, and um, it was a million-dollar condo he liked, and I forget what he signed for, but it was, you know, multi-millions. And he was so clueless, so focused on baseball, he literally said, I know nothing but baseball. He looked at his agent and asked if he could afford the place. And you know, he's making 15 million a year and it's only a million-dollar property. Like he's clueless. And oddly, his his son's in the uh the Sox farm system right now.

SPEAKER_11 49:14

Oh, goodness, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's awesome. Great pick, Dongo. That's to you, Kev.

SPEAKER_09 49:22

All right. Well, this one I didn't have to think about at all because I had to go with Jack Splat. Jack Lambert redefined the middle linebacker position to make that cover two work. But really, the thing is you just imagine lining up against him with the missing teeth, those massive shoulder pads on the cold games, the steam coming up. I mean, it's just I I I think you would run the other way if he was coming at you. He was such an intimidating character. And then, of course, when uh Harris started mouthing off at that at the kicker when he when he missed the field goal, and he just picked that boy up and slammed him into the ground. He was like, you're not messing with my kicker. I'll mess with my kicker.

SPEAKER_05 50:07

One left a deeper impression on Dallas than Jack Lambert. Trailing 10-7 in the third quarter, the Steelers missed a field goal. When Cowboy Safety Cliff Harris taunted kicker Roy Jarella, Lambert responded.

SPEAKER_01 50:27

I thought that was right on time, and I'm glad Lambert did that.

SPEAKER_09 50:31

I think the message sent was Thunderous. No one's gonna intimidate any of the Pittsburgh Steelers. You're not gonna mess with Mike Hicker. But yeah, just an amazing player and just so intimidating, and I just I love to see him on the field. He was he was the epitome of of that that position and that fear. And did it without slapping you in the ear holes like Deacon Jones awesome pick, Kev.

SPEAKER_11 51:00

And now we're off to number three, which is gonna be your favorite non-big four sport. Kevin Shaw, that's to you.

SPEAKER_27 51:09

Yeah, I had to laugh when I saw this topic come up because my initial thought was with the Olympics just ending curling. I was so into that sport. I'm like, what this is the ultimate drinking game. This is right up my alley. You know, it's like being out on a frozen lake with beers and you know, slush as they freeze.

SPEAKER_26 51:30

The five of us could be Olympians doing curling, you know. You don't have to have athletic skill.

SPEAKER_27 51:37

They actually have a curling league at the Guilford rink, and we've all skated there, I think. You know, pick up games.

SPEAKER_10 51:44

They still have that rink.

SPEAKER_27 51:45

They do I think they're paved or uh putting concrete down to do pickleball for the summer, and then it'll be curling in the winter. I've wanted to do it, but anyway. Curling's not my answer, but damn, what a great drinking game that is. Um being a Guilford guy and growing up in the soccer program, I had to go with soccer. Kind of a no-brainer for me. You know, soccer, it's not super popular in the States. Just kind of an off story. Last year I got a call from a realtor in Florida and she said, Um, have you ever heard of Tyler Adams? And I'm thinking, Tyler Adams is the captain of the U.S. soccer team. That the short of it is I ended up selling he and his wife a home in Tuftenboro on the water. So being a soccer guy growing up and selling a home to the captain of the U.S. soccer team was pretty cool for me. This is a lot of good comments. And he plays overseas in England for Bournemouth.

SPEAKER_03 52:41

So that was still from Tyler Adams. When I saw him take it Ian and leaning up for the short, I thought, who does he think he is? Kenny McLean. He's actually inside the half, and it's a wonderful streak. It's the execution of striking that ball, measuring it, look at him. He knows exactly what he's trying. He actually had a 2v1. And to have a goal from that distance, absolutely remarkable. It's a wonderful streak, absolutely beautiful. The flight of the ball. And he's nowhere near it, Roos. Can't get it. Just falling under the bar. What a magnificent second goal for Bournemouth!

SPEAKER_27 53:26

You know, I'd be like, hey, where are you playing this Wednesday? Overseas they play uh Wednesdays, Saturdays. He's like, ah, Manchester United, Liverpool, like all these stadiums I saw as a kid. Went to games, uh, being able to travel over there. It was just super cool. And he's telling me, you know, just about his experience. But it was pretty cool being a soccer guy that you know nobody in the States thinks it's a real sport. They call it the pussy sport, but you know. It's a contact sport, believe me. At least the way we played it in the 80s. Just ask the Belmont boys, they'll tell you. Anyway, soccer is my uh my answer. Awesome.

SPEAKER_29 54:02

And now a short commercial break.

SPEAKER_11 54:05

Welcome to Halftime at 80shigh. Want to just get a little info out there for you folks, including our website, which is pasttimes at 80shigh.com, and that is 80s for 80s, past times at 80shigh.com. Shoot us an email at pta80h at gmail.com, pta80h at gmail.com. Love the feedback you've been sending. We can't appreciate it more. Check us out on all the socials, including our new Facebook, which is past times at 80s high. And then for interaction, past timers at 80s high. Find us on all the major podcast platforms, including Spotify and Apple Podcasts. And please remember that those five-star reviews and the comments go a long way helping us move up that chain. So thank you so much. We couldn't appreciate it more.

SPEAKER_15 55:00

Pop Rock, Jack. Stretch Armstrong, Jack, the Bionic Man.

SPEAKER_14 55:08

Jack. You've gone back in time. This is past times at 80 high.

SPEAKER_10 55:21

All right, well, this one depends. I do have a pick, but I'm gonna just go out on a limb, even though Kfabe wasn't broken, that professional wrestling doesn't count. It might count.

SPEAKER_11 55:34

Remember, on this category, I'm pretty sure we said it could go down to darts or foosball.

SPEAKER_10 55:40

So I know, but none of those none of none of those uh matches were predetermined, at least not to my knowledge. So I'm going with 10 pin bowling. 10 pin bowling.

unknown 55:53

Over the line!

SPEAKER_15 55:55

Huh?

SPEAKER_06 55:55

I'm sorry, Smokey. You were over the line, that's a foul. Bullshit. Market eight, dude. Uh, excuse me. Market zero next frame. Bullshit, Walter. Market eight, dude. Smokey, this is not Nom. This is bowling. There are rules.

SPEAKER_11 56:08

Hey, Walter, come on. It's just hey, man, it's Smokey. So his toe slipped over a little, you know. It's just a game, man.

SPEAKER_06 56:14

This is a league game. This determines who enters the next round, Robin. Am I wrong?

