#23 Kansas City Royals Broadcaster Joel Goldberg

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hey, what's up everybody.
Welcome to the PossibilityMindset Podcast.
I'm Devon Henderson, I'm yourhost and I believe that
something greater is alwayspossible for you All.
Right, joel, before I introduceyou formally, let me ask you
how were the breakfast tacoshere at Excedera Shawnee?
Excellent.

Speaker 2 (00:26):
Good breakfast, tacos , coffee Nice way to start the
day.
I'm a breakfast guy, yeah.
So give me eggs, give me somejalapenos in there, throw it in
a taco, throw it in a burrito,throw it in a bowl, whatever it
is.
The breakfast tacos wereexcellent.

Speaker 1 (00:44):
Awesome man, that's what I'm talking about.
See, that's Excedera Shawnee.
They do it up right, they'reamazing here.
So if you haven't tried, etc.
Come on down.
Okay, we have a couplelocations in KC, so give it a
whirl.
I'm kind of the guy who alwaysgets the same thing.
As long as there's like meat,there's eggs sprinkle a little
bacon, a little protein, and getsome oatmeal in there, some
fruit.

(01:04):
I'm ready to go, man.

Speaker 3 (01:05):
I'm ready to podcast at that point which is saying a
lot, I guess the oatmeal I meanyou could be sleepy after this,
but yet you're ready to go.

Speaker 1 (01:13):
I think I'd be sleepy if it was like a waffle or a
pancake.
I feel like the oatmeal is likethat lighter carb.
That kind of gives me wings.

Speaker 2 (01:19):
That's right, which, by the way, they have the waffle
, the pancake too, I'm prettysure.

Speaker 1 (01:23):
Oh, yeah, yeah, they do.
Oh, they do have it all.
Yeah, if you want it, just me,for, like, I have to take it
easy, otherwise it's dangerous.
I'm with you.
Yeah, man, well, awesome, well,hey, for the full experience
for this podcast.
You know, go to YouTube,subscribe, like, share with your
friends.
We're going to have someawesome wisdom, information
stories for you today from Joel,so you're going to want to be

(01:43):
sure to share this.
So one more question for you,joel, before we get to formally
introducing you Do you like towalk?
I do like to walk, okay, do youlike to walk?
This is this might separate us,as like, yeah, okay, this might
divide us a little bit.
Do you like to walk barefoot?

Speaker 2 (02:01):
I feel like I know this isn't a trick question, but
I feel like you're going towant me to say yes.

Speaker 1 (02:08):
I want you to be honest.
So even if you say no, we'll,we'll figure out, We'll still be
friends.

Speaker 2 (02:14):
Yeah, yeah, I typically walk with like
something on that resemble shoes.

Speaker 1 (02:19):
Okay, okay, which is fine, that's, that's fine.
So I, the barefoot thing iskind of this culture, it's like
this whole lifestyle shift ofrealizing that, like being
connected to the earth and thegrass is good.
Grounding and grounding.
There you go, you know, youunderstand.

Speaker 2 (02:30):
Yeah, you know, Around the young kids, the
athletes.

Speaker 1 (02:32):
Yeah, that's right.
I mean yeah.
And so you know, the earth iselectric, our bodies are
electric, but on top of that,like we're just really built
meant to walk barefoot, like ourmuscle structure, our bones and
all that.
So that's why I like torecommend Zero Shoes.
It's what I wear, it's honestlyall I wear.
I speak in zeros, I kick asoccer ball in zeros, I run, I
walk, I would sleep in zeros ifmy wife would let me.
I totally would.
So, so go to zeroshoescom slashgo slash, devon just to check

(02:56):
it out, see if it's for you.
Just try your first pair.
It really honestly, for me it'schanged my life.
I love these shoes, they'retotally amazing, and it's also a
way you could support thispodcast.
So you can find the link in theshow notes zeroshoescom slash
go slash, devon.
All right, well, joel,congratulations.

Speaker 3 (03:16):
What did I do?
Yeah, what'd you do?
I can't wait to find out.

Speaker 1 (03:18):
You're the first guest to join us with our new
podcast equipment See Break itin.
I know I was like, well, let'syou know who's going to be the
right guest to be the firstperson for the equipment and
that, or it just worked out thatway.
But a little bit of you know, alittle bit of destiny, it's it
just worked out.
So, yeah, this, we got Zachbehind the scenes doing his

(03:39):
thing.
He's awesome.
So Zach shout out and yeah, sothis is fun.
So you, know, strap in.
Let's see how this goes.

Speaker 2 (03:46):
Honored to be the first, whether it was by design
or whether fate just brought ushere.
And I will say, as someone thatyou know has been in this
business a long time it's thatpeople don't realize this and
you don't.
You don't see it, you won'thear it, but it's nerve wracking
when you're trying out newthings because you want to get
it right and you know that it'sgoing to be better.
But sometimes, like when wefinish this later, you may say

(04:08):
to me oh, we forgot to roll.
Can we do it again?

Speaker 3 (04:10):
We've all been there by the way, it's a great thing.

Speaker 1 (04:13):
Zach's like oh, speaking of which, yeah, I
forgot to hit record, you know.

Speaker 2 (04:18):
We'll do that all the time on TV too, like we'll
finish a great interview andthen the photographer will say,
like, did you want me to roll onthat?
Oh nice.

Speaker 1 (04:25):
Nice, I have a friend who you'll talk, you'll tell
like a 10 minute story.
He's like could you repeat thatI, you know, hey, and one thing
also about this podcast you mayor may not know, I don't we
don't really like to edit a lotunless it's something
significant, a significantinterruption.
And the reason I tell you thatis because I'm going to ask Zach
right now hey, how we lookingLike, are we both?
I want Joel to be comfortable.
Is he facing okay?

(04:46):
Is we?
Are we good?
All right?
Zach's like leave us, leave meout of this dude.
I like to work behind the scenes.
Don't even drop my name, man,act like we don't know each
other.
Okay, awesome, man.
Well, I want to introduce youand I keep saying but this first
, but this we can't ignore thisfact.
Okay, last night, who won theSuper Bowl?

(05:07):
Again, I can't remember, Idon't know, I think it was the
chief.
It was the chief.
That's right Now.
This podcast isn't coming outfor, like I don't know, two or
three weeks after this, but wecan't not talk about it,
especially when you're thesports guy.
Yeah, so thoughts, feelings onhow it all went down.

Speaker 2 (05:23):
You know, it's all really interesting to me because
, first off, it was a great gameand I think that any game that
goes down to the wire, let alonean overtime, is going to be a
classic.
It just is.
It didn't feel like a greatgame for a while.
It was.
It was pretty boring in thefirst half.
There wasn't a lot of scoring,but the tension was there the

(05:43):
whole game.
You could feel the storylinesmounting.
I view games differently.
I'm not a football expert.
I covered football over theyears.
I can come up with a millionpeople that know the game better
than I do, but I just I knowstorylines.
I think in storylines and youcould see it developing the
whole time, right, that youcould see it building.
I kept saying to everyone thatthey're not playing that well

(06:03):
the chiefs.
Yet there's still one scoreaway from winning this, and
usually when you let a good teamstay in a game that they don't
have a business being in, basedon how they're playing, they
find a way.
And there's just there's somany cool storylines with
Mahomes and with with Andy Reed,and I was telling you before

(06:23):
that the greatest of all timefind a way to do things that no
one else can do.
And he, patrick Mahomes, is inthat category.
And so you know, for anyonethat's checking out this podcast
, if you're a chiefs fan, even afew weeks later, you're still
giddy over this.
If you're not a chiefs fan, youprobably hate them.
But I think, ultimately you youknow you've, you've arrived

(06:45):
when you've gone from the thedarling, the beloved team in
America because everybody likesthe small market Cinderella
story to being hated becausewe're sick of you.
That's when you know you'vestarted to create a legacy.
But you know, I just think,like I've covered a million
great games and bad games andeverything in the middle, and
games that aren't too, toosignificant and games that are

(07:07):
incredibly significant.
And last night, just as a fan,falls under the category of one
of the greats of all time,people will talk about that game
for generations and so just tobe able to be in that moment,
talk about being present.
You know that that's what Iwant people to take out of last
night's game and if it's notyour team, maybe something else
will come up where it is yourteam, or maybe you feel like

(07:28):
your team will never win it andone day, hopefully they do and
and you get to enjoy it is.
You have to enjoy these momentsbecause that there's no
guarantee they'll get back.
They just keep finding a wayback.
That makes it even more specialbecause you don't see it very
often anymore.

Speaker 1 (07:43):
Yeah, yeah, wow.
And you know what Chiefs fan orno chiefs fan, all of us are
Swifties Should be, so there'ssomething for everyone.

