First, Doug gives his thoughts on the passing of basketball legend, cultural treasure and his personal longtime friend, Bill Walton.
Doug also pulls back the curtain with an inside look at the whirlwind 48 hours leading up to his getting the Wisconsin-Green Bay job, the non-stop first two weeks since touching down as head coach, how he’s building his staff, and where he’s at with early recruiting.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:06):
All right, what I welcome in. I'm Doug Gottlieb. This
is all ball.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
We are a week in or slightly over a weekend
my tenures the head headball coach.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
Maybe I should get some HBC hats.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
That'd be cool anyway, to go along with all the
gear I've gotten since I've become the headball coach at
Green Bay. I got lots of kind of interesting nuggets
and tidbits to get to. But I do want to
start this podcast thinking about my childhood friends Adam Walton,
Nate Walton, Chris, and Luke Walton. Not as close with Luke,
(00:44):
I'm not gonna sit here light yet. Chris, known as
Toughy Toughy, obviously played for my brother at San Diego State,
and Nate and I played together some.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
Late into high school.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
And then when we were in college, when he was
at Princeton, I think we played the say No Classic together.
And then of course Adam was my teammate since like
six or seventh.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Grade, and he was just.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Every bit of joy that you felt from Bill Walton.
Like that's truly how Adam always has been. And I
have about five of the best Bill Walton stories ever
in my life. Five of them occupy It's part Bill Walt.
My first Final four, the first Final four was in
nineteen eighty nine. I was thirteen years old and I
(01:32):
went to Seattle with my dad. My brother had gone
several times previously, but I had not, and Adam was
then my teammate, and so we were hanging out together
and my dad got one ticket.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
The way it works with the NABC is if you're
a former coach, you get one ticket.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Dad had one ticket, and what I would what I
would later come to do, I think in the coming years,
would be I sell a ticket and then trade down
to get worse tickets, because his decade was usually not.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
Necessarily court level, but lower level.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
And then I'd go up a level two tickets for
two more and work my way up to the top
of the building and then we get to just to
get the door and then go by the way to
sit down low right.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Old school style.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
But in this particular year, Bill was so appreciative to
my dad that he said.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
Don't worry about it, Bob. They're getting in the game
with me.
Speaker 2 (02:27):
And so we walked in like past the because I
think he was doing some CBS stuff or he's Bill Frickin'
Walton and he let everybody know he's Bill Walton, and
then we just followed him, and I remember they opened
up this curtain because back then he was in the
corner of the Kingdome and there was a big curtain
up and I just remember walking in through TV trucks.
(02:47):
I'd never seen TV trucks before, walking into a dome,
I'd never been into a dome before, and then walking
underneath the stands and then open this curtain and boom,
there's like fifty sixty thousand people. It was insane, but
it was also insane that we just went and he
gave us CBS passes and we had literally sat like.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
Really close.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
I remember we were like standing kind of underneath the
basket during a portion of the game, and we sat
really really close, and anytime somebody had come up and
ask us for our tickets, he would just wave his
hand and say.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
There would be and he would smile.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
And greet him ever and asked them their name, and
next thing, you know, everybody left us alone.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
We watched the games, which are incredible. So that's the first.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
That's my first Final Four is connected with Bill and Adam.
You know, I've I've worked with him so much since,
but I do remember that in one of my first
years at ESPN, we did the ESPN twenty fifth anniversary,
like the launch. Is it twenty years of ESPN Radio
(03:54):
or twenty five years of ESPN, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
There's a party. I think it was twenty five years.
There's a party at the e ESPN Zon.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Hes remember that. ESPN's on New York City and I
was at the time, I was hosting a show called
Game Night with Chuck Wilson. It was six hours a night,
four nights a week, and then Freddie Coleman and John
Cebel did the weekend shows. And I remember starting that night,
it was a it was a big celebration and we
(04:21):
were we got to interview some of the most iconic
figures in sports. We started with the King Richard Petty,
like it was me, Richard Petty, and then the Wizard,
the Wizard of Oz, Ozzie Smith, and.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
Then Chuck Wilson. Like That's how the show started.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
But what I remember distinctly about that night was I
remember I had been at ESPN at this time, probably
like two years or year and a half maybe, and
so I mean I would say I was a guy
sort of on the rise, but people remember me from
college basketball a little bit. But in terms of sports radio,
(05:03):
like there's something to credibility of we have Bill Walton
on and if anybody's ever had him on those when
he goes, there's nothing you can do to stop him.
They'll talk through a break, doesn't even matter. Then he
went on and on and on about my your father Bob,
changed my son's lives at home, and Nate.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
Christopher and Christopher getting to play.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
You know.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
So, uh, it gave me like instant credibility. It was
really cool, really cool.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
And then you know, I host an event for the
Pump Brothers for they do it. They have a cancer
research board in uh in Northridge, California. We had Bill
on one time. I don't remember. It was to honor him.
I think it was to honor him. And when I
say Bill went on and on and on, I'm telling
(05:57):
you what on on on Now. What people don't know
about Bill, and maybe it's been shared a million times over,
is he used to have a stutter. And one of
the devices he had for not stuttering is just continuing
to talk stream of consciousness and he'll tell you what
to tell you, totally tell you, like I apologize. I
just once I get to talking. If I stopped talking, uh,
(06:20):
then then it stops my brain and it doesn't volction.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
Probably that was his either belief or trick. I don't know.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
I've so this is like maybe two years ago we
honored him, and I think he went for like fifteen
twenty minutes, which is really really you know, everybody wants
to her Bill Walton talk, but not for fifteen to
twenty minutes. It was maybe longer.