SPEAKER_10 56:18

Yeah, but I wasn't. Am I wrong? 10 pin bowling. Absolutely. I I mean, as far as what me play you know, me playing it, playing bowling. Me bowling, I mean, I we used to go to St. Johnsbury, Vermont, me and Freddie and Joel King, and we'd go over there and uh, you know the drinking age was eighteen. I was what, nineteen or whatever? Eighteen what and we would be able to sit there and drink beer and bowl, but the real reason I'd loved it was do you guys remember Chris Schenkel and Saturday afternoon ten pin bowling with I remember Pete Weber. Pete Weber, Nick Weber, and then you had Earl Anthony, Mark Roth. Just it was a tradition. Bowling was massive back then. It was I watched it with dad. Yeah, and then of course the the lanes came into Guildford and uh I mean that was a that was incredible the fact that we could just go right down there and they had the bar and all that and uh unfortunately that when did they close? I mean haven't moved from there. I mean twenty years ago, probably. Yeah. I thought it was not even made it to the 21st century, did it? Was it the nineties?

SPEAKER_11 57:33

It was before the nineties. You mean Lakes Region bowling lanes.

SPEAKER_10 57:38

The one that used to be down level the roller skate rink was and all that.

SPEAKER_11 57:42

Exactly. Yeah, they did. They shut down.

SPEAKER_10 57:45

Yeah, that's too bad, but yeah, dad and Phil used to bowl there constantly.

SPEAKER_11 57:50

Yeah, and I'm hoping I could continue unless you have more to say, because I want to continue your story.

SPEAKER_10 57:59

Okay.

SPEAKER_11 58:00

May I? Alright. Story about my good old daddy. He bowled like a champ. I mean, I don't know where I put his two balls, I was gonna say. But I don't know where to put my dad's balls, but we lost his bowling balls, but man, our dad fucking rocked it bowling, and he was one strike away from a 300. And I'll never forget this as long as I live, because my dad certainly never forgot it. At the Lakes Region bowling lane lanes, he uh one strike away, and he said he was so fucking nerved up, and he's there with the ball in his hand, ready to throw his last one, and someone in the crowd went, go get him, Dave. He said it fucked everything. He missed, wound it up with like a 280 something. And they had a pretty big prize, I think. It was like 10 grand or something if you roll the 300. And go get him, Dave. But anyway, that's all I had to say, because I'll never live that story down. He told it to me for decades after it happened. Anyway, off to me, correct? Yeah, that's right. Uh well, this is a tough one because I'm gonna go with a pro sport instead of some deeper ones I was thinking about, and I'll keep it brief. But I'm just gonna go with tennis because back in the day I used to love watching Wimbledon and some of the tournaments. But John McEnroe is one of my heroes. You must be joking, AJ. Oh, just exactly. He just was incredible, fucking screaming at those raps.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:06

Fuck, you can't be serious, man. You cannot be serious! That ball was on the line. Shaw blew up, it was clearly it. How can you possibly call that out?

SPEAKER_23 1:00:19

Boy, uh, I don't know how much more uh abuse Richard Ings takes before he gives him a warning.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:24

Yeah, just what I was thinking, Fred, that it's been pretty even-handed so far. Obscenity from Mechanic, clearly heard by us. Uh was not heard by Skippy Ings, otherwise, if he heard it, he should definitely have given Mechanical warning.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:40

My question! The question, sir!

unknown 1:00:44

Come on!

SPEAKER_11 1:00:48

It's like you would have thought it was like hockey or foot, like just so fucking intense. Like, can you see someone putting on the green and screaming at the official?

SPEAKER_14 1:01:04

Son of a bitch, Ball. Why didn't you just go home? That's your home. Are you too good for your home? Answer me! Suck my white ass ball!

SPEAKER_11 1:01:15

Just uh, but between him and Borg when that shit was going down was so exciting, and I just loved it. I thought it was great.

SPEAKER_26 1:01:27

To you, Donald. Cool, man. Uh, I'm gonna go with just an an obvious one, an easy one, and it's golf. Like, I don't like watching it on TV. I could care less about watching it on TV, but I love playing it and I suck at it. But it's fun being out there if you got a good group, you know, and you're just it's good weather and you're just hitting the ball around, it's fun. And uh, you know, I I'm one who can, you know, hit the thing a country mile, but then it does like a horseshoe and comes right back to me and you know. Um and uh my iron game's pretty good, but I you know I can get on the green for par and then seven putt, you know. Oh, absolutely. If if it if you didn't have to putt, I don't know.

SPEAKER_09 1:02:16

We gotta get into a best ball tournament, Donnie, because I can't drive to save my life, but I can chip and putt. Yeah. Maybe a best ball tournament we'd do all right. Yeah. But I played with a lot of people like that that can drive the drive the green on three holes over. Not the one they're aiming for.

SPEAKER_26 1:02:34

Right. It will kind of come out of the gate straight and then just start that spin, just starts taking over and there it goes. Slice. But I've had someone teach me how to like, you know, I put my front foot on the ball and all that stuff, and it helps play the slice.

SPEAKER_11 1:02:49

But uh, we'd be fucked though, boys, if we played together because sounds like we're all pretty good at chipping, but not one of us would drive.

SPEAKER_09 1:03:03

There's really two levels of golfers. Yes. There's the guys that are making millions of dollars and the rest of us. Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_26 1:03:10

And I still swing like I'm swinging a baseball bat. It's like you know.

SPEAKER_09 1:03:18

Where do you get those four foot tall T's, Donnie?

SPEAKER_11 1:03:20

God rest his beautiful soul. But uh my buddy Stevie Sousa, I can still see him at the T box because he had this fucked up thing where he'd come back in his back swing and he'd stop like three-quarters of the way, and then he'd finish the rest of the way, and then finish his swing. It was the weirdest thing I've ever seen, but God, I wish I had that on my phone video. But anyway, good pick, Dongo, and to you, Cat.

SPEAKER_09 1:03:53

All right. I was worried being last that this one wouldn't be here, but this was my absolute joy because it would be on in the afternoons at the bar, and that's the old strongman competitions. I mean, it started with the Highland games, and then they turned it into, you know, NBC, I think, turned it into the strongman competition. But watching guys bending iron bars around their heads, um, pulling tractor trailers or buses, uh, picking up Toyotas and holding it for as long as they could with four people sitting in the car, um caber toss, sheath toss, you know, all that stuff from the Highland games. It was just so much fun to watch. And it was like, I mean, you had Sven Magnuson was like the the ultimate, but it was uh Bill Bill Casmer.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:38

Bill's strongest man from the USA, Mr. Bill Casmer.

