June 9, 2026 • 35 mins
Pat McEvoy is the Manager of Rocco's Pizza and Cantina in Downtown Omaha. Rocco's has become world famous for their College World Series Jello Shot Challenge and will certainly be hopping once again in 2026. Pat talks about the origins of this great tradition and how the charitable aspect of it has fed thousands of people all over the USA.
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Speaker 1 (00:09):
It is the Emory Songer podcast here on the iHeartRadio app.
We thank you for joining us. If you live in Omaha,
you know this time of the year is about as
exciting as it gets. The College World Series is upon us,
and one of the places that a lot of people
are going to be stopping. In fact, I would imagine
most people are stopping is Rocos, right across the street
from Charles schwab Field and joining us to talk about Rocos,
(00:31):
the impact it is having and what has made it
a staple of the College World Series for tourists and
locals alike. Is the manager of Rocos, Pat McAvoy, sitting here. Pat,
thanks so much for stopping in on this busy week
for you guys.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Absolutely absolutely, always always happy to help you get the
message out of what we're trying to do at Rocos,
especially to the local audience.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
Yeah, so let's go ahead and start at the very beginning.
Rocos Pizza and Cantana located on in a beautiful spot
just right across the street from the ball field. You guys, Uh,
I'm so happy you exist because after like a Supernova's
game or you know, any late event, I can usually
stumble in there and get myself a good pizza.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Yeah. We with so avent riven most of the most
of the year obviously, with you know, concerts, conferences, Creighton
Basketball Union, Omaha, now Supernova's. Yeah, there's so many people
that don't come down outside of College World Series, which
is which is a real shame because the area is
a is a lot of fun and only growing bigger
and bigger. But it's yeah, we do have a nice
little spot right across the street from Gate to and
(01:34):
we do do have a I mean I have season
tickets to you know, to the Supernova's. I go to
all those games then stumble back myself to Rocos, so
I understand.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
Oh yeah, I love that. Now. See we were talking
before we came on the air.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
Anybody who spends a lot of time downtown, right you
kind of like you you learn the lay of the
land and you kind of have your spots, and Roccos
has become that Lefties's next door. I got, you know,
my buddies, the Pork tour NADOs, who you know, great
you know cover band that come to Omaha a couple
of times a year. They love to after party at
Lefties and.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
After they're done at Slow Down. Yeah, yeah, I was
at that show for a little bit this year, so
I mean.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
It's just it's the spot is just immaculate, and you
guys Rocos itself. Let's talk about the layout because you
have a lot of patio space. Yeah, and I know
this time of the year that's really important for you guys.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Well, especially because you know Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, I think
it's it's you know, it's going to be in the seventies,
which is you know, seventy seventy five to watch a
baseball game. I remember, if never, we haven't had weather
like this in a long time, so it's you know,
normally we get unlucky and it's either one hundred and
ten or it's sixty in raining. So uh, definitely looking
forward to it. But yeah, big patio right across the street,
you kind of get to see all the festivities as
the teams come by, the team buses come by. You know,
(02:47):
there'll be fans out there cheering and you know, making
making a lot of noise to represent their squad. But
uh yeah, and this year it'll be a little bit
different because Lefties and Rocos is actually one bar now,
so we have a garage door in the middle that
we built the off season that we you know, took
took six months to get all the all the you know,
all the clearance from the city and everything. But now
it's you know, it's all one big space. So they'll
(03:08):
be you know, they'll be the one way into to
both bars, and but you'll be able to buy jello shit.
You know, you'll be able to walk around to the
jell O shot room and do that from from Lefties,
so you don't have to go outside your pizza. You
don't have to walk outside to get it anymore. It'll
it'll come right over to you. You'll come get it. So, yeah,
just one of those things that every year you try
to make the space a little more inviting and a
little bit bigger and a little bit better, and you
(03:28):
don't want to rest on your laurels, and so we're
just trying to trying to fine tune it and make
sure that that we can fit the.
Speaker 4 (03:34):
Most amount of people in and that you know, everybody's happy.
Speaker 3 (03:37):
That garage door thing is gonna be awesome.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
Yeahow, I mean, what a great idea, especially with all
the people trying to pack in and I mean we've
kind of buried the lead a little bit. The reason
that you know, Roco is a great establishment, but the
reason it has become the premiere establishment this time of
the year is the Jello Shot Challenge. And I moved
to Omaha just after the College World Series in twenty
(03:59):
twenty three. Okay, that was you know, that was lsu big,
you know, when it really started to jump up. And
the first day that I worked here in this building,
I went downtown because it was the finals and I
just had to stop in and see Rocos for myself
because I saw it on social media. Now it is
is an icon of kind of this event. You know,
(04:21):
just a few years later, everybody who is coming for
the first time or their school has become kind of
like North Carolina, like a regular. They are making their
plans to go to Rocos and take part in this
Jello Shot Challenge. So where was this formulated? How did
this start? And did you have any concept of how
big this thing was going to become.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
The answer to that last question is definitely not the
answer to the start of the question. Is it started
as a fun, fun thing between fan bases like I'm
you know, obviously a big, big, fan of a lot
of different sports. I've my teams that I root for
that I keep private this time of year, so I
don't get too much on line, but I have, you know,
i have my squads that I root for, and I've
(05:02):
been to a lot of a lot of away games
and seeing a lot of a lot of different sporting
events and a lot of different venues. And you find
that there is fan bases that are better fan bases,
and there's fan bases that are worse. So there's fan
bases that travel better and there's fan bases that don't.
But every school, every time you go to a place,
it's like, oh, our fans are the best. It's like, well,
how do you prove that? Like you can't prove it
by you know this or that. There's no like real metric.
(05:24):
And so you know, the first year of the of
the new stadium in twenty eleven, if Florida South Carolina
were playing in the finals, and this is before it
was Rocos, this is back when that building was good nights,
and the Florida fans were down, and so we gave
them rally shots. The South Carolina fans found out about
the rally shots and they wanted their own rally shots too,
and so it was a fun deal where we weren't
(05:44):
keeping track, but they both had their own signature shot
and they were sending them back and forth and everybody
was happy and everybody, you know, friendly rivalry is how
I would describe it. And so like six months later,
I'm sitting at a DJ's dugout out in West Omaha
rip DJ's piano bar when they used to have dueling
pianos like that was like the most fun thing you
could do on the weekend. And the one of the
(06:06):
guys was playing Let's Go Jay's and the other guys
playing Go Big Red because Nebraska and Creton were playing basketball,
and fans are like tripping all o'er themselves, I mean
like tossing chairs out of the way to go slam
dunk hundreds into it, you know, into a guy's tip jar.
So he keeps playing the school's fight song. And I
thought that that was just such a brilliant move by
those guys. And so the next series rolled around, I
was like, well, what if we make a signature I
(06:27):
was only already going to make a signature shot for everybody,
but what if we keep track? What if we put
a metric to the fan base, what fan base is
the best based on how many shots they they selling.
At the time, I was just making you know, batches
of shots and store and pores and just you know,
it wasn't Jello. Wasn't Jello until twenty nineteen. Kevin the
current owner of Rocos, he started Rocos after good Night's closed. Yeah,
(06:49):
they he was like, what if we just do these
prepackaged Jello shots so you don't have to individually set
out twenty shots or fifty shots or a hundred shots.
I said, right, way easier for me, brother, Like, let's
do it that way. So that's you know, twenty nineteen
was the first year that it became the jell O Shot,
the True jell O Shot Challenge. So yeah, now obviously
it's a little bit different. You know that that year
the most we sold was eight hundred and sixty four
(07:11):
to Arkansas, you know. And then and then we started
to catch a little bit of wins, you know, like
different Twitter accounts and some social media stuff happened, and
you know, the next year, Mississippi State was here and
they saw that the Kevin's like, you know what, I'm
gonna make a plaque for the all time record. The
Mississippi States fans saw that plaque and they were like, no, no.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
Right, this will not stand, and we say know what
to shoot for now?
Speaker 2 (07:33):
Yeah, and so they went, you know, they went twenty
nine hundred and sixty five. And you know, in twenty
one and you know, it's three X We're like, oh
my god, you know, who's going to touch that? Like
this is you know, that's insane. And then you know,
again some rumblings of social media and some other people
like oh this person or that person talked about you.
So you know, in twenty two, I started the Twitter
account for you know, for just the whiteboard, you know.
Speaker 4 (07:56):
Just this is the update. This is where you can
go and get it.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
And and I had seventeen followers on Monday, and by
the end of the week, I had like seventeen thousand,
and I was like, oh, people care about this. Oh.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
And honestly, the videos themselves, what I love about them
is the simplicity. It's there's no politics, there's no super
high level like production that goes into it. It literally
is the shopboard. We're updating the shopboard, you're welcoming teams.
(08:26):
They get to watch their school's name get put on here,
which is now a rite of passage for a lot
of these schools, you know, like the fans of Troy
are like.
Speaker 3 (08:33):
Oh, we're on the whiteboard. How awesome is this? And
you is it a daily update that you guys do?
Speaker 2 (08:39):
We do it three times a day, So we normally
do it an hour before the first game, an hour
before the second game, and then an hour after the
second game. That way, you know, give give people a
good update it. You know, we try to do it,
you know, an hour before the game because that's when
the fan bases are the biggest, and it's a lot
of fun. Like honestly, if you haven't been down for it,
it's people ground, People get up out of their chairs,
(09:01):
or they get you know, they they crowd around just
to see it get erased. And and especially if it's
a horse race, especially if it's you know, if two
schools are close, or if you know, oh we're we're
playing and we want to be ahead. We had we
had one, uh, one person that literally left their tab open.