Speaker 3 (07:52):
Should be.
Well, you got young kids.
When it comes to the chiefs, Ido have young kids.
I'm sure that some of your kidslove her right.

Speaker 1 (07:57):
Yeah, we're counting how many times they showed her.
We're like that's not enough.
We need more Taylor.
I don't know what the deal was.

Speaker 3 (08:02):
I'm pretty sure not everybody in.

Speaker 2 (08:03):
America feels that way.
But I'll just say this andsomehow this, like this whole
thing, turned into political,which is absurd, like it's
that's just the world we live in.
But I think what I say aboutTaylor Swift and I now have a
teenager and a 20-something andand my daughter is the teenager

(08:24):
and she likes to claim that shewas a Kelsey fan before.
She was a true Swifty, althoughshe liked her music.
But I think that my point hereis that there's, whether you
like the chiefs or you don't,whether you now suddenly feel
like you don't like her becauseof I don't know why people
wouldn't like her.
She brings people together, she, she, around the globe, has

(08:49):
this ability of being anunbelievable role model for
young kids and especially younggirls.
And now it's really cool to meto and I know there's skeptics
like I can't imagine, I don'tknow Devin.
I mean, could you imagineliving in her world and every
step you take is chronicled bypaparazzi and this, and that I

(09:10):
feel like like this is the mostat that level, since maybe
Princess Diana and she kind ofhas that feel too of someone
that brings people together anddoes good around the world.
Maybe you know I was watchingthe Beckham documentary on
Netflix, your Soccer Guy, andthe level of where they were at.
You know, beckham and PoshSpice neither one of them

(09:34):
individually are greater thanwhat Taylor Swift is worldwide,
but maybe collectively they were.
They were bigger, where everystep and move they take and, in
his case, in England, beloveduntil they decided they hated
him because, you know, he messedup in one game.
I can't imagine what it wouldbe like to live in that world.
So I get why there are skepticsof you know, maybe it's just a

(09:57):
made for TV thing, or maybe it'sa whatever.
They look pretty genuinelyhappy and I think it's pretty
cool to watch all that playingout Like who roots against love?
I don't know.
Yeah, who roots against love?

Speaker 1 (10:06):
I think that's the name of this episode, that's
beautiful.
Who roots against love man.
That's so good.
Well, this is a man who reallydoesn't need an introduction.
But why not, right?
I mean, let's do it.
And our speeches are kind oflike this we tell a story, we
hook them in, then they get theintro and the why and where
we're going.
So let's jump into thatEverybody.
This is Joel Goldberg, and youprobably know him from the

(10:29):
Kansas City Royals post gameshows.
So a little fun facts that youprobably don't know he's been
married almost 25 years, twokids in college.
I mean, this man has really,truly rounded the bases, as he
likes to say.
He's been on TV for 29 yearsand the last 16 have been the
pre and post game show, like Imentioned, with the Royals and
you get to travel with them, Imean, wherever they go.

(10:51):
So you are all over the place,that's, to the moon and back.
Right, you've dodged a lot ofGatorade buckets.
I'm sure Andy Reid wouldappreciate that kind of
nimbleness.
Right, like, yeah, he gotnailed with some purple Gatorade
last night.
You won an Emmy.
I have a daughter named Emmy,so we're talking about the award
.
You won an Emmy Award forreporting in 2001.
Congratulations, Thank you.

(11:12):
Yeah, because you've been.
I mean, you've been alsoWisconsin and St Louis.

Speaker 3 (11:16):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (11:17):
I mean you did, speaking to Super Bowl, you did
some Super Bowl work with theRams.

Speaker 3 (11:20):
Yeah, back when they had a football team.

Speaker 1 (11:22):
Back when they had a football team.
There you go.
Yeah, All right.
So his podcast, which I wasactually on recently rounding
the bases with Joel Goldbergthat's him, in case you you know
checked out at some point.
That began in 17, 2017.
A lot of kind of mini guests,right, Tech 9.
Who's the KZ native?

(11:43):
Right, KZ native?
Yeah, Bob Costas.
And then I looked it up so Icould say my episode is 911.

Speaker 3 (11:49):
So there you go 911.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (11:51):
I know that's a lot of episodes you've done.
I'm on.
I think this is 22 or 23.

Speaker 3 (11:55):
So you know watch out , it's a long haul, I'm gonna
catch you.

Speaker 1 (11:57):
It's a long haul, not a competition yeah man and he
has a book called Small Ball,big Results.
I like that Speaking, which yousent me in the mail, and I need
to read it's sitting on my desk.

Speaker 3 (12:09):
You don't have to.
I mean, it's not you know it'snot an obligation, I don't have
to Okay, there'll be no test.

Speaker 1 (12:12):
Well, it takes the pressure off, but you know, I
still want to read it.

Speaker 3 (12:15):
Yeah, I have to have a chapter here.
There you go.

Speaker 1 (12:17):
There you go.
He started his speakingbusiness back in 2016 and he's
kind of like me in the sensethat, like we talked about on
your podcast, baseball is yourmetaphor for life.
Magic is my metaphor for life,but you like to use those
baseball stories when you do asteaching and storytelling
mechanisms right, the same waythat I would use magic.

Speaker 2 (12:36):
So yeah, 100%, and I think that that's like I would
say.
There aren't a lot of peoplethat could do what Devin does
the magic, the juggling, allthis type of stuff.
So I, you know there's one sideof it that says, well, I can't
put myself in your world becauseI can't do any of those things.
What I do know is that I canstorytell and make that point
using that metaphor.
The way you do with your magicmind is usually baseball and the

(12:59):
people that I meet and tying ittogether.
I think that, in the end, thegood speakers are great
storytellers and they're dotconnectors.
We're connecting dots forpeople.
We're not telling anyonegenerally.
We're not telling anyoneanything they haven't heard
before.
Hopefully, we're doing it in adifferent way that connects
those dots, in a way that givesyou those aha moments oh yeah,
now I get that, and so that'sthe commonality between us.

Speaker 1 (13:22):
Absolutely, absolutely.
It's so easy to compare andlook at another speaker and I
mean you can all relate to thistoo, whatever industry you're in
Just look at someone else andsay I don't have that.
I call it the illusion ofcomparison, that it's like I
can't.
I can't do that.
Well, you have your ownbrilliance.
You know your own ingenuity.
You can be innovative and bringout the best you and I mean
it's all sounds, you know,cliche, cheesy if you will, but

(13:44):
I mean it's, it's true.
You know we see it play out inour, in our industry all the
time.
So one last thing I want tomention, biographical wise, is
some of your favorite TVinterviews You've done Rowdy
Roddy Piper, who's the Canadianwrestler.

Speaker 2 (13:59):
I think he was American, I believe.

Speaker 3 (14:02):
I don't think he was.

Speaker 2 (14:02):
Canadian.
I know he always talked aboutthe Scottish background.
I don't know how much of thatwas real or not real, but yeah,
he was amazing.

Speaker 1 (14:09):
Okay, awesome man, that's, that's fun.
And then the other one was WillFerrell.
Yeah, so so I you know it's,it's so tempting to just be like
Joel tell me what it's like tobe on the field with the Royals
after the game.
I want to hear all that.
But I really also just want tohear a lot about your personal
life, what you do on stage andthe message that you bring to
your audiences, because withthis speaking business that you

(14:30):
have, I mean you really arechanging lives, transforming
people, and through your booktoo, and so so I want to hear
about all of it.
But I have to kind of ask onefanboy question.
You got to interview WillFerrell.
I mean, like comedy legend.
I mean I love Elf Anchorman,you know it's like.
What was that like?

Speaker 2 (14:50):
Yeah, Elf Anchorman, old school.

Speaker 1 (14:54):
We go on a Saturday night live, I mean all of it.

Speaker 2 (14:57):
I mean, he's a legend , Really nice guy, by the way,
too.
So was the late Roddy RoddyPiper.
He was a sweetheart of a guy,Will Ferrell.
I'll take you back, I think itwas 2011.
For those that know, the Royalshave this big well, it's not
the Royals deal, but the bigslick charity event every single
year, started by Paul Rudd andRob Riggle and Jason Sudeikis,

(15:19):
and eventually they added EricStone Street and Heidi Gardner
and all these local famouscomedians and the first year and
they bring in friends fromaround the country and there are
a lot of you know actors thatyou've seen around.
Maybe, you know, not at thelevel of a Paul Rudd all of them
Certainly not at the level of aWill Ferrell, but they're all
highly accomplished, reallyskilled, funny people that have

(15:40):
been on SNL and this and that,and there's always a connection
between these guys.
He knows, you know, this guy isthe opening act for Jimmy
Fallon and Seth Herzog and hegoes back to this point with
Paul Rudd.
You know, they all know eachother in New York, wherever it
is, and the first year they dothis big slick to raise money

(16:01):
for children's mercy.
It's a brand new charitythey're starting, which has now
been going 13 years.
They've raised millions andmillions and millions of dollars
.
Will Ferrell was one of theguests and at that point they
would give me a full inning inthe dugout suites.
So right along the third baseside, behind third base dugouts,
two dugout suites and theywould give me a full inning to

(16:24):
interview these celebrities.
Now we do it in a half inningbecause it's like all right, you
know, we've been there, donethat, They've got a lot of
obligations and my game plan,since I had a full inning, was
I'm going to sit the first halfand interview Rudd, Riggle and
Sudeikis.
This is pre-Ted last, so, butthey're all you know.
Sudeikis have been a star onSNL.
Everybody knew who Paul Rudd was.