SPEAKER_17 1:04:46

Do you rate yourself as the world's strongest man like that? Yeah, I actually think I'm the strongest man who ever lived.

SPEAKER_09 1:04:52

Was the one that really early on, and these guys were just they were monsters. They were absolute monsters, and it was just hilarious to watch. Guys running around throwing kegs at each other or picking up picking up granite boulders and seeing how far they could walk.

SPEAKER_26 1:05:09

Was steroid use allowed in Strongman Corp?

SPEAKER_09 1:05:12

I think I think it was if you didn't sponsor abusing steroids, you were not fly, right. Here's here's your here's your$20 entrance fee. Here's your steroids.

SPEAKER_11 1:05:25

They would move the they fucking had one category where they would move trucks with their teeth, right?

SPEAKER_26 1:05:32

Yes, they're carrying the boulder and the the veins are like popping out of their heads so much more.

SPEAKER_10 1:05:42

How many of them are still alive would be a good question. Probably not many.

SPEAKER_11 1:05:48

All right, boys. So we're off to you, Kevin Shaw, to number two, and this is gonna be your favorite sports memory from any sport or game in your lifetime. And this can be you or a pro.

SPEAKER_27 1:06:06

Yeah, this is an interesting one. I thought about some of the games I grew up playing with, some state championship games and things like that. But I think in the end, it's gonna come down to Carlton Fisk's home run to win game six. I probably just took half of the your choices, but what I love most about it years and years later, is this is actually an important part of the movie Goodwill Hunting, when Robin Williams and Matt Damon are talking about it. And uh he's like, I can't believe you didn't see that game. You went to see about a girl, and Robin Williams says, I didn't fucking know Fisk was gonna hit a Homer in that shit. It would have been nice to see that game.

SPEAKER_22 1:06:49

Did you rush the field?

SPEAKER_21 1:06:50

No, I didn't rush the fucking field. I wasn't there. What? No, I was in a bar having a drink with my future wife. You missed Pudge Fist's home run? Oh yeah. To have a fucking drink with some lady you never met? Yeah, but you should have seen her. She was a stunner. I don't care if Oh no, no, she lit up the room.

SPEAKER_31 1:07:06

I don't care if Helena Troy walks in the room. That's game six. Oh my god, and who are these fucking friends of yours? They let you get away with that?

SPEAKER_21 1:07:13

If I had to.

SPEAKER_31 1:07:14

What did you say to him?

SPEAKER_21 1:07:15

I just slid my ticket across the table and I said, sorry, guys, I gotta see about a girl. I gotta go see about a girl? Yeah. That's what you said? I had to. And they let you get away with that. Oh yeah, they saw in my eyes that I meant it. You're kidding me? No, I'm not kidding you, Will. That's why I'm not talking right now about some girl I saw at about 20 years ago and how I always regretted not going over and talking to her. I don't regret the 18 years I was married to Nancy. I don't regret the six years I had to give up counseling when she got sick, and I don't regret the last years when she got really sick. I sure as hell don't regret missing a damn game. That's regret.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:52

Wow.

SPEAKER_21 1:08:00

Would have been nice to catch that game, though.

SPEAKER_27 1:08:05

So iconic. That's uh so anyway, I that just and being a little kid and a super Red Sox fan. I mean, back then, I remember going to Papagino's with my grandfather, and he'd literally be like, you know, we could go through the lineup. Who's batting what, who's playing where the averages, you know, I was just dialed in, caught every game on the radio, fell fell asleep to the radio and the Sox games. It's that was, I mean, baseball is my favorite sport. So just uh growing up with the Sox and all the disappointments and what could have been in 75 against the big red machine, they almost did it, but they didn't. So it would definitely be that that game.

SPEAKER_10 1:08:46

That wasn't as heartbreaking as 86, but still hardbreaking.

SPEAKER_27 1:08:51

Yeah, they're similar, you know. They still had chances to win in game seven each series, you know. Yeah, oh yeah, yeah. Yeah. The wrong people got blamed all around. You know what I'll say about the difference between '75 and '86. The Mets were good in '86, but the Reds were great in 75. You didn't feel as bad. I mean, that team was loaded with Hall of Famers. Right. And they were just they were called the big red machine. And the Mets, again, they were good, but the Sox should have won that series for sure. Yeah.

SPEAKER_10 1:09:25

The Reds were more way more classy than the friggin' Mets were in '86. Oh. Yeah. Oh, yeah.

unknown 1:09:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_27 1:09:34

Although the Mets had some characters. They uh that was uh that was a wild team. Didn't they have Lenny Dykstra? Was he on that? Yes. Yeah. Daryl Strawberry's in jail now for fraud.

SPEAKER_11 1:09:46

Didn't he have a blonde curly mullet, if I'm picturing him right?

SPEAKER_27 1:09:51

Well, everybody, everybody had the mullet then, even me who has who have no hair now.

SPEAKER_11 1:09:57

Awesome pick, Kev. And I gotta tell you, when we were texting about the Fisk Homer a couple weeks ago, when you listened to one of the recent episodes, my mind, when I was saying, get over, get over, was Robin Williams in Goodwill Hunting.

SPEAKER_21 1:10:15

Instead Carlton Fisk. Old punch. Steps up to the plate, you know, he's got that weird stand. And then he clocks it, you know.

SPEAKER_22 1:10:26

35,000 people on the feet. Yellow at the ball, but that's not because Fisk, he's waving at the ball like a man. And then hits the fumble ball, bowl ego's ancient, and then 35,000 fans.

SPEAKER_26 1:10:50

Great call. That's a great scene. That's a nice call. That scene is great.

unknown 1:10:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_10 1:10:56

It would have been better if that was a game seven Homer. Oh.

SPEAKER_27 1:10:59

Oh that would have been like the Blue Jays walk-off home run in I forget which year that was. 92. Yeah. How you know that? It's beyond me.

SPEAKER_10 1:11:11

Oh, wait a minute. Actually, tell I take that back. I was wrong. That was 93 against the Phillies. They beat the Braves in 92. 93 was game six uh against Mitch Williams. Yeah. So All right, Brother Mark.

SPEAKER_11 1:11:28

Well, run on with it because it's your pick.

SPEAKER_10 1:11:31

Okay, well, I mean, I was under the impression that this was only in my sporting world as far as my athletic prowess.

SPEAKER_11 1:11:39

Oh, that's fine. I went that way route too, but it was both.

