Alex Marvez: Every Batman Needs A Robin

Miami Dolphins Tales From The Deep Alex Marvez, currently a host for Sirius XM NFL Radio, has covered the National Football League as a beat writer, television and radio reporter, and author for nearly 30 years. Marvez has served as president of the Pro Football Writers of America and is a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame’s 49-person selection committee. During his eight seasons (1999-2006) on the Miami Dolphins beat, Marvez covered everyone from Dan Marino, Jason Taylor, Zach Thomas, and Ricky Williams, to Jimmy Johnson, Dave Wannstedt, and Nick Saban. When he isn’t discussing passer ratings and sack totals, Marvez talks clotheslines and pile drivers as the backstage interviewer for AEW Wrestling. Contributors to this episode include Sean “DJ Prec” Todd and Dolphins Productions. Theme song created and performed by The Honorable SoLo D.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're now diving down juice, and this is strictly for
them true fans number one one, of course, just what

(00:22):
there was to welcome back to the fish tank right
here on the Miami Dolphins Podcast Network. DJ prinches in
the back making sure the board is straight, and my
main man wearing the three oh five oh J McDuffie juice.
Okap the tank. You know what I mean. We gotta
ripped the tank to you know, that is man. You
know I'm too big to being all of that, being

(00:44):
that shot, big seth. You know what I mean, big dude.
Now you know I'm still about You know, I'm two
pounds over my playing weight, two pounds over your playing weight,
and two years now a little more than two years
away from your playing weight, right right right, just a
couple of years something like that. But that's okay. Here's
a man who never cared about his playing weight. And
I am fired up for this interview. And I know
I say it all the time, but I want to

(01:06):
welcome in Alex the dude Marvez, and I want to
tell him why we call him to dude. But how
are you feeling, Marvez? I am so honored to be
here in the fish tank, you know. And it's so
funny because I go back, you know, more than twenty
years with both of you, Setha. I believe one time
I asked you to leave your hotel room so one
of the PR interns could go ahead and maybe have
a fun night out on the town. Yeah, I said, no,

(01:29):
go find another damn room. He's an intern. Yeah, he's
an Maybe it feels a full time or may would
be a little bit different, but I remember that, and
of course Juice would go back a long way, went
to weddings together back. Uh, you know, when you're growing
around with Kajana Carter down in South Florida and uh,
of course Kajana living down there. It is so good
to be with both of you. I cannot wait to
go down Memory of Lading talking about my days covering
the Dolphins. Yeah, I'm fired up about it. And so Juice,

(01:52):
if you hear me go into calling him dude as
opposed to alex or Marvez. You have to understand, and
the folks listen, we have to understand the guy you
see before you now or that you're listening to. This
is the grown up version of Alex Marviz. But the
dude was I mean, you showed up on the beat
and it was like no writer we had ever seen before.

(02:12):
You had the I don't mullet slash kind of ponytail
going on, goatee or I don't know, you know, maybe
something different and everybody was dude, and uh, you know,
I think it was right around the time that the
Big Lebowski was doing their things, so it just it
was it was definitely a new voice and a fresh
personality on the beat. Well. And you know, one of

(02:35):
the reasons I did a lot of that stuff was
it didn't hurt to be different, you know what I mean,
didn't hurt to be a little bit counterculture. Maybe I
could be a little more relatable to the players that
were involved. You know, I hated myself as professionally as
I could at the time, mind you, but it was
just something that was just the way I was living
my life too. I mean, it was, you know, carefree
coming back to South Florida. I just finished a sync

(02:56):
covering the Denver Broncos two years before that, the Cincinnati Bengals,
and you know, it was just such an honor to
come back home, right you know, my dad had had
been not in not too good of shape. He passed
away shortly after I came back on the beach. So
I'm glad I got to spend about three months, you know,
really with him and be there for my mom as
you know, she dealt with the fallout of all that.
And I mean, you're covering your hometown team. Now, I

(03:17):
admit I was not a Miami Dolphins fan growing up.
I was a Jame. That's a damn shame. I wouldn't
even going there with this man, But that's a damn
that was a Chargers fan growing up. Believe it or not.
It was Dan Fouts in the uniforms and all of that. So,
you know, but to cover this team, to have a
chance to go to the Sun Sentinel was was just amazing.

(03:39):
And listen, that beat was one of the most competitive
in the country. You look at some of the people
who were involved. We're all Pro Football Hall of Fame
voters to an extent, right, And when you're talking about
Armando Salgado, Jason Cole, Todd Archer, one of the very
best beat reporters that there is. You know, with ESPN
Dallas for almost twenty years covering the Cowboys, which in
human years is about a hundred and fifty with the

(03:59):
way that beat is. I mean, and you know, just
the number of characters that have gone in and out
covering this team. So the fact that I got to
rob elbows with all of them was just an incredible thing.
And it was just it was an interesting era because
we were transitioning from newspapers to the internet and it
was so different, guys. I mean, you know, went back
and sounds so flipping old. It's like you would you

(04:23):
would write a story and then you would just keep
your fingers crossed that would hold up to the next morning.
You know, we're gonna get into all of that. Yeah,
we're gonna get into all of that. You're all in
our playbook right now. But we ask you about that.
You know, you know, you talked about a little bit
man before we even got down here. Let's go back
and you know you came down here, but you spent
a couple of years you talked about right now in

(04:44):
Denver back to back Super Bowl champion seasons. And now
we're gonna spend some time, you know, discussing how competitive
the Dolphins beat was. As you're talking about a little
bit compared to what you were dealing with Denver and
you were right for the you know, for the Rocky
Mountain News. But there's another guy right for the rival
Denver Post, you know, the rival newspaper named Adam Schefter. Yeah,

(05:06):
how was that was? That was miserable, Absolutely horrendously miserable. Listen,
Chefty is a great reporter. And I have have a
funny story for you. The Washington Post wrote a feature
on Adam Schefter this summer and it was a big
controversial and the writer of the story, Ben Strauss, had
reached out to me basically looking for anecdotes on Adam
on the beat, and I said, no, you know what

(05:28):
it's like, I just wanted to leave all that aggravation behind.
You know, one thing that he was able to do
is build a very cozy relationship with Mike Shanahan, and
it paid huge dividends, you know, when it came to
getting news. And it was very frustrating because when I
started on the Bengals beat, I worked my way up
and hard work paid off when it came to what
I was doing in Denver. You have to go about

(05:50):
it a different way. I mean, and I listen, I
did some things. I'm not necessarily proud of when Mike
Shanahan wouldn't give a vote of confidence to Greg Robinson
coming back as a defensive coordinator. I saved the story
for Christmas morning and I put it out then, you know,
I mean just stuff like that that I was going
crazy and sometimes the beat would make you do that.
So it was just a very difficult thing working against

(06:11):
someone like that. Obviously, Adam has become you know, he's,
you know, one of the best insiders to me. Jay
Glazier is my guy. I'm never gonna say Adams the
best because Jay is. But that being said, I you know,
it was very tough, but you know what it did too,
It hardened me up right. And what it also led
to was people who felt sorry for me in the
journalism business, quite honestly. And I'll give you an example here.

(06:32):
One of my first scoops that I got was Bernie
Parmeley being cut by the Dolphins at the end of
training camp at the end of the preseason. Nobody else
had it, and it was like the way I splashed
on the beat. I got that tip from another reporter
who just wanted me to get off to a good
start on the Dolphins beat. They had seen the NFL wire,
they had told me this, and then I had it,

(06:53):
so I was like great, and then that helped establish
my name in South Florida. Again, you're working against some
of the very best people in journalism at that time,
Coving the Miami Dolphins. I had to do something, and
fortunately that experience in Denver did prepare me for what
was to come. Yeah, I feel you know, it's interesting.
I don't think that folks necessarily understand that. We know

(07:14):
that the sport you cover is competitive. And like we
just had Brendan Ayambadejo on who was amazing, what a
great guest. But and he talked about his journey of
four years of trying to get to the NFL and
getting cut by all different teams and going to different leagues,
and he talked about how difficult it was. But he
also used the term and it stood out to me.
He said, I was forged. I was forged in all

(07:35):
of that adversity. And you know the coach here with
the Dolphins now tell you, Mike McDaniel talks about adversity
of opportunity, so but to hear, we don't think about
that from a beat reporter. We don't think about and
I don't know, and some of that maybe we'll get
into this now is I don't know if competition on
the beat is different now than what it was back then,
but I think it's pretty cool to hear about how
it did toughen you up. Well, no, it's different because

(07:57):
what happens now. Listen to national folks. They get the
same text from the same agent, schefter rapaport. I mean,
I out a head coach, tell me this, you know,
because we were talking as a story broke, and he goes, yeah,
I guess, I guess Jimmy Sexton sent out the text,
you know, the pay this agent. So everyone gets it
at the same time because the agent doesn't want to
necessarily show, you know, a special treatment to one insider

(08:18):
over another. So what has happened? Did you have this
cottage industry? Now have NFL network, ESPN, They get spoon
fed the information. Back then, you didn't have that. You sure,
you had Chris Mortenson and you had insiders, but you
had to you could still build relationships with agents, you know, locally.
I mean it was a very big deal. Drew Rosenhouse
cared about what was in the South Florida newspapers, other ages.