(16:44):
Riggle's been in some of theyou know greatest roles that
hang over with the Taser sceneon and on, and that's going to
be enough.
And then I'm going to see if Ican get up the courage in the
bottom of the inning I think itwas the third inning I'm going
to try to get up the courage togo.
I think Will Ferrell was inside.
There's an inside part of thesuite and then you can come
outside.
You're right along the baselineIn between innings, during the

(17:07):
commercial.
I'll go in and ask if he'll doit and if you know, if he's a
jerk or whatever, then it's fine.
Like you don't know, Like youknow, good guy, bad guy, leave
me alone, I'm not doing this, Imean I don't even know that that
makes you a jerk If you'regetting pulled in a million
directions all day long, andthen that's what I tell people
all the time too.
Maybe you got them at the wrongmoment, so right we're.
I don't know.
Not even halfway into thisinterview with with Sedeikis and

(17:31):
Rod and Riggle, and up walksWill Ferrell and just interrupts
the interview.
He just walks in and so theysomebody hands him a microphone
and he, just for the next 10minutes, takes over in what was
basically.
I had a front row seat with anoccasional chime in to keep
things moving, front row seat tonight at the improv with Will

(17:55):
Ferrell and those guys, andthey're all.
They're all kind of, you know,in deference to him, like they
all.
Every one of those guys can runcircles or on any normal person
in terms of the way they'remind things, how quick.
But now they, they want WillFerrell on center stage.

Speaker 1 (18:13):
It's like they got Rob Robin Williams in the room
now.
Right, just like you can'tcompete.

Speaker 2 (18:17):
Yeah, and I realized that was the first year that I
realized, because I do whateveryear with them now, minus Will
Ferrell just set it up for themand then shut up.
And then, when it runs itscourse and they need another
direction, throw something outthere.
And so he walks in, they handhim a microphone and he starts
screaming out to the to thefield, yelling at Royals pitcher

(18:39):
, bruce Chen, come on, chen, Idon't like his body language,
he's lullagang, I don't likethat.
And so I, finally, I remember,I say, ladies and gentlemen,
will Ferrell is joining us, willum in to support your friend's
charity.
And he just looks at me and hegoes just deadpan.
No, no, I, I just passingthrough Kansas City, as I do

(19:01):
every year in June, and they'relike real, oh, you know, I could
hear, I don't know, was Robregular?
So I'm like really where, where,where were you going that you
just were passing through here?
Well, I had some seats up inthe upper deck.
I don't know how I ended updown here on my way to Branson
to do a, to do a show.
Oh, oh, what's the show about?

(19:22):
They just know, just keeppoking the bear, right?
Yeah, oh, what's the show about?
It's a.
It's a one man show about thehistory of banjos and it's
something like it's three hourslong with 20 acts or whatever he
said, and it's called America'sGot Back and it's about a,

(19:45):
something like it was like abouta back tattoo of the American
flag, and just goes on, and on,and on and on, and I'm like
they're just creating the storyand I'm just going to sit here
and relish in it.
So he couldn't have been nicer.
And you know, this is very samething to Roddy, roddy Piper.
Once that camera's on thatswitch turns and it's like

(20:07):
you're just watching televisiongold.

Speaker 1 (20:09):
That is man.
What a crazy.

Speaker 3 (20:11):
I'm getting starstruck for you from that
moment, from forever ago.

Speaker 1 (20:15):
That's so cool.

Speaker 2 (20:17):
You know what you're learning, and it's not true for
all of them, but you just learntheir, their people.
I mean they're all people,obviously.
And most of them are pretty goodguys.
And then and then what I knowand it's the same thing with the
athletes, even though I'm a lotcloser with the athletes
because I'm around them everyday if you give people the right
amount of space and respect thespace that they need, they're

(20:39):
more likely to come back, youknow.
And so, yes, it'd be great tochat with like as soon as we're
done.
I'd love to sit there and talkfor 20 minutes, because how cool
would that be.

Speaker 3 (20:50):
But you know what, they got other stuff to do, so I
just respect people's space.

Speaker 2 (20:54):
When you do that, they understand that they're
probably going to do a quicksomething that helps support
something and they'll give you,hopefully, their best, and every
now and then they don't, butthat was.
That was a pretty cool one.

Speaker 1 (21:05):
Well, what a mark of a pro for you rolling with the
punches and not being like guys.
Can we bring this back?
I have questions for, but justletting that play out.
That was.
That's brilliant.
I don't think a lot of peoplewould.
I don't know.
I imagine like maybe somepeople wouldn't have that
awareness and then would createit awkward and squelch that
whole comedy journey thatthey're taking you on.
So cool that you just sat backand let it happen.

Speaker 2 (21:26):
It's kind of my interviewing style anyway, and I
, you know I want to be carefulwith saying that that this
doesn't mean be unprepared.
There's a danger if you're aguy that likes to add lib and
likes to roll with it, thatwants to play off of the answers
and doesn't want to get trappedby a specific set list, so to
speak.
Right, right, you know it's,it's more like, I don't know,

(21:49):
like a jam band, like let's justgo with the flow, and but
there's a danger to get lazy andnot do your homework.
I think you still need to beable to do your.
You have to be able to do yourhomework.
You still need to.
You know I always say I couldshow up and do a show.
You know, as we're doing thisright now it's February, we're
still about six weeks fromopening day.
If you told me that opening daywas in five minutes and that

(22:09):
you got to go on the air and doyour first show in six months in
five minutes, I'd be like great, just help me.
Help me know where we're goingnext.
Yeah, and we'll get there.
My fear would be am I dressedright?
Because I'm not going to beready in five minutes.
But if this is good, let's go,yeah, but that that doesn't
happen.
If you were to drop me, say inI don't know, drop me in Miami

(22:33):
and say, hey, go host the soccerteam's pregame show in five
minutes, and I'd be like, ok, Iknow they got messy, but I don't
really know anything else.
And, oh man, I don't know whatI'm going to do here.
So you have to have yourbackground.
But I think, and look, somepeople Devon are, they're script
, they're script people, they,they need that structure.

(22:53):
And I'm not saying that's bad.
If you're someone and this isnot just a TV thing or a
speaking thing, this is apresentation, this is a
boardroom, this is anything yeah, if you're someone that that
really wants to, you know,follow that exact script and you
need that, and that's whereyou're at your best then that's
what you should do.
But I think, ultimately, if youknow what you're talking about,

(23:14):
you've done your homework.
You know.
I know maybe not everythingabout the Royals, but I know
enough to get me by, day afterday after day, on a bad day.
If, if, on a bad day, yourworst is still good enough, then
trust your instincts and listena little bit, because when
you're, when you're deep into ascript, you tend to miss what's

(23:36):
going on and developing in themoment, and nothing ever goes
exactly to plan.
That's what I love about livetelevision.
That, I believe, has preparedme for so much in life, and you
know this from a speakingstandpoint.
When does everything, when yougo speak to a group on stage,
when does everything go exactlyas planned?
It's like a wedding.
That's right, yeah, that'sright, and and probably the best

(23:58):
wedding planners understandthat something's going to go
wrong, and probably, when thatsomething goes wrong, it's
something that they've seen insome form or another before, and
so, instead of panicking, it'slike boy, I wish this didn't
happen, but all right, let'sfigure it out and move on.
Yeah, and that's a verycomforting thing, not just for
you as a speaker, not just forme as a speaker or as a

(24:18):
broadcaster, but but hopefullyfor everyone around you,
including the audience, who maynot even know anything's going
wrong.