Speaker 3 (06:42):
It was long.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
And then this year we had him on and we
built in he was introducing somebody.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
Maybe he was the introducing so quokes one year. I
don't so this year we built in a bill buffer
like fifteen to twenty.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
We have no idea how long he's gonna go, and
damn it if he didn't go for like two minutes
and then was done and it was perfect. And I
think Parvar was he knew that the year before he
went away too long, way too long, and because of it,
he like adjusted without us ever having to say anything.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
And it's a it's a it's kind of a great.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
Little I don't know, learning experiment for somebody like myself
in that you got to read the room and understand
that sometimes you may go a little too long or
say something you should say. You gotta sometimes make that
adjustment by yourself, and he did. Bill was a He's
an interesting cat man, interesting cat. First time I met
(07:45):
Bill Will we took Adam home from a game his u.
Bill's first wife, Susie is awesome. It's just really cool,
and they were really good friends. It was like that
was actually, I think my first divorced friend. Yeah, I
think they're my first divorced friend. I was thirteen twelve,
(08:08):
maybe only men, and.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
I remember one time.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
You know, what we would do is my dad would
drive down to like San Clemente, which was like thirty
minutes to the south. It was like thirty five forty
minutes north of where Susie lived, and we'd meet pick
up at him and then play basketball and then bring
him back. So one time Susie couldn't pick us up,
so we took him to Bill's house which was in
(08:34):
San Diego, and we went in and I'll never forget that.
We go in the backyard and there's a tep and
that fucker is sleeping in the TP. It was just nothing,
says Bill Walton Moore, than beautiful house like Nice's house
I'd ever been in to that point in my life.
And he's sleeping in a fucking TP in the back.
(08:58):
So it's sad. I mean, anyone in this day and
age is too sid He died a day after the
last kind of official PAC twelve game or PAC ten game,
with the year Zono win Conference of champions. Yeah, that's
that's more than just a little bit ironic, isn't it.
I truly enjoyed working with him with Westwood One. He
(09:21):
was just awesome to me. I knew he was sick
only because this year he could go to the final
four four West with one. He always hopped out with
us and wax poetic for a couple minutes. He's in
any conversation of the biggest player college basketball, and you
know he probably would have been a discussion with NBA basketball. Look,
(09:42):
got Dominie was in Portland. Here's the big Red band.
That's a life well lives.
Speaker 4 (09:49):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app search FSR to and.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Lie, Okay, let me catch you up on what's what
it's like to put together in college basketball for so,
let me just kind of walk you through some stuff
which are cool and part of this look selfishly, I'm
gonna use this and here market is almost my audio
audio blog, you know, or audio flaw No, yeah, audio
(10:23):
flog because it has video two.
Speaker 3 (10:25):
This is my diary.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
I've had several people tell me, hey, you should really
really keep copious notes, You should keep a journal. I
have one and I'm keeping you and this will be
my kind of audio turn. So obviously we all know
NCAA rules. I can't talk about prospects, but I can
talk about dudes that I got that are that that
(10:49):
are going to play for me. They never went in
the portal, so that's kind of the way it goes.
This has been an unbelievable whirlwind, So I'll give you
kind of how crazy this shit.
Speaker 3 (11:01):
Is when you make an announcement.
Speaker 2 (11:05):
As much as I knew, I had the job Saturday
night because Sundan's Wicks kind of in dark. On Saturday
he had a recruit on campus, and in addition to
the recruit on campus, he had I think one of.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
His kids three year old birthday party.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
And and I only know this because that's what you know.
We're all honest with each other here, and that's what
was told to me, like, hey, how come we can't
figure out if Sunny's getting this.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
Job or not.
Speaker 3 (11:34):
So by by Saturday night, he.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
Talked to Josh boone is not my boss and said,
you know, he thought it was going to go his way,
but he didn't have a contract. And I wasn't going
to be presented with a contract or at MoU unless
he was. And even then I didn't know for sure
if I was one of one, one of two, one
of three, you know. But you've hand forward from that
(12:01):
to Sunday was Mother's Day, and I still really didn't
have a true answer. But I had started the process
of putting together who do I want players, who do
I want staff?
Speaker 3 (12:14):
When can I get there?
Speaker 2 (12:15):
What's it all look like, what's the money look like,
what's the staff will look like? Is there any are
there any ancillar resources? What's the nil? All these different things?
And you're keeping a written for me. I got to
write it down as much as I can keep everything
up here, you know, And I'm really really good with numbers.
(12:39):
You still you need to have it kind of directed
to you so you know exactly what's going on, and
then you can write it down and then you can
call upon it anytime you need. So I went to
sleep Sunday night. I had this, as I said at
my press conference, that has great talk to my mom
and I remember this was like, I don't know how
(13:00):
many people, how many of you have this, but now
you have those moments in your life where you share
something with your parents. And the last time I had
one of these moments was in twenty twelve, So twelve
years ago. I remember sitting on my stairs at my
house and I was like, front up, Yeah, I was
(13:21):
front porch in Canton, Connecticut talking to my dad about
leaving ESPN to go to CBS.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
My dad said, you know, just atch a mistike. I
don't even know CBS had a cable network. I didn't
even know.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
And I said that that the bigger play here is
I'm going to get to do the Final four. I've
always want to do the Final Four. It's like, you know,
when you do the Final Four, everybody watches ESPN up
until the game, and then they watched it.
