Ep 16: The Politics of Creating Your Own Lane - Featuring Josiah Johnson - Spolitics

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, what's up everybody.

Speaker 2 (00:01):
I'm Jamel Hill and welcome to politics and I heard
podcasts and unbothered production.

Speaker 1 (00:07):
Time to get spolitical.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
It's Black History Month, and since there seems to be
a concerted effort to just erase the presence of black folks,
not just in February, but all year long, it's important
to share those stories they are determined to bury. So
for the rest of this month, I want to share
some of these stories here on Politics, especially those that
aren't known as much. And on this episode, I want
to share the story of track and field sensation Rose Robinson,

(00:40):
who carries a very important distinction in sports history. Robinson
is believed to be the first black athlete who refused
to stand for the national anthem to protest against racial injustice,
which she did during the opening ceremonies of the nineteen
fifty nine Pan American Games. Now, before I get into
what compelled Robinson to take a stand, and then, let

(01:01):
me explain some of her backstory, because then you will
understand why her decision to stay seated during the national
anthem was completely on brand. Rose Robinson was born in
nineteen twenty five.

Speaker 1 (01:12):
She was a.

Speaker 2 (01:12):
Gifted track athlete, and her specialty was high jumped. In
her twenties, Robinson became deeply involved in the movement. She
led a small chapter of the Congress of Racial Equality
organization while she worked as a social worker at a
Cleveland community center. Now, Robinson organized and led a protest
against a segregated skating rate. Not only did she lead

(01:33):
this skate in, but she also defied the segregation rules
and skated at the rink anyway. The white patrons were
so angry at Robinson they tried to trip her as
she skated, and unfortunately they were successful. Robinson suffered a
broken arm. Now, while all of this was going on,
Robinson still continued to show her prowess in track and field.

(01:53):
When she returned to Chicago in the late nineteen fifties,
she was an accomplished high jumper, and in nineteen fifty
eight she won high jump at the National AAU Championship,
earning a spot on the US women's track and field team,
which was mostly black. Now, shortly after receiving that honor,
Rose was invited to compete in Russia at a State
Department track event. Now, this was during the height of

(02:14):
the Cold War and the purpose of the event was
to use black athletes to promote America's foreign policy agenda overseas.

Speaker 1 (02:21):
Now the United.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
States government they often used the presence of black athletes
and entertainers to shield themselves from criticism for terrorizing black
folks under Jim Crow on their own soil. Now, as
you can see, the recipe for black obedience hasn't changed,
has it. But Rose Robinson wasn't having it. She told
Jet magazine. I don't want anyone to think my athletics

(02:43):
have political connotations. In other words, I don't want to
be used as a political pawn.

Speaker 1 (02:48):
Now.

Speaker 2 (02:48):
As you might imagine, that did not sit well with
Track officials nor the US government. A year later, after
standing ten toes down about not going to Russia, she
was competing in the Panamas in Chicago, and when the
national anthem played during the opening ceremonies, Robinson stayed seated
as if to say, oh nah, y'all got it. As

(03:09):
you might imagine, Robinson was vilified. Six months after she
sat during the anthem to protest the treatment of her people.
The United States government arrested her for tax evasion because
she owed three hundred and eighty six dollars Robinson told
Jet magazine she didn't.

Speaker 1 (03:24):
Pay taxes from nineteen fifty four to nineteen.

Speaker 2 (03:26):
Fifty eight because, as she put it, I know a
large part of it goes to armaments. The US government
is very active in Adam Bomb's and fallout, which is
destructive rather than constructive. If I pay income tax, I
am participating in that destruction.

Speaker 3 (03:40):
Ooop.

Speaker 1 (03:41):
Robinson was sentenced to a year and a day in jail.

Speaker 2 (03:44):
The day she was sentenced, authorities had to carry her
out of the courtroom because she refused to walk. She
literally made them carry her to jail. But Robinson wasn't
done expressing her descent. While in jail, Robinson went on
a hunger strike that generated a ton of media attention,
hundreds of letters of support, and even protesters who demonstrated

(04:05):
outside the courthouse. Robinson was so fril from the hunger
strike that she was force fed intraveniously the resistance, though
it paid off. After three months of being on a
hunger strike, she was released. Now do y'all think she
paid that three hundred and eighty six dollars. Here's a hint,
hell naw. Her stin in prison essentially ended her athletic career. Physically,

(04:26):
she was unable to compete, and at that point she
had burned so many bridges in the sports world. After
being released, Robinson continued, though, to resist and protest while
also creating change. Robinson linked up with a group called
the Peacemakers. Her and two other organizers were traveling to
Maryland and attempted to eat at a segregated restaurant. Robinson
and her friends refused to leave. They were then arrested,

(04:49):
but they refused to appear in court, and they refused
to eat while in jail. They eventually wore the authorities
down and were given fifty dollar finds and released. Y'all
know she didn't pay that fifty dollars five right, but
their defiance sparked the local movement to end segregation and
restaurants in Maryland and now. As you can see from
Robinson's life, track and field was something she did and

(05:09):
something she excelled at, but it did not define who
she was. She used her platform as a tool, and
even when she no longer had track and Field to amplify.

Speaker 1 (05:18):
Her message, she never abandoned what was important.

Speaker 2 (05:22):
Robinson died in nineteen seventy six at just fifty two
years old. I'm hoping she never paid the FEDS a
dime the rest of her life. I'm Jamelle Hill and
I approved this message. Now I'm very excited about today's episode.
My guest today has a very unique and organic brand
in the social media space. He is known as the
meme King, the King of NBA Twitter, but I think

(05:44):
of him as someone who is proof that the best
way to build a great brand is to try to
not build the brand, just be authentic. He's got a
huge social media following, and his well timed memes have
been applauded by the likes of Lebron James and Keegan,
Michael Key and legions of NBA fans. Currently, he is
host of Gil's Arena, which stars Gilbert Arenas and Rashad
McCants and a rotating group of NBA and WNBA players

(06:07):
of the Cheryl Swoops, Kenyon Martin, Brandon Jennings, Lexi Brown,
and Nick Young. But despite all of his success, my
guess is just a regular down earth dude.

Speaker 1 (06:16):
Coming up next on his politics Josiah Johnson.

Speaker 2 (06:27):
All right, Josiah, I want to start this podcast by
asking you a question. I ask every guest who appears
on politics and that is name an athlete or a
moment that made.

Speaker 3 (06:36):
You love sports athlete or moment made me love sports. Ooh,
I'm gonna go. It's a good question. There's so many
kind of think moment athlete. I'm gonna go. I'm gonna
go off off the beaten path a little bit. I'm
gonna go ed Obannon, UCLA. So I was a ball

(06:56):
boy ULA for the ninety four to ninety five year,
last time you say basketball, the national championship. A lot
of time. My older brother Chris was on the team,
so I got to spend a lot of time with
the crew, you know, pregame, rebound and form working with him.
So the Seattle band in that season, and a lot
of people know ed from his NCAA lawsuit and all
the things he's done in the aftermath for player likeness
and nil and all the stuff that you see now.

(07:16):
But to see ed that last year, no history, everything
he had been through him leading that team to a
national championship and ultimately sacrificing the rest of his career.
He had bad knees, so he was counting in his
knee drain in that year doing a bunch of stuff,
but just to see him as a leader and what
he was able to do with that squad me as
like a young, impressionable kid, almost almost a teenager. So
I say that moment in my my, you know, kind

(07:39):
of teen life and before that, younger than that, probably
just Magic Johnson. Honestly growing up in Los Angeles, seeing
Magic this larger than life figure but always approachable, just
a really great dude, and everything he had dealt with
at that time, you know, nineteen ninety one. I think
everybody remembers the announcement, kind of all the uncertainty around,
you know, his health status, his future and what he
was going to be. But to see Magic still here,

(08:00):
healthier than the most of most of us, you know,
just to see that it's another dude. But showtime Lakers air.
My dad played for the Clippers, so we kind of
were in the shadow of the Lakers. I was forced
to be a Clippers fan growing up.

Speaker 1 (08:11):
Forced.

Speaker 3 (08:12):
Yeah, I didn't know any better. But slowly, but surely,
as a kid, you start to realize, like, wait a minute,
like sports arena is always empty, ain't nothing really going on?
And you got all this other stuff going on. I
grew up near Englewood. So everything that the Lakers impact
that they had, So I say magic in my early
life and uh ed O'Bannon for kind of my preteens
in or my teenage.

Speaker 2 (08:30):
Yeah, that team, because I'm of a certain age, I
remember them vividly. Tias Adney trying to think of the guard,
the freshman, light skinned cat, Toby Baana, Toby Bailey. Obviously
the old Bannon is like that was a really really
special team, you know, as somebody who grew up here
in LA And for those who don't know, your father's

(08:51):
Marcus Johnson what five time NBA Also, yeah, you know
I know.

Speaker 1 (08:56):
Him beyond just raiment from White me and cajup.

Speaker 3 (08:58):
But you're a professional, so already know you did your to.

Speaker 1 (09:01):
Do a little digging.

Speaker 2 (09:02):
But I mean I knew who he was, you know,
before then, and he is legitimately considered one of the
best hoopers to ever come out of this area. You know,
you played ball yourself, you went to UCLA, you came up.

Speaker 1 (09:15):
You had your own hoops journey.

Speaker 2 (09:17):
Your father being such a big star around here, how
did his accomplishments kind of impact how your basketball career
was seen?