(08:39):
Neil Schwartz, did you know who represented a number of
Dolphins players. They all cared about what it is that
that you wrote, and that was a big deal. But
and when you talk about beat writing, I mean you
took it like a winning loss. But every day it
was almost like you played a three and or sixty
five day a year schedule of did I have this story?
Did I not have this story? How did this writer
get this story? I mean, if you're this is what

(09:00):
you want as a beat writer, you wanted me someone
with no life, someone who would throw away things Christmas, Holidays,
New Year's and Thanksgiving, anything to be able to get
a scoop head to the airport before all the security
issues to meet uh under what was his name Underwood? Right,
They went ahead and met with him and got I

(09:22):
mean some of the stuff was just absolutely wild. But
you would do that stuff back then. I remember one
time getting quotes and seeing Todd Archer pulling up to
the airport just as the car of this guy for
the Dolphins was leaving and he was cursing. I mean,
this was this was how it was. And you go
into the press room, the next day, and sometimes you
walk in and your chest is all puffed up. Other times,

(09:42):
remember your Brad don't want to talk to anybody. I mean,
it was how it was. And the other thing was
we all went about it a little bit differently, right,
I mean some of us had different sources in different places,
so you know, you just it was just a very
competitive time in my life for one of the reasons,
and absolutely no desire to become a beat writer again.
And it is because if you cannot do this job

(10:02):
twenty four hours a day and consider it your child,
that's really what it is. You know. If you don't
have that type of pride that you want to have
every single story, you want to get everything right, you
want to be first on everything, then you shouldn't be
doing the job. Damn that that is Yeah, that's that
sounds that sounds stressful, bro. It is opening for you. Right,

(10:23):
you just saw the end result. It didn't matter who
the writer offer. You happy about it? I know, I know,
I remember talking about I hear about deadlines and everything
but them, right, You're right, especially nowadays when all you
do is press send on the story now to get them,
to get them out there before anybody else gets him out. Yeah,
and it's also a people business. So Joy, you go
in the locker room. Right, I wrote something and said,
you can you can understand this, you know, being as

(10:44):
close as you are with Jason Taylor. I made a
huge mistake. I'll be the first to admit it. I
still feel bad about it. Twenty three years later, Jason
Taylor put out a swimsuit calendar or modeling calendar what is?
That's what it was, right, And basically I made a
comment that basically these these calendars are gonna go to
seventy pc off because he's playing so poorly. It was

(11:05):
an offhanded, stupid comment to make, and he and he
approached me in the locker room and told me about it.
And it took a long time to get j ts
trust back, and I really do to this day. I
still feel badly about it. I made a big mistake,
but I learned a valuable lesson as well. If you're
going to write something, okay, be there the next day.

(11:25):
You know what I'm saying. And so it makes you
think a little bit because we had hit and run
columnists who would write things and then never show up
and they're not accountable or people would say things on
the radio maybe and they're not in the locker room.
I do give Dave Hide credit. Dave Hide had to
throwaway line about Jimmy Johnson's dog Buttercup, and he you
talked about it on the show Buttercup, right, And so
he brings it out and Jimmy I told Dave can

(11:48):
you please come out? He comes out and Jimmy just
looks at him. He goes to try it a little
dog and he just gets tested. He wants off the
news conference. That was it. But Dave had the you know,
the guts to show up and be there for it,
you know, unlike a lot of other people. But that's
part of it too. O. J is relationship business. I
told Randy McMichael he was being cut by the Dolphins,

(12:09):
I I told him this. I told another player who
was cut by Nick Saban, who was at a Christmas
function pool the cornerback from back in the day, from
Southern Cow. He didn't know pol you know, because no
one could get a hold of him. I don't want
to be that guy, you know, the guy I shouldn't
be the person telling you you've been released from the team.
Your employment Stone, but I did have enough of a

(12:29):
relationship to try to give someone a heads up, try
to be sympathetic. And I like to think that I
forged a pretty good relationship with players, which again, when
you're building sources, I think you want to be not
just beholding to agents or particular coaches when it comes
to covering a beat. Yeah, you gotta. I imagine it's
a holistic process, right, you know, you want to have
the ability to have access to information from everywhere. But

(12:49):
so here's here's a kind of pivoting off. I wanted
to ask you about how competitive it was and if
you thought you were coming down the palm trees and
sunshine and that it would be different than Denver, but
it was. It was different, but it was competitive in
its own right, as you just talked about. Because of
those names we've had Armando out here, you know, in Armando,
Armando is a killer man. Armando is like he wants
to win everything, and and it's what made him great

(13:11):
at his job. It's what I think makes him great.
And we're gonna talk about the Hall of Fame piece
as well, and uh, and so it I think for Juice,
it's really eye opening to see because he loves a
good competition, and to see that that existed amongst you all,
because again it was something that I don't think he
was ever exposed to. But what about that, you know,
and you haven't been a beat writer in a long
long time. But you also didn't have to deal with Twitter.

(13:34):
You were only competing with print headlines. And as you said,
it did transition into internet, but I don't even think
newspapers even knew what to do with the Internet at
that point, and they were trying to hold certain content
back because they wanted to still sell papers and everything.
And now it is such a right now business with
respect to information. And I always talked about if I
talked to young people who are getting in the industry,

(13:55):
it used to be a race to be right, and
sometimes now it feels like it's a race to be first.
And it's so easy to correct yourself now because you
can just delete a tweet, you know, said quote tweet,
the old tweet, and said, oh, here's a correction. Whereas
something that was in print was gonna live in print forever,
a retraction wouldn't be printed for twenty four hours. And

(14:16):
if it was who no I remember Harvey, I don't
want to have attraction. It's gonna be on page eleven
at about it. You don't he didn't want to hear
that when when something else was this big headline above
the fold on the front page. How much has that
changed the industry. It's it's changed it so much. And
what I'm amazed at is I'm a news aggregator now.
I'm full time at Series x M NFL Radio, and

(14:37):
I look. I sit there on Sunday, I watch all,
you know, seven eight games at once on my TV
right on direct TV channel seven oh two. It's a godsend,
and I'm watching people give me information for free. Maybe
they just want to show how smart they are. Maybe
they want to try to build their own brand. I
don't know. I can just cold cold the Internet and
get so much information. But when you're writing now, it's

(14:58):
interesting because of the marriage between what a newspaper is
now and you just can't think of the brick and
mortar buildings, You can't think of the printing press because
they're trying to get rid of all that. You almost
have to write based upon you know, where do I
take a story after it breaks? You know? How do
I how do I advance a story. It used to
be you would wake up in the morning if you've
got scooped on something, and you'd be trying to do

(15:19):
that the next day. Now it's instantaneous. You're on call
pretty much twenty four hours a day when it comes
to news, and that's been the big thing about Twitter
and Seth. If you have any young people to tell
you they want to get into journalism, please tell them
to get the heck out of it. Please tell them
to never go down this road. If you work forever,
you don't get paid a heck of a lot unless
you're able to find a you know, a really tough

(15:41):
flight gig. And it's just a thankless type of employement.
I mean, if you're really that curious a person or
I feel like you're going to change the world, a
more power to you. But it's a pretty miserable deal
when it comes to beat work. And I feel for
people when it comes to, you know, trying to cover
a team because of all the different things now, and
remember too, you've got different types of media outlets that

