July 24, 2024 • 41 mins
His first trip to Colorado came when the Broncos drafted him 31st overall in 1983. Prior to that, Mark Cooper had spent nearly his entire life in Florida, growing up playing football and excelling on the offensive line at the University of Miami. When Coop got to Denver, he was reunited with a guy he met briefly a few months earlier when both played in the East-West Shrine Bowl: John Elway.
Mark’s four years with the Broncos weren’t as successful as he would have liked, he often found himself in the training room with an injury and then fighting to get his job back. He did start many games, however, including Super Bowl 21.
In 1987, Mark was ready to move on. After a little game of “let’s try to trade you rather than release you,” the Broncos set the price tag too high for a trade and nobody took the bait. Mark was released and signed with Tampa Bay where he played the next few seasons before retiring.
After he retired, Mark returned to Denver. He had fallen in love with the Mile High City and got into some business ventures. He also got his real estate license, which worked out very well for him: more than 30 years later, he’s still helping clients buy and sell in both Colorado and Florida.
Mark’s four years with the Broncos weren’t as successful as he would have liked, he often found himself in the training room with an injury and then fighting to get his job back. He did start many games, however, including Super Bowl 21.
In 1987, Mark was ready to move on. After a little game of “let’s try to trade you rather than release you,” the Broncos set the price tag too high for a trade and nobody took the bait. Mark was released and signed with Tampa Bay where he played the next few seasons before retiring.
After he retired, Mark returned to Denver. He had fallen in love with the Mile High City and got into some business ventures. He also got his real estate license, which worked out very well for him: more than 30 years later, he’s still helping clients buy and sell in both Colorado and Florida.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
He said, look, we're goingto do something different, and I was
like, okay, great, let'sdo whatever whatever works best and I'll get
my agent involved, et cetera,blah blah. Then they kept asking too
much for me, so you know, I said, I don't totally agree
with everything's going on. I meanall the times I shot up for you,
all the times I did ankles,shoulders, feet, you know,
all kinds of stuff I go.So, look, it's just part ways.
(00:22):
They tried to trade me. Thingsdidn't go well, and I went
back in. I was like,look, you're asking too much. My
agent says, is just not goingto happen this way, So trade me,
cut me, or I'll just youknow, go to the press and
we'll have some conversations. Welcome toanother edition of Cut, Traded, Fired,
Retired. This podcast is chock fullof conversations with professional athletes and coaches,
(00:43):
all of whom have some tied ofColorado and they've all been cut,
traded, fired, and or they'reretired. I'm your host, Susie Wargen.
On this podcast, you'll find conversationsalready with two members from the Broncos
nineteen eighty three draft eighth rounder GaryKubiak and twelfth under Carl Mecklenberg. For
this episode, we hear from theirsecond round pick in nineteen eighty three,
(01:06):
offensive lineman Mark Cooper. Coop grewup in Florida and played college ball at
the University of Miami. He'd neverbeen West until the Broncos drafted him.
Not only did he get a Mountainview when he arrived, he also got
John Elway as a quarterback. Coopdealt with a number of injuries during his
time in Denver, but started manygames, including Super Bowl twenty one.
(01:26):
After the Broncos, he had afew years in Tampa Bay, then decided
to hang up his cleats. Soonafter retirement, he got his real estate
license and is still practicing real estatein both Colorado and Florida. Ladies and
Gentlemen Number sixty three Mark Cooper cutTraded fired retired podcast with Susie Wargin Mark
(01:48):
Cooper, How are you? Howare you? I am doing just fine,
Thank you, thanks for inviting me. Absolutely we were saying last time
we saw each other, well kindof I amc the boy Scout of America,
Breakfat and I always introduce all thecelebrities that are in but I can
never see who's coming in because I'mblinded by the light. So I just
read names and hope that that personis at the back and coming up at
the right time that I say theirname. Now, you did a great
(02:10):
job. That's I've gone to thatfor years and years. Yeah, yeah,
a lot of good. Yeah.I was a scout when I was
a kid, so kind of bringsback some memories absolutely. All right,
well, and speaking of being akid, this is how this goes.
We go way back in the hottub time machine and start at your beginnings
and then work our way up towhat you're doing now. So let's go
back. You're born in New Jersey, but you don't stay there very long.
(02:31):
You really grow up and spend allyour time in Florida. Yeah,
it was at two my family movedto Actually, my dad was supposed to
be getting a job in Cape Canaveraland then they had all these cutbacks,
so we ended up in Sarasota.In Sarasota, I lived there pretty much
a baby through you know, Ithink fourth grade. In fourth grade we
(02:52):
moved to Port Charlotte. So allthis is on the west coast of Florida,
and you know, I've been abig fisherman in my whole life.
My dad was a fisherman. Mydad did some crab in he did he
did all kinds of odd jobs becausehe was in the rigging business, right,
so he had to kind of reinventhimself. And he did a number
of odd jobs and different stuff asa kid. And then he went into
the police business and went to theacademy and became a police officer in Charlotte
(03:14):
County. They call him county sheriffsback then. You know, it's kind
of funny because they were the bigcowboy hat, the big gun, very
traditional, very traditional back then.But he could make more money going to
Miami and becoming a city cop,right so they were almost doubling to pay
a city cops in Miami at thetime. And Miami was growing like crazy.
So we moved to Miami, andthat's where I ended up, you
(03:35):
know, going to elementary school,junior high school, high school, and
then college University of Miami. Playedthere. Under was recruited by an old
name from Denver, lou Saban noWay, Yeah, wow. He had
just left the Buffalo Bills and wentdown to University of Miami. He didn't
last long. He I guess Louhad a way of moving around quite often,
(03:55):
so like every four years he wassomewhere new. Tell me a little
bit about your growing up then,and how did you get into football.
Did you play other sports? Yeah, you know as a football basketball track
kid. It was interesting because inFlorida, as a youngster, they go
by weight classes, you know.In seventh grade, I was like six
three and just a big tall Yeah, I was monster tall kid, and
(04:17):
I was over all the weight limitsas a kid. So I didn't play
any like what would you call itlittle league football? Right in junior high,
I played every sport there was andthen went to high school. In
high school was ten eleven twelve inMiami, so I started playing football,
and I was playing basketball and track, and we had a head coach named
(04:38):
Chris Phagotus who was like just thetoughest guy you ever want to meet,
right, he was on like nationalTV throwing people around and that guy.
But he was a man maker,you know. He took kids and tournament
and men. So really interesting coachat the time who ended up coming on
to the Miami staff later as Iwas there. But high school was interesting,
I mean, Miami high school footballis crazy. I mean it's literally
(05:01):
the best of the best. Whenyou start looking at all the guys that
have come out of South Florida,it's crazy and it's you know, the
level competition is really hoigh. Ohyeah, so it's it was you know,
it wasn't It wasn't a monstrous transitiongoing from high school to college,
as it was going from college tothe pros. But high school to college
was interesting because you know, you'replaying against guys five six years older than
you, and so all of asudden I came in as a tight end.
(05:25):
I was a tight end punter inhigh school. Oh interesting, Yeah,
not an offensive lineman. You know, I could run real fast,
and I you know, could whenI was playing. Not anymore, but
I was going to say that,but now, so, uh, I
had you know, I had alot of fun at high school and then
got into University of Miami recruited bylu Saban, and then Howard Schnellberger comes
in. And Howard was a discipleof Bear Bryant, and a lot of
(05:47):
people don't know this. He wasthe offensive coordinator for the Miami Dolphins when
they were seventeen and oh oh theseventy two dolphins. Dolphins. Yeah interesting,
Yeah, so you know he's aShula Bear Bryant disciple, right,
And we quickly found that out too, because practices were let's see who we
can get rid of type practices.Oh wow, and tough. I mean,
(06:09):
but we had hit a great staff. He had a lot of guys
that went on with him elsewhere incollege when he left, and a lot
of guys went on to Jimmy Johnson'sstaff at the Dallas Cowboys, and and
on and on. I mean,we had Moral was on our staff,
incredible quarterback coach, and for meat the tight end spot, you know,
he'd give me tips and stuff likethat. And I'm believe it or
(06:29):
not. Even as a young kidthat university, mimmy, I played a
little bit of wide receiver because Icould run. And that was only because
the other wide receivers were hurt becauseI was such a big tight end and
I could block. So it soabout three years into this, I've had
an injury. I'm backing up attight end. I'm big and strong,
and we got tackles falling left andright. So Howard brings me into the
to a meeting and says, hey, we're going to move you to tackle
(06:50):
today. And I looked at himand I was like, hey, coach,
how about I go to the defensiveside of the ball. I said,
I can I can run. Ithink I can take Isaiah and I
think it or I forget the otherguy's name, I think I can take
their spots. He just looks atme like I was crazy, right,
and he says, Coop, I'vedone this a number of times before with
tight ends to turn into great tackles, he says, And you've got all
(07:12):
the attributes, he says, soI really need you to offensive side.
I look at him like about tosay but coach, and I'm thinking,
you know, I think I betterjust shut up right now. So yeah,
so I'll see you tackle. Yes, I'm a tackle right And you
know, I fell in love withit at the very first practice. I
fell in love with it because it'smore like getting into a bar fight every
(07:33):
play, every play that it is, you know, Yeah, yeah,
there's no pressure. I don't haveto run as much, right, so
you know, it's all about powerhands, technique, foot hat. Anyway,
So I had a pretty good offensiveline coach as well, Kim Helton,
who went on to be head coachesin college and all that kind of stuff.
So I learned from some good guys. But I also was playing against
(07:55):
the guy in the Chicalow name.People remember because his son played here for
a while a number of years agoas an outside linebacker. But his dad
played for the Jets for a coupleof years. But his dad was a
guy I was playing against every practice, and his dad was a wacko.
And I loved Tony, but hewas a whack child. He had no
other speed than one hundred and fiftymiles an hour every play, So he
(08:16):
was one of those guys you're justjust battling your every play as a battle.
We had an All American right tackle. I had moved into the left
tackle spot in my junior year,and they were coming to see Tony,
the guy I'm practicing against every day, and they're coming to see the right
tackle. All of a sudden,they're like, Hey, who's that kid
over there playing the left tackle spot. So I ended up getting drafted second
(08:37):
round. Yeah that's how you getit, and yeah, I get noticed,
and I went to the I gotto go to the East West Shrine
game. And the North South AllStar Game. So that helped me because
your practice against all the better draftpicks and high draft picks and everybody that's
at those games. You know,you go there and you're practicing against them.
So that helped me up my stock, you might say, and was
luckily enough to get drafted in thesecond round. Well yeah, and interestingly
(08:58):
enough, if you're the thirty firstpick overall, so if you were drafted
today, Mark, you'd have beenin the first raft. That's right.
