July 7, 2026 • 46 mins
Bumper to Bumper with Dan Barreiro!
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
We're telling the truth.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Yesterday at six twenty four, when we said Dan Barrero
should be back tomorrow, we expect that Bumper to Bumper
will be full strength. That's debatable from three to six thirty.
The big ticket will be back after the fourth of
July weekend. As Brett Blakemore is my witness, that was
the intention. As Rich Spielman once said, we have no
intention of trading Percy Harvin. But things change, conditions change,
(00:25):
and in this case, I'm sure when Dan returns, hopefully tomorrow,
who knows. It sounds like he will have quite the
travel tale to tell. I got a text about seven
in the morning, which is early for Dan and me.
We like to get things going just in case I've
got to find a guest to book, or I think
there's someone he should reach out to get on their radar.
(00:46):
Day of We usually talk between eight, eight thirty nine o'clock.
If it's ten, then I really feel guilty as a
producer that I'm not doing my job. But I got
the text around seven this morning. I'm the usual host
of this show saying not going to work gonna be
surprising if I make it back in time for the show.
(01:08):
I will let him give all the details. But I
had every intention of mailing and end today and just
being the usual goofy sidekick. A couple of cheap shots,
couple of jokes, a couple of takes while he's reading texts,
and that's your plan today. But here's the thing. I
was locked in early for the show yesterday. I had
(01:31):
all the guests I wanted to have on. I knew
exactly who we needed, I knew exactly what regulars we had.
I really liked what we had today or yesterday. Today
we're going old school. I didn't say I'm just going
to force a guest in. I didn't say I'm just
going to pop on Alec Lewis to.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
Talk to Vikings. What's going on with the Vikings? Nothing?
Speaker 2 (01:52):
Even lu Nani, the Tuesday regular. I texted him and said,
I don't know what your plans were, but if you
weren't planning on coming in, feel free to take the
day off. And he said, I'll do that, thanks, because
there's nothing going on with the wild right. In fact,
there's something I'm going to talk to you about later.
Is it time to pivot off of Dylan Larkin mull
(02:12):
that over for a minute.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
I saw that on social media today.
Speaker 2 (02:16):
Sure I could have Jason Frederick on, or Pat mcletty on,
or the voice of the Gophers, Mike grim On. I
could have all the usual guardsy crutches on today, but
we're not going to do that.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
We're going to grow a little bit. Brett Blake Moore.
Speaker 2 (02:27):
It is going to be a talker Tuesday and in
some cases a talkback Tuesday at the bottom of the hour.
I'm gonna need a lot of feedback, and I think
we're going to open up every channel. The branch on
Brian Cafe in text line six four six eighty six.
My Twitter handle is open. That's at guard Zy, that's
with a hy not ie. We're going to open the talkbacks.
I don't even know how to log into the talk
back over there because it's been so long since we've
(02:49):
actually used them, and we may even dust off the
phone lines. I think the number is eight hundred and
three to two zero five three two six. Used to
have a sixty five to one nine nine five three
two six number. I don't think we have that one anymore.
I don't think we're straight up toll free. If you
don't know what toll Free is, well, you're probably not
listening to this station because you're too young.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
Eight hundred and three to two zero five three two six.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
We might open it up because, like a lot of
people today, we're gonna do the audio think piece on
how to fix youth sports or how to fix youth soccer,
because that is the think piece that I think every
columnist in the country had in their drafts ready to
send to their editor about ten minutes in to the
(03:38):
round of sixteen match last night in the World Cup,
and that's where we begin today. The joy ride always
ends fast, doesn't it. I feel that way when the
Wolves are out of the playoffs or the Wilder out
of the playoffs, you're in this meat grinder. Every other
night there's a game, you're reviewing a game, previewing a game.
(04:01):
What are the adjustments going to be? How's this series?
Jade McDaniel said, they're all bad defenders. Jokis tried to
kill him, women Yama tried to kill nas Reed, what's
going on with Jamie benn Is, Kapriesov gonna score?
Speaker 1 (04:13):
How good is Quinn Hugh's been?
Speaker 3 (04:15):
Man?
Speaker 2 (04:15):
If we can just get by Colorado, then it's basically
a bye to the Stanley Cup Final. Like there's all
these things that you just break down and then you lose.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
And it's it. It's over.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
You're on to the next thing. I remember feeling that
with Gopher women's basketball. You're on this amazing ride. You're
top ten in the country, you're a number four seed,
You've got eleven thousand people at Williams Arena, game winning
shot with three tenths of a second left. You go
out to Sacramento, you play UCLA, you lose, and then
you're home and it's over.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
You just have to move on with the rest of
your life.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
It always always ends abruptly and ends fast. And the
most fun run of US men soccer in my lifetime.
And some people might say, oh, two right, that was
the quarter final year. Was that the landed non e ingol. Yes, okay, yep,
some people might say that. But the most fun run,
(05:13):
at least for me, the first time I really got
into it.