Speaker 1 (24:24):
Well, and what audiences excuse me, what
audiences really appreciatetoday is audience interaction
facilitation, right.
And so I look at a podcast thesame way, like I'm facilitating,
right.
We're trying to create thisconversation and I was given
some really good advice when Istarted podcasting.
Like don't don't have a list ofquestions, you know, maybe as a

(24:44):
backup, maybe just a few kindof go-tos in case you hit a dead
end and you go blank.
But the whole idea is just tobe genuinely curious, right?
Like if you're just curious,because anything you might say
might open up a question to me,and if I'm like if I'm asking
that, they might be asking thattoo.
So don't let that like ask thatquestion so that it can go
deeper, because you never knowwhat doors that might open up.

(25:06):
And that's part of the fun ofjust you know, I don't look at
it as winging it, I look at itas like just being curious and
that's the plan, right, if youstick to that plan, I mean it's
going to go awesome places thatyou couldn't have planned in
your formatted questions.

Speaker 2 (25:19):
That's right.
And if it's not winging itagain, if you've done your
background and you have, it'slike when you're speaking or
when I'm speaking, and you'llget some people and I'm not
talking money here, but you'llget some people that say, wait a
minute, they're going to payyou X amount of dollars for an

(25:39):
hour.
Wow, that's a pretty good gig.
And it's like, no, no, no,they're, they're.
They're paying us for alifetime's worth of experience.
You're sharing a lifetime'sworth of experience in one hour.
And that's what.
That's what this is.
It's not winging it, it's anability to pivot, it's a bill,
it's an ability, in the moment,to go where the conversation's
taking you, where you know themoment is taking you.

(26:01):
There's always a structure,there's always a framework.
On our pregame show and our postgame show, we don't have one
script outside of somecommercial billboard reads or
any promos that I've got to read, that they want that copy to be
right and you know I've got toget that.
But for the most part I've gota page of notes Like I wouldn't
even call it notes, but justbullet points of either a key

(26:25):
stat or a point or a word that Iwant to mention.
I find, again, everybody'sdifferent.
I find that the less words Ihave written down or memorized,
the better that I'm at, thebetter I'm at, and I'll see it
especially early in the seasonwhere I'll look down.
I do everything digitally on myiPad, but I'll look down and
I'll have full sentences writtenout.

(26:45):
I'm like what are?

Speaker 3 (26:47):
you doing?
That's not you.

Speaker 2 (26:48):
But there's just, sometimes you get pulled into
that and then you got to go backand trust your instincts and
you're right, like, and I see ita lot, two people will say
somebody will bring up, you know, whatever I'll go.
Oh wait, you just brought upmagic.
I was going to ask that fivequestions later, so hold on,
I'll get back to that.
I got to go to this questionnext.

(27:10):
Essentially is what?

Speaker 3 (27:11):
they're saying, they're not saying, well, why
don't you just go there?

Speaker 2 (27:14):
now.
You know the conversation tookyou there.
Just go there now.
Sometimes it doesn't work.
Sometimes you've got like forme on my podcast.
I have only three and you wentthrough these.
I only have three scriptedquestions and it was never my
goal to have any.
And then what I realized wasthat I liked asking from that
baseball standpoint, using themetaphor or, in this case, as an

(27:37):
analogy I guess, what's thebiggest homerun you've hit?
No, it is metaphor what's thebiggest homerun you've hit?
What's the biggest swing andmiss you've taken?
And what is small ball, whatare the little things?
So I knew I'd want to ask everyguest.
That led to a lot of greatcontent.
Content still does.
But I also knew that it wasn'tfair to ask them those questions
if they hadn't thought aboutthem, and it does nobody any
good to have 30 seconds oftrying to come up with an answer

(27:59):
that we could at it out.
But why not at least let themput a little thought into it?
Otherwise, after that I usuallydo four final questions to
round the bases and I jot down acouple of notes of things I'd
like to do.
But oftentimes those finalquestions end up popping into my
head as the show is going onbased on some of their answers,
and so that's a kind of freeingthing.
I think you give me all kindsof ideas right now.

Speaker 1 (28:20):
So if I'm typing over here, it's because I'm learning
from you.
That's great, so okay.
So now you're doing Kansas CityRoyals post game shows.
You have a speaking business.
You have a speaking business.
Take me back a little bit, joel, like what first got you
interested in broadcasting?

Speaker 2 (28:35):
Yeah, you know the kind of fun story I'll tell, and
I'll tell this to audiences too, and it's not incorrect.
I just I mean, I can't piecetogether everything at a young
age.
This is what I remember andit's true.
Is that somewhere in first orsecond grade and I say first or
second because my first gradeteacher grew up outside of

(28:58):
Philadelphia in New Jerseybefore moving to Chicago when I
was 13, our first grade teachermoved up with us to second grade
.
So somewhere in that two yearspan, whether it was first or
second grade, this teacher, mrsDunwoody, who I remember very
well because my parents over theyears, like, became friends
with her well beyond when weleft and kept in touch with her
and she was a sweet lady and shewould complain to my parents

(29:22):
that I was disrupting class atyou know.
So, seven or eight years old,giving everybody the updates of
the scores and the games and therecaps from the night before.
Now, let's keep in mind this isthe 1980s.
I mean not that a whole lot offirst and second graders
probably have phones coming intoclass, but you know this is

(29:42):
pre-internet, pre-all of thatstuff.
You got your sports informationeither from watching the news
or maybe a game.
It's not like there were ahundred games on ESPN and this
and that right, I mean there was, cable was still not that
expansive.
So I was disrupting classgiving sports updates, basically
as a seven and eight year oldand so that I remember is the

(30:06):
first signs of it.

Speaker 1 (30:07):
And then I know, as a teenager, and your teacher had
to deal with this for two yearsbecause she, I think of the
teaching industry.
They call it looping when yougo from one grade, yeah, so she
got two years of Joel Goldberg.

Speaker 2 (30:17):
She got stuck with the Goldberg loop and I don't
know when it was like I want todo that.
I just know that I lovedwatching the local sports guy on
the news back then and that Iwanted to either be that or I
wanted to be the play-by-playguy and as I got older and
teenage years I used to sitthere and watch games my

(30:39):
parents' house or in a room andturn the volume down and pretend
to be the announcer.
Which is why you tell people topractice now anyways, but that's
what I was doing, and so I knewfrom.
I don't remember ever wantingto do anything else, which is
pretty cool.

Speaker 1 (30:52):
Wow, that's awesome.
So how does that grow then?
Because I mean, we talk aboutpossibilities on this podcast
and for you, that was.
It wasn't something thatsomeone said Joel, I want you to
go and start.
You just you knew that youwanted to do it, and it makes me
think of me with magic.
I was like you can't stop me,right, and you don't have to
tell me how.
I'm just gonna find a way.
How did that go into?

(31:13):
Now I'm gonna be a professionalsports broadcaster.
What was the evolution like?

Speaker 2 (31:18):
Well, I mean, I think the first thing I would say too
and this applies to everyone isthat you talk about
possibilities.
What exists today, or maybe Ishould say what could exist in
10 years, 20 years, five years,three years, I don't know what
could exist then may not evenexist now.

(31:40):
So when you talk aboutpossibilities, I'm not even sure
that you need to see it, youjust need to be open to it.
Because I'll take you back to1994, which is when I graduate
from the University of Wisconsinin Madison, wisconsin, and I
wanna be on TV.
And really now my backgroundand my path is to be on local

(32:01):
television news, because myfinal two years at Wisconsin I
got an internship with the NBCtelevision station.
I think those internships wereprobably supposed to be a one
month thing.
They usually are.
It's usually an unpaid.
Get some credit so that we canjustify, you know, the free
labor.
And when I say labor, I meanit's not like you're lifting a
lot of heavy things or whatever.

(32:22):
A lot of times you're sittingbehind a television watching a
game and writing down what timethe key plays happen.

Speaker 3 (32:28):
Labor so.

Speaker 2 (32:31):
Yes, it's a grunt worker, but I don't know that
they really if they were payingattention or they just liked me.
But they had me do foursemesters, so I had two years of
working for this NBC televisionstation.

Speaker 1 (32:43):
It came back on you the looping thing.
Now you're having a footerright.

Speaker 2 (32:46):
Yeah and a good call.
And I was able to really buildsome trust in relationships with
the people that I was workingfor.
These were some of my earliestinfluences.
I wanted to be them.
I wanted to be them when I wasa kid, without knowing who they
were.
Now I meet these guys and nowI'm trying to be them and
ultimately I did.

(33:06):
And so I graduate fromWisconsin in May of 94.
I'm sending resume tapes allover the country and I joke now
that nowadays the kids just senda YouTube link Much easier,
right?
Well, they got linked in andthey got email and all this type
of stuff.
Well, guess what?
So does everyone else.