And that was a quarterback draft.They had like six quarterbacks. Go if
you remember, oh yeah, no, absolutely so. And that draft class,
this is nineteen eighty three. You'rein the same class with Gary Kubiak
and Karl Mecklenberg and people around here. Of course, no, John Elway
was not in the Broncos draft class, but he there was the big trade
(09:22):
where Chris Chris Sinton got traded tothe Colts and then Elway ends up coming
here. What is your memory ofthat, because I've talked to both Tubes
and Carl about it and just kindof how that went. So it's kind
of a weird story. I runto John in the East West Shrine game.
I'm on the east and he's onthe west obviously, and we're in
a nightclub and I'm with the clownfrom Miami who looked like a donna's right.
(09:46):
He was like the lady killer guy. His name was Mark Rush.
Were you his wingman then, yeah? Yeah. I'm like, yeah,
I'll just take seconds place because youcan't compete with this guy. I don't
think you've ever got in the weightroom. I lived in the weight room,
right, and you look like adonnas, right. So I'm hanging
out. I'm hanging out with Markand he's being a knucklehead and he actually
lifts this gallop over his head inthe bar and IM like I'm going,
(10:07):
no, no, mine's got enoughof a wrap. We don't need this.
So I grab her to take heroff over the top of him,
and at that same second, ohwayand his boys are all walking in and
they're like looking at us like we'reyou know, from Star Trek or something,
and I'm going, oh no,here we go. So I set
her down and I'm like rush atcivil they come over. We introduce each
other and kind of get to knowthese guys, right, because they're all
(10:30):
on the West side. So anyway, we leave and I don't talk to
him again until you know, thedraft goes off, the trade gets made.
We're all being you know, invitedand flown in and I fly in
and he's flown in. So Iwalk into the locker room and we shake
hands and we sit down for aminute and start talking and goes, aren't
you the guy in San Francisco theyhad that Grover's head? And I go,
(10:52):
no, no, no, letme explain, no, no,
no, no, explaining that.You don't to explain to me. We're
all good. I mean, itwas just one of those It wasn't me,
It was him, Yeah, exactly, helping it was. It was
comical. But we end up beingroommates our rookie year. Oh did you
really? Yeah. So we hada lot of fun and we got to
know each other pretty well and tookThere's some cool if you like thirty for
thirties and some of the stuff.There's a there's one about Marino in Lway
(11:13):
because they had the same agent andMarino was supposed to go high. He
goes last pick to the Dolphins andJohn goes number one to the Colts but
ends up at the Broncos. It'sa great thing to watch. I have
not watched that one, say,because the guy's got notes and they got
their agent up. He literally givesyou like a day by day by conversation
by conversation, Wow, of everythingthat went on during that draft with those
(11:35):
two quarterbacks. And it's really interestingbecause I knew enough about John because of
what happened here, but then Ididn't know all the Marina stories other than
he got a bad rap and somebodyyou know, wrote some stuff up about
him and pushed them way down.Interesting. Okay, so when John comes
here, then do you understand atthat point, like what this team was
getting. Here's exactly what I thought. I was like, Wow, I
saw him playing these FIS Shrine game. He reminds me of Jim Kelly because
(11:58):
I was Jim Kelly's left tackle atMiami. Oh so I'm watching Jim.
You know Jim. You know,this is kind of a side story,
but Jim goes to the USFL.But they had extra pro days for him
at Miami, so we got torun extra and show off our skills and
all that kind of stuff because theyhad a very specific pro day for just
Jim Kelly. So Jim gets draftedby Houston and he ends up going there,
(12:22):
but Buffalo still picks him. SoI stop in ratone because he's calling
me up, going, hey,I want you to be my left tackle
in Houston. But I'm like Jim, they're not paying me. I mean,
they're gonna pay me good money,but nothing guaranteed. Nothing like him,
right, I mean he's being guaranteedby the owners and you know everything
else and insured and everything else.But yeah, anyway, I come here
and I was happy, is I'llget out to come to Colorado because I
(12:43):
really like the Broncos. I reallyit was a dream. You know,
the NFL is a dream. Hadyou been this far west, never had
no clue. That's always so amazingto me that all the East Coast guys,
they never came this far. Ionly flew out of Miami one time
as a kid in seventh grade togo to New Jersey to visit relatives for
a weekend and back. So I'dnever been out of the state. Oh
(13:03):
my gosh, you know, otherthan playing football, and yeah, that's
all going to be and that's travelback and forth back. But I mean,
my father was a police officer,my mom was a nurse, so
we didn't. We you know,we were very taking plush vacations. No,
we had. We spent all ourtime on a boat that my dad
owned with another police officer, sowe split a boat and we'd go out
to La a Key and fish andcamp and so we really stayed local and
(13:28):
did a lot of fishing. Sowhen you get here and you see these
mountains, oh, you fall inlove. Yeah, oh your horseback ride
and you're just like wow, it'soverwhelming. That's why probably ninety plus NFL
retirees in this state, most ofthem I'm not the Broncos, But how
do you leave this state? Right? Yeah, it's a really tough state
to leave. And you know,then moving on into the real estate business
(13:50):
was wonderful. But this is agreat place to grow kids, families.
You know, You've got so muchto do year round. And it's really
not that cold, even though I'ma mining and I hate to snow,
right and I'm like sitting there goingno. You know, I'm one of
those like I'm an age right now. If I could split time between both,
that'll work out and sell real estatein both. So, yes,
which is what you're doing, andwe're going to get to that. Yeah,
(14:13):
but the Broncos were you know,Dan Ruve's head coach. Pat didn't
own the team until the I thinkthe two years following that, who was
an incredible owner by the way.You know, we had success pretty early.
I mean, you know, Johnwas one of those guys you knew
you could always win the football gamewith. There was not an occasion where
you know you're behind. You're like, Okay, we're temporary, We're gonna
turn this thing around. But youknow, we ran. Not to take
(14:37):
anything away from Dan Reeves, butwe ran the Cowboys offense, and the
Cowboys offense was a run first andplay not to lose and throw the ball
when you got to win, rightAnd no, no offense to Dan,
because that's what Dan did and that'swhat he grew up. It was his
wheelhouse, absolutely. And I coacheda lot when I was My kids are
in middle school and stuff like that, and you and during that you reflect
(14:58):
a lot, right, and youthink about what you've got and what you're
doing and how you're coaching. AndI've played under Alex Gibbs, one of
the best offensive line coaches in theleague, and then Larry Beckall, who
was very very good down to TampaBay afterwards. So you know, you
reflect all the different types of coachesyou have, and you just wonder why
they didn't. You know, ifI did John Elway, my offense is
going to be around John Elway,Peter. You're coaching to the player's strengths
(15:20):
that you have rather than plugging himinto your system. Right. So you
see that a lot in the NFL. And the misconception is that the when
you get to the NFL, you'regoing to have all the best coaches you've
ever could have dreamed of. Andit's totally not true. And it's actually
sad that billionaires hire some of thecoaches that these guys hire and don't do
more research on them, or don'thave a committee or something involved with it
(15:43):
to you know, maybe, butthey're billionaires for a reason, and you
know there's any ego that goes withall that, et cetera. But I
see more bad coaching than anything Isee in the league. An offensive lineman
that you know, cross over andthey do all the fundamental things you don't
even we didn't even do in collegebecause we were taught that those are the
things you don't do. I mean, there are some guys that can do
crossovers, but that's they're super athletes, right, And the NFL guys are
(16:07):
a lot different than any other guys, even the second string guys, because
the level athleticism is beyond comprehension.And most people don't even know what I
just said. They're so special,they really are. And I mean,
I look back and go, Idon't even know how I did all that
stuff, because you know, you'resixty four and you're looking back and you
go. And I watch games religiously, and I love watching offensive line play,
(16:29):
and I watch a lot on TVbecause I get to see the replay
rather than because I'm watching the lineplay. So I'm watching hands feet,
had placement and coach for a longtime. And then and like when I
left the league, I followed like, I followed like Charles Bentley, and
I followed Duke Maniweather and all theseoffensive line gurus because the game has changed
and how you block people has changed, and the way you block people has
changed. And like I learned handslike from Radikovich, who was our offensive
(16:53):
line coach when I first got toDenver, and then I really learned feet
more when I was in Tampa Bayunder another guy named Larry Bechdel, Right,
and you'd almost wish, boy,if you could have that in college,
or you could have had a guruon the side like they have now.
You know, you can go tothis guru and get coached up.
Whereas I watch our offensive line herein Denver and I just go the mistakes
(17:15):
and the way they're, the thingsthat they do, and as good athletes
as they are, you just go, wow, they're not being coached very
well. What is it that yousee most often that is surprising to you
that happens? And you hear alot of offensive linemen and on the defensive
side as well, talk about handsand feet and how important and how somebody
either another player had to teach themhow to do it, yep, or
(17:36):
they found the right coach finally thatdid. But nobody else taught them how
to do hands and eating. Likeyou learn them in two different places.
Why can't you learn them in thesame place. How helpful would that be?
Because it's a good old boys network? Yeah, unfortunately. And you
see, so think about football asa corporation, right, and you come
in as a scout and then youget moved to another position, and then
(17:56):
you become the special teams coach,then you become the tight end coach,
then you become the assistant offensive linecoach, and then become the offensive line
coach, and then you want tobecome the offensive coordinator. Why because you
make more money. Yeah, right, So you see that same hierarchy in
corporations is the NFL. But peopledon't realize that. Just go look at
the coaches and go back in theirhistory and see how many positions they coached
(18:18):
all over the place, and yougo, Okay, now I get it.
None of them have ever been likespecialized all the way from start to
finish. And even some of themthat are specialized start to finish are horrible
because they kept what they learned fromlike wherever they learn from. Yeah,
that's right, teaching bad habits likehopping and like some of the things that
you might do in high school collegeyou get and get away with it.
(18:41):
You don't do that at the pros, so you get thrown your back.
And I've never seen I do aTuesday deal with Gil Whiteley and we talk
about offensive line play during the seasonand he loves it. Right, But
I've never seen so many big dudesget turtled. What we call turtle is
thrown on your back, as Ihave in recent years. And maybe it's
because there's so much bigger, orthey're much stronger, or I call it
(19:03):
bad fundamentals. Right, So yousit there and see guys getting turtled,
and you're like, God, howdon't even go back to a film the
next day, right and see yourselfgetting You're the hammer of the nail,
right, But there's always a betterplayer, right, Like, you got
a Howie Long you're playing against.You know, that's gonna be a tough
day. You know, Aaron Donaldyou're gonna play against. That's gonna be
a tough day. You got youknow, you got these certain guys that
are the cream of the crop.You know, they're that one percent of
(19:25):
that three thousand guys seventeen hundred guysthat are playing or whatever, you know,
the top ten percent or one percent. Oh yeah, so you're gonna
have a tough day, but you'regonna scheme against that too, right,
Right. It's interesting to hear theolder generations talk about how the game has
changed, what it's doing now,and how different it is, and a
lot of it comes down to fundamentals. Believe me. It's all. Yeah,
(19:45):
the little guy can hold his ownagainst a big guy or a better
guy with sound fundamentals. Yeah,absolutely, fundamentally absolutely. Okay, So
you're with the Broncos from eighty threeto eighty seven, which also means you're
a part of the drive, youbet, and part of twenty one.