Speaker 3 (09:26):
So I've got a bunch of brothers, and uh, you know,
we all tell the story for a long long time
in my life. People don't know me as Josiah. It
was either little Marcus, you know, or little Chris, who
was my older brother. They both played at Crenshall High
School one city championships. I want to say with the
first father and son in LA to be able to
do that, so you kind of see it. But I
was super young for the beginning of his career. He

(09:47):
had a tragic neck injury I believe nineteen eighty five
eighty six. I was probably like three or four years old.
Remember the game Noise playing against the Dallas Maths, and
I remember he just didn't come home that night, and
we were at the game. Everybody's kind of down, Distras said.
And then for the next couple of years neck brace.
He ended up, you know, messing up a lot of
stuff in his vertebrae, was almost paralyzed, ended up battling

(10:07):
through that. So the first real experience that I got
to see with him in his pro career. He got
a brief stint in Golden State with the Warriors in
the nineteen eighty nine ninety season. This was right around
the TMC time. So I want to say like Tim
Hardaway was the second year player there, Chris Mullin was there,
Mitch Rickman was there. That was the first time I
really got to be like immersed in NBA culture and world.
And then in the aftermath of that White Man Can

(10:29):
Jump I believe, came out nineteen ninety two ish, So
I was a part of the whole process with him.
From you know, reading lines, I got to see him.
He was a method actor, so he didn't cut his
hair or shaved as he was embodying this Raymond character.
Got to spend a little bit of time on set.
My older brother Chris actually makes cameos in it. A
lot of friends and people that we know, but everywhere
we would go, you would just see the way that

(10:50):
people would treat him and touch the high regard they
would have him been he's coaching my youth league teams
and just you know, other coaches looking over just in awe.
And every time he walked into a gym, this the
whole room just stops and looks at him and all
the love that he would get. So for us, there
was a tremendous amount of pressure to be able to
try to, you know, attain an accomplished status that he
had as a professional athlete. But to his credit, he

(11:10):
was always he just wanted us to all be our
own individuals, you know, work hard and whatever you were
going to do. He never really pushed us towards anything
in particular. It's actually funny. He was so at UCLA.
I think he majored in theater arts, so he used
to do a lot of stuff in that space. So
he would push us a lot towards the entertainment side.
So even as a young kid, I was doing acting
classes and taking summer classes, different things like that. But

(11:31):
he would push us in that. He would come make
cameos in our little you know, third grade, fourth grade
student films and things like that. But he always just
wanted us to be the best human beings we could be.
He pushed us towards basketball. Of course, it was very
tough on us to try to get us to where
we wanted to be, just like his life was to
get where he was. But I think ultimately he start
to get older, you start to realize, I'm probably not

(11:51):
going to get to that level. I'm not gonna you know,
there's only a few that have really been able to
surpass the achievements of their father. You think about like
Steph Curry, people like that. I look at Bronnie now
and it's like, I just imagine the pressure that Broni's
dealing with. And it's no shade to Bronni, but you
are never gonna be as good as your father. And
I think that's what a lot of us have to
come to realize. But again, to my dad's credit, he
never forced us or pushed us or put that pressure

(12:13):
on us. If anything, you try to diffuse that pressure
in that tension and just wanted us to be the
best that we could be at whatever we did.

Speaker 2 (12:18):
When it comes to content creation, you probably, I mean,
you hold a lane that's so unique in sports, and
you obviously you started a lot of trends in sports
just based off how you approach using social media.

Speaker 1 (12:33):
So what title do you prefer?

Speaker 3 (12:35):
Mean?

Speaker 2 (12:35):
King, King of sports Comedy, King of NBA Twitter? Like,
what's your preferred title when it comes to what you do?

Speaker 3 (12:43):
I'm gonna be right hat and all that shit. I
just like Joe Sien, I mean, because I walk you
around places and just so people know the context, my
social media handles King Joe Siah fifty four right a
mirror that after Lebron, who win? It's King James. Like
when I was starting all this stuff, I might let
me just pick a name, didn't really think much of it.
But now when I walk in up, like what's up
King or whatever? I can always tell people like I
know who really knows me who really doesn't, Because people

(13:05):
who really know me will call me joe So joe
yess me my nickname. My mom nicknamed me Joey as
a little kid. So people who really know me, family friends,
like what's up Joey? Like that's how they refer to me.
So anytime I walk in somewhere and people like what's up, King,
I'm like, Okay, this person doesn't really know me. Like
all love and respect, I appreciate it. So all that
stuff is cool. Believe me, I've worked really hard and
it's great to see that people recognize that and appreciate that.

(13:27):
But I'm just a regular dude, Like you know, I
just I pull up, like I try to stay out
the way, I spend time, my family, do what I
gotta do. But to see the success that that stuff
has happened definitely appreciative of it, but I hate title,
so I mean producer, executive producer or whatever. Creator so
many you know hyphens, I guess hyphen in whatever they
call it. Like, I just like to do the work,
grind and see positive results from it.

Speaker 2 (13:49):
Now, in twenty nineteen, I think you had about like
twenty five thousand Twitter followers, and you know, we see
I don't know what's your follower account now, probably about it.

Speaker 3 (13:56):
I're in like the two hundred and sixty five thousand
range or whatever. But every time there's like a big
you know, right around November. There was a huge dip
right around mid January January twenty if I think MLK
Day to be exact, there were some other things going on.
It was a mL I was just trying to celebrate Mlkday,
my my business. Some other things were going on in
the country. So I'll see those kind of shifts in it.

(14:17):
But it's been interesting to see, Like there was a
point where it was just like always on the steady incline,
but around like October twenty twenty two, things kind of
took a turn. I think people can do the matter.

Speaker 1 (14:27):
I think we could connect the dots on that one.

Speaker 2 (14:29):
But Nevertheless, like your tweets, they get insane impressions. I mean,
were they were there maybe a couple of key moments
that you think really exploded or what were those key
moments that allowed you to sort of take that moniker
that you don't particularly like as becoming like the mean king.

Speaker 3 (14:48):
Of the end. So I got to take it back.
So I came up once a. UCLA wasn't that good.
I'll be the first to admit it. I think good
better than ninety nine percent of society. But the reality
road the bench kind of knew that basketball wasn't going
to be a our long term future. So started working
in sports entertainment over Fox Sports, NFL Network. Worked in
NFL Network for a number of years, And while I
was doing that, I started a blog called Jersey Chaser,

(15:09):
and that for me was just like a creative outlet
to get my thoughts out. I think at that time
there was kind of a control and dominance over sports
media landscape where people weren't really respective of athletes and
all the things that they put in to get to
they want to be. Is it was a lot of
people who had never done it before kind of just
given their opinions about the world and about sports culture
and things like that. So did that built that up,

(15:31):
ended up as a result of that, getting a TV
show on Comedy Central called Legend of Chamberlain Heights animated
series that was based on my experience with a couple
of buddies of mine riding the end of the bench
at UCLA. So that I thought, all right, cool, I'm
gonna be We're gonna be the next South Park. You know,
We're gonna be the next Tray, and Matt like, we're
gonna well, you know, I'm gonna be a billionaire all
that stuff. Show ends up getting canceled after two seasons,
and I'm kind of left in limbo, no man's land.

(15:52):
I don't really have anything, you know, as people as yourself.
You know, you work in this entertainment industry. When you hot,
everybody wants to work with you. They love you. When
you're not, the phones call stopped bringing like and you
got to start figuring out life again. So I'm thankful
and blessed to have a lot of different skill sets
and things that I could do. And then I started
just looking at social media. I'm like, well, for me,
I kind of just got depressed after the show ended.

(16:14):
Kind of got tired of dealing with kind of the
corporate entertainment side of things, notes, calls, all that type
of stuff, and I was like, let me just operate
in a vacuum and build this thing up and figure
it out. So I was working at a company and
you know NFL network, different spots, writing articles, doing stuff
on the company computers. You know, bosses would come in.
I have to X out of the screen real quick,

(16:34):
act like I'm doing my NFL stuff. But slowly, but surely,
that stuff started to take off to the point where
my boss's NFL network we'd be talking about articles from
the website I posted under an alias, and I'm just
sitting there cracking up, like they got no idea that
it's me doing this stuff. So that stuff took off,
ended up leading to the show Comedy Central. That show
gets canceled. I start doing social media kind of as
a hobby at that point, like a lot of people,

(16:55):
I'm just like, well, I can get my unfiltered thoughts
out here. I don't have to get anybody's permission or approval.
So it just started doing a lot of stuff in
the meme space. And notice I would watch shows like
Game of Thrones, Insecure, see the communities that were built
around those shows, like had the Isa Hive and the
Lawrence Hive and all that stuff going on, and I'm
just like, this is the future of content. This is
the future of the world. And you know, back in

(17:16):
the days when Legends of Chamber and Heights started, everything
was we're gonna give you some billboards and you're gonna
be in magazines and stuff like that, and I'm just thinking, like,
that's not how people engage or interact with content. I
find out everything. I find out through Twitter, through Instagram,
through social media, and really see people born out of
this thing, kind of non traditional stars, if you will,
that have grown out of this whole world in this
lane where they can control their destiny with what they do.

(17:38):
So I just really started hitting it hard, really started
looking at memes and for me, like growing up playing basketball,
being in locker rooms, like it was always getting the
jokes off, and you had to know pop culture, you
had to know sports culture, you know, you had to
know everything to be able to kind of hold your
own to survivor amongst the sharks in the locker room
where everybody's clowning each other or whatever it may be.
So I use meme culture to really grow, and I
think the first kind of pivotal moment for me, I

(18:00):
won't forget this, Like Antonio Brown had bounced around from
like two or three different teams like the Patriots, the Raiders, whatever,
if you remember those times. So I did a get
Out meme of him seeing Josh Gordon at the Patriots facility,
like I think the Raiders that released him. You know,
he made that video I'm free whatever, run around the house.
So he goes and at that time Belichick coaching the
Patriots the Patriots way, everybody kind of knew what it was.