(16:03):
are providing different type of content, you know what I mean.
You got news stuff that's coming from places you would
have never seen before because the NFL is so big
and because everyone is trying to grab that, you know,
sliver of the journalism pie, so to speak. So things
have changed in that regard as well. But no, completely
different world. When I worked at Fox, I left the
Sunsetting with two thousand seven to become a Fox NFL writer,

(16:24):
and you know we were. That's really when Twitter was
starting to truly take off. And it's great to be first.
At the end of the day, though, how did that
really help Fox? Did it drive traffic? Two people go
into the website. No, people just want to see, Okay,
this happened, that's it. So I don't see what the
payoff is a lot of times in the news breaking business,
no doubt about it. Man, Yeah, you know, but I

(16:45):
you know, Alice, I know Jeff loves talking about the
writers in the in the pr guys and stuff like that.
But there was also a football team to cover. Man,
there's a football and in those first two years, you know,
had to be very interesting for you main Hell, man,
they think about it, Jimmy Johns and quits. But Wayne
and Dan talking back into the game, the Wayne really
offered Jimmy just an opportunity to coach home games. So

(17:07):
you know, I believe that is the case. And I
will tell you I hit the ground running a little
bit on this. I came in the summer of back
when Jimmy had quit, basically came back and he was
willing to do anything. Listen, if you remember, Jimmy got
in some hot water because he sent Dave Wantstead to
a league meeting, you know, and this was one of
the caveats that Wayne had offered Jimmy, like, hey, listen,
we'll we'll let you do basically whatever you want, please

(17:28):
stay as our head coach. And it's funny when you
look back at that decision. Now, poor Wayne, Wayne Jazinga
was a wonderfully nice guy who was looking for the
right person to run his football team. You know, Wayne,
Heyazinga was looking for the right people, and he tried
so many different ways to get this thing right. First
it was Jimmy Johnson, Then he trusted Jimmy that Dave
Wantson was the right guy. Then it was Nick Saban.

(17:50):
Then it was failing forward fast with with Cam Cameron,
you know, And it was just like non stop of
just him just not being able to get this right.
Hopefully the people are in place now that are gonna
help lead the Dolphins to you know, playoff appearances, victories,
being a good team every year. And I think that
the one good thing about Jimmy Johnson is he got
out at the right time. And when I say that,
I mean it in that it allowed him to like

(18:12):
live his life and to find out there's more outside
of football. And you know, he's still very close to
the game obviously and has been for a number of years.
But I think just stepping away from the pressure cooker
of football, building a better relationship with his family, with
his sons, you know, a new wife, all those sorts
of things. I just think it was the best thing
for Jimmy Johnson, the human being who was really lacking
at times in that in that way when he was

(18:35):
head coach of the Dolphins. And then you think about
some of the cast of characters. I mentioned Demetrius under
what I was thinking the other day, Cecil Collins, you
know that one, you know you have you know, I
didn't get to cover Lawrence Phillips, thank God for that.
But if there was a player with any sort of talent,
Jimmy was willing to bring them in and give him
a chance and something it didn't In this case, it
did not pay off. It happened to you know, look,

(18:56):
Chris Carter, more power to him paid off for the
Minnesota Vikings, no question, right, not so much for the
Dolphins to seem like every time they brought someone into
an off field issue it manifested itself in South Florida.
So it's interesting though, right because also, like, how do
you define work out? Granted, the super Bowl is the
ultimate goal, but the team also did go to the
super Bowl, to excuse me, to the playoffs five straight

(19:16):
years and then you know, it's been a lot of
difficulties since then, and some of that was under Dave
and certainly some of that was under Jimmy Juice doesn't
want to hear what I'm saying here, but but I
think O J's point is like the defense was really
built up, and we're going to talk about some of
those players, but the defense was built to be one
of the best defenses that's ever been Obviously we had
the no name in the seventies, but certainly the fans

(19:37):
that listen to this show and they know that defense
it was significant. They just what happened to the offense.
I just kind of crippled or put it put a
glass ceiling, you know, and the team could only go
so far. Yeah, and I think that that was the
biggest problem, you know. I mean, I thought one thing
we were doing before that was what's scoring points? You know,
and then the next thing, you know, we had a
great defense. But you know, we were trying to play

(19:59):
in my opage in marve Az We're trying to do
Dallas offense without Dallas personnel. And it came with Dave
and it continued with Wan stand right, and you know, listen,
I like Dave a heck of a lot. He was
good to me on the beat. We can talk about that.
But I also realized too, It's like, you know, okay,
we're gonna I'm not gonna do my wants and impression,
but we're gonna play defense. We're gonna win the game.
We're you're you know, okay, we're gonna run the ball defense,

(20:21):
and we're gonna win the game in the fourth quarter. Okay,
but then the counters, Dave, what if you passed the
ball in the first three quarters, you'd have a huge lead.
It wouldn't matter we're gonna run the ball. I gotta
play deep. We went in the fourth quarter, and it
was this formula that with a conservative coach like Dave
that it just didn't work. He just did. You had
to make plays in the passing game. This was not
a team that was well equipped to do that. I

(20:41):
think one of the big things that happened to once
North Turner left and became Raiders head coach, that became
a real struggle for him to try to find someone
else to run this offense. I think too he trusted
Jay Fiedler, but Jay had his limitations and I just know,
you know, and I love me some Jay Fiedler, but
he was only going to get you so far. You
either have that quarterback or you don't. And you compound

(21:03):
that with some offensive philosophy issues. You compound that with
some personnel issues. You know, once Richmond Webb was gone
to left tackle, that became a revolving door of talent
as well. And then as that defense got older, got
a little bit more injury prone. You know, Larry Chester
suffering that torn a c L he had been replacing
Darryl Gardner, Tim Bowen's getting older, you know, just they
didn't find the right types of replacements. And it was

(21:23):
a Dolphins team that almost was always looking for the
quick fix, right trade draft picks, bring someone in, you know,
and and it just didn't pay off. And it left
a team that obviously went four and twelve and two
thousand and four. And when the Nick Saban, Cam Cameron,
I can go on the list here to you know,
Tony the Lake Great, Tony Sperano, you know, Adam Gaze,
whomever this couldn't get this thing fixed. Yeah, he has

(21:44):
a whole lot of that. Let's let's go back to Dave.
Though you mentioned he was good to you on the beat,
You and you and Dave once that had a very
interesting relationship we did. You know he well, first I
think he felt that people were out to get him,
whether it be you know, Jason Cole, Armando Saugero. He
just didn't really consider the Palm Beach Post people too much.
It's like the main newspaper, you know. He just didn't.

(22:05):
And that's no disrespect that. Joe Chad is great, Todd
Archer is great. I mean these are people who wrote,
you know, Joe to the stay continues to cover the Beach.
I took their careers to a national level. Yeah. I mean,
but the thing was that he didn't get the Palm
Beach Post delivered to his house every day. He wasn't
living in Palm Beach. I mean, the Harold and the
Sun Sentinal were really the two papers, and I just
had to I started a good relationship with Dave back

(22:27):
in before he became head coach. I talked to him.
We get into conversations that he made his own judgment
and he did you get him a gift? What? No,
I didn't. Did you get him a gift? I didn't.
I do have a day, once said bubble Head Dolf
from a charity thing that he did with a great
loose hottie back in the old days. Uh, you know,
los hottie is still going strong, by the way, in

(22:47):
his early nine he said he would have pointed that out,
but that he said, you know, so he trusted me.
So it led to, you know, the ability to ask
him questions and to be able to get information. I
mean that's what beat writing is, right, You build that
really chip with someone and you try to take advantage
of it. I mean, no payola has ever exchanged nothing
like that. But Dave, like the way I handled myself,
like the way I covered this beat. Look, we had problems.

(23:09):
I mean, he was upset because I quoted Marcus sprigs
Old Spriggy about something that, you know, when he was
ripping on David, and Dave called me in his office
and screamed at me for five minutes. But you know,
that's the other thing too that I learned is that
you have to sort of let things go. If you're
gonna be around people every day, you have to be
able to let things go. You can't. You can't carry
a grudge as a writer, and honestly, everyone needs each other.