Yeah. What was that experience like? And you probably didn't know at that
time. I mean that was goingto be the end that you had with
(20:07):
the Broncos as well. Yeah,it was a crazy year. My career
with the Broncos was tough because I'dwin a job and I'd lose a job
to get hurt. I did gainit back the next year, and then
I'd lose to getting hurt. Iwas one of those guys that I could
not stay healthy. And I getit. You know, if I can't
stay healthy, eventually you know you'regoing to replace them. And I knew
that would come. But the otherthing I did is I learned to play
every spot on the offensive line.So smart because I could move from right
(20:30):
tackle to left tackle, left guardto left tackle, that you name it.
I could play every spot. Didyou play center? A couple of
times, just messing around the project. But that's a total different piece.
Yeah, so so that both guardspots and both tackle spots are hard enough.
Believe me, most guys can't evenmove from a guard to a tackle,
let alone right to left because ifyou work every hand work, everything's
(20:51):
different. But I'd played left tacklein college, so I was very comfortable
on the left side. I camehere and as a right guard initially,
and then I ended up starting toleft guard year against Pittsburgh and I blow
an ankle the first game right sothat puts me out like six eight weeks.
It's a tough start. But Iwas one of those guys that I
would do whatever it took to tostay on the field. So I'd shoot
whatever I had to shoot up anddo what I ever had to do to
(21:14):
be on the field. And itdidn't matter, because if you weren't,
somebody's gonna take your job. Yeah, you don't get paid. No.
The NFL was a totally different gameback in the day, And not that
it's not brutal now, but itwas. I mean, we're talking,
you're in two and three days.Like in Tampa we had three days and
it was hit hit, hit,hit hit, I mean you build up
a body, you know, ashell of armor. And we weren't being
(21:37):
paid near as much, so youwere a lot more expendable, right,
and they could replace you pretty easily. So you know that was the thing
you do whatever it took to stayon that field. You literally beat your
body up. Oh I look backand I go here. I called the
loose bolt syndrome. Every guy thatplayed in the NFL had to have a
loose bolt of some sort in thatera to play because oh yeah, the
(22:00):
guys are too smart to play becausethey just they'd worked their way out of
the game because they wouldn't do thethings to their body or they wouldn't they
couldn't play hurt or they couldn't thingsthey couldn't do would basically eliminate you.
The more you can do, thebetter off you are. Yeah, and
the longer you'll stay the loose boltof that. Yeah. Okay, so
after Super Bowl twenty one, yourtime comes to an end with the Broncos.
(22:22):
How does that happen? Yeah?So again for injury deal won the
job back in camp get dinged,we had this rule, when you come
back, you get your spot back. Well, that didn't always work out.
If Dan was done with you.Dan was done with you, so
and I figured that, did youhave a conversation with him? Oh?
Yeah, No, we had agreat conversation. We had a great conversation.
It wasn't the most honest conversation,and I held him his feet to
(22:45):
the fire on that. A littlebit later, when I wasn't being traded,
he said we're going to do somethingdifferent, and I was like,
okay, great, let's do whateverwhatever works best and I'll get my age
involved, et cetera. Blah blah. Then they kept asking too much for
me, so you know, Isaid, I don't totally agree with everything
going on. I mean all thetimes I shot up for you, all
the times I did ankles, shoulders, feet, you know, all kinds
(23:06):
of stuff. And he acted likehe didn't know any of that. I
was like, Dan, really,you're telling the joke about a guy that
they gave Demra all to. Youalmost killed the guy in the locker room
and they had to give him someother things to get him back. You
could tell he remembered that story becauseit was a Dallas story. I go,
so, look, it's just partways. They tried to trade me.
Things didn't go well, and Iwent back in. I was like,
(23:27):
look, you're asking too much.My agent says, is just not
going to happen this way, Sotrade me, cut me, or I'll
just you know, go to thepress and have some conversations because I want
it out at that point, right, I'm not going to sit around.
And there's so many those kinds ofstories that go back and back with a
lot of the different players, whichI thought it was odd that we you're
at an age where you're doing businessand you have a respectful business, and
(23:49):
you deal with people on an ongoingbasis like I have for the last what
thirty two years. You know,you look back at some of the conversations
you had in football and you're like, I didn't have to go that way.
You know, you go, whydo I just have a civil conversation
about, Hey, we're going togo in a different direction rather than play
games and this and that and theother. So you you know, and
this is going to be kind ofa it's going to sound bad, but
(24:10):
a guy once said to me whenmy sons were being recruited to college for
basketball and football, they were like, hey, that's just a Pee coach
with a whistle, And that stuckwith me a little bit because when you
start thinking about the level education allthese a lot of coaches have, they
were never in business, They neverran a business. They kind of got
put into these spots of leadership andauthority. You know, you kind of
(24:33):
look back and you go, Okay, now I understand why, right,
I understand why that was handled likethat was handled pleasure to manage. Really,
Yeah, it's a business and it'sabout money, and it's about you
know, getting better and better intheir team and all that kind of stuff.
Anyway, I get cut and Igo right to Tampa. Okay,
that was wonderful. I show upat Tampa and uh, I start the
second week I'm there and finish outthat season. They had other plans too
(24:56):
for the left tackle spot, butthey knew I could play response, so
they they drafted getting Paul Gruber,and then I moved to the backup tackle
at the guard spot and finish upplaying guard and tackle both in Tampa.
And that was a good experience.And my folks were close. Oh you
could come here again. Yeah,they're just right down the street in Miami,
which is you know, about fourhours away from Tampa. Back in
that day, I had a funcareer. You know, I look back
(25:18):
at it and could have gone better. Yeah, I could have stayed freaking
healthy. And when I get dingthat, you know, most of them
were things that were pretty serious.Serious, I mean outside of being the
ACL or something like that which takesyou off the field. I would do
everything I could to stay on thefield. I went on IR one time
for four weeks and came back off. But it's like everything takes six to
eight weeks and then you're trying tocome back and it's it's a vicious cycle.
(25:41):
That's a vicious cycle. It's ait's brutal, but it makes you
a tougher person too mentally, youknow. Oh absolutely, So that's you
know, there's always a good anda bad, right, Yeah. The
injury table and I do talk toa lot of guests about this. Being
injured is a really lonely place tobe. You feel like an outcast,
yeah, and back in that dayyou kind of were because you're trying to
(26:02):
make things happen and you're not onthe field practice and you don't have that
same camaraderie. And that's a toughthat is so mentally tough. And back
then you couldn't be weeks, youcouldn't show it, you couldn't talk to
anybody about it. You had tostay wacho and just get out. Now,
when we get it was funny likepeople, how many times you get
a concussion? I go, Youdidn't talk about concussions. You walk over
and the trainers would have this likea thing out and you'd walk over and
(26:25):
you just grab selling salts and youstick them in your sock and you'd stick
them in your nose. And youknow, when you knew you you know
you got dinged or you're pretty youwouldn't never you don't report that stuff.
Oh no, you know, youjust go self medicate and and do whatever
you have to do to be onthe field the next day. And now
today it is so different, Mark. I mean, I watch, I'm
down there on the sideline and Iwill see the doctors that have the red
(26:47):
hats. That's how you always knowwho's watching. They'll watch a play and
they'll pull a guy and guys likewhat, what what's happening and they're like,
well, we saw something upstairs andwe want to see how I mean,
it is so every play. Multipleplayers are being looked at all the
time whenever there was a hit,and they analyze it, and there's four
screens there on the field. There'ssomebody up in the booth and they're figuring
out guys can go back in ornot. Yeah, that's so different.
(27:10):
Yeah. Yeah, they walk upto you. Is that a thumb or
is that a finger? Yeah?That's that was good. That's okay,
that works good out there, getback out there. Yeah, how many
fingers I'm holding up? Okay,yep, you're right. Yeah, it
doesn't matter how many there were.Whatever you said was good to go.
Yeah, man, So how manyseasons in Tampa? Then three more?
Three more seasons? And then howdid you know it was time to hang
it up? After that eighty nineseason? You know, I had all
(27:33):
I was playing with a patella tendontear, and that was tough. It
was partially torn and like thirty sixhundred milograms of motrin every day, and
you know you're you're just stomach linersgone. Yeah, and you know ice
and all the stuff you do yourI was like, so I had to
get that fixed. That off seasonI get fixed, and those were the
days of Plan B. It waskind of like free agency but kind of
(27:55):
not right. So I only wassigning one year deals. So I got
my kney fixed and I was going, Wow, had seven good years.
I mean, didn't turn out theway I wanted, but don't want to
go try to go eight nine andrisk more injuries. And it's not like
I haven't had a history of that. So I'm, what thirty years old.
I'm thinking, you know a lotof guys are way ahead of me
in the business community already. Whatdo you do? Right? What do
(28:18):
you start? But I had alsohad I was involved with a public company
we started and had to dive operationin Turks and Caicos and a wholesale travel
agency, so we already had abusiness in the works and running and getting
going and going to demon was actuallygoing well into like right as I retired,
even I'm thinking, you know,I can grow that business, et
cetera. And then if you remember, Eastern and pan Am both went out
(28:41):
of business like one year after theother one. Oh yeah, and we
had bulk airfare agreements with them allright, where we buy our bulk airfare
from them up front and then resellit. So that hurt that business really
bad. But I sold the travelagency to a guy in Tampa who wanted
one, because back then it wasdifferent. Travel agents were different. You
had to have you had to andyet exactly that then you had to have
a you had to go through backgroundchecks and all kinds of stuff together.
(29:03):
So and they were expensive, sothere was a value attributed value. And
then I had the dive operation.I just sold to the guy down there
on like a owner carry deal,and I'm going to go take it back
about three years later and I soldit to the Sheridan. But I was
playing softball with a bunch of Remaxguys here in town, and we were
talking about how much they're making,and they're making more than I was making
(29:23):
in the NFL. And I'm going, oh my god, these guys,
I'm as smart as any one ofthese clowns, and they're making more money
than I was making playing in thatleague. Right. So I was like,
well, in real estate, lookslike an interesting business, right,
And I'd kind of been messing aroundwith it with doing the stuff we were
doing with our public company. Soit was a natural three years after you're
(29:44):
done, you get your license.Yeah, fell right into it, and
you never looked back, and soyou came back here after Tampa Bay.
