April 16, 2024 • 43 mins
Growing up in Indiana, Matt Mauck’s favorite sport was basketball, followed by football, then baseball. He received some scholarship offers to play basketball but committed to Michigan State for football under Nick Saban. Then came spring of his senior year: he was drafted by the Cubs, his baseball team won a state championship and he was named Mr. Baseball. Matt leaned into the diamond.
He played 3 seasons in the minor leagues and came to realize that small towns with no fans wasn’t much fun, not to mention baseball’s mental anguish. So he called Nick Saban and asked to meet. Coach Saban got back to him within a few hours and said Matt always had a spot with him.
When Coach Saban got the head coaching job at LSU in 2000, Matt joined him. After coming off the bench in an SEC Championship game in 2001 and helping secure a come from behind victory, Matt was the starter. He would go on to help his team win a National Championship, forgo his senior year and get drafted by the Broncos in 2004. The NFL wasn’t easy and Matt was done after a few seasons.
Immediately after his playing days were over, Matt started with CU’s School of Dentistry and became Dr. Matt Mauck. His thriving practice in Aurora is also partnered with the Broncos as the team dentist. Full circle.
He played 3 seasons in the minor leagues and came to realize that small towns with no fans wasn’t much fun, not to mention baseball’s mental anguish. So he called Nick Saban and asked to meet. Coach Saban got back to him within a few hours and said Matt always had a spot with him.
When Coach Saban got the head coaching job at LSU in 2000, Matt joined him. After coming off the bench in an SEC Championship game in 2001 and helping secure a come from behind victory, Matt was the starter. He would go on to help his team win a National Championship, forgo his senior year and get drafted by the Broncos in 2004. The NFL wasn’t easy and Matt was done after a few seasons.
Immediately after his playing days were over, Matt started with CU’s School of Dentistry and became Dr. Matt Mauck. His thriving practice in Aurora is also partnered with the Broncos as the team dentist. Full circle.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
One thing football. I've always hada pretty good memory, but Mike Shanahan
used to make us so we wouldhave a call sheet okay, and it
would have one hundred plays on there, okay, and he would give us
a blank piece of paper and youwould have to fill the whole thing in
and the winner got five hundred bucks. Oh Dan, I won every week.
So yeah, so memory against Jake, Danny and Bradley. Yeah,
(00:21):
yeah. I started getting pissed andthen I had to like and said and
then Bradley's like, it's like lookingat my sheet the whole time. Welcome
to Cut, Traded, Fired,Retired a podcast featuring conversations with professional athletes
and coaches who have been gracious enoughto tell their stories of changes, setbacks,
and moving forward. I'm your host, Susie Wargen. One of the
fun outcomes of this podcast is findingout what athletes and coaches have done with
(00:45):
their time outside of sports. Thisepisode's guest has had a very successful second
career that is completely different, yetstill intertwined with his sports career. Matt
Mott grew up in Jasper, Indiana, and had scholarships in three sports,
football, basketball, and baseball.He committed to play football for Nick Saban
at Michigan State, but in thespring of his senior year, he was
(01:06):
drafted by the Cubs. His teamwon the state championship and he was named
Mister Baseball, so he detoured tothe Diamond. After three years in the
minor leagues, Matt decided football didn'tsound so bad after all, and he
joined coach Saban in his first yearas the head coach at LSU. Eventually,
Matt became the starter and he helpedLSU to the national championship after the
(01:27):
two thousand and three season. Hethen hopped to the NFL and was drafted
in two thousand and four by theBroncos. The NFL turned out to be
a tough road, and within afew seasons Matt was out of football and
starting his schooling at CU School ofDentistry. Today he is Doctor Matt Mock
with a thriving practice that includes takingcare of the Broncos and many of the
(01:49):
alumni that are still in town.Ladies and gentlemen, Matt Mock cut Traded
Fired Retired podcast with Susie Wargin,Hello Matt Mock, how you doing.
I'm doing great? Thanks for havingme on absolutely. I can't believe that
I haven't had you in yet.And it took seeing Charlie adams great smile
to remind me that you're here andyou have been for a long time.
(02:13):
Yeah. I wish you wouldn't havesaid that, because he's going to remind
me of that. He gave youall the credit for his great smile,
as do others. David Brutin too, He's like, oh, yeah,
I go see Matt, he's everybody'sdentist. Well those are two great guys.
Yeah, you've created a good nichefor yourself here in this market.
But we're going to talk about allthe sports first and then get into what
(02:34):
you're doing now, because you've gota pretty fascinating story between two different sports
at very high levels. Different levelstoo, Yeah, no for sure.
Yeah. So you are born inJasper, Indiana, Yes, and you
go to Jasper High School where youexcel in baseball and football. Was there
a third or fourth sport that youalso loved or was it just those two?
Basketball? Ok? Yeah, soI had some scholarship offers for basketballs
(02:58):
you did all three sports? Yeah, when you're in a small town,
I think that's the being that Ihave three boys and they go to Cherry
Creek High School, and uh,it's just a different deal. How many
how many kids were at your schoolcompared to the four k at Cherry Cree?
I had a thousand, which waspretty big for you know, Southern
Indiana. But yeah, it's ayou know there there wasn't enough kids,
(03:21):
so you're you know, hey,if you're a good athlete, coaches are
begging you to here. It almostforces you to specialize, right, because
there's too many people, too many. What did you play in basketball?
I was a shooting guard? Okay, so actually, uh, Michael Lewis,
who ended up being the Alzheim assistleader at Indiana then followed Bobby Knight
and he's the head coach at ballState, was a year above me.
(03:43):
So he and I were teammates.Wow, that's cool. Yeah, So
you didn't play multiple positions in basketballlike you did in baseball and football,
Well, I was. I wassix' three and then Southern Indiana that's
actually like potential center work, right, So I was I could shoot,
so plates of shooting guard, butthen kind of every if they had a
guy that we needed to guard,I would go down okay, all right,
(04:04):
in the blocks. So in baseballyour pitcher, center fielder, third
basement. You won two state titlesin high school. And then in football
quarterback and dB played both sides safety. Okay, brute and I'm coming for
your job. And that team wentto the state finals one of your years
of high school as well. Yeah, we were lost in the state championship
(04:26):
game my junior year. You goto those big games in high school and
you're one of the best athletes probablyat the school, do you kind of
get that feeling like, all right, top of the world and the world
is mine to have, you know, I think back on it, it's
kind of funny, like when you'rein this small town and you don't have
the experiences, everything just seems socool. And I remember we went we
(04:47):
played in the old RCAA Dome forthe state championship, and I remember walking
in that place just like looking around, going, oh my god, this
is the biggest thing I've ever seenin my life. This is unbelievable.
And then when I was with weactually had a playoff game and four at
the RCA though, and then afterplaying in the SEC and the NFL,
had all these memories and things,and I walked in and I go,
(05:10):
wow, this is tiny. Sothat's funny. Yeah, life changes your
perspective. Yeah quite a bit.Oh how funny. So you get recruited
obviously in football baseball, and yousaid some basketball. You first of all
had committed to go to Michigan Stateand play with Nick Saban there, and
then when the Cubs draft you,you end up going to baseball. What
(05:31):
went into that decision? I can'timagine that was an easy one, Honestly
it was. I feel like kidsnow play sports because they want to.
They think it's going to lead toa scholarship or to do things. When
I was I just didn't do that. You just kind of were like,
Hey, I play because I lovedoing it, and oh I happened to
be pretty good at it. Ohcool, now people want me to go
play more. So sign with MichiganState to do football and baseball, and
(05:56):
then was drafted one state championship,was named mister Baseball. All these kind
of things happened at one time,and so I think I just I never
really liked baseball. I really,yeah, I liked it, but didn't
Football was my favorite. Basketball wasin the second Baseball was my third.
But I think the culmination of allthose things, you know, win in
the state championship, win in misterbaseball, and then they're like, well,
(06:16):
I've always got playing a professional sport. Wow, that'd be pretty cool.
I never thought that would happen.And that all happened your senior year
when you won the state title andall that, so it's very fresh in
your mind, without a doubt.Yeah, And and football had success individually,
and we went to the state championshipand then lost the next year.
But in baseball we'd gone to threestraight state championships and won two, and
that was the second one in arow. And Scott Rowland is from my
(06:39):
hometown. He played third base.He and my brother were really good friends
growing up. So it was justkind of that, well, you know,
I worked out for Scott, maybeyou should work out for me.
Sure type of thing. So Ireally, honestly, I wish I could
sit here and say, oh,I made this pros and cons and all
this stuff. Not really, itwas kind of like, yeah, let's
(07:00):
go yeah, hey, you knowwhat, Sometimes that's the way it goes,
right. So you spend three yearsthen in the minor leagues with the
Cubs. I read somewhere that youhad said, you know, I wish
I'd been more patient. And Ihave a lot of baseball guys that come
in here. The grind of baseballis insane. I mean they'll spend seven
eight years in the miners till theyget that first call up and then then
it's up and down, up anddown up in it. You know,
(07:23):
there's very few of the guys thatare called up. It's a great story.
They stay there on a roster foryears and years. There's just so
many other stories that just don't sothree years probably not enough time there.
Right to your point, there's veryfew Jackson Holidays, Yeah, that are
out there. There's more Matt moocks. Yeah. I think the biggest thing
(07:45):
in minor league baseball two things.One, you have to love it.
I mean, baseball has to beyour sport. I mean it really does,
because it is. It is agrind. People can tell you that
unless you experience it, it ismake zero money. Tiny towns, no
fans. I mean really, theonly time you get fans is if they
have some promo night. You know, they're hanging out beer cooozies or something.
(08:05):
Then everybody shows yeah, yeah,something like that. So so I
found out very quickly what I knewall along. Baseball was my third favorite
sport. It just you know,it was tough, and I've always been
parents instilled that in me. Butthe harder you work, the better it
works out for you. In baseball, it's almost different because sometimes the harder
(08:26):
you work, the more you thinkabout it, you press, you try
to do these things. I say, sometimes the best baseball players are the
dumbest people, and no offense tobaseball players, but it's true. You
just gotta You're like, I don'tthink, you don't think the thinking kills
You're like, I mean, Ihad a buddy I played with. It
was David Keltoney is the second roundpick from La Grange, Georgia. Did
(08:46):
minor league baseball his second round pick, but he didn't he couldn't get into
any schools. He was going tobe a Cheaco guy. But David like
he'd be like, oh for fourand like you're having beers and pizza afterwards,
and we're like, David, howdo you feel? He's like,
what do you mean? I'm like, well, you just had like four
strikeouts. Oh, bro, justwait till tomorrow. That's what he would
say, you know, and that'sa tough mentality to have, very tough,
(09:07):
very tough or not tough. Yeah, depending on your more mentality.