(23:31):
I learned that from Bruce Coslet covering the Bengals, you know,
and that really helped me a lot, because I had
to blow up with Bruce one day when he was
a coach there, and you know, the next day he
just acted normal and I was like, oh, okay, let
me learn from this and move on from there. So yeah,
I mean Dave was good to work with. I mean, honestly,
I still have a great relationship with him to this day.
No his wife, I mean, just he's he was wonderful

(23:51):
to me. What else can I say, Well, you're both
media guys. Now that's a whole different yeah family, which
is crazy because Dave would get nah for all like
not being good with the media, and now he's absolutely
fantastic at it. I just think it's it's awesome. I mean,
and I you know, I like Dave talking. You know,
when he was a quote, he give me some stuff.
He was good. You know, I don't mind it. I do.

(24:12):
I do think he regrets the choice of a lobster
trap though in the locker room. Once there was a
game that the Dolphins were about to play, and he
put up lobster traps in the locker room Trap game,
Baby Trap game, except nobody knew what a lobster trap was.
This wasn't really spelled out very clearly. You're simply looking
up at a wooden box on it and you have

(24:35):
no idea what this means none. It was not an
effective a pregame message, and the Dolphins did fall into
that trap. The trap was the trap. That's that's exactly
what it was. Too much fun. Well, let's let's shift
gears to the players. We talked about the coaches here,
some of the players he had an opportunity to cover.

(24:56):
There's a few names that just jumped right off the
page to me. Uh you JT. You talked about j
T and you know you got to cover him as
a player and then vote for him, Uh, you know
as a as a Hall of Famer. Zach want talk
about some Zach Thomas and certainly Ricky Williams because that was, Yeah,
that was I imagine an adventure for you. Look at

(25:17):
that headshake, big said, look at that headstage made my
life miserable us more years on this beat. First, he
had a cozy relationship with Dan Lavatard, so anything that
was going on was going to Dan Lavatard, who worked
at the Miami herold I worked at the Sun Sentinel. Second,
just the easiest things with him were hard. For example,

(25:37):
I get commissioned by Sports Illustrated for kids to write
a story about Ricky Williams, and and you know, there's
two thousand two seasons. Everything's going great midway through Dolphins
or winning, He's leading the league and watching everything couldn't
be better, you would think for Ricky Williams. First question, Ricky,
what are you having the most fun with this season?
His answer, why do you think I'm having fun? What?

(26:02):
What do I do? With is Ricky. I'm writing for
Sports Illustrated for kids, Okay, could you please help me
out here? But there was that I remember I had
a party at my house. That's one in the morning. Everyone's,
you know, pretty hammered in a shocking development, knowing, knowing
my situation. So and then party. Yeah, we have the
TV on and all of a sudden, breaking news Ricky

(26:24):
Williams retires and I'm just like, whoa, you know, and
it was absolutely stunning. And then trying to track Ricky.
Where is Ricky today? Ricky's in Japan, Ricky's sleeping with
the Aborigines in New Zealand. Ricky may come back, Ricky
may not come back. Why isn't Ricky playing? It became
so like consuming. Then he did come back, and then
he got suspended again, and then he was gone, but

(26:46):
he was playing in Canada and then he came back again.
I mean, it's crazy. I mean, I have a good
enough relationship with him, we say hello and all this,
but I mean, honestly, that's a full time job. And
I remember when the trade was made with with Ricky Williams,
and I talked with Dave off the record date onstead
and I told him caveat emptor on this one by
everywhere because I had heard so many bad stories, you know,

(27:08):
with his the way he was living his life in
New Orleans, the people around him, just him just dealing
with everything. And it ended up, you know, you know,
to a large extent, hurting Dave. Dave couldn't adjust once
Ricky Williams was gone. They never found a bell cow
running back David Boston goes down with an injury in
two thousand four, had to use Chris First, US offensive coordinator.
That was before the Devil's advocate for a minute. I'm

(27:30):
gonna play Devil's advocate for a minute. So he comes
in and he rushes for eighteen hundreds something yards, however
many touchdowns, leads the league in rushing. JT leads the
league in in pass rushing with eighteen and a half sacks,
and they don't go to the playoffs. You know, was
that Ricky Williams fault? Was that? Like, you know, you know,
so who's who's responsible for that? And then he has
another thirteen hundred plus his second year also leads the

(27:53):
league and carries over those two years, So you know,
I feel like you said, it ended up hurting Dave,
and to an extent it did. And and interestingly enough,
Juice was at a party that Dave wants that a
Silver Bowl party that Dave wants that and Ricky Williams
got to see each other for the first time since
Ricky's retirement, and it was O J It was Dave,

(28:16):
and it was Ricky Williams and Jimmy Johnson and Jimmy
was it was this. It was all bad. You know
that the whole thing could have been prevented by this
set and this was an organizational thing, paying Ricky Williams
in the Dolphins at and that's why Ricky told us here.
And it was a number of things and some of
which he blamed me for, blames me, but but I mean,

(28:41):
you know, but honestly, had they paid him, that was it.
If if you felt like but in clauses that say,
if this guy is suspended, then you know that that's
the situation, right, You're not gonna get paid. But you
know they hold to hold the contract over his head
like that was just why so they didn't pay him
and I can I can understand that. And then to
hold the contract over his head was just part of it.
I mean, so that's all I'm saying. There's a lot

(29:03):
there and it's a complex situation. Yeah, I just said,
you know, I don't want to just sit here and
say poor Dave, Ricky's Ricky's a bad guy when there's
there's multiple size to the story. Oh four was I
mean you name it like like perfect storm. Literally the
first game moved the Tennessee, right, I mean it had
it goes to goes to a Saturday, and then when
A J. Feeley comes in, who Dave wants said, doesn't

(29:24):
want us his quarterback because you had Wayne is inga
give Rick Spielman power. Dave wants that hired Rick Spielman.
So you had this this terrible dynamic going on in
the front office. You had a decaying roster. I mean
it was just yet injuries and the whole thing was
was terrible. The Lamar Gordon era it came and went.
I mean you talk about footnotes and I mean it,

(29:46):
I don't think you can call it that an era.
All right, so let's let's pay it off. Ricky was
a third round pick, third round pick Juice Lamar Gordon
Ladies and Gentlemen, third round pick. Yeah, all right, let's
let's go to a happier Zach Thomas. What was it
like covering Zach Thomas? And then we're gonna talk you know, yeah,
let's talk about covering Zack Thomas. So I have when

(30:08):
I talk about footballs, right, I have a Zach Thomas
autograph football from two thousand and five when the Dolphins
played the Chargers out there in one and I went
to Zach and just told him about a linebacker in
the NFL. I can't remember who it was, but that
they had a bunch of interceptions, Like you know, you
see this guy that sees me as eight interceptions and
he goes, what are you saying I can't cause turnovers?

(30:28):
I'm like, no, I didn't say that at all. Yes,
you did. You said it. I'm gonna get one Sunday
and give you the football. I still have that football
he forced to turn over and got the ball, kept
it on the sideline, signed it in the locker room
to me, and I'm having one hand with a football
over here, one hand with a microphone here talking to him.
Because of that, he was so driven. I feel the

(30:51):
other thing about Zach. I mean, look, there was nobody
who was gonna work harder at their craft than Zach
Thomas in terms of film study, you know, speaking of
connection and so so they want to let me sit
in a linebackers meeting in oh four when Bob Sanders
was a coach and I covered Bob at the University
of Florida. I met him there with Junior say Out
and Zach Thomas, and it blew my mind. I sat

(31:12):
in on a rookie meeting and what Bob was feeding
these guys. And then I sat in when Junior and
Zack came in, and they could tell you everything before
the snap. Hey, you know what, in the fifty two,
you're lined up six inches too far. They're gonna run
the football this way. They knew everything like to a t.
It was ridiculous. And that was just a type of
crap that Zach Thomas had. I also think too, to

(31:34):
his detriment, he would play through anything. There were times
in the locker room when I taught to zact that
I just didn't think he was right. That was the
thing too, those Zack just he would not stop playing football.
How he was so dedicated to his craft. Hey, I mean, listen,
you feel me in now He's got one vote for
me for the Pro Football Hall of Fame, Armando Jason.
That's gonna be three, so we'll see. Hopefully this is

