Ep. 9: Reflecting On Conversations With Seahawks Legends

Big Ray recaps some of his previous conversations with Seahawks Legends like Doug Baldwin and K.J. Wright. Today’s show: holiday season can be really tough (02:09), honored to interview Seahawks Legends (04:08), lessons learned from K.J. Wright (06:09), unresolved issues can cause problems down the road (11:40), sacrifices made by athletes and other high achievers (15:40), getting to therapy (25:33), Mindful Therapy Group (32:41), and pressure to perform and win is hurting our young people (37:36).

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
You're listening to Big Raise Garage Grind.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
I want to bring awareness and my voice to something
that's meaningful and purposeful more than just who's the best
football player, who's the best football team. The intersection between life,
football and mental health. When you need help and you
ask for help, you're operating from a position of power.
When you need help and you don't ask for help,
that's the weakness.

Speaker 1 (00:24):
Now here's your host, Seahawks legend Ray Roberts. What Up,
What Up? What up? Man?

Speaker 2 (00:30):
Welcome to Big Raised Garage Grind mental Health addition presented
by the Mindful Therapy Group. I'm your host, Big Ray Roberts.
Glad to be back on the mic and back in
the studio again. And before we get started, I just
wanted to also give a shout out to the Seattle Seahawks.
I came to them a little over a year ago

(00:51):
and asked if I could kind of start to tell
my mental health journey story, and they were all in
on it and allowed me to use some of their
production crew and some of the facility here to produce
those first two episodes.

Speaker 1 (01:05):
That were pretty cool.

Speaker 2 (01:06):
And then I also want to give out a shout
out to my man Nasachobi who has been he's the
producer of our pregame postgame show and has been a
big support of mine from the very first day I
met him.

Speaker 1 (01:18):
And so if if you.

Speaker 2 (01:20):
Guys know me at all, you know that, like you know,
I'm always running late or behind, or I forget the
time or all these different kinds of things are I
get into my feelings on the on the show, and
Nasa has always been a dude around that kind of
keeps me calm and keeps me steady. He understands what's
going down, you know, with this mental health stuff. He
was on board right away and then didn't even hesitate

(01:43):
when I came to him and said, Hey, this is
what I want to do. And then, you know, in
our process of trying to get it set up, just
kind of brought me a lot of comfort in knowing
that he was going to make sure that a lot
of the back end stuff was going to be cool,
and I just needed to bring the content and my story.
So just want to give a big shout out to
my God Nasa for being support of that way. We

(02:03):
all need somebody in our life that way. So I'm
glad that he's in mind that way. I hope that
you guys are also getting geared up for the holiday season.
It's a lot of food and gifts and parties and
family time. And I just want to give you a
reminder though, that this time of the year can be

(02:24):
very emotionally tough. Sometimes it can can be a trigger
for unresolved family issues. It can bring up memories of
lost loved ones, and you can have We all tend
to sometimes follow in that place of having a little
too much to drink and say things that we don't mean.
But have a plan, have a plan for how you
want to handle these things and protect your mentals, as

(02:47):
as Marshawn Lynch would say. So you know, just know
that that's coming up. I know for me, man, it
tends to drum up a lot of emotions and things
that go on, and so I try to make sure
that I keep myself clear of of of those situations
and in those conversations. So just just a little reminder

(03:07):
of that. But then, wow, man, let me just say
that I've had the opportunity with this podcast. Uh, you know,
it's probably already exceeded you know what I thought it
would be. You know, started out just kind of wanting
to tell my story and and and talk about the
things I've been through in a way that it might
help someone else. And in the process, I've been really

(03:30):
fortunate to interview some really, absolutely, without a doubt, bonafide
Sea Hawks legends. Like there's legends that that that we call.
That's kind of like what we call our alumni group.
That's what the NFL calls, uh, the alumni group. It's
not called the NFL alumni, it's called the NFL Legends.

(03:51):
But then there's legends, and these dudes are legends of
of the Saddle Seahawks.

Speaker 1 (03:57):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (03:58):
And that would be Cliff Averril, Doug Baldwin, and then
our last episode that we broke into two parts was
mister kJ Wright And I'd have to say that that
was one of the coolest conversations for me. Uh, been
a Sea Hawks fan and a former Seahawk.

Speaker 1 (04:15):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (04:15):
These those are three dudes, uh, that I have so
much respect for, just the way they went about their life,
the way they played the game, the way they think
the game, the involvement that they that they are in
the community. You know, Cliff and Doug, you know, do
a lot of different things in the community, they have
fundraisers that they do a basketball game they use to
raise a lot of money. Doug has his uh his

(04:38):
uh community center down in Renton. Cliff does his stuff
back in his back in his home country.

Speaker 1 (04:44):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (04:44):
And then kJ is just everywhere all the time. I
just don't know how he does it. He has his
own podcast, Uh, he does stuff with the Seattle Sports Radio,
he does things for the Seahawks, and so he's also
out there doing his thing.

Speaker 1 (04:59):
Excuse me.

Speaker 2 (05:00):
And so for me, it was just I'm older than
those dudes. I'm interviewing CAJ. I realized that I was
probably like twenty years older than this dude. Like I
was like wow, Like, sitting acrossroom, I didn't feel that old.
But when I started thinking about it, I was just
how much older I am than they are. And uh,
but I felt like a kid in the candy shop.
Like talking to them. They just had so much to bring,

(05:22):
so much thoughtfulness and about their approach to to mental health,
their engagement with mental health, how they handle those situations.
And so it's just it was just an It's been
an honor of mine just to be able to be
in the same room with those dudes, having meaningful conversations.
It's one thing to be sitting at the bar having
a drink, or you know, at a club or sitting

(05:44):
at the football game or whatever. But to sit across
from these dudes and have grown men conversations and have
them be engaged in it that way has just all
just been just been an honor, an honor for me.
And so been able to talk to, you know, kJ
around you know, the conversation, you know was we had
a pretty robust conversation, and so sometimes it was about

(06:07):
mental health stuff and sometimes it wasn't. But I just
wanted to kind of review some of the things that
we talked about, because we talked about everything from life
outside of football to the Super Bowl victory to the
devastating Super Bowl loss, to his retirement, all these different
kinds of things, and so I wanted to kind of
maybe just kind of bring out and talk a little

(06:27):
bit more or have a little bit more to say
about some of the things he said. And as I
was thinking about it, this might be a nice little
rhythm for for how we do the podcast. Was still
trying to figure out what works and what doesn't work,
but to be able to interview someone and then the
next time come back and kind of pull out some
of the themes from that interview to kind of expand

(06:48):
on I think might be a good way to go
about it, because we hear so much, but we only have,
you know, forty five minutes to an hour to talk
about it, So being able to pull some of that
out might be.