I, yeah, I had myhome. I had bought a house here
and a pint creek range, justhad some horses and dogs and all that
stuff. So that on acreage outthere. And then you get your real
estate license and here you are thirtytwo years later, and you've got kids,
family, everybody has grown up hereand you've done very well. And
(30:07):
the beauty about real estate you cankeep doing it as much or as little
as you want to, as longas you want to. Yeah, it's
funny. Buddy might call me.He's like, when you're going to retire,
I go retire. I said,why would I retire? I can
do this in mines closed, right, And I have so much fun doing
it, and it's so much funto do. And when I do it
in Florida, I mean, I'lladd a fishing day on the front,
or a fishing day on the backor And today nowadays with teams and Microsoft
(30:30):
and Zoom and everything else, youcan do anything from anywhere because of the
technology advances have gone so far.And even when I'm out on one of
my buddy's yachts, right, theyhave that new Elon Musk satellite technology,
and these guys have it on theirboats. Let me tell you what,
It's faster than my office. Thattechnology on vessels is so amazing. You
(30:52):
can run your iPad, your phone, your computer, everything, and like
I said, it's faster than myoffice. That's amazing. So you have
your real estate license here in Coloradoand also in Florida, so you're able
to help out people in both places, and that made sense for you.
One of the things that we talkabout here on the podcast is reinvention.
So you have your realtor here inColorado and then realize, hey, I've
(31:12):
got all these people that are buyingthings in Florida. All my friends are
going there. Yeah, so I'msmall, a small team here, so
I got coverage when I'm gone,and then same there. I've got two
associates I work with down there.And what's weird to start in the keys,
right, I'm selling some pretty bigplaces for buddies that are buying second
and third homes. And then onebuddy had a house blown up by Dorian
(31:33):
and that sold his lot, youknow, so you get some of those
weird things that happened too. Andthen he bought a big place in Miami.
And then another client once to moveout of Miami to Palm City,
which is right outside of Stuart.And then that buddy mine called me from
Washington who had done some business withand he's like, hey, Coop,
I want to move to Stuart.I saw you're doing some stuff in Stuart.
And we buy a place for himand Stuart, my financial adviser retires.
He's going to be in Jensen Beach, right, Hutchinson Islands. We
(31:55):
buy a place, a big condo, a beautiful by the way, overlooking
the ocean. On the fifteenth floor. You get to live you don't have
a place there, right, justlive vicariously through all your other people's places.
Well that's what's so funny, right, so I can get to see
I got keys to that place,the keys and a boat in Palm City.
I got, you know, keysto a house in Miami. It's
the best of all works. He'sthe one at Marathon and they rent them
sometimes and someone they don't even rent, just just their second and third homes.
(32:20):
So they're like, you know,check it out for me. Why
you're there's the toilets, right,yeah, go go look at this same
for me here, so I gotit's like having you know. Plus it's
weird because from Stuart to you know, Fort Lauder deal is about two hours
hour and a half, you know, and then thirty minutes to Miami and
then you know, another hour anda half to Elmarada, you know,
and then another say hour and ahalf to Marathon and then say another hour
(32:42):
and a half or two to KeyWest, so you know all the way
up the from Key West. Yeah, there's two there's two MLS's. You
know. All this works, butso you have to be members of the
two different boards and then you haveaccess to all that data, but real
estates data. You know, it'sall data driven. And once you've done
it, as long as you knowI've done it and you you've been in
it now doing it, it's reallydata driven. And so it's not that
difficult to find the comparables and comparethem and then put them in front of
(33:05):
the sellers and say here's where weshould be price wise plus or minus and
come up with a plut game plan. And if you have a good game
plan, and I've got a marketingplan I've been using forever and keep tweaking
it and all the things we doin real estate, it's been good.
And if you could apply these principlesto the NFL, how they you know,
to comp out players, Like,why don't you just do it like
we do in real estate? Yeah, and then maybe some of these things
(33:27):
wouldn't happen where somebody gets paid whenthey shouldn't get paid so much you didn't
comp them. Well, how manyquarterbacks have we gone through in this town?
Right? Since job like comps aresimple, we do it all the
time. At the human level,there is a whole level at difficulty there.
But still it's you know, businessis business, so it is,
and the NFL is a tough placeit is, and you do still stay
very involved with the Broncos and theAlumni Association. Yeah, we have a
(33:51):
we have alumni event tonight. It'sabout some of the things that the trust
is doing for players and stuff,you know. And the NFL is just
such a monopoly. You know,they dictate the rules and you know,
the guy with the gold wins,right, So that's kind of the way
the NFL is. Unfortunately, becausethere's a lot of guys I don't even
care for myself, to be perfectlyhonest with you, because I've done well,
I've can pay for insurance. Ican do a lot of things that
(34:13):
some guys can't. But there's guysthat are really banged up from that game.
Oh yeah, They're hurting mentally andphysically. And it's really sad to
me because I've I stay in thegym three four days a week, and
you know, I'm religious about everythingI do, and but I want to
fish till I'm eighty, right,and so in real estate till then.
I'm trying to kind of repair thedamage that I did in earlier times to
(34:36):
now. But I've got buddies andI won't name them all because it's a
little bit sad, And so I'mpushing hard back at the NFL on,
you know, getting some of theseguys some help and coverages and stuff.
And the NFL has done a fewthings, but with the way insurance works,
it's almost laughable because the money theygive you just doesn't go so far.
And then what happens is you're inthere network and anything else you want
(34:57):
to do is outside of a network, and the other network won't be that
network, right, Yeah, Soit's all these games, these just insurance
games that get played so I thinka lot of that money goes to waste
that they act like they are spending, but they're not because you can't use
it. Like they give you twentyfive a year, right for medical stuff.
Well, I literally I was gonnahave my back worked on and it
was going to be a ninety minuteprocedure and it's just going and clean up
(35:21):
a disc and make the area biggerso the nerve doesn't get pinched like it's
being pinched and clean up is aninety ninety minute procedure and it's outpatient.
That was twenty three thousand dollars.Well, okay, there's two grand left.
Okay, so I'll give them atip. Right, obviously stays,
it stays in there. But no, but then okay, then you had
to have the hospital, stay atanestesiology said, the doctor's fee, all
(35:45):
the other stuff. Right, thatwas that was in the six figure range.
So what like I'm gonna go toKaiser and say you got to pay
for this. Now they're not doingthat because they're like they're gonna say you're
out of network. Right, Soall this all these little these insurance games,
you know, and the NFL isnot stupid. They got the smartest
attorneys and multitudes of them, right, so they know how that game is
played, and so a lot mostof that money is just not being used.
(36:07):
Then they got in the twenty fivethat sits there for guys for mental
capacity issues. Right, Well,I don't know how far that goes because
I don't I haven't had to useit, luckily, And I was saying,
why wouldn't you let that money goover to the medical side if it's
not being used for mental stuff,making for the physical side. Yeah,
because most of the guys have physicalissues. They do, and there's a
handful of mentals too. But andit's sad, you know, it's sad
(36:29):
that they can't get help, andthey're almost like when you get asked the
same question every time you see aguy and you get that little story look
in their eye, and there yousee the dear deterioration and it's sad to
watch in front of your eyes,like watching your mom and dad pass away.
Oh yeah, it's very hard tosee. But those the teammates that
you played with. Yeah, absolutely, So the NFL is it the PA
(36:50):
that ends up giving you or isit the NFL? Kind of No,
the PA is the union different,right, Okay, but the PAS really
for current guys. I mean they'lleven tell you that pretty much, even
though we're part of that union andwe've gotten some benefits over the years.
Like I was talking in Biquay,who is on the Broncos years back.
We work at a Lifetime and Iwas saying, I'm fighting for guys that
are my age, that can't dothings and for guys like you. He
(37:13):
was like, he's like forty eight, right. I'm like, so hopefully
you guys get them after us,because they're basically waiting for the most guys
to die sadly unfortunately. Yeah,I go to most of the meetings I
can and appreciate you, Mark Quisurefor these guys because you feel there are
teammates. Yes, they're like family. Yeah, absolutely, all right,
as we start to wrap this up, then I always ask all my guests
(37:34):
this question. As you look backover your career and there's been some ups
and downs when you got cut fromthe Broncos and things weren't going great,
and then you are done at TampaBay and you've got to figure out what
do I do with the rest ofmy life. All my friends are ahead
in business, What do you tellpeople how did you kind of get past
some of those tough times. Andthere's been ups and downs in real estate
plenty of times too, during yourthirty two years kind of moving forward and
(37:57):
doing that reinvention and figuring out what'sthe thing that I can do to be
successful. So I always look forthe opportunity that's in front of you rather
than worrying about stuff you can't worryabout and not riding the elevator we call
it. And my clients even respectme for that because they're like, well,
you stay really calm during all this, right, And I'm like,
that's my job, right, Butso, you know, looking for the
(38:21):
opportunity and everything is what I thinkhas helped me because I've had a lot
of adversity. Everybody's had a lotof adversity, I mean, and people
a lot more than I've had.Right by any stretch imagination, I just
couldn't stay healthy. So I battlingthat all the time. But I mean
a lot of guys came out alot of worse situations. In me,
I look at every opportunity that Ican create for myself and what are the
things I can do to perpetuate that. So, you know, getting your
(38:44):
education, getting your degree at Universityof Miami, getting all the designations I
have in real estate because I wantto be smarter than than the other guy,
and just trying to do as manybe proactive and go to tech classes
and go you know, I'm alwaysdoing stuff to try and even better myself
today because things change and the marketwe've been through. You know, I've
been through every market you could possiblyimagine, from the recession on, through
(39:05):
and and up and down markets.When you know, Denver had an IT
business that was crazy and then wehad an it blow up, you know,
oil and gas blow up, andthen it blow ups and then the
recession and then you just so youlook at the opportunities that those create and
try and take advantage of those.And when I say take advantage, not
advantage, but learn to use thoseas a tool to better yourself and your
clients. Because if I can dosomething like I've got a mortgage license during
(39:29):
the recession because everybody was refining rightand the houses that weren't being sold,
I was involved with the refined rightfinance of them. So you know,
you do a lot of different thingsto make up for business and or to
generate that business or diversify yourself.Yeah, so that you're so when your
client asked you a question, youhave the answer. I love that.
Yeah, and I there are somany disruptors. And since we're both realtor
(39:51):
as, we can go a littlegeeky on that point. They always talk
about, oh, this is happeningand it's gonna ru in real estate forever.
Well, no it's not. It'sgonna have some people going, I
can't do this because it's too hard, and those of us that are smart,
go, actually, you know what. I think I've figured out a
way to kind of make this workand be a better real term, be
better at what I'm doing, andhelp explain things better. And then the
(40:14):
client is that much more appreciative.And then also the people that just can't
do it, it's like, that'sokay, go do something else. Because
it isn't for everybody, and itis hard. You do have to work
at it. And when it's nottwo and a quarter percent interest rate and
no inventory, that's when it's easyand the orders are coming in right now?
Not so easy. How you doing, We're doing okay? Yeah,
totally. Yeah. Again, Ithink like when I was coaching, we
(40:37):
put our fingers next to each otherand people can't see it on this podcast,
but we'd say get a little bitbetter every day. If you can
get a little bit better every dayat everything you do, I mean spiritually,
physically, mentally, all those things, and try and be the best
person you can be, for sure, Mark, this was great. Thanks
for coming in today. Thank you. Yeah, I really really appreciate it.