Speaker 1 (05:17):
And I think a lot of people are in my boat.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Here ends in the most painful, dreadful way possible and
could possibly haunt these guys for a really, really, really
long time because when you think about everything that was
set up, and I know that a lot of them
talked about it last night. Expanded field waters it down
a little bit. Right, Teams that you weren't even thought
(05:41):
to have had a chance to play because they just
started soccer ten minutes ago or just got into.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
The World Cup.
Speaker 4 (05:46):
You got to play relatively easy group. Right, they were
in pot as they are Pop one. It's as easy
as it gets.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
Easy as it gets, relatively easy, first knockout round opponent
right in Bosnia Herzgovina. I think they've been that far
one time in history to the knockout round. We even
got the controversial FIFA corruption decision. We had the presidential
trump card, We had everybody mad at us, You had
(06:15):
the undivided attention of the sporting public, You had the
undivided American public attention at large. And from everything that
Mike Trudell not my pillow, Guy, Pierre Nusium, Brett Blakemore,
all the people that love soccer that are in my life,
those three, and they were all on the show yesterday.
What they say about Belgium not great form, been a
(06:38):
little choppy, They might be getting older, their best football
is behind them. It was all laid out you're in
the perfect soccer city, Seattle. Will cloud Cover Softy from
kJ R.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
Was there.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Disaster disaster last night, so much of a disaster that
even the other soccer fans in my feed were commenting.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
Man, this could really actually sets you back.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
We were all excited about the growth of the game
and the popularity of the game. A performance like this
with forty million people watching, this is something that really
halts that momentum. We're going to talk about it first
couple of segments. Everybody's bored and bitter with Polistic. Now
everybody's done with him. I think I understand some of
the reasons why. To me, it comes down to a
couple of things. Belgium was ready to play. Obviously, whether
(07:33):
they were mad about the Balligan red card or not,
they were ready to play. They scored less than ten
minutes in after the US got the Tillman shot, which
was again awesome, like, hey, we're back in it. Bad start,
nothing good, We're back in it. Well, they hadn't even
like reset the field yet and we were already down
two to one. Again, It's almost impossible to give up
(07:53):
a goal sixty seconds after you've scored one, but we
did if there's one word to describe the effort early,
I don't know how you feel.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
I tweeted it out. Nervy.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
You can tell that because and I get it. When
you're trying to do something that you've never done before,
and all of a sudden, the spotlight is on you,
and you know what everybody's been talking about, that this
is the match. You'd already kind of been giving the
mulligin next round, lose to Spain, no harm, no foul,
But this is the one. Let's get to the quarters,
let's do it. They played like it. They were tight,
(08:25):
The passes were all over the place, just horrifying defense
that you know when our coach is just throwing his
arms up, like, what are we doing? Cam Dnsler, what
are we doing? The Belgian four check? That's what I'm
calling it. I thought was outstanding. Like they gave us
no time in space like my hockey analogies, noe, like
(08:47):
we had it.
Speaker 1 (08:47):
They go, no, we're just gonna run up on you.
We're going to make you get rid of it.
Speaker 4 (08:50):
They were gripping the stick too tight, they were, That's
exactly what was happening.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
And they were trying to be too cute, and you
just got to get shots on net. You just got
to throw it go high side on Crawford. They weren't
going to give us any time to start passing it
around and doing our version of the Pentagon.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
They weren't doing any of that. We were going backwards
a lot, and.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
I know that's a thing you go backwards to set up,
but we felt like we were going backwards because there
was no place else to go, and then we couldn't
do it, and then they would for check again and
we'd lose the ball.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
It was bad.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
That doesn't even mention the goaltender meltdown. I've never seen
anything like that in a high stakes game. It was
a buzzkill. It was a bummer, and just like that,
it's over. The dream is dead. You've already moved on.
You're already looking at transfer windows. Your Polisic jersey nowhere
to be found. And it was a fun three weeks.
(09:40):
We're going to talk about get Blake Moore's thoughts on
the match as our official World Cup correspondent when we
come back. I'll also get to the polistic problems, because
people are bitter with him for a number of different things,
including some postmatch comments that we will play big picture.
(10:00):
I think it's still an absolutely successful World Cup for
the US. We can argue about that, we can talk
about that. I love opinions, but that one's mine. The
last three weeks were fun. I thought they played really well.
The Paraguay match will always stand out to me.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
It was great.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
But when it ends, man, it ends quickly. So where
do we go from here? That will be a theme
in terms of the soccer next segment, in terms of
everything else in this country, sports related, more specifically you
sports related that's coming up at the bottom of the
three o'clock hour.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
When we will need participation from the audience.
Speaker 5 (10:38):
Justin guard In for Barrera on the fan from the
one eight hundred Ask Gary Traffic Center.
Speaker 4 (10:44):
This report is sponsored by GenZ Ryan Heating. Bonus Bucks
is coming back to KFAM starting next week. We'll have
nine chances for you to win one thousand dollars every weekday.
It's every hour from nine am till five pm. Tenner
keywords and learn more. Head to kfam dot com. Bonus
Bucks is presented by big deck dot Com.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
Kike Show Edition Bumber to Bumber rolls on guards he
In for Barrero today, Bret Blake Moore back as well.
Speaker 1 (11:17):
We expect Dan back tomorrow.