Speaker 1 (06:58):
A good way to go about it.

Speaker 2 (07:00):
But the thing that was surprising to me, and because
you know, we've all witnessed and we've all heard the
stories about, you know.

Speaker 1 (07:10):
What it was like to lose that Super Bowl, the way.

Speaker 2 (07:14):
That it was lost, and then how it impacted the
team moving forward, and so I was really surprised when
I asked him about, you know, how did he or
the team and and folks deal with with that loss.
And I was surprised that he said that even today
is still a tough one to get over. And then

(07:36):
also that that cloud kind of hovered over this team
for for a few years after that loss. And that's
powerful to me because sometimes the people outside the game,
or who have never put that much into accomplishing something
or or can't understand how difficult it must be to

(07:58):
get to the place to be first in the NFL
and then secondly, win enough to get yourself to be
to play in the ultimate game. It takes a lot
to get there. And I don't think that some people
outside the game or have never experienced that or have
achieved at the level quite understands understand what it takes
and what's all wrapped up into that. So when you

(08:20):
start thinking about, like, well, man, how could that be
a cloud you know over the team for so long?
And how can can and you can see it in
in Kj's body language, how he was still holding on
to uh, to that moment into the and to that
game and so and so you so, well, why can't
they just get over that? Like you move on, you
go play another game, and all these other kinds of things. Man,
Like the mind is a powerful thing and uh, and

(08:42):
our memories are pretty incredible, and so it can be
the slightest thing that can bring back those memories. So,
like I think we talked about this in one of
the earlier episodes as a book called The Body Keeps
the Score.

Speaker 1 (08:52):
And so when you've had any.

Speaker 2 (08:53):
Type of trauma or adverse situation, so like losing the
game isn't trauma, but it's an adverse situation. It's a
situation that impacted you adversely, and so you can you
can have you can have a smell that maybe they
were cooking hot dogs in a stadium and you can
smell the hot dogs on the field during that game.
You can walk into a place and smell the same

(09:14):
hot dogs today and your body can still have the
same response even though that that Super Bowl was how
many every years ago? And so when when it relates
to personal trauma, the same thing can happen. You can
be in some type of trauma or or some type
of adverse situation as a five year old, and at
forty five you can be triggered to almost feel as
if that same adverse situation is happening again. And so man,

(09:38):
it's powerful to hear kJ talk about that and talk
about how how that cloud was over this team for
some time. And I'm sure some of it was wrapped
up into anger and frustration. But if you know anything
about mental health and feelings and emotions and things, anger
and frustration are secondary emotions. And so then so then

(09:59):
you go like, well, and what is the primary emotion
up under that? So I don't know, Like I wasn't
on that team I was at the game.

Speaker 1 (10:06):
I took my kids to the game. I had promised
them that we.

Speaker 2 (10:09):
Would go to the Super Bowl when they beat the
Denver Broncos and New York and something came up and
we weren't able to go. So they're really mad at me,
and so I'm like, all right, the next time they go,
we're going. And so we got a little airbnb in Arizona,
was down there for the whole week, spent a lot
of time. So we're at that game, so we know,
you know what that was like. But I don't know

(10:29):
what these guys are were experiencing. But my thoughts, my
guesses are, you know, maybe there was some embarrassment. There
could have been some resentment. There could have been feelings
of you know, been unfulfilled, disappointment, sadness, heartbreak. All those
types of primary emotions can lead to frustration and anger.

(10:50):
So when when someone is operating in their frustration and
their anger, sometimes the best thing to do is to
just kind of back back off a little bit, let
them calm down down, and then really get to the
root of what those frustrations, what that frustration and and
and anger is, because that's usually what's underneath all of
those all of that stuff is some other primary uh, emotion,

(11:11):
and which then can kind of relates to you know
what we're talking about with the you know, having a
plan for on holiday season. Sometimes these unresolved issues, some
of some of the unresolved issues in our everyday lives.

Speaker 1 (11:27):
Can lead to.

Speaker 2 (11:28):
Unhealthy mental health issues, or unhealthy relationships, or tough conversations
or uh, you know, maybe it leads you to drive faster,
or party harder, or drink more or you know what,
what have you. So it's really important to get to
the root causes of what some of these these feelings
of anger and frustration and things are, because then you can.

Speaker 1 (11:48):
Address those things. Uh, it's important to.

Speaker 2 (11:53):
Identify those actions and conversations you need to have in
order to walk out from under the dark cloud. And
so when you think about this football team, to me
an indication that they're starting to have those conversations and
come to terms with with what their experience was with
this team during that time and afterwards, it is because

(12:15):
you see these dudes coming back, like to see Cliff
April out on the field coaching, to see h Doug
Baldwin out out on the field talking to Pete and
talking with the receivers, to see Richard Sherman coming back,
to see kJ Wright you know, is out there.

Speaker 1 (12:36):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (12:37):
So there's been a bunch of those players, you know,
Cam Chancellor, all those guys have been coming in and
around the organization. And to me, that's a sign of
healing because they're they've been able to kind of step
out from whatever the cloud was, or whatever the emotions were,
whatever the feelings they had towards the team, towards Pete,
towards you know, that loss, towards.

Speaker 1 (12:58):
Whatever went down.

Speaker 2 (13:00):
Uh, you know, after that loss and and since that loss. Uh,
an indication that there is healing going on is the
fact that these guys are back around and uh. And
I think that's that's that's really important, uh for kJ
and for that team, for that team. Uh, I think
uh a lot of that has been has been resolved,

(13:22):
because otherwise I don't I don't know that you'd see
them as engaged, uh as they are. Michael Bennett has
you know, been back here. He's another guy. You know,
he's been on the on our broadcast, on our pregame
post game broadcast. Some great dude, great personality, awesome dude.
But uh, but for all of those guys to be
to come back and to to embrace the team, embrace PETE,

(13:43):
embrace their experience here, I think that's an indication, uh,
that that they're they're at a place of you know,
walking beyond and out from under that cloud.

Speaker 1 (13:53):
And uh.

Speaker 2 (13:53):
And so in our own lives, that's also important too,
whether it's something that happened maybe maybe the dark cloud
was created yesterday or the day before, or last year
or ten years ago or twenty years ago, or whenever
it was, it's important to come up and identify the
things that will allow you to address those those things.