Speaker 3 (13:44):
I was like, I don't know if that's truly the case.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
So I talked to my dad and then I basically
told him this is what I was going to do,
and I thought it was the right thing for my career.
And there's a good portion of him that it was
right because and he didn't say it this way, but
I was very happy, and you know, fuck with happy.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
But there's also a.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
Good portion of what I believed to be right, which
was I got to move to California, got a chance
to have a better relationship with them, and I also
got to the phone four and I remember my dad
texting me during it wasn't even during the NCAA tournament,
was leading up to the NCAA tournament, and that was
on a Saturday, and I was on and he's like,
(14:26):
you were right, this is a way bigger platform.
Speaker 3 (14:29):
So there's something about your gut instincts.
Speaker 2 (14:32):
I also knew, though that California is hard to raise kids.
Speaker 3 (14:38):
I think it'd be hard.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
In relationships, but there is something to telling your parents
about this life change you're going to make, because they've
known you longer than anybody. So Sunday I talked to
my mom and she was yellt emotional for a second,
so that I were talking about my dad, the fact
that now I'm coaching in Wisconsin, where he last had
a head coach job, how much she loved living here
(15:01):
when she was in Wisconsin, the people He's to the
pace of living, the whole.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
Thing, and.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
It just felt like this was something really special. And
I'm a realist, you know, I am a dreamer. I
am a romantic. I believe in the good people. I
think that most anybody, obviously outside of like murderers, try
and save them. I don't know what my true limit
(15:30):
would be in terms of broadcasting, but I've done so
many different things. And I remember this year I was
doing Duke Carolina for Compass Media, So I was doing
the radio call of Duke Carolina and I remember walking
around Cameron that day and I started kind of doing
a mental checklist of all the things I've done in broadcasting,
(15:55):
you know, climbing my way up the ladder at ESPN
to ultimately being on Bracketology, with which at the time
was there, you know, their biggest show. Granted I never
got on college game Day there, which is one of
the reasons frankly, that I left. You know, I wanted
to be on their biggest show. If not, I'll go
be on CBS's big show. But you know, in broadcasting,
(16:15):
I I mean all the shows I did on ESPN,
starting in Wisconsin with the great outdoor games, all the
college basketball. I got to do cole Pizza back when
was cold pizza, before it was first to ten, before
it was first take, and I got to do all
of those differents. I remember doing Sports Center post game
(16:37):
after Duke Carolina and I was doing it with Scott
Van Pelt and the Lake great Stewart Scott.
Speaker 3 (16:43):
These were just like seminal moments.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
You like my blazer slash jersey was retired on Sports Nation,
as I was the number one Phillip be Cowhard, probably
James Harden and of course Beats. I think of all
these things that I got to do. Then I go
to CBS, I do the Final Four. I get to
do my own TV show along with Ali LaForce.
Speaker 3 (17:06):
Who's just amazing.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
We got I finally started going to Super Bowls doing shows.
Speaker 3 (17:14):
And I'll give you a little.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
This is gonna stroke my egos so but I think
it will help explain why I don't think I know
I can do the radio show this pod and be
the head coach of green Back. When I was at CBS,
my radio show was on TV CBS Coorts Network and
(17:40):
Adam klub was my producer and Klueger shout out to
you if you're listening. He was awesome and he was
constantly working to go and get guests. I mean, you're
at the Super Bowl and you're, for example, in San
Francisco and you're going from Tony Romo to adjacent to
to Ryan Reynolds, you know, to Phil Simms Montana. You know,
(18:01):
you have to be able to mentally pivot from one
interview to the next. Remember, so here's here's how it works.
In live radio Ontellivision, Adam Coogan and I had a
two man operation. Yes, we had producers and for TV
we had directors, but we did not have runners to
(18:22):
go and grab guests. We did not have people to
help us show prep. I don't have anybody write my questions.
We just do it all ourselves. And the mental dexterity
it takes to pull that off and have really good conversations,
which translates to interviews. And by the way, you got
to keep everybody happy and let them do their plug
(18:43):
and oh yeah, by the way, you have your own
reads to do that kind of mental dexterity, I think
is fairly rare, and I know I can do it.
Speaker 3 (18:52):
I pull it off. I've done it before, but there's
always gonna be questions about it. And I credit Josh Boone.
He understands that. He gets it. We talked enough about it.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
He doesn't really have any any misgivings about it anyway.
So I wake up Monday morning to a phone call
from Josh. Josh is now my boss, and he knows
I'm an early riser, but this one's about you me
get woken up like ten twenty minutes before you're supposed
(19:21):
to get woken up, and you're like, oh my god,
I am so much more tired than I was for it.
It's so I'm shaking the cob webs. Five forty one
in the morning. He says, Okay, I'm ready to officially
offer you the head coach job for the Phoenix, And
of course I said something smart ass, which was are
(19:44):
you offering me a first impression rose or is this
the final rose? He's like, this is the final rose.