It's great to see again and lookforward to seeing you fly fishing at
(40:58):
eighty and beyond. All right,hopefully all right? Thanks Mark, Thank
you, Thank you. Mark.New episodes of Cut, Traded, Fired,
Retired are released on Tuesdays. Pleasefollow, download, rate, and
review this podcast wherever you listen topodcasts. You can also follow podcast updates
and new releases on Twitter and Instagramat CTFR podcast and give a visit to
(41:20):
the website at ctfrpodcast dot com foreasy links to other episodes. I'm your
host, Susie Wargen. To findout more about me, visit susiewargon dot
com. Thanks for listening, anduntil next time, please be careful,
be safe, and be kind.Take care
He said, look, we're goingto do something different, and I was
like, okay, great, let'sdo whatever whatever works best and I'll get
my agent involved, et cetera,blah blah. Then they kept asking too
much for me, so you know, I said, I don't totally agree
with everything's going on. I meanall the times I shot up for you,
all the times I did ankles,shoulders, feet, you know,
all kinds of stuff I go.So, look, it's just part ways.
(00:22):
They tried to trade me. Thingsdidn't go well, and I went
back in. I was like,look, you're asking too much. My
agent says, is just not goingto happen this way, So trade me,
cut me, or I'll just youknow, go to the press and
we'll have some conversations. Welcome toanother edition of Cut, Traded, Fired,
Retired. This podcast is chock fullof conversations with professional athletes and coaches,
(00:43):
all of whom have some tied ofColorado and they've all been cut,
traded, fired, and or they'reretired. I'm your host, Susie Wargen.
On this podcast, you'll find conversationsalready with two members from the Broncos
nineteen eighty three draft eighth rounder GaryKubiak and twelfth under Carl Mecklenberg. For
this episode, we hear from theirsecond round pick in nineteen eighty three,
(01:06):
offensive lineman Mark Cooper. Coop grewup in Florida and played college ball at
the University of Miami. He'd neverbeen West until the Broncos drafted him.
Not only did he get a Mountainview when he arrived, he also got
John Elway as a quarterback. Coopdealt with a number of injuries during his
time in Denver, but started manygames, including Super Bowl twenty one.
(01:26):
After the Broncos, he had afew years in Tampa Bay, then decided
to hang up his cleats. Soonafter retirement, he got his real estate
license and is still practicing real estatein both Colorado and Florida. Ladies and
Gentlemen Number sixty three Mark Cooper cutTraded fired retired podcast with Susie Wargin Mark
(01:48):
Cooper, How are you? Howare you? I am doing just fine,
Thank you, thanks for inviting me. Absolutely we were saying last time
we saw each other, well kindof I amc the boy Scout of America,
Breakfat and I always introduce all thecelebrities that are in but I can
never see who's coming in because I'mblinded by the light. So I just
read names and hope that that personis at the back and coming up at
the right time that I say theirname. Now, you did a great
(02:10):
job. That's I've gone to thatfor years and years. Yeah, yeah,
a lot of good. Yeah.I was a scout when I was
a kid, so kind of bringsback some memories absolutely. All right,
well, and speaking of being akid, this is how this goes.
We go way back in the hottub time machine and start at your beginnings
and then work our way up towhat you're doing now. So let's go
back. You're born in New Jersey, but you don't stay there very long.
(02:31):
You really grow up and spend allyour time in Florida. Yeah,
it was at two my family movedto Actually, my dad was supposed to
be getting a job in Cape Canaveraland then they had all these cutbacks,
so we ended up in Sarasota.In Sarasota, I lived there pretty much
a baby through you know, Ithink fourth grade. In fourth grade we
(02:52):
moved to Port Charlotte. So allthis is on the west coast of Florida,
and you know, I've been abig fisherman in my whole life.
My dad was a fisherman. Mydad did some crab in he did he
did all kinds of odd jobs becausehe was in the rigging business, right,
so he had to kind of reinventhimself. And he did a number
of odd jobs and different stuff asa kid. And then he went into
the police business and went to theacademy and became a police officer in Charlotte
(03:14):
County. They call him county sheriffsback then. You know, it's kind
of funny because they were the bigcowboy hat, the big gun, very
traditional, very traditional back then.But he could make more money going to
Miami and becoming a city cop,right so they were almost doubling to pay
a city cops in Miami at thetime. And Miami was growing like crazy.
So we moved to Miami, andthat's where I ended up, you
(03:35):
know, going to elementary school,junior high school, high school, and
then college University of Miami. Playedthere. Under was recruited by an old
name from Denver, lou Saban noWay, Yeah, wow. He had
just left the Buffalo Bills and wentdown to University of Miami. He didn't
last long. He I guess Louhad a way of moving around quite often,
(03:55):
so like every four years he wassomewhere new. Tell me a little
bit about your growing up then,and how did you get into football.
Did you play other sports? Yeah, you know as a football basketball track
kid. It was interesting because inFlorida, as a youngster, they go
by weight classes, you know.In seventh grade, I was like six
three and just a big tall Yeah, I was monster tall kid, and
(04:17):
I was over all the weight limitsas a kid. So I didn't play
any like what would you call itlittle league football? Right in junior high,
I played every sport there was andthen went to high school. In
high school was ten eleven twelve inMiami, so I started playing football,
and I was playing basketball and track, and we had a head coach named
(04:38):
Chris Phagotus who was like just thetoughest guy you ever want to meet,
right, he was on like nationalTV throwing people around and that guy.
But he was a man maker,you know. He took kids and tournament
and men. So really interesting coachat the time who ended up coming on
to the Miami staff later as Iwas there. But high school was interesting,
I mean, Miami high school footballis crazy. I mean it's literally
(05:01):
the best of the best. Whenyou start looking at all the guys that
have come out of South Florida,it's crazy and it's you know, the
level competition is really hoigh. Ohyeah, so it's it was you know,
it wasn't It wasn't a monstrous transitiongoing from high school to college,
as it was going from college tothe pros. But high school to college
was interesting because you know, you'replaying against guys five six years older than
you, and so all of asudden I came in as a tight end.
(05:25):
I was a tight end punter inhigh school. Oh interesting, Yeah,
not an offensive lineman. You know, I could run real fast,
and I you know, could whenI was playing. Not anymore, but
I was going to say that,but now, so, uh, I
had you know, I had alot of fun at high school and then
got into University of Miami recruited bylu Saban, and then Howard Schnellberger comes
in. And Howard was a discipleof Bear Bryant, and a lot of
(05:47):
people don't know this. He wasthe offensive coordinator for the Miami Dolphins when
they were seventeen and oh oh theseventy two dolphins. Dolphins. Yeah interesting,
Yeah, so you know he's aShula Bear Bryant disciple, right,
And we quickly found that out too, because practices were let's see who we
can get rid of type practices.Oh wow, and tough. I mean,
(06:09):
but we had hit a great staff. He had a lot of guys
that went on with him elsewhere incollege when he left, and a lot
of guys went on to Jimmy Johnson'sstaff at the Dallas Cowboys, and and
on and on. I mean,we had Moral was on our staff,
incredible quarterback coach, and for meat the tight end spot, you know,
he'd give me tips and stuff likethat. And I'm believe it or
(06:29):
not. Even as a young kidthat university, mimmy, I played a
little bit of wide receiver because Icould run. And that was only because
the other wide receivers were hurt becauseI was such a big tight end and
I could block. So it soabout three years into this, I've had
an injury. I'm backing up attight end. I'm big and strong,
and we got tackles falling left andright. So Howard brings me into the
to a meeting and says, hey, we're going to move you to tackle
(06:50):
today. And I looked at himand I was like, hey, coach,
how about I go to the defensiveside of the ball. I said,
I can I can run. Ithink I can take Isaiah and I
think it or I forget the otherguy's name, I think I can take
their spots. He just looks atme like I was crazy, right,
and he says, Coop, I'vedone this a number of times before with
tight ends to turn into great tackles, he says, And you've got all
(07:12):
the attributes, he says, soI really need you to offensive side.
I look at him like about tosay but coach, and I'm thinking,
you know, I think I betterjust shut up right now. So yeah,
so I'll see you tackle. Yes, I'm a tackle right And you
know, I fell in love withit at the very first practice. I
fell in love with it because it'smore like getting into a bar fight every
(07:33):
play, every play that it is, you know, Yeah, yeah,
there's no pressure. I don't haveto run as much, right, so
you know, it's all about powerhands, technique, foot hat. Anyway,
So I had a pretty good offensiveline coach as well, Kim Helton,
who went on to be head coachesin college and all that kind of stuff.
So I learned from some good guys. But I also was playing against
(07:55):
the guy in the Chicalow name.People remember because his son played here for
a while a number of years agoas an outside linebacker. But his dad
played for the Jets for a coupleof years. But his dad was a
guy I was playing against every practice, and his dad was a wacko.
And I loved Tony, but hewas a whack child. He had no
other speed than one hundred and fiftymiles an hour every play, So he
(08:16):
was one of those guys you're justjust battling your every play as a battle.
We had an All American right tackle. I had moved into the left
tackle spot in my junior year,and they were coming to see Tony,
the guy I'm practicing against every day, and they're coming to see the right
tackle. All of a sudden,they're like, Hey, who's that kid
over there playing the left tackle spot. So I ended up getting drafted second
(08:37):
round. Yeah that's how you getit, and yeah, I get noticed,
and I went to the I gotto go to the East West Shrine
game. And the North South AllStar Game. So that helped me because
your practice against all the better draftpicks and high draft picks and everybody that's
at those games. You know,you go there and you're practicing against them.
So that helped me up my stock, you might say, and was
luckily enough to get drafted in thesecond round. Well yeah, and interestingly
(08:58):
enough, if you're the thirty firstpick overall, so if you were drafted
today, Mark, you'd have beenin the first raft. That's right.
And that was a quarterback draft.They had like six quarterbacks. Go if
you remember, oh yeah, no, absolutely so. And that draft class,
this is nineteen eighty three. You'rein the same class with Gary Kubiak
and Karl Mecklenberg and people around here. Of course, no, John Elway
was not in the Broncos draft class, but he there was the big trade
(09:22):
where Chris Chris Sinton got traded tothe Colts and then Elway ends up coming
here. What is your memory ofthat, because I've talked to both Tubes
and Carl about it and just kindof how that went. So it's kind
of a weird story. I runto John in the East West Shrine game.
I'm on the east and he's onthe west obviously, and we're in
a nightclub and I'm with the clownfrom Miami who looked like a donna's right.
(09:46):
He was like the lady killer guy. His name was Mark Rush.
Were you his wingman then, yeah? Yeah. I'm like, yeah,
I'll just take seconds place because youcan't compete with this guy. I don't
think you've ever got in the weightroom. I lived in the weight room,
right, and you look like adonnas, right. So I'm hanging
out. I'm hanging out with Markand he's being a knucklehead and he actually
lifts this gallop over his head inthe bar and IM like I'm going,
(10:07):
no, no, mine's got enoughof a wrap. We don't need this.