(14:13):
Whether it's a tough conversation you have to have and
maybe you have to have someone facilitate that conversation, or
maybe you have to have you know, I've had conversations
even with my kids before where I go, you know what,
like there's so many emotions involved in this conversation. We
need someone that we can use to help us talk
through this. And so we've used either a therapist that
they've seen or a therapist that I've seen, and they

(14:36):
help facilitate these conversations so that we can move beyond
the point. So we can take some of the emotion
out of the conversation, speak to what the facts are
and then speak to what.

Speaker 1 (14:45):
The resolutions are.

Speaker 2 (14:47):
And so I think that's important for this team. And
that was to me to hear kJ talk about that
in a way that you could still feel the energy
from that loss coming from him across this time. Uh,
I think it was I think it was important even
in that moment. I think for him to say it
out loud, I think I think there's some there's some

(15:07):
relief and being able to say it out loud. But
then I think the biggest healing is seeing uh him
being back engaged with the with the team. I know
at one point he said he didn't want to be
a coach, but uh, but he wants to be involved
with the team in some way, And to me, that
equals some form of healing. It may not be all
the healing, but some healing is better than no healing.
So that was one of the things that really uh

(15:29):
took me back a little bit just in that conversation,
was just the longevity of the pain that that that
some of the guys suffered from that from that loss.
We also talked about sacrifices he's made in his life.
Uh and and sometimes you know, I'm on the pregame show,
so I'm sure that pre and postgame show. And you

(15:51):
see me on Twitter all the time if you're not familiar,
as my Twitter handle is uh Big Ray Roberts and
uh and so I comment on players or games or
whatever it is. And sometimes you get into these conversations
you don't really think about exactly what you're saying or
the ramifications of what you say. But sometimes as analysts,

(16:12):
when we're questioning a player's work ethic or commitment to
winning or or being better or hidden hidden in those
critiques is that you don't understand. We sometimes forget the
time that you spend away from your loved ones, the
other life adventures that you postpone, you know, being present

(16:36):
physically but not mentally or emotionally, because you're so locked
in on the game and you're locked in on trying
to get better, and you're locked in on trying to
please people. And so as an analyst, when you're saying, like,
hey man, this guy needs to work harder. He needs to,
you know, commit more time to the weight room or
commit more time to the film room, you know, when
you're saying yes to one thing, you're saying no to

(16:59):
the other. So a lot of times when these professional athletes,
men and women, are achieving at really high levels, you
don't think about the sacrifice to the rest of their
life that they're making. When you're saying yes to being
in the into the locker room at you know, five
o'clock in the morning, you're saying no to waking up

(17:19):
and having breakfast with your wife and kids. If you're
saying yes to stand late after practice to watch film,
get an extra workout in catch, you know, extra footballs
you're saying no to maybe you know, watching your kid
get off the bus after school. So like, there are
sacrifices that you're making if you're saying yes, like the
Seeharts are doing this year, and I've done several times.

(17:40):
Planning on Thanksgiving Day, you're saying no to like missing
time on Thanksgiving Day with your family. And I don't
think that people understand. Sometimes maybe they would understand if
it was more present when you're having a conversation, but
I don't think people understand when you're when you're when
you're telling a person and that they need to do

(18:02):
things better. In order to perform better on the football
field or on the basketball court or baseball field or
soccer pitch, whatever it is, that you're also telling them
to say no to other things in their life that
might be important to them, that might be important to the.

Speaker 1 (18:16):
Where their mental health lies and all of that.

Speaker 2 (18:20):
And so you I remember when I looked back at
my college years, man, I was so locked in on
just football was my way out of the life I
was living. Grew up really poor in the amounts of
North Carolina. Uh, you know, parents were alcoholics, brothers and
you know, I mean didn't have brothers. My sisters were

(18:41):
you know, in trouble and stuff from time to time
tow of my sisters, and so just wasn't a whole
lot of expectations for where my life was going to
be other than either running the streets selling drugs, you know,
in prison somewhere or whatever. And so it was important
to me that football was my ticket, was my ticket out.
And so I spent a lot of time the weight room,
a lot of time watching film, a lot of time

(19:03):
trying to get better. But man, when I look back
on it, there were so many things that were important
in life that I think that are important now that
I that issues that I that I care about that
were going on on our college campus. At the same time,
there were there were friends that I had that I
didn't spend as much time with. There were speakers that
came that were, you know, uh, impactful speakers, people that

(19:26):
talk about the things that I'm interested in. There are
protests and movements and all these different things that were
going on that makes life life that I did not
experience because I was so in the weight room, you know,
in the film room or on the practice film all
the time. And so the sacrifice that that folks make
to accomplish at such a high level, sometimes it just

(19:48):
gets dismissed and it doesn't get thought about.

Speaker 1 (19:50):
When we're pressuring.

Speaker 2 (19:52):
These athletes to show up as their best athletic self
to entertain us and to meet our expectations, sometimes we
don't understand what they're giving up in order to do that.
So when kJ was talking about the sacrifices that he
had made with his life, and he talked about that
in his retirement interview, he was talking about the sacrifices

(20:14):
that he that he's that he's made, you know, and
it takes a lot. I can speak specifically for football,
but to get to this level, it takes unbelievable talent, timing,
and sacrifice. And there are people that will say like, hey,
well yeah, you say all that ray and all this

(20:35):
feeling stuff and all this mental health stuff. But man,
like they make enough money to you know this, that
and the other thing. Money doesn't solve all the problems.
Money solved some problems, but money can also create issues too,
and those are conversations for another day. But money doesn't
solve everything. If if that was the case, the richest
people in the world would be the happiest people in
the world. The richest people in the world wouldn't be

(20:57):
committing suicide, The richest people in the world wouldn't be
having divorce. It's the richest people in the world wouldn't
be having you disputes with their kids and things like that.
Money is not the end all be all. Does it help, Yes,
it does, but it can It is not the thing
that necessarily carries a day. When you start talking about
the sacrifices you make and the things that you give up,

(21:18):
you know, spending time with your family and missing time
with your family, there's no amount of money.

Speaker 1 (21:22):
That can bring that back.

Speaker 2 (21:23):
You know, even though people will say that, and that's
what people will say, like, well, what is he worried about?
You know, he's going to make all this he has
all this money that he's made. But man it when
the pressure to perform and to be perfect and then
to win takes a tremendous toll on a person's mental health.
Whether they are at a place where they can acknowledge

(21:46):
that or not. Whether you're a fan and you want
to hear that or not, whether you're an owner, a coach,
or teammate or whatever. It is a friend and whether
you want to hear that or not, it does. It
takes a lot of pressure to be on all the time,
on top of your game. So even as a professional athlete,
like the only downtime you would have is at home.

(22:09):
If you're out in public, you're on. You have to
be kJ Wright, you know, number fifty for the Seattle Seahawks.