(18:22):
Josh Gordon had been there for a while. So I
had a scene from get Out, you know when the
main character SE's a keif character at that little like
get together gathering whatever. He tried to tap him up
and gets, you know, he gets the week the handshake.
So I made a video that Jordan Peele ended up
seeing it, and then Jordan Peel idole of Mine had
Key and Peel at Comedy Central at that point. And
I always tell people this story kind of just as

(18:43):
a motivational tool for them, Like me and Jordan Peel
both had a TV show the same network. If I
would have went to my agents, like, yo, can you
give me a meeting with Jordan Peel, they would have
pretended like they were gonna do it. It would have never happened.
You know. We reached out to his team, he wasn't available,
blah blah blah. But through that thing he quotes the
video said you win, Joe Side Like, I made a
t shirt out of it, Like, took a screen grab

(19:04):
of the tweet. Still got the shirt in my closet
at home. You went just so I ended up following me.
We DM back and forth and talked and communicated and connected,
and that was kind of the first real time I
realized that the power that social has. And then obviously
a lot of people now remember like Lebron you know,
calling me the King or whatever it may be. And
I think that was twenty twenty one, if I'm not mistaken.

(19:24):
During the playoffs again, similar situation. I think the Nets
are playing in the playoffs. Bruce Brown kind of took
some crazy shots, so I throw up a Harlem Knights video,
you know, stop shooting that little shit, you know, But
just as a kid growing up, I would see all
this stuff and it just I was I loved entertainment.
I love media, love content. So that then getting like
the co sign from Lebron at that point like really

(19:46):
kind of put me on the map. But it's playing
like before that atter he created a TV show for
Comedy Central and done a bunch of stuff. So people
will look at that and be like, oh, that's when
you really got put on like not been doing it,
but that was like, all right, I'm here now. It
really just showed me social the ability that it has
to help elevate and grow you as a human being
in your personal life, your career and as you know now,

(20:07):
like you can't really walk in the door of a
network or whatever. First thing they're looking at is you're
following what kind of engagement you have and how you
can move the needle and culture without having to rely
on what, you know, whatever resources they have, Like can
you build this up yourself? Can you really go out
and do it? So I'd say the Jordan Peel moment
really kind of showed me all right, I can do this,
Like wow, like this is like I can really like

(20:29):
somebody I idolize and you know has a similar kind
of trajectory and stories me get their attention, and then
the Lebron thing was like, all right, now I'm gonna
go just all in on this. And this is during
the tail end of the pandemic. We all still are
kind of just reeling from that, figuring out what life
is and trying to get back to it. But in
that pandemic moment, I really was like, I'm just gonna
hit it with this. This is the one thing I

(20:49):
can do that nobody else can control. And now I'm
seeing a ton of success from it. And it's funny.
The same people who you know, I'm not gonna say
I left Comedy Central on the best terms, but those
same people now see me like, oh man, we always
believe that you know you can do it, And I'm like,
you would have used me as a cautionary tale if
you could. You would have been like, see what happens
when you act up? See what happens when you you know,
you talk back or you try to nah. This is

(21:10):
so I just kind of laugh at all that now,
but it's it's given me a sense of humility and
made me super humble and everything I do. So when
you asked earlier, like what do you like to be called? Like,
just call me Josiah, Like I don't. I don't roll
in like I'm the king of social media. Like that's
just you know, can you. I'm just saying, like I
see so many people that do that. I think it's
like an insecurity they have and just not believing in
their achievements. I roll in T shirts short, it's like

(21:31):
in some chucks. That's that, you know, anywhere you see me,
That's what I'm gonna be rocking.

Speaker 2 (21:35):
Now, what's your process for like sort of finding the
perfect meme?

Speaker 3 (21:39):
I have so much stuff just sitting in my head,
and just like I'll randomly quote.

Speaker 1 (21:42):
Stuff as I'm like drafts like ooh.

Speaker 3 (21:45):
So I'll normally like I'm so basic and I'm looking
at like AI and all this stuff now and I'm
just like, I know I'm gonna be phased out soon
because I just can't get down like Gronck and all
this other stuff. I just I see Chad GPT and
I'm just like, nah, I just have it in my brain.
So when I see things happen, like I'll see in
like mean form and it's like it might be a
moment in a game or whatever it is, I'm like, oh,
that reminds me of don't be a minute. So that

(22:06):
reminds me of you know, I'm really heavy in my era,
like John Singleton films, obviously the Wayne's family. I actually
went to junior high school with Damon Wayne's junior so
living color a era, all that stuff like that's what
I grew up on. So all that stuff just like
festering on my brain, those memories, and for me, it's
like just to stay connected to that material, stay connected
to that time in my life. But I tell people like,

(22:28):
I didn't grow up in the SpongeBob era, So y'all
got all the SpongeBob stuff y'all got, That's not my lane, like,
and I'll never always gonna be true to myself. But
everything that is from my era, like that nineties, early
two thousands, all those experiences, I just see stuff and
it's like, all this reminds me of this or that,
and I'll quickly just try to get it up. And
you know, like you said, a lot of people now
have gravitated toward this space. A lot of them haven't

(22:49):
paid their dues or you know, paid their tithes. As
I like to say, and they just try to kind
of mirror and copy it, but there's always a secret
sauce to it. I think a lot of people just
don't grasp in terms of how to connect with people
and how to get it in that right moment, in
the exact time and the caption, the wording and everything,
the exact clip, when to get in on the clip,
when to get out on the clip. So much that
goes into it that I think people don't really appreciate

(23:10):
that they think they can replicate, and it's just funny
to see kind of I'm gonna call them copycats because
I appreciate you know, it's very flattering, but it's also
like nothing makes me matter when somebody tried to do
it and they do it wrong, and I'm like, you
could just like you're trying to copy the sauce and
you just don't want it. Left it, leave it alone
or ask me ask for missould be like hey, cause
people know, like I'm always like I embrace everybody, like yo,

(23:31):
should I do it like this? That whatever? And it's funny.
I got a lot of people that we know they'll
see them do sof sometimes I'm like, just do it
like that? You know, I'll just hit him in the
DM like you almost had it, but just do it
like that. They go do it and it goes viral
and it's like, oh man, you know, so I'm gonna
say I'm ghost writing, but it just irks me when
I see some shit and I'm like, yo, if you
just did that, it would have been perfect. Like, so
it is what it is.

Speaker 2 (23:50):
Well, we know, one of the conversations that we constantly have,
especially around content creation, and you know you're a perfect
example of this, is that notice how these team Twitter
accounts are the language that you use now and they're
doing what you're doing right or trying to.

Speaker 1 (24:07):
Some of them make very bad attempts.

Speaker 2 (24:09):
For black creators, that has been a sore spot is that,
you know, taking your genius, taking your excellence, and then
trying to copy it and doing it worse.

Speaker 1 (24:19):
You know, like what's your perspective on that?

Speaker 2 (24:21):
And the fact that, like we often see how the
culture is like sort of robbed in this way.

Speaker 3 (24:26):
So I'm gonna take you back twenty twenty George Floyd
situation goes down and I'm working a lot in Hollywood
at that time, and I had a lot of what
I call the George Floyd General Meetings, where at that point,
people kind of finally realize like, damn, this is really
fucked up, like we're not giving black creators, black culture
this opportunity and kind of did these performative meetings where
it's like we really want to hear your thoughts and

(24:48):
we believe in you and we want to you know,
and I realized, like, damn, I'm a lot of white
people's only black friend, like a lot of white people's industry,
Like I'm really your only black friend. So I kind
of I want to say I've lost my mind at
that point, but really just got disappointed, like grew my
hair out, didn't shave for a long time. So I
would take these meetings probably looking like my dad is
Raymond and white make can jump, just looking crazy because
like I don't believe any of this shit. And then

(25:09):
there was a point too where you had all these
social teams and they would post pictures of their whole team.

Speaker 2 (25:14):
Man, and I'm just looking like I hear everybody white.

Speaker 3 (25:17):
And like I'll hear the way you guys talk, and
then I see you in real life and you don't
talk the way that you talk in real life, Like,
if there's one thing about me, I'm gonna be consistent,
Like the way I speak on social is the way
I'm gonna speak when you see me. So it felt like, again,
you were kind of just robbing and taking the culture.
And that's like a sad thing. And even I don't
use TikTok, but you see the world where you know,

(25:38):
there was a couple of years ago where a couple
of black creators came up with dances and we're doing stuff.
Then you look at All Star Weekend, they got the
white creators kind of doing it off beat and not
hitting it like they need to. And then eventually they
kind of obviously repaired that brought the black creatives black
dancers in to kind of come do it correctly. But
you just see how people and this isn't anything new, right,
they've they've eaten off this culture, benefited from it, and

(26:00):
again not put anything back in the offering plate. And yes,
black culture is amazing, like and I'm not mad that
people want to do that, Like who wouldn't want to
see that and want to be like it? But it
also comes to point too where you can't be tone
deaf with it, right, you've got to be respectful. You've
got to give these people, especially with everything going now
in the world. And we talk about merit base, well,
you know, that's a term I don't really get down

(26:20):
with because we've seen what it is in real life.
We've seen if two candidates have the same exact resume,
if one's name is hard to pronounce, they're probably not
going to get that gig. If one person looks like
somebody else, they look like the person hiring they they're
more likely going to get that gig. So I think,
you know, we talk about the need for diversity, but
it's not diversity like we want handouts, Like we just
want acknowledgement and recognition for the things that we're doing.

(26:42):
And I should see so many creators that I knew
and respected that will blatantly just get their content jacked
by these big accounts. And we've seen it, entertainment accounts,
gambling accounts, all these type of things that try and
talk like the culture and then you look at their
you know, social media director and this person and that person,
and I'm like, you were a square. You are not
like you don't speak like this. So and the fact

(27:04):
that you're doing this putting on digital black face, Like
that's something I really should just feel disrespected by, but
also like we just got to continue grinding, do what
we got to do to get to where we need
to be and hopefully to get some more equity in
these spaces.