So I grab her to take heroff over the top of him,
and at that same second, ohwayand his boys are all walking in and
they're like looking at us like we'reyou know, from Star Trek or something,
and I'm going, oh no,here we go. So I set
her down and I'm like rush atcivil they come over. We introduce each
other and kind of get to knowthese guys, right, because they're all
(10:30):
on the West side. So anyway, we leave and I don't talk to
him again until you know, thedraft goes off, the trade gets made.
We're all being you know, invitedand flown in and I fly in
and he's flown in. So Iwalk into the locker room and we shake
hands and we sit down for aminute and start talking and goes, aren't
you the guy in San Francisco theyhad that Grover's head? And I go,
(10:52):
no, no, no, letme explain, no, no,
no, no, explaining that.You don't to explain to me. We're
all good. I mean, itwas just one of those It wasn't me,
It was him, Yeah, exactly, helping it was. It was
comical. But we end up beingroommates our rookie year. Oh did you
really? Yeah. So we hada lot of fun and we got to
know each other pretty well and tookThere's some cool if you like thirty for
thirties and some of the stuff.There's a there's one about Marino in Lway
(11:13):
because they had the same agent andMarino was supposed to go high. He
goes last pick to the Dolphins andJohn goes number one to the Colts but
ends up at the Broncos. It'sa great thing to watch. I have
not watched that one, say,because the guy's got notes and they got
their agent up. He literally givesyou like a day by day by conversation
by conversation, Wow, of everythingthat went on during that draft with those
(11:35):
two quarterbacks. And it's really interestingbecause I knew enough about John because of
what happened here, but then Ididn't know all the Marina stories other than
he got a bad rap and somebodyyou know, wrote some stuff up about
him and pushed them way down.Interesting. Okay, so when John comes
here, then do you understand atthat point, like what this team was
getting. Here's exactly what I thought. I was like, Wow, I
saw him playing these FIS Shrine game. He reminds me of Jim Kelly because
(11:58):
I was Jim Kelly's left tackle atMiami. Oh so I'm watching Jim.
You know Jim. You know,this is kind of a side story,
but Jim goes to the USFL.But they had extra pro days for him
at Miami, so we got torun extra and show off our skills and
all that kind of stuff because theyhad a very specific pro day for just
Jim Kelly. So Jim gets draftedby Houston and he ends up going there,
(12:22):
but Buffalo still picks him. SoI stop in ratone because he's calling
me up, going, hey,I want you to be my left tackle
in Houston. But I'm like Jim, they're not paying me. I mean,
they're gonna pay me good money,but nothing guaranteed. Nothing like him,
right, I mean he's being guaranteedby the owners and you know everything
else and insured and everything else.But yeah, anyway, I come here
and I was happy, is I'llget out to come to Colorado because I
(12:43):
really like the Broncos. I reallyit was a dream. You know,
the NFL is a dream. Hadyou been this far west, never had
no clue. That's always so amazingto me that all the East Coast guys,
they never came this far. Ionly flew out of Miami one time
as a kid in seventh grade togo to New Jersey to visit relatives for
a weekend and back. So I'dnever been out of the state. Oh
(13:03):
my gosh, you know, otherthan playing football, and yeah, that's
all going to be and that's travelback and forth back. But I mean,
my father was a police officer,my mom was a nurse, so
we didn't. We you know,we were very taking plush vacations. No,
we had. We spent all ourtime on a boat that my dad
owned with another police officer, sowe split a boat and we'd go out
to La a Key and fish andcamp and so we really stayed local and
(13:28):
did a lot of fishing. Sowhen you get here and you see these
mountains, oh, you fall inlove. Yeah, oh your horseback ride
and you're just like wow, it'soverwhelming. That's why probably ninety plus NFL
retirees in this state, most ofthem I'm not the Broncos, But how
do you leave this state? Right? Yeah, it's a really tough state
to leave. And you know,then moving on into the real estate business
(13:50):
was wonderful. But this is agreat place to grow kids, families.
You know, You've got so muchto do year round. And it's really
not that cold, even though I'ma mining and I hate to snow,
right and I'm like sitting there goingno. You know, I'm one of
those like I'm an age right now. If I could split time between both,
that'll work out and sell real estatein both. So, yes,
which is what you're doing, andwe're going to get to that. Yeah,
(14:13):
but the Broncos were you know,Dan Ruve's head coach. Pat didn't
own the team until the I thinkthe two years following that, who was
an incredible owner by the way.You know, we had success pretty early.
I mean, you know, Johnwas one of those guys you knew
you could always win the football gamewith. There was not an occasion where
you know you're behind. You're like, Okay, we're temporary, We're gonna
turn this thing around. But youknow, we ran. Not to take
(14:37):
anything away from Dan Reeves, butwe ran the Cowboys offense, and the
Cowboys offense was a run first andplay not to lose and throw the ball
when you got to win, rightAnd no, no offense to Dan,
because that's what Dan did and that'swhat he grew up. It was his
wheelhouse, absolutely. And I coacheda lot when I was My kids are
in middle school and stuff like that, and you and during that you reflect
(14:58):
a lot, right, and youthink about what you've got and what you're
doing and how you're coaching. AndI've played under Alex Gibbs, one of
the best offensive line coaches in theleague, and then Larry Beckall, who
was very very good down to TampaBay afterwards. So you know, you
reflect all the different types of coachesyou have, and you just wonder why
they didn't. You know, ifI did John Elway, my offense is
going to be around John Elway,Peter. You're coaching to the player's strengths
(15:20):
that you have rather than plugging himinto your system. Right. So you
see that a lot in the NFL. And the misconception is that the when
you get to the NFL, you'regoing to have all the best coaches you've
ever could have dreamed of. Andit's totally not true. And it's actually
sad that billionaires hire some of thecoaches that these guys hire and don't do
more research on them, or don'thave a committee or something involved with it
(15:43):
to you know, maybe, butthey're billionaires for a reason, and you
know there's any ego that goes withall that, et cetera. But I
see more bad coaching than anything Isee in the league. An offensive lineman
that you know, cross over andthey do all the fundamental things you don't
even we didn't even do in collegebecause we were taught that those are the
things you don't do. I mean, there are some guys that can do
crossovers, but that's they're super athletes, right, And the NFL guys are
(16:07):
a lot different than any other guys, even the second string guys, because
the level athleticism is beyond comprehension.And most people don't even know what I
just said. They're so special,they really are. And I mean,
I look back and go, Idon't even know how I did all that
stuff, because you know, you'resixty four and you're looking back and you
go. And I watch games religiously, and I love watching offensive line play,
(16:29):
and I watch a lot on TVbecause I get to see the replay
rather than because I'm watching the lineplay. So I'm watching hands feet,
had placement and coach for a longtime. And then and like when I
left the league, I followed like, I followed like Charles Bentley, and
I followed Duke Maniweather and all theseoffensive line gurus because the game has changed
and how you block people has changed, and the way you block people has
changed. And like I learned handslike from Radikovich, who was our offensive
(16:53):
line coach when I first got toDenver, and then I really learned feet
more when I was in Tampa Bayunder another guy named Larry Bechdel, Right,
and you'd almost wish, boy,if you could have that in college,
or you could have had a guruon the side like they have now.
You know, you can go tothis guru and get coached up.
Whereas I watch our offensive line herein Denver and I just go the mistakes
(17:15):
and the way they're, the thingsthat they do, and as good athletes
as they are, you just go, wow, they're not being coached very
well. What is it that yousee most often that is surprising to you
that happens? And you hear alot of offensive linemen and on the defensive
side as well, talk about handsand feet and how important and how somebody
either another player had to teach themhow to do it, yep, or
(17:36):
they found the right coach finally thatdid. But nobody else taught them how
to do hands and eating. Likeyou learn them in two different places.
Why can't you learn them in thesame place. How helpful would that be?
Because it's a good old boys network? Yeah, unfortunately. And you
see, so think about football asa corporation, right, and you come
in as a scout and then youget moved to another position, and then
(17:56):
you become the special teams coach,then you become the tight end coach,
then you become the assistant offensive linecoach, and then become the offensive line
coach, and then you want tobecome the offensive coordinator. Why because you
make more money. Yeah, right, So you see that same hierarchy in
corporations is the NFL. But peopledon't realize that. Just go look at
the coaches and go back in theirhistory and see how many positions they coached
(18:18):
all over the place, and yougo, Okay, now I get it.
None of them have ever been likespecialized all the way from start to
finish. And even some of themthat are specialized start to finish are horrible
because they kept what they learned fromlike wherever they learn from. Yeah,
that's right, teaching bad habits likehopping and like some of the things that
you might do in high school collegeyou get and get away with it.
(18:41):
You don't do that at the pros, so you get thrown your back.
And I've never seen I do aTuesday deal with Gil Whiteley and we talk
about offensive line play during the seasonand he loves it. Right, But
I've never seen so many big dudesget turtled. What we call turtle is
thrown on your back, as Ihave in recent years. And maybe it's
because there's so much bigger, orthey're much stronger, or I call it
(19:03):
bad fundamentals. Right, So yousit there and see guys getting turtled,
and you're like, God, howdon't even go back to a film the
next day, right and see yourselfgetting You're the hammer of the nail,
right, But there's always a betterplayer, right, Like, you got
a Howie Long you're playing against.You know, that's gonna be a tough
day. You know, Aaron Donaldyou're gonna play against. That's gonna be
a tough day. You got youknow, you got these certain guys that
are the cream of the crop.You know, they're that one percent of
(19:25):
that three thousand guys seventeen hundred guysthat are playing or whatever, you know,
the top ten percent or one percent. Oh yeah, so you're gonna
have a tough day, but you'regonna scheme against that too, right,
Right. It's interesting to hear theolder generations talk about how the game has
changed, what it's doing now,and how different it is, and a
lot of it comes down to fundamentals. Believe me. It's all. Yeah,
(19:45):
the little guy can hold his ownagainst a big guy or a better
guy with sound fundamentals. Yeah,absolutely, fundamentally absolutely. Okay, So
you're with the Broncos from eighty threeto eighty seven, which also means you're
a part of the drive, youbet, and part of twenty one.
Yeah. What was that experience like? And you probably didn't know at that
time. I mean that was goingto be the end that you had with
(20:07):
the Broncos as well. Yeah,it was a crazy year. My career
with the Broncos was tough because I'dwin a job and I'd lose a job
to get hurt. I did gainit back the next year, and then
I'd lose to getting hurt. Iwas one of those guys that I could
not stay healthy. And I getit. You know, if I can't
stay healthy, eventually you know you'regoing to replace them. And I knew
that would come. But the otherthing I did is I learned to play
every spot on the offensive line.So smart because I could move from right
(20:30):
tackle to left tackle, left guardto left tackle, that you name it.