Speaker 1 (22:15):
You can't.

Speaker 2 (22:16):
You don't get to be kJ Wright who might be
having a bad day, or kJ Right, you know who
needs to go to the parent teacher conference, or our
kJ Wright who wants to be just out on a
date with his wife and being able to enjoy her.
You're kJ right, the Seattle Seahawks, And so it takes
takes a toll on your mental health to be able
to show up like that all the time, twenty four

(22:39):
to seven. You are on all the time, and so
you can say what you want. There's people that will
think that this talk about mental health and feelings don't matter,
and there are no feelings and this that and the
other kind of thing, and people are being soft and
what have you. But to me, that's an indication that
you haven't addressed the stuff in your own life that

(22:59):
you haven't that you haven't addressed addressed like uh, that
you've bought into this idea that uh, that you have
to feel miserable because that's just what it is. That
that that's just being tough, that's just being a person
that's just been a man, that's just been whatever it is,
because you haven't addressed it.

Speaker 1 (23:12):
But for those of us that have addressed it, like.

Speaker 2 (23:15):
You just have a different awareness. You have a different uh,
you have a different walk and how you go about things,
a different way that you see people, the different way
you interpret what people are doing, their actions, their motives,
the words that they use. And so the the sacrifice
uh that it takes.

Speaker 1 (23:32):
UH to.

Speaker 2 (23:34):
Achieve at a certain level and then stay at that
level and then even excel at that level, not just
be a guy, just not there's you know, you're just
not a guy on the roster. You're the guy or
you're one of the guys. You know, we talked a
little bit about in that conversation about man, how kJ
how did you hold on to who you are in

(23:55):
the middle of the legion of boom that had so
many big, huge personalities and and outspoken personalities and and
quirky personalities.

Speaker 1 (24:04):
How did you hold on to it?

Speaker 2 (24:06):
And so for him just to hold on to who
he is, who's very soft spoken, dude, very to the point,
kind of a guy that's had a whole lot of
fluff in his conversation, Like he's gonna you ask him
a question, he's gonna answer the question from from his
heart and where he thinks and where he's where he
sees it from. And so it would it had to
be hard to hold on to all of that stuff

(24:26):
in the middle of all of that. And so, man,
this idea around sacrifice is not just you know, sacrificing
your health like your physical self. So you're out there,
you know, running into three hundred and for hundred pound
not foreign a pound, maybe some four hundred pounds, but
three hundred thirty forty pound dudes and running backs that
are coming at you running four or five top speed,

(24:47):
and you have to figure out a way to stop him.
Your sacrifice and your health, you know, like we've we
know all the stuff about CTE and the brain injury.
Your sacrificing that, but you're also sacrificing the person of
who you are, the person that you want to be,
the person who you are, and how you live your life,
how you show up for other people. You're sacrificing that too.
And I don't think that sometimes when we're breaking down games,

(25:09):
when we're criticizing players, where critiquing teams and coaches and
whoever it is, that we don't really consider those types
of sacrifices, those those sacrifices that impact the person and
not just the soul and the spirit of a person
and not just their physical self. So it was really
cool to hear kJ you know, talk about, like talk

(25:31):
about those types of sacrifices. We also talked a little
bit about therapy and you know, we you know, each
guest that I've had on kJ, I mean, kJ, Cliff,
and Doug, we've all got we've gotten to this conversation
around what are the uh what walked you? How did
you get to therapy?

Speaker 1 (25:50):
Like? Who walked you to it?

Speaker 2 (25:51):
And for the most part, all three of them, it
was a female in their life, mainly their wives, that
kind of walked them.

Speaker 1 (25:57):
To this therapy space.

Speaker 2 (25:59):
Uh. And in Cliff's space, we had like some similar experiences.
Both our fathers, you know, passed away, but you know,
before a game, before a season and had to you know,
had to find a way to deal with that. For Doug,
you know, he was a little bit more proactive. He
knew that he was retired and going home to basically

(26:19):
three daughters and a wife. So like he knew that
the way he solved problems physically on the football field
wasn't the way that he wanted to solve them at home,
and so he had to he had to walk through that.
And then and then for for kJ, a dude who
in his tenth season had his best year and couldn't
find a team, and uh, you know, we didn't talk

(26:40):
about it on the call, but he gave me permission
to talk about it. But I can remember the first
time I officially met kJ. We were on a zoom
call with the nfl PA and they were talking to
us about this whole broadcast career, and kJ was really
interested in, like how do you start a podcast, how
do you get the reps? All these different kinds of things,
And I remember I just sent to him in the

(27:00):
chat box. I said, dude, like the people in Seattle
love you. Man, You're like mister Seattle. You can do
anything in Seattle, and people are gonna like it and
they're gonna tune in. And so then we just started
talking in the chat box and then he figured out
who I was and uh. And so that was my
first initial, uh formal introduction to gay J. Well then
during this off season when he was trying to find

(27:22):
a job and uh and uh, it looked like he
wasn't gonna, you know, come back to the Seahawks.

Speaker 1 (27:28):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (27:28):
One day I just said, man, I need to check
in on kJ. And I sent him a text and said, man,
how you doing? And uh he said big ray, like
it happened a tough day, Like I'm I'm down here,
uh on the road behind the vMac at the time,
watching the guy's practice, and it's hard to not be
out there. And so I told him in that moment, like, Man,

(27:52):
I'm your dude. Whatever you need, anybody you need to
talk to, Uh, if you just need to shoot with somebody,
if you just need to uh scream, process, be angry, mad,
whatever it is, Like, I'm your guy, Like, reach out
for me.

Speaker 1 (28:05):
Let's let's have those conversations.

Speaker 2 (28:07):
Let me be the dude that leans on you that
you can lean on uh that way. And so UH
to say that that mental health and your attention to
mental health is a is a matter of toughness, Uh
is a wrong is the wrong assessment because kJ is
just as tough as they come, Cliff, just as tough

(28:27):
as they come, doug just as tough as they come.

Speaker 1 (28:30):
Like, So it's not.

Speaker 2 (28:31):
A matter of being tough or strong or if you're
soft or weak or all those.

Speaker 1 (28:35):
Kinds of things.

Speaker 2 (28:36):
It is just a matter that needs to be addressed.
Just like if you have a cold. If you catch
a cold, it doesn't mean that you're soft.

Speaker 1 (28:41):
You know.