Speaker 2 (27:17):
You know you're for rating and entertainment, I guess for
people who know a little bit about your background, and
it is really not that surprising I read this about you,
the fact that you sort of grew up being exposed
to like the different world said, and really kind of
early on getting exposed to entertainment. What did those early experiences,
how did that shape how you felt your place in

(27:39):
the industry would be.

Speaker 3 (27:41):
So there's one major or moment or series of moments.
So my dad played for the Clippers, his teammate Norm Nixon,
Norm married to Debbie Allen, Debbie the show runner. A
different world at that point, so very close family friends.
My mom used to be an extra on a Different World.
So she's in a like the Patti LaBelle Christmas episode,
but so missus, I would always, you know, make my

(28:01):
mom featured in these things. And there's points she's like
pregnant with one of my little brothers, in these things,
different stages of her life, but she's always popping up
in the background. So as kids, I went to the
same elementary school as Norman Debbie's kids, so we would
get picked up and then we would get taken over
to the studio, like on Thursday, Friday. I forget whatevery
day they taped. So I would spend a good portion
of my life just watching this show. And I think

(28:22):
not really appreciating at that point in my younger life
because at that point, you had the Cops Show, you
had a different world. You had all these shows that
were dominating network television, and me just thinking that was normal, right,
not realizing now that that was not saying anomaly, but
that was it.

Speaker 2 (28:36):
Maybe not for La, you know, I lit most of
us growing up to watch a different world.

Speaker 1 (28:41):
We couldn't imagine a life, but we would actually be on.

Speaker 3 (28:43):
Set watching the HBCU and I'm just like, oh, this
is normal, And then you get older you kind of
realize what it is. But to see the way that
Debbie Allen, you know, she would be the voice of God.
She'd be in the control room, but you'd have the
studio audience there and she's just voice of godding onto
the set town everybody where they need to be, in
places in boot Boom and just doing all that stuff
and just seeing her in the regular life, you know,
and they kind of realizing how incredible and amazing entertainer

(29:06):
and all her achievements, but getting to spend time on
those sets, and also learning too that a lot of
people just watch these shows and I don't think they
realized the time, energy effort that goes into actually making
these things, the hours that you spend doing it. So
I remember, you know, vividly the wedding episode where obviously
Welly's supposed to marry you know, Senator, if I'm not mistaken,
and obviously Dwayne Wayne comes in and so I've seen that.

Speaker 1 (29:30):
You saw, you saw them actually do it?

Speaker 3 (29:31):
Oh wow, eight weeks, you know, three months for the
episode came out, just because they would let me. Because
I was with her, I kind of got a little
bit more cart blanche to kind of just roll around.
I would get bush at and cussed out by you know,
people in the crew at times, like what you're doing
over here or whatever. But you know, so I'd pick
up scripts, read and kind of you know, watch along
with all the with all the stuff that was going on.

(29:53):
But I would know eight twelve weeks in advance what
was going on on these shows, just because my mom
was an extra. And if you watch that episode my
dad as a part of like the grooms Men, like
my mom's extra in there, like oh that's right, so
you see him roll off like it's like so my
dad kind of chunky at that point, got the beer.
But so we were all just like immersing that world.
And like I said, white Man Can't Jump. And Dad

(30:15):
did a bunch of cameos on La Law on Simbad Show.
So I used to go there and hang out on
set with like a young Ray J who was on
Simbad Show and just watch all these things get made
and created. So I always had an affinity for that world,
and then obviously as I got older in life, got
to actually do it, but really appreciate what went into
making that kind of just understanding that that really kind
of guided the culture. And now that I take a

(30:38):
step back and look at it, it's like wow, Like
you know, I got to really hang out with Debbie Allen,
just know her as a regular see her in her
regular life at birthday parties and school events and things,
and then see her as a showrunner of one of
the greatest television shows I feel like in history.

Speaker 1 (30:51):
So it holds up incredibly well.

Speaker 2 (30:53):
I still watch it whenever I can, at least multiple
times a week, and it's amazing to me.

Speaker 1 (30:58):
Just again, I will the best age.

Speaker 2 (31:00):
You are so versatile in so many things that you
do a lot more I definitely want to get to
you with and also some NBA stuff I want to
ask you about.

Speaker 1 (31:08):
But you know, we're going to talk about gils Arena
as well, because y'all be on there fooling. But we're
going to take a quick break.

Speaker 2 (31:14):
We'll be back with more with the Josiah Johnson who
never call him the king when you see him ouern
public back in the moment.

Speaker 1 (31:31):
So, as I mentioned before the break, you're very versatile.

Speaker 2 (31:34):
And one of the roles I really enjoy you in
is you happen to play Ernie Johnson on GILA.

Speaker 1 (31:43):
Now.

Speaker 2 (31:43):
Gils Arena is a podcast that you have Gilbert Arenas.
It's what Brandon Jennings, Kenyan, Martin, Lexi brown Shiro swoops
for Shot mccant's personalities like big, big bold personalities and
you guys are hilarious. Y'all also crazy, but you guys
are very hilarious. But just tell me a little bit
about how Gil's arena came together.

Speaker 3 (32:04):
Also how to get swaggy pe some little yeah, but
you know, I'm sorry. I make sure. Look I love
that crew, and so me and Gil our working relationships.
I've known Gil. We are actually the same age. He's
born in January, I'm born in April. But he was
a year older in high school. So that's one thing
about Gil. I don't think people realize that. You talk
about this whole back culture nowadays where kids stay back.

(32:26):
Now you got eighteen, nineteen twenty year old seniors in
high school. I want to say Gil was like seventeen
years old as a graduating senior in high school. Was
seventeen when he went to u of A. And one
thing about Gil, he was kind of like an under
the radar. Like my dad always tells his story, He's
heard the name Gilbert Arenas, didn't see the face, so
he thought he was a Mexican basketball player. And he
was like I would always see these newspaper articles. I'm like,
who's this Mexican dude that this out here putting up

(32:47):
forty to fifty. It's like Gilbert and then he finally
kind of saw in college and realized who he was.
So we had always I went to high school in
the valley. Gil went to high school in the valley.
So I transferred from Crenshaw my junior year. Gill was
I think in his senior year at Grant. But the
thing back in those days was the Daily News. They
had a great high school sports section. LA Times had
a great high school sports section. But you knew if

(33:09):
you played the same night that Gill played, they would
do the top scores, like I'm not gonna be the
top scorer, and I ain no matter what I'd do.
I could drop forty, he's gonna drop fifty. I could
drop fifty, he's gonna drop sixty. He this is what
it is. So he built up a name and reputation
for himself. So we ended up just coincidentally. I moved
literally like two blocks away from him. So around like
about twenty sixteen, right around when legend the Chamberlain Heights

(33:31):
was taken over, me and my wife moved to Widland Hills,
So I would you know, during the pandemic, I would
go jog around the neighborhood. That was like my only release.
I'd gotten really kind of down and depressed at that point.
Legend that got canceled. This was when I was first
kind of doing social media. But I ballooned up to
close to like four hundred pounds. Pandemic happens. My wife,
my family kind of politely or like, look, you need

(33:51):
to get your fat ass in shape, like this thing
is shacking people's live now. My brother's gonna be really
like yeah you like, you know, Joe, you're fat dog,
Like get it together. So I'm close to like four
hundred pounds, So I would just start go jogging around
the neighborhood. And at that point, you know, it was
felt like, you know, third world country out here. You
go to routes and be thirty people online and they
let into at a time and you no toilet paper.
I'm just thinking of my head, like what y'all need

(34:12):
all this toilet paper for? Like y'all were never doing
this before, Like why paper towers and toilet paper became
the thing that everybody like thought that.

Speaker 1 (34:19):
They needed for the roy me.

Speaker 2 (34:21):
It was just like, Wow, we're really here now where
we're on food like when they were only allowing you
to get like one pack of meat per household.

Speaker 1 (34:28):
You're just like, dog, what it's crazy.

Speaker 3 (34:30):
But you would roll in there and you see paper
towers and toilet paper, be like, oh my god, love.
But then you understand why they hoarded it. My back
end of Mike, you understood why they hoarded it. But
so around that point, I would go run around the neighbors.
So I would see Guil all the time, and we
were kind of just say what up to each other.
I'll be mid jogg, but he'd come through in his
made back mini van, and you know, we constantly would
bump into each other. So fast forward. It ended up

(34:51):
he was looking for a new host for a show
No Chill. My agent connected us. Uh, you know, we
just kind of hit it off right away. So we
started doing. Bill saw a ton of success for that.
But for him, he was always I mean, I want
to do more. And and the thing I say about
Gil what makes him so successful is Gil doesn't approach
this like traditional media traditional talent. Traditional talent can be
a pain in the ass. They don't want to work,

(35:13):
they don't want to do they just want to do
the bare minimum. Hey, my show is on from one
to two. I'll be here at twelve, like I'm leaving
at two oh five, where Gil is more like a
CAI sented like streamer, like I'm on like we do
our show. We do a two and a half to
two hour, forty five minute show no commercials, which I
tell people by comparison because I grew up work in
sports entertainment, sports television. That's like a four hour TV

(35:33):
show with the commercial breaks and all that stuff. Bill think,
So we don't stop like we started about eleven thirty,
eleven forty, you know, we'd be on CP time like
it is kind of what it is cha. The chat
always gets mad, y'all not ready, like, look, this is Gil.
And the crazy thing is we film this in Gill's house,
in his basement, and he's usually the last one to
come down, but it's like when he does, he's on.