(31:54):
his year. I feel he didn't get in last year
because Sam Mills was in his final year of eligibility
and pulled it a lot of people's heart strings that
he was you know, this was it and that Zack
still has time left. Hopefully this is Zach Thomas is here.
He deserves that. He did every You got every ounce
of football out of that man's body that you possibly could,
and he was a difference man. Yeah, man, at least
right into our next question. Actually, we're gonna talk a

(32:15):
little bit more about Zach. And I know you have
that vote, you know, as a Hall of Fame selector
for one. I mean, how did you get to be
on that panel? Let's start, let's start right there. You know,
Joe Horrigan, the Pro Football Hall of Fame saw that,
you know, I started becoming a national writer. I'd put
in my time on the league and they were looking
for someone. And I also was a Pro Football Writers
President back uh in two thousand seven and eight. I think,

(32:35):
so I had a vote for a couple of years.
I saw that I did my research, saw that I
knew the league and my story and of it. So
they offered me an opportunity to become an at large voter.
And I've been able to hold that ever since, you know,
and it's been incredible to to have that honor. Yeah,
that's that really is awesome. And you know, you talked
about why Zach probably didn't get in last year, but
what about other guys like Richard Webb and Mark Clayton

(32:57):
and guys like that that you know, I think that
be you know, getting in there as well. So we
have a situation here where I can only vote for
the people in front of me, right when we have
fifteen candidates, that's all I can do. And for whatever reason,
they just have not gotten the traction that that other
candidates have. Mark Clayton, Mark Cooper, no traction on the
Senior Committee, Richmond Webb, same thing. I think they're they're

(33:18):
players who are going to be considered among the best
of their time. But juice, I don't see it happening.
It's unfortunate. I mean, heck, Bob Kuchenberg was like, got in,
get in, and Richard Webb can't get in. I mean again,
it's it's beauties in the eye to beholder, right, And
I mean, we all love Richmond. We know what job
he did on Bruce Smith, we know how he changed
things for the Dolphins. But Tony Basselly, you know, had

(33:38):
that maybe that national allure. I don't I don't know,
you know, it's it's hard to do Jacksonville, Like, why
did you have national lore from Jacksonville when when Richmond
Webb was Dan Marino's left tackle, you want to talk
about national lure. So that's and and that's and that's
not an interesting thing. The funny thing is when Jason
Cole was here, we got into a big debate with
him on Besselli and Richmond Webb. But you know, so
that's another question I have for you when we say

(34:00):
beauty is in the eye beholder. I actually have great
respect for the process. I learned a lot about it
when JT went through it and kind of fascinating to me.
And and the panels incredible and and there's just a
wealth of knowledge and I think the depth of backgrounds
there from you also. But there are some people that
would say it was, well, well, should this group be
the beholders? And so what do you think about when

(34:22):
folks attack the process. Well, a couple of things. I
do want to point this out about Baselli. When I
say Jacksonville, think of Jacksonville when they first started, because
it's a team that made the a f C title game.
They were in the playoffs basically every year the Tony
Boselli played and they were a primetime type of team
at that time. But so as Richmond Webb and Dan
Marino understood, understood, and maybe just people just don't think

(34:44):
that Richmond was a Pro Football Hall of Famer. I
just I can't. I can't account for it. I mean,
he makes a cut to like a hundred twenty five
names and then doesn't make it to the twenty five.
So how do you make it to the Pro BO
all those years and get the All Pro years and
not being of fam er like he? Dam Me, I
think he didn't stop stop making it. I think he
stop making a Pro Bowl leg a year eight or so. Right. Well,

(35:06):
and this is something that's interesting because you know, sometimes
it's one guy at a time. And let me be
honest here, I'll give you the Cincinnati Bengals right with
Willie Anderson. You know, Jeff Hobson. If you start trying
to push too many people on your team for the
Pro Football Hall of Fame, you're gonna split votes and
you're not gonna be able to give maybe enough attention
and love to somebody. So it's almost like one at
a time, is that Thomas goes in? Okay, So you

(35:27):
know we have a period with the Dolphins here quite
honestly over the past fifteen years or so, well, we're
not gonna have a lot of Hall of Fame discussion
about players who are on this team. Maybe then it's
an ability to look at Richmond Webb, you know, to
see that or even when it comes to a senior's candidate,
why some hy Richmond Webb should be under consideration for it.
When you talk about attacking the process set, I can understand.
You know, when it comes to transparency, would you want

(35:50):
to know how forty nine voters voted with that? I mean,
there's I don't know if there's a perfect system to
have it in. It's tough, you know, I mean, it
makes the Hall look pay do I guess when Terall
Owens doesn't get in on the first ballot, considering all
that he did, you can have people argue, look spetistically,
this guy dominated the game. What else could you ask for?
He took the Philadelphi Eagles to their only Super Bowl

(36:10):
under Andy Reid. I can go off on Tio's accomplishments,
but maybe not great with the media and maybe disruptive,
to say the least on some teams that it was
held against him. I know that was one of the
arguments against him. Yeah, so tough. It's it's a tough debate.
I know that was a criteria though. That criteria as well. Well.
Making your teammates better is one, right, Well, it's supposed
to be. It's an interesting question because it's supposed to

(36:31):
be what takes place between the lines and you know,
like on on a game day, and that's what you
should be looking at. But I don't think you can
ignore the way that a player may impact a team
culture for the better or for worse, you know what
I mean. I think that's an important thing that you
have to consider. What about some of the guys that
in the hall that had terrible teams or whole careers,
I mean, with what they do to help their team well,

(36:52):
I mean, I mean it would be one the lake
part Kenedy he was the NFL Defensive Player of the
Year on a two and fourteen team, right, So mean,
there's that, and then you get into this argument to
which is another rabbit hole to go down. But you
know why players like L. C. Greenwood are the Steelers
or I mentioned Bob Kuchenberg, how about Jake Scott, I mean,
how about players like this that were really difference makers.

(37:12):
But then people say, oh, well, you're gonna put everyone
from that team in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
And so then you discriminate against a player who could
have been a Pro Football Hall of Famer on a
lesser team, but because so many of his teammates are
in the Hall now, it works against him. So it's
a tough It's a tough goal. That sounds like the
goalposts are getting moved around every time that that does
sound a little bit to me like the goal posts
are getting moved. And think about this, two guys. I mean,

(37:34):
in baseball, you have this vote. If nobody gets in
the Pro the Major League, or the Baseball Hall of Fame,
that's it. You know, you still have a celebration in Cooperstown,
but that's it now at the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
We have to have a minimum of four people into
the Pro Football Hall of Fame each year. And you know,
because as you know, in Canton, this is their big event.
This generates so much revenue for the city, so you're

(37:55):
going in there, so you've got to put people in
the hall. And I think it was Dion Sanders earlier
this year, who who you know, put some shade on
the hall and said, well, what really constitutes a Hall
of Famer nowadays? And that gets tough. I mean, juice.
It's like if you would just say Jerry Rice is
the standard, He's a Hall of Famer. So who else
belongs with Jerry Rice in the Pro Football Hall of Fame? Right?

(38:18):
You know. So it's an incredible honor, and I feel
for the people that are up for it and don't
get in and have to deal with so much of it.
And it really affects not only them but their friends,
their family. They're pulling for him, and you've seen it
eight nine years of a guy having to sit there
and deal with the disappointment of having his name brought
up and then having that taken away from him. It's
it's a tough situation. That's why I think that's all

(38:38):
I can do. Is the best job that I can
vote the way that I really feel like it is
do as much research as I can going in, and
then we'll see if others feel the same way. Do
you carry the way of that pressure? Ever? Do you feel?
Because I know you're you're a you know, I think
when you get past the surface of the mullet and
the and the you know, the galtee and all the
things we talked about earlier, I think you are a
guy who who emots and and feels things, and so

(39:01):
I wonder, like we're talking about this and we're giving
you a hard time a little bit about Richmond Webb.
But do you feel some of that pressure when you
go into that room that when you go into the
room of the fifteen. I have to be objective, you know,
I do, and I have to listen. And I don't
mean pressure like from one side or the other. I
mean just that the idea that you're going to some
people's dreams are gonna be pulled fumed. I don't feel that.