Speaker 2 (11:19):
We expected him back today about help never know, airline travel,
Lill Dicey, Litt Dicey nowadays. So we are here until
six thirty. Guests free Top five at five coming up.
Something to monitor, or at least something will bring up
at some point during this show as it relates to
the Minnesota Timberwolves. Brian Windhorst, ESPN dot Com, ESPN Wendy
(11:40):
apparently via ESPN Cleveland said, Lebron absolutely knows what team
he's going to sign with, and the vibes are pointing
towards returning to the Cleveland Cavaliers.
Speaker 1 (11:54):
Religion.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
Continue to monitor that wait for the white smoke. We'll
wait for everything there with Lebron, and later probably in
the five o'clock hour, maybe four thirty, we will talk
a little bit about the Wolves plan, with or without Lebron.
Speaker 1 (12:07):
I know you've been thinking about it. I have for
the last fortnight.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
You've been dying to try to figure out what the
Wolves are trying to piece together.
Speaker 4 (12:13):
It just makes so much basketball sense. Cardsyes, that's what
I see.
Speaker 1 (12:17):
So how are you doing? How how are you doing?
Speaker 2 (12:19):
Today before we get into how you were feeling last
night as one of the number one soccer people on
the station. Really you and Nordo are the two football fiends. Yeah,
I would say even you more so because you don't
have three kids like him. You're locked in on Premier
League and everything that goes with it.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
So you are.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
That's why you were the bumper to bumper World Cup correspondent,
because of your connection to the beautiful game. So as
a guy who I've seen you three times in the
last three weeks, and each time you were wearing the
pallistic kit, how are you doing today?
Speaker 4 (12:51):
I mean, fine, it sucks. It's about the worst way
you can imagine. If they would have played their best
in Belgium would have just been better. We're not having
any of these conversations. Yeah, it's like, well there's the
better team. It is what it is. I think people
are being a little dramatic. You know, you were mentioning
it's gonna set soccer back in this country for you know,
(13:12):
seeing a performance like that, it's like, well, they were't
going to win the whole thing, you know, and who's
to say they don't lose three to Zil to Spain
in the next round and we go boy didn't even
show up and it's the same thing. So I think
that angle of things is a little dramatic. But the
performance was just hideous. I mean you could go to
a man and just say this guy stung. And the
(13:34):
tactics that Belgium had they subbed off their two best
players from more athletic, bigger guys to just bully us
and it worked to perfection.
Speaker 1 (13:43):
Yep.
Speaker 4 (13:44):
They moved their striker. I I was just watching a
video on this. They moved him to just float next
to Tim Reim, our oldest and slowest defender, and they
just used and abuse him. I mean it was The
first goal was on Realm, the second goal was on Reem.
The third goal could have been by Rien but he
couldn't manage to turn his body around because the goalkeeping feet.
(14:04):
You know, the disaster that was the goaltending situation there.
All four of the goals were completely preventable and individual
mistake caused them to happen. So when you see that,
it's just it just stinks, and no one. Polistic wasn't good.
The build up wasn't good. They couldn't string together two
(14:25):
passes it felt like just the cohesiveness and organized we
have a game plan and we're sticking to it that
we saw every other game that the starting eleven played
was gone. So that angle really sucks of it. I
think in two weeks time it'll be, oh yeah, it
was a good World Cup. They played well, they had
some good moments, fell flat at the end, but we're
(14:46):
you going to do.
Speaker 2 (14:46):
I get Belgium credit for making them uncomfortable. I think
you nailed it, though. When you have a big opportunity
and this was as big as it gets, right, you
could argue this is maybe. I mean, you would know
better than me. I don't think I'm being hyperbolics, like
you're never going to have a better opportunity to really make.
Speaker 1 (15:05):
A big splash.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Hugh the Lavelli and Neal the third sounder make a
big splash and really get everybody at a fever pitch
for that match on Friday against Spain.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
But it's how it happened.
Speaker 2 (15:18):
When you have an opportunity like that, and I remember,
we can go through it in every sport, every team
when the build up is as big as it was,
and I don't remember one bigger and you've got the
scenes in Seattle and Tom Rinaldi's saying against Bosnia they
played with ten tonight, they'll play with twelve playing off
(15:39):
of that. That's just classic Grinaldi. Right, You've got all
of that going to play so poorly. That's where you've
said the word it stinks because it feels like you
didn't even give yourself a chance. You didn't even give
yourself the opportunity to make things interesting. And by the
way they said it that halftime, the first assistant coach
(16:01):
whoever it was, to talk to Jenny Taft after all
that we're only down one, like it could have been
much worse. It felt like they didn't have the ball
for the first fifteen minutes. They get the free kick,
which was awesome, and you're like, all right, you're you're
back in this thing. It was a disaster to start. Everybody,
calm down, We get why you were nervy. This is
the biggest match that really any of these players have
(16:23):
ever played in, right, so there's going to be pressure
and you could feel it just on the simple for
me tou passing that they couldn't quite figure out.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
But when you.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
Melt down that badly, that's where when I say this
could haunt them for a while because you never know
you're gonna have that opportunity again. Like when you have
a performance like that, I'm guessing as a competitor, the
one thing you want to do is just get back
out there and play like that wasn't us, and it
wasn't Polchettino said it after the match, that wasn't who
we've been for this entire tournament, and he was right.