So I accepted that rose and say, grayssure to the head.
Speaker 3 (19:57):
Coach that cool feeling.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
Then I recorded a couple of interviews, five or six
important calls, and we were planning on dropping podcasts at
the same time that we made the announcement, and Jeff Goodman,
who I'd given the story to, was holding it back,
holding it back, and then you know Norlander, who was
very good cats and who else? John Rosstein breathing down
(20:22):
my neck wasn't until Tuesday was actually off for the job,
so I signed an MoU on Monday. I basically agreed
to the basic premise of its Sunday, but then when
I looked at the MoU, we made a couple of
just a couple of adjustments to it, nothing crazy, and
by Monday we agreed to those terms. Tuesday morning, I
was off of the job. So all of those people
(20:44):
are breathing down my neck. We decided to go with
it an hour early. But I didn't want to communicate
to the players that I was their new head coach
until it was announced, so I did a video on
a group text that they can all read, and then
promising them to touch base with all of them.
Speaker 3 (21:05):
My radio show got done at two.
Speaker 2 (21:07):
My flight was leaving it three twenty five, I picked
up my new suit, got out the airport, and I
flew out. I think I may have miscounted in terms
of underselling it because I was still on that first
Southwest flight to Phoenix. I was texting as they would
(21:27):
come in, thank you and whatever. But I had like
twenty seven Hondred text messages over three days. It was
like twenty seven our new ones like that. Just conversations
that was nuts. And if you're listening to this in
your a basketball coach, you know what that means. When
somebody gets a job, especially this late cycle, everybody's got
a player. Any coach that doesn't have a job once
(21:48):
get picked up, I get it. And I've tried to
talk to everybody, communicate with everybody, and it just takes time.
Speaker 3 (21:56):
So I landed in.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
Milwaukee at eleven, I got my rental card, drove up,
shut it down at two during in the morning, and
then I was up at six the next morning, started
doing interviews. Don all prepared, Shaye put out my suit,
went over and with my president, Michael Alexander, as well
as Josh Moon and a whole bunch of other Then
(22:17):
I did Dan Patrick, a couple other shows, go out
into the press conference, meet with the players, and then
set up a meeting with one of the parents one
of the players. And that was an all timer. Meanwhile,
the phone still buzzing, bringing off the hook.
Speaker 3 (22:33):
Did my radio show.
Speaker 2 (22:35):
So in the first week, what have we accomplished. Well,
we've returned most all the text passages of the returning
potential returning eight players, five have recommitted, three are in
the portal.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
We have taken one to.
Speaker 2 (23:00):
Commitments to date, and I hired two assistant coaches. Jordan
McCabe was coming to Green Bay anyway, actually encourage him
to take the job with Sonny had only been on
the job like a week before Sunny left.
Speaker 3 (23:14):
We've actually put.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
Him out in the road recruiting and we're gonna fill
out the staff as we go. And every coach I've
talked to you said, hey, take your time. Everybody's gonna
rush you to do it right away. You wanna put
together staff that works. You want to put together a
team that works. So that's what I'm doing. So that
was the announcement was Wednesday.
Speaker 3 (23:32):
That was just a blur.
Speaker 2 (23:34):
On Wednesday night, we went to dinner in a place
called Shipes and I met with a donor along with Josh,
you know, and I had like half class of wine,
made ten phone calls, phone was on fire, just no
time to catch my breath as a person, went back,
laid it down, got up, did it again. And then Thursday,
(23:58):
shout out to Sunny, you got a brand new out
the office sexual really comfortable. I slept on that sucker
Thursday night and I think I knocked out like four
hundred returning four hundred text messes, called a bunch of coaches,
some for players, watched a bunch of Bill and then Friday,
(24:18):
I wanted to go to ny to La, which is
a big event, but I also wanted to see my players,
one who was in the portal, actually twur of the portal,
and a couple others that were not, so I went
kind of down the state that way. Now we're at
day ten and we're moving and shaking. But it has
(24:40):
been thrilling, rewarding, tiring, sure, but it is starting to
come together. You do learn that some you know, as
you're recruiting, the power really is in the player's hands
on some of these recruiting things and on others it's
in your hands. But you gotta be cautious that way.
Why is somebody giving me this kid? Why is this
(25:02):
too easy? Why is this player available high school players?
Do you understand? Because presumption is you can't win with youth,
and young players you develop are going to leave and
go elsewhere. The reality is there are some really really
talented twenty four is still out there, and there's some
talented guys in the portal.
Speaker 1 (25:21):
They're in the portal for a myriad of reasons. You know.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
Sometimes it's because the initial ask was too big. Sometimes
it's because the teams that could meet that ask there
wasn't the role that they desired as well. And if
you don't have the role, then this will be the
last time you make any money play basketball. And look, guys,
some guys if people missed on or they're too small,
or they can't go right, or they can't guard anybody,
or they struggle academically or whatever. But I do think
(25:50):
that every piece of advice I've gotten is about being thorough,
and I'm trying to be as thorough as possible, and
being thorough is not usually my strength. All Right, more
to come, I'll give you more insight into what it's
like to coach college basketball. Really soon, but I just
want to make sure people do My thoughts. But the
lake great Bill Well, I'm Doug Gottliet.