I could play every spot. Didyou play center? A couple of
times, just messing around the project. But that's a total different piece.
Yeah, so so that both guardspots and both tackle spots are hard enough.
Believe me, most guys can't evenmove from a guard to a tackle,
let alone right to left because ifyou work every hand work, everything's
(20:51):
different. But I'd played left tacklein college, so I was very comfortable
on the left side. I camehere and as a right guard initially,
and then I ended up starting toleft guard year against Pittsburgh and I blow
an ankle the first game right sothat puts me out like six eight weeks.
It's a tough start. But Iwas one of those guys that I
would do whatever it took to tostay on the field. So I'd shoot
whatever I had to shoot up anddo what I ever had to do to
(21:14):
be on the field. And itdidn't matter, because if you weren't,
somebody's gonna take your job. Yeah, you don't get paid. No.
The NFL was a totally different gameback in the day, And not that
it's not brutal now, but itwas. I mean, we're talking,
you're in two and three days.Like in Tampa we had three days and
it was hit hit, hit,hit hit, I mean you build up
a body, you know, ashell of armor. And we weren't being
(21:37):
paid near as much, so youwere a lot more expendable, right,
and they could replace you pretty easily. So you know that was the thing
you do whatever it took to stayon that field. You literally beat your
body up. Oh I look backand I go here. I called the
loose bolt syndrome. Every guy thatplayed in the NFL had to have a
loose bolt of some sort in thatera to play because oh yeah, the
(22:00):
guys are too smart to play becausethey just they'd worked their way out of
the game because they wouldn't do thethings to their body or they wouldn't they
couldn't play hurt or they couldn't thingsthey couldn't do would basically eliminate you.
The more you can do, thebetter off you are. Yeah, and
the longer you'll stay the loose boltof that. Yeah. Okay, so
after Super Bowl twenty one, yourtime comes to an end with the Broncos.
(22:22):
How does that happen? Yeah?So again for injury deal won the
job back in camp get dinged,we had this rule, when you come
back, you get your spot back. Well, that didn't always work out.
If Dan was done with you.Dan was done with you, so
and I figured that, did youhave a conversation with him? Oh?
Yeah, No, we had agreat conversation. We had a great conversation.
It wasn't the most honest conversation,and I held him his feet to
(22:45):
the fire on that. A littlebit later, when I wasn't being traded,
he said we're going to do somethingdifferent, and I was like,
okay, great, let's do whateverwhatever works best and I'll get my age
involved, et cetera. Blah blah. Then they kept asking too much for
me, so you know, Isaid, I don't totally agree with everything
going on. I mean all thetimes I shot up for you, all
the times I did ankles, shoulders, feet, you know, all kinds
(23:06):
of stuff. And he acted likehe didn't know any of that. I
was like, Dan, really,you're telling the joke about a guy that
they gave Demra all to. Youalmost killed the guy in the locker room
and they had to give him someother things to get him back. You
could tell he remembered that story becauseit was a Dallas story. I go,
so, look, it's just partways. They tried to trade me.
Things didn't go well, and Iwent back in. I was like,
(23:27):
look, you're asking too much.My agent says, is just not
going to happen this way, Sotrade me, cut me, or I'll
just you know, go to thepress and have some conversations because I want
it out at that point, right, I'm not going to sit around.
And there's so many those kinds ofstories that go back and back with a
lot of the different players, whichI thought it was odd that we you're
at an age where you're doing businessand you have a respectful business, and
(23:49):
you deal with people on an ongoingbasis like I have for the last what
thirty two years. You know,you look back at some of the conversations
you had in football and you're like, I didn't have to go that way.
You know, you go, whydo I just have a civil conversation
about, Hey, we're going togo in a different direction rather than play
games and this and that and theother. So you you know, and
this is going to be kind ofa it's going to sound bad, but
(24:10):
a guy once said to me whenmy sons were being recruited to college for
basketball and football, they were like, hey, that's just a Pee coach
with a whistle, And that stuckwith me a little bit because when you
start thinking about the level education allthese a lot of coaches have, they
were never in business, They neverran a business. They kind of got
put into these spots of leadership andauthority. You know, you kind of
(24:33):
look back and you go, Okay, now I understand why, right,
I understand why that was handled likethat was handled pleasure to manage. Really,
Yeah, it's a business and it'sabout money, and it's about you
know, getting better and better intheir team and all that kind of stuff.
Anyway, I get cut and Igo right to Tampa. Okay,
that was wonderful. I show upat Tampa and uh, I start the
second week I'm there and finish outthat season. They had other plans too
(24:56):
for the left tackle spot, butthey knew I could play response, so
they they drafted getting Paul Gruber,and then I moved to the backup tackle
at the guard spot and finish upplaying guard and tackle both in Tampa.
And that was a good experience.And my folks were close. Oh you
could come here again. Yeah,they're just right down the street in Miami,
which is you know, about fourhours away from Tampa. Back in
that day, I had a funcareer. You know, I look back
(25:18):
at it and could have gone better. Yeah, I could have stayed freaking
healthy. And when I get dingthat, you know, most of them
were things that were pretty serious.Serious, I mean outside of being the
ACL or something like that which takesyou off the field. I would do
everything I could to stay on thefield. I went on IR one time
for four weeks and came back off. But it's like everything takes six to
eight weeks and then you're trying tocome back and it's it's a vicious cycle.
(25:41):
That's a vicious cycle. It's ait's brutal, but it makes you
a tougher person too mentally, youknow. Oh absolutely, So that's you
know, there's always a good anda bad, right, Yeah. The
injury table and I do talk toa lot of guests about this. Being
injured is a really lonely place tobe. You feel like an outcast,
yeah, and back in that dayyou kind of were because you're trying to
(26:02):
make things happen and you're not onthe field practice and you don't have that
same camaraderie. And that's a toughthat is so mentally tough. And back
then you couldn't be weeks, youcouldn't show it, you couldn't talk to
anybody about it. You had tostay wacho and just get out. Now,
when we get it was funny likepeople, how many times you get
a concussion? I go, Youdidn't talk about concussions. You walk over
and the trainers would have this likea thing out and you'd walk over and
(26:25):
you just grab selling salts and youstick them in your sock and you'd stick
them in your nose. And youknow, when you knew you you know
you got dinged or you're pretty youwouldn't never you don't report that stuff.
Oh no, you know, youjust go self medicate and and do whatever
you have to do to be onthe field the next day. And now
today it is so different, Mark. I mean, I watch, I'm
down there on the sideline and Iwill see the doctors that have the red
(26:47):
hats. That's how you always knowwho's watching. They'll watch a play and
they'll pull a guy and guys likewhat, what what's happening and they're like,
well, we saw something upstairs andwe want to see how I mean,
it is so every play. Multipleplayers are being looked at all the
time whenever there was a hit,and they analyze it, and there's four
screens there on the field. There'ssomebody up in the booth and they're figuring
out guys can go back in ornot. Yeah, that's so different.
(27:10):
Yeah. Yeah, they walk upto you. Is that a thumb or
is that a finger? Yeah?That's that was good. That's okay,
that works good out there, getback out there. Yeah, how many
fingers I'm holding up? Okay,yep, you're right. Yeah, it
doesn't matter how many there were.Whatever you said was good to go.
Yeah, man, So how manyseasons in Tampa? Then three more?
Three more seasons? And then howdid you know it was time to hang
it up? After that eighty nineseason? You know, I had all
(27:33):
I was playing with a patella tendontear, and that was tough. It
was partially torn and like thirty sixhundred milograms of motrin every day, and
you know you're you're just stomach linersgone. Yeah, and you know ice
and all the stuff you do yourI was like, so I had to
get that fixed. That off seasonI get fixed, and those were the
days of Plan B. It waskind of like free agency but kind of
(27:55):
not right. So I only wassigning one year deals. So I got
my kney fixed and I was going, Wow, had seven good years.
I mean, didn't turn out theway I wanted, but don't want to
go try to go eight nine andrisk more injuries. And it's not like
I haven't had a history of that. So I'm, what thirty years old.
I'm thinking, you know a lotof guys are way ahead of me
in the business community already. Whatdo you do? Right? What do
(28:18):
you start? But I had alsohad I was involved with a public company
we started and had to dive operationin Turks and Caicos and a wholesale travel
agency, so we already had abusiness in the works and running and getting
going and going to demon was actuallygoing well into like right as I retired,
even I'm thinking, you know,I can grow that business, et
cetera. And then if you remember, Eastern and pan Am both went out
(28:41):
of business like one year after theother one. Oh yeah, and we
had bulk airfare agreements with them allright, where we buy our bulk airfare
from them up front and then resellit. So that hurt that business really
bad. But I sold the travelagency to a guy in Tampa who wanted
one, because back then it wasdifferent. Travel agents were different. You
had to have you had to andyet exactly that then you had to have
a you had to go through backgroundchecks and all kinds of stuff together.
(29:03):
So and they were expensive, sothere was a value attributed value. And
then I had the dive operation.I just sold to the guy down there
on like a owner carry deal,and I'm going to go take it back
about three years later and I soldit to the Sheridan. But I was
playing softball with a bunch of Remaxguys here in town, and we were
talking about how much they're making,and they're making more than I was making
(29:23):
in the NFL. And I'm going, oh my god, these guys,
I'm as smart as any one ofthese clowns, and they're making more money
than I was making playing in thatleague. Right. So I was like,
well, in real estate, lookslike an interesting business, right,
And I'd kind of been messing aroundwith it with doing the stuff we were
doing with our public company. Soit was a natural three years after you're
(29:44):
done, you get your license.Yeah, fell right into it, and
you never looked back, and soyou came back here after Tampa Bay.
I, yeah, I had myhome. I had bought a house here
and a pint creek range, justhad some horses and dogs and all that
stuff. So that on acreage outthere. And then you get your real
estate license and here you are thirtytwo years later, and you've got kids,
family, everybody has grown up hereand you've done very well. And
(30:07):
the beauty about real estate you cankeep doing it as much or as little
as you want to, as longas you want to. Yeah, it's
funny. Buddy might call me.He's like, when you're going to retire,
I go retire. I said,why would I retire? I can
do this in mines closed, right, And I have so much fun doing
it, and it's so much funto do. And when I do it
in Florida, I mean, I'lladd a fishing day on the front,
or a fishing day on the backor And today nowadays with teams and Microsoft
(30:30):
and Zoom and everything else, youcan do anything from anywhere because of the
technology advances have gone so far.And even when I'm out on one of
my buddy's yachts, right, theyhave that new Elon Musk satellite technology,
and these guys have it on theirboats. Let me tell you what,
It's faster than my office. Thattechnology on vessels is so amazing. You
(30:52):
can run your iPad, your phone, your computer, everything, and like
I said, it's faster than myoffice. That's amazing. So you have
your real estate license here in Coloradoand also in Florida, so you're able
to help out people in both places, and that made sense for you.