(16:55):
And unfortunately, in a one and done situation, when the
other team has a say in it, you make a
couple of mistakes and that's all.
Speaker 4 (17:02):
She wrote. How many that's just playoffs? Playoffs, soccer playoff?
How many times do we see that in the NFL.
You've got a great, you know, stretch of games going
into the playoffs, you have one game where you don't
show up and that's it.
Speaker 1 (17:15):
It's over.
Speaker 4 (17:16):
So I don't know it. No one played well that game,
but I don't think. And we can get into the
polistic stuff too, because I'm as you mentioned, I was
wearing his shirt for you know, three weeks long practically, yeah,
a long time. It's gonna need multiple washes. I think
that a lot of the slack heat or a lot
of the criticism he's the slings and arrows he's getting
(17:37):
is mostly unjustified. He was terrible in this game. Yeah,
Like there's no getting around that. He was losing the ball.
No one was particularly good, but he was one of them.
He wasn't good. But I feel like that's coming from
a lot of people. I don't want to do that.
You don't know what you're talking about, you know you don't.
But it's like I watched this team play Nation League
(18:00):
games against Jamaica, you know what I mean. Like I
watched this team play Gold Cup games against Costa Rica
in here, so like I'm I don't just watch once
every four years, and I know that Polisic when he's
on the pitch, it's different and it feels different.
Speaker 1 (18:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (18:16):
So, did he have a horrible, no good, very bad day. Absolutely,
he's stunk. But that doesn't mean let's strip him of
Captain America and get him off all the commercials, you
know what I mean. It's just no one played well. Yeah,
so I don't know. He got hurt trying to score
a goal, trying to have a shot and he kicked
somebody's ankle who tried to make a play on it.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
So where are you starting, because that's one of the
big I'm with you to this extent. There's a lot
of people that have said, out of the seven World
Cup matches, he's missed like three of them or something like,
he's not been available very much and that could just
be bad luck. That and you mentioned the injury last night.
That's bad luck. Like you're going to try to score
(18:58):
the guy's foot gets in your way.
Speaker 4 (19:00):
I'm sure that hurt, Like, hey, kick the hell out
of it, you know, Calf.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
I'm sure that really hurt.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
Now where do you stand on The broadcasters are saying, bro,
we love you.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
You got to get off the field. You got to
get down.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
You got to put your hand up, like, we appreciate
your trying to cut it out here, but if you're hurt,
you're not helping us. And I think they scored. Was
it the last goal at that point or whatever it was.
Speaker 4 (19:19):
I think it was the third one.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
Regardless, you got to get They were pretty adamant that
you got to stop trying to be the hero there.
I get you want to stay in but if it's
that bad, and here's what he had to say, by
the way, after here's Jenny Taft and Polisic.
Speaker 3 (19:33):
You know you're in a lot of pain, had to
be stepped off.
Speaker 6 (19:35):
What were you dealing with fighting through?
Speaker 3 (19:38):
Yeah? I mean I just twisted my ankle and just
just sprained my ankle. I mean it's just frustrating to
end like that, of course, but you know, now I
get time to rest so for a little bit.
Speaker 2 (19:48):
Okay, So everybody's mad about that last part. Now he
gets time to rest. I don't know, nice attitude, that's
what you're thinking about.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
Now you get to rest.
Speaker 4 (19:56):
Someone sent this to me with that exact same like
what a pansy.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
People are mad about it. So you're saying that's trumped up.
You don't buy that.
Speaker 4 (20:03):
I don't understand the frustrated What do you want him
to say?
Speaker 5 (20:05):
Oh?
Speaker 1 (20:05):
Man, well now I get to rest. Yeah, we know,
because you're out of the World Cup.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
He.
Speaker 4 (20:10):
Was saying. They asked about the ankle. He said, well
I get to wrestle. Hopefully it'll be okay.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
Are you a polistic pocket protector.
Speaker 4 (20:18):
Of one hundred percent? And I'll stand by it. So
I just think some of that and he's not. I
think a lot of it comes from when we expect
the stars, the Captain America, the Anthony Edwards, justin Jefferson's there.
Their personalities, you know, just jump off the screen. And
Polistic just doesn't have that personality. Sorry, he's an introverted,
(20:40):
soft spoken guy, and I think that just rubs people
the wrong way. Yeah, like maybe if he was sobbing
in that interview, Oh.
Speaker 1 (20:46):
My gosh, I can't believe we lost. It's going to
be four years.
Speaker 4 (20:49):
But that, I'm sure people will go the other direction
and go he's soft. He's crying. You can't be blubbering.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
Oh, he's polarizing in general.
Speaker 4 (20:56):
He's polarizing in general. That he's a soft spoken keep
to yourself die. He's not a super he's not an
Anthey Edwards that you know has got his logo everywhere
and his shoes and it's just he's not that type
of personality.