Speaker 2 (28:42):
If you break your leg, it doesn't mean that you're soft.
You know, if you have a headache, it doesn't mean
that you're soft or you're not tough. It just means
that there's there's something in your life that you have
to deal with, and mental health is is no different.
But the cool thing that I that I like that
kJ brought up talking about therapy is that he said,
when if I'm doing therapy, I'm not the one who

(29:06):
can just talk to someone and just have them listen.
I need someone that can give me actionable things to do.
I need someone that's going to give me solutions. And
he's like, otherwise, it just does nothing for me to
just say something and you're just not in your head
back and just saying yes, I understand, they're okay, or
what have you. I need something to work on, I

(29:26):
need give me, give me something back, which in general,
like I would think if you talk to most professional athletes,
most of them go about life that way because that's
what you're you've been trained to do your whole life.
Like you do whatever you do, you're not doing it well.
They tell you what you need to do well, and
then you try to go do that thing to make
it better. And so so it kind of is in

(29:49):
rhythm with what it what it's like to be a
professional athlete. But the thing that I like about him
saying that is that I'm the I can be the
exact opposite, and so I can be one.

Speaker 1 (30:01):
When I'm going.

Speaker 2 (30:01):
Through stuff, I just need to say it out loud,
and so sometimes it's like verbally to a person, I
can say, hey man, I'm having a tough day, and
this is why I'm having a tough day. And sometimes
just saying it helps me. It relieves the anxiety, or
it relieves the panic, or it relieves the depression. Other
times I can just text it to someone I've Like

(30:24):
I've said before, I have two guys that was in
this after the Impact program with me in Michigan, and
that's how we use each other. Like if I'm having
a bad day, I just text those two dudes, Tony
and Ronnie, and I go like, hey man, I'm having
a tough day.

Speaker 1 (30:40):
Man, this is happening. No da da da da da da.

Speaker 2 (30:42):
And sometimes they're busy, I don't get a text back
right away. But the fact that I just said it
out loud, it helps, it helps relieve.

Speaker 1 (30:50):
It for me.

Speaker 2 (30:51):
Most of the times, they know what my routine is,
they know what it's like. They've seen me when I'm
operating on all cylinders. They know the things that are
going on in my life when that's happening, and so
then that's kind of what they start shooting back at me,
and the text message, hey, like are you getting your
workouts in?

Speaker 1 (31:06):
Are you eating right? You know?

Speaker 2 (31:07):
Are you are you seeing your kids? Like all those
types of things. Are you are you enjoying the work
that you're doing? Like, so they they know the types
of things that I'm tend I tend to do when
I'm in a good rhythm and I'm a good routine,
and so they kind of speak it back to me.
So in some ways, I'm kind of I'm kind of
I do a little bit of the kJ thing where
I need someone to kind of feedback to me what

(31:29):
it is that I that I need help with or
what I need to do or what I can do.
So my therapists do that, my buddies do that. And
then on the other side part of it, I can
just say it out loud, and it just helps me
just say it out loud, just to have someone that
is genuinely listening to me, not someone that's I'm talking
to and they're on their cell phone. Or they're watching
the game, or they're cooking dinner, or you know, whatever

(31:51):
it is. But if they're if if they are engaged
with what it is that I'm saying, uh, that is
enough for me to kind of to kind of get
through things.

Speaker 1 (32:01):
And the key point of that is that there's no
cookie cutter way of doing therapy. Uh.

Speaker 2 (32:08):
It can be different for everybody, and it should be
different for everybody because we're our makeups are different, our
experiences are different. The way we experience things, the way
we hear things, the way we communicate things are all different.
And so, uh, if if if you're in a place
and you're having a mental health crisis and and someone
is telling you to to well, this is what I

(32:28):
did and it didn't work for you. It doesn't mean
that you're that mental health or therapy doesn't work for you.
Just means that you haven't found the right way that
helps you. And so the cool thing is that you
know one of the sponsors or the sponsor of our program.
Here Big Ray's Garage Grime in aal health edition. The
Mindful Therapy Group, UH. The Mindful Therapy Group is based

(32:52):
in the Pacific Northwest, is a diverse group of qualified
mental health providers offering both in person and virtual care,
whether it's talk therapy or medication management. You can book
your first visit within one week. Visit Mindful therapygroup dot
com to start your journey to better mental health today.
And the reason this is a good spot to kind
of bring these guys up is because.

Speaker 1 (33:12):
They have.

Speaker 2 (33:14):
They have a way of going about matching people to
the type of therapists that they think will work. So
there's an assessment that they do, there's questions you answered,
there's a you know, like a like an interview type
thing that you go through with during your initial visits
where they start to then try to match you up
with that type of therapist. And so yeah, you may

(33:35):
go through one of one or two therapists, or you
may go through three or four, but they're going to
be there with you to help you along to find
the person that matches how what you need, how you
need to receive therapy, how you need to hear it, uh,
you know, how you need to communicate it, the type
of therapy that works for you, and uh and and
it's all just as you know, I think they have

(33:55):
about one thousand therapists on their roster, and so I'm
pretty sure that they can find a way to find
the right person, uh to to for you to connect with.
And yes, does it take a little bit of patience,
Yes does it. Is it hard to do sometimes when
you're in the middle of crisis to kind of have
that patience, Yes it does. But do not give up

(34:18):
because the when you give up, if you if you
give up and you walk away from it, then ramifications
are much harder than if you were able to just
muscle through the patient's piece of it to find the
right therapist. And and that that can happen with the
Mindful Therapy group, they do a very good job of
doing that. And so uh, you know, with the NFL,

(34:41):
they used to have a system where, uh, you call
in one eight one hundred number, they connect you with
a person that's kind of walk you through the process
to find the therapist. And for me, uh a couple
of times that was really hard because I was in
the middle the crisis and I'm talking to basically like

(35:04):
an administrator that's just answering the phone to kind of
connect you to the people that you need to talk to,
and it was taking a long time, and this kind
of speaks to sometimes how how I need to receive therapy,
and so I was really frustrated, and I'm like, man,
I'm gonna have to look through this list of fifty therapists.

Speaker 1 (35:24):
I'm about to call them. I have to see if
they have space.

Speaker 2 (35:26):
I have to then meet with them to see if
I connect with them, then see if they are, you know,
up for taking the insurance program that the NFL provides
all this other kind of stuff. And when you're in
the middle of a crisis, that can be hard. And
so for me, this lady on the call just recognized
that I was just in that place, and so she said,
mister Roberts, like, I am not a therapist, but whatever

(35:48):
it is that you're going through, if you want to
talk it through with me, I'm willing to listen. And
so I did, and this lady sat there for an hour,
and I mean, I'm sure I was rambling all over
the place and probably wasn't making a whole lot of sense,
but the lady listened to me, and the fact that
she listened to me gave me an opportunity to kind
of find space where I could kind of breathe and

(36:09):
understand what was going on. And so then she said,
you know what ray like tomorrow at you know, three
o'clock your time, make sure you buy your phone because
I'm just gonna call and check in and say how
you're doing.