SPEAKER_10 1:11:43

I didn't know that it was either or. I mean, I wasn't a world-renowned athlete, but I will take you back to 1976, Littleton Little League. To me, championships were everything back then. You know, we weren't very good in 74 and 75. And I was never a great hit. I mean, God, I hit the ball constantly, but it was always outside of the foul lines. But anyway, we played, I don't even remember who we played, but it was in the championship game. And uh I think it was probably the Vets. It was the Elks, Vets, we were the Elks. The Vets, the Knights, and the Eagles. This was everything to me. I mean, this was for all the marbles. This was game seven of the World Series. And we were just so gleeful and so excited. I I mean we we beat them pretty good. I mean, like, I I don't know what the score was, seven to three, whatever. But it was a pretty commanding victory, and oh my god, I'll never forget it, except for the score and who we played. But other than that, we won the title. The title. We were champions of the world in my mind. Championships are great. Yep. Yep. Not at all. No, it was incredible to me. And that was what year, Mark? 1976. 76.

SPEAKER_27 1:13:01

Nice. Mark, do you celebrate with pizza or ice cream?

SPEAKER_10 1:13:06

Uh no, we got we each got 12 pack and went home. 12 pack. 12 years old.

SPEAKER_11 1:13:15

I don't remember. No, back then it was school. Awesome, bro.

SPEAKER_10 1:13:22

Probably went fishing, you know. Knowing me.

SPEAKER_27 1:13:26

Mark, a little off topic. What year was Rich Gale up there? I know he's older than all of us, but he was Okay.

SPEAKER_10 1:13:32

Um Rich Gale was uh Rich Gale um played for Littleton um in the early 70s. He beat the Red Sox three to nothing on a Friday night and like the day before a game that we went to. This is back in 78 when he played for the Roy pitched for the Royals. And uh I was like, how can somebody I know come in and defeat the Boston Red Sox with Jim Rice? I just I didn't get I I couldn't fathom it. In fact, we saw him that the day at the game we went to, we talked to him afterwards, and uh you know, he was an incredible basketball player too. Yeah. And uh yeah, he you know, he didn't have an incredible career, but I mean he did pitch was it did he start I don't know if it was game six or seven of the eighty series against uh I think it was game six, uh you know, when they played the Philadelphia Phillies, and uh you know, after that he kind of w became a journeyman. Giants, uh Reds, pitched for the Red Sox briefly, and then was I think he was actually the pitching coach, but he was in Littleton in the early seventies and played in the mate, you know, the minor leagues and then made it, and he was a pretty good pitcher for a while, so good career.

SPEAKER_11 1:14:50

I always remember dad talking about Rich Gale and how everyone knew him around town. I'm always just fine. Used to go to Dave's market. Awesome. All right, off to me, and now I'm starting to realize how maybe I should have gone with a pro thing, but you guys know me, and I have to point to something that has acute meaning to me every show. Dungo, I almost went with some cellar ball catches or some ping pong plays, but I had to go to my passion because and I know it's gonna sound like I'm patting myself on the back here, but once again it was because just before I feel like my life was a bit destroyed. But uh anyway, I'm going to my little league years because I was one of the younger kids that actually made it for all four years, which a lot of kids don't. And uh it was my first year I played for Peach Ski Shop. I can still see my yellow uniform with the green writing. I got stuck in a right field because it was my first year, and Chris Rogers, who was my coach's son, played center, Pudge, he was called back then, and there were people on base, and it was the bottom of the inning to end the game. A fly ball was hit right to to right center, and both Pudge and I are running in, and I'm fucking screaming my head off. I got it, I got it, I got it, and he's doing the same thing, and I'm waving him off. He dives under me, I dive over him, make the catch into a somersault, and fucking run in to huge hugs and the whole dugout coming out. That's awesome. And the reason this is important to me is because we became the wall. Ryan Jordan and I go to shortstop in third base. We were a fucking wall, you couldn't hit the ball by us for four years. We did it. And this is when I'm like Mark said, eight to twelve years old, guys, but this is why it's important to me. So and that's the yes, sir. Whose ball is it?

SPEAKER_26 1:17:21

Like, just out of curiosity, whose balls are both. Technically, center field should be a big center field was ball say, but you're both calling for it. I was calling it. Like somebody has to yield, and it's like, whose ball is it? And the majors they have the same thing when it's in that like neutral zone, you know, the athletes are gonna go for it.

SPEAKER_11 1:17:40

The center fielder should have the say, but I overtook that and made the catch. But then I had my coach come to my house to talk to my parents to to tell them to put me into every baseball camp possible that you know I could have gone somewhere with it, and then after my final year of little league, uh my dad was transferred and I was moved, and then alcohol, cigarettes, and drugs took me over, and it fucked my life. So, anyway, a good memory into a bad, you look back in hindsight's 2020, everyone. To you, Donald. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_26 1:18:26

I mean, we could all we all hit those crossroads, man. Could I jump in real quick, guys?

SPEAKER_27 1:18:31

Yes, AJ. So, what you're saying, if you didn't go the booze drugs route, you would have been the outfielder that your brother David was, because he was amazing. I got to play two years of varsity baseball with him. I was lucky enough to make freshman as a or make varsity as a freshman. So I got two years with David and Chris Sheridan, who played in White Lightning with him, and Mark Warren and those guys. It was awesome. Those guys took good care of me when I was a young and but David was smooth as silk in that outfield, just roaming it, nothing up by him. Anything that could have been caught was caught. He was unbelievable.

SPEAKER_11 1:19:08

Yeah, yeah, that's cool. Oh, I will say this that God love David. I moved to into the infield. The one thing that I'll tell you, and David, if he was here with us today, would tell you, well, for me anyway, in high school, I turned it around, but my dad used to tell David and I, neither of us could hit our hats. Great in the field, but fucking terrible batting.

SPEAKER_27 1:19:36

David was great because he was so fast. So you put him, you put him in the bottom of the lineup. So if he got on, you knew that your leadoff hitter and you're you know coming through the top of the order, he was gonna score. You know, he's always scoring from second base. He's fast. I always said this to the outfielders they put the good players on the infield. So when you move to the infield, that's why. You know, they don't have to deal with the ground balls and all that stuff. You get much more action. So he took the pride in center, baby. Oh, yeah, it was unbelievable. And you know, there's a lot of high school players that aren't great that play in the outfield um at that level, but David was one of the true, true, really good outfielders. Freddie Lynn was his idol. Yeah, he's cool. He roamed it like Fred, that's for sure. It was awesome.