Is like, I don't care if you have to put
two hundred on there. We're going to be winning before,
you know, before the first pitch is thrown, so like
it's it's just one of those things that, yeah, it's
(09:23):
it's a it's the atmosphere that that you want and
and you know that the pan shot of the crowd
is there is they're singing Rocky Top if it's Tennessee
or if it's Country Roads, you know, like take me Home,
if it's West Virginia this year, I mean, depending on
you know, the hotty Toddy, gosh a mighty, the the
the old mischance of always a fun one. So it's
cool to to update it and then have the fan
bases react as well. It brings a lot of energy.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
I love it.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
And the thing is it's not there's not a gate
keeping element to it. It's very like you can buy one.
I mean, you can be a part of this and
they're very affordable or if they're yeah, I mean like
you can go in there. The thing that I would
wondering when I first got there was the setup. Right,
so you walk in. You have this restaurant and you're
(10:07):
serving beverages and you're right across the street from a
gate in the stadium. So it's always going to be
busy just because of your proximity, so trying to navigate
that and then where do I go get my jello shots?
And you were forward thinking enough over there, Racos to say,
we just need to dedicate an entire space in our
building for this. So tell me about kind of how
the infrastructure of the Jello Shot challenge during College World
(10:30):
Series has evolved over the last few years.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
Absolutely, and what you were saying about gatekeeping briefly is
absolutely true. We had a ninety five year old woman
that took her first ever jello shot last year with us,
you know, and that's like a fun thing to do.
So but yeah, the you know, in twenty twenty two,
you know, eighteen seven and seventy seven for Old miss
and that number dwarfed, you know, the previous Mississippi state record,
and so it was really difficult because we're all selling
(10:54):
them behind the bar still and it's it's almost impossible
to serve alcoholic drinks and yellow shots when you're going
eighteen thousand, seven hundred and seventy seven. So the following
year we built a seventeen foot bar, you know, kind
of back against one of the walls, and that was
the That was twenty three and obviously we all know
what happened in twenty three LSU shows up and you know,
(11:16):
buy sixty and eighty eight shots.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
I that was the moment for me on your account
that it started to leak that they were just they
were buying so many of them. And it was the
Skins team, which is one of the great college teams
of the last decade for sure, and so like, I'm sure,
what what was that week like? Because I saw the
setup and everything, and I was like, Okay, that's awesome
(11:41):
that they have this home whole dedicated thing. But it
just it continued to crescendo as the week went on
with their purchases.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
The first guy that kept buying a lot was just
this I mean, he's just a general like southern looking
dude with a cool handlebar mustache. And he would he
would walk up and he buy a Trey and a
Tram was twenty so one hundred bucks. He'd give me
one hundred and fifty and then he'd just walk off
as I was making his change, and I'm like, ah,
I love this guy.
Speaker 4 (12:07):
I don't know who this guy is, but I love
this guy.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
We get three four days into the tournament, I find
out it's Dylan Cruz, you know, Golden Spikes winner center
fielder's dad, and he's just like, you know, he's just
he just loves it and and just the nicest guy
and never said anything about who he was or what
he was doing, just a just a super awesome guy. Well,
the further they made it, you know, we had at
the time, we had a private room that we had
run out to people, and him and some of the
(12:32):
other player's parents just said, hey, listen, we're here for
the long haul now, like, can we just have your
back room for the rest of the time. Like we'll
start a tab every day, one of us will pay
it every day. We don't you know, run up the tab.
Everyone's on one tab and then we'll just split it
at the you know. So we did it. It became
the LSU you know, friends and family room in that
back party room, and it was awesome because you got
(12:53):
to meet you know, we got to meet George, we
got to you know, get a you know, get a
tap on the shoulder. It's like, hey, we want to
talk about buying a lot of Jello shots. I'm like,
all right, how many you're looking for two hundred? You're
looking for four hundred, you know five, what are we
talking about? Well, come outside, talks to us table of guys,
no idea who they are. Ah, yeah, we're thinking about
like we're gonna break the record tomorrow. And I said, well,
(13:14):
I know where you have to get to. You know,
I know where you're at now, and I know where
you have to get to. It's you know, it's an
uphill battle, but I think you can do it. They're like, no, no, no,
we're gonna break this table is gonna break the record tomorrow.
And I'm like, you're gonna You're gonna buy enough. So
I was like, okay, they're talking thousands at this point
in time. Don't don't always believe because during college World Series,
everybody is somebody, you know, everybody thinks they're bigger and
(13:34):
everybody you know. So pulls out two black MX cards
and he's like he looks at his buddy and he goes,
is this personal or is this business?
Speaker 3 (13:41):
I don't.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
I don't really know how to And I'm like, all right,
you got two black mixes, then a thousand yellow shots
isn't hurting you too bad. Turns out to be the
billionaire owner of Raisin Canes. Todd Graves, Okay there, yeah,
and so it's it's one of those things that you're
just like, you know, but Todd was never said, Hi,
I'm Todd Graves, billionaire owner of Raisin Kanes, has never
you know, never been any thing but super cool to us.
So he does that, and then you know, we knew,
(14:04):
you know, it got to okay, we want to buy
two thousand, all right, three thousand. Then I get a
text a five thousand just to make sure, and then
it was, well, we just found out that Merle Haggard
has the shot record. He bought you know, five thousand
and something shots at a bar in Texas. So we
want to buy six thousand. We want to have the
unofficial you know, shot record, And so he buys six thousand,
(14:26):
and you know, and we have obviously we can't give
out six thousand. So we told him, we're like, hey man,
we'll give you. We'll do a whole thing. ESPN. We
know ESPN is going to be there now, like we've
made all these connections and so everyone's coming in.
Speaker 4 (14:37):
We'll do it. We'll do one.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
Big toast and then throughout the day we'll just kind
of send out another tray and like, you know, whoever's
twenty one, send out another tray, and just we have
to slowly leak six thousand yellow shots into a into
a populated bar. You can't just be like, hey, here
you go, everybody.
Speaker 4 (14:52):
Free for all.
Speaker 3 (14:52):
Yeah, yeah, here's here's a credive them. Yeah, help yourself.
Speaker 2 (14:55):
Yeah, exactly, especially because at the time we were still
you know, we're still all aged, because we wanted you know,
we wanted the family atmosphere. Of course, after that year,
the State Liquor Commission politely suggested that maybe we should
go twenty one and over because it would just help
everybody out at that point in time. But it was
one of those things that, yeah, like you meet these
people and you see it grow, and so then it's like,
(15:16):
all right, well we have the you know, we have
the back party room. And now you know, after they
won the championship, you know, all these people that we met,
you know, Okay, well we're during the week, I guess okay,
well we're bringing in Joe Burrow. Now, Pat, can you
get him in the back gate? We need a little
section roped off. Okay, well, now Brian Kelly and Kim
Wolkey Basketball and Football coach are coming in, like they're
bringing in all these people, and it's just like, Okay,
(15:38):
I don't know that we have the security for that,
Like I can't keep people out of that room.
Speaker 4 (15:41):
I can.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
You know, Scanson it off, but it was it was
a little bit surreal at that point in time that
you're meeting these people or you're having to tell these
people no some of the times too, So it's it's
kind of nuts. But yeah, the final night they win,
they get done with their hotel party. I think they're
at the Hilton.
Speaker 1 (15:58):
They were at the Hilton because I was staying at
the Hilton as a new omahan.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
It was my first night there.
Speaker 4 (16:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
I just was looking around just like this is insane. Yeah,
and that's crazy. How many people they had that packed
in there to welcome them back.
Speaker 4 (16:13):
Oh exactly.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
And most of them weren't even staying there, but they
knew that was the team hotel and so they were. Yeah,
and and how many people bought rooms just for the
night there, if they had any left, I mean, just
just because they knew. I mean, they party, but they
all came back that the ones that were there were
of age, came back to Rocos and the whole, like
most of the team was in there, all the seniors
and some of the juniors were in there, you know,
taking jello shots and hanging out with us, and you know,
(16:34):
got to meet you know, Skiens and and Dylan Cruz
and a bunch of those other guys. So it is
it's kind of one of those things that you're bartending.
Two of them were trying to help us bartend. I
had to tell one of them to put their cigar
out because they were smoking inside, you know, just like
that atmosphere is electric, but it's it's that weird moment
where you're like, I gotta do my job and I
got to keep this legal. But also this is pretty
This is a pretty cool thing that you'll remember for
(16:55):
while forever.
Speaker 3 (16:56):
What a what a sweet moment.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
So then you know, and obviously I'm hooked, Like I
love the idea of the College World Series every year
and living here now, but the whole like every day
we're downtown, we have to go to Rocos.
Speaker 3 (17:11):
So it changes.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Twenty twenty four and twenty twenty five you kind of
evolve it into an even more well oiled machine and
now you have dull room.
Speaker 3 (17:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
Yeah, So now the party room that the parents used
to be in. Yeah, that's just the jello shot room.