(39:22):
But let me say this, I have not been a
presenter yet, and that it's where you feel the pressure.
I mean, poor Amando he's going nuts trying to get
Zach Thomas in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and
so he's trying every year, and you have to sort
of keep the presentation fresh, you know, and right that
that's part of it as well. So I think that
there's that I think too, when you have a player
that's come up time and time again, how do you

(39:44):
keep it fresh? You know? John Lynch, I think was
what a nine time finalist. I mean, in the group
of fifteen After a while, how do you find new
information to try to support your candidate to get them
over the top. Sometimes you just know that it's time, right,
Like I really feel going into this year's Profil Paul
Hall of Fame class, we're probably gonna have two first
ballot inductees. In my opinion handicapping it would be Joe

(40:05):
Thomas and Darrell Revas. And after that, I mean, Dwight
Freeney and Robert Mathis are very worthy, but are they
so good that they jump to Marcus Ware and Jared
Allen in the pecking order? And I think that some
of it, too is pecking order. We all want instantaneous,
we all want first ballot. Well, not everyone's a first
ballot player, but you might belong to the Pro Football
Hall of Fame, you may have to wait your turn,
and that's sometimes what happens, or you get a log

(40:27):
jam in a position. Think about how many times we
had Tim Brown, Andre Read Chris Carter and all those
votes nullifying, and then nobody could get through. And year
after year we're voting on these three and splitting our votes.
Finally one of them gets a consensus and the other
one goes in and the other one goes in. So
I think for those who have done this process a
long time, you show a respect for the people who
have been finalance for a number of years, and ultimately,

(40:49):
as we like to say, we get them out of
the room and we move them on, because otherwise, don't
keep bringing them back in the room. If you're if
you're that committed to not voting for them for the
Pro Football Hall of Fame, leave him off your final
your vote from fifteen, and let's vote on somebody else.
That's a fair point. That's a fair point. I appreciate
that insight. So I want to go and we're a

(41:11):
little out of order here, but I want to go
back to those players that you covered and during your
tenure there with the Dolphins, and you talked about how
Jimmy was willing to take gambles on, you know, uh
just uh sometimes a motley crew. His first overall draft
pick that he ever had as a Miami Dolphin was
Darryl Gardner. And you weren't here for Darryl coming into

(41:32):
the league or coming into the Dolphins locker room, but
you were a part of his departure, and you know,
you gotta share that story. It's one that many folks know. Well.
I mean, basically, Darryl Gardner gets cut, he's got it,
he's got a back issue. Okay. And if I'm remembering
this correctly, his agent Neil Schwartz, and I love me

(41:54):
some Neil Schwartz, but he essentially wrote a manifesto about
Darryl Gardner and the greatness of Darryl Gardner. And he
brings us to Darryl Gardner's house to talk with Darryl tremendous. Right.
We got the lawn service guy who looks like he's
scared for his life working for Daryl Gardner, Okay, and
he just absolutely horrified. I mean, just so we get there,

(42:14):
we we've got There was a palatial estate like it
was cute. I remember that place cute. So we go
to the sauna, okay, and there are liquor bottles everywhere.
I wish my bar was stocked as nicely as all
those empty bottles were right there everywhere. And Darryl talked
about himself, I believe, as a modern day gladiator and

(42:34):
all of this stuff. It was completely gonzo, right. This
would have been in today's world with the Internet. I mean,
the story would have just lived on and on and
on and on. So that was Darryl. I mean, he
just he he had his issues, man, he really really did.
And you know, look talented enough player. I think that
maybe just because he looked like, you know, such an

(42:56):
incredible specimen, that they overrated his ability a little bit.
I think Tim Bowens was a better defensive tackle. But
they were good. I mean they were really good combination.
But Darrel and his life spiraled out of control. You know,
things like this that had gone on that you know,
caused the Dolphins, after signing him to an extension to
release him. He went on to Washington, went on to
Denver and just really fizzled. And you know, it's always

(43:18):
wanted go to be one of those cases of what
could have been for Darryl Gardner because I'm not saying
he's a pro football Hall of Fame talent, but the
guy could have played a long time in this league
and ended up cutting it short in that back that
she didn't help either, definitely did not help him whatsoever. Man,
But you know a lot of things didn't help him, bro,
A lot of things did not help him out, you know,
I mean, so it is what it is, man, you know,

(43:39):
And I'm glad you mentioned Timbo because we all probably
agree about Timbo's contribution, how good he was, how greedy
was for this team compared to what you know, I
was short, he was doing well. It's funny because if
you ask, you know, the outsider, who who who is
the player you would at least want to be in
a dark alley against right most, you know, the outside
of it's, oh my god, Darryl Gardner right easily, Timbo easily,

(44:02):
not even close, not even close. That was a dude.
That was a scary dude. And I love Timbo. You
know what, Let's let's go back a little bit to
the Hall of Fame talk, because you know, we've had
Jeff Darlington here. I want to show a couple of times,
and in his most recent appearance, he painted us legendary,
yourself legendary, he said, In fact, Jeff, I mean one

(44:23):
of the most respected. You know. We know Jeff is
one of the most respective reporters in the business. But
he struggled to find words describe what life on the
road was like with Marv Daz. What the hell is
he possibly talking about? Marvin? Every batman needs a Robin, right,
so I figured, you know that's name in his episode.
I'm telling you that, right. You know, every batman needs

(44:45):
a Robin, and mar Vez knows his way around on
the road a little bit. Jeffy was a prodigy at
the University of Florida. In fact, I read his story
when he was working at the University of the Independent
Florida Alligator on channing crowder, catching wild hogs. I mean,
Jeff was a prod. Jem also like to have a
good time. He may have left that part out of
it as well, but this brought us together for many

(45:07):
an exploit such as modest Yahoo go to see him
back in uh back in Ohio and maybe a five
am night fear in loathing and Acron on Pro Football
Hall of Fame weekend, you know, a party with the
taxi driver. God blessed. That was a mistake. But the
point is that, you know, somehow we survived all of
this together. But yes, you know it was. It was

(45:27):
fun though, but it was a different time. That doesn't
These things don't happen now, right, I mean, you hear
legendary beat writer stories about guys out on the road
because the day would end, the day would be over.
It'd be like, okay, I've written, I filed my story.
It's nine o'clock at night. Only bad things can happen
from here. Let's go right like that was just how
it was, but not anymore, you know, because you really

(45:47):
have to be on call twenty four hours a day.
I just feel like there's a different type of individual
maybe covering the beat than there was before. You know,
Degenerates like me weren't really you know that we were
around then, not so much anymore. I was gonna say,
I can guarantee you everybody different than you, dude, you know. Well,
you know it's just that that was a Hall of
Fame a type performance, you know what I mean? That

(46:08):
was worthy of a beat writer pro football Hall of
Fame type stuff again the different time. Man, I really
don't think you could pull it off today. I love
it so good. So I wasn't preparing here a little
bit of your crossroads because I know you covered this
team right up and through the summer leading up to
Camp Cameron as you as you indicated, But I'm gonna
save us all from that memory. We've had enough of

(46:29):
those stories. I'm gonna shift gears completely. And one of
the areas that you and I really connected on from
day one, beyond our daily working relationship, was your affiliation
with professional wrestling. You wrote a national column for the sport.
You were a wealth of information. You were I wasn't
saying encyclopedia, but half the listeners don't even know what
those are anymore. But you are like Google for professional wrestling,

(46:51):
and you would always come to me with these wild stories,
behind the scenes stuff. And I grew up loving the
WWF and all of those things. So talk about your
history with the wrestling industry and how uh you know,
your expertise, your relationships and all of that positioned you
for your current role with a WST. It's a wild situation.
So I grew up a pro wrestling fan, right, I

(47:13):
mean my view of world politics is shaped by professional wrestling.
For example, I even go off terrible Russia bad, you
know what I mean? Good? You know, and that was
a big deal for six year old Alex Nikolai Volkoff.
No good exactly. But later in life Nikolaive Volkoff is
has changed, climate changed, and you know, you had Michael
Gorbachev and Nikolai Volkoff became a positive force when it

(47:36):
came to Russia. Not that he was a real Russian,
but nonetheless you get my point. But you know, so,
I'm buying wrestling, hook line and sinker. Growing up, I
could not get enough professional wrestling and the eighties coming,
It's a boom, right. I get hold of a thing
called The Wrestling Observer newsletter. It's got all the inside information.
My first issue March second seven. I'll never forget the

(47:56):
day Dave Melts are writing, and he's a pre eminent
journalist and pro wrestling. We strike up a friendship. I've
got all this information. I start going to local shows.
I'm not working on meeting people the Miami Herald, where
I'm stringing for at the time, I started there in
high school. They know what a wrestling that I am,
and they say, hey, we ran a reader survey and
they would like to see a pro wrestling column. Would
you be willing to write one? I said, oh my god, yes.