SPEAKER_26 1:20:24

Don't go to you. All right. All right, AJ and Mark, I'm gonna need you to pump the brakes while I this is gonna take me a little while to kind of circle around and get to where my point is. But Guilford Hills had a floor hockey league. And the very first season of that floor hockey league, we were using sticks that you played in gym class, like the flimsy plastic sticks, and people the other team were using like real sticks with like hard plastic, you know, basically a real hockey stick, but with a plastic blade. We didn't know that. We had like the shitty gym class hockey sticks that were flat and flaccid and couldn't so anyways.

SPEAKER_11 1:21:07

But my risk with the plastic blade.

SPEAKER_26 1:21:10

Our first game, I was the goaltender, and we played like probably one of the best teams ever. And we lost we lost like 34 to 2. No, and they were it was 36 to nothing. All right. And there was a guy in the and I was the goaltender, and there was a guy that said it was one of the greatest goaltending like achievements he's ever seen. Because yeah, I let 34 goals go by, but I stopped like 700 shots.

SPEAKER_23 1:21:41

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_26 1:21:42

It was like we got a personality. It was the highest percentage of all like there was like an auto pitcher thing coming at me, just shot after shot. I had like 700 saves, but I let 34 go in. 32. Yeah, like I mean, this was a league that had like Stevie Leach, Bobby Carpenter from the Bruins were playing on it, which when I was on the floor, I I was like, yeah, I could poke check Steve Leach. I was I was 5'9, 160, he was like, you know, 6'5, 220, and I I could hang with him on the floor with feet, never not on skates, obviously, you know. Right. But uh he could out stick handle me, but I could poke check his ass, you know. But that was a lot of fun that league, you know.

SPEAKER_10 1:22:30

But that night it wasn't.

SPEAKER_26 1:22:31

No, we got annihilated. We just weren't we weren't ready. We were like, we were not prepared. We had the shitty sticks, we didn't know how the action was gonna be. And uh we learned quickly and we actually became you know viable. We we were pretty decent after a while. Oh yeah, we were. Yeah, but that first game, man, they were lighting us up, and I was exhausted. I took like 700 shots.

SPEAKER_11 1:22:55

Yeah, you had a 94 save percentage and we lost 36 to nothing because right. I just remember the first shot. It's like awesome.

SPEAKER_26 1:23:08

I'm like, we lost 36 to nothing.

SPEAKER_11 1:23:11

Oh I'm so glad you took that, Don, because that's his highlight.

SPEAKER_10 1:23:18

Oh my god. Right.

SPEAKER_26 1:23:20

Say greatest goalie performance ever in a 36 to nothing loss in the hockey. 97%.

SPEAKER_10 1:23:31

Remember that game, the football game, the backyard game against Donnie? I mean, David had hands, man.

SPEAKER_26 1:23:37

David could have been a wide receiver in football. It was threw the ball and he caught it. You know, like I didn't have to aim it or nothing. He went up and got it.

SPEAKER_10 1:23:46

As long as you didn't hit him, then he was up for the year.

SPEAKER_26 1:23:49

Right. Yeah, I just scored Brady John Elway. I I just no matter where I threw the ball, David caught it.

SPEAKER_10 1:23:56

But you were on my team, Donnie. We lost 56 to 7.

SPEAKER_11 1:24:00

Uh David would come up to me and I'd whisper, Deep and Over the shoulder.

SPEAKER_26 1:24:07

Oh, I was thinking when we played in Lakeport. That was it.

SPEAKER_11 1:24:10

Oh, no, no.

SPEAKER_26 1:24:11

You're playing football in Lakeport with David.

SPEAKER_11 1:24:13

Oh, always. I mean, it was deep over the shoulder. Awesome. All right, Kevin, off to you. Sorry for the rant.

SPEAKER_09 1:24:24

No worries. This is what it's all about. Um so I again I took this one as it was something personal that that we did. And so not really being in Usports, I remembered one of the greatest times that that I ever had, and that's uh my best friend and his dad opened up a pool hall back in I think l 89 or 90, and there was a huge resurgence of billiards at that time, and then it started to wane. So his brother came in to make it a bar, and I came in to run the kitchen and then 10 bar and and have lots of fun with that. What we would do is we would close the bar on Sunday nights, and we'd take the two Kathy Ireland cutouts, the full-size Cathy Ireland Budweiser promo cutouts, and put them on either side of the wide screen, put them on either side of the widescreen TV set so that nobody could see inside to what was happening. And once that happened, we began what we called the Bangshot Olympics. We had a styrofoam cup covered with tinfoil. The town we were in was called Gonic. So it was the Gonic Cup. We would have teams, and we would start, we'd play a game of nine ball. We'd play a game of UBQB. I don't know if you guys remember that one. It was one of the ones like the you know, the basketball ones, but you had a football and you had, you know, it's netted on the sides, and you had to throw the football through the hole. Yeah. So we cumulative scores. So, you know, how you did in in nine ball, how you did in UBQB. Games came and went. We had remember the shuffle board you had at at uh the place you rented near me, AJ. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So we had one of those, one of those you put the wax down, sorry, you put the you put the wax down and you had the big metal disc and you and you played shuffleboard with that. That was part of it. Uh bubble hockey, which is what's greater than that with a boo button. Pushing the boo button as much as you can. Um ping pong ping pong was involved in it. And of course, we had we would use one of the two greatest pinball games ever, the first being one of my favorites, Taxi. Because when everything was quiet, the come on was hey, you with the face. But usually it was Adam's family, which is the greatest pinball game ever. And then of course it always came down to really it was usually tied right up into the end, and it would come down to a fairly violent foosball game.

SPEAKER_34 1:27:24

Foosball. You playing the foozeball behind my back.

SPEAKER_09 1:27:28

And was just for the win. Oh my god. I'm I'm talking, it's like four o'clock in the morning now, and everybody's drunk as a skunk, and we are just so competitive in this game. We unbelievable. There's one kid, Cook, would he would shoot from the goal, and that thing, if he scored, you know, the back of the the the nice tournament soccer tables made that nice metal metallic slam when he really rammed one in. He would do that from the back, from the goalie, the rear goalie, louder than anybody did it from right up front. And I was I was a wall. I used to jokingly we we refer to me as Ed Civ, Ed Civ and goal. I'd psych people up with that. But what a great time we had doing that. It was it was so much fun, and it ran for I think uh at least a year or two that we did that. And it was like a it was a big fucking deal if you had the Gonnet Cup. Fucking right.

SPEAKER_11 1:28:26

I gotta tell you the reason Mark was laughing in the beginning is when we would go striper fishing with our dad. He always felt like the word gonic sounded like a disease. It does. So when he drove on the spaulding turnpike, he'd always go AJ. I got gonic. I know. But what a fucking marathon that sounds like. I used to love those tournaments.