Speaker 1 (21:10):
So a big picture, was this a successful World Cup
for the US men's national team? World Cup correspondent Brett Blakemore, I'm.
Speaker 4 (21:21):
Standing by what I said yesterday. If they lose it,
it'll be a good World Cup, won't be a great
World Cup. They would have won, it would have been
a great World Cup. It's a good one. They played well.
They showed they can play an organized game. But the
weaknesses that we knew coming into it were the goalkeeping
is a problem.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
And.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
How does that happen? What is he doing on the
third goal?
Speaker 4 (21:44):
I have no answer for you. I don't know how.
You don't just you're you had it right there. Maybe
you're expecting that you're going to get a cleat in
the calf, so you you pull up on it. I
have no clue.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
But he did his foot get caught in the turf
a little bit. It feels like I got tried it,
so I.
Speaker 4 (22:01):
Think he hesitated on one, he got caught on the
turf two and then they get an open shot. But
then Tim Reim is there. Yeah, I can't do anything
about it.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
That's tough, though. It's tough.
Speaker 4 (22:12):
All you get you don't even have to stop it,
just redirect Iteah away from goal. That's hard though, But
you're also not expecting it. You're not expecting your goaltender
to completely throw up all himself out there.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Yeah, when you're like I said.
Speaker 4 (22:27):
It was like Marty Turco, but he you know, caught
an edge and slipped and slid to the red line,
That's what it was.
Speaker 2 (22:33):
I do think it was a good World Cup. I
might even say great. Now I look at it as
I'm the casual. I'm the guy that just came into
this literally first half of the Paraguay game, Like that's
a great place to come in though. But watching that
and going this is fun. This is entertaining, and I
can see why people like this. And I've lived through
I've had We've been on the fan twenty two years.
(22:54):
Whatever it is, oh good for me. So how many
World Cups have we gone through? We mentioned Jamie Watts
and Sneaky Pete's Poor Richard's Lavelle Neil the Third doing
the show with Pa and Dube down Highway one hundred,
Uncle Sam waving people in to come watch with us,
like we've been I've been through a lot of these
as the casual observer. This is the first time, certainly
(23:16):
since I started working here in three that it all
felt It felt different, It felt real, It felt like
something cool could happen.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
Not that they were going to win the World Cup.
I don't think anybody expected that.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
But because of all of that, and because of just
how the conversations I feel like have changed between the
hardcore is like you and.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
The casuals like me.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
Globally, Yeah, I feel like it was a very successful run.
And women come here next year, right, and that's a
totally different deal because they win the World Cup. Quite frequently,
I've turned watching every second of nineteen ninety nine. I
remember exactly where I was watching all of it. Brandy Chastain,
the whole deal, her sister and law coaches soccer at
the U.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
It's all good.
Speaker 4 (23:57):
But I think they've got a new core too. A
lot of their old card is gone. Morgan and yeah everyone, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
So it'll be interesting to see.
Speaker 2 (24:05):
Where it goes. But I think it was a successful run.
I think it was a good run. We can split
hairs on good to great. I think you probably lay
it out pretty fairly there. But I know I enjoyed it.
I know the regular host of this show enjoyed it.
I'm sure he'll have a lot of thoughts if when
he ever gets out of Chicago, he'll have some thoughts
for all of us. But I hope you enjoyed it.
Speaker 1 (24:25):
Hope you. I know you're bombed.
Speaker 4 (24:27):
I got more than sixty seconds worse, that's for sure.
Exactly now, we'll go back to that for a while.
We'll go back to that limit. Worst case scenario. If
you can get Max to talk a little bit more soccer,
that's fine. But we'll get sixty seconds of soccer on
this show from.
Speaker 1 (24:39):
Time to time.
Speaker 4 (24:40):
What if the US is in like a big final
against Mexico, is it that Teca could be pro probably
in Vegas or something.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Yeah, No, not really, No, I don't know. We'll see,
we'll see. If you would have asked me three weeks ago,
I wouldn't have thought.
Speaker 4 (24:56):
That said definitely.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
No, Yeah, three weeks ago, I wouldn't have thought I'd
be this invested in this team in this run and
enjoyed it as much as I did. We've got more
soccer to sprinkle in as we go. As it pertains
to the men's national team. It's the last day really
for the post mortem for our World Cup correspondent Brett
Blake Morman. We said yesterday, we hope it's not the
end for the US side of things. We'll maybe keep
(25:18):
you on retainer as the later rounds go, because the
tournament still goes on for like six months.
Speaker 1 (25:23):
We've still got that going.
Speaker 2 (25:24):
But when we come back the day after the day after,
when the US loses, there's always the think pieces. We're
in think piece time. Now, what to do? How do
we fix it? This is a problem with the youth system.
This is a problem with how kids are raised in
the game. Why does Europe have it so much better
than we do? Why are we the only country that
(25:45):
can't figure it out? Well, it's not necessarily a soccer problem.
It's not unique to one sport. We're going to try
to tackle it. I go in eyes wide open that
we're probably not going to come up with many solutions today.
I do think when it comes to the youth sports
problem that we have in this country, and by the way,
we have it big time. I came up in it.