Yeah, exactly. How funny.Yeah, so hard to forget even though
there's so many games. It wasa tough one for you to let it
go each day without a doubt.Yeah. Yeah. And if you're working
on something and it didn't work out, Yeah, it was just, uh,
my mentality and baseball just didn't mix. Yeah. Well and maybe the
(09:30):
physical there's a physical grind to baseball, but it's the mental grind without that
is really that much more grueling.And the point of you just got to
love it, you know, youhave right, you have to truly love
it. And so three years intothat minor career, you decide, yeah,
I might go back to college andfootball, and you make a phone
call to Nick Saban. You haveto be playing in East Lansing, is
(09:52):
that right? So yeah, Somy first year was rookie ball. I
was drafted. They gave me anoption to play in third base or pitching.
My high school coach pissed at mebecause I said third base. He
was like, you would have beena better pitcher. It's funny. There's
a guy and my high school thisguy Phil Kendall. He was drafted in
the fifth round by the Brewers theyear before me, and he was drafted
as a pitcher. But my highschool coach is like, he should have
(10:13):
been the catcher. You should havebeen the pitcher, because no one asked
me he was. I've won likeseven state championships. You can at least
tell them like, I think Iknow, Yeah, you think I might
know these things. That's funny.Yeah. So the first year I was
a catcher. Terry Kennedy, whoplayed for the Cardinals Padres a long time,
like ten fifteen years or something likethat, was my manager my first
year. He and I just hitit off. He was like a second
(10:37):
dad or he just for whatever reason, he really took to me. You
need that you're eighteen, Yeah,a little bit. Yeah, I mean
people don't realize that too late.In Indiana, you play baseball until June.
So you graduate and you're still playingin the state championship, which is
kind of cool because here in Colorado, by the time the weather actually breaks
seventy you're done with baseball. Yes, yeah, thing, so they do
(10:58):
it a little different. But Iliterally got drafted, win the state championship,
go back home, pack and leaveon a plane the next day.
Oh and I'm eighteen and I'm inArizona living in a hotel. It's just,
yeah, you grow up pretty quick. Oh yeah, that's a lot
with that. So anyway, hewas he just kind of took to me
and he said, hey, Ithink you'd be a great catcher. Literally
(11:20):
never put catcher's gear on in mylife, not one time. Yeah,
And so I repeated rookie ball inArizona and then the next year went to
Lansing, Michigan, and so itjust happened. And honestly, when you
know, you break spring training,you get on there. So we all
land, and some of the guysI played with kind of, you know,
knew that I'd signed with Michigan State, but not everybody knew. Well,
(11:43):
we land, and there's like twentyreporters waiting for me take it off
because they're like, oh, youdidn't come here. You know, there's
this big story that was kind ofthere. So everybody, you know,
we got off the plane where itwas like, what the hell you just
you just had like two hundred whydo they care about you. Yeah,
pretty much funny. And then howdo you get connected with coach Saban?
(12:05):
Again? At the time, Ijust knew baseball wasn't my my deal,
so I actually just called the secretaryand said, hey, Matt makan meet
with coach. Literally called back withinthree hours. I think that's one thing
about Nick Saban is he is meticulousabout details and if there's something that he
can get from you, he Imean, he is on it really quick.
(12:28):
So I think part of was hedidn't really love his quarterback situation at
Michigan State, so he got backto me real quick. And what was
that conversation? Like, Well,he was great. When I called him
to tell him I was doing baseball, he goes, He goes, I
can't falter. He goes, that'syou know, I was a baseball player.
He goes, Just no, ifyou ever change your mind, you've
always got a scholarship. So hewas nice, wasn't mad? I mean,
(12:50):
he was extremely professional about it.So I just said, hey,
you know, I think I'm madea mistake. I'm not loving baseball.
What would it be like if Icame back and he goes, well,
I already told you you got aspot anytime you want it, I said,
all right, you know, letme think about it. I have
terrible beginning of the first half ofthat season. I was hitting literally like
one ninety or something like that.So I was like, I'm done.
(13:11):
I'm not doing this. I hadlike three point fifty the second part of
the season, so I was like, okay, maybe I still like baseball
a little bit type of thing.So decided not to quit. And actually
Jim Hendry, who ended up beingthe GM of the Cubs, is the
guy who drafted me. He wasgood friends with Mark Rogers, who's the
agent for Russell Wilson. Jim introducedme to Mark. Mark was my agent
(13:35):
when I was doing that, sothey kind of had this, you know,
they were talking and you know,he was telling Mark he really like,
Matt, tell him not to quit. We think this is going to
work out all this stuff, SoI kind of had It's kind of cool
that I, you know, Ihad someone that was making all the decisions
that was kind of in yes corner, because again, you're still really young.
Are you even twenty one at thispoint? Not yet? Okay,
So I tell people I retired frommy first job at twenty one. So
(14:00):
the next year I go back toLancing and I just knew. It was
the first year I loved my teammateseverybody. The second year it was just
it was miserable, you know,really it was bad. So made the
decision basically in June. I justcalled Jim Hendry and I said, hey,
Jim, I said, it's notme. I can't do it.
He was didn't ask for any signingon his money back. Wow, nothing.
He said, You've been awesome,love you to death, wish you
(14:24):
the best. He goes, You'vegot great opportunities. Why would we stand
in the way. It's pretty cool. That's cool that people didn't slam doors
in your face and were good aboutyou moving on and doing what you wanted
to do. Yeah, without adoubt, which that doesn't always happen at
all, not at all, notin the sports world. Yeah, I
would say it's the opposite. Yeah, yeah, for that. So,
(14:45):
yeah, I'm very fortunate. Ihad a lot of good people and they
were all really nice to me.I'd like to think because I worked hard
as a good kid. But sure, that was a lot of it.
But yeah, but they still didn'thave to always do Yeah, if you
had been in a hole the wholetime, they probably would have reacted differently
to you a little bit. Iwould have asked for some of that signing
bonus money back. So then bythen when you make that decision, Nick
(15:05):
Saban's at LSU or not yet justleft. So I was his first year
at it. Oh, that's right, because he had done that fall at
Michigan State and then so right atthe same time, you're going in together
to LSU. Yeah. So basicallyI quit and then I'm like, oh,
crap, I don't know where Ican go play. So Bobby Williams
was the head coach at Michigan State. He said I could come there.
(15:26):
Gary Barnett, who had recruited meat Northwestern was actually called Colorado. Yep.
He said I could come here.And it was funny because Joel Klatt
was here, so we'd had twobaseball guys. True. Yeah. And
then Gary Trankle was off the corner, and here's at Virginia. So those
were basically the four schools that Inarrated it down to. I wanted to
stay with coach Saban just because ofhow good he was to me. So
(15:46):
I basically said, hey, youknow, I want to come here,
I said, but I've never beento Louisiana. So they flew me down.
I met with Jimbo Fisher, justhe and I and here's your OC
right. He was, Okay,if you've never been to Louisiana, I
would not recommend your first time beingJune thirtieth, hot and sticky. Yeah.
Literally, you come like walk offthe planet, like someone smacks you
(16:08):
in the face with humidity. Soloved what they were doing. I thought
that it was just this untapped potentialthat was there. At the time.
I had baseball money, so whenyou sign out of high school, you
get a signing bonus, but thenthey put money into a college fund for
you. So I went to LSUas a walk on. Essentially my first
(16:30):
year starting LSU, Major League Baseballpaid for that. Oh. I was
going to ask you how that happenedbecause you had been pro, you had
an agent. So did the NCAAget involved with you then going back into
school or was there anything with that? So, I mean, I still
have a year of eligibility. Basketballis still a thing. Maybe, Oh,
as long as you don't play,Yeah, as long as you don't
(16:52):
play the sport you were professional inyou have not lost your amateurs. Okay,
well that's handy, all right.So you're there your first year,
you red shirt in two thousand andthen two thousand and one you have some
playing time, but then your bigbreakthrough comes in that SEC championship game against
Tennessee where you come in off thebench, score a couple of touchdowns and
(17:14):
you come from behind and win,and that really projects LSU into the next
season. You have the injury,but then the following season the championship,
when you came in in that SECchampionship game, what was that like?
I mean, you're coming off thebench and now you're here, you are
and this is your biggest football stagethat you've been in. Yeah. I
mean when I was in high school, we were the running type team.
(17:37):
We threw just because. But themost times I'd ever thrown in a game
was twelve. Oh okay, ever, so I came in the first time
I ever got to play. Itwas the second half of Florida that two
thousand and one year, and Ithrew twenty two passes and the second half
because Rohan Davey was injured. Sothe most times I ever thrown in a
game or the second half of that. So anyway, for that week we
(17:57):
were playing Tennessee tennis. He waswriting number one or two in the nation.
They had Albert Haynesworth, John Henderson, will Overstreet, demetris Ville.
They had like six guys that playedin the NFL, and three were first
or second round picks, so theywere needless say, we were worried about
protecting Rohan. And Roe was agreat quarterback, great leader, everything,
(18:18):
but wasn't the most mobile guy inthe world. So on Wednesday, Jimbo
puts in this package. It wasn'tfor me, it was for Rohan,
but it was a bunch of quarterbackdraws and some things like that direct snap
stuff. Literally one day put itin, like just hadn't done it all
year long. So Roe gets hurtingfirst quarter. I come in. We
just start running those plays over andover and over. Hadn't run them.
(18:41):
I literally hadn't taken a rep ofthose plays. Oh my gosh. And
obviously Tennessee hadn't seen it on film. I had not seen it at all.
Ended up being like one of thegreatest things ever. Oh that's cool.
Yeah, So yeah, that wasbasically I'm on the LSU campus.
People kind of know you, butnot really. But after that game,
then you go to class, everyone'stalking to you all these things. I
had one of my buddies on theteam, Jack Hunt, his brother.
(19:04):
I was older at the time,twenty one, so he was using my
ID to be able to get intobars and things like that. So it's
funny. He goes the weekend afterthat SEC championship, he goes to the
bar and they look at it andthey go, you're not You're not.
So it was great for me,but ruined though his sophomore year. Oh
(19:30):
my gosh, that's hilarious. Wow. All right, so in two thousand
and two, then you are thestarter. Your team starts five and one
and you break your foot. Iread where you had said, you know,
while breaking a foot, that stinks, you're out. The team doesn't
do as well the rest of theseason. But that was huge for you.