SPEAKER_09 1:28:58

Oh, it was it was the greatest time ever. We had so there was a kid. He was actually thinking he was a year or two older than me, but it his name was Pete. Parler Pete? What's that? Is it Parler Pete? Parler Pete. Yeah. Parler Pete. And he was just one of those guys that just like whatever it was, whether it was darts or billiards or foosball, or like the first time he ever played the game, he was like nap nap and just figured everything out, and he was amazing.

SPEAKER_11 1:29:28

That's like some way around here.

SPEAKER_09 1:29:30

Right, exactly. Exactly.

SPEAKER_26 1:29:36

So Kevin Shaw giving you some uh personal sports accolades. Like I remember in high school, you had quads, you had the biggest quads ever, and you could fucking fire a soccer ball, man. You had a laser of a soccer ball kick, you know. I remember you guys playing. It was amazing watching you guys.

SPEAKER_27 1:29:59

That must have been fun for you guys being a little bit younger. So every time we went to Concord in the final four, you guys were up at the stands drinking and we were working our asses off down the ball.

SPEAKER_07 1:30:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_27 1:30:10

But yeah, those are the days of running Bell Knop Mountain doing Indian sprints. I don't know if you're saying that nowadays, it might be non-PC. But you know, if you remember Pinkham and his thighs and how much he'd go run 10 miles just for something to do. And yeah, I mean, we were all fit. And it was funny because the skiers and the ski jumpers, I get a kick out of you guys talking about ski jumping with Scoot and DeGee a couple episodes back, and I remember all those guys, Greg Serviny, Jim Leggett, Chris Leggett. I actually saw Greg last night. It was uh fun to catch up with him. But I mean, Guilford High had an iconic jumping team and skiing team, and the downhill team was untouchable, they were unbelievable. Amazing. So yeah, all those guys, all those skiers would play soccer just to get ready for you know their winter sports. Yeah. Remember the Ski Meister where you did cross country ski jumping and downhill? It was almost like a cap one.

SPEAKER_11 1:31:09

And so they've given it up because of cross-country. Oh, yeah. Without a doubt.

SPEAKER_26 1:31:16

Cross country is fitness, man. Yeah. And boring as fuck.

SPEAKER_11 1:31:20

Yeah. Sounds like too much work to me. One story before I go to you, Cavshaw, is um you were well graduated by this because this time, because I think I was in 10th or 11th grade, but I had just moved to Hinsdale and we went to Concord for the finals.

SPEAKER_27 1:31:40

Yeah, we're not talking about this shit.

SPEAKER_11 1:31:41

We're not. No, we're not. No, no, we won. Well, you guys won, which I rooted for. Yeah. And I was there for one week getting tooled on, and then I went to the soccer finals and sat with all of my friends from Guilford. And I'll never forget this as long as I live, because Rich Ellis was the golden eagle, and we are playing the Littleton Spartans. And Rich Ellis was just being fun out there as the mascot, and runs up to the Spartan, this dude with this massive head.

SPEAKER_10 1:32:20

You mean the Crusaders, AJ?

SPEAKER_11 1:32:22

No, no, it's the Spartans. Maybe they weren't from Littleton, but it was the Spartan. That was White Mountain. White Mount Mountain. I remember that. Yeah. So Rich goes up in the golden eagle mascot fucking costume and just jacks the Spartan in the head like six times. So hard, right? Just joking, having fun, and all of a sudden the person pulls the head off, and it's this chick bawling her. Oh no. And I'll never forget it as long as I live because the announcer in the booth just went, please, no beating up on the Spartan. No beating up on the Spartan. I just felt like such an asshole.

SPEAKER_27 1:33:13

Yeah. No, I cut you off with Hensdale because my my uh freshman year, I was in the hospital, so I didn't play on the varsity team. Sophomore year, we knocked off White Mountains in the quarterfinals. They were loaded. They had everybody. They had the All-American, Mark Griffin, and they were just loaded. And they beat us twice during the regular season. This is one of the things I was going to talk about if I didn't choose Fisk for the best sporting moment. So we go to Concord, we win easily. And this is, you know, Dave Scott, Pat O'Connor, all these really Stevie Cookman, all these great players. And um, we get our asses kicked to Hopkinton in the finals. So we still haven't won. Those guys graduate, we come back. We have no seniors on my junior year. So Moulton would have been a senior. They were all baseball, basketball players. So we lose 1-0 with two minutes left to Hensdale. We have everybody coming back. Following year, we outscore our opponents 86-1 going to the finals. We're annihilating teams. Some of us aren't even playing in the second half of games. Lo and behold, we play Hensdale. We outshoot them 32 to 3 and lose 2-1. Then it gets better. I graduate, they go on and win the next 10 championships in a row. Which is just like kicking the nuts.

SPEAKER_11 1:34:32

Kicking the nuts.

SPEAKER_27 1:34:34

But anyway.

SPEAKER_11 1:34:35

All right, Kevshaw, we're gonna go to you for number one. And that's gonna be the most loved or most hated team coach, manager, or owner.

SPEAKER_27 1:34:47

Yeah, so this was uh I had a lot of thoughts on this, whether to go with my favorite team or manager, you know, or go the other way. And I'm going back to the dreaded Yankees because this one's the true trifecta. Ownership, George Steinbrenner, we all hated him. The Yankees always won, so we hated the team. And then the best part might have been Billy Martin as their manager, just a character getting thrown out of games, throwing tantrums and you know, throw getting thrown out of bars. The stories are legendary. So I'm gonna go with the Yanks and uh during their era of dominance, and you know, you could have gone with a bunch of different ones, and even on the on the good side, because in the 80s, the re the um a lot of the different teams in Boston did well. Some not so well, some did well. So I'm going with the dreaded Yanks, Steinbrenner and Billy Martin. Yeah, Steinbrenner was a great hate.

SPEAKER_26 1:35:56

Yeah, yeah, he was an easy hate. Yeah.