Speaker 1 (26:09):
This is all ball
All right, what I welcome in. I'm Doug Gottlieb. This
is all ball.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
We are a week in or slightly over a weekend
my tenures the head headball coach.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
Maybe I should get some HBC hats.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
That'd be cool anyway, to go along with all the
gear I've gotten since I've become the headball coach at
Green Bay. I got lots of kind of interesting nuggets
and tidbits to get to. But I do want to
start this podcast thinking about my childhood friends Adam Walton,
Nate Walton, Chris, and Luke Walton. Not as close with Luke,
(00:44):
I'm not gonna sit here light yet. Chris, known as
Toughy Toughy, obviously played for my brother at San Diego State,
and Nate and I played together some.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
Late into high school.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
And then when we were in college, when he was
at Princeton, I think we played the say No Classic together.
And then of course Adam was my teammate since like
six or seventh.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Grade, and he was just.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Every bit of joy that you felt from Bill Walton.
Like that's truly how Adam always has been. And I
have about five of the best Bill Walton stories ever
in my life. Five of them occupy It's part Bill Walt.
My first Final four, the first Final four was in
nineteen eighty nine. I was thirteen years old and I
(01:32):
went to Seattle with my dad. My brother had gone
several times previously, but I had not, and Adam was
then my teammate, and so we were hanging out together
and my dad got one ticket.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
The way it works with the NABC is if you're
a former coach, you get one ticket.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Dad had one ticket, and what I would what I
would later come to do, I think in the coming years,
would be I sell a ticket and then trade down
to get worse tickets, because his decade was usually not.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
Necessarily court level, but lower level.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
And then I'd go up a level two tickets for
two more and work my way up to the top
of the building and then we get to just to
get the door and then go by the way to
sit down low right.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Old school style.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
But in this particular year, Bill was so appreciative to
my dad that he said.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
Don't worry about it, Bob. They're getting in the game
with me.
Speaker 2 (02:27):
And so we walked in like past the because I
think he was doing some CBS stuff or he's Bill Frickin'
Walton and he let everybody know he's Bill Walton, and
then we just followed him, and I remember they opened
up this curtain because back then he was in the
corner of the Kingdome and there was a big curtain
up and I just remember walking in through TV trucks.
(02:47):
I'd never seen TV trucks before, walking into a dome,
I'd never been into a dome before, and then walking
underneath the stands and then open this curtain and boom,
there's like fifty sixty thousand people. It was insane, but
it was also insane that we just went and he
gave us CBS passes and we had literally sat like.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
Really close.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
I remember we were like standing kind of underneath the
basket during a portion of the game, and we sat
really really close, and anytime somebody had come up and
ask us for our tickets, he would just wave his
hand and say.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
There would be and he would smile.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
And greet him ever and asked them their name, and
next thing, you know, everybody left us alone.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
We watched the games, which are incredible. So that's the first.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
That's my first Final Four is connected with Bill and Adam.
You know, I've I've worked with him so much since,
but I do remember that in one of my first
years at ESPN, we did the ESPN twenty fifth anniversary,
like the launch. Is it twenty years of ESPN Radio
(03:54):
or twenty five years of ESPN, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
There's a party. I think it was twenty five years.
There's a party at the e ESPN Zon.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Hes remember that. ESPN's on New York City and I
was at the time, I was hosting a show called
Game Night with Chuck Wilson. It was six hours a night,
four nights a week, and then Freddie Coleman and John
Cebel did the weekend shows. And I remember starting that night,
it was a it was a big celebration and we
(04:21):
were we got to interview some of the most iconic
figures in sports. We started with the King Richard Petty,
like it was me, Richard Petty, and then the Wizard,
the Wizard of Oz, Ozzie Smith, and.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
Then Chuck Wilson. Like That's how the show started.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
But what I remember distinctly about that night was I
remember I had been at ESPN at this time, probably
like two years or year and a half maybe, and
so I mean I would say I was a guy
sort of on the rise, but people remember me from
college basketball a little bit. But in terms of sports radio,
(05:03):
like there's something to credibility of we have Bill Walton
on and if anybody's ever had him on those when
he goes, there's nothing you can do to stop him.
They'll talk through a break, doesn't even matter. Then he
went on and on and on about my your father Bob,
changed my son's lives at home, and Nate.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
Christopher and Christopher getting to play.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
You know.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
So, uh, it gave me like instant credibility. It was
really cool, really cool.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
And then you know, I host an event for the
Pump Brothers for they do it. They have a cancer
research board in uh in Northridge, California. We had Bill
on one time. I don't remember. It was to honor him.
I think it was to honor him. And when I
say Bill went on and on and on, I'm telling
(05:57):
you what on on on Now. What people don't know
about Bill, and maybe it's been shared a million times over,
is he used to have a stutter. And one of
the devices he had for not stuttering is just continuing
to talk stream of consciousness and he'll tell you what
to tell you, totally tell you, like I apologize. I
just once I get to talking. If I stopped talking, uh,
(06:20):
then then it stops my brain and it doesn't volction.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
Probably that was his either belief or trick. I don't know.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
I've so this is like maybe two years ago we
honored him, and I think he went for like fifteen
twenty minutes, which is really really you know, everybody wants
to her Bill Walton talk, but not for fifteen to
twenty minutes. It was maybe longer.