(26:06):
I'm in it right now with my own kids. I'm
living it like a lot of you are out there.
But I want some feedback on a couple of different things.
When we come back, we will try to tackle the
untackleable the youth sports problems in America.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
We will get to that when we come back. Let
bumper to bumper.
Speaker 4 (26:30):
The fan welcome some great shows at Grand Casino Arena
this year, including Journey October fourth, Smashing Pumpkins October fourth, thirteenth.
Take us around till now. Get complete details on all
of our upcoming shows on the concert page kfan dot com,
Keybor Calendar.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
All Right, techs have already come into the Bradshawn Brian
Kfean text line sixty four six eighty six, and we
haven't even really introduced the that I do.
Speaker 1 (27:00):
Want to spend a lot of time on. It's a
topic that's not new.
Speaker 2 (27:03):
It's a topic we've spent time on on this show
and other shows for many, many years. But it's something
that if you're listening to a sports talk radio station
or like sports, you're probably in the thick of it,
or have been in the thick of it, or at
least know someone that is, and it has to do
with you. Sports and soccer is the natural jumping off
(27:23):
point because the World Cup just ended, and I swear
the second that the match was over, like actually over, not.
Speaker 1 (27:31):
When we gave up the goal after we tied.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
It, sixty two seconds after we tied it and we
went down two to one, or our goaltender threw up
on himself and we went down three to one, or
when Polisic got hurt and then everybody was mad at
him not then, but when the horns actually went off,
the three horns, only four minutes of extra time too.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
Seemed light. Seemed light.
Speaker 4 (27:51):
Seems like the vibes we were talking about the vibes,
they were dead, so we don't need all four them.
Speaker 1 (27:55):
Vibes were bad.
Speaker 2 (27:56):
Yeah, but the tweets and the thing pieces went out immediately,
and the one that caught my eye, and a million
of them have. And I've spent a lot of time
today just kind of parsing through it because you don't
have to go very far to find people's opinions on this,
and they already made. But was from Clay Travis, out
kick Guy. He's on Twin City's news Talk Buck and
(28:17):
Travis been a sports guy, been all over the place
speaking of polarizing. He's got opinions. He likes to inflame,
he loves to throw stuff out there. He's Clay Travis.
But this tweet caught my attention and some others. One
big US soccer thought Colin. Our youth development has got
(28:39):
to get more affordable. One of my kids plays travel.
It's at least five thousand dollars a year. And this
isn't even super high end. We can afford it, thankfully,
Watts can't. Youth sports costs in the US are out
of control soccer more than most which somebody named Mike
Herndon quote tweeted it and said this one hundred percent true.
(29:03):
If you have a six year old who is any
good at all in the US, your options currently are
a cheap rec league soccer where your child gets zero
coaching and no real competition, or b shell out thousands
per year to a travel club completely broken system. Twitch
that second point one hundred percent right, and the disclaimers
(29:29):
that I would get out there at the beginning, because
I do want to talk about this for a while
and get a lot of different opinions. A couple of disclaimers.
Number one, not every person or group that runs a
for profit club is in it for the wrong reasons,
Because we get that a lot. There's a lot of
(29:51):
There are plenty that are that just want to make money,
that have put all their eggs in that financial basket
to this is how I'm going to make my li
I'm gonna support my family this way.
Speaker 1 (30:02):
I'm club director.
Speaker 2 (30:03):
Why, I've got to recruit a certain number of athletes,
and there's a number of parents that are going to
pay whether I'm delivering on anything that I say I
can deliver on or not. There are a lot of
bad ones, there are a lot of good ones. So
I'm gonna try to I want to get that out
there about the generalities, because that gets thrown out there
(30:24):
a lot. It's like everything's a money grab, everything's about
the dollar.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
I don't think that's true.
Speaker 2 (30:30):
As someone who's grown up with it, who participated in it,
and now currently has not one, not two, but three
kids who are in various stages of these the wreck
to the travel, the fun with very little compelling coaching too.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
You have to turn over your entire life.
Speaker 2 (30:48):
The other disclaimer I will say is I'm not going
to come at this like I have every single answer
in this thing, because I certainly do not, and we
certainly do not. Because I've already, in just the short
amount of time that my kids have been in it,
I've already fallen prey to this stuff. I've already made
poor choices, I've already had to rethink things, I've already
(31:10):
had to back off. I've already had to say this
seems like not a good situation. And I like to
think of myself as someone who's pretty educated on the
whole thing because I'm around a lot of coaches.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
I grew up with a lot of coaches.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
Like I feel like I have an advantage of what's good,
what's bad, what's fake, what's real, what's the money grab,
what's productive? And I still, at the end of it,
a couple of things we've done, like, man, this was dumb,
Like I put my kid in a bad situation here.
So we're all kind of learning as we go, We're
all kind of winging it. So I don't claim to
have all the answers, but what Mike outlines is something
(31:47):
that I've found to be completely true.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
I've said it before about politics.