SPEAKER_10 1:36:00

Always awesome. Do you remember what happened to the uh to Billy Martin the middle of that year in 78? He did he did not finish the year. Bob Lemon took over after Steinbrenner fired Billy Martin. So and uh did they fire him? Yeah, well he got fired about God, at least five times. Yeah. Of course, then they won 40 out of 50 games, so 30 of them against the Red Sox. Yeah.

unknown 1:36:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_10 1:36:33

Brother Mark, that's off to you. Okay, well, uh there were this came down to two, and I'm very partial to both of them, but um go I'm going my favorite, and that's Don Cherry, the coach of the Boston Bruins, the 74 season, 74-75 to the 78-89 season. And he just had that extremely blue-collar coaching style. He was belovedly uh referred to as I mean, his nickname was Grapes. Just the lunch pail gang. It was a lunch pail gang. I mean, they they made it to let's see, uh um 77 in the 78 finals, they made it to against those friggin' Canadians. And unfortunately, his very last game as a coach, and I would never would have got rid of him like Harry Syndon did. Apparently they were at loggerheads. We're talking about the game where the Bruins went up 3-1 going into third period. Montreal came back and tied it, and then Ricky Middleton was like three or two four no, it was like 340 something left in the game. They took the lead, and then the Bruins got called for too many men on the ice.

SPEAKER_13 1:37:48

Well, they were calling the Bruins for too many men on the ice. The Bruins got caught in the line changed the wrong way, and they're gonna be penalized at this time, a very significant penalty. Well, this is a terribly inopportune time for the Boston Bruins to pick up a penalty of that nature and of that magnitude at this time, as you say, with two minutes and 34 seconds remaining.

SPEAKER_10 1:38:12

He called. Oh, yeah, and then of course the Canadians, I think it was Gila Fleur that scored, and then Lambert in overtime. They would have won the cup that year. They they they absolutely would have because they would have played the Rangers. The Bruins had the Rangers number back in those days. But yeah, just an incredible coach. Just he I remember asking Rick Middleton at the Shalimar, is it true that Don Cherry did not want his players wearing helmets? He says, That's absolutely true. So just badass.

SPEAKER_27 1:38:48

Can I throw out a Rick Middleton story quickly? It's a drinking story. Oh, yeah, he was drunk that yeah. So years ago, I had a client, C.B. Sullivan, and he owns a big hair care product uh company since passed away. But he was the sponsor of Bike Week, and I coached his kids. So the kids at soccer practice said, Come on over to the place. They had a place on the lake. So I go over and I walk in. Who's there? Rick Middleton, Ian Zeering from Beverly Hills 90210, uh, Robbie Knievel. Of course, he's Robbie Knievel. Robbie Knievel was there. He was big on bike week. Robbie would come days before they all got there and use the boat, and they hoped he didn't trash it and he was a character. But then also um John Paul De Giorno, who is John Paul Mitchell, you know, patron and the hair care products. So I don't treat it for a minute. Yeah, I like I like uh beers, I don't like hard stuff. So here we are, JP Diorno, and I don't even know who he is. He says, Hey, you want a shot of uh tequila? I'm like, I don't. He goes, Come on, I just bought the company. And I'm like, What? This is what's growing his niggas, and I'm like, wow, and Middleton's there, and he was uh CB's guinea pig for the hair growth potion that they had. He was trying to grow his hair back. So we all sit down and I did a shot and it was smooth. You know, Patron's a good product, and he starts telling me all about the hair care, how they started the company, selling it out of the trunk of his car in LA, on and on and on. And then I got Middleton stories, Robbie Kennevel, Ion Zering stories. I've never been so drunk in my life that just and I said no to the first shot, and it was so smooth. We just went on and on. That's the dangerous it was wild. Just you know, it was wild. And CB ended up marrying a uh past um centerful from Playboy or Penthouse, whatever. She was there, and it was just a wild night. Oh my god. Yeah, it was fun. So that's awesome. Yeah. Robbie Robbie used to be around for bike week all the time, and then uh they kind of crew it.

SPEAKER_09 1:40:58

So I threw him out of a couple places. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_27 1:41:02

He was not a good drinker. No, no, he was fun in the beginning, and then you're like, oh, here he goes. He took the boat out one night in the fog and couldn't they couldn't find him till the next morning. Found him out in the 40s, the islands straight out from their house. Um, just kind of bouncing off some rocks and you know, fog cleared in the morning. Just wild. Nice guy. I mean, but yeah, once he got to a certain point, you didn't know. Nice guy, bad drinker. Yeah, the other guy.

SPEAKER_09 1:41:36

I don't know anything about that, AJ. Nor do you.

SPEAKER_26 1:41:38

Nor do I think we know a few. Yeah.

SPEAKER_27 1:41:41

Uh Little Finn would have been nicer, old nifty, the old captain. Oh, he was super when I met him. Yeah. Nice guy. Yeah, JP was great. Uh Ian was great, and uh, they were it was fun. It was a wild night. Oh, awesome. But that's a cool story.

SPEAKER_11 1:41:58

Donnie, I hope you're ready to roll because I'm going to me and I'm gonna say just two words, and that's George Steinbrenner. Off to you, Donald. You know where that goes, but that was my pick, and I'll leave it at that. I well, I should say I did have a love, and that was Bobby Knight.

SPEAKER_26 1:42:22

But was there a lot of Seinfeld Steinbrenner stuff? Yes.

SPEAKER_34 1:42:25

I'm not going to the wedding. Why not? Because Jerry is bringing a date. I am not an usher. I don't have anyone to talk to, and I'm not sitting at the singles table all by myself.

SPEAKER_08 1:42:36

Wait a minute, young lady. What's this about singles tables? I don't sit at singles tables. Singles tables are for losers. The Yankees have won 33 pennants and 22 world championships. We're winners. We don't sit with losers. Well, and I've got an idea. You're gonna go to the party with me.

SPEAKER_34 1:42:54

Oh, well.

SPEAKER_08 1:42:56

You dance, don't you? Lose a little weight, get yourself in shape, and then when they throw the bridle bouquet, you'll maybe get it. I don't know, Mr. Well, I know you're the cause of all this, Costanza. It's your wedding, so either she goes with me or you're out of here. Yesterday's newspaper. Of course she's gonna go with you, Mr. Stein. Well, that's fine. I don't like to put undue pressure on people.

SPEAKER_26 1:43:23

And love them or hate them, the guy the guy knew how to manage a uh, you know, own a baseball team. You know, he exactly why we hate him. Right, right. You hate the guys that are good, you know. And he was good. He was the the evil enemy. Yeah. All right. So for mine, it's a love hate. Um I tend to more towards the hate. And it's uh you were talking about buying some fish, and this guy was related to a fish, and it's the tuna, Bill Parcells. Yeah. Um I he brought he brought respect back to the Patriots, um, getting them into the Super Bowl again. And uh and then he the next year he left his ego. He couldn't get over the fact that that uh you know he had to pick Terry Glenn because the owner, Robert Kraft, wanted Terry Glenn. Uh uh, you know, he the famous like, you know, if you're gonna buy the grocery, if you're gonna cook the meal, you gotta be able to buy the groceries, that that thing, you know. It's like fuck off, man.