We realized that where we had it the bar the
first time, you know, when we built its own separate bar,
it was you know, there was just too much foot
traffic through that area right behind them exactly, so it's
tough to get there. So we decided that, you know,
we had to build its own separate bar. And so
(17:41):
now it's a twenty four foot bar with you know,
with two registers and four handhelds and that way, we know, okay,
because when it's busy, it's it's we're doing you know,
thousands of shots every couple of minutes. So it's you know,
you're you know, every ten twenty minutes, you're you're pumping
out a lot of shots. So you have to have
enough people back there, and you want people to you
know a lot of people aren't buying a ton, but
a lot You want the ninety five year old lady
(18:02):
that does one shot to be able to get in
there and not have to wait forty five minutes to
do or one jello shot. So you definitely again, you know,
Kevin the owner is is always thinking ahead and always
smart about that stuff, and we always meet him and
his sons and his wife. We all kind of have
an after action report afterwards, a little post mortem to
talk about what went well, what didn't you know? Next
(18:22):
year we should think about doing this, or next year
we got to remember this. This went wrong, so we
got to fix that. So yeah, he's just always thinking ahead.
And we work incredibly well together at this point in time,
so if one of us doesn't think of it, the
other one probably will. So yeah, it's got its own room.
It's got a big sign above it that says, you know,
world famous Jello Shot Challenge Room and everything. So we
(18:42):
have a big sign in the bar that says Jello
that points that way, so people, don't, you know, come
and ask the bartenders for it.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
It's such a great idea and I was in there
last year, I think it was, and I was just
kind of in awe how well it's set up. Now,
you know, they're, like you mentioned, there's like six different
lines you can be in at any one time, and
they're getting you through pretty fast. And part of the
reason of that is that you're just they're reaching in
and they're grabbing the color or flavor that people want,
(19:12):
and they're just able to hand them over. Like you said,
you've kind of taken out that process of having to
make it or to have to go fetch them. So
tell me about how that part has evolved to Now
you have basically the most technologically advanced jello shots that
anybody will find anywhere.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
Yeah, so we you know, the first company we used,
they you know, they have a prepackaged jello shot, and
they just physically couldn't provide us with with what we needed.
We sold them out day one, day two, day three,
and so finally it was getting to the point where
it was like, hey, like we need we had a
guy like a Liquoric from Kansas City run a U
(19:49):
haul and like Cannonball run twenty cases up for us,
you know what I mean. Like it got to the
point where we just they couldn't promise us the amount,
and so, you know, we switched to a different company
that was making them on premise, which was good because
then they could be a little more customizable and everything
is like okay, like you can really nail team colors
and you know, if you want to use different alcohols
or if you want to use different flavors, you can
(20:10):
do that. The problem with making them on premise is
one it's incredibly messy. Two you don't have the storage
for it, and then three you don't really have the time.
Like you have to have someone basically there, like like
as soon as we close and clean up and get
out of there. You have to have a team of people,
not just a guy. A team of people come in
to replenish ten thousand jello shots every day. So it's uh,
(20:32):
you know, we we had we had to go away
from them, and we ended up getting you know, getting
this company that that prepackages them, and they said, hey,
we'll have one hundred and twenty thousand co branded Rocos
and Jots is the name of the company. We'll have them,
you know, we'll have one hundred and twenty thousand in
you know, in the quality warehouse in Omahon and they'll
be ready for you like before the thing even starts.
We can promise that.
Speaker 4 (20:52):
And it was like.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
Perfect, that's what we want.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
Yeah, that's exactly what we need because that again, that
just takes a lot of the guesswork out of it
for us. Now it's just about ordering the you know,
the colors at night. This year, we are doing something
a little bit different. Obviously. What we haven't talked about
this whole time is the fact that you know that
this thing has become a charitable you know phenom, you know,
over the you know, over the course of its lifetime,
(21:16):
we've raised five hundred and thirty three thousand dollars UH
for to five food insecurity. A dollar from every shot
goes to that schools on campus food bank. Fifty cents
from every shot that gets sold stays in the Omaha
metro and gets distributed to food banks and the metro.
So it it's one of those things that, again you
make the Twitter account for it and that's really cool,
and then it blows up and then Kevin and Bonnie,
(21:37):
the owners, are like, well, we're not gonna do nothing
with this. We got to do something cool with this.
So they decided to donate that for the Missipi State
or sorry, the old miss Year and then just after
that it was like, we got to keep you know,
that's what makes it cool. It's not the competition makes
it cool. The charitable aspect makes it nice, you know,
makes it fun, but also something that people can really
hold on to.
Speaker 1 (21:58):
Yeah, I think just to kind of piggyback off of
that concept of charity that goes into it. It does
change the tone a bit because if there are people
in again, I like the party I'm down for, like, hey,
let's buy like ten of those and let's put them down,
like let's let's have it, let's have ourselves at night.
But my mom would not be like that. My mom
(22:19):
would be like, okay, come on, like this seems incredibly excessive.
And this is just, you know, hooliganism in America at
its finest. When you, you know, you introduce the idea
that you mentioned, a dollar to every Jello shot goes
to that school, yep, So the school itself is helping
out their own local community. And then of course, you,
(22:40):
being an Omaha business, fifty cents goes to this community
that we're in, that you're in, and you're talking hundreds
of thousands of dollars have been donated force food insecurity here.
I mean to me, that totally opens the door to
where there's really no downside to this as long as
it doesn't become on there.
Speaker 2 (23:00):
And that's exactly what how we feel. And again, you know,
Kevin and Bonnie, the owners have have always given to
the food banks because that you know, they've been in
the restaurant industry their whole lives, and so that's just
something you know, especially during COVID, we saw that, you know,
like how how how disturbing it is when people can't
get food. But yeah, it's it's one of those things
that they you know, that was you know, they knew
(23:21):
that we had that we were sitting on something, and
they knew that that we had built something, but they
didn't they didn't want it all for themselves. They want
they knew that they had to share in the in
this newfound fame, and that's that's what made it interesting
to a lot of other people. Great Todd Grave said,
He's like, if you guys were just doing this and
pocketing all the money, I probably would have came in
and bought some and just you know, helped out that
(23:41):
the fact that it goes to charity. Gordon McKernan and
another LSU booster. A lot of people that are coming
in are like, hey love the fact that this is
for charity. And that's the part that goes unseen a
lot of the times, Like, you know, I'll make those
posts and then people are like, oh, this is such
a total cash grab or this is I could make
a jello shot for four cents, or I could do this,
or you guys should do this. And it's like, again,
(24:01):
half a million dollars raised, and you're still gonna like
try to poopoo all over our thing. Like it's it's
a little strange to me, but anytime you become at
least moderately well known, you're gonna get some of those people.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
The element of supplying themand also I think applies here
you guys still don't You could price these things at
ten dollars a pop pretty easy and still have thousands
of people coming in there and buying them at this point.
You know what about this, you know, in terms of
the money in and of itself, because you dedicate an
(24:34):
entire room to basically two weeks of the year, you know, So,
so how did that kind of you know evolve as well?
Just trying to understand the supply and the demand is
that has just I mean, it's going to continue to increase.
West Virginia is gonna make a huge impact this year,
oh for sure.
Speaker 3 (24:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
I think the thing that everyone wanted to do early
on is everyone wanted to grow it but not in
an organic way. Everyone was like, oh, we should do this,
or we should do that. You know, you should have
a mechanical board that updates automatically every time someone buys this,
and people other companies are callingists and saying, hey, we'll
give you x amount of money to put our name
(25:11):
on the board, or you should do you should think
about this, or you should you know, ditch the weird
middle aged guy that writes on the board and gets
some young hot girl, you know what I mean. I've
heard it all and I agree with most of it,
but it's it's one of those things that you you
want to keep the thing as pure as possible. You want,
like we're fans of sports, we're fans of the college
(25:32):
World Series. We don't we're not looking, you know, we're
looking to just keep the thing as cool as it
can be for as long as it can be. And
that means it's still a forty dollars white board that
Kevin bought, you know, five or six years ago, you know,
and it still means the five dollars with the dollar
and dollar fifty like again, like there's no you know,
there's some inflation on jello this year, but at the
(25:53):
end of the day, we're still just going to keep
it at five because we think that's that's that's a
fair price for people to come in and do want
or do fifty doesn't really matter.
Speaker 3 (26:00):
And it's easier to do the mass, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
One hundred percent easier to do the math, which is
always helpful. But yeah, it's yeah, it's one of those
things that you you don't want to you don't want
to try to capitalize. People are coming in and they're
buying two jello shots and then four beers in a pizza,
you know what I mean. So that's the that's the
also true, they are still serving food. Yeah, that's the
that's the mathematics of it is. This thing is at
this point in time, it's you know, it's it's marketing
(26:22):
more than it is anything else. People are coming in
year round. I mean the month of July last year,
I bet fifty percent of our business was still people
from Louisiana. They were driving through, going to Mount Rushmore,
going to Sturgis, or going to you know, they're just
driving through and we're just stopping in because they didn't
get to make it during the series. You know, they
they come in, they take a picture of the shopboard.
See if we have any we do bang bang some
of them by ten to go because they're sealed so
(26:44):
we can sell them to go. And it's you know,
they take them back or take them on their journey
with them and it's it's cool. I call it the
call the shopboard the Mona Lisa of the sec because
everyone just crowds around it to get one picture of it.
So it's like lines of people just waiting to take
a picture of it.