Speaker 2 (31:53):
If there's no money in the middle, you can't make
any money online, you can't make any money doing a show,
having a YouTube chante. If you're just playing it straight
down the middle, taking it issue by issue, you have
to be insane this way or insane that way, because
what does that do. It drives engagement, It gets clicks,
it gets people talking. There's no money in the middle.
So the reasonable stuff that I think most of us
(32:15):
kind of long for politically and otherwise, it's hard to
find that stuff because there's no money in it. There's
no money unless you're making people mad this way or
happy this way, or vice versa. It's the same here.
I think in the sports world there's no middle ground,
or at least I haven't found enough of it yet.
I found it in some places in some of the sports.
(32:38):
It seems like every sport we've been in or are
currently in, you have two options. And I don't know
if this is like this when you grew up, Brett,
but you have two options. Wreck the community stuff. Every
community center in every community and city, in the lobby,
they'll have the pamphlets or they'll have the guide. Here's
(32:59):
our programming on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from ten twenty
to eleven. We've got soccer, and it's fifty four dollars
for the whole thing. And you show up and there's
ten kids, and two of them really want to be there,
two of them might want to be there, and six
of them don't want to be there at all, hate
everything about it. And they're all on the same team. Well,
(33:20):
that's a tough situation if you're the two that really
want to be there, So what do you look for?
I'm going to look for something a little bit more competitive.
I'm not just there to smell Dandy Lions and get
the icys after the game. My kids like to play.
My kids like to win. My kids want to keep score,
they want to know the standings. All right, Well, we
(33:41):
have an option for you sign this contract that's longer
than the NDA that attendees of Taylor Swift and Travis
Kelce's wedding guests had to sign.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
Make sure you book every.
Speaker 2 (33:52):
Weekend for the next fifty two weeks and do the
next thirty six just to be safe, because we might
qualify for some other tournaments.
Speaker 1 (33:58):
We're gonna need a year and a half out of
your life.
Speaker 2 (34:00):
We're gonna make you try out for a team in
August that doesn't start until March, and we're gonna need
two thousand dollars now and probably two thousand dollars later.
And when we get there, there's probably a uniform fee,
and they're gonna be a tournament or two that aren't
in the original package, so we're gonna need an extra
one hundred and fifty to three hundred dollars for those
as well. And when we get to those tournaments, all
the parents that are gonna be there.
Speaker 1 (34:19):
They're not just gonna want to.
Speaker 2 (34:20):
Go to Culver's or Dairy Queen or McDonald's or dunkin
Donuts to get to breakfast or the dinner.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
After the games are matches, we need.
Speaker 2 (34:26):
To go to a very bougie tap house so we
can have some beers, we can have some dinner. They
don't really have a kid's menu, so you got to
order op. That's gonna be a couple one hundred dollars too.
By the way, this tournament is six states away, which
isn't really drivable, so you might have to fly, but
the drivable ones with the gas prices are still really expensive.
That's your option. There's no middle ground. There's wreck, which
(34:51):
is what I grew up playing for a really long
time house league basketball, and then we started traveling in
like fifth grade. I think we had two teams. We
didn't have A or B until we got to I
think seventh grade or and that that's over now. I mean,
if you're not playing traveling basketball in third grade, now
you're cooked. It's toast. I can't even believe. Why would
(35:13):
you even try to go to tryouts like that's absurd? Oh,
you didn't get him in traveling before they were ten,
well good luck. They're not gonna play, so you've got
the wreck or you've got to literally sign over your
entire life. And there's very little middle ground to the
whole thing. And that's where I think we're cooked and
we're stuck, because I don't blame the people that start
(35:35):
the programs because people are gonna pay for him, and
as long as people are gonna pay for them, there's
gonna be there's gonna be programs for it. So I
guess what I'm saying is the only solution we really
have to the pay for play thing, because that's what's
being blamed right now for the US Soccer and jump
(35:55):
in on this, Bret, because the European mod allegedly is
basically inverted from what we do, where it's a lot
of people to get to participate. The pro clubs have
clubs underneath them, and they have clubs underneath them, and
it's all very easy, it's all very accessible.
Speaker 1 (36:13):
When a player.
Speaker 2 (36:14):
Graduates out of a certain club, they get financially rewarded
for it. The cost isn't really passed on to the
parents as much as it is here where it's literally no,
you're funding all of this, and there's obviously there's scholarships,
and there's need based stuff and all of this. But
part of the reason why I think in sports we
(36:34):
lose a lot of it, and I don't know if
it's soccer or not you could maybe speak to it,
is the second your kid shows any interest in it
beyond reck, you basically need to ask chat GPT how
much money can I get from my kidney and where
do I need to go. There's no ramp up and
I've dealt with this with all three of my kids.
(36:55):
I've got a hockey player. God bless all of us. Okay,
as much as community hockey is a staple here in
Minnesota and most places in the country, say that we
do it better than anybody else, and I do believe
that we do. We talked about the Black Bear Hedge
fun thing out east where this company's just going in
and buying ranks and basically making it all club hockey,
and the community hockey models dying there because it's unaffordable.
(37:18):
You can't the Rex stuff can't happen. Minnesota still tries
to do it. I think that way, but as someone
who has a kid in a huge association that has
great association hockey and great volunteers and great availability and
great affordability.