A transformation as far as your throwingability. Yeah, I don't sit
around very well. So I wouldjust grab an equipment guy and I'd get
(19:53):
a huge bag of balls, andI would sit on a cooler and just
sit and throw THEMN over and Iwould throw five sucunner balls a ton,
Oh my gosh, and I wouldjust sit there and work on your release
because I couldn't do anything else.I was like, hey, I might
as well do this, So I'msure the equipment guy was a little annoyed,
but worked out great. No,no more, a few more,
Yeah, yeah, sure, Idon't look at your arm tired, Matt,
(20:15):
Let's just take a break. Howfunny. The injury thing always is
interesting, and you had another onelater in your pro career with your back,
And I talked to a lot ofthe guests on this podcast about where
that puts you in a mental state. I mean, you at least were
still getting back out there throwing.But it can be very easy to go
sit at that training table everybody elseis out of practice, and you don't
(20:36):
go into the training table till everybody'sgone because they're all in there when you're
not. And so it's a disconnectwith your teammates and it's just a really
lonely dark place sometimes. Well,without a doubt, sports is amazing and
awesome in this brotherhood and everything likethat, but if you're not in the
brotherhood, it's tough, you know. And I said that my son was
just a senior of this last yearat Tray Creek and his sophomore and junior
(21:02):
year, he was a little bitof a contributor, but not a lot,
and he just didn't feel part ofpart of it, you know.
And it's such a big school thatyou have to believe in yourself, you
know, you have to have thatinner belief that, Okay, I might
not be doing it now, butI will be doing it. And I
think injury is a lot like that. You went from being a contributor helping
(21:22):
out and now some of those guys, you know, if it's champ or
you know some you know, theseguys who go through that that are big
time players, Hall of Fame timeplayers, they don't go through that,
but they okay, yeah, ifyou're a fringe guy, yeah, you
know, you just you really feelit, and then doubt starts creeping at
Oh man, if I don't getbetter, am I going to get cut?
What's gonna happen? Like all thesethings, it's really hard. So
how did you come back then thatnext year and just have that confidence of
(21:47):
like here we go. And thatwas the year you guys went eleven to
one and win the national championship,I think part of when you're injured,
you can't wait to get back.I said, I had these kind of
breaks in my life that you knowwhat, it's dead minorly baseball. Then
when I went to college, Iwas excited about college because I hadn't done
it for a little while. Soand then you don't get to play for
a whole year, and you hadhad you had been playing well, really
(22:08):
you couldn't wait to get back outthere. So and it would just we
got lucky the right people, theright places. And I think that two
thousand and three team one really coolthing about it is, Yeah, you
have to be a good player,but when you have good people, yeah,
and camaraderie on your team, it'sa me I mean that team was
very tight. Yes, I mean, I'm sure the Broncos in ninety seven,
(22:32):
ninety eight or yeah. Anytime youhave a championship, you have to
have that, don't without a doubt. Yeah, it's the only way to
make it happen. Can you believethat championship game was in two thousand and
four? It was from the twothousand and three season. It's been twenty
years, I know. Did youstay in touch with everybody? Had anion
last year. Oh nice, Yeah, it was kind of cool to see
everybody, But yeah, I probablystill talked about seven or eight guys pretty
(22:56):
regularly. But you're just being faraway. It's kind of hard. A
lot of them still in Louisiana ora few several yeah, yeah, yeah,
yeah. People from Louisiana don't leaveLouisiana and it's a cool place,
but then families so close down there, and it's just absolutely it's hard to
leave. Do you ever want togo back, you know, later in
life in retirement or something like that, or would that not be the place
to go? Yeah? I meanI love Louisiana. I mean absolutely love
(23:19):
Louisiana. For me. It justworked out here. I mean coming to
Denver was I mean, Denver's prettyspecial place. There's the reason that there's
so many former players that are Sothat's why my podcast is full of that
love. Yeah, I'm like,oh he's here too, fantastic. All
right, Well, so let's talkabout that. You get drafted by the
Broncos and four you decide to foregoyour last year of college, right,
(23:42):
and you go pro. Broncos draftyou in the seventh round. You're in
a quarterback room with Jake Plumber andDanny Canell. You make the team,
but you don't play. Yeah,what was that like after? I mean,
you come off of a national championshipand then you get in the pros
and then you're you're sitting there theNFL. It's difficult. A lot of
(24:03):
times when you're a later pick,you get one or two opportunities and if
you don't capitalize, it really hurtsyou. Probably playing the best football I've
ever played my life in that trainingcamp, Kobeak, Mike, all of
them. Really, man, dude, you're telling you we want you.
You're going to be our backup thisyear. I get in. I was
the first guy that got in afterJake. In the Hall of Fame game,
(24:26):
this funky coverage they were playing.I end up throwing a pick or
two something like that, and thencame third Street again. They've just got
a little nervous. And so Ihad played so much better than Danny Canell
in camp, but it was justhard for them to say, oh,
we're gonna have a rookie do that. But if I would have played well
in that game, for sure,Second sup probably in some reps getting to
(24:48):
play a little bit so in theNFL's off I said, quarterbacks are very
difficult if you're not six four,huge hands and all these physical attributes.
Not that I'm a small guy oranything, but I was a REP guy.
I needed reps. I needed timing. I needed to do these things.
The guys who are bigger in staturesometimes can get in there, so
(25:10):
it can be so I look backof kind of looking at my career,
I wish that's one one game Iwish I could have hit reset on.
And then my one start in theNFL with the Titans against the Jacksonville Jaguars
just didn't play well. And itgoes to confidence, you know what I
mean. I felt underprepared probably forboth games because I was a REP guy.
(25:30):
I need to know that I've thrownthis past six times and it's been
perfect, you know, every singletime. Yeah, and when you don't
have that just different. Yeah,going back to those five hundred passes you
made, sitting down and getting allthat timing down and knowing exactly where you're
going. Yeah, So after yourfirst year with the Broncos, do they
release you? The first year Iwas on practice squad, But actually Mike
(25:51):
really liked me, so it wasactually paid me twice the amount because you
could do whatever you wanted to.So basically said, hey, you know,
we really love you. We're goingto keep your hear pay more type
of thing. And so then thenext year and Bradley Van Pelt was also
here as well. Oh that's right, that was bvp's year. Yeah.
Yeah, And so BVP for agood reason. I think, you know,
Pat Bolin was unbelievable at understanding howto make the Broncos popular. Yeah,
(26:15):
I mean he was so good atthat. And part of that was
Bradley to CSU, I mean,yeah, it was. Bradley was a
big name in Colorado. He wasI've had him on the podcast and his
whole story about it, and hementioned you as well. I forgot about
that, Yeah, that he wasin that room. So and that was
interesting too, because Bradley and Icame in together. Should have hated each
(26:36):
other, but we actually really likedeach other. Yeah. And that's the
other weird part too, is thatsometimes people can't understand that they're like,
wait a second, they're competing.That guy took your job and you're still
texting him, right, Yeah,that's funny. And then you go to
the Titans, then how does thattransition happen? So it was funny.
So they were gonna put me backon the practice squad and Denver I just
(26:56):
was like, not no offenses isBradley? But I just thought I was
a better player and if I said, if, hey, if you don't
think I'm better than Bradley, AndBradley was a great athlete, could do
things, but just didn't. TheNFL was not ready for Bradley. No,
but Brad Bradley was a great adlib and then but he just didn't
the way Mike Shannan's office was notfit Brad No, I just didn't.
(27:18):
And I think he would admit thatnow and he did so much in his
podcast and that probably should have exploredother positions like people were encouraging him to.
In his head at that time,he was a quarterback and that was
all he was going to be.Take it or leave it. And they're
like, all right, we'll leaveit. Damn it. That didn't work
out. Yeah, So anyway Iwas I didn't want to go back on
(27:38):
practice squad. I really loved Denver, I loved Mike Shannahan, I love
Karey Kubiak, Pat Macpherson. Ilove those guys. They were great.
But actually Norm Chow was the offensivecoordinator at Tennessee and so he calls me.
It was almost like a recruiting call, and he's like, hey,
love to have you. And atthe time, I'm like, Norm Chow,
that's like, man, I loveMike Shannan. I let you know.
(27:59):
I love doing there writings on thewall doesn't appear that they love me
as much as I love it.Here I get to go learn from Rome
Chow. That'd be kind of cool. I decide to sign in their practice
squad and then you're there for acouple of years. Right, two years,
you get into two games and thenthey keep you into the two thousand
and six preseason, you get cutand then resigned. It there, so
you're kind of up and down intheir in their organization as well. When
(28:22):
did you know you were done?So I was running out to practice,
just jogging out and literally, ifyou make me bet, I thought.
So there was like a sniper onthe roof and like shot me in the
right calf. Oh my god.So I just kind of went down.
I couldn't so I had a hernateddisc in my back and it finally pinched
the nerves so much that my rightcalf wouldn't work. So it was the
(28:44):
most random, Literally, I wishI had some better story. Yeah,
it was kind of crazy, matYeah. Yeah, So anyway, so
then I had to have back surgeryand that was two thousand and six.
I had Bengals, Falcons, andJaguars all wanted to bring me in.
I had already, see you,dental school admitted me into their program.
So I had to make the decisiondo I want to keep trying to play
(29:07):
or go to school. I justhad my first son, and I just
kind of said, you know,I've had a pretty good rude. Yeah,
it's just I don't I got togrow up at some point, you
know, right, And I haveno regrets, and I wish I would
have gone back for my senior yearat LSU, just because you just don't
get to do that very often inyour life. I know, you don't
get to be in your twenties incollege you care free, right, Yeah,
(29:30):
not at all at all. Sothat's the only thing in life I
look back and say, God,I should have done that. Well,
that's good then that you you feltgood about walking away, yeah, or
olympian mentally yeah, maybe not physicallybut mentally yes, all right, and
then the decision to get into dentalschool. You were into orthopedics when you
were at LSU, is that right? And you kind of followed around the
(29:51):
docks there and then yeah, yeah. So my one of my dear friends
at Brent Banks and was the teamorthopedic surgeon. That's what I wanted to
do. So he literally let mecome in surgery and like I was like,
using like this all except I'm like, am ill have to do this?
I don't know if this is wow? But yeah, I mean I'm
scrubbing up. I probably went intolike ten different surgeries with him. Oh
my gosh, what a great experience. Very cool, very cool. But
(30:12):
he was the one who was like, you know, he goes, dude,
you're old. I go, well, I'm not that old. And
he's like, he's you're going todo medical school residency fellowship. He goes,
you're going to be like thirty fouror thirty five, and he goes,
and then you're the low man inthe totem pole and you're gonna he
says, but till you're forty,you're gonna have a miserable life. I
(30:33):
was like, wow, you're reallyselling this. Yeah, and he said
you're going to be in debt likeall these things. So he said you
should go be a dentist. Igo, what here's yeah, And so
I went and shadowed a dentist andI was like, wow, it's kind
of cool. Your work four daysand it's like little mini surgeries and things.
So and then you didn't have tostay in school for years on end,
(30:55):
did not? You graduated in twentyeleven from see you Dennis School and
you're a doctor of dental surgery.I'm not a real doctor. My friends
all let me know that you stillget to be called doctor, don't we?