Speaker 1 (26:58):
Literally what Skemes was updating the board. I mean, it's
what have looked like. It just like looked like there
was just this huge sea of people just trying to
get a video of what they were seeing in person.
Speaker 2 (27:09):
That was that was so wild because you know, we
I knew they were coming in, so we put them
a little you know, we put a little table together
for him because again they're they're people are gonna bug
him otherwise, so you have to rope it off a
little bit. And they had security and they you know,
we know all those they're they're great and but you
have to rope them off. So we're sitting there and
I was I was serving them drinks and stuff and
(27:30):
Livy Dunn said, hey, here's two thousand dollars. Paul wants
to buy shots for everybody in the bar, so you know,
i'd buy, you know, round of shots and just start
passing them out to some of the LSU fans we knew.
And one of the guys goes, hey, you're about to
do the update, right I said, yeah, he goes, you
should let Skans do it, and Skeens, like Skeens wasn't
drinking because he was in the season, he couldn't do
any shots. He was just kind of sitting in the corner.
(27:51):
It was kind of awkward because he like he couldn't
know everyone was just like staring at him.
Speaker 4 (27:56):
Like so yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:57):
So it was one of those things that it's like,
I don't know, man, I didn't Graves do it when
he bought six thousand, you know, And Graves looks at me,
he goes, I don't give it, no dude, you go like,
let like, let's Keen do. It'd be a lot of fun.
I said, all right, it sounds good. So we we
got him in Livy back behind the bar and I
was telling him, Okay, this what you're gonna do, I'll
wipe it. Down for you and then you you know,
and I was telling him the numbers, and the first
one he.
Speaker 4 (28:16):
Like, he was like, what am I doing?
Speaker 2 (28:17):
You know, and he writes it, and then the second one,
and then he feels like behind him, he feels the
electricity and he's like kind of turn around. He's like
he's getting pumped, like he's getting really into it at
that point in time. And so by the end of it,
I'm like, oh, yeah, he's turned around. He's let's go,
you know, because LSU was obviously in the lead, and
so that he gets done and and you know, he's
slapping hands and he's behind the bar and everyone's you know,
(28:40):
everyone's going wild and walk over and one of the
guys goes man, That's that's the most I've seen this
kid smile on this whole trip, because again, it was
it was he was only there for a day, and
it was like he wanted to be there for ten,
but he had to actually pitch in the big leagues unfortunately,
so he couldn't.
Speaker 4 (28:55):
So he was so so happy, so excited to do it.
Speaker 2 (28:58):
And and that's that's kind of what we like, is,
you know, the people that we have brought behind this
shopboard from time to time or the bar to look
at the shopboard. It's it's it's different back there, you know.
It's it's like you have you know, like you have
a crowd out there. And so every time I'm updating
that board, that's that's what we're trying to do, is
just get you know, get the people chanting their chants
(29:18):
or singing their songs or you know, supporting their school,
because it's just it's electric and gives us the energy.
Speaker 1 (29:24):
I think that the other thing that you're going to
look out for here this year with you know, West
Virginia is the school that to me is likely I
would put them as the favorite in the clubhouse to
because they they've heard all about the College World Series,
have never been and now this element of it a
chance for them and all of their fans to show
how much they've showed out, you know, and you have,
(29:47):
but you always have these little guys, you know, like
Oral Roberts and you had Murray State last year. You
have Troy coming this year with still plenty of you know,
the big dogs still in the field. What how do
you you know from your perspective, And I talk to
the people at the College World Series and they say
they love a mixture of all the different types of
(30:08):
you know, schools and sizes and locations that you know,
this tournament can bring people from your guys' perspective for
those little guys who have absolutely no hope of winning,
you know, your guys' thing, but they can still be
a part of this. What is kind of the message
that you guys feel from them as well because they
may not get the headlines, but they still get to
(30:30):
be a part of this really cool thing that you
guys have started.
Speaker 2 (30:33):
That's it's the message. One is that Omaha will have
your back, like Omaha loves an underdog when you know,
when it was Coastal Carolina, when it was you know,
when it was Oral Roberts. You know, like that, there's
these teams that Omaha just sort of automatically. If you
don't have a rooting interest, you're a lot of Omaha
is gonna pick you know, pick the underdog. So yeah, Troy,
(30:55):
Troy will will be well represented, if you know, and
from what I hear they travel, you know, there's not
a million people but the but you know, the couple
hundred that they have are rabbit. So I'm looking forward
to to seeing that fan base because I heard they're
you know, they love their baseball down there, and so
we are looking forward to meeting those fans. But but yeah,
Omaha will will represent the underdog. They always try to
(31:16):
do that. And the best part about that is is
that on a campus like Troy, if you know, if
we can get Troy to five thousand or six thousand
or eight thousand jello shots, that's that's two or three
or four times to some of these schools, the entire
budget of their food pantry, you know, in in ten days,
and so what their food pantry can do year round,
(31:38):
you know, at least for the next year two years
with that money is exponentially bigger than then a school
that has a lot more funding for things like that.
So when you, yeah, when you're you know, you when
you have the Murray States, when you have the Troy's
like it, we know that that money, all those thousands
of dollars make a difference in real hands in real
places that that aren't you know, that aren't Austin, Texas,
(31:59):
you know, aren't you know some of these bigger sort
of you know, UCLA, like some of these schools that
already have pretty well built out programs. So not to
say that all the money isn't useful anywhere it goes,
but to some of these schools that, especially their food banks,
it means means the world.
Speaker 1 (32:13):
Yeah, it's just a bigger chunk of you know, impact
then maybe the larger schools. You know, it's hard to
believe that Tuscaloosa is going to feel the same impact
even if they buy a ton of shots that a
place like Troy would find.
Speaker 3 (32:26):
So it's amazing.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
How would you best you know, for people listening to this,
obviously coming to Rocos would be the first thing that
they should do, But how can people follow along online
or learn more about what you and your entire team
of people do throughout the two weeks of the College
World series.
Speaker 2 (32:43):
Yeah, so the fall the original follow is the you
know is on x at CWS shop Board. You can
follow Rocos on Facebook, you can follow CWS Shopboard on Instagram.
You can follow Rocos on Instagram. We just we have
a TikTok now, so you can follow us on TikTok
as well, where it's mostly just the board updates. We
are going to do a couple fan interaction things this year,
(33:04):
a couple of fan contests, you know, trivia things like that,
just to see how much how much people know? What
do you know about your school and what do you
know about the College World series? So gonna be interested
to see that. Maybe give away a couple of yellow
shots and do things like that. But again, just try
to keep it fun and lighthearted and not take ourselves
too seriously. At the end of the day, we got
famous for selling jello, and that's a pretty silly thing,
so you got to keep it pretty silly in your
(33:26):
own head.
Speaker 3 (33:26):
Yeah, and the pizza is good, by the way, the
pizza is great.
Speaker 2 (33:29):
You know, I'll eat it for the next fourteen days
straight probably, so I love it.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Yeah. Yeah, I can imagine you workaholics down there. And
we had Amy Hornocker on from the College World serious.
She's like, yeah, I'm staying in a hotel down there
because I can't get away for two weeks.
Speaker 3 (33:42):
You know.
Speaker 1 (33:43):
Yeah, it's like, you know, it's fun for us to
go down and party. You guys have a bit of
elbow grease.
Speaker 2 (33:48):
I left the neighborhood one time last year. I was
out of food and so I was going to get
groceries quick and just literally lived downtown. So I just
drove up, you know, to Saddle Creek and I was
getting some food. As soon as I push my car
in the store, I get a phone call and it's
from Kevin, the owner, the only number that rings through,
you know during that time. Hey, yeah, the Governor Louisiana
(34:10):
has a couple of guys down here and they want
to come do a thing and I need you to
talk to him, can you? And I was like, just
push my grocery cart back outside and you know, into
the into the stalls and then went I was like, yep,
guess I'm nugetting food from uh for.
Speaker 4 (34:20):
The apartment today.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
So yeah, just one of those things that it's It's
always something if you you know, if you think you
can sleep in, then you have an interview and then
you have you know, this went down. The computers crashed,
you know, the internet, the credit card processing is going wrong,
and this guy wants to talk to you, this guy
wants to pitch you something. You know, this staff member
didn't show up. So it's always you're just you're just
on your toes for you know, for the rest of
(34:42):
the time. My body is slowly just waning me off
sleep Like you know, I was like last week, I
started only sleeping like six hours and I'm like, man,
I'm you need to rest up.
Speaker 4 (34:49):
What am I doing?
Speaker 2 (34:49):
Then?
Speaker 4 (34:50):
I was like, Oh, my body knows, it knows what's coming.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
It's just like you know, you're you're gonna be way
more used to the two hours you're going to be
getting to these nights.
Speaker 4 (34:57):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
Pat McAvoy, who is the manager of Rocos Pizza and
Cantina right across the street from Charles Schwapfield be there
or B Square, honestly just an absolute party, fun atmosphere,
and I can't wait to see how the Lefties garage
shore thing works out. I think that's going to be
a lot of fun. Thanks for coming in and doing this, man, Honestly,
always fun to chat with you, and I can't wait
to see you because I will be going down into
(35:19):
donating my dollars to jell O here the.
Speaker 3 (35:22):
Next few days.
Speaker 4 (35:23):
Fantastic, fantastic, Looking forward to seeing you.
Speaker 1 (35:25):
Yeah, absolutely, and I'm looking forward to seeing you come
and say hello when you see us down there at
the College World series this weekend. And stay locked in.