Speaker 3 (06:42):
It was long.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
And then this year we had him on and we
built in he was introducing somebody.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
Maybe he was the introducing so quokes one year. I
don't so this year we built in a bill buffer
like fifteen to twenty.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
We have no idea how long he's gonna go, and
damn it if he didn't go for like two minutes
and then was done and it was perfect. And I
think Parvar was he knew that the year before he
went away too long, way too long, and because of it,
he like adjusted without us ever having to say anything.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
And it's a it's a it's kind of a great.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
Little I don't know, learning experiment for somebody like myself
in that you got to read the room and understand
that sometimes you may go a little too long or
say something you should say. You gotta sometimes make that
adjustment by yourself, and he did. Bill was a He's
an interesting cat man, interesting cat. First time I met
(07:45):
Bill Will we took Adam home from a game his u.
Bill's first wife, Susie is awesome. It's just really cool,
and they were really good friends. It was like that
was actually, I think my first divorced friend. Yeah, I
think they're my first divorced friend. I was thirteen twelve,
(08:08):
maybe only men, and.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
I remember one time.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
You know, what we would do is my dad would
drive down to like San Clemente, which was like thirty
minutes to the south. It was like thirty five forty
minutes north of where Susie lived, and we'd meet pick
up at him and then play basketball and then bring
him back. So one time Susie couldn't pick us up,
so we took him to Bill's house which was in
(08:34):
San Diego, and we went in and I'll never forget that.
We go in the backyard and there's a tep and
that fucker is sleeping in the TP. It was just nothing,
says Bill Walton Moore, than beautiful house like Nice's house
I'd ever been in to that point in my life.
And he's sleeping in a fucking TP in the back.
(08:58):
So it's sad. I mean, anyone in this day and
age is too sid He died a day after the
last kind of official PAC twelve game or PAC ten game,
with the year Zono win Conference of champions. Yeah, that's
that's more than just a little bit ironic, isn't it.
I truly enjoyed working with him with Westwood One. He
(09:21):
was just awesome to me. I knew he was sick
only because this year he could go to the final
four four West with one. He always hopped out with
us and wax poetic for a couple minutes. He's in
any conversation of the biggest player college basketball, and you
know he probably would have been a discussion with NBA basketball. Look,
(09:42):
got Dominie was in Portland. Here's the big Red band.
That's a life well lives.
Speaker 4 (09:49):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at foxsports Radio
dot com and within the iHeartRadio app search FSR to and.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Lie, Okay, let me catch you up on what's what
it's like to put together in college basketball for so,
let me just kind of walk you through some stuff
which are cool and part of this look selfishly, I'm
gonna use this and here market is almost my audio
audio blog, you know, or audio flaw No, yeah, audio
(10:23):
flog because it has video two.
Speaker 3 (10:25):
This is my diary.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
I've had several people tell me, hey, you should really
really keep copious notes, You should keep a journal. I
have one and I'm keeping you and this will be
my kind of audio turn. So obviously we all know
NCAA rules. I can't talk about prospects, but I can
talk about dudes that I got that are that that
(10:49):
are going to play for me. They never went in
the portal, so that's kind of the way it goes.
This has been an unbelievable whirlwind, So I'll give you
kind of how crazy this shit.
Speaker 3 (11:01):
Is when you make an announcement.
Speaker 2 (11:05):
As much as I knew, I had the job Saturday
night because Sundan's Wicks kind of in dark. On Saturday
he had a recruit on campus, and in addition to
the recruit on campus, he had I think one of.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
His kids three year old birthday party.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
And and I only know this because that's what you know.
We're all honest with each other here, and that's what
was told to me, like, hey, how come we can't
figure out if Sunny's getting this.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
Job or not.
Speaker 3 (11:34):
So by by Saturday night, he.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
Talked to Josh boone is not my boss and said,
you know, he thought it was going to go his way,
but he didn't have a contract. And I wasn't going
to be presented with a contract or at MoU unless
he was. And even then I didn't know for sure
if I was one of one, one of two, one
of three, you know. But you've hand forward from that
(12:01):
to Sunday was Mother's Day, and I still really didn't
have a true answer. But I had started the process
of putting together who do I want players, who do
I want staff?
Speaker 3 (12:14):
When can I get there?
Speaker 2 (12:15):
What's it all look like, what's the money look like,
what's the staff will look like? Is there any are
there any ancillar resources? What's the nil? All these different things?
And you're keeping a written for me. I got to
write it down as much as I can keep everything
up here, you know, And I'm really really good with numbers.
(12:39):
You still you need to have it kind of directed
to you so you know exactly what's going on, and
then you can write it down and then you can
call upon it anytime you need. So I went to
sleep Sunday night. I had this, as I said at
my press conference, that has great talk to my mom
and I remember this was like, I don't know how
(13:00):
many people, how many of you have this, but now
you have those moments in your life where you share
something with your parents. And the last time I had
one of these moments was in twenty twelve, So twelve
years ago. I remember sitting on my stairs at my
house and I was like, front up, Yeah, I was
(13:21):
front porch in Canton, Connecticut talking to my dad about
leaving ESPN to go to CBS.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
My dad said, you know, just atch a mistike. I
don't even know CBS had a cable network. I didn't
even know.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
And I said that that the bigger play here is
I'm going to get to do the Final four. I've
always want to do the Final Four. It's like, you know,
when you do the Final Four, everybody watches ESPN up
until the game, and then they watched it.