(35:53):
But he'll come down after doing a three hour livestream
on his own personal channel or doing you know, two
to three hour workout with his kids, like his son
Elijah McDonald's all American who just committed to SC His
older daughter issela who you know, standout high school player
Thisever at Louisville, and he's got a couple of young
ones too that are gonna be doing the same thing
following that trajectory. So he kind of handles all his
responsibilities but locks in to do the show. So we

(36:14):
started that show February twenty twenty three, didn't really know
what it was gonna be. We're kind of just figuring
it out. But the thing I love about Gil is
Gil himself is a guy who couldn't really get on
the mainstream media. I kind of compare him all the
time to Pat McAfee, who's a friend of mine, somebody
I'll look up to. But I'm like passive punter. If
he goes to ESPN, he goes to these networks before

(36:35):
he has any success. It's like, bro, you're a punter.
Like same with Gil. Gil had a tremendous amount of
success in his NBA career, but not you know, he's controversial.
Obviously had situations going on in his life when he
was with the Wizards, so he kind of had this
stigma around him where he wasn't ever going to get
those opportunities, so he had to go create and take
those opportunities. Similar to what Pat did. So we started
the show and right away he's like, I don't want

(36:57):
you know, traditional people on the show. I want, you know,
Rashan mckantz, who we had had on an episode of
No Chill. He was great on that episode. I think
they ended up Gil. So Gil has a gym in
his house, but he goes and works out at La Fitness.
So him and shot You's always see each other at
La Fitness and they would just you know, be shooting
the shit and talking. He's like, I want Rashad Brandon Jennings,
who lives right down the street from us, Like, I

(37:17):
want to get a BJ on the show. I want
to get you know, Swaggy, who they have their relationship,
their dynamic which is like, you know, it's Swaggy was
Gil's Ricky when they were together, and they still operate
like that. But just to see those two dudes when
they get together. And I don't think a lot of
people realize for as crazy as you think, the show
is like the group chat like those dudes that they
don't they don't turn anything on. That's what it is like.

(37:39):
If anything, the camera start rolling, but they've already been
in the middle of arguments and shit that will just
bring to the show, bringing on Lexi Brown, who's done
an amazing job still playing obviously WNBA, Cheryl Swoops, who
arguably the goat, bringing her perspective, just a unique crew
of minds. Everybody has so much to offer from their experiences.
You talk about a guy like Brandon who who you know,

(38:01):
was a trendsetter going from high school to Italy, not
going to the traditional college route. Rashad won a national
championship in North Carolina, Dayton Kardashians, all that type of
thing and the reputation he has. Versut when you actually
just sit down and meet and just understand how smart
and creative and you know, kind of the narrative about
him before you meet him, then you just send and
talk with him and like, Yo, this dude is really
just like high level intelligence. He's basically be called the

(38:23):
joker that Gill's batman. So he loves nothing more than
and sometime I don't even think he believes the shit.
But if Gil says go left, he gonna say, nah,
go right, and they're just gonna butteas and go at it.
And I kind of always make the joke. You know,
we have a good show. If one of them is
sweating and now both of them are sweating because they're
just going at each other. That's that's a recipe for
great television. But we've been able, and when we started

(38:44):
this thing, we had a vision of where we wanted
to be, where we wanted to go, And I really
salute Underdog who came in and was like, look, we're
gonna let y'all rock out. Shout out. Tim Livson, who's
a VP of content over there, Jeremy Levine, one of
the founders, like you guys be you like and you know,
working in this game, it's like we want Jamail, but
then it's like, oh, we don't want that Jamail though,
like you can't.

Speaker 1 (39:03):
Yeah, But it's it's levels to how much they want
of you.

Speaker 3 (39:06):
Can you say like this? I like, yeah, Buth And
for us, like we don't have any restrictions, any limitations
to an extent. Obviously, we have told that line and
pushed it. And for me, in my regular life, I'm
a jokester kind of you know, don't really take anything serious.
I've had to adapt more to the Ernie Johnson kind
of straight in here because I tell people like if
I go out there and be my normal self. This

(39:28):
shit is gonna be way too turned up and crazy
and we will not get anything accomplished. So I got
to kind of be I don't even say the adult,
but like the point guard in the room. Make sure
everybody's getting involved, make sure everybody's getting their points and
their takes and across. And I think for us, you know,
when we started this thing, we wanted to be the
cure for the common show that was kind of the
moniker rallying cry. And I think we've accomplished that now here.

(39:48):
We are almost two years into it. We're in our
third season right now. A whole cash has got extensions recently.
And I think for as much as people see Gill's
front facing public face, I mean Gil's super loyal dude.
Like if Gil with you, he's gonna ride with you
till the wheels fall off. Of supports his crew, supports
all the talent on the show, supports me, like it's funny.
So Gil. Gil has a phone that doesn't take incoming calls,

(40:10):
so he calls you. You don't pick up, You can't
call Gil back. I have to. He'll call me sometimes
if I miss it. I got a text him, I'm
by the phone now, Gill like you hit me, but
he'll call me.

Speaker 2 (40:22):
Uh, how does one get a phone that doesn't take
incoming calls?

Speaker 1 (40:26):
And I want to find this phone?

Speaker 3 (40:28):
Well, as he explains it, at the height of his career,
when he was making a lot of money, a lot
of people were hitting him up for money and to
bother him and all those types of things.

Speaker 2 (40:35):
So he was like saying, why, Yeah, but I wonder
how do you get the phone?

Speaker 3 (40:39):
You know, you get to a certain status. I'm not
quite there yet. You know, you get one hundred MS.

Speaker 1 (40:43):
You can note it. If you ever run into Gilbert
or Reada's make sure that you ask him how did you.

Speaker 3 (40:47):
Get the So you try to call Gil like you
was wasting your time, like you know what I'm saying,
like that's family included, whoever. But he hits me up
and we just go over ideas content And like I said,
he's just kind of a mad scientist genius in terms
of how he put this whole crew together. And I
think all of us are like super appreciative of just hey,
the opportunity, but be I see how hard Gil works.

(41:08):
So I'm literally you know this schedule is basically. So
I'm producing the shows along with our show runner, Steve
Martinez and Baron Damn, our other producer. But we're going
till two am. And on the days I got to
produce a show, I got to so we do the
show eleven thirty to two thirty. I go do I
coach high school basketball, I coach my kids, so I'll
do all that stuff. Knock out my family obligations, come back,

(41:29):
watch the games up till two am. Building the show
because Gill wakes up at four thirty in the morning,
so I have to have the show lined up for
him when he wakes up to go back review everything,
make its good. He'll calm if you don't like some
take it out, or he got a great idea, let's
do this, or you know, I'm gonna say it like
this that we'll just kind of constantly go back and
forth and then just following that same formula recipe. And
this is seven days a week. We're all Monday through Thursday.

(41:51):
But it don't stop cuz we're either talking. We got
a group chat with everybody on the show in it
that's you know, a little too hot for TV, but
that's where the best stuff goes now as it could
be any point in today. It could be something somebody
said three weeks ago, and it's like, remember when you
said this, and then just I'll open the phone. Sometimes
it be like one hundred text messages back and forth. Dude,
just going at each other and getting it. But I

(42:11):
think that's that's the secret to making the show so successful,
because these people aren't changing, They're not switching up. When
the camera turns on. Whatever's on their mind at that
particular moment, they're gonna say controversial. I know we got
a lot of players that are mad at us, and
you know a lot of people that are critical of
what we do. But I think they also got to
recognize at the end of the day, these are former players.
These are guys who experienced it. And I go back
to a moment for us Zion a summer of twenty

(42:34):
twenty three kind of I want to say, put our
show on the map. But like we were taping episodes
the Summer League in Vegas. Gil who you know, but
Gil always I think, very complimentary guys, but has experienced that.
So Gil will tell you about life on the road,
tell you going to the four seasons, eating two double
cheese burgers and three milkshakes, and what his pregame routine
and ritual was. So he was very sympathetic to Zion.

(42:54):
So we were having a convo about Zion at the
Blue Wires studio at the wind there's a big glass
partitioning so you can see everybody coming in and out.
Ten seconds later, Zion walks up. We had no clue,
looks at us. Oh there they go right there, fucking
rolls in and he had had some situations going on
at that time. I'm sure people obviously you can google
what was going on around twenty twenty three for Zion

(43:15):
in that summer. But comes on the show for twenty minutes.
He's got a handler with him trying to get him
to leave. And you know, like you try to book
a guests, you try to get talent that comes with strings.
You can't ask him about this, you can't do that,
you can't say this like and this was like Zion, like, nah,
I want to talk to these dudes. He came up
right behind guild like, hands on shoulders, kind of put
him in the vice grip. But you know, you know,

(43:36):
a very polite professional way ended up sitting us for
twenty minutes, and that was kind of one of the
first moments that showed us that athletes watched this thing,
like you know what I mean, I'm rolling around the wind.
I don't think people know who I am. I'm seeing
all these guys who I look up to, all these
NBA players. They're like, man, what's up? We love the show?
Like whatever. So it let us know that we were
doing something special. And like I said, we've been blessed
to all get extensions. We're gonna be doing this thing

(43:57):
for the coming years, but really putting that show on
the map. And we look at kind of traditional shows,
not even necessarily as our competition, but they can't do
what we do. You know, I watched Sports Center back
in six.

Speaker 1 (44:11):
But you got a a block an ESPN show definitely
not you got.

Speaker 3 (44:14):
To a block. You gotta B block, you gotta c block.

Speaker 1 (44:17):
It's a structure.