We got plenty more coming in this feed for the
Emery Sunger podcast coming up in the next few weeks,
right here on the free iHeartRadio app
It is the Emory Songer podcast here on the iHeartRadio app.
We thank you for joining us. If you live in Omaha,
you know this time of the year is about as
exciting as it gets. The College World Series is upon us,
and one of the places that a lot of people
are going to be stopping. In fact, I would imagine
most people are stopping is Rocos, right across the street
from Charles schwab Field and joining us to talk about Rocos,
(00:31):
the impact it is having and what has made it
a staple of the College World Series for tourists and
locals alike. Is the manager of Rocos, Pat McAvoy, sitting here. Pat,
thanks so much for stopping in on this busy week
for you guys.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Absolutely absolutely, always always happy to help you get the
message out of what we're trying to do at Rocos,
especially to the local audience.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
Yeah, so let's go ahead and start at the very beginning.
Rocos Pizza and Cantana located on in a beautiful spot
just right across the street from the ball field. You guys, Uh,
I'm so happy you exist because after like a Supernova's
game or you know, any late event, I can usually
stumble in there and get myself a good pizza.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Yeah. We with so avent riven most of the most
of the year obviously, with you know, concerts, conferences, Creighton
Basketball Union, Omaha, now Supernova's. Yeah, there's so many people
that don't come down outside of College World Series, which
is which is a real shame because the area is
a is a lot of fun and only growing bigger
and bigger. But it's yeah, we do have a nice
little spot right across the street from Gate to and
(01:34):
we do do have a I mean I have season
tickets to you know, to the Supernova's. I go to
all those games then stumble back myself to Rocos, so
I understand.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
Oh yeah, I love that. Now. See we were talking
before we came on the air.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
Anybody who spends a lot of time downtown, right you
kind of like you you learn the lay of the
land and you kind of have your spots, and Roccos
has become that Lefties's next door. I got, you know,
my buddies, the Pork tour NADOs, who you know, great
you know cover band that come to Omaha a couple
of times a year. They love to after party at
Lefties and.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
After they're done at Slow Down. Yeah, yeah, I was
at that show for a little bit this year, so
I mean.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
It's just it's the spot is just immaculate, and you
guys Rocos itself. Let's talk about the layout because you
have a lot of patio space. Yeah, and I know
this time of the year that's really important for you guys.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Well, especially because you know Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, I think
it's it's you know, it's going to be in the seventies,
which is you know, seventy seventy five to watch a
baseball game. I remember, if never, we haven't had weather
like this in a long time, so it's you know,
normally we get unlucky and it's either one hundred and
ten or it's sixty in raining. So uh, definitely looking
forward to it. But yeah, big patio right across the street,
you kind of get to see all the festivities as
the teams come by, the team buses come by. You know,
(02:47):
there'll be fans out there cheering and you know, making
making a lot of noise to represent their squad. But
uh yeah, and this year it'll be a little bit
different because Lefties and Rocos is actually one bar now,
so we have a garage door in the middle that
we built the off season that we you know, took
took six months to get all the all the you know,
all the clearance from the city and everything. But now
it's you know, it's all one big space. So they'll
(03:08):
be you know, they'll be the one way into to
both bars, and but you'll be able to buy jello shit.
You know, you'll be able to walk around to the
jell O shot room and do that from from Lefties,
so you don't have to go outside your pizza. You
don't have to walk outside to get it anymore. It'll
it'll come right over to you. You'll come get it. So, yeah,
just one of those things that every year you try
to make the space a little more inviting and a
little bit bigger and a little bit better, and you
(03:28):
don't want to rest on your laurels, and so we're
just trying to trying to fine tune it and make
sure that that we can fit the.
Speaker 4 (03:34):
Most amount of people in and that you know, everybody's happy.
Speaker 3 (03:37):
That garage door thing is gonna be awesome.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
Yeahow, I mean, what a great idea, especially with all
the people trying to pack in and I mean we've
kind of buried the lead a little bit. The reason
that you know, Roco is a great establishment, but the
reason it has become the premiere establishment this time of
the year is the Jello Shot Challenge. And I moved
to Omaha just after the College World Series in twenty
(03:59):
twenty three. Okay, that was you know, that was lsu big,
you know, when it really started to jump up. And
the first day that I worked here in this building,
I went downtown because it was the finals and I
just had to stop in and see Rocos for myself
because I saw it on social media. Now it is
is an icon of kind of this event. You know,
(04:21):
just a few years later, everybody who is coming for
the first time or their school has become kind of
like North Carolina, like a regular. They are making their
plans to go to Rocos and take part in this
Jello Shot Challenge. So where was this formulated? How did
this start? And did you have any concept of how
big this thing was going to become.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
The answer to that last question is definitely not the
answer to the start of the question. Is it started
as a fun, fun thing between fan bases like I'm
you know, obviously a big, big, fan of a lot
of different sports. I've my teams that I root for
that I keep private this time of year, so I
don't get too much on line, but I have, you know,
i have my squads that I root for, and I've
(05:02):
been to a lot of a lot of away games
and seeing a lot of a lot of different sporting
events and a lot of different venues. And you find
that there is fan bases that are better fan bases,
and there's fan bases that are worse. So there's fan
bases that travel better and there's fan bases that don't.
But every school, every time you go to a place,
it's like, oh, our fans are the best. It's like, well,
how do you prove that? Like you can't prove it
by you know this or that. There's no like real metric.
(05:24):
And so you know, the first year of the of
the new stadium in twenty eleven, if Florida South Carolina
were playing in the finals, and this is before it
was Rocos, this is back when that building was good nights,
and the Florida fans were down, and so we gave
them rally shots. The South Carolina fans found out about
the rally shots and they wanted their own rally shots too,
and so it was a fun deal where we weren't
(05:44):
keeping track, but they both had their own signature shot
and they were sending them back and forth and everybody
was happy and everybody, you know, friendly rivalry is how
I would describe it. And so like six months later,
I'm sitting at a DJ's dugout out in West Omaha
rip DJ's piano bar when they used to have dueling
pianos like that was like the most fun thing you
could do on the weekend. And the one of the
(06:06):
guys was playing Let's Go Jay's and the other guys
playing Go Big Red because Nebraska and Creton were playing basketball,
and fans are like tripping all o'er themselves, I mean
like tossing chairs out of the way to go slam
dunk hundreds into it, you know, into a guy's tip jar.
So he keeps playing the school's fight song. And I
thought that that was just such a brilliant move by
those guys. And so the next series rolled around, I
was like, well, what if we make a signature I
(06:27):
was only already going to make a signature shot for everybody,
but what if we keep track? What if we put
a metric to the fan base, what fan base is
the best based on how many shots they they selling.
At the time, I was just making you know, batches
of shots and store and pores and just you know,
it wasn't Jello. Wasn't Jello until twenty nineteen. Kevin the
current owner of Rocos, he started Rocos after good Night's closed. Yeah,
(06:49):
they he was like, what if we just do these
prepackaged Jello shots so you don't have to individually set
out twenty shots or fifty shots or a hundred shots.
I said, right, way easier for me, brother, Like, let's
do it that way. So that's you know, twenty nineteen
was the first year that it became the jell O Shot,
the True jell O Shot Challenge. So yeah, now obviously
it's a little bit different. You know that that year
the most we sold was eight hundred and sixty four
(07:11):
to Arkansas, you know. And then and then we started
to catch a little bit of wins, you know, like
different Twitter accounts and some social media stuff happened, and
you know, the next year, Mississippi State was here and
they saw that the Kevin's like, you know what, I'm
gonna make a plaque for the all time record. The
Mississippi States fans saw that plaque and they were like, no, no.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
Right, this will not stand, and we say know what
to shoot for now?
Speaker 2 (07:33):
Yeah, and so they went, you know, they went twenty
nine hundred and sixty five. And you know, in twenty
one and you know, it's three X We're like, oh
my god, you know, who's going to touch that? Like
this is you know, that's insane. And then you know,
again some rumblings of social media and some other people
like oh this person or that person talked about you.
So you know, in twenty two, I started the Twitter
account for you know, for just the whiteboard, you know.
Speaker 4 (07:56):
Just this is the update. This is where you can
go and get it.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
And and I had seventeen followers on Monday, and by
the end of the week, I had like seventeen thousand,
and I was like, oh, people care about this. Oh.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
And honestly, the videos themselves, what I love about them
is the simplicity. It's there's no politics, there's no super
high level like production that goes into it. It literally
is the shopboard. We're updating the shopboard, you're welcoming teams.
(08:26):
They get to watch their school's name get put on here,
which is now a rite of passage for a lot
of these schools, you know, like the fans of Troy
are like.
Speaker 3 (08:33):
Oh, we're on the whiteboard. How awesome is this? And
you is it a daily update that you guys do?
Speaker 2 (08:39):
We do it three times a day, So we normally
do it an hour before the first game, an hour
before the second game, and then an hour after the
second game. That way, you know, give give people a
good update it. You know, we try to do it,
you know, an hour before the game because that's when
the fan bases are the biggest, and it's a lot
of fun. Like honestly, if you haven't been down for it,
it's people ground, People get up out of their chairs,
(09:01):
or they get you know, they they crowd around just
to see it get erased. And and especially if it's
a horse race, especially if it's you know, if two
schools are close, or if you know, oh we're we're
playing and we want to be ahead. We had we
had one, uh, one person that literally left their tab open.