Speaker 3 (13:44):
I was like, I don't know if that's truly the case.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
So I talked to my dad and then I basically
told him this is what I was going to do,
and I thought it was the right thing for my career.
And there's a good portion of him that it was
right because and he didn't say it this way, but
I was very happy, and you know, fuck with happy.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
But there's also a.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
Good portion of what I believed to be right, which
was I got to move to California, got a chance
to have a better relationship with them, and I also
got to the phone four and I remember my dad
texting me during it wasn't even during the NCAA tournament,
was leading up to the NCAA tournament, and that was
on a Saturday, and I was on and he's like,
(14:26):
you were right, this is a way bigger platform.
Speaker 3 (14:29):
So there's something about your gut instincts.
Speaker 2 (14:32):
I also knew, though that California is hard to raise kids.
Speaker 3 (14:38):
I think it'd be hard.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
In relationships, but there is something to telling your parents
about this life change you're going to make, because they've
known you longer than anybody. So Sunday I talked to
my mom and she was yellt emotional for a second,
so that I were talking about my dad, the fact
that now I'm coaching in Wisconsin, where he last had
a head coach job, how much she loved living here
(15:01):
when she was in Wisconsin, the people He's to the
pace of living, the whole.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
Thing, and.
Speaker 2 (15:09):
It just felt like this was something really special. And
I'm a realist, you know, I am a dreamer. I
am a romantic. I believe in the good people. I
think that most anybody, obviously outside of like murderers, try
and save them. I don't know what my true limit
(15:30):
would be in terms of broadcasting, but I've done so
many different things. And I remember this year I was
doing Duke Carolina for Compass Media, So I was doing
the radio call of Duke Carolina and I remember walking
around Cameron that day and I started kind of doing
a mental checklist of all the things I've done in broadcasting,
(15:55):
you know, climbing my way up the ladder at ESPN
to ultimately being on Bracketology, with which at the time
was there, you know, their biggest show. Granted I never
got on college game Day there, which is one of
the reasons frankly, that I left. You know, I wanted
to be on their biggest show. If not, I'll go
be on CBS's big show. But you know, in broadcasting,
(16:15):
I I mean all the shows I did on ESPN,
starting in Wisconsin with the great outdoor games, all the
college basketball. I got to do cole Pizza back when
was cold pizza, before it was first to ten, before
it was first take, and I got to do all
of those differents. I remember doing Sports Center post game
(16:37):
after Duke Carolina and I was doing it with Scott
Van Pelt and the Lake great Stewart Scott.
Speaker 3 (16:43):
These were just like seminal moments.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
You like my blazer slash jersey was retired on Sports Nation,
as I was the number one Phillip be Cowhard, probably
James Harden and of course Beats. I think of all
these things that I got to do. Then I go
to CBS, I do the Final Four. I get to
do my own TV show along with Ali LaForce.
Speaker 3 (17:06):
Who's just amazing.
Speaker 2 (17:09):
We got I finally started going to Super Bowls doing shows.
Speaker 3 (17:14):
And I'll give you a little.
Speaker 2 (17:17):
This is gonna stroke my egos so but I think
it will help explain why I don't think I know
I can do the radio show this pod and be
the head coach of green Back. When I was at CBS,
my radio show was on TV CBS Coorts Network and
(17:40):
Adam klub was my producer and Klueger shout out to
you if you're listening. He was awesome and he was
constantly working to go and get guests. I mean, you're
at the Super Bowl and you're, for example, in San
Francisco and you're going from Tony Romo to adjacent to
to Ryan Reynolds, you know, to Phil Simms Montana. You know,
(18:01):
you have to be able to mentally pivot from one
interview to the next. Remember, so here's here's how it works.
In live radio Ontellivision, Adam Coogan and I had a
two man operation. Yes, we had producers and for TV
we had directors, but we did not have runners to
(18:22):
go and grab guests. We did not have people to
help us show prep. I don't have anybody write my questions.
We just do it all ourselves. And the mental dexterity
it takes to pull that off and have really good conversations,
which translates to interviews. And by the way, you got
to keep everybody happy and let them do their plug
(18:43):
and oh yeah, by the way, you have your own
reads to do that kind of mental dexterity, I think
is fairly rare, and I know I can do it.
Speaker 3 (18:52):
I pull it off. I've done it before, but there's
always gonna be questions about it. And I credit Josh Boone.
He understands that. He gets it. We talked enough about it.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
He doesn't really have any any misgivings about it anyway.
So I wake up Monday morning to a phone call
from Josh. Josh is now my boss, and he knows
I'm an early riser, but this one's about you me
get woken up like ten twenty minutes before you're supposed
(19:21):
to get woken up, and you're like, oh my god,
I am so much more tired than I was for it.
It's so I'm shaking the cob webs. Five forty one
in the morning. He says, Okay, I'm ready to officially
offer you the head coach job for the Phoenix, And
of course I said something smart ass, which was are
(19:44):
you offering me a first impression rose or is this
the final rose? He's like, this is the final rose.
So I accepted that rose and say, grayssure to the head.