Yeah? Yeah, yeah, Iguess it's like David Brutin, he's
a doctor. Yeah, exactly,exact doctor. Yeah, yeah, you
didn't. Can we start this over? I'd like to introduce this doctor.
(31:18):
Very good. Yeah, And youhave your you have a practice with another
dentist and you guys have had thatfor a very long time in a Roora.
You've become kind of the quasi broncosdentist, haven't you. I mean,
how players come to see you?So many of them do, don't
they well, we have a partnershipwith them, so we do. We
do do the dentistry. Oh nice, but we just don't advertise it all
that stuff. Our job is ifsomeone's needs us, we just make room.
(31:41):
As basically, so those four daysa week sometimes you're on call.
Well yeah, I know, right, gosh, I need to rethink this
working way too much. Yeah,because games are on weekends. Yeah.
So it was actually when I wasa player here, the two doctors that
the practice they took over. Iwas a patient there. Oh yeah,
so that's how I got into that. So it's a same practice. Oh
that's cool. Yeah, I loveit. But then obviously you take care
(32:04):
of regular people as well. Yeahwe do, yes, yeah, yeah.
It's funny some people that are likethey're like, wow, that's not
that many people to do a practice. I said, well that's we do
other things. Yeah, oh yeah, that's the Broncos are a very small
portion right of that. What doyou like the best about what you do?
People? Yeah? Yeah, yousee everyone. It's twice a year,
but it feels like more than that. And so it's actually kind of
(32:25):
great because it's like smaller conversations andeverybody loves you you know, they think,
look, it's so funny. Yah. Yeah. I could use the
same joke like six different times andI just changed them up every six months
and nobody knows. Yeh, thereyou go. No, but that that
is obviously like medicine because I wantto help people. That's just my kind
of who I am. But Ithink dentistry the nice part of that is
(32:49):
as an orthopedic surgeon, the hopeis you never see that person again.
In dentistry, you get to seethat person, you know, hopefully it's
just twice a year, but butsometimes more so, it's really cool you
have like two three thousand people thatyou become friends with real Yeah, do
you write notes down about people?I'm always curious how the Dennis like remembers
the things that we taught. I'mlike, how in the world did he
remember we talked about that. Iam telling you, I think one thing.
(33:12):
Football. I've always had a prettygood memory. But Mike Shanahan used
to make us so we would havea call sheet okay, and it would
have one hundred plays on there,okay, And he would give us a
blank piece of paper and you wouldhave to fill the whole thing in and
the winner got five hundred bucks.Oh Dan, I won every week,
so yeah, Mimi, guess Jake, Danny and Bradley. Yeah yeah.
(33:34):
I started getting pissed and then Ihad to like and so, and then
Bradley's like like looking at my sheetthe whole time. So it did help
me. So I actually, honestly, and my staff sometimes are like,
how did you know that? I'mlike, I don't know. I just
I think sometimes things are important football. If it's important to you, you
just learn how to ingrain it intoyour mind. And so it had actually
(33:57):
helped me. So you actually rememberyou're not writing. No, you write
some stuff, but there's a lotI would say eighty percent of the time.
I just remember, like they're like, oh Susie, Like we do
a morning huddle and everybody comes inlike they'll be like, oh Susie.
I'm like, oh, yeah,she just got back from Bahamas and I
think we need to do a crowna number three and everyone's like what I
was like yeah, and they're likeoh wow, yeah that's right, dang
(34:20):
ye. So I think football helpedme with them absolutely. That's impressive.
All right, you mentioned your boysall of them? Are they all in
high school right now. So I'vegraduating senior Cherry Creek. He's a football
player. He's actually gonna to playwide receiver at Mines. Oh nice,
Oh that's great. Good. Andthen I have a eighth grader that'll be
a freshman a Cherry Creek next year. And then a fourth grader good to
(34:42):
be fifth grader. Oh man,busy times, huh, very probably sports
and other activities involved. I honestly, this could be a whole nother podcast
about you, sports man. Itis. Oh yeah, it's sickening,
holding kids back, and it's just, you know, it's how it should
be. We putting way too muchemphasis on something that should be fun well,
(35:06):
and certain people are I mean,when you say whatever, this is
funny. At a minor league baseballcoach, he said, double A is
a great big siphon. He is. You just throw everybody in there,
and all of a sudden you justshake him out and he goes. The
crappy players just fall through. That'swhat he said. And so and I
think that there is something it isabout hard work. And then but guess
(35:27):
what, I'm six three, twohundred and fifteen pounds. There's not many
people that are like that, youknow what I mean? And just so
so some of this we can tryas much as we want, and we
can want it and do all thesethings. Puberty is the great decider decider.
Yes, it is. It is, yeah, and it's it and
I feel like it. Just thesepoor kids. Now, man, it's
just it's not good enough being agood high school player. Why why is
(35:51):
that not good enough? That's whatthat's whatever all guys sitting around the bar
talk about. You know, isthat you played in high school football was
fun, You did these things.Now if you a scholarship player, you
suck. No, you don't.It's just it's just not how it is.
Yeah, I hate it, absolutelyhate it. A bigger part of
that, as you know, arethe parents, and that's who is driving
a lot of this in that they'refulfilling dreams that they didn't get to have,
(36:15):
so now their kid is suffering throughsomething. So my my former partners,
Nick Demiko, his son Brin Demiko, was a great tennis player,
number one tennis player in Colorado.Dulla stuff got a scholarship to Notre Dame.
But it's a tennis scholarship, soit's like fifty forty percent or something
like that. And Nick had agreat perspective. He was like, you
know, people are like, ohmy god, that's awesome. You know
(36:36):
your kid got a scholarship to NotreDame. You know that's so great.
I bet that was such a financialreward for you. And he goes what
he goes, No, he waslike, all the money I spent on
junior tennis and traveling, he goes, my kid could have gone to Stanford
for four years and got his masters. He's like, it, does you
know that you're doing it for thewrong. We did it because my kid
(36:57):
loved it and he wanted to doit. And that's why I feel like,
you know, you walk around neighborhood, drive around neighborhoods. Kids aren't
outside playing anymore. People burn out. They're tired of it, you know,
they're tired of it. People askme how to well, how did
you do this? I didn't doanything. I just that's what I love
doing. Yeah. My best friendlived right next door to me, and
if I wasn't outside shooting baskets,he knew I wasn't home. It's just
(37:20):
how it was. That's how Iknew you weren't home. Wow, Because
I wanted to know because my momand dad made me go out there.
It's just you want to go dothat, right? And I think we're
making kids do stuff too much.Yeah, and at some point, if
your kid doesn't want to do it, stop making him do it. Yes,
our son, we tried everything.We did baseball, we did football,
we did and he just he's nota sports kid. And I'm like,
Okay, I'm going to stop.And I'm sorry that he doesn't want
(37:43):
to do this, but he'll haveother interests. There's so many other things
in life to enjoy. Let's stopmaking him go out there and do stuff
that he doesn't like to do.Well. When I say this too,
there's some I just talked to hisdad and his kids going to college for
football, went there four years,never stepped on the field, didn't play
one time. It was cool thatyou were part of it in scholarship And
they says, but I bet ifyou asked that kid, hey, and
(38:06):
this dad was a travel baseball Imean, they did everything. Would you
rather have had a couple of weekendswhere we could have gone up to Steamboat
or these places and had some memoriestogether. I guarantee they would have liked
that absolutely, And I say this, I'm preaching about this, but I'm
not always great about it. Youknow. I said, spending your whole
(38:27):
summer on a baseball field is notall that enjoyable, right, And but
the bottom line is no matter.You can do that as much as you
want, but puberty and genetics isgoing to win everything exactly. It just
is. Yeah, absolutely, absolutelyall right. Last question for you,
Matt. As you look back throughoutyour career and there's been some super highs
(38:49):
and some lows, what do youtell people as you talk to them?
And you probably have people hit youup for advice all the time, especially
when they're like, oh, youhave three boys, I bet they're all
playing quarterback. I bet they're doingthis, doing that. How do you
get through the tough times when thingsaren't working out the way you want them
to work out? What do youtell people and how did you get through
them? Believe in yourself. Ithink that's the biggest thing. And that's
really hard sometimes easy for me tosay that because life's worked out pretty well
(39:12):
for me. But I have workedhard. I won the genetic lottery a
little bit, you know what Imean. From an athletic standpoint. Sure,
I tell people all the time asa parent, encourage something for your
child that they love, that theyare passionate about, that puts a smile
on their face. If you're havingto say it's time for practice and they're
like, oh God, I haveto go to practice, it's probably not
(39:34):
what they should be doing. Andthe other thing I think is when you
meet celebrities or you meet people athad success, you always think their life
was wonderful, that it was perfectin everything was great. No, not
at all. I've been through adivorce. There's been things about me that
aren't great, you know. Andso I think that you're on social media
and you see the picture you getto see how beautiful it looked in Florida,
(39:57):
that you forgot that family probably wentthrough six fights to get the clothes
on those kids and to get themto smile, and to get suitcases through
baggage clay. Yes, yeah,yeah, it wasn't all perfect, right.
Yeah. I think that's a greatpoint. And like I said,
this podcast is about humanizing the proathlete the coach where it just seems like,
hey, they're making great money,everything's awesome. It looks like they
(40:21):
take great vacations. Oh there's awhole lot of stuff that goes down that
is hard, and money doesn't solveall the problems. In fact, it
can create more, without a doubt, without a doubt. NFL players that
have retired, I think, youknow, people are like, oh,
CT and all that stuff, AndI'm not saying that there's not CT or
anything like that. But to me, the biggest problem is you took someone
and at a very young age,gave them the best job they will ever
(40:45):
have, the best what anybody wouldwant to do, and then for the
rest of their life they have todo something else. They can't get back
to it so hard mentally, it'sjust it's it's hard to me. I
think that's more of a problem thanactually the brain try and brain trauma is
an issue, and I think they'retrying to address it. But I was
very fortunate that I went straight froma very sports is like, I hate
(41:07):
when there's comparisons in military because sportsis nothing like the military. People are
giving their lives for that, butit is similar from the structure standpoint.
Yes, very regimented, very regimentI went from football regimented straight into dental
school. I feel extremely fortunate thatI didn't have to figure that out,
and then I went straight from dentalschool into an established practice that had parameters.
(41:30):
They had everything set out for me. So I feel sometimes it's even
hard for me to talk about itbecause I haven't had to endure some of
those things, right, But seeingteammates that have had to go through that,
I feel bad for him because alot of times they're just lost.
It's tough. That happens in myindustry as well. And I'm similar to
you and that I've been able togo from one thing to another and never
had that downtime to go, wow, I suck or what's going on?
(41:53):
You know? So I feel veryfortunate in that too. But even when
you have you know, you gofrom one to this to this, it's
not always up when you're in oneof those. There's can be downtimes as
well where you still think you sucks. So and it's okay to suck.