Speaker 1 (36:21):
And just that little small.

Speaker 2 (36:26):
Way that she engage me and let me know that
she saw me and she could hear me even though
she was on the phone somewhere else in the country.

Speaker 1 (36:33):
Was enough for me.

Speaker 2 (36:34):
And so I was looking forward to that call the
next day just to let her know I was okay
and how much I appreciated her sitting in there with me.
So therapy can come in different ways, and there there's
not one cookie cutter way to do it. The key
is finding what works for you and sometimes it takes,
you know, going through a handful of therapists to do that.

(36:56):
And if you want to start that journey, if you're
in that place, and like I said, it can be
you could be reacting to trauma in your life, trying
to resolve unresolved trauma or adverse situations in your life,
or you can be like taking a Doug Baldwin route,
where you're trying to be proactive and wherever you're moving
to in the next stage in your life, whether you're
you know, going into a marriage or going into a relationship,

(37:17):
or a new job or a new part of the country,
or you know, or or you know, you're trying to
change things in your life so that you can be
your best self, you know more often, like it's important,
uh to just trying to take the time, uh to
find that person that that works for you.

Speaker 1 (37:36):
I did mention.

Speaker 2 (37:36):
Earlier about the pressure to perform and be perfect and
when and I try to, like every episode, I try
to bring something current into the episode, so they were
not just always talking about uh my story, which you know,
obviously is a ongoing story, but a lot of the
things I talk about are things that happened in the past.

Speaker 1 (37:59):
And not are currently.

Speaker 2 (38:01):
And so I try to like make sure that I
I'm reading the papers and the internet and watching TV,
and you know, I read a lot about mental health
and things. And so this this this pressure to perform
and to be perfect and win, it is it has

(38:23):
our young people under fire. If you look at some
of our athletes, you know, even our high school athletes,
you know, the pressure to to to be good enough
to go to the right teams, to the best teams,
like it's getting to the point where there's like five
or six or ten teams. If kids aren't receiving scholarship

(38:44):
offers from them, they feel.

Speaker 1 (38:45):
Like they failed.

Speaker 2 (38:46):
Man, if you if you receive a scholarship offer from
a Division III school, you're still in the top like
two percent of athletes in the country that are getting
an opportunity to play football or to play sports at
the next level. And but people will look at that
as a failure. I get a lot of requests all
the time from football players all over the country that
I don't even know, but they know that I'm into
football and I help young players, and they'll send me

(39:10):
stuff in my Twitter in box and like, hey, mister Roberts,
can you like get my film out to this team
or that team or the people you know? And so
the first thing I asked them is like, well, who's
recruiting you? And then they'll tell me who's recruiting I'm like, okay,
what's wrong with that group of teams?

Speaker 1 (39:22):
You know?

Speaker 2 (39:23):
And it's like this pressure that you for you to
be recognized as anything good, you have to go to
these top five or ten teams. But man, like you're
getting an opportunity to advance your education. You're getting an
opportunity to showcase your skills and your talent. Man the
heck would like, if you're getting a chance to play
at the Alabama's or the Georgia's or the Washingtons or

(39:44):
the USC's or whatever it is, then that's great. But
if you get to play at POU, that's great too.
If you get to play it, you know, Portland State,
that's great. You know, if you get to play at
you know, the Jackson State, that's great. Like, there's not
a whole lot of other people that are getting those opportunities.
So this but the pressure that we put on kids
these days, especially in sports, to perform, to be perfect

(40:08):
in their performance and to win is just is unbelievable.
And the social media onslaught is just it's ridiculous. It's
from day to day, minute to minute, game to game,
possession to possession. It's like you're either great or you're terrible.
And I don't understand. I don't think that fans, I

(40:30):
don't think that the analysts and the booth realize this
type of pressure. And you could see it coming back
in twenty ten, I got asked to come to the
University of Virginia to be the Life Skills Director. So
I was there to help our football team, especially prepare
for life after football, whether it was going to the

(40:50):
NFL or going to the Canadian League or going to
any other league, or if it was just like, hey,
how do I find a job, how do I set
up my LinkedIn page, how do I build a resume?
So that was my job at the for UVA for
about five years.

Speaker 1 (41:04):
I was a Life Skills director.

Speaker 2 (41:06):
But at the same time, this is twenty ten, they
hired a and I've talked about this before, they hired
a sports psychologist and in the first week of this
sports psychologists being there, they had to hire two more
psychologists to work with him because the caseload was that
great and the first week of him been on the job.

(41:26):
And this was twenty ten. So now you think about
all the stuff that has happened since then, the pandemic
that you know that we've gone through, the George Floyd stuff,
like that's been so much stuff that has happened, the elections,
the presidential campaigns, all this stuff that has gone on
that has created like this culture and this atmosphere of
stress for our young people, the school shootings like all

(41:47):
that kind of stuff. Man, they are under a tremendous
amount of pressure to and it's not that like it's
just showing up and winning sometimes how you win and
what it looks like when you win. So winning sometimes
isn't even enough. Oh yeah they won, but man he
played like terrible, she didn't do this thing or whatever

(42:09):
it is.

Speaker 1 (42:10):
Or yeah, man they won, but man, like, man.

Speaker 2 (42:12):
You beat it. It was a team that you should
have beat by fifteen. You beat them by seven. And
it's like so like like even the the the winning
sometimes isn't isn't enough. So the pressure is real, and
then this idea that they can just escape the.

Speaker 1 (42:26):
Pressure is unreal.

Speaker 2 (42:28):
Like so you hear these these folks sometimes like oh,
they just need to not listen.

Speaker 1 (42:33):
How do you not listen?

Speaker 2 (42:36):
I mean, there's social media everywhere, there's billboards everywhere, there's
like the there's there's analysts everywhere. There's somebody the even
the the paid ones and the ones that are just
on social media who are just fans and think they
know it all, like you're getting it from everywhere, your
family members even probably and so like to say that hey,
like just.

Speaker 1 (42:55):
Don't listen to it. That's unrealistic too.

Speaker 2 (42:57):
And so that brings me to this this idea that
you know, watching the USC Washington Husky game last week,
so you had Caleb Williams, who is generally considered, you know,
a generational type quarterback, the first possibly the first pick
in the NFL draft, won the Heisman Trophy last year,
was probably on track to possibly win the second second

(43:20):
Heidsman Trophy this year. Was planned against Michael Pennick Jr.
Who is another highly rated quarterback, another quarterback that's in
the Heisman race, and a Washington team that was number
five in the country.