Speaker 3 (44:18):
We got ten minutes for this block. We will go
forty five to fifty minutes hour. We will go on
a topic and I'll try and keep it moving, and
the chests always coming to me like oh man, you
got to moderate better whatever, and it's like you need
to understand the personalities that I'm dealing with because I
will try to move on, and I know that they're
not going to move on. If Gill got a point
he want to make, if Seo I got a point
he want to make, Kenyon or Brandon or Lexi or

(44:38):
Share whoever, we're not moving on like I'm gonna try. Hey,
let's talk about this topic. Now. Wait, what was that
you said about whatever? And now we're going twenty more
minutes on it, So we're not We don't have we
have a structure like we format it like a traditional
kind of sports network style. That's what I grew up
and that's what I was born in when I started
my career. But also knowing we have the luxury and
ability that an ESPN show or a Fox show ca

(45:00):
because we don't have a ten minute you know, we
don't have to get to a commercial break. We can
go hour on this thing if we want. And for me,
that's the best convo. When we show up and it's
something that wasn't even in the script or in that
the game plan, production plan for the day, but they're
passionate about it and they go thirty forty five minutes
and now you look up and it's like, damn, we
had three more seconds we were supposed to get to.
But it's time to go because obviously, you know, somebody

(45:21):
go pick up their kids, or I got to go
to practice, or Gill got to go to one of
his kids games or whatever it may be. But we
don't have any rules or regulations and no constraints on it.
So I'll really just give a shot out the underdog
for allowing that in Gil. Like, I see how hard
Gill works. So you know, I'm up till two am
every day, but I know he's up. He's lurking, like
he's in the Google doc. You know, I see his
icon light up, or he's calling me or texting me.

(45:43):
I go jog before the show, He'll call me. I'm
on the jog with him, just having the convo with
the hefo's in. He were going over everything. So just
the amount of dedication, preparation and work that he puts in,
and I think we all feed off that, from the
talent to the crew, and I think that's why the
show has been so successful.

Speaker 1 (45:57):
You know, and watching this.

Speaker 2 (45:58):
Show, even though every five minutes, I'm like such as
such as crazy.

Speaker 1 (46:02):
What I love about is is the authenticity.

Speaker 2 (46:04):
As you mentioned before, you know, you've had players that
gave you positive feedback, and because y'all keep.

Speaker 1 (46:09):
It so real, I imagine you've gotten the opposite because
y'all do keep it really real.

Speaker 2 (46:15):
So how what are some of the I guess memorable
maybe encounters or feedback negative feedback that you've gotten from players?

Speaker 3 (46:23):
There is again, like you said, we keep it very real.
There are certain cities now that I feel like we
are not allowed to pull up to, not me like
you're probably good, like Detroit City.

Speaker 1 (46:33):
I know as a native Detroiter, I was like, why
always coming?

Speaker 3 (46:38):
And the thing you got to understand about Gil is
Gil is relentless, right, so if somebody comes to him, like,
he's not going to back off, like you've seen it
kind of some of the personal beefs that he may have,
like he's never gonna end it, Like he like that's
just not in his round, right, Yeah, that's just not
in his makeup. And like you know, I got a
ton of respect for Kwame, and there will be times
on the show I know he's trying to get there
and it's like but it don't matter or what I say,

(47:00):
Like I'm trying to avoid it, and it's like all right,
go ahead. He'll say, yeah, I had this da or whatever,
like y'all, I know where you're going with this right now,
and it's like I don't want no beef with that.
Like I gotta live here too. I tell them all
the time. I got to walk around these places too,
and I ain't trying to you know. I love y'all.
Like we had a situation he talked about. So he
had said something to when Isaiah Stewart that came out
after lebron Gil posts this message on Instagram and basically

(47:24):
just saying like you can't do that, like you gotta
like you know what I mean, this is this is
the Golden Boy of the league. You gotta pretend, pretend fight,
you can do all that stuff, but like, don't go
at him. So we were at to coma at Isaiah
Thomas's charity event, the Zeken Who's there, Beef Stu Beef
still see Gil, and you know you see Beef still
in real life. You're just like shit, And it's kind

(47:45):
of like, all right, it's gonna be a Busines decision
right here. Because it was like me and Rashad a
couple of us standing there and it's like, you know
and believe me, like I have hands, I know how
to fight a little bit, but I'm gonna get my
ass whipped. And you know, I'm also a realistic I.

Speaker 1 (47:58):
Mean, you got reached og like you're you're not a
small person.

Speaker 3 (48:01):
But seeing him and it's like it's like fuck all right,
But they kind of talk it out and guilt. But
after that, like Gil, don't let it stop. He goes
and makes videos talking about he goes and whatever. Like
Gil such a creative and content Maven that anything he
sees an opportunity to address or talk about, he's gonna
keep it real on anything. But yes, we have had
to answer your question long win it. I know I

(48:21):
speak a lot, but have had several players who let
it be known. We have had several players who let
it be known, either via social media or in real life,
that they're not necessarily fucking with the views that are
expressed on the show. You know, I walk around and
it's funny because I got to walk around now, like
if I'm at Summer League or All Star weekend or
these type of things, see a guy and be like, damn,

(48:42):
did somebody come at him. No, Okay, we're good. What up?
How you doing right?

Speaker 1 (48:46):
Like, did we say something that it's never me?

Speaker 3 (48:48):
But yeah, guys like guys will you'll see them kind
of lurking in the comments of videos. Obviously. Brandon Jennings
assessed the things about Jason Tatum recently that getting a
response and Tatum's trainer and Tatum coming at him directly
and indirectly, and it's like, yeah, but that's not everybody
on the couch. But ultimately, somebody's gotta beef with you nobody. Yeah,

(49:09):
somebody's rocking with him.

Speaker 2 (49:10):
This person is in a weird way though. Do you
take it as a compliment, Yeah, for sure, Yeah, that
they see it, but that they see it a care
about what you said enough to respond.

Speaker 3 (49:18):
Yeah, And I think for us, we're really starting to
see when we first started people kind of just s
thumb their nose at us. We don't give a shit
about this show. It's not gonna be nothing to now
where we're on ESPN, we're on these clips. Like Guil
recently had his son Elijah, announced his college commitment to
USC much to my disappointment. You know, I was working
the pill trying to get him over you see, like
a non acessarty mail love Elijah, super happy for him.

(49:40):
But watching Sports Center and it's like that's like the
G block or the end of the show they show
they got to show a clip from our things. So
we've started to really see the power that we possess
in being kind of this new media. And now initially
when we first started, like we don't have to acknowledge
you guys, And now now you got to come over here, right,
and now you got to look at us and respect
the work we're doing and the numbers were doing and

(50:01):
the impact we have on the culture. Like like for me,
like I'm a low key dude. I stay out the way,
like I coach little league, I coach youth sports, I
coach high school. If you want to see me, come
to the local target, you know, right around like two
thirty three thirty, Like you'll see me just doing my
shopping or whatever's going on. But I'm not really on
the scene or in the streets, are doing any of
that type of stuff. But just started to notice over

(50:21):
the past year eighteen months, I would just like I'm
at the airport one day, flying to Laxes late at night,
I'm rolling to get my car out of the parking structure.
I see a police officer. He got a headphone in
me mugging straight faces, looking straight like I'm not gonna
bother this, dude. I'm just gonna keep going by my way.
He turned to look at me. He's like, y'a, I'm
listening to the show right now. Like I'm like like wow,
like you really just you know. I'm rolling through Philly

(50:43):
Airport past like a gnos or a pass when they
got the one with the airport chiefs stay by. All
the chefs see me come through. They chopping up. Chefs
say like, yo, what's up? Man? We rolled with Kim
Till gives up being so crazy. I was in Sacramento
for a high school tournament and he's been very obviously
same way as Detroit Veru. We'll say disrespectful if you
will the city. But rolling through Sacramento getting rolled up

(51:05):
on people like yo, tell Gill stop disrespecting the city. Man.
Like so just to see that even like high school kids.
I coach some high schoolers and they'd be like, yo, coach,
we see you on TikTok all the time. Like I
don't even got TikTok. What do y'all see on there? All?
We see clips from the show and this and that whatever,
and it's like, why Gill do this that? So just
to see the impact that it's had on basketball culture.
But with that comes a lot of responsibility, right and

(51:26):
how we move And I think we're all kind of
figuring this out as we go and learning and growing
from it. But if there's one thing that you know
with Gil, his literal nickname, his moniker is no chill chick,
and he lives that up to the fullest extent. So
I don't know whatever definition of no chill you had
in your brain, but he's gonna take it to another
level and truly have no chill.

Speaker 1 (51:45):
Yeah, he embodies that well.

Speaker 2 (51:47):
Before I let you go, I want to get you know,
just talk a little bit of an NBA. I know
he has been discussing Jimmy Butler in the Miami Heat.
Who side are you on in that one?

Speaker 3 (52:00):
It flip flops? Yeah? I think for me, you know,
watching this whole thing play out, Jimmy's comments in the
summer about you know, if he was healthy, they could
have beat the Celtics or Nicks, And for me, always
being pro athlete, pro player, pro player empowerment. You know,
pat Riley told him to keep his mouth shut. There's
just words you hear, you know, like we have to

(52:20):
operate in corporate spaces and we have to move a
certain way, but we will snap it. Like there's phrasingg
show what two finals with these rosters. I'm just saying,
like all this shit I've done here, like you're not
gonna reward me for that? And to pat Riley, the godfather,
that he'd have never been that type of franchise. So
it's like, if d Wade ain't getting that, you think
you're gonna get it, like let's just keep it a buck.