(48:18):
So I'm using stuff that had never been out there before.
I'm using wrestler's real names. I'm saying, what's gonna happen
in the matches that have been taped two weeks from now?
I mean, this stuff is is not one guard right.
So it's so popular it comes to every week at
the Miami Herald. I had a nine seven six number
if you remember that, or three seven six whatever it was.
You know, people call that information make a couple like

(48:39):
thre hundred bucks a month, which a big deal for
my bar tap. So you know all that. So I leave,
I carry it with me. I go to Dayton, Ohio.
I've got you know, the Dayton Daily News is covering it.
Then I moved to Denver. I'm insistent upon writing this
wrestling column, and it worked with Script Tower. Then I
come to the Sun Sentinel. I'm still writing this wrestling column.
I continue it all the way up through two thousand
and twelve. At that point, I'm done with wrestling. I'm

(49:01):
not a I'm not a w w E person, I'm
not an instrict man person. They were the only game
in town, basically, and I was done. So I meet
Tony Condo at a Jet Jacksonville Jaguars training camp and
I'm do him a serious sex job. And he introduces
himself and he says, yeah, I know we've got football
in common. But I used to read you growing up,
and I like the wrestling comm and and Tony was

(49:21):
on the A O. L fanboards. I used to book
his own wrestling promotion. I mean, he was die hard
like me, but he's a little bit younger than me.
But he was a huge wrestling fan. So as time
went on and Tony and I just struck up a
friendship outside of football. I never used him as a source.
I never tried to milk information from him. I just
liked the guy. It was just a very nice guy,
and we had wrestling. He got me back into watching

(49:42):
wrestling a couple of years ago. He says, Hey, I'm
gonna be starting a wrestling company. You're interested in doing it?
Are you interested in being part of it? I'm like, yeah,
I think I'll do that. So it led to me
being able to work with all elite wrestling, and my
role has changed through the years. I did some color,
I did some analysis work to start. I've done backstage interviews.
I do lot of the production work now. I prepare
notes for the announcers. I work on the graphics that

(50:04):
you see at the bottom of the screen. I keep
records of all the wrestler's wins and losses and double
check all that. I mean, so it's a it's a
little bit of geek work. But every week come on
the road back in high school. Still some of the
old Marvez comes out from time to time, basically Tuesday
and Wednesday night, and you know, we just have a
I just have a great time. And I'm very blessed
at the opportunity that Tony has given me. An a
w I don't take it for granted. It's really been

(50:25):
every week I'm back in high school. So I share
a locker room with guys, you know, like Jake Roberts,
like Rn Anderson, you know, Tully Blanchard for a while,
Dustin Rhodes, you know guys. Yeah, I mean these are
my co workers, you know, alone the modern generation. And
it also is nice to be around young people. Listen,
I'm fifty one now, man, I know that my time
in a lot of ways has passed, but it does

(50:46):
allow me to just sort of see how young people,
you know, react to things, process information. I try to
learn as much as I can about people, let alone
pro wrestling, and that's really been a fun thing for
me as well, doing these two full time jobs that
are driving me absolutely crazy sometimes, but it's a blessing.
I mean, I get paid to talk about football in
Series X, and I get paid to work in pro wrestling.

(51:06):
If there's someone who has two better jobs, tell I mean,
I'd like to meet him, because I don't know if
there is. Tomar. You're telling me that Chief Wahomi Daniel
wasn't really a chief. Um actually ed McDaniel former Miami
Dolphin by the way, good tie in there. Once drank
a quarter motor oil on a bet, which was a
terrible idea on his part. Once ran a marathon very
literal like. It wasn't an official marathon, but ran twenty

(51:29):
six miles on a bet. He also was arrested before
a Dolphins game with Bob Brugger's former Miami Dolphin. Former
pro pro wrestler contemporary of Rick Flair, and when Ric
Flair's plane went down in a car and a plane
wreck in the seventies, Bob Bruggers was part of it.
And Bob, if I'm not mistaken, still might be working
at a bar over on Sunset Boulevard that I did
a big story on thirteen years ago for some day drinking.

(51:51):
This is how we got through practice, juice and training wrestling.
No wa who McDaniel was amazing. He was great and
he so was big. When I broke the story about
Hulk Hogan and the asteroid try in the early nineties,
you know why who had had talked about wrestlers using steroids,
which was a big revelation at the time. By the way,
you know, anabolic steroids just back when people cared well,

(52:12):
you could tell most of those guys weren't on anything.
They were just their their body types are just like,
that's what it is. And then it changed because the
Road Warriors came along and they were so popular. Everyone
wanted a new Road Warriors, right and WWF. It was
just all these jumbo sized guys and unfortunately, you know
the combination of steroids with some other things led to
a bunch of people passing, and it did. They did

(52:32):
ultimately pass a wellness policy. But you just think about
how many family wrestlers might still be with us had
there been some safeguards in place too, so that they're
not feeling Listen, individual choices, individual choice, But I think
so many folks felt pressure to look a certain way
because it is a cosmetic industry. You know, you said
what you will about whether it's sports entertainment or not.
But you know, when you have everyone that's looking like

(52:53):
Hawker Animal, you feel like you have to look at
like Hawker Animal, and that can sometimes lead to shortcuts
like that that they maybe not so great, you know
when it comes to your long term health. But that's
part of wrestling. It. It's wrestling, by the way, the
most fascinating thing I've ever done in my life. But
how about what I loved seeing I went on. I
was like, all right, let me go YouTube balance Marvez
a w wrestling and there you are the mean gene

(53:15):
oakland of and you're all suited up and you're asking
the questions and it's the whole stick and the guys
yelling at you. What kind of question is that? Marvez.
I mean, you had to be just eating that up.
I listen, It's an honor right and I try to
tree wrestlers with respect, you know, and try to get
their points across. And that's why I try to blend
in the background as much as possible. It's all about
the wrestlers. I'm not selling a ticket unless my mom's

(53:37):
gonna go to a show, and I don't think even
she would cross the street, to be honest. So I
think that you're talking about you know, you want that,
you want to put the storyline across, you want to
ask the question that that's Elictit's the best response from
a pro wrestler, and my my style is a little
bit different. I go back to Gordon Solely and the
old Championship wrestling from Florida Day's and he would call
the matches very straight, very sports like, you know, and

(53:58):
that's what initially our company started as with Beard in
a little bit of a direction. Now maybe we're towards
the tradition traditional pro wrestling, but to me, that's how
that's the error that I really enjoyed a lot of
it is because like anything, when you're a kid, you know,
you'll always look back. Finally, those housy on days, if
you will, right un pro wrestling. But it's listen again.
I'm just too roll elbows with these folks to call
them my co workers, you know, to be part of

(54:19):
a w the most successful startup company in pro wrestling history.
I'm so grateful to Tony Cohn and his friendship and
for bringing me on board. I'm grateful for what I
do every week, going to a different city, you know,
seeing the world and doing pro wrestling, I mean, and
also on top of that NFL radio? What else can
I ask for? Pretty darn good? All right, Marve is
all right. You know, we know you spent you know,
your career mostly writing on that nine o'clock deadline for you,

(54:41):
you know, you know, but as a guy has covered
to the NFL, you know for nearly thirty years, you know,
there's no deadline like the two minute drill. So we're
gonna put you through our version of the two minute drill,
you know, before we let you get off of here.
Is that cool? All right? Let's try it? Alright, Bet,
it's alright, alright, We're gonna get my time out. Bix
up not I if Marves needs a time out. And

(55:03):
you know this is a little it's two minute drill,
but it's also a little bit like wrestling because we
just play with space and time to make sure we
get a good story out. So that's how we're gonna
do it. But well we'll kick it off right now.
Which NFL city is your favorite to visit and cover
a single game in? It would have to be New Orleans,
you know, if I can make it to the game.
But New Orleans what an incredible city of food, drinks, atmosphere.