Yeah, I think sucking makes youlook in the mirror absolutely, so that's
okay. Yeah, Hey we canall suck. There you go. All
(42:14):
right, Hey, Matt, thankyou for the time. I appreciate.
I know you're super busy and yougot some you got some dental procedures to
do. I'm sure so somebody's cameback from a vacation. It needs a
crown on three. So yeah,thanks for having us. Thank you,
Matt. Well, if you're hearingthis, you have listened to the entire
episode. First of all, thankyou. Secondly, if you enjoyed this
(42:35):
episode, please rate and review onApple Podcasts and Spotify and share it with
someone. New episodes have, cut, Traded, Fired, retired, come
out weekly on nearly every podcast platform. Get social with the podcast on Twitter
and Instagram at ctf our podcast andcheck out the website ctfurpodcast dot com.
I'm your host, Susie Wargen.To learn more about me, visit susiewargin
(42:59):
dot com. Thanks so much forlistening, and until next time, please
be careful, be safe, andbe kind. Take care
One thing football. I've always hada pretty good memory, but Mike Shanahan
used to make us so we wouldhave a call sheet okay, and it
would have one hundred plays on there, okay, and he would give us
a blank piece of paper and youwould have to fill the whole thing in
and the winner got five hundred bucks. Oh Dan, I won every week.
So yeah, so memory against Jake, Danny and Bradley. Yeah,
(00:21):
yeah. I started getting pissed andthen I had to like and said and
then Bradley's like, it's like lookingat my sheet the whole time. Welcome
to Cut, Traded, Fired,Retired a podcast featuring conversations with professional athletes
and coaches who have been gracious enoughto tell their stories of changes, setbacks,
and moving forward. I'm your host, Susie Wargen. One of the
fun outcomes of this podcast is findingout what athletes and coaches have done with
(00:45):
their time outside of sports. Thisepisode's guest has had a very successful second
career that is completely different, yetstill intertwined with his sports career. Matt
Mott grew up in Jasper, Indiana, and had scholarships in three sports,
football, basketball, and baseball.He committed to play football for Nick Saban
at Michigan State, but in thespring of his senior year, he was
(01:06):
drafted by the Cubs. His teamwon the state championship and he was named
Mister Baseball, so he detoured tothe Diamond. After three years in the
minor leagues, Matt decided football didn'tsound so bad after all, and he
joined coach Saban in his first yearas the head coach at LSU. Eventually,
Matt became the starter and he helpedLSU to the national championship after the
(01:27):
two thousand and three season. Hethen hopped to the NFL and was drafted
in two thousand and four by theBroncos. The NFL turned out to be
a tough road, and within afew seasons Matt was out of football and
starting his schooling at CU School ofDentistry. Today he is Doctor Matt Mock
with a thriving practice that includes takingcare of the Broncos and many of the
(01:49):
alumni that are still in town.Ladies and gentlemen, Matt Mock cut Traded
Fired Retired podcast with Susie Wargin,Hello Matt Mock, how you doing.
I'm doing great? Thanks for havingme on absolutely. I can't believe that
I haven't had you in yet.And it took seeing Charlie adams great smile
to remind me that you're here andyou have been for a long time.
(02:13):
Yeah. I wish you wouldn't havesaid that, because he's going to remind
me of that. He gave youall the credit for his great smile,
as do others. David Brutin too, He's like, oh, yeah,
I go see Matt, he's everybody'sdentist. Well those are two great guys.
Yeah, you've created a good nichefor yourself here in this market.
But we're going to talk about allthe sports first and then get into what
(02:34):
you're doing now, because you've gota pretty fascinating story between two different sports
at very high levels. Different levelstoo, Yeah, no for sure.
Yeah. So you are born inJasper, Indiana, Yes, and you
go to Jasper High School where youexcel in baseball and football. Was there
a third or fourth sport that youalso loved or was it just those two?
Basketball? Ok? Yeah, soI had some scholarship offers for basketballs
(02:58):
you did all three sports? Yeah, when you're in a small town,
I think that's the being that Ihave three boys and they go to Cherry
Creek High School, and uh,it's just a different deal. How many
how many kids were at your schoolcompared to the four k at Cherry Cree?
I had a thousand, which waspretty big for you know, Southern
Indiana. But yeah, it's ayou know there there wasn't enough kids,
(03:21):
so you're you know, hey,if you're a good athlete, coaches are
begging you to here. It almostforces you to specialize, right, because
there's too many people, too many. What did you play in basketball?
I was a shooting guard? Okay, so actually, uh, Michael Lewis,
who ended up being the Alzheim assistleader at Indiana then followed Bobby Knight
and he's the head coach at ballState, was a year above me.
(03:43):
So he and I were teammates.Wow, that's cool. Yeah, So
you didn't play multiple positions in basketballlike you did in baseball and football,
Well, I was. I wassix' three and then Southern Indiana that's
actually like potential center work, right, So I was I could shoot,
so plates of shooting guard, butthen kind of every if they had a
guy that we needed to guard,I would go down okay, all right,
(04:04):
in the blocks. So in baseballyour pitcher, center fielder, third
basement. You won two state titlesin high school. And then in football
quarterback and dB played both sides safety. Okay, brute and I'm coming for
your job. And that team wentto the state finals one of your years
of high school as well. Yeah, we were lost in the state championship
(04:26):
game my junior year. You goto those big games in high school and
you're one of the best athletes probablyat the school, do you kind of
get that feeling like, all right, top of the world and the world
is mine to have, you know, I think back on it, it's
kind of funny, like when you'rein this small town and you don't have
the experiences, everything just seems socool. And I remember we went we
(04:47):
played in the old RCAA Dome forthe state championship, and I remember walking
in that place just like looking around, going, oh my god, this
is the biggest thing I've ever seenin my life. This is unbelievable.
And then when I was with weactually had a playoff game and four at
the RCA though, and then afterplaying in the SEC and the NFL,
had all these memories and things,and I walked in and I go,
(05:10):
wow, this is tiny. Sothat's funny. Yeah, life changes your
perspective. Yeah quite a bit.Oh how funny. So you get recruited
obviously in football baseball, and yousaid some basketball. You first of all
had committed to go to Michigan Stateand play with Nick Saban there, and
then when the Cubs draft you,you end up going to baseball. What
(05:31):
went into that decision? I can'timagine that was an easy one, Honestly
it was. I feel like kidsnow play sports because they want to.
They think it's going to lead toa scholarship or to do things. When
I was I just didn't do that. You just kind of were like,
Hey, I play because I lovedoing it, and oh I happened to
be pretty good at it. Ohcool, now people want me to go
play more. So sign with MichiganState to do football and baseball, and
(05:56):
then was drafted one state championship,was named mister Baseball. All these kind
of things happened at one time,and so I think I just I never
really liked baseball. I really,yeah, I liked it, but didn't
Football was my favorite. Basketball wasin the second Baseball was my third.
But I think the culmination of allthose things, you know, win in
the state championship, win in misterbaseball, and then they're like, well,
(06:16):
I've always got playing a professional sport. Wow, that'd be pretty cool.
I never thought that would happen.And that all happened your senior year
when you won the state title andall that, so it's very fresh in
your mind, without a doubt.Yeah, And and football had success individually,
and we went to the state championshipand then lost the next year.
But in baseball we'd gone to threestraight state championships and won two, and
that was the second one in arow. And Scott Rowland is from my
(06:39):
hometown. He played third base.He and my brother were really good friends
growing up. So it was justkind of that, well, you know,
I worked out for Scott, maybeyou should work out for me.
Sure type of thing. So Ireally, honestly, I wish I could
sit here and say, oh,I made this pros and cons and all
this stuff. Not really, itwas kind of like, yeah, let's
(07:00):
go yeah, hey, you knowwhat, Sometimes that's the way it goes,
right. So you spend three yearsthen in the minor leagues with the
Cubs. I read somewhere that youhad said, you know, I wish
I'd been more patient. And Ihave a lot of baseball guys that come
in here. The grind of baseballis insane. I mean they'll spend seven
eight years in the miners till theyget that first call up and then then
it's up and down, up anddown up in it. You know,
(07:23):
there's very few of the guys thatare called up. It's a great story.
They stay there on a roster foryears and years. There's just so
many other stories that just don't sothree years probably not enough time there.
Right to your point, there's veryfew Jackson Holidays, Yeah, that are
out there. There's more Matt moocks. Yeah. I think the biggest thing
(07:45):
in minor league baseball two things.One, you have to love it.
I mean, baseball has to beyour sport. I mean it really does,
because it is. It is agrind. People can tell you that
unless you experience it, it ismake zero money. Tiny towns, no
fans. I mean really, theonly time you get fans is if they
have some promo night. You know, they're hanging out beer cooozies or something.
(08:05):
Then everybody shows yeah, yeah,something like that. So so I
found out very quickly what I knewall along. Baseball was my third favorite
sport. It just you know,it was tough, and I've always been
parents instilled that in me. Butthe harder you work, the better it
works out for you. In baseball, it's almost different because sometimes the harder
(08:26):
you work, the more you thinkabout it, you press, you try
to do these things. I say, sometimes the best baseball players are the
dumbest people, and no offense tobaseball players, but it's true. You
just gotta You're like, I don'tthink, you don't think the thinking kills
You're like, I mean, Ihad a buddy I played with. It
was David Keltoney is the second roundpick from La Grange, Georgia. Did
(08:46):
minor league baseball his second round pick, but he didn't he couldn't get into
any schools. He was going tobe a Cheaco guy. But David like
he'd be like, oh for fourand like you're having beers and pizza afterwards,
and we're like, David, howdo you feel? He's like,
what do you mean? I'm like, well, you just had like four
strikeouts. Oh, bro, justwait till tomorrow. That's what he would
say, you know, and that'sa tough mentality to have, very tough,
(09:07):
very tough or not tough. Yeah, depending on your more mentality.
Yeah, exactly. How funny.Yeah, so hard to forget even though
there's so many games. It wasa tough one for you to let it
go each day without a doubt.Yeah. Yeah. And if you're working
on something and it didn't work out, Yeah, it was just, uh,
my mentality and baseball just didn't mix. Yeah. Well and maybe the
(09:30):
physical there's a physical grind to baseball, but it's the mental grind without that
is really that much more grueling.And the point of you just got to
love it, you know, youhave right, you have to truly love
it. And so three years intothat minor career, you decide, yeah,
I might go back to college andfootball, and you make a phone
call to Nick Saban. You haveto be playing in East Lansing, is
(09:52):
that right? So yeah, Somy first year was rookie ball. I
was drafted. They gave me anoption to play in third base or pitching.