Speaker 3 (19:57):
Coach that cool feeling.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
Then I recorded a couple of interviews, five or six
important calls, and we were planning on dropping podcasts at
the same time that we made the announcement, and Jeff Goodman,
who I'd given the story to, was holding it back,
holding it back, and then you know Norlander, who was
very good cats and who else? John Rosstein breathing down
(20:22):
my neck wasn't until Tuesday was actually off for the job,
so I signed an MoU on Monday. I basically agreed
to the basic premise of its Sunday, but then when
I looked at the MoU, we made a couple of
just a couple of adjustments to it, nothing crazy, and
by Monday we agreed to those terms. Tuesday morning, I
was off of the job. So all of those people
(20:44):
are breathing down my neck. We decided to go with
it an hour early. But I didn't want to communicate
to the players that I was their new head coach
until it was announced, so I did a video on
a group text that they can all read, and then
promising them to touch base with all of them.
Speaker 3 (21:05):
My radio show got done at two.
Speaker 2 (21:07):
My flight was leaving it three twenty five, I picked
up my new suit, got out the airport, and I
flew out. I think I may have miscounted in terms
of underselling it because I was still on that first
Southwest flight to Phoenix. I was texting as they would
(21:27):
come in, thank you and whatever. But I had like
twenty seven Hondred text messages over three days. It was
like twenty seven our new ones like that. Just conversations
that was nuts. And if you're listening to this in
your a basketball coach, you know what that means. When
somebody gets a job, especially this late cycle, everybody's got
a player. Any coach that doesn't have a job once
(21:48):
get picked up, I get it. And I've tried to
talk to everybody, communicate with everybody, and it just takes time.
Speaker 3 (21:56):
So I landed in.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
Milwaukee at eleven, I got my rental card, drove up,
shut it down at two during in the morning, and
then I was up at six the next morning, started
doing interviews. Don all prepared, Shaye put out my suit,
went over and with my president, Michael Alexander, as well
as Josh Moon and a whole bunch of other Then
(22:17):
I did Dan Patrick, a couple other shows, go out
into the press conference, meet with the players, and then
set up a meeting with one of the parents one
of the players. And that was an all timer. Meanwhile,
the phone still buzzing, bringing off the hook.
Speaker 3 (22:33):
Did my radio show.
Speaker 2 (22:35):
So in the first week, what have we accomplished. Well,
we've returned most all the text passages of the returning
potential returning eight players, five have recommitted, three are in
the portal.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
We have taken one to.
Speaker 2 (23:00):
Commitments to date, and I hired two assistant coaches. Jordan
McCabe was coming to Green Bay anyway, actually encourage him
to take the job with Sonny had only been on
the job like a week before Sunny left.
Speaker 3 (23:14):
We've actually put.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
Him out in the road recruiting and we're gonna fill
out the staff as we go. And every coach I've
talked to you said, hey, take your time. Everybody's gonna
rush you to do it right away. You wanna put
together staff that works. You want to put together a
team that works. So that's what I'm doing. So that
was the announcement was Wednesday.
Speaker 3 (23:32):
That was just a blur.
Speaker 2 (23:34):
On Wednesday night, we went to dinner in a place
called Shipes and I met with a donor along with Josh,
you know, and I had like half class of wine,
made ten phone calls, phone was on fire, just no
time to catch my breath as a person, went back,
laid it down, got up, did it again. And then Thursday,
(23:58):
shout out to Sunny, you got a brand new out
the office sexual really comfortable. I slept on that sucker
Thursday night and I think I knocked out like four
hundred returning four hundred text messes, called a bunch of coaches,
some for players, watched a bunch of Bill and then Friday,
(24:18):
I wanted to go to ny to La, which is
a big event, but I also wanted to see my players,
one who was in the portal, actually twur of the portal,
and a couple others that were not, so I went
kind of down the state that way. Now we're at
day ten and we're moving and shaking. But it has
(24:40):
been thrilling, rewarding, tiring, sure, but it is starting to
come together. You do learn that some you know, as
you're recruiting, the power really is in the player's hands
on some of these recruiting things and on others it's
in your hands. But you gotta be cautious that way.
Why is somebody giving me this kid? Why is this
(25:02):
too easy? Why is this player available high school players?
Do you understand? Because presumption is you can't win with youth,
and young players you develop are going to leave and
go elsewhere. The reality is there are some really really
talented twenty four is still out there, and there's some
talented guys in the portal.
Speaker 1 (25:21):
They're in the portal for a myriad of reasons. You know.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
Sometimes it's because the initial ask was too big. Sometimes
it's because the teams that could meet that ask there
wasn't the role that they desired as well. And if
you don't have the role, then this will be the
last time you make any money play basketball. And look, guys,
some guys if people missed on or they're too small,
or they can't go right, or they can't guard anybody,
or they struggle academically or whatever. But I do think
(25:50):
that every piece of advice I've gotten is about being thorough,
and I'm trying to be as thorough as possible, and
being thorough is not usually my strength. All Right, more
to come, I'll give you more insight into what it's
like to coach college basketball. Really soon, but I just
want to make sure people do My thoughts. But the
lake great Bill Well, I'm Doug Gottliet.
Speaker 1 (26:09):
This is all ball
Host
Doug Gottlieb
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