(55:25):
Plus when you go to the game itself and they're cranking,
let's get crunk. I mean, what's better than that? I
mean to me, that is just a very magical, dangerous,
dangerous city, like like like party until noon, super Bowl
week in, blowing off the media availability like danger. Yes,
all right, clock is running forever on this. It's hard

(55:47):
to recover from that. As you, as you discussed earlier,
you and Darlings can share some great memories on the road.
Who's your number one week man? Though, when you when
you look at your NFL misadventure, I'd have to say
Todd Archer because Todd was the into my yang. Todd
made sure I got home safely, which was how we
met in Baltimore on the road. He got me back
from the horse you rode in on the Edgar Allan

(56:08):
Poe Bar in downtown Baltimore back and struck up a friendship.
And we're very opposite people. And I think that's what
really helps a lot. That makes sense because I'm surprised
by the answer, but when you explain it, it makes
perfect sense, all right. Which Miami Dolphins player who you
covered would have made the best professional wrestler and which
pro wrestler could have best helped the Miami Dolphins in
your era? Oh, I think that Darryl Gardner would have

(56:29):
been an incredible pro wrestler just because of the look,
the size, And I'm not sure if he would have
really and this is not a knock on intelligence. I
just don't know if he would have grasped the concept
of pro wrestling and not hurting people, you know what
I mean, and trying to make it make it look good.
But you know, but he would. He just had the
physique to look and he was absolutely horrified. I mean,
you would want to face hit in the ring. And
what wrestler could have helped the Dolphins? Maybe m j

(56:52):
f Our Current a W World chain because he would
have added some swagger at a time in the early
two thousand's that Dolphins needed a little bit of swag. Okay, okay,
who gave a better Silver Stream performance? Dan Marino and
asan turr Jimmy Johnson and the water Boy Ricky Williams
and struck on you or Alex Marves in draft Day.
My scene got cut so differentely isn't me, But I

(57:13):
didn't know. I did go to the to the premiere.
They flew me out. They felt bad for me. So
we go and it's you know, we're all Darlington everybody,
and two things happened. Number one, you know, get pretty
hammered before the showing and we I've got a guy
in front of me, I don't know, have to do
this red carpet a little you know, black dude with
with a neck roll, and I'm like, who this guy is?

(57:34):
Os Mike Tyson, who I would later all that later
go on to interview with a W. So it all
comes full circle, right, Um, so we had that, but
you know, so we had that one. But you know
the cool part about that is Kevin Costner and Hey,
Jeff and Jeff and I hung out with Kevin Soil
about two in the morning of the night of the showing,
and he was the most down to earth guy. I
think you just enjoyed being around people, and we answered

(57:55):
his sports questions and he was really cool. By the
end of the night. Jeff and I basically like this
to Osner, you'd be good now, you know what I mean.
That's absolutely absurd. So we had that. But you know
when you mentioned that Dame Marino, anything that has to
do with a Sventura, right, Finkle everybody that that's it.
It's Daniel. Though kim Bo Caamper really was the correct
answer to this question imprinting the ring upon Jim Carrey's head,

(58:17):
that is that would have been did a great job.
He did a great job. There's a reason why you
cover the NFL and you don't call the two minutes
drill from the sidelines, but because we've totally just blown
through the clock. But I'm gonna get this last question
in Steel Cage Battle Royal featuring the writers from your
time on the Miami Dolphins beat. It's Marvez, it's sal Garrow,

(58:37):
it's Cole, Chris Perkins, Ethan Stolen to Todd Archer, Berry Jackson,
Joe shadd throw in bullet Bob who is left standing
at the end. You know what, I gotta give credit
to Amando because I will say this, you know longevity.
I met Armando in high school. He was working at
the Miami the Neighbors branch. For those who remember what
Neighbors was. Neighbors was a Miami Herald supplement that would

(59:00):
come out on Sundays and Thursdays and when the Miami
News folded and Armando was covering the Miami Dolphins. Back then,
he didn't have a job, so the Harold hired him.
But they put him in this bureau in Hialiah. I
was in high school. I'm looking to write as much
as I can. I would write Armando stories for Okay,
so as a competitive as it got, I could never
get mad at Armando because he helped me. You know,

(59:23):
when I was a young guy. It was very gracious
with it to give me a few story ideas. And
I don't even know if he knew what he was
doing at the time, but I think that an honorable
mention to Barry Jackson Hi because he has survived and
he is the He is the backbone of the Miami Harold.
You can put him on anything. He is going to
be relentless. And what it is that he does, he's
a perfectionist. I go back with him keeping stats for

(59:45):
high school football games in nineteen seven at the Miami Herald.
He was covering Miami Beach High School quite a bit
because he is a High Tide graduate and he is
just he is a guy. Now that's like almost an
institution in South Florida, you know, not only covering sports media,
but every team. You to put him anywhere, and you
know you're not only going to get a great job,
but probably breaks some news along the way. So I
think those two are great. Listen, Jason Cole speaks for itself. Obviously.

(01:00:08):
Some great names are and bullet Bob Boby Manuel Jr.
Poor father fell off that airplane wing God bless and
bullet Bob was named after bullet Bob Armstrong by the way,
for former. So that's that's how great. Yes, so I
mean it was, but that is a great battle, Royal.
I gotta tell you, you know, if we can only
settle our differences that way, and you know, again, it

(01:00:29):
felt like it felt like when I went down that
spiral staircase and exactly viral staircase. That thing was miserable.
Oh my god. And then you had the old Dolphins headquarters.
How you learned how to sand bag like Barry Jackson
would hang out in the lobby. Somehow somebody had the
weakest bladder in all the sports. It was remarkable because
he had to walking back and forth to see who

(01:00:49):
was around and who was coming in the front, which
is probably why he wouldn't win the Battle Royal. So
Salgary gets it for longevity. That's the two minute drilling
about six and a half minutes. But he did an
outstanding job. I will the last thing I'll leave you
with before we get you out of here is he
talked about Barry Jackson and and it is crazy that
some of these names are still on this beat. But
if you, I don't know how much you've watched any

(01:01:11):
of Mike McDaniel's pressors, you know he does his daily pressors.
But Barry opens up every question and Coach McDaniel has
so much fun with him and the two for a
question and hold, and they actually have this really fun
rapport that it is to to to watch those two
guys go so, uh yeah, Barry's still grinding me, and
that's what he is. He is a grinder, but he's
he's such a wealth of knowledge. The South Florida sports

(01:01:32):
scene would be so much worse off without Barry Jackson, honestly,
and I have a world of respect for Barry. I mean,
he is just he's phenomenal at what he does. And
you know, again, he and Armando at the end, I'd
like to see that if it was just settled between
those two, Barry might find a way. You never know.
I don't know that somebody's gonna have like a foreign
object in the trunks and they're gonna they're gonna come

(01:01:54):
out of the top of that. He is Alex Marveez.
You can call him the dude. You are pretty damn
good at what you do too, sir, so I greatly
appreciate your spending some time with us and and you
definitely when you get into town, you better give us
a call. I don't know when it will be, but
I know Juice and Pest will be ready for the ride.
I'll probably be the guy that's tapping out. I am
down to Rod awesome. I absolutely love it. Thank you

(01:02:15):
so much for having me in the fish tank. I
do appreciate it. Hopefully I swam and didn't sing. Damn right.
Thanks to Diving and Marve, you're now diving tank, sitting

(01:02:38):
down with step and this is strictly for them true
fan golf fans number one one of course, y'all. This
Loinaris was talk never been at pitch tank. Get aquas
kid's kind of never been at pish tank. It's on
the legend that we're talking. When you ever been that

(01:03:00):
petch tank rocking? Well? Oh, j yourselthful you've never been
that petch tape. Noh