My high school coach pissed at mebecause I said third base. He
was like, you would have beena better pitcher. It's funny. There's
a guy and my high school thisguy Phil Kendall. He was drafted in
the fifth round by the Brewers theyear before me, and he was drafted
as a pitcher. But my highschool coach is like, he should have
(10:13):
been the catcher. You should havebeen the pitcher, because no one asked
me he was. I've won likeseven state championships. You can at least
tell them like, I think Iknow, Yeah, you think I might
know these things. That's funny.Yeah. So the first year I was
a catcher. Terry Kennedy, whoplayed for the Cardinals Padres a long time,
like ten fifteen years or something likethat, was my manager my first
year. He and I just hitit off. He was like a second
(10:37):
dad or he just for whatever reason, he really took to me. You
need that you're eighteen, Yeah,a little bit. Yeah, I mean
people don't realize that too late.In Indiana, you play baseball until June.
So you graduate and you're still playingin the state championship, which is
kind of cool because here in Colorado, by the time the weather actually breaks
seventy you're done with baseball. Yes, yeah, thing, so they do
(10:58):
it a little different. But Iliterally got drafted, win the state championship,
go back home, pack and leaveon a plane the next day.
Oh and I'm eighteen and I'm inArizona living in a hotel. It's just,
yeah, you grow up pretty quick. Oh yeah, that's a lot
with that. So anyway, hewas he just kind of took to me
and he said, hey, Ithink you'd be a great catcher. Literally
(11:20):
never put catcher's gear on in mylife, not one time. Yeah,
And so I repeated rookie ball inArizona and then the next year went to
Lansing, Michigan, and so itjust happened. And honestly, when you
know, you break spring training,you get on there. So we all
land, and some of the guysI played with kind of, you know,
knew that I'd signed with Michigan State, but not everybody knew. Well,
(11:43):
we land, and there's like twentyreporters waiting for me take it off
because they're like, oh, youdidn't come here. You know, there's
this big story that was kind ofthere. So everybody, you know,
we got off the plane where itwas like, what the hell you just
you just had like two hundred whydo they care about you. Yeah,
pretty much funny. And then howdo you get connected with coach Saban?
(12:05):
Again? At the time, Ijust knew baseball wasn't my my deal,
so I actually just called the secretaryand said, hey, Matt makan meet
with coach. Literally called back withinthree hours. I think that's one thing
about Nick Saban is he is meticulousabout details and if there's something that he
can get from you, he Imean, he is on it really quick.
(12:28):
So I think part of was hedidn't really love his quarterback situation at
Michigan State, so he got backto me real quick. And what was
that conversation? Like, Well,he was great. When I called him
to tell him I was doing baseball, he goes, He goes, I
can't falter. He goes, that'syou know, I was a baseball player.
He goes, Just no, ifyou ever change your mind, you've
always got a scholarship. So hewas nice, wasn't mad? I mean,
(12:50):
he was extremely professional about it.So I just said, hey,
you know, I think I'm madea mistake. I'm not loving baseball.
What would it be like if Icame back and he goes, well,
I already told you you got aspot anytime you want it, I said,
all right, you know, letme think about it. I have
terrible beginning of the first half ofthat season. I was hitting literally like
one ninety or something like that.So I was like, I'm done.
(13:11):
I'm not doing this. I hadlike three point fifty the second part of
the season, so I was like, okay, maybe I still like baseball
a little bit type of thing.So decided not to quit. And actually
Jim Hendry, who ended up beingthe GM of the Cubs, is the
guy who drafted me. He wasgood friends with Mark Rogers, who's the
agent for Russell Wilson. Jim introducedme to Mark. Mark was my agent
(13:35):
when I was doing that, sothey kind of had this, you know,
they were talking and you know,he was telling Mark he really like,
Matt, tell him not to quit. We think this is going to
work out all this stuff, SoI kind of had It's kind of cool
that I, you know, Ihad someone that was making all the decisions
that was kind of in yes corner, because again, you're still really young.
Are you even twenty one at thispoint? Not yet? Okay,
So I tell people I retired frommy first job at twenty one. So
(14:00):
the next year I go back toLancing and I just knew. It was
the first year I loved my teammateseverybody. The second year it was just
it was miserable, you know,really it was bad. So made the
decision basically in June. I justcalled Jim Hendry and I said, hey,
Jim, I said, it's notme. I can't do it.
He was didn't ask for any signingon his money back. Wow, nothing.
He said, You've been awesome,love you to death, wish you
(14:24):
the best. He goes, You'vegot great opportunities. Why would we stand
in the way. It's pretty cool. That's cool that people didn't slam doors
in your face and were good aboutyou moving on and doing what you wanted
to do. Yeah, without adoubt, which that doesn't always happen at
all, not at all, notin the sports world. Yeah, I
would say it's the opposite. Yeah, yeah, for that. So,
(14:45):
yeah, I'm very fortunate. Ihad a lot of good people and they
were all really nice to me.I'd like to think because I worked hard
as a good kid. But sure, that was a lot of it.
But yeah, but they still didn'thave to always do Yeah, if you
had been in a hole the wholetime, they probably would have reacted differently
to you a little bit. Iwould have asked for some of that signing
bonus money back. So then bythen when you make that decision, Nick
(15:05):
Saban's at LSU or not yet justleft. So I was his first year
at it. Oh, that's right, because he had done that fall at
Michigan State and then so right atthe same time, you're going in together
to LSU. Yeah. So basicallyI quit and then I'm like, oh,
crap, I don't know where Ican go play. So Bobby Williams
was the head coach at Michigan State. He said I could come there.
(15:26):
Gary Barnett, who had recruited meat Northwestern was actually called Colorado. Yep.
He said I could come here.And it was funny because Joel Klatt
was here, so we'd had twobaseball guys. True. Yeah. And
then Gary Trankle was off the corner, and here's at Virginia. So those
were basically the four schools that Inarrated it down to. I wanted to
stay with coach Saban just because ofhow good he was to me. So
(15:46):
I basically said, hey, youknow, I want to come here,
I said, but I've never beento Louisiana. So they flew me down.
I met with Jimbo Fisher, justhe and I and here's your OC
right. He was, Okay,if you've never been to Louisiana, I
would not recommend your first time beingJune thirtieth, hot and sticky. Yeah.
Literally, you come like walk offthe planet, like someone smacks you
(16:08):
in the face with humidity. Soloved what they were doing. I thought
that it was just this untapped potentialthat was there. At the time.
I had baseball money, so whenyou sign out of high school, you
get a signing bonus, but thenthey put money into a college fund for
you. So I went to LSUas a walk on. Essentially my first
(16:30):
year starting LSU, Major League Baseballpaid for that. Oh. I was
going to ask you how that happenedbecause you had been pro, you had
an agent. So did the NCAAget involved with you then going back into
school or was there anything with that? So, I mean, I still
have a year of eligibility. Basketballis still a thing. Maybe, Oh,
as long as you don't play,Yeah, as long as you don't
(16:52):
play the sport you were professional inyou have not lost your amateurs. Okay,
well that's handy, all right.So you're there your first year,
you red shirt in two thousand andthen two thousand and one you have some
playing time, but then your bigbreakthrough comes in that SEC championship game against
Tennessee where you come in off thebench, score a couple of touchdowns and
(17:14):
you come from behind and win,and that really projects LSU into the next
season. You have the injury,but then the following season the championship,
when you came in in that SECchampionship game, what was that like?
I mean, you're coming off thebench and now you're here, you are
and this is your biggest football stagethat you've been in. Yeah. I
mean when I was in high school, we were the running type team.
(17:37):
We threw just because. But themost times I'd ever thrown in a game
was twelve. Oh okay, ever, so I came in the first time
I ever got to play. Itwas the second half of Florida that two
thousand and one year, and Ithrew twenty two passes and the second half
because Rohan Davey was injured. Sothe most times I ever thrown in a
game or the second half of that. So anyway, for that week we
(17:57):
were playing Tennessee tennis. He waswriting number one or two in the nation.
They had Albert Haynesworth, John Henderson, will Overstreet, demetris Ville.
They had like six guys that playedin the NFL, and three were first
or second round picks, so theywere needless say, we were worried about
protecting Rohan. And Roe was agreat quarterback, great leader, everything,
(18:18):
but wasn't the most mobile guy inthe world. So on Wednesday, Jimbo
puts in this package. It wasn'tfor me, it was for Rohan,
but it was a bunch of quarterbackdraws and some things like that direct snap
stuff. Literally one day put itin, like just hadn't done it all
year long. So Roe gets hurtingfirst quarter. I come in. We
just start running those plays over andover and over. Hadn't run them.
(18:41):
I literally hadn't taken a rep ofthose plays. Oh my gosh. And
obviously Tennessee hadn't seen it on film. I had not seen it at all.
Ended up being like one of thegreatest things ever. Oh that's cool.
Yeah, So yeah, that wasbasically I'm on the LSU campus.
People kind of know you, butnot really. But after that game,
then you go to class, everyone'stalking to you all these things. I
had one of my buddies on theteam, Jack Hunt, his brother.
(19:04):
I was older at the time,twenty one, so he was using my
ID to be able to get intobars and things like that. So it's
funny. He goes the weekend afterthat SEC championship, he goes to the
bar and they look at it andthey go, you're not You're not.
So it was great for me,but ruined though his sophomore year. Oh
(19:30):
my gosh, that's hilarious. Wow. All right, so in two thousand
and two, then you are thestarter. Your team starts five and one
and you break your foot. Iread where you had said, you know,
while breaking a foot, that stinks, you're out. The team doesn't
do as well the rest of theseason. But that was huge for you.
A transformation as far as your throwingability. Yeah, I don't sit
around very well. So I wouldjust grab an equipment guy and I'd get
(19:53):
a huge bag of balls, andI would sit on a cooler and just
sit and throw THEMN over and Iwould throw five sucunner balls a ton,
Oh my gosh, and I wouldjust sit there and work on your release
because I couldn't do anything else.I was like, hey, I might
as well do this, So I'msure the equipment guy was a little annoyed,
but worked out great. No,no more, a few more,
Yeah, yeah, sure, Idon't look at your arm tired, Matt,
(20:15):
Let's just take a break. Howfunny. The injury thing always is
interesting, and you had another onelater in your pro career with your back,
And I talked to a lot ofthe guests on this podcast about where
that puts you in a mental state. I mean, you at least were
still getting back out there throwing.But it can be very easy to go
sit at that training table everybody elseis out of practice, and you don't
(20:36):
go into the training table till everybody'sgone because they're all in there when you're
not. And so it's a disconnectwith your teammates and it's just a really
lonely dark place sometimes. Well,without a doubt, sports is amazing and
awesome in this brotherhood and everything likethat, but if you're not in the
brotherhood, it's tough, you know. And I said that my son was
just a senior of this last yearat Tray Creek and his sophomore and junior
(21:02):
year, he was a little bitof a contributor, but not a lot,
and he just didn't feel part ofpart of it, you know.