Is like, I don't care if you have to put
two hundred on there. We're going to be winning before,
you know, before the first pitch is thrown, so like
it's it's just one of those things that, yeah, it's
(09:23):
it's a it's the atmosphere that that you want and
and you know that the pan shot of the crowd
is there is they're singing Rocky Top if it's Tennessee
or if it's Country Roads, you know, like take me Home,
if it's West Virginia this year, I mean, depending on
you know, the hotty Toddy, gosh a mighty, the the
the old mischance of always a fun one. So it's
cool to to update it and then have the fan
bases react as well. It brings a lot of energy.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
I love it.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
And the thing is it's not there's not a gate
keeping element to it. It's very like you can buy one.
I mean, you can be a part of this and
they're very affordable or if they're yeah, I mean like
you can go in there. The thing that I would
wondering when I first got there was the setup. Right,
so you walk in. You have this restaurant and you're
(10:07):
serving beverages and you're right across the street from a
gate in the stadium. So it's always going to be
busy just because of your proximity, so trying to navigate
that and then where do I go get my jello shots?
And you were forward thinking enough over there, Racos to say,
we just need to dedicate an entire space in our
building for this. So tell me about kind of how
the infrastructure of the Jello Shot challenge during College World
(10:30):
Series has evolved over the last few years.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
Absolutely, and what you were saying about gatekeeping briefly is
absolutely true. We had a ninety five year old woman
that took her first ever jello shot last year with us,
you know, and that's like a fun thing to do.
So but yeah, the you know, in twenty twenty two,
you know, eighteen seven and seventy seven for Old miss
and that number dwarfed, you know, the previous Mississippi state record,
and so it was really difficult because we're all selling
(10:54):
them behind the bar still and it's it's almost impossible
to serve alcoholic drinks and yellow shots when you're going
eighteen thousand, seven hundred and seventy seven. So the following
year we built a seventeen foot bar, you know, kind
of back against one of the walls, and that was
the That was twenty three and obviously we all know
what happened in twenty three LSU shows up and you know,
(11:16):
buy sixty and eighty eight shots.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
I that was the moment for me on your account
that it started to leak that they were just they
were buying so many of them. And it was the
Skins team, which is one of the great college teams
of the last decade for sure, and so like, I'm sure,
what what was that week like? Because I saw the
setup and everything, and I was like, Okay, that's awesome
(11:41):
that they have this home whole dedicated thing. But it
just it continued to crescendo as the week went on
with their purchases.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
The first guy that kept buying a lot was just
this I mean, he's just a general like southern looking
dude with a cool handlebar mustache. And he would he
would walk up and he buy a Trey and a
Tram was twenty so one hundred bucks. He'd give me
one hundred and fifty and then he'd just walk off
as I was making his change, and I'm like, ah,
I love this guy.
Speaker 4 (12:07):
I don't know who this guy is, but I love
this guy.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
We get three four days into the tournament, I find
out it's Dylan Cruz, you know, Golden Spikes winner center
fielder's dad, and he's just like, you know, he's just
he just loves it and and just the nicest guy
and never said anything about who he was or what
he was doing, just a just a super awesome guy. Well,
the further they made it, you know, we had at
the time, we had a private room that we had
run out to people, and him and some of the
(12:32):
other player's parents just said, hey, listen, we're here for
the long haul now, like, can we just have your
back room for the rest of the time. Like we'll
start a tab every day, one of us will pay
it every day. We don't you know, run up the tab.
Everyone's on one tab and then we'll just split it
at the you know. So we did it. It became
the LSU you know, friends and family room in that
back party room, and it was awesome because you got
(12:53):
to meet you know, we got to meet George, we
got to you know, get a you know, get a
tap on the shoulder. It's like, hey, we want to
talk about buying a lot of Jello shots. I'm like,
all right, how many you're looking for two hundred? You're
looking for four hundred, you know five, what are we
talking about? Well, come outside, talks to us table of guys,
no idea who they are. Ah, yeah, we're thinking about
like we're gonna break the record tomorrow. And I said, well,
(13:14):
I know where you have to get to. You know,
I know where you're at now, and I know where
you have to get to. It's you know, it's an
uphill battle, but I think you can do it. They're like, no, no, no,
we're gonna break this table is gonna break the record tomorrow.
And I'm like, you're gonna You're gonna buy enough. So
I was like, okay, they're talking thousands at this point
in time. Don't don't always believe because during college World Series,
everybody is somebody, you know, everybody thinks they're bigger and
(13:34):
everybody you know. So pulls out two black MX cards
and he's like he looks at his buddy and he goes,
is this personal or is this business?
Speaker 3 (13:41):
I don't.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
I don't really know how to And I'm like, all right,
you got two black mixes, then a thousand yellow shots
isn't hurting you too bad. Turns out to be the
billionaire owner of Raisin Canes. Todd Graves, Okay there, yeah,
and so it's it's one of those things that you're
just like, you know, but Todd was never said, Hi,
I'm Todd Graves, billionaire owner of Raisin Kanes, has never
you know, never been any thing but super cool to us.
So he does that, and then you know, we knew,
(14:04):
you know, it got to okay, we want to buy
two thousand, all right, three thousand. Then I get a
text a five thousand just to make sure, and then
it was, well, we just found out that Merle Haggard
has the shot record. He bought you know, five thousand
and something shots at a bar in Texas. So we
want to buy six thousand. We want to have the
unofficial you know, shot record, And so he buys six thousand,
(14:26):
and you know, and we have obviously we can't give
out six thousand. So we told him, we're like, hey man,
we'll give you. We'll do a whole thing. ESPN. We
know ESPN is going to be there now, like we've
made all these connections and so everyone's coming in.
Speaker 4 (14:37):
We'll do it. We'll do one.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
Big toast and then throughout the day we'll just kind
of send out another tray and like, you know, whoever's
twenty one, send out another tray, and just we have
to slowly leak six thousand yellow shots into a into
a populated bar. You can't just be like, hey, here
you go, everybody.
Speaker 4 (14:52):
Free for all.
Speaker 3 (14:52):
Yeah, yeah, here's here's a credive them. Yeah, help yourself.
Speaker 2 (14:55):
Yeah, exactly, especially because at the time we were still
you know, we're still all aged, because we wanted you know,
we wanted the family atmosphere. Of course, after that year,
the State Liquor Commission politely suggested that maybe we should
go twenty one and over because it would just help
everybody out at that point in time. But it was
one of those things that, yeah, like you meet these
people and you see it grow, and so then it's like,
(15:16):
all right, well we have the you know, we have
the back party room. And now you know, after they
won the championship, you know, all these people that we met,
you know, Okay, well we're during the week, I guess okay,
well we're bringing in Joe Burrow. Now, Pat, can you
get him in the back gate? We need a little
section roped off. Okay, well, now Brian Kelly and Kim
Wolkey Basketball and Football coach are coming in, like they're
bringing in all these people, and it's just like, Okay,
(15:38):
I don't know that we have the security for that,
Like I can't keep people out of that room.
Speaker 4 (15:41):
I can.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
You know, Scanson it off, but it was it was
a little bit surreal at that point in time that
you're meeting these people or you're having to tell these
people no some of the times too, So it's it's
kind of nuts. But yeah, the final night they win,
they get done with their hotel party. I think they're
at the Hilton.
Speaker 1 (15:58):
They were at the Hilton because I was staying at
the Hilton as a new omahan.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
It was my first night there.
Speaker 4 (16:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
I just was looking around just like this is insane. Yeah,
and that's crazy. How many people they had that packed
in there to welcome them back.
Speaker 4 (16:13):
Oh exactly.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
And most of them weren't even staying there, but they
knew that was the team hotel and so they were. Yeah,
and and how many people bought rooms just for the
night there, if they had any left, I mean, just
just because they knew. I mean, they party, but they
all came back that the ones that were there were
of age, came back to Rocos and the whole, like
most of the team was in there, all the seniors
and some of the juniors were in there, you know,
taking jello shots and hanging out with us, and you know,
(16:34):
got to meet you know, Skiens and and Dylan Cruz
and a bunch of those other guys. So it is
it's kind of one of those things that you're bartending.
Two of them were trying to help us bartend. I
had to tell one of them to put their cigar
out because they were smoking inside, you know, just like
that atmosphere is electric, but it's it's that weird moment
where you're like, I gotta do my job and I
got to keep this legal. But also this is pretty
This is a pretty cool thing that you'll remember for
(16:55):
while forever.
Speaker 3 (16:56):
What a what a sweet moment.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
So then you know, and obviously I'm hooked, Like I
love the idea of the College World Series every year
and living here now, but the whole like every day
we're downtown, we have to go to Rocos.
Speaker 3 (17:11):
So it changes.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Twenty twenty four and twenty twenty five you kind of
evolve it into an even more well oiled machine and
now you have dull room.
Speaker 3 (17:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
Yeah, So now the party room that the parents used
to be in. Yeah, that's just the jello shot room.