(33:27):
So in the television world, ifyou're applying for a TV job and
in 94, if you want to get on TV, you're going to a local news
station and you're startingsmall.
Most people get out of itbecause why would you want to
make no money with that collegedegree and have to relocate to a
small town?
I knew that that was the onlypath and so there was never a

(33:47):
second guessing of the firstsalary that was less than
$15,000 a year.
But I'm often running, I'm inTV.
But let's say that you'reapplying for a television job
and I just I make these numbersup.
But let's say there's.
Let's say there are 10,000 kidscoming out of undergraduate and
more grad school and all thattoo.

(34:08):
But let's say there are 10,000kids that want to get on TV in
any given year and I don't knowif it's 5,000 or 20,000,
whatever it is, it's a lot ofpeople.
Let's say there's 10,000 kidsgetting out of college,
22-year-olds or whatever, thatdon't really know a whole lot of
what they're doing, that wantto get on TV, and of those
10,000, there might be 50 jobsout there if that, at any given
moment, there might be 25, maybe50.

(34:30):
How are you going to be one ofthe 50 out of 10,000 to do this
when nobody's really vac rate?
They don't have a lot ofexperience, and so I got
rejected everywhere that I went.
I was mailing out these tapesand I have a collection of
rejection letters.
They all sent rejection lettersback and I got desperate and I

(34:52):
started to make phone calls.
Instead, I started cold calling, and I tell this because most
people hate cold calling, myselfincluded.
But if you want it bad enough,you'll do whatever it takes.
I was eyeballing going back tothe local hot dog stand
restaurant where I worked inSuburban Chicago and they, by
the way, would have paid meabout twice as much as I made in
television to start to managethe restaurant.

(35:14):
And I started calling.
I remember it was my parents'landline.
I had a script written out andit would be the same thing every
time.

Speaker 1 (35:22):
Speaking of scripts, right.
This is where you developedyour hate for scripts, right.

Speaker 2 (35:26):
Yeah, but I also had no confidence of how to quote,
unquote, wing it and how tothink off the top of my head.
That thought, even intelevision at that point was
mortifying to me because I wastoo worried about my looking at
the camera right and my standingright and my this and my that
and my projector.
There's so many millions.
It's kind of like I'm not agolfer.
Once twice a year it's kind oflike a golf swing.

(35:47):
Like how do I get done what Ineed to do when I'm thinking of
a hundred things?
So I didn't have that comfortlevel yet and so I'm reading off
of the script.
I would call Devin the TVstation there were no real
websites yet and I would.
The receptionist would answerand I'd say, hi, can you tell me
who your news director is?
Yes, it's Devin Henderson.
Okay, thanks, click.
10 minutes later.

(36:08):
It's like when you're youngerand you wanted to call the girl
and you're thinking, okay,when's the right time to do it?
When can I call back?
Oh, they didn't answer or justwent over, not that you were
over.

Speaker 1 (36:20):
Yeah, I was going to say, not that you were
overthinking, not at all.
I hadn't been overthinker, so Ican relate.

Speaker 2 (36:24):
I would wait 10 minutes after I hung up on the
receptionist and then call backagain.
Hi, can I speak with DevinHenderson?

Speaker 1 (36:30):
Would you do it in a different voice?
No, I thought about it, though,like your trick or treating,
and you come back in a differentcostume.

Speaker 2 (36:35):
Yeah, the whole thing is just preposterous.
And so for the conversationthen, reading from the script hi
, I'm Joel Goldberg.
I recently graduated from theUniversity of Wisconsin.
I understand you don't have ajob opening right now, but I'm
passing through town next weekWith Will Ferrell.

Speaker 1 (36:50):
With Will Ferrell On the way to Branson, on the way
to Branson To do the Bandjomshow.

Speaker 2 (36:53):
And neither of us are going to any of those places,
but I'm on my way or passingthrough and would you be around
on Tuesday, wednesday orThursday because I'd love to
hand deliver a tape and meet you.
And all but one said yes andthe one that said no said I
can't guarantee I'm going to bethere and I already found
another TV station in that town,so I went anywhere and dropped

(37:13):
it off.

Speaker 1 (37:14):
So how many?
Yes, like how many people werethere?

Speaker 2 (37:16):
Over 20.

Speaker 3 (37:17):
Wow, that's a good, and I started driving all over
the country, right.

Speaker 2 (37:20):
Because, look, if you're them, you've probably
been in my shoes at a certainpoint.
Yeah, you hear from a millionpeople and if someone's willing
to take that extra step, what Imean I do this too now.
I mean it's great to be able togive back and, who knows, maybe
you actually end up with a lead.
And what happened is that,instead of being see when you're
, when you're applying forsomething and everybody else is

(37:42):
applying, you have to hope thatyou make it to the front of the
stack.
You have to hope that theyactually ever even see you.
You don't know that they'regoing to look at you or not.
What I guaranteed was that whena job opening came up, I was
going to be on the top of theline because they had met me,
and it was the earliest lessonto me.
I didn't even grasp it at thetime, it just was instinctual.
It was the earliest lesson tome that relationships matter,

(38:04):
that relationships and buildingtrust, which is what I speak
about now, matter, because whenyou can get to know somebody,
you've got a chance.
If you don't get to knowsomebody, it's a complete shot
in the dark, and that's whatopened the door.
And but going back to theoriginal two.
If you look at what I'm doingnowadays, I host a pre and a
post game show, so it's over 300shows a summer.

(38:25):
You know we do close to 160games If you were wondering why
he's so polished.

Speaker 3 (38:30):
now you know it's all debatable, it's all.

Speaker 2 (38:33):
It's all matter of perspective too, and humble.
Look at that.
They may love you, they mayhate you, but but pre game, post
game show pretty much every dayfor six months straight,
hosting a podcast.
First off, none of those thingsexisted.
When I broke into television,there weren't pre and post game
shows.
You might have, like, a Sundaynight wrap up show on the local

(38:55):
news for sports.
We might have a special highschool football Friday show or
something like that.
There were no pre and post gameshows.
There were no sidelinereporters.
I'm also the in game reporterfrom the by the dugout with the
Royals those roles there werethree or four guys doing that on
a national broadcast forcollege football, maybe your NFL
, and that was it.

(39:15):
So everything that I'm doingtoday was was really it
manifested over time?
None of it existed back then,and so that's the beauty of it.
You jump in and then you let itgo where it takes you.

Speaker 1 (39:26):
Yeah, what I love about your story?
First of all it reflects mineand my beginning and cold
calling.
Cause for me it was restaurants.
I thought if I could just landa couple of restaurant gigs
doing table side magic, thatwould pave the way, cause then
it's like making connections,like the relationships factor.
You're talking about hand outthe business card, getting hired
for private parties, gettinghired for corporate events, but

(39:47):
walking into the restaurantsasking who the general manager
was, you know, cause the phonething didn't work for me at
first they were like goodbye.
So then I learned okay, you gotto go in, you got to ask for
the GM and then you've got tolike be ready with your, with
your script Right.
For me it was like my scriptwas to have a deck of cards on
me and something that lookedlike a professional business
card and to go in.
But what I really love aboutyour story, you, you had a

(40:08):
possibility mindset, becausesomeone could have shut you down
and been like Joel there's20,000 students who want to do
what you do.
There's no way.
Fine, find something else.
But you said what else ispossible?
What if there is a way?
What if I?
What if I go and visit?
You know, reach out to 20people and and drive around the
country and do this.
And I mean, if you hadn't had apossibility, mindset, none of

(40:30):
that would have ever happened.

Speaker 3 (40:31):
You know, what's interesting too, is that.

Speaker 2 (40:33):
I don't.
I really have no idea orrecollection if anybody told me
to do that or if I just did it,but it's advice that I've given
to every young broadcaster eversince.
Most of the time I'll get alook like what language are you
speaking?

Speaker 3 (40:51):
And I'm like they're never going to do it, Like you
want me to do what?

Speaker 2 (40:53):
Like that's insane and I get it, but the odds are
you're not going to make it inthis business, Right?
And I could tell the ones thatthat will do it.
It's just.
It's just different.
We're in a we're in a differentage now, where everything is so
instant and everything andeverybody wants instant, I mean
that's, that's what I, that'sthat's what I feel most

(41:13):
concerned about for the youngergeneration and I I'm not an anti
like where the youngergeneration is taking us is a
great thing.
What's gone on in the world andthe change we've had post the
pandemic, you know more freedomin the workplace, you know
taking care of yourself, mentalhealth, all of these types of

(41:34):
things I think are are apositive step and it'll keep
going in different directions.
But my fear is just that withthat, convenience becomes
sometimes a lack of inability toto do face to face.
And we don't have to do face toface all the time.
But what ended up ultimatelygetting me in this business?