Speaker 1 (43:35):
And so this game was a tremendous game.

Speaker 2 (43:38):
You can say what you want about the defense, but man,
sometimes the defense is not affective because the offense is
so good. And so these two quarterbacks put on a show.
And and if you think about it, you know, sometimes
our young people is like, well, they're selfish, they're entitled,
they you know, they only think about themselves and all
this other kind of stuff.

Speaker 1 (43:59):
But you think about these two quarterbacks.

Speaker 2 (44:01):
Michael Pennix went through injury after injury after injury at
his stop before he came to the University of Washington,
he could have given up on it and UH, but
he but he found a way. He found a home
here in Washington. He's been able to be healthy. Last year,
he had an unbelievable year. He could have left for
the for the UH, for the draft, but I think
he felt like his team and his teammates could be

(44:23):
in the position that they're in like that. Yeah, they're
number five and the top four teams go to the
playoff playoffs. But I think I may, I may be wrong,
and people can look this up, but I think a
lot of times that team that's the fifth team in
the in the country in that first initial pole ended
up being one of the four teams in the in
the playoffs.

Speaker 1 (44:40):
So it's not a bad position to be in.

Speaker 2 (44:42):
They have a tough schedule ahead, but it was a tough,
hard fought game. Both of these dudes laid it all
on the line, left it all out on the field.
And then after the game, the camera caught Caleb Williams
in the stands and he was been you know, he
was with his parents and his mom was hugging him
and covering his face and he was crying. And the

(45:03):
visceral that came back towards this dude from UH, from
people about how that was soft and that's not what
the leader does, and all these kinds of things. And
this is under the umbrella people at the same breath
saying you're entitled and you're selfish, and and these young
people only think about themselves. And here's a dude who
is laying it all on the line because he I

(45:26):
remember at the Heisman Trophy presentation last year and he
was standing up there with the with the other four
players or the other players that were UH in the finalists,
and those players were continuing on to play in in
the playoff, in the in in the college playoffs, and
he said, man I love having his Heisman Trophy, but

(45:47):
man I wish I was playing in the tournament like
these guys. And so I don't think people realized that
he said that. And I don't think that people realize
that that is that was a motivating factor for him
coming back, And so I don't think people realize that
in that moment he saw all of that slipping away,
there was like, for sure, there's no chance they're going
to get into the playoffs. And then if he was

(46:07):
coming back to win the second Heisman, He's probably not
going to do that either, and so to see your
commitment to it, and you see this dude putting everything
on the line, running around, taking hits plan every single snap,
doing everything he can to help the team win, and
then he has a moment like this, and then in
that moment, you want to question his toughness, you want

(46:27):
to question his commitment, you want to question his leadership,
and then you want to say like that that these
young people are sawt because they're into their emotions and
feelings and stuff. To me, like one of the hardest
ones was I don't know the dude's name, and I've
never really watched the show, but there was a coach
from that showed the Last Chance You and he commented

(46:48):
on what RG three was saying about it, what it
means for Caleb Williams to show that type of emotion,
and this dude, if he would have had a bulldozer,
he would have run Caylet Williams over with that, questioning
his toughness, question and his leadership ability, saying that if
he was an NFL team, he wouldn't draft this dude,
basically calling him undraftable because in that moment, he had

(47:11):
laid it on the line, and then he had played
as best he could possibly play. They had scored I
mean watching had to score fifty points to win the game.
It was back and forth, back and forth, and in
that moment to feel like maybe something that you came
back for, something that you want to accomplish with your teammates,
was slipping away or had slipped away, to be able
to be.

Speaker 1 (47:32):
Fully who you are, authentically who you are. Yes, he's
a quirky kind of dude.

Speaker 2 (47:35):
He talks about going and sitting with his dogs, or
he has a different fingernail polish for each game. He
who cares this is who he is, authentically who he is,
and for him to be in that moment and then
showing it to the world that this is who I
am and this is how important it is to me,
and then for people to come down on him like that,
and then you question why mental health is on the

(47:58):
rise in our country. You question why health is on
the rise with young people in our country. You question
why mental health is leading to a lot of these
shootings and a lot of the suicides and things like that,
and you question why our men are suffering in silence.
This way, because it is things like this, it's the
response to stuff like that that causes all of that,

(48:20):
and men like, I'm sorry, I'm get kind of getting
caught up in this, but these are eighteen, eighteen, twenty
twenty one year old kids that we're putting this type
of pressure on that we're beating down like this and
expecting them to then pop back up, show up and
be who they are all the time, and then try
to meet your expectations, not their own. They have to

(48:40):
meet your expectations. And so it doesn't matter what they
expect of themselves or what they want from themselves. What
matters is what you want from them. That is so unfair.
That is not the right way to do it. That
is not the way to be a parent. That is
not the way to be a fan. That is not
the way to be a mentor, that is not the
way to be a friend to another person. Is to
is to is to project your expectations onto them, and then,

(49:04):
when they don't need it, to protect to project failure
onto them. And then and then you wonder, why, uh
why some of some of our mental health issues are
what they are today, Like if you look, if you
think about it, like.

Speaker 1 (49:18):
Uh, just the week before.

Speaker 2 (49:21):
UH, one of the popular sports TV guys was saying
that Caleb Williams should sit out the rest of the season.
They had lost the game and so his chances of
going to the playoffs and maybe winning the Heisman were
probably done at that point. And this this individual was saying, like, well, man,
he should just sit out the rest of the season.
And if he had done that, some people probably would
have respected that, and some other people would have been like, oh, man,

(49:42):
like he's soft, you're not tough. And this dude chose
to come back, put it all on the line. He's
not going to quit on his team. He's not going
to quit on himself. He doesn't seem like that type
of person. But but we're so into like if a
guy transfers, it must be because he doesn't want to
work hard. And young people call it self and lazy
and and they don't understand when people say that. I

(50:11):
don't think you understand what it says about the person
saying it. So to me, for this coach, this coach
from the Last Chance You or wherever it is that show,
for him to come at Caleb so hard to me
says more about him and his lack of awareness and
his lack of unresolved issues in his life. It says

(50:31):
more about him than it does about Caleb Williams. It
makes you start to go like, man, like, what has
happened in this dude's life? Where about in his life
was he not able to be fully who he is?
Where about in his life was he not able to
show emotion? Where about in his life was he not
able to show disappointment?

Speaker 1 (50:46):
Because that is what breeds those types of those types
of comments.