One of the things that we talkabout here on the podcast is reinvention.
So you have your realtor here inColorado and then realize, hey, I've
(31:12):
got all these people that are buyingthings in Florida. All my friends are
going there. Yeah, so I'msmall, a small team here, so
I got coverage when I'm gone,and then same there. I've got two
associates I work with down there.And what's weird to start in the keys,
right, I'm selling some pretty bigplaces for buddies that are buying second
and third homes. And then onebuddy had a house blown up by Dorian
(31:33):
and that sold his lot, youknow, so you get some of those
weird things that happened too. Andthen he bought a big place in Miami.
And then another client once to moveout of Miami to Palm City,
which is right outside of Stuart.And then that buddy mine called me from
Washington who had done some business withand he's like, hey, Coop,
I want to move to Stuart.I saw you're doing some stuff in Stuart.
And we buy a place for himand Stuart, my financial adviser retires.
He's going to be in Jensen Beach, right, Hutchinson Islands. We
(31:55):
buy a place, a big condo, a beautiful by the way, overlooking
the ocean. On the fifteenth floor. You get to live you don't have
a place there, right, justlive vicariously through all your other people's places.
Well that's what's so funny, right, so I can get to see
I got keys to that place,the keys and a boat in Palm City.
I got, you know, keysto a house in Miami. It's
the best of all works. He'sthe one at Marathon and they rent them
sometimes and someone they don't even rent, just just their second and third homes.
(32:20):
So they're like, you know,check it out for me. Why
you're there's the toilets, right,yeah, go go look at this same
for me here, so I gotit's like having you know. Plus it's
weird because from Stuart to you know, Fort Lauder deal is about two hours
hour and a half, you know, and then thirty minutes to Miami and
then you know, another hour anda half to Elmarada, you know,
and then another say hour and ahalf to Marathon and then say another hour
(32:42):
and a half or two to KeyWest, so you know all the way
up the from Key West. Yeah, there's two there's two MLS's. You
know. All this works, butso you have to be members of the
two different boards and then you haveaccess to all that data, but real
estates data. You know, it'sall data driven. And once you've done
it, as long as you knowI've done it and you you've been in
it now doing it, it's reallydata driven. And so it's not that
difficult to find the comparables and comparethem and then put them in front of
(33:05):
the sellers and say here's where weshould be price wise plus or minus and
come up with a plut game plan. And if you have a good game
plan, and I've got a marketingplan I've been using forever and keep tweaking
it and all the things we doin real estate, it's been good.
And if you could apply these principlesto the NFL, how they you know,
to comp out players, Like,why don't you just do it like
we do in real estate? Yeah, and then maybe some of these things
(33:27):
wouldn't happen where somebody gets paid whenthey shouldn't get paid so much you didn't
comp them. Well, how manyquarterbacks have we gone through in this town?
Right? Since job like comps aresimple, we do it all the
time. At the human level,there is a whole level at difficulty there.
But still it's you know, businessis business, so it is,
and the NFL is a tough placeit is, and you do still stay
very involved with the Broncos and theAlumni Association. Yeah, we have a
(33:51):
we have alumni event tonight. It'sabout some of the things that the trust
is doing for players and stuff,you know. And the NFL is just
such a monopoly. You know,they dictate the rules and you know,
the guy with the gold wins,right, So that's kind of the way
the NFL is. Unfortunately, becausethere's a lot of guys I don't even
care for myself, to be perfectlyhonest with you, because I've done well,
I've can pay for insurance. Ican do a lot of things that
(34:13):
some guys can't. But there's guysthat are really banged up from that game.
Oh yeah, They're hurting mentally andphysically. And it's really sad to
me because I've I stay in thegym three four days a week, and
you know, I'm religious about everythingI do, and but I want to
fish till I'm eighty, right,and so in real estate till then.
I'm trying to kind of repair thedamage that I did in earlier times to
(34:36):
now. But I've got buddies andI won't name them all because it's a
little bit sad, And so I'mpushing hard back at the NFL on,
you know, getting some of theseguys some help and coverages and stuff.
And the NFL has done a fewthings, but with the way insurance works,
it's almost laughable because the money theygive you just doesn't go so far.
And then what happens is you're inthere network and anything else you want
(34:57):
to do is outside of a network, and the other network won't be that
network, right, Yeah, Soit's all these games, these just insurance
games that get played so I thinka lot of that money goes to waste
that they act like they are spending, but they're not because you can't use
it. Like they give you twentyfive a year, right for medical stuff.
Well, I literally I was gonnahave my back worked on and it
was going to be a ninety minuteprocedure and it's just going and clean up
(35:21):
a disc and make the area biggerso the nerve doesn't get pinched like it's
being pinched and clean up is aninety ninety minute procedure and it's outpatient.
That was twenty three thousand dollars.Well, okay, there's two grand left.
Okay, so I'll give them atip. Right, obviously stays,
it stays in there. But no, but then okay, then you had
to have the hospital, stay atanestesiology said, the doctor's fee, all
(35:45):
the other stuff. Right, thatwas that was in the six figure range.
So what like I'm gonna go toKaiser and say you got to pay
for this. Now they're not doingthat because they're like they're gonna say you're
out of network. Right, Soall this all these little these insurance games,
you know, and the NFL isnot stupid. They got the smartest
attorneys and multitudes of them, right, so they know how that game is
played, and so a lot mostof that money is just not being used.
(36:07):
Then they got in the twenty fivethat sits there for guys for mental
capacity issues. Right, Well,I don't know how far that goes because
I don't I haven't had to useit, luckily, And I was saying,
why wouldn't you let that money goover to the medical side if it's
not being used for mental stuff,making for the physical side. Yeah,
because most of the guys have physicalissues. They do, and there's a
handful of mentals too. But andit's sad, you know, it's sad
(36:29):
that they can't get help, andthey're almost like when you get asked the
same question every time you see aguy and you get that little story look
in their eye, and there yousee the dear deterioration and it's sad to
watch in front of your eyes,like watching your mom and dad pass away.
Oh yeah, it's very hard tosee. But those the teammates that
you played with. Yeah, absolutely, So the NFL is it the PA
(36:50):
that ends up giving you or isit the NFL? Kind of No,
the PA is the union different,right, Okay, but the PAS really
for current guys. I mean they'lleven tell you that pretty much, even
though we're part of that union andwe've gotten some benefits over the years.
Like I was talking in Biquay,who is on the Broncos years back.
We work at a Lifetime and Iwas saying, I'm fighting for guys that
are my age, that can't dothings and for guys like you. He
(37:13):
was like, he's like forty eight, right. I'm like, so hopefully
you guys get them after us,because they're basically waiting for the most guys
to die sadly unfortunately. Yeah,I go to most of the meetings I
can and appreciate you, Mark Quisurefor these guys because you feel there are
teammates. Yes, they're like family. Yeah, absolutely, all right,
as we start to wrap this up, then I always ask all my guests
(37:34):
this question. As you look backover your career and there's been some ups
and downs when you got cut fromthe Broncos and things weren't going great,
and then you are done at TampaBay and you've got to figure out what
do I do with the rest ofmy life. All my friends are ahead
in business, What do you tellpeople how did you kind of get past
some of those tough times. Andthere's been ups and downs in real estate
plenty of times too, during yourthirty two years kind of moving forward and
(37:57):
doing that reinvention and figuring out what'sthe thing that I can do to be
successful. So I always look forthe opportunity that's in front of you rather
than worrying about stuff you can't worryabout and not riding the elevator we call
it. And my clients even respectme for that because they're like, well,
you stay really calm during all this, right, And I'm like,
that's my job, right, Butso, you know, looking for the
(38:21):
opportunity and everything is what I thinkhas helped me because I've had a lot
of adversity. Everybody's had a lotof adversity, I mean, and people
a lot more than I've had.Right by any stretch imagination, I just
couldn't stay healthy. So I battlingthat all the time. But I mean
a lot of guys came out alot of worse situations. In me,
I look at every opportunity that Ican create for myself and what are the
things I can do to perpetuate that. So, you know, getting your
(38:44):
education, getting your degree at Universityof Miami, getting all the designations I
have in real estate because I wantto be smarter than than the other guy,
and just trying to do as manybe proactive and go to tech classes
and go you know, I'm alwaysdoing stuff to try and even better myself
today because things change and the marketwe've been through. You know, I've
been through every market you could possiblyimagine, from the recession on, through
(39:05):
and and up and down markets.When you know, Denver had an IT
business that was crazy and then wehad an it blow up, you know,
oil and gas blow up, andthen it blow ups and then the
recession and then you just so youlook at the opportunities that those create and
try and take advantage of those.And when I say take advantage, not
advantage, but learn to use thoseas a tool to better yourself and your
clients. Because if I can dosomething like I've got a mortgage license during
(39:29):
the recession because everybody was refining rightand the houses that weren't being sold,
I was involved with the refined rightfinance of them. So you know,
you do a lot of different thingsto make up for business and or to
generate that business or diversify yourself.Yeah, so that you're so when your
client asked you a question, youhave the answer. I love that.
Yeah, and I there are somany disruptors. And since we're both realtor
(39:51):
as, we can go a littlegeeky on that point. They always talk
about, oh, this is happeningand it's gonna ru in real estate forever.
Well, no it's not. It'sgonna have some people going, I
can't do this because it's too hard, and those of us that are smart,
go, actually, you know what. I think I've figured out a
way to kind of make this workand be a better real term, be
better at what I'm doing, andhelp explain things better. And then the
(40:14):
client is that much more appreciative.And then also the people that just can't
do it, it's like, that'sokay, go do something else. Because
it isn't for everybody, and itis hard. You do have to work
at it. And when it's nottwo and a quarter percent interest rate and
no inventory, that's when it's easyand the orders are coming in right now?
Not so easy. How you doing, We're doing okay? Yeah,
totally. Yeah. Again, Ithink like when I was coaching, we
(40:37):
put our fingers next to each otherand people can't see it on this podcast,
but we'd say get a little bitbetter every day. If you can
get a little bit better every dayat everything you do, I mean spiritually,
physically, mentally, all those things, and try and be the best
person you can be, for sure, Mark, this was great. Thanks
for coming in today. Thank you. Yeah, I really really appreciate it.
It's great to see again and lookforward to seeing you fly fishing at
(40:58):
eighty and beyond. All right,hopefully all right? Thanks Mark, Thank
you, Thank you. Mark.New episodes of Cut, Traded, Fired,
Retired are released on Tuesdays. Pleasefollow, download, rate, and
review this podcast wherever you listen topodcasts. You can also follow podcast updates
and new releases on Twitter and Instagramat CTFR podcast and give a visit to
(41:20):
the website at ctfrpodcast dot com foreasy links to other episodes. I'm your
host, Susie Wargen. To findout more about me, visit susiewargon dot
com. Thanks for listening, anduntil next time, please be careful,
be safe, and be kind.Take care
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