And it's such a big school thatyou have to believe in yourself, you
know, you have to have thatinner belief that, Okay, I might
not be doing it now, butI will be doing it. And I
think injury is a lot like that. You went from being a contributor helping
(21:22):
out and now some of those guys, you know, if it's champ or
you know some you know, theseguys who go through that that are big
time players, Hall of Fame timeplayers, they don't go through that,
but they okay, yeah, ifyou're a fringe guy, yeah, you
know, you just you really feelit, and then doubt starts creeping at
Oh man, if I don't getbetter, am I going to get cut?
What's gonna happen? Like all thesethings, it's really hard. So
how did you come back then thatnext year and just have that confidence of
(21:47):
like here we go. And thatwas the year you guys went eleven to
one and win the national championship,I think part of when you're injured,
you can't wait to get back.I said, I had these kind of
breaks in my life that you knowwhat, it's dead minorly baseball. Then
when I went to college, Iwas excited about college because I hadn't done
it for a little while. Soand then you don't get to play for
a whole year, and you hadhad you had been playing well, really
(22:08):
you couldn't wait to get back outthere. So and it would just we
got lucky the right people, theright places. And I think that two
thousand and three team one really coolthing about it is, Yeah, you
have to be a good player,but when you have good people, yeah,
and camaraderie on your team, it'sa me I mean that team was
very tight. Yes, I mean, I'm sure the Broncos in ninety seven,
(22:32):
ninety eight or yeah. Anytime youhave a championship, you have to
have that, don't without a doubt. Yeah, it's the only way to
make it happen. Can you believethat championship game was in two thousand and
four? It was from the twothousand and three season. It's been twenty
years, I know. Did youstay in touch with everybody? Had anion
last year. Oh nice, Yeah, it was kind of cool to see
everybody, But yeah, I probablystill talked about seven or eight guys pretty
(22:56):
regularly. But you're just being faraway. It's kind of hard. A
lot of them still in Louisiana ora few several yeah, yeah, yeah,
yeah. People from Louisiana don't leaveLouisiana and it's a cool place,
but then families so close down there, and it's just absolutely it's hard to
leave. Do you ever want togo back, you know, later in
life in retirement or something like that, or would that not be the place
to go? Yeah? I meanI love Louisiana. I mean absolutely love
(23:19):
Louisiana. For me. It justworked out here. I mean coming to
Denver was I mean, Denver's prettyspecial place. There's the reason that there's
so many former players that are Sothat's why my podcast is full of that
love. Yeah, I'm like,oh he's here too, fantastic. All
right, Well, so let's talkabout that. You get drafted by the
Broncos and four you decide to foregoyour last year of college, right,
(23:42):
and you go pro. Broncos draftyou in the seventh round. You're in
a quarterback room with Jake Plumber andDanny Canell. You make the team,
but you don't play. Yeah,what was that like after? I mean,
you come off of a national championshipand then you get in the pros
and then you're you're sitting there theNFL. It's difficult. A lot of
(24:03):
times when you're a later pick,you get one or two opportunities and if
you don't capitalize, it really hurtsyou. Probably playing the best football I've
ever played my life in that trainingcamp, Kobeak, Mike, all of
them. Really, man, dude, you're telling you we want you.
You're going to be our backup thisyear. I get in. I was
the first guy that got in afterJake. In the Hall of Fame game,
(24:26):
this funky coverage they were playing.I end up throwing a pick or
two something like that, and thencame third Street again. They've just got
a little nervous. And so Ihad played so much better than Danny Canell
in camp, but it was justhard for them to say, oh,
we're gonna have a rookie do that. But if I would have played well
in that game, for sure,Second sup probably in some reps getting to
(24:48):
play a little bit so in theNFL's off I said, quarterbacks are very
difficult if you're not six four,huge hands and all these physical attributes.
Not that I'm a small guy oranything, but I was a REP guy.
I needed reps. I needed timing. I needed to do these things.
The guys who are bigger in staturesometimes can get in there, so
(25:10):
it can be so I look backof kind of looking at my career,
I wish that's one one game Iwish I could have hit reset on.
And then my one start in theNFL with the Titans against the Jacksonville Jaguars
just didn't play well. And itgoes to confidence, you know what I
mean. I felt underprepared probably forboth games because I was a REP guy.
(25:30):
I need to know that I've thrownthis past six times and it's been
perfect, you know, every singletime. Yeah, and when you don't
have that just different. Yeah,going back to those five hundred passes you
made, sitting down and getting allthat timing down and knowing exactly where you're
going. Yeah, So after yourfirst year with the Broncos, do they
release you? The first year Iwas on practice squad, But actually Mike
(25:51):
really liked me, so it wasactually paid me twice the amount because you
could do whatever you wanted to.So basically said, hey, you know,
we really love you. We're goingto keep your hear pay more type
of thing. And so then thenext year and Bradley Van Pelt was also
here as well. Oh that's right, that was bvp's year. Yeah.
Yeah, And so BVP for agood reason. I think, you know,
Pat Bolin was unbelievable at understanding howto make the Broncos popular. Yeah,
(26:15):
I mean he was so good atthat. And part of that was
Bradley to CSU, I mean,yeah, it was. Bradley was a
big name in Colorado. He wasI've had him on the podcast and his
whole story about it, and hementioned you as well. I forgot about
that, Yeah, that he wasin that room. So and that was
interesting too, because Bradley and Icame in together. Should have hated each
(26:36):
other, but we actually really likedeach other. Yeah. And that's the
other weird part too, is thatsometimes people can't understand that they're like,
wait a second, they're competing.That guy took your job and you're still
texting him, right, Yeah,that's funny. And then you go to
the Titans, then how does thattransition happen? So it was funny.
So they were gonna put me backon the practice squad and Denver I just
(26:56):
was like, not no offenses isBradley? But I just thought I was
a better player and if I said, if, hey, if you don't
think I'm better than Bradley, AndBradley was a great athlete, could do
things, but just didn't. TheNFL was not ready for Bradley. No,
but Brad Bradley was a great adlib and then but he just didn't
the way Mike Shannan's office was notfit Brad No, I just didn't.
(27:18):
And I think he would admit thatnow and he did so much in his
podcast and that probably should have exploredother positions like people were encouraging him to.
In his head at that time,he was a quarterback and that was
all he was going to be.Take it or leave it. And they're
like, all right, we'll leaveit. Damn it. That didn't work
out. Yeah, So anyway Iwas I didn't want to go back on
(27:38):
practice squad. I really loved Denver, I loved Mike Shannahan, I love
Karey Kubiak, Pat Macpherson. Ilove those guys. They were great.
But actually Norm Chow was the offensivecoordinator at Tennessee and so he calls me.
It was almost like a recruiting call, and he's like, hey,
love to have you. And atthe time, I'm like, Norm Chow,
that's like, man, I loveMike Shannan. I let you know.
(27:59):
I love doing there writings on thewall doesn't appear that they love me
as much as I love it.Here I get to go learn from Rome
Chow. That'd be kind of cool. I decide to sign in their practice
squad and then you're there for acouple of years. Right, two years,
you get into two games and thenthey keep you into the two thousand
and six preseason, you get cutand then resigned. It there, so
you're kind of up and down intheir in their organization as well. When
(28:22):
did you know you were done?So I was running out to practice,
just jogging out and literally, ifyou make me bet, I thought.
So there was like a sniper onthe roof and like shot me in the
right calf. Oh my god.So I just kind of went down.
I couldn't so I had a hernateddisc in my back and it finally pinched
the nerves so much that my rightcalf wouldn't work. So it was the
(28:44):
most random, Literally, I wishI had some better story. Yeah,
it was kind of crazy, matYeah. Yeah, So anyway, so
then I had to have back surgeryand that was two thousand and six.
I had Bengals, Falcons, andJaguars all wanted to bring me in.
I had already, see you,dental school admitted me into their program.
So I had to make the decisiondo I want to keep trying to play
(29:07):
or go to school. I justhad my first son, and I just
kind of said, you know,I've had a pretty good rude. Yeah,
it's just I don't I got togrow up at some point, you
know, right, And I haveno regrets, and I wish I would
have gone back for my senior yearat LSU, just because you just don't
get to do that very often inyour life. I know, you don't
get to be in your twenties incollege you care free, right, Yeah,
(29:30):
not at all at all. Sothat's the only thing in life I
look back and say, God,I should have done that. Well,
that's good then that you you feltgood about walking away, yeah, or
olympian mentally yeah, maybe not physicallybut mentally yes, all right, and
then the decision to get into dentalschool. You were into orthopedics when you
were at LSU, is that right? And you kind of followed around the
(29:51):
docks there and then yeah, yeah. So my one of my dear friends
at Brent Banks and was the teamorthopedic surgeon. That's what I wanted to
do. So he literally let mecome in surgery and like I was like,
using like this all except I'm like, am ill have to do this?
I don't know if this is wow? But yeah, I mean I'm
scrubbing up. I probably went intolike ten different surgeries with him. Oh
my gosh, what a great experience. Very cool, very cool. But
(30:12):
he was the one who was like, you know, he goes, dude,
you're old. I go, well, I'm not that old. And
he's like, he's you're going todo medical school residency fellowship. He goes,
you're going to be like thirty fouror thirty five, and he goes,
and then you're the low man inthe totem pole and you're gonna he
says, but till you're forty,you're gonna have a miserable life. I
(30:33):
was like, wow, you're reallyselling this. Yeah, and he said
you're going to be in debt likeall these things. So he said you
should go be a dentist. Igo, what here's yeah, And so
I went and shadowed a dentist andI was like, wow, it's kind
of cool. Your work four daysand it's like little mini surgeries and things.
So and then you didn't have tostay in school for years on end,
(30:55):
did not? You graduated in twentyeleven from see you Dennis School and
you're a doctor of dental surgery.I'm not a real doctor. My friends
all let me know that you stillget to be called doctor, don't we?
Yeah? Yeah, yeah, Iguess it's like David Brutin, he's
a doctor. Yeah, exactly,exact doctor. Yeah, yeah, you
didn't. Can we start this over? I'd like to introduce this doctor.
(31:18):
Very good. Yeah, And youhave your you have a practice with another
dentist and you guys have had thatfor a very long time in a Roora.
You've become kind of the quasi broncosdentist, haven't you. I mean,
how players come to see you?So many of them do, don't
they well, we have a partnershipwith them, so we do. We
do do the dentistry. Oh nice, but we just don't advertise it all
that stuff. Our job is ifsomeone's needs us, we just make room.
(31:41):
As basically, so those four daysa week sometimes you're on call.
Well yeah, I know, right, gosh, I need to rethink this
working way too much. Yeah,because games are on weekends. Yeah.
So it was actually when I wasa player here, the two doctors that
the practice they took over. Iwas a patient there. Oh yeah,
so that's how I got into that. So it's a same practice. Oh
that's cool. Yeah, I loveit. But then obviously you take care
(32:04):
of regular people as well. Yeahwe do, yes, yeah, yeah.