We realized that where we had it the bar the
first time, you know, when we built its own separate bar,
it was you know, there was just too much foot
traffic through that area right behind them exactly, so it's
tough to get there. So we decided that, you know,
we had to build its own separate bar. And so
(17:41):
now it's a twenty four foot bar with you know,
with two registers and four handhelds and that way, we know, okay,
because when it's busy, it's it's we're doing you know,
thousands of shots every couple of minutes. So it's you know,
you're you know, every ten twenty minutes, you're you're pumping
out a lot of shots. So you have to have
enough people back there, and you want people to you
know a lot of people aren't buying a ton, but
a lot You want the ninety five year old lady
(18:02):
that does one shot to be able to get in
there and not have to wait forty five minutes to
do or one jello shot. So you definitely again, you know,
Kevin the owner is is always thinking ahead and always
smart about that stuff, and we always meet him and
his sons and his wife. We all kind of have
an after action report afterwards, a little post mortem to
talk about what went well, what didn't you know? Next
(18:22):
year we should think about doing this, or next year
we got to remember this. This went wrong, so we
got to fix that. So yeah, he's just always thinking ahead.
And we work incredibly well together at this point in time,
so if one of us doesn't think of it, the
other one probably will. So yeah, it's got its own room.
It's got a big sign above it that says, you know,
world famous Jello Shot Challenge Room and everything. So we
(18:42):
have a big sign in the bar that says Jello
that points that way, so people, don't, you know, come
and ask the bartenders for it.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
It's such a great idea and I was in there
last year, I think it was, and I was just
kind of in awe how well it's set up. Now,
you know, they're, like you mentioned, there's like six different
lines you can be in at any one time, and
they're getting you through pretty fast. And part of the
reason of that is that you're just they're reaching in
and they're grabbing the color or flavor that people want,
(19:12):
and they're just able to hand them over. Like you said,
you've kind of taken out that process of having to
make it or to have to go fetch them. So
tell me about how that part has evolved to Now
you have basically the most technologically advanced jello shots that
anybody will find anywhere.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
Yeah, so we you know, the first company we used,
they you know, they have a prepackaged jello shot, and
they just physically couldn't provide us with with what we needed.
We sold them out day one, day two, day three,
and so finally it was getting to the point where
it was like, hey, like we need we had a
guy like a Liquoric from Kansas City run a U
(19:49):
haul and like Cannonball run twenty cases up for us,
you know what I mean. Like it got to the
point where we just they couldn't promise us the amount,
and so, you know, we switched to a different company
that was making them on premise, which was good because
then they could be a little more customizable and everything
is like okay, like you can really nail team colors
and you know, if you want to use different alcohols
or if you want to use different flavors, you can
(20:10):
do that. The problem with making them on premise is
one it's incredibly messy. Two you don't have the storage
for it, and then three you don't really have the time.
Like you have to have someone basically there, like like
as soon as we close and clean up and get
out of there. You have to have a team of people,
not just a guy. A team of people come in
to replenish ten thousand jello shots every day. So it's uh,
(20:32):
you know, we we had we had to go away
from them, and we ended up getting you know, getting
this company that that prepackages them, and they said, hey,
we'll have one hundred and twenty thousand co branded Rocos
and Jots is the name of the company. We'll have them,
you know, we'll have one hundred and twenty thousand in
you know, in the quality warehouse in Omahon and they'll
be ready for you like before the thing even starts.
We can promise that.
Speaker 4 (20:52):
And it was like.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
Perfect, that's what we want.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
Yeah, that's exactly what we need because that again, that
just takes a lot of the guesswork out of it
for us. Now it's just about ordering the you know,
the colors at night. This year, we are doing something
a little bit different. Obviously. What we haven't talked about
this whole time is the fact that you know that
this thing has become a charitable you know phenom, you know,
over the you know, over the course of its lifetime,
(21:16):
we've raised five hundred and thirty three thousand dollars UH
for to five food insecurity. A dollar from every shot
goes to that schools on campus food bank. Fifty cents
from every shot that gets sold stays in the Omaha
metro and gets distributed to food banks and the metro.
So it it's one of those things that, again you
make the Twitter account for it and that's really cool,
and then it blows up and then Kevin and Bonnie,
(21:37):
the owners, are like, well, we're not gonna do nothing
with this. We got to do something cool with this.
So they decided to donate that for the Missipi State
or sorry, the old miss Year and then just after
that it was like, we got to keep you know,
that's what makes it cool. It's not the competition makes
it cool. The charitable aspect makes it nice, you know,
makes it fun, but also something that people can really
hold on to.
Speaker 1 (21:58):
Yeah, I think just to kind of piggyback off of
that concept of charity that goes into it. It does
change the tone a bit because if there are people
in again, I like the party I'm down for, like, hey,
let's buy like ten of those and let's put them down,
like let's let's have it, let's have ourselves at night.
But my mom would not be like that. My mom
(22:19):
would be like, okay, come on, like this seems incredibly excessive.
And this is just, you know, hooliganism in America at
its finest. When you, you know, you introduce the idea
that you mentioned, a dollar to every Jello shot goes
to that school, yep, So the school itself is helping
out their own local community. And then of course, you,
(22:40):
being an Omaha business, fifty cents goes to this community
that we're in, that you're in, and you're talking hundreds
of thousands of dollars have been donated force food insecurity here.
I mean to me, that totally opens the door to
where there's really no downside to this as long as
it doesn't become on there.
Speaker 2 (23:00):
And that's exactly what how we feel. And again, you know,
Kevin and Bonnie, the owners have have always given to
the food banks because that you know, they've been in
the restaurant industry their whole lives, and so that's just
something you know, especially during COVID, we saw that, you know,
like how how how disturbing it is when people can't
get food. But yeah, it's it's one of those things
that they you know, that was you know, they knew
(23:21):
that we had that we were sitting on something, and
they knew that that we had built something, but they
didn't they didn't want it all for themselves. They want
they knew that they had to share in the in
this newfound fame, and that's that's what made it interesting
to a lot of other people. Great Todd Grave said,
He's like, if you guys were just doing this and
pocketing all the money, I probably would have came in
and bought some and just you know, helped out that
(23:41):
the fact that it goes to charity. Gordon McKernan and
another LSU booster. A lot of people that are coming
in are like, hey love the fact that this is
for charity. And that's the part that goes unseen a
lot of the times, Like, you know, I'll make those
posts and then people are like, oh, this is such
a total cash grab or this is I could make
a jello shot for four cents, or I could do this,
or you guys should do this. And it's like, again,
(24:01):
half a million dollars raised, and you're still gonna like
try to poopoo all over our thing. Like it's it's
a little strange to me, but anytime you become at
least moderately well known, you're gonna get some of those people.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
The element of supplying themand also I think applies here
you guys still don't You could price these things at
ten dollars a pop pretty easy and still have thousands
of people coming in there and buying them at this point.
You know what about this, you know, in terms of
the money in and of itself, because you dedicate an
(24:34):
entire room to basically two weeks of the year, you know, So,
so how did that kind of you know evolve as well?
Just trying to understand the supply and the demand is
that has just I mean, it's going to continue to increase.
West Virginia is gonna make a huge impact this year,
oh for sure.
Speaker 3 (24:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
I think the thing that everyone wanted to do early
on is everyone wanted to grow it but not in
an organic way. Everyone was like, oh, we should do this,
or we should do that. You know, you should have
a mechanical board that updates automatically every time someone buys this,
and people other companies are callingists and saying, hey, we'll
give you x amount of money to put our name
(25:11):
on the board, or you should do you should think
about this, or you should you know, ditch the weird
middle aged guy that writes on the board and gets
some young hot girl, you know what I mean. I've
heard it all and I agree with most of it,
but it's it's one of those things that you you
want to keep the thing as pure as possible. You want,
like we're fans of sports, we're fans of the college
(25:32):
World Series. We don't we're not looking, you know, we're
looking to just keep the thing as cool as it
can be for as long as it can be. And
that means it's still a forty dollars white board that
Kevin bought, you know, five or six years ago, you know,
and it still means the five dollars with the dollar
and dollar fifty like again, like there's no you know,
there's some inflation on jello this year, but at the
(25:53):
end of the day, we're still just going to keep
it at five because we think that's that's that's a
fair price for people to come in and do want
or do fifty doesn't really matter.
Speaker 3 (26:00):
And it's easier to do the mass, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
One hundred percent easier to do the math, which is
always helpful. But yeah, it's yeah, it's one of those
things that you you don't want to you don't want
to try to capitalize. People are coming in and they're
buying two jello shots and then four beers in a pizza,
you know what I mean. So that's the that's the
also true, they are still serving food. Yeah, that's the
that's the mathematics of it is. This thing is at
this point in time, it's you know, it's it's marketing
(26:22):
more than it is anything else. People are coming in
year round. I mean the month of July last year,
I bet fifty percent of our business was still people
from Louisiana. They were driving through, going to Mount Rushmore,
going to Sturgis, or going to you know, they're just
driving through and we're just stopping in because they didn't
get to make it during the series. You know, they
they come in, they take a picture of the shopboard.
See if we have any we do bang bang some
of them by ten to go because they're sealed so
(26:44):
we can sell them to go. And it's you know,
they take them back or take them on their journey
with them and it's it's cool. I call it the
call the shopboard the Mona Lisa of the sec because
everyone just crowds around it to get one picture of it.
So it's like lines of people just waiting to take
a picture of it.
Speaker 1 (26:58):
Literally what Skemes was updating the board. I mean, it's
what have looked like. It just like looked like there
was just this huge sea of people just trying to
get a video of what they were seeing in person.