(52:42):
But seeing that, but also you know, Jimmy at times
has a Tennessee control, has a tendency to go a
little bit too far, and I think this has happened
now at several different stops that he's been in throughout
his career. So you have to see both sides, but
also have to recognize that this is a dude who
took these rosters to two NBA finals, right, won in
the bubble, won recently against the Nuggets. And if he's

(53:04):
asking you, hey, hey, build this roster up. I want
to be competitive. You've got a guy who wants to win,
and you're not getting that done. You know, you strike
out on Dame, you strike out on Drew Holliday, some
of the other names have been out there. There comes
a point where this is the league that's based on
player empowerment. In the way that my contract is structured.
Right now, I have a player option at the end
of this season, so I can force your hand because
I can either opt in and y'all want to bench

(53:24):
me and suspend me in definitely or whatever. Cool, like
I'm gonna opt in. Figure it out, like I'm gonna
win this when I got fifty two mil coming. So
at the end of the day, like if I got
fifty two mil coming, and this is a bullshit you're
trying to pull, like I can do that. But there's
times too where it's like I want it from the
team side, like growing up. And this is the thing
I don't think a lot of people grasp. When you're

(53:44):
playing team sports as a kid, use sports as a kid.
There's not money involved. It's not business, right, Like you're
all playing for love of the game to attain a
certain goal. Now, when business gets involved. It's a lot different,
especially talking about millions and millions of dollars dues in
the twilight of their career. That's maybe the last contract
that they're able to get, and they don't feel like
they're getting the love from the franchise. And this is
a discussion that I've had with Gill as well, because

(54:06):
it impacts legacy, it impacts how you talk about these dude.
You talk about the goat debates and things like that,
and Gil is always more lean towards the side of
individual accolades because it's like, you might be a great
individual player that's hamstrung from being on a bad team
that's beyond your control. You may have a franchise that's
in tank mode or whatever it is, but the average
fan don't care about that.

Speaker 1 (54:26):
You get the plan, yeah, because it's your face.

Speaker 2 (54:28):
Because pat Riley, they just see the cameras showing him
in the stands like he didn't hold it. He doesn't
have to be accountable to the media after every game,
but the star player does. And so it's much easier
to point the dagger at the guy who you know
has to answer some level of questions before the public.

Speaker 3 (54:44):
And you talk about like low management. You look at
somebody like Kawhi. People that know know Kawhi works his
ass off. Kawhi don't want to be injured, like he
wants to be out there playing. And a lot of
times it ain't Kawi saying I don't want to play
back to backs, I don't want to play tonight. It's
the team trying to protect their investment. But the team
is happy to let him eat all shit for it.
The team ain't gonna be like now we're the ones
making them do it, like they want just the average

(55:04):
consumer to be like, oh, he's lazy, or he he
don't love the game or whatever. So there's so much
now working with all these people and kind of getting
their perspective with these guys do to be able to
go out there and perform at the highest level. And
for the longest time, it was kind of like, you know,
you guys should just be happy to be here type
of situation instead of well, if we're not here, this
product's not good and you're not gonna watch the shit.
So for me, looking at Jimmy, I kind of toil

(55:26):
on both sides because I think about that team component,
like you got guys that ultimately are dealing with this
that have nothing to do with it. I think about
a guy like Kevin.

Speaker 1 (55:33):
Love and their livelihoods are caught up into what you're doing.
So there there's other part of it.

Speaker 2 (55:39):
I mean, I think both of them at various points
have looked very unbecoming for both of them, right, And
it's like, at the end of the day, you're getting
paid fifty billion dollars, I'm not I do understand why
you would be like, why should I give it my
all when already this is what you're giving me to work?
So they're both both of them are right, It's just

(55:59):
the way that has played out I think has made
them both look bad at different points.

Speaker 1 (56:05):
I don't think Jimmy's gonna be there that much longer anybody.

Speaker 3 (56:07):
Else, So get and the other problem that happens now
his teams, you like, oh you want we want to
this deal or that deal, And there's so much bullshit
and bs that goes on from different sizes. They use
their various media channels to paint the other side in
the bad light. It's like, at the end of the day,
he like, either you're not. This is something we talked
about on the show. Was like, you have to send
him home, Like so this bullshit about let him come

(56:27):
player or whatever, why, Like you already know what it's
gonna be and what time he's gonna be on, and
you already know what time you're on. So get a
deal done. Send him home. But then we're gonna make
him play, and he's going, Okay, we've seen this before,
So get the trade down. You have to take a
little bit less than what you wanted, but ultimately now
you'll be able to move on as a franchise and
he'll be able to move on as a player and
go somewhere he actually wants to be, and you can

(56:48):
bring players in the actually want to be there.

Speaker 2 (56:50):
What did you make of NBA Commissioner Adam Silver talking
about how much he favors ten minute quarters.

Speaker 3 (56:57):
He never.

Speaker 2 (57:01):
I thought it was a little like, huh if he
had said less games, I'd be like, yes, but I
know that won't happen.

Speaker 3 (57:06):
But in any rate, the NBA declining viewership, all those
too many games or too much of this, too much
of that, we're still watching. They just signed a historic
media rights deal, So for all that talk, the bread
is still coming in. So whatever you're talking about like
people complain about it, people watch our show.

Speaker 2 (57:21):
I mean, do you do you buy into that though
that there is some there's a legitimate ratings problems, Like
I know the ratings have rebounded from where they were
earlier in the season, but like, do you buy that,
like there is some part of this NBA product that
is now distasteful for fans.

Speaker 3 (57:36):
I think people need to adjust to the times. Right
when I was growing up, we had TV. That was
the only way that we could watch games. I have
little brothers who can watch something on their TV, can
watch something on their phone, and some on their computer,
all three in unison and know everything that's going on
on all three things. And I'm just sitting here looking
like how do you how do you know what's going
on there? And there and boom. So people consume media.

(57:58):
Different consumption happens a k. Like I said, all my
kids I coached in high school, they talk TikTok. I'm
not on TikTok, but they see all the shit from
the show on TikTok. I don't know how they see it.
I don't know what clips they're watching or whatever. So
we have to just kind of shifting again, like I said,
if you're signing that deal now, it would be scary
is if like, oh, the deal went down, the numbers
went down, the bread went down, you got players earning

(58:19):
more money than ever before. I do at the highest level,
I respect those guys for getting their bag, but then
you look at guys at the lowest level, like hopefully
their break can come up to it. It has been
a huge seismic shift from the guys at the top
taking all the bread and kind of the rest of
the league kind of left the swander. But at the
end of the day, those are the guys who make decision.
We see it in the country as it is right now,
you got the most bread, We're doing everything, We're falling

(58:42):
in line with what you want. And that's just what
it is, like, you know, like we're basically being controlled
by oligarchs and billionaires. Now billionaire says, hey, we don't
need we don't need all these FAA people, we don't
need all this, and that that's just what it is.
Some fucks up. Oh it was diversity's fault. Huh, everybody
was white what But it could.

Speaker 2 (58:58):
Have been listening to Gil because you talked about how
other shows use the clip. The clip I used that
I did a whole thing about the state of American
basketball on this show is him saying they need to
kick the foreigners out the game.

Speaker 3 (59:09):
But he was just saying that in guilt, like just
like he tried to get a rise out of the table.

Speaker 1 (59:14):
I understood the point he was trying to make.

Speaker 2 (59:16):
But to that point is that like it has become
a more European style of game, Like there's just no,
there's no question about it, that it has become that.
I don't know we can we can't kick all the
warders out of the game, obviously, but there is a
larger commentary about what the state of American basketball actually is.

Speaker 3 (59:35):
And they talked that shit. And I got to live
in Italy as a kid and see how those programs work.
I think we can do a lot at the grassroots level, yes,
to improve these things.

Speaker 1 (59:43):
Their youth coach, so you see.

Speaker 3 (59:45):
I'm doing it. Yeah, like we're getting blieve me coach
is my nickname. We're gonna get you right, like we're
gonna approach it. But yeah, you seeing what those guys
come up with. But it is a global game, you know.
You talk about back to the viewership, thing real quick. China,
there what four or five hundred million people are watching
in the NBA. So the NBA has you know, we
talk about who's gonna be the next face or whatever. Yeah,

(01:00:05):
there's an American demographic because this is the home nation
of the sport, if you will. But this is a
global game. So the end of the day, and I
always make this point to people, like if you're making
a billion dollars in China and zero dollars in America,
that's still a billion dollars. Like I'm not tripping. Yeah,
I mean, I wish I was making more bread out here,
but I'll take that billion over here and still, you know,
live the life that I want to live. So ultimately,

(01:00:26):
you want everybody to be watching. But it's not like
this isn't the second or third biggest sport on the planet. Right.
You don't have hundreds of millions of people playing this
sport because you're not doing a good enough job promoting it.
But those are things that I think the league is
going to need to address. It back to the Adam
Silver thing, like you cut it from twelve minutes to
ten minutes, Now, what happens to those you know, the tenth, eleven,
twelfth guy on that roster because the superstar is still

(01:00:48):
playing the same amount of minutes. Like, we ain't coming
off of any of these minutes, and you're looking at
the Olympics and all that and all I want a
two hour window.

Speaker 1 (01:00:54):
It's like, but I don't think pace of the game
is what people have a problem with.

Speaker 2 (01:00:58):
Like Baseball, it was a pace shoot for a long time,
and they've done a bunch of different teams.

Speaker 3 (01:01:02):
Hey, the pitch clock. I go to Dodgors game.

Speaker 2 (01:01:04):
Now, that's what I'm saying they had that problem. Pace
is not the issue in the NBA. I think it's
just the three point. The amount of three point shooting
is wearing on people. But again I think that ebbs.

Speaker 3 (01:01:16):
And flows, like you know, too many brocast jumpers taking three,
Like everybody don't get to shoot threes level.

Speaker 2 (01:01:25):
This is all y'all like, And you know, as somebody
who much liked you grew up watching basketball a certain way. Man,
it's still it drives me crazy when it's a three
on one, you right at the hoop and you kick
it out, like it just drives me fucking crazy.

Speaker 3 (01:01:38):
And a lot of people will blame Steph for that.
And this is what I would say, Yes, you have
to blame step but you have to blame the people
that are trying to follow in steps footsteps, because I've
seen Steph work out. Yeah, I've seen the amount of
work he puts in. We were in Baltimore, we got
the interview him. He was doing an under armoured thing
and this was the workout he was doing for the
general public. Thirty forty five minutes, got about three hundred
shots up, but just not stopping intense and then he

(01:01:58):
went and did a two hour workout after that.