(41:55):
And you could say, oh, you know, that's 30 years ago.
I mean, the world has changed.
But whether it's face to faceor a connection on a zoom or
whatever it is, how did you getin?
You got in by going, gettingface to face with those GMs.
I got in by getting face toface with those news directors
around the country.
And and what I tell anyone thatasks me, especially if they're

(42:16):
asking me early enough, I wantto get into TV.
I get this all the time.
You know there's not a weekthat goes by, that, that someone
isn't asking to to pick mybrain on how to get on TV, which
is incredibly humbling, thatI've been doing this so long
that somebody would want to know.
And I say you, you need to keepdoing anything and everything
you can over and over again.

(42:36):
By the way, this is a lessonfor any business, that it's all
about repetition, right?
How are you so comfortabledoing all the magic and getting
on stage without getting nervousand freaked out?
And all that because you'vedone it over and over and over
again?
Oh my gosh, devin Hendersonlook at how crazy all that stuff
he does.
It's not crazy to you, you know.
It's crazy to everyone else.

(42:57):
It's not crazy to you becauseyou've done it over and over
again.
Oh my gosh, joel Goldberg getsin front of the television
camera every time and he neverlooks nervous, and I don't
always understand what the heckhe's talking about, but but he
seems really calm out there.
Well, because I've done itthousands and thousands and
thousands of time.
And so the two pieces of adviceI give you know, young aspiring

(43:20):
broadcasters, is do anything andeverything you can over and
over again, because everythingyou do is just experiences along
the way in the journey.
That's all it is.
You'll never look back at anyof them, or almost any of them,
and say, hey, I remember thattime when I.
It's not even going to be amemory, but what it will do is
build up muscle memory.
It will make you morecomfortable, it will allow you
to fail.
So that's the first piece.

(43:40):
And the second piece I think tome is that you're you're in the
business of collecting people.
Collect people every step ofthe way.
You never know who that nextperson is that could be your
boss or know your boss or beable to be your advocate.
But the way you get them toadvocate for you, the way that
you get them to to be thatperson that can help you, is by

(44:02):
understanding boundaries,reading the room.
So you collect these people andthen you be someone that
they're willing to hear, thatthey're excited to hear from,
which means you don't botheranyone too much.
You know the right time, when'sthe right time, when's the wrong
time.
And suddenly you know all these.
Like I'll hear from a collegekid hey, I'm broadcasting.

(44:22):
You know our local blah blahblah games.
I'm like great every time thatthe other school comes in.
Meet their broadcaster, meettheir, their media meet, meet,
meet their coaches, meeteverybody you can along the way,
because you never know who thatnext person is.
Might that might open a doorfor you, and so you're in
control of that and how you goabout it.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (44:42):
So repetitions, relationships, that's it.
Boom, that's it.
I love it, man, I love it.
So let's jump to the stage,because now you, now you speak
about your experiences in a waythat other people can say, oh
wow, those are some good.
That's some good life, wisdom,life hacks, mindset tools,
whatever you call them, what.
What do you speak about?

(45:02):
How do you use your baseballanalogy and your broadcast and
experiences to help people livebetter lives?

Speaker 2 (45:08):
Well, it all started with and I just kind of stumbled
into this as a side hustle andthen it became a main hustle and
then it was like I think somepeople still think it's just
this little side hustle.
It's like it's one A, one Bwith my baseball schedule and so
, you know, it's everything tome and I I thought when I
started this someone had givenme this suggestion.
You know, I think you could begood at this.

(45:30):
I'm like man, I'm spoken torotary clubs.
I don't know, like you knowthere's a difference.
Right, you know, you go, you gospeak to a rotary club, a
church group, it's, you know,it's kind of community
engagement.
You're giving an update on theteam.
Now somebody wants to pay youand the question, at least in my
mind from day one, was ifthey're going to pay me, then
what are they going to pay me todo?

(45:51):
Like nobody's going to pay you,to give an update on how the
Royals are going to do this year.
Hey, thanks for coming out.
What do you think the Royalsare going to do this year?
Well, I think they're going towin X amount of games.
Great, here's a check.
You know, it just doesn't.
There's some entertainment Q&A.

Speaker 1 (46:07):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (46:07):
What's the takeaway?
What's the message?
So I thought, you know, Iwatched the Royals go from one
of the worst franchises inbaseball to a championship and
and they, yeah, they had goodtalent, but really what they
they prodded themselves on wasbuilding a culture, a
championship culture, and Ithought, well, boy, that's
relatable to any profession.

(46:29):
So at first I started talkingabout championship culture, that
small ball, big results.
What are the little things thatadd up to the big results?
And I had all these differenttopics.

Speaker 1 (46:38):
And, by the way, for those of you that maybe aren't
Kansas City savvy, they won theworld championship back in 2015,
.
Right, it was when it had beensince 85 when they won their 30
years, yeah.

Speaker 2 (46:49):
There's so many cool stories with that.
Again, I'm in my role,traveling with the team and
doing all the interviews and thepre and post game show.
I'm the fly on the wall.
I'm the.
I'm the fly on the wall thateverybody wishes they could be,
and so I always understand thatin my role in TV, I get to share
some of that.
What I've found out is that Iget to share a lot more of it

(47:09):
when I'm not on TV.
Instead of a 30 second or a oneminute report, I've got close
to an hour to handcraft thismessage to make people better,
expand these stories, challengethem, get them thinking in a
different way.

Speaker 1 (47:23):
And with the World Series under the belt of the
Royals, I mean you got a lot ofleverage as a speaker Like
you're coming, you know it helps.

Speaker 2 (47:29):
Yeah, it helps, but you know, we're also now nine
years from that, and so it'slike but I also believe now you
don't get as much attention thatwhen a team and last year I
covered a Kansas City Royalsteam that lost 106 games out of
62, tied for the most they'dever lost, and I would say that
there were a lot of lessonslearned from that failure that I

(47:49):
could also use to help peopleAlong the way, and you remember
this too, like in the earlyyears, you're trying to figure
out what's the message thatresonates.
Do I want to go here, here,here here, and eventually you
find that sweet spot, and for meright now, it's trust.
I think that the number onetopic that I talked about in

(48:10):
every culture speech was trustand just finally said you know
what?
Let's hone in on that, becausethere's not a story I tell that
doesn't involve trust.
Every story I tell involvestrust and it's what I have to do
every single day.
I think sometimes people assumethat because I've done this so

(48:32):
long that it's easy, right thatI'm just living this world with
all these athletes and I do.
But I could throw that awaytomorrow.
I'm not a former player.
Most of my fellow broadcastersplayed professionally.
I never did anything like that.
I just love to talk about itfrom all the way back in first
and second grade, right.

(48:53):
So I feel like I have to earnthe respect of those players and
the fans for that matter everysingle day that I'm there, and
even in the off season if thereare opportunities to touch base.
So I have this lifetime ofexperience of building trust and
getting results.
In a way that's allstorytelling based.

(49:14):
I mean, I'm a storyteller tobegin with.
Now I get to bring it on stageand so I think you know, I do
think we all like to be that flyon the wall.
We all like a peak behind thecurtain.
You and I are sitting here inKansas right now and we can do
all kinds of fun things aboutthe Wizard of Oz.
Sometimes I feel like I'm theWizard of Oz in the sense that I
get to go places that no onegets to go.

(49:36):
And now if I could take thoseexperiences and shape them in a
way that allows somebody to goback to their company and be
better, especially in a day andage right now where we're not
communicating and connecting theway we used to.
The other thing to Devin isthat as I get older and I joke
that because of course we allget older, but every day that

(49:58):
I'm in this game I keep gettingolder and the players keep
getting younger, and that's notan exaggeration, because every
player that I covered when I gotinto this game is retired and
I'm still here, and guys that Icovered that were just coming
into their prime when the Royalswon the World Series in 15.
Salvador Perez is a greatexample.

(50:19):
This baseball season coming up,opening day, march 28th, will be
my 14th season with SalvadorPerez, the longest that I've
ever been with any athlete.
That's a long time.
The chemistry and theconnection that he and I have is
better than anyone that I'veever covered.
And this comes from a51-year-old guy that grew up in
the suburbs of Philadelphia inChicago and a 33 or 34.

(50:43):
He'll be 34,.
He's April of 90,.
I believe He'll be 34 in April.
I believe May.
I think he's May.
So a 34-year-old guy that grewup in a single parent household,
raised by his mother and hisgrandmother in Venezuela, and

(51:03):
the guy 17 years older you knowthat was graduating high school,
as this guy was born in anothercountry.
Like, we have nothing in commonand yet the bond that he and I
have is so good and I couldthrow that away tomorrow if I
don't go about things the rightway.
And so I have this experienceof being able to connect and
earn the trust of athletes thatnowadays are almost half my age.