Speaker 2 (27:09):
That was that was so wild because you know, we
I knew they were coming in, so we put them
a little you know, we put a little table together
for him because again they're they're people are gonna bug
him otherwise, so you have to rope it off a
little bit. And they had security and they you know,
we know all those they're they're great and but you
have to rope them off. So we're sitting there and
I was I was serving them drinks and stuff and
(27:30):
Livy Dunn said, hey, here's two thousand dollars. Paul wants
to buy shots for everybody in the bar, so you know,
i'd buy, you know, round of shots and just start
passing them out to some of the LSU fans we knew.
And one of the guys goes, hey, you're about to
do the update, right I said, yeah, he goes, you
should let Skans do it, and Skeens, like Skeens wasn't
drinking because he was in the season, he couldn't do
any shots. He was just kind of sitting in the corner.
(27:51):
It was kind of awkward because he like he couldn't
know everyone was just like staring at him.
Speaker 4 (27:56):
Like so yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:57):
So it was one of those things that it's like,
I don't know, man, I didn't Graves do it when
he bought six thousand, you know, And Graves looks at me,
he goes, I don't give it, no dude, you go like,
let like, let's Keen do. It'd be a lot of fun.
I said, all right, it sounds good. So we we
got him in Livy back behind the bar and I
was telling him, Okay, this what you're gonna do, I'll
wipe it. Down for you and then you you know,
and I was telling him the numbers, and the first
one he.
Speaker 4 (28:16):
Like, he was like, what am I doing?
Speaker 2 (28:17):
You know, and he writes it, and then the second one,
and then he feels like behind him, he feels the
electricity and he's like kind of turn around. He's like
he's getting pumped, like he's getting really into it at
that point in time. And so by the end of it,
I'm like, oh, yeah, he's turned around. He's let's go,
you know, because LSU was obviously in the lead, and
so that he gets done and and you know, he's
slapping hands and he's behind the bar and everyone's you know,
(28:40):
everyone's going wild and walk over and one of the
guys goes man, That's that's the most I've seen this
kid smile on this whole trip, because again, it was
it was he was only there for a day, and
it was like he wanted to be there for ten,
but he had to actually pitch in the big leagues unfortunately,
so he couldn't.
Speaker 4 (28:55):
So he was so so happy, so excited to do it.
Speaker 2 (28:58):
And and that's that's kind of what we like, is,
you know, the people that we have brought behind this
shopboard from time to time or the bar to look
at the shopboard. It's it's it's different back there, you know.
It's it's like you have you know, like you have
a crowd out there. And so every time I'm updating
that board, that's that's what we're trying to do, is
just get you know, get the people chanting their chants
(29:18):
or singing their songs or you know, supporting their school,
because it's just it's electric and gives us the energy.
Speaker 1 (29:24):
I think that the other thing that you're going to
look out for here this year with you know, West
Virginia is the school that to me is likely I
would put them as the favorite in the clubhouse to
because they they've heard all about the College World Series,
have never been and now this element of it a
chance for them and all of their fans to show
how much they've showed out, you know, and you have,
(29:47):
but you always have these little guys, you know, like
Oral Roberts and you had Murray State last year. You
have Troy coming this year with still plenty of you know,
the big dogs still in the field. What how do
you you know from your perspective, And I talk to
the people at the College World Series and they say
they love a mixture of all the different types of
(30:08):
you know, schools and sizes and locations that you know,
this tournament can bring people from your guys' perspective for
those little guys who have absolutely no hope of winning,
you know, your guys' thing, but they can still be
a part of this. What is kind of the message
that you guys feel from them as well because they
may not get the headlines, but they still get to
(30:30):
be a part of this really cool thing that you
guys have started.
Speaker 2 (30:33):
That's it's the message. One is that Omaha will have
your back, like Omaha loves an underdog when you know,
when it was Coastal Carolina, when it was you know,
when it was Oral Roberts. You know, like that, there's
these teams that Omaha just sort of automatically. If you
don't have a rooting interest, you're a lot of Omaha
is gonna pick you know, pick the underdog. So yeah, Troy,
(30:55):
Troy will will be well represented, if you know, and
from what I hear they travel, you know, there's not
a million people but the but you know, the couple
hundred that they have are rabbit. So I'm looking forward
to to seeing that fan base because I heard they're
you know, they love their baseball down there, and so
we are looking forward to meeting those fans. But but yeah,
Omaha will will represent the underdog. They always try to
(31:16):
do that. And the best part about that is is
that on a campus like Troy, if you know, if
we can get Troy to five thousand or six thousand
or eight thousand jello shots, that's that's two or three
or four times to some of these schools, the entire
budget of their food pantry, you know, in in ten days,
and so what their food pantry can do year round,
(31:38):
you know, at least for the next year two years
with that money is exponentially bigger than then a school
that has a lot more funding for things like that.
So when you, yeah, when you're you know, you when
you have the Murray States, when you have the Troy's
like it, we know that that money, all those thousands
of dollars make a difference in real hands in real
places that that aren't you know, that aren't Austin, Texas,
(31:59):
you know, aren't you know some of these bigger sort
of you know, UCLA, like some of these schools that
already have pretty well built out programs. So not to
say that all the money isn't useful anywhere it goes,
but to some of these schools that, especially their food banks,
it means means the world.
Speaker 1 (32:13):
Yeah, it's just a bigger chunk of you know, impact
then maybe the larger schools. You know, it's hard to
believe that Tuscaloosa is going to feel the same impact
even if they buy a ton of shots that a
place like Troy would find.
Speaker 3 (32:26):
So it's amazing.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
How would you best you know, for people listening to this,
obviously coming to Rocos would be the first thing that
they should do, But how can people follow along online
or learn more about what you and your entire team
of people do throughout the two weeks of the College
World series.
Speaker 2 (32:43):
Yeah, so the fall the original follow is the you
know is on x at CWS shop Board. You can
follow Rocos on Facebook, you can follow CWS Shopboard on Instagram.
You can follow Rocos on Instagram. We just we have
a TikTok now, so you can follow us on TikTok
as well, where it's mostly just the board updates. We
are going to do a couple fan interaction things this year,
(33:04):
a couple of fan contests, you know, trivia things like that,
just to see how much how much people know? What
do you know about your school and what do you
know about the College World series? So gonna be interested
to see that. Maybe give away a couple of yellow
shots and do things like that. But again, just try
to keep it fun and lighthearted and not take ourselves
too seriously. At the end of the day, we got
famous for selling jello, and that's a pretty silly thing,
so you got to keep it pretty silly in your
(33:26):
own head.
Speaker 3 (33:26):
Yeah, and the pizza is good, by the way, the
pizza is great.
Speaker 2 (33:29):
You know, I'll eat it for the next fourteen days
straight probably, so I love it.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Yeah. Yeah, I can imagine you workaholics down there. And
we had Amy Hornocker on from the College World serious.
She's like, yeah, I'm staying in a hotel down there
because I can't get away for two weeks.
Speaker 3 (33:42):
You know.
Speaker 1 (33:43):
Yeah, it's like, you know, it's fun for us to
go down and party. You guys have a bit of
elbow grease.
Speaker 2 (33:48):
I left the neighborhood one time last year. I was
out of food and so I was going to get
groceries quick and just literally lived downtown. So I just
drove up, you know, to Saddle Creek and I was
getting some food. As soon as I push my car
in the store, I get a phone call and it's
from Kevin, the owner, the only number that rings through,
you know during that time. Hey, yeah, the Governor Louisiana
(34:10):
has a couple of guys down here and they want
to come do a thing and I need you to
talk to him, can you? And I was like, just
push my grocery cart back outside and you know, into
the into the stalls and then went I was like, yep,
guess I'm nugetting food from uh for.
Speaker 4 (34:20):
The apartment today.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
So yeah, just one of those things that it's It's
always something if you you know, if you think you
can sleep in, then you have an interview and then
you have you know, this went down. The computers crashed,
you know, the internet, the credit card processing is going wrong,
and this guy wants to talk to you, this guy
wants to pitch you something. You know, this staff member
didn't show up. So it's always you're just you're just
on your toes for you know, for the rest of
(34:42):
the time. My body is slowly just waning me off
sleep Like you know, I was like last week, I
started only sleeping like six hours and I'm like, man,
I'm you need to rest up.
Speaker 4 (34:49):
What am I doing?
Speaker 2 (34:49):
Then?
Speaker 4 (34:50):
I was like, Oh, my body knows, it knows what's coming.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
It's just like you know, you're you're gonna be way
more used to the two hours you're going to be
getting to these nights.
Speaker 4 (34:57):
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
Pat McAvoy, who is the manager of Rocos Pizza and
Cantina right across the street from Charles Schwapfield be there
or B Square, honestly just an absolute party, fun atmosphere,
and I can't wait to see how the Lefties garage
shore thing works out. I think that's going to be
a lot of fun. Thanks for coming in and doing this, man, Honestly,
always fun to chat with you, and I can't wait
to see you because I will be going down into
(35:19):
donating my dollars to jell O here the.
Speaker 3 (35:22):
Next few days.
Speaker 4 (35:23):
Fantastic, fantastic, Looking forward to seeing you.
Speaker 1 (35:25):
Yeah, absolutely, and I'm looking forward to seeing you come
and say hello when you see us down there at
the College World series this weekend. And stay locked in.
We got plenty more coming in this feed for the
Emery Sunger podcast coming up in the next few weeks,
right here on the free iHeartRadio app
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