SPEAKER_35 1:44:29

Okay, now I'm gonna quote, and I'm not trying to be cute here, okay? I'm just gonna say they want you to cook the dinner, at least they ought to let you shop for some of the groceries.

SPEAKER_26 1:44:39

If if you like him, that shit came out Super Bowl week. So that was obviously a distraction to the game. And as a coach, he should not have done that. You know, that was a stupid thing to do as a coach. It was selfish, and then he goes to the Jets, and he was an asshole with the Jets, and I don't think he ever did it accomplished anything without Bill Belichick as his defensive coordinator. Like he won Super Bowls with the Giants with with uh Belichick, he went to the Super Bowl with the Pats with Belichick as a defensive coordinator. So, you know, the tuna wasn't anything without Belichick. So um, but he's a good good coach, you know, he's he's got his history, but I I I had I have great animosity towards that Super Bowl because they should have they could have won, you know. He quit before the game started. Him coming out with that shit before the before the game was huge.

SPEAKER_11 1:45:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_26 1:45:36

So yeah.

SPEAKER_10 1:45:37

What does that do for fucking morale? I just wanted to say that it was a lot of uh Parcell's draft picks that helped Bill Belichick win those Super Bowls. He was a I mean Belich I mean Parcells was a great evaluator of talent. He was incredible at it. Look at the drafts he had. Ty Wall, Willie McGinnis, Teddy Bruski. And uh and those were the that was the friggin' core of the the championship teams, the first dynasty. And Belichick did bring in a bunch of players that certainly helped. But I mean Pete Carroll tried to destroy the Patriots with all their draft picks that they got from Parcells with the whole you know, but uh so yeah, he was he was a better GM than he was a coach in some ways, I think. Yeah because I that was my second pick. I w I was going back and forth with Terry and uh Parcells, and I'm glad you picked them because that that's something I really wanted to say. Yeah, thank you. All right, Kevin, wrap it up.

SPEAKER_09 1:46:41

All right, so I did a love hate, but they're two different coaches here. So we're gonna start with because it plays right what into you you were talking about. I firmly believe that what Parcells did in drafting, what Belichick did with the team and evaluating talent and all that was taken from the book of Chuck Knoll, who took the Steelers out of the basement. And still, as far as if you if you count coaches with no Super Bowl losses, he has the most wins. He's right behind Belichick if you count losses as well. But um, he really he he was the guy that was like, we're gonna draft the right people at the right the best people that are available and really manage a team and turn a team around and and make it a winning franchise. And on the other side of mine is that piece of shit we just scraped off our shoe in Pittsburgh, Mike Tomlin, who did fucking nothing except act like a thug on the sideline and w waste talent as as long as the day was. He is such a useless, useless, talentless individual. And I've heard a million stories about what a him and Joey Porter being thugs at their kids' games, and just just not a decent human being. And that was another thing I loved about Noel was he was an upright guy right across the board. Everything you don't read articles about him being a shit bag, and so that's it. That's that's both of mine, same team, and opposite sides of a coin.

SPEAKER_11 1:48:20

Awesome. All right, I didn't I I don't know if anyone heard me say Bobby Knight, but I loved him just because he was such a prick and throwing chairs, yeah, definitely a character. Yeah, he was a great character. Awesome, boys. As always, we have just what a great time it is just to shoot the shit here with you guys and reminisce, and it really makes my friggin' weak. Truly. But anyway, Dongo, I thank you very much. Hey, it was a great time.

SPEAKER_09 1:48:55

Yes, uh Kevin. Yeah, awesome. Thanks for for being here, Kevin. Appreciate you coming in and sitting in with us and sharing your stories and and your fun and look forward to the next one.

SPEAKER_10 1:49:09

Awesome, and brother Mac. Yeah, that was fun. Kevin, do you remember that time? I I remember you coming up to me when we were playing with the Maroons and you said, I think we're gonna finally win one, and we did. We beat the Flyers.

SPEAKER_27 1:49:22

That team wasn't very good, but we got our acts together at the end of the year. Oh, yeah, it was fun, though. It was a lot of fun. Nobody had more fun than that team, that's for sure. We had the most fun of everyone.

SPEAKER_11 1:49:33

I'm guessing there was no drinking involved. But anyway, awesome. Yeah, Kevin Shaw, thank you so much for joining us. Um and anything you want to plug for yourself, have at it, man.

SPEAKER_27 1:49:47

Yeah, I just want to thank you guys for having me on. As I mentioned, I've listened to every episode. I love it. You guys are covering the greatest time that, you know, one, we were in very impressionable ages of our life, but it it just it truly was the greatest time to grow up. No phones, no cameras, none of that bullshit. It was just the best. Um, and you know, AJ and the rest of you guys, you mentioned so many uh people like AJ and Donnie were good buddies with my brother. And you mentioned Stevie Sousa today. Um we talk about David all the time, and I got to play baseball with him and party with him in high school. And then Big Al my cousin, Big Al. You were tight with him. Uh just David. So just so many good times. So this all kind of brings it back. full circle and it's super cool, super fun. And thanks for everything you guys do. This is definitely just capturing the greatest time of you know of growing up to those were the just cool stories, you know, super fun. And I relate to a lot of them where you guys talk about, you know, the old Guilford days and you know, I'm kind of a little younger than Mark, older than AJ and Donnie and Kev. And it's just super cool. So thanks a lot and love to come back and do it again at some point if you uh if you'd have me. It's great.

SPEAKER_11 1:51:06

Of course man. Yes sir. Awesome man. Yeah. It's all about nostalgia the best time ever. Yep.

SPEAKER_26 1:51:14

And thank you for calling out those those ones we lost. Thank you.

SPEAKER_11 1:51:17

Yeah man so important. So important. Awesome Kevin Shaw well thank you so much for joining us and thank you everyone out there for listening man we can't appreciate it more just the downloads are going haywire and please as I always say you know reach out uh check us out on uh past timers at 80s high on Facebook and definitely realize that we can all on Spotify put some uh comments right in there because that's awesome and it's so easy to see just just thank you all and we are out hello tribe fans welcome back to Major League Baseball sort of pay to tennis today is 1412.

SPEAKER_17 1:52:11

Some of them were driven away by a little ten run first inning the Red Sox put up take over Marty I'm in the bag for the Indians one round on let's say one hit that's all we got one goddamn hit you can't say goddamn on the air don't worry nobody's listening anyway