Speaker 2 (50:51):
If you have that unresolved stuff and you feel like
that's what you've had to live up to and you
haven't had the chance or the opportunity, or no one
has ever created the environment you to do that, then
you end up saying like those types of comments, and
you're not going to tell me that there's someone on
the place, on the face of this planet that has
gone through their entire life without some type of trauma,

(51:11):
whether it's physically against them, something they witness, something that
they've seen, or something that's happened to them, whether it's
like breaking in their car, breaking in the house, whatever
it is talking about you calling your names, bullying, whatever
it is, or some type of adverse situation, like there's
no one on the face of the planet that has
that has gone through life and not experienced that. And
so then so you're not going to tell me that

(51:32):
there are people, Uh well, I will tell you there
are people walking around with these unresolved issues, and a
lot of times they're the ones that are out front
trying to tell someone that they're weak or softer or
or or you know, this is not the way to
go about it and showing emotions and things aren't real.
When you start to when you start to talk like
that to me, I start to go like, Okay, I

(51:52):
wonder what's going on in that person's life. I wonder
what it is that they're suffering from. I wonder who
hasn't listened to them. I wonder what the environment they
that they grow up or that they live in, or
that they've been in that hasn't allowed them to express
whatever it is that they're filling in their life. So
I used to have this thing when Twitter first came
out it call It was called raise rants, and I
feel like that was one of them. I got caught

(52:15):
up in it because it just like it just uh,
if you're gonna call yourself, and I'm just you know,
obviously there's men and women athletes. But if you're going
to call yourself a leader of men, and men in
our country are suffering big time with mental health, and
you're not concerned about a man's mental health, then you are.

Speaker 1 (52:35):
Not a leader of men. If it all comes down.

Speaker 2 (52:38):
To being tough, are not tough and that's that's that's
the barometer or that's the how you measure them, then
you are not doing them.

Speaker 1 (52:46):
A service at all. There's a little data here like
uh I did I found and.

Speaker 2 (52:55):
It's a little maybe a couple of years old, so
these numbers are are probably bigger. But over six million
men in our country are affected by depression each year,
six million men. The five major mental health problems that
men face. One is depression, and it often goes undiagnosed,

(53:19):
and more likely it shows up as fatigue or irritability
or loss of interest in their work or our hobbies,
and they and and they rather rather than expressing feelings
of sadness and or worthlessness. The second one is anxiety.
Over three million men have panic disorder or some other
type of phobia. And then the third is bipolar and

(53:42):
bipolar disorder, and bipolar disorder is usually uh is on
set in men between the ages of sixteen and twenty five.
So these these these individuals that we are putting under
a tremendous amount of pressure to be perfect, to perform
and to win at between the ages of eighteen and

(54:03):
twenty one years old, are right in the wheelhouse of
where this bipolar disorder is onset. And sometimes bipolar disorder
can be a function of the environment that you're in,
and so think about that. So that's the number three.
So we have depression, anxiety, and bipolar disorder. Number four
is a type of psychosis or a schizophrenia, and number

(54:26):
five is eating disorders. And so when you think about
what it's like and you want to call yourself a
leader of men, and you're not really considering truly what
that means. It's not about just standing up in front
of the room and yelling and screaming and getting guys

(54:47):
motivated to go out and play football, to go dunk
a basketball, go hit a baseball, run down the soccer
field or whatever. It's also about knowing who the person
is and understanding what that person needs to show up
as a best selves and and yes, some of it
is the physicality of what you're asking them to do,
the mindset of what you're asking them to do, and

(55:08):
some of it also is what are those things in
their life and their lives that is affecting their mental
health so that impacts their ability to show up and
do what it is that you want them to do.
If you're not aware of those things, if you're not
aware about that in yourself, you're not going to be
aware about it and other people. And so it's nothing
wrong with having the conversations with people are about.

Speaker 1 (55:30):
Your own If you're leading any group.

Speaker 2 (55:33):
At this point, whether it's men, women, older people, young people, whatever,
if you're leading any group of people and you're relying
on them to show up as best they can, to
perform as best they can, and you're not concerned about
mental health. If you're thinking this mental health thing is
is something that's just kind of uh frue through or

(55:54):
you know, like you know, you know, like the hippies
or something created or whatever, then you're you're serving. It's
a disservice to the people that you're serving, and it's
also a disservice to who you are, because there are
ways that you can show up better by addressing some
of your mental health and wellness. And like I said,
it doesn't have to be necessarily It's not a bad thing.

(56:17):
It's a positive thing no matter how you get to it.
But you can be proactive about it, like you know, like, Okay,
I took this job where I'm going to lead these
high school football players, Like how do I go about
it in a way that I'm not further damaging their
mental health? A lot of times, like I've been in
situations where I'm coaching teams and coaches are really hard
and screaming and yelling at players. That's what they're getting

(56:39):
at home, and so when they come to practice, they're
experiencing the same thing. And you wonder why they push
back or why they hey, like they don't respect authority. Well,
have you ever considered like what the authority might be
like in the environment they're living in. So, yeah, they're
trying to carve out a space where that isn't happening
to them, So of course there's going to be some pushback.
So I don't know I can talk about that kind

(57:01):
of stuff forever, but I just want you to be
aware of the pressure that we're putting on our young
people what it means to be a leader of people.
Sometimes we give people leadership abilities because they make the
most money, or they been successful, or because of their title,
and they have no not an ounce of leadership in
their body. It's only because they can call the best plays,

(57:25):
or they can make the most points, or they can
jump the highest or they got the fattest paycheck. That
is not leadership. If you think that's leadership, then you're
thinking the wrong thing. And so we need to reevaluate.
And that's another conversation for another day. So to all
of you men, and to all of you who care
about men in your life, it's okay to ask for

(57:46):
and seek for help. And it's not a matter of
toughness or been less than a man. It's a matter
of being healthy and showing up for yourself first so
that you can then show up.

Speaker 1 (57:59):
And be your best self for other people. It's been
a pretty good podcast. This is I don't know.

Speaker 2 (58:06):
My energy is like pretty Jack Tepray right now. I
feel like I can and can talk forever. But we're
gonna put a button on it right here. Thank you
guys for listening again. You can find the Big Rays
Podcast on seahawks dot com, Seahawks I Mean YouTube dot com,
Slash Seahawks on Spotify, on Apple Music, Apple Podcasts, and

(58:27):
other podcast platforms. And like we always say when we
end the show, remember it's okay to not be okay.
If you are experiencing a mental health crisis, reach out
to your to your medical provider for guidance. And if
you need help and you ask for help, you're operating
from a position of power. That's it for me, Big
Ray and the Big Race Mental Health Podcast.

Speaker 1 (58:49):
Peace