It's funny some people that are likethey're like, wow, that's not
that many people to do a practice. I said, well that's we do
other things. Yeah, oh yeah, that's the Broncos are a very small
portion right of that. What doyou like the best about what you do?
People? Yeah? Yeah, yousee everyone. It's twice a year,
but it feels like more than that. And so it's actually kind of
(32:25):
great because it's like smaller conversations andeverybody loves you you know, they think,
look, it's so funny. Yah. Yeah. I could use the
same joke like six different times andI just changed them up every six months
and nobody knows. Yeh, thereyou go. No, but that that
is obviously like medicine because I wantto help people. That's just my kind
of who I am. But Ithink dentistry the nice part of that is
(32:49):
as an orthopedic surgeon, the hopeis you never see that person again.
In dentistry, you get to seethat person, you know, hopefully it's
just twice a year, but butsometimes more so, it's really cool you
have like two three thousand people thatyou become friends with real Yeah, do
you write notes down about people?I'm always curious how the Dennis like remembers
the things that we taught. I'mlike, how in the world did he
remember we talked about that. Iam telling you, I think one thing.
(33:12):
Football. I've always had a prettygood memory. But Mike Shanahan used
to make us so we would havea call sheet okay, and it would
have one hundred plays on there,okay, And he would give us a
blank piece of paper and you wouldhave to fill the whole thing in and
the winner got five hundred bucks.Oh Dan, I won every week,
so yeah, Mimi, guess Jake, Danny and Bradley. Yeah yeah.
(33:34):
I started getting pissed and then Ihad to like and so, and then
Bradley's like like looking at my sheetthe whole time. So it did help
me. So I actually, honestly, and my staff sometimes are like,
how did you know that? I'mlike, I don't know. I just
I think sometimes things are important football. If it's important to you, you
just learn how to ingrain it intoyour mind. And so it had actually
(33:57):
helped me. So you actually rememberyou're not writing. No, you write
some stuff, but there's a lotI would say eighty percent of the time.
I just remember, like they're like, oh Susie, Like we do
a morning huddle and everybody comes inlike they'll be like, oh Susie.
I'm like, oh, yeah,she just got back from Bahamas and I
think we need to do a crowna number three and everyone's like what I
was like yeah, and they're likeoh wow, yeah that's right, dang
(34:20):
ye. So I think football helpedme with them absolutely. That's impressive.
All right, you mentioned your boysall of them? Are they all in
high school right now. So I'vegraduating senior Cherry Creek. He's a football
player. He's actually gonna to playwide receiver at Mines. Oh nice,
Oh that's great. Good. Andthen I have a eighth grader that'll be
a freshman a Cherry Creek next year. And then a fourth grader good to
(34:42):
be fifth grader. Oh man,busy times, huh, very probably sports
and other activities involved. I honestly, this could be a whole nother podcast
about you, sports man. Itis. Oh yeah, it's sickening,
holding kids back, and it's just, you know, it's how it should
be. We putting way too muchemphasis on something that should be fun well,
(35:06):
and certain people are I mean,when you say whatever, this is
funny. At a minor league baseballcoach, he said, double A is
a great big siphon. He is. You just throw everybody in there,
and all of a sudden you justshake him out and he goes. The
crappy players just fall through. That'swhat he said. And so and I
think that there is something it isabout hard work. And then but guess
(35:27):
what, I'm six three, twohundred and fifteen pounds. There's not many
people that are like that, youknow what I mean? And just so
so some of this we can tryas much as we want, and we
can want it and do all thesethings. Puberty is the great decider decider.
Yes, it is. It is, yeah, and it's it and
I feel like it. Just thesepoor kids. Now, man, it's
just it's not good enough being agood high school player. Why why is
(35:51):
that not good enough? That's whatthat's whatever all guys sitting around the bar
talk about. You know, isthat you played in high school football was
fun, You did these things.Now if you a scholarship player, you
suck. No, you don't.It's just it's just not how it is.
Yeah, I hate it, absolutelyhate it. A bigger part of
that, as you know, arethe parents, and that's who is driving
a lot of this in that they'refulfilling dreams that they didn't get to have,
(36:15):
so now their kid is suffering throughsomething. So my my former partners,
Nick Demiko, his son Brin Demiko, was a great tennis player,
number one tennis player in Colorado.Dulla stuff got a scholarship to Notre Dame.
But it's a tennis scholarship, soit's like fifty forty percent or something
like that. And Nick had agreat perspective. He was like, you
know, people are like, ohmy god, that's awesome. You know
(36:36):
your kid got a scholarship to NotreDame. You know that's so great.
I bet that was such a financialreward for you. And he goes what
he goes, No, he waslike, all the money I spent on
junior tennis and traveling, he goes, my kid could have gone to Stanford
for four years and got his masters. He's like, it, does you
know that you're doing it for thewrong. We did it because my kid
(36:57):
loved it and he wanted to doit. And that's why I feel like,
you know, you walk around neighborhood, drive around neighborhoods. Kids aren't
outside playing anymore. People burn out. They're tired of it, you know,
they're tired of it. People askme how to well, how did
you do this? I didn't doanything. I just that's what I love
doing. Yeah. My best friendlived right next door to me, and
if I wasn't outside shooting baskets,he knew I wasn't home. It's just
(37:20):
how it was. That's how Iknew you weren't home. Wow, Because
I wanted to know because my momand dad made me go out there.
It's just you want to go dothat, right? And I think we're
making kids do stuff too much.Yeah, and at some point, if
your kid doesn't want to do it, stop making him do it. Yes,
our son, we tried everything.We did baseball, we did football,
we did and he just he's nota sports kid. And I'm like,
Okay, I'm going to stop.And I'm sorry that he doesn't want
(37:43):
to do this, but he'll haveother interests. There's so many other things
in life to enjoy. Let's stopmaking him go out there and do stuff
that he doesn't like to do.Well. When I say this too,
there's some I just talked to hisdad and his kids going to college for
football, went there four years,never stepped on the field, didn't play
one time. It was cool thatyou were part of it in scholarship And
they says, but I bet ifyou asked that kid, hey, and
(38:06):
this dad was a travel baseball Imean, they did everything. Would you
rather have had a couple of weekendswhere we could have gone up to Steamboat
or these places and had some memoriestogether. I guarantee they would have liked
that absolutely, And I say this, I'm preaching about this, but I'm
not always great about it. Youknow. I said, spending your whole
(38:27):
summer on a baseball field is notall that enjoyable, right, And but
the bottom line is no matter.You can do that as much as you
want, but puberty and genetics isgoing to win everything exactly. It just
is. Yeah, absolutely, absolutelyall right. Last question for you,
Matt. As you look back throughoutyour career and there's been some super highs
(38:49):
and some lows, what do youtell people as you talk to them?
And you probably have people hit youup for advice all the time, especially
when they're like, oh, youhave three boys, I bet they're all
playing quarterback. I bet they're doingthis, doing that. How do you
get through the tough times when thingsaren't working out the way you want them
to work out? What do youtell people and how did you get through
them? Believe in yourself. Ithink that's the biggest thing. And that's
really hard sometimes easy for me tosay that because life's worked out pretty well
(39:12):
for me. But I have workedhard. I won the genetic lottery a
little bit, you know what Imean. From an athletic standpoint. Sure,
I tell people all the time asa parent, encourage something for your
child that they love, that theyare passionate about, that puts a smile
on their face. If you're havingto say it's time for practice and they're
like, oh God, I haveto go to practice, it's probably not
(39:34):
what they should be doing. Andthe other thing I think is when you
meet celebrities or you meet people athad success, you always think their life
was wonderful, that it was perfectin everything was great. No, not
at all. I've been through adivorce. There's been things about me that
aren't great, you know. Andso I think that you're on social media
and you see the picture you getto see how beautiful it looked in Florida,
(39:57):
that you forgot that family probably wentthrough six fights to get the clothes
on those kids and to get themto smile, and to get suitcases through
baggage clay. Yes, yeah,yeah, it wasn't all perfect, right.
Yeah. I think that's a greatpoint. And like I said,
this podcast is about humanizing the proathlete the coach where it just seems like,
hey, they're making great money,everything's awesome. It looks like they
(40:21):
take great vacations. Oh there's awhole lot of stuff that goes down that
is hard, and money doesn't solveall the problems. In fact, it
can create more, without a doubt, without a doubt. NFL players that
have retired, I think, youknow, people are like, oh,
CT and all that stuff, AndI'm not saying that there's not CT or
anything like that. But to me, the biggest problem is you took someone
and at a very young age,gave them the best job they will ever
(40:45):
have, the best what anybody wouldwant to do, and then for the
rest of their life they have todo something else. They can't get back
to it so hard mentally, it'sjust it's it's hard to me. I
think that's more of a problem thanactually the brain try and brain trauma is
an issue, and I think they'retrying to address it. But I was
very fortunate that I went straight froma very sports is like, I hate
(41:07):
when there's comparisons in military because sportsis nothing like the military. People are
giving their lives for that, butit is similar from the structure standpoint.
Yes, very regimented, very regimentI went from football regimented straight into dental
school. I feel extremely fortunate thatI didn't have to figure that out,
and then I went straight from dentalschool into an established practice that had parameters.
(41:30):
They had everything set out for me. So I feel sometimes it's even
hard for me to talk about itbecause I haven't had to endure some of
those things, right, But seeingteammates that have had to go through that,
I feel bad for him because alot of times they're just lost.
It's tough. That happens in myindustry as well. And I'm similar to
you and that I've been able togo from one thing to another and never
had that downtime to go, wow, I suck or what's going on?
(41:53):
You know? So I feel veryfortunate in that too. But even when
you have you know, you gofrom one to this to this, it's
not always up when you're in oneof those. There's can be downtimes as
well where you still think you sucks. So and it's okay to suck.
Yeah, I think sucking makes youlook in the mirror absolutely, so that's
okay. Yeah, Hey we canall suck. There you go. All
(42:14):
right, Hey, Matt, thankyou for the time. I appreciate.
I know you're super busy and yougot some you got some dental procedures to
do. I'm sure so somebody's cameback from a vacation. It needs a
crown on three. So yeah,thanks for having us. Thank you,
Matt. Well, if you're hearingthis, you have listened to the entire
episode. First of all, thankyou. Secondly, if you enjoyed this
(42:35):
episode, please rate and review onApple Podcasts and Spotify and share it with
someone. New episodes have, cut, Traded, Fired, retired, come
out weekly on nearly every podcast platform. Get social with the podcast on Twitter
and Instagram at ctf our podcast andcheck out the website ctfurpodcast dot com.
I'm your host, Susie Wargen.To learn more about me, visit susiewargin
(42:59):
dot com. Thanks so much forlistening, and until next time, please
be careful, be safe, andbe kind. Take care
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