(51:24):
He's one of the older ones,salvador Perez, the guy that's
now the upcoming superstar, theexpected Patrick Mahomes in
baseball of Kansas City a goodfriend now of Mahomes, bobby,
with Junior, just signs a $289million contract to be here long
term, at least seven years.
As many as 14, he's 23.
And I'm 51.

(51:45):
You know he's two years olderthan my oldest.
If I can't connect with thatyounger generation and
understand what makes them tick,I become irrelevant in this
business.
So there are a lot of lessonsthat play out in what I call the
quote-unquote real world.

Speaker 1 (51:59):
Yeah.
So you've got several topics.
We could go deep and it wouldtake us hours for me to ask all
my questions about trust.
How do you develop trust?
How do you keep thatrelationship going for so long?
We don't have time for allthose questions.
But also, you mentioned failure.
I mean you have all thesedifferent topics, right, and so
what do you say to the meetingplanner when they you know, I
know you have a manager,charlotte, who's amazing and

(52:20):
when they say, hey, what's Joelgoing to teach our people?
We've looked at his website.
We just need to give us asynopsis.
What are they going to go dodifferently because they had
Joel speak?

Speaker 2 (52:29):
And I think again, it does all start with trust.
I mean baseball, sport offailure, great teaching, all
that type of stuff but how tobetter connect with the people
internally and externally withintheir worlds, and how to do it
quickly, but, more importantly,how to do it over the long term
and how to sustain it.
Because in the end, I'm not inthe baseball business any more

(52:50):
than you were in the magicbusiness.
Right, we're in the peoplebusiness.
Yeah, that's it.
That's it.
I just happen to be living inthis world of being in the
people business, with somepeople that are doing freakish
things that most of us don't do,and I get the free pass to be
in there, no different than youliving in that magic world.
Not a whole lot of peopleunderstand that.

(53:11):
So you, as a speaker, can goand say, hey, I'm going to do
all this cool magic stuff, and Ican go in there and say I'm
going to tell you the coolestbaseball story is great, awesome
, we'll laugh and we'll have fun.
But what are the takeaways?
And when you have a takeaway tome, that's where you find that
success To me, if I can go inthere in front of an audience

(53:33):
and explain to them why I failedto connect with Albert Pujols,
probably the greatest playerthat I've covered in my lifetime
and one of the greatest hittersin the history of Major League
Baseball talking about 150 yearsworth of history and a guy
who's in the same sentence interms of production with Babe
Ruth, and it took me seven yearsto earn his trust.

(53:53):
If I had to do it again, I thinkI probably could have done it
in one or two years with him.
But if I can connect with a guyagain, from a different culture
, a different background, thatwas the biggest star in the game
, that was very leery and nottrusting of others.
Impossible to connect with Aguy that I despised for a lot of
years because I didn'tunderstand why he wouldn't talk

(54:14):
to me, to then get to the pointwhere he would do anything that
I asked of him.
I mean, the line that AlbertPujols gave me was, in the end,
was there are a lot of peoplethat pull me in a lot of
different directions.
There are a lot of people thatwant something from me.
Once I trust you, I'll doanything for you.
So to me, the pitch to thoseevent planners is that we all

(54:37):
deal with rejection.
I know how to make thatconnection.
I know how to teach them how tobuild that trust.

Speaker 1 (54:44):
Nice.
What I'm getting is that ifyou're a company and
organization who's looking for aspeaker, you didn't ask me to
pitch a commercial, but what I'mhearing is that After you've
hired, devin Well.
I mean, if you want to build astrong culture of trust and be
able to build trust immediatelywith maybe new hires or new
clients, new partners, and alsobe able to just develop that

(55:06):
factor of trust over the longhaul so that we're breaking down
silos where there's morecohesiveness who doesn't want
this in their company?
From a fun baseball typeperspective that's not a
baseball speech you can helporganizations achieve that so
they can achieve better resultsand hit a bigger bottom line
together.
I mean, it trickles all the waydown right, that's it.

Speaker 3 (55:26):
So get this guy while he's available, I'm taking
Devin on the road with me.

Speaker 1 (55:31):
As we start to wrap up, just two questions I want to
throw back to you from yourpodcast, if you'll let me do
this, which I know you give yourguest time to think about, just
your biggest strikeout and yourbiggest home run, because you
mentioned failure, so I'd loveto just hear more about how your
failure, what you've learnedfrom that.

Speaker 2 (55:48):
So I've thought about this a lot and of course most
of my guests say some version ofthis too, with the swig and
mist.
I've swung and mist a milliontimes and so I can go in a lot
of directions.
I just told you the AlbertPujol story.
I think that that's probably mybiggest, because I for the

(56:11):
better part of seven years I hadnothing with the guy.
I mean maybe one out of every10 times he might say yes, but I
mean I held my breath and mychest was pounding, heart
pounding, waiting for thatrejection every single time, and
in the end it made me better.

(56:31):
I don't know if I'd be furtheralong than I was.
I mean it felt awfully sweetonce I moved on to Kansas City
and he moved on to Anaheim for$300 million or whatever he got,
and to be able to get theone-on-one interview and have
people say, boy, how did you getthat, how are you getting this
exclusive interview?
And so it gave me a lot ofcredibility.

(56:53):
But I think for me what Ilearned from that swing and miss
with with Albert is that weoften misunderstand others Along
the way, especially when theydon't give you what you want or
you know they keep you fromgetting to what you want.
It's very easy to either notlike someone or wonder why

(57:14):
they're being this or this orthis or this or this.
And what I learned was that foran Albert Poole's All right guy
that hit over 700 home runs youknow we're talking Babe Ruth,
hank Aaron territory here he'sone of only four that ever hit
700 home runs that we can'tpossibly know what it's like to
walk in someone else's shoes.
But when you make a little bitof an attempt to understand

(57:37):
their life a little bit better,when you make a little bit of an
attempt to go deeper than whereyou're trying to go instead of
it being about you and I want toget here Can you?
Can you understand what they'regoing through?
Can you understand that they'regoing home to Family issues
just like the rest of us, and asick child or you know, maybe a
fight with a wife, or you know,a sick mother or whatever?

(58:00):
It might be right that justbecause their name might be will
Ferrell or just because theirname might be Albert Poole's
Doesn't mean they're immune tothe challenges of life.
Mm-hmm, just because they haveall the money in the world, just
because they could hit a ballfaster and harder than anyone
else, and I think once youunderstand that you can go

(58:23):
anywhere if you go about thingsthe right way.
And no one ever taught me that.
There were no classes on this,and so you know.
They taught us how to set upcameras and lights, like Zach
did for us here, and and at onepoint I knew how to do that
better than I do it now, but youknow they taught us.

Speaker 1 (58:39):
I notice you didn't help at all.
You just kind of stood andwatched, yeah, like I did Zach's
, like really guys, it's all melisten.

Speaker 2 (58:45):
I used to have to do all this stuff, and it's not
that it's beneath me in any way,I just I think I've had enough.
You know, photographers andengineers and all that that have
said to me not leave right,don't touch it.
Just don't, please.
Okay, fine, I understand.
So I, you know, I wish Fromthat swing and miss and a lot of
swings and misses, over andover and over and over and over

(59:07):
again.
You know what they say, like itlearned from your mistakes.
Well, I wasn't learninganything, I All right, the guy
doesn't like me?
Well, I don't like him.
This, it's a pain covering asuperstar that won't give you
the time of day, and it neverdawned on me that it was
potentially my fault that Ididn't know how to make that
connection.
So the lesson learned is beforeyou put someone on a pedestal,

(59:32):
it's very easy to put people ona pedestal.
They don't have to be an AlbertPujols level I, the comparison
game that you talked about Icould put you on a pedestal
because, oh my gosh, I can't doit.
Devon's doing on stage whywould anybody hire me when he
could do everything that he's?
He's juggling and doing allthese magic tricks and his
energy is off the charts.
I'm never gonna be that.
How am I gonna do that?
Instead of putting you on apedestal, instead of putting

(59:54):
Albert on a pedestal, how aboutgetting to know them a little
bit better?
And then, suddenly, you reapthe rewards of that relationship
?

Speaker 1 (01:00:00):
Yeah, ah, man, that's so great it, as you were
talking to me, to think justlove you know Like like love
covers over a multitude of sins,I mean, and it's whoever sins
that aren't.
And I think that's part of whatcan build trust.
You can build people's trustright if you're Showing them.
Hey, I'm gonna give you grace.
If you drop the ball, I'm notgonna blame you, I'm not gonna
gossip about you.
I'm gonna come to you directlywith any kind of problems.

(01:00:21):
Let's work on this relationship.
You know, I so, I so.
You said you kind of didn'tlearn at the time, but at the
end, as you look back, youlearned a huge lesson, no
question.
And so that's that's the beautyof it the and the beauty of it.