Speaker 1 (01:02:00):
Like, but you don't put that work in right, and
you want to chuck the same amount because I.

Speaker 3 (01:02:04):
See it at the lower levels now and it's like
you are not Steph, right, I know you've seen it.
Just like I'm not mjury. I can wear the knee
braces and i can wear the armband. I'm not junky
from the free throw line. So get your ass in
the post and go hit them with these jump hugs
real quick. But so that's ultimate because they blame Steph
and like you blame Steph because that's the pinnacle, that's
what everybody wants to get to. But the reality is
you don't put the work in. So you're not putting

(01:02:26):
the work in, like Steph, go get your ass inside
this three point line and get an easier bucket.

Speaker 1 (01:02:30):
Yeah, I know, God.

Speaker 2 (01:02:32):
Bless RP to the mid range game. Unfortunately, these guys
only know either dunk or shoot a three shot.

Speaker 3 (01:02:38):
He keeping it keeping none of.

Speaker 1 (01:02:40):
These threes, giving me hope.

Speaker 2 (01:02:42):
All right, Well, final question is a question, or I
should say, the final question is usually what I call
the messy question question. We're gonna get in some trouble, Josiah.

Speaker 3 (01:02:52):
Here we go. Well, all right, when I get your
trouble every day.

Speaker 2 (01:02:54):
So now I feel like this this will not even
remotely come close to get in on daily on a
daily basis when you do Gills Arena. My messy question
is this, of all of your wonderful you know co
stars on your show on Gills Arena, who consistently makes
the least amount of sense.

Speaker 3 (01:03:18):
That's a tough one. I'm gonna say Swaggy, but I
know a lot of people will say Rashad mckam's aka
Cemetery Larry, But Rashot if you really listen to what
he's saying, it's like, okay, like swaggy like he will
tweet some shit and it's like, we'll have to talk
about this on the show, and I don't know how
you defend this, but he just like stream of thought

(01:03:38):
tweeting and he'll go out there. But it's funny, like
for me, I know all their personalities and that dynamics
so well, so all that shit makes sense to me.
And you know, me and Gil talk about this a
lot at a high level. You need that, right, That's
what makes a show good. You can't have everybody on
the show agreeing with each other saying the same thing.
People pretend like they want that they're not gonna watch
like you need again the joker that gives bad man,

(01:03:59):
Oh you need a I mean, it just is what
it is. And we're closer than our WWE because I
will watch in real time, two people will be beefing,
somebody will join in and tag team the one person,
but then switch up midway and then they'll start tag
team and the other person and somebody else will jump in.
It come it's like royal rumbles. So it's crazy to
watch it at real time because it can it all

(01:04:20):
takes as a sentence or a word or a thought
or whatever. Just wait a minute, like and then they
just go at each other. But you know you're trying
to give me in trouble that that is a very
messy question. I did a very political job of steering
away from it. Didn't answer. I've been watching a lot
of CNN lately, so I know how to word salad
is now my specialty.

Speaker 1 (01:04:37):
Well, you did a good job. And before I forget,
want to mention Memes of Nightmares right.

Speaker 3 (01:04:43):
What you wrong? I just want to tell the people.
So Memes and Nightmares coming out on Hulu is a
project I did with spring Hill and Escaping Starry. Shout
out to Pepsi Coo, preveyor of Delicious Beverages. But you
actually made a cameo.

Speaker 1 (01:04:56):
You better sell that product.

Speaker 3 (01:04:57):
I'm getting my marketing bag right. Look, people, I just
want you guys to know sometimes you're gonna have to
do some marketing stuff. You really better do your best
to do it right. All right, I like beverages. You know.

Speaker 2 (01:05:09):
You did not ask my opinion before I asked you
that question. Sorry is legitimate, and I'm.

Speaker 3 (01:05:13):
Sorry He's gonna listen to this and be like, yes
we are and they are. I appreciate all the beverage
if you sent to the crib. But yeah, so we
did a film just kind of taking a deep look
at at sports media culture, basketball media culture, really NBA Twitter,
back when Twitter was Twitter and now whatever it is,
but just the impact that it has at every level
of human being. You look at myself, I'm kind of
a testament to what NBA Twitter has been able to

(01:05:34):
provide with just a dude out there, you know, mean
boy or whatever people wanted to call it. And now
I'm literally hosting the TV show with Gilbert Areenas, are
coaching a show with Gilbert Arenas on digital platforms like
but so many people I know in that space that
have been able to leverage social to create opportunities for themselves,
create jobs for themselves. And this is the future the frontier.
And you are kind enough to make a cameo in

(01:05:55):
the project. So when you reach out to me to
do this, you were like, Yo, we can do something.
I'm like, nah, fuck that you came and pulled up
And then I thing you ain't doing no zoom for
that shit. You took time out of your schedule. So
I'm gonna come over to Hill just non traffic hour. Please.
You know we live in LA so you know, depending
off it's noon or four, that's like a you know,
that could be a forty minute driver or four hour drive.

Speaker 1 (01:06:15):
I've ever done that to you. That's why I was like,
you just let me know what's your time windows.

Speaker 3 (01:06:18):
And I got you. But I appreciate you for giving
me the opportunity to come on here again. That's Memes
the Nightmares coming out February twentieth, this Thursday, February twenty
th Yep, we will be.

Speaker 1 (01:06:27):
Locked and loaded.

Speaker 3 (01:06:28):
You got a movie, yes, I know.

Speaker 1 (01:06:29):
I can't wait to see.

Speaker 2 (01:06:30):
It's so happy for all of your success and everybody
keep watching, gils A Reena, thank you, Josef.

Speaker 3 (01:06:35):
Appreciate you.

Speaker 1 (01:06:37):
One more segment to go, and you guys know what
that means.

Speaker 2 (01:06:40):
I got questions to answer up next, your viewer slash
listener questions and I have plenty of answers coming up
next on the final segment of Spotatives.

Speaker 1 (01:07:00):
All right, y'all know what time it is. It's time
for your questions.

Speaker 2 (01:07:03):
And this week's question comes from Aaron, who asked her
question via email. Aarin writes, my question for you is
this I listen to women's sports podcasts.

Speaker 1 (01:07:12):
The gist of it. This is one of the podcasts.

Speaker 2 (01:07:14):
Apparently she listens to the gist of It's audience is
women who happen to like sports, regardless of women's level
of sports or the gender of sports. The gist breaks
down to every level. I listen to Good Game with
Sarah Spain. Her audience is anyone who wants to know
about women's sports, any women's sports, on any topic, the
business case of women's sports. Audience about why it matters

(01:07:36):
to invest in women's sports, not as a charity, but
because it's financially smart.

Speaker 1 (01:07:40):
Why am I explaining this to you?

Speaker 2 (01:07:42):
Obviously there's individual sports podcasts the PWHL. My question is this,
what audience's topics do you think are missing in women's
sports areas? If you could add to your to do
list or your listening list, what would you want next?
Thank you for fighting the good fight. Okay, Aaron, So
I'd like to see more podcasts to women just kind

(01:08:04):
of talking shit about sports, and not just about women's sports,
but all sports. For example, Rappers Cam and Mace they
have a sports podcast or a digital show.

Speaker 1 (01:08:11):
It's called it Is What It is Now?

Speaker 2 (01:08:13):
These are two guys who just love sports, and they
talk their own shit about sports in their own unique way.
Bloorilla is a big sports fan. Taraji Pinca is a
big sports fan. I know Taraji isn't a rapper, but
I'm here for two women in entertainment just talking about sports.

Speaker 1 (01:08:27):
I'd love to see a female version of Pat McAfee.

Speaker 2 (01:08:31):
Now, I don't mean in terms of personality type, with
someone who can create a loose environment where she's driving
the show with her opinion, in the company of her
homegirls or a combination of her homegirls and homeboys. You
know who I would give a show to in a minute.
That's like that Sidney Colson, who now plays with the
Indiana Fever. Sidney is a huge personality. She's arguably the

(01:08:53):
funniest woman in the WNBA. I build a show around
her in a minute, but I have her going around
pulling pranks on people as part.

Speaker 1 (01:09:00):
Of the show.

Speaker 2 (01:09:01):
Don't steal my idea, Gilbert aretas though he also has
a show, Gil's Areta. It's just him and his homies,
former players Nick Young, Jimmy Martin, Cheryl Swoops, and all
they do is arguing bullshit. I want to see more
women in these media spaces just talking shit, just bullshit
and just telling stories and just kicking it. That's the
content I want to see. Thank you Erin for your question. Now,

(01:09:23):
if you have a question for me, you can hit
me up on social media or email.

Speaker 1 (01:09:26):
I'm at jamail.

Speaker 2 (01:09:27):
He'll across all social media platforms, Twitter, Instagram, blue Sky, Threads,
and I recently joined fan base, so check me out there.
Please use the hashtags politics. You also have the option
of emailing me as Politics twenty twenty four at gmail
dot com. You can also send me a video of
your question, but please make sure it's thirty seconds or less.

(01:09:49):
Don't forget to follow and subscribe to this Politics on
iHeart and follows Politics Pod on Instagram and TikTok.

Speaker 1 (01:09:56):
Politics is spelled spo l tict.

Speaker 2 (01:10:00):
A new episode of Spolitics drops every Thursday on iHeart
Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. This is politics
where sports and politics don't just mix, they matter. Politics
is the production of iHeart Podcasts and The Unbothered Network.
I'm your host Jamel Hill. Executive producer is Taylor Chakoigne.

(01:10:22):
Lucas Hymen is head of audio and executive producer. Original
music for Spolitics provided by Kyle Viz from wiz FX

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Ep 16: The Politics of Creating Your Own Lane - Featuring Josiah Johnson

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Ep 16: The Politics of Creating Your Own Lane - Featuring Josiah Johnson