Speaker 2 (01:00:33):
I mean I wish I'd figured it out sooner, but I
think I learned more by notfiguring it out soon.

Speaker 1 (01:00:38):
Wow, man, that's deep , that's crazy like.
But the delayed lesson hadvalue.
Third right, that's crazy.

Speaker 3 (01:00:46):
There's.

Speaker 2 (01:00:47):
Honest, I don't know if I could find this or not.
I wrote down a quote.
I'm a quote guy and that's oneof the beauties of sports too,
is that oftentimes you, you seethose quotes come up During, you
know, just during a toughmoment in in in sports.
And it was the I'm doing thegood old stall here, as I love

(01:01:09):
it, man.
This would just be like.

Speaker 1 (01:01:12):
I'll put in music and you know.
But yeah, that's like what theJeopardy theme song.

Speaker 2 (01:01:18):
No, I've got so.
When the when the chiefs beatthe Baltimore Ravens in the AFC
championship, I heard JohnHarbaugh say afterwards you
never know what lessons you'lllearn from the experiences you
have, and so my challenge onthat would just be Look for
those lessons right.
Understand that in theheartbreak of failure that's
something good will come of it,and you may learn it later.

(01:01:39):
But if you're really observingin the moment, you might see
what that is and it becomes verypowerful.

Speaker 1 (01:01:44):
I mean, you ask what else is pop?
This is a hard situation.
My career is now Effectedbecause of in a negative way,
but it's what else is possible?
What if this is growing me insome way?
You know that's the great thingabout always thinking
possibilities, so awesome.
So your home runs are honestlyin a lot of your lessons that
you've learned.
But is there one home run youwant to share?
With us we haven't gotten aglimpse of yet.

Speaker 2 (01:02:04):
You know what I think it is and because it's very
easy, I think like the home runquestion for me and for you,
like the home run question couldbe something like what's the
greatest magic trick you've everdone?
Right, I'm sure I asked yousomething?
like that and what's thegreatest interview you've ever
done?
And the greatest game, thegreatest, this great.
And those are fun, but I thinkfor me, it was starting this

(01:02:27):
speaking business and the reasonwhy I say that is so.
I came to Kansas City from StLouis in 2008 and it was the
first time that I was anon-salary employee, basically
meaning I'm gonna come here,have more responsibility, I'm
gonna be on every game, travelwith the team, I'm gonna make
the money that I did in my lastplace over six months.
You don't have the benefits andall that.
I'm a freelance.
Essentially, you got six monthsto do whatever you want, and I

(01:02:49):
didn't Find that what I wanted.
I was doing random games.
You know a college game here, ahigh school game there, and it
was something to get off thecouch.
And I bumped into some friendsand they said what are you up to
?
I'm, you know, just a game hereand I'm speaking to some golf
course management associationNext week.
Oh, do you do a lot of that?
Not really.

(01:03:10):
I mean Not usually.
And I said, well, you couldstart a business and you can.
You can do well with that.
You know, you know how to speakand all that I didn't know such
a thing as this world, yourworld, exists.
I Thought a speaker was likeTony Robbins and we'd all love
to do that too, but yeah, noteverybody could be Michael
Jordan, and so, you know, therest of us can live a really

(01:03:33):
good life in this pro world andand, and and do well and make an
impact and and take care of ourfamilies.
And so I I called the home runbecause what it did for me,
devin, was that I'd never beenin business for myself, I'd
never been an entrepreneur Okay,I'm a freelance TV guy that
here the games you're working,that it's not like running a
business.
So, yeah, I started to learnhow to run a business and

(01:03:55):
started the podcast and wrotethe book and all these type of
things, and suddenly it's thistiny little media company, if we
want to call it that.
But what I figured out instarting this in late 2016,
which then turned into 2017baseball season Was that I was
going to work, meaning KaufmanStadium or around the country,
to baseball games every singleday, with a different
perspective.
It made me a better reporter,because I started going

(01:04:19):
Selfishly and saying what can Ilearn today?
Who can I talk to today thatCan give me something to bring
to an audience on stage.
What can I learn today that Icould share to make others
better?
That enabled me at a time I'vebeen doing this for a while now
to sharpen my skills, to look atthings differently, to be more
curious, all the things that Ineeded To do to be a good

(01:04:41):
reporter.
That I was doing fine, but it'scertain it started to push me
into deeper ways and and digginga little bit deeper and
building stronger Relationshipsit just it made me a better
Television broadcaster.
That wasn't the intent, hmm,but in trying to help others it
just it made me more focused andthe two kind of play off each

(01:05:04):
other right now.

Speaker 1 (01:05:05):
That's crazy, yeah, that there was like this rest of
prosody between what youbrought to the stage and then
what the stage brought to lifeeven for you.
You know, and made you better,because now you're more hyper
aware of Sharing.
Now am I doing that right?
Am I walking the talk?

Speaker 2 (01:05:19):
And look the bulk of what I find out every single day
.
It's a long season, two tothree stories every single day,
times 160, and the bulk of themwill never make the stage most
of them all, but it just I.
It forced me to Dig deeper andthat makes for better broadcast.
That makes for betterinformation for my television

(01:05:40):
audience.
The television audience isn'tall that different than our
audience on stage.
The difference is thetelevision audience is a little
bit more entertainment and theywant to be updated on their team
and Get some fun stories.
And then the the you know stageaudience is more about what can
I take back to work to bebetter?
What can I take back to my lifeto be better?
But in the end you're affectingpeople's lives.

Speaker 1 (01:06:02):
Yeah, what I love to, I think about, like any anyone
who's listening, you know,whatever position you're in of
leadership, of influence.
I think of parenting.
When I'm telling my kids tobehave back to a certain way,
I'm like, well, now I've got todo that right, because they're
gonna.
It's that old saying thatthey're not gonna do what you
say, they're gonna do what youdo, and so I love how that that
comes back on us and I thinkthat, to your point, devin, we

(01:06:27):
all have the chance to do that.

Speaker 2 (01:06:29):
So, you know, I like to encourage people to to say,
like you don't have to be agreat magician, you don't have
to be a sports personality infront of a television camera
that gets to go into theselocker rooms.
Everything that you talk aboutand I talk about, anybody can do
.
And I talk about being curious,I talk about wanting to know

(01:06:50):
people's stories and seeing howthey could help with others.
Well, you can walk around youroffice, wherever you're at, and
get to know people better on adeeper level, and it's gonna
make you certainly better inbuilding that trust and you may
learn things that you couldshare with others and mentor and
on and on.
I mean it's the gift that neverstops giving if you're paying
attention.
So this is not just a how to bea better broadcaster or how to.

(01:07:12):
It applies to any walk of life.

Speaker 1 (01:07:14):
Yeah, that's great, joel, thanks for coming on today
.
Really appreciate this, I know.
I know you all have gottensomething out of that From the
from the second we started tothe second we stopped.

Speaker 3 (01:07:23):
So appreciate you, man.
Thank you, devin.
Thanks for having me on, thanksfor the breakfast tacos.

Speaker 2 (01:07:28):
Absolutely Shout out to etc.
Here.
Yeah, and I appreciate it,thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:07:31):
It'd be fun to do it again sometime too, man.
Always happy to do it Awesome.
Well, hey everybody, joelGoldberg, remember to go to
YouTube to get the fullexperience.
One thing you can help us to onApple or Spotify, you know,
give us that five star rating.
If it's genuine, give us acomment.
That'll help us spread thismessage to more people.
And so Did I say thanks to etc.

(01:07:52):
Again, yet Did I say that?

Speaker 3 (01:07:53):
I mean you did you did.

Speaker 1 (01:07:54):
There you go.
Joel said it Well, thank you,etc.
Shiny, we really appreciate it,thanks to our new producer,
zach, who is just crushing itright now.
So this is gonna be thebest-looking podcast, yet we're
gonna end it with, just like thequestion you ask when you
embrace a possibility mindset,which is what else is possible.
So I'll say what else you'llsay is possible.
You're ready.
Yes, I got it cuz, you're ascript guy you need it All right

(01:08:19):
.
So remember to never stopasking the question what else is
?

Speaker 3 (01:08:24):
possible.

Speaker 1 (01:08:25):
See you next time.
Hey, sorry, afterthought, ps.
Right, um, go to.
He didn't tell me to do this, Iwas like Joe, I forgot to
mention your website.
So, joel Goldberg media Com toconnect with Joel and especially
to book him as a speaker.
Joel Goldberg media calm, we'llput it in the show notes and
that's it.
See you next time.

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}#23 Kansas City Royals Broadcaster Joel Goldberg

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#23 Kansas City Royals Broadcaster Joel Goldberg

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