Speaker 1 (37:35):
All those kids are doing a lot of different hockey.
All those kids are still.
Speaker 2 (37:39):
Doing Team AX, Team Y out, and my son's right
in there with them. I think we do less than
a lot of people, and I still think he's doing
too much. But that's the spot, the tricky spot that
you're in. And I have no illusions that I'm going
to get a text from RUSSOU Radio on the fourth
(38:01):
of July in twenty forty and saying, hey, has your
son decided who he's going to sign with? I'd like
to break it on the fourth of July. He's a
free agent. I have no illusions that one day I'm
going to be a source for RUSSO Radio on which
NHL team my son is going to play on. But
I want him to be able to play as long
as he can, competitively as he can, because he loves
(38:23):
to play. If I let him play ten hours a day,
he would play ten hours a day. Same thing with
my oldest son in basketball. If I told him go
play basketball all day, he would if I could. If
he could play all day, that's what he would do.
I have no idea what my daughter's going to do,
but I even think about her dance when she did
that at ages three and four. She did the dancing.
(38:43):
Think right, none of them know what they're doing when
they're on the stage. Half of them are crying. The
outfits cost like a thousand dollars. You give him the
flowers at the end. It's the greatest thing ever to
go to the next level. And I'm using quotations for
people that can't see me. I seriously got a pamphlet
that was like thirty two pages about what the expectations
were for the group, for the team.
Speaker 1 (39:04):
For the deal.
Speaker 2 (39:04):
I'm like, she's five, it's November right now, and you're
telling me that you need her this weekend in March,
this weekend and April, and this weekend in May, and
it's the expectation that the whole weekend is blocked after that.
You're aware she's five, right, that I sign up for
the wrong group. So that's part of the issue that
(39:26):
we're dealing with now. And the only way out of
that box is we have to stand up as parents.
We have to stand up as a as a parental community.
And say we're not doing it anymore because half the reason,
I'd say seventy five percent of the reason, I don't
know most of the time, the reason you're signing your
kid up for all this stuff is is because Brett
(39:47):
and his wife they signed their kids up, and we
don't want our kid to fall behind or we want
him to be in the frat like we're out. And
I don't even know if any of us really know
what we're chasing or what we're doing. But the pay
for playing model that's being talked about right now with
the soccer community of how we've got it backwards, the
(40:08):
only way we stop it is it has to come
from inside the house, doesn't it.
Speaker 1 (40:14):
These companies like, we'll change the model when people stop
making money out the model.
Speaker 2 (40:19):
Well, the only way they're going to stop making money
out the models if we stopped paying for it. Because
my response to that original tweet that I talked about
was everybody knows what the issues are or what we
think they are. Those have all been diagnosed. Why we
think we're behind in soccer, for example, or why the
best player in the world for basketball in the NBA
(40:41):
the last how many MVPs have not come from America, right,
They've come from Greece, They've come from Serbia.
Speaker 1 (40:49):
You'll go down the list. Canada and I know SGA.
Speaker 2 (40:52):
Technically it was a product of the AAU system a
little bit because he was from Toronto, I think, and
played a lot down here. But the European model for
sports development has worked out pretty well, and we all
know how they do it compared to how we do it.
(41:13):
And the only way we're going to change how we
do it is we have to the ones that are
in charge, the ones that had the endless group me's
and endless paypals and endless direct deposits and endless payment plans,
we're the ones that kind of have.
Speaker 1 (41:25):
To stop it. But do we have the stomach for it.
I don't know that we do.
Speaker 2 (41:30):
I'd love some talkbacks on it on how we feel
about the whole pay for play model in general. Is
it as broken on the soccer side of things, Is
it has broken on the hockey side of things, basketball? Whatever?
Is there a middle ground? Can we find a middle
ground on a lot of the sports. That's what I've
tried to do with especially my middle son who likes
(41:54):
to play everything and plays hockey and plays lacrosse and
plays football. He asked me one time, why does every
sport that I play, why do I need a helmet?
It's like, well, you kind of need a helmet your
entire life all the time. Bro, you were just that kid.
You run into walls. You don't care like that's how
it's going to go. And he likes he wants to
do the extra stuff. His friends do the extra stuff. Well,
(42:16):
I can't stomach doing all the extra stuff in any
of the sports. But what's the middle ground? Haven't found
it yet. I want to play one thing here. It's
about a three minute clip before we take a break,
take some talkbacks, take some calls, maybe definitely takes some
texts because they've been pouring in. It's just from a
(42:36):
hockey tournament that I think wrapped up today. Want you
to just listen to the audio. I've got one more
thing to say about it.
Speaker 7 (42:44):
After champion, right beside your name, Billy, You guys have
been knocking on the door finally bust through.
Speaker 6 (42:49):
What does it mean? Well, it means a lot to Minnesota.
Speaker 8 (42:51):
We represent a lot of teams that have come up
here and been close and back home.
Speaker 6 (42:56):
A lot of people.
Speaker 8 (42:56):
Every time we come up, they're like, bring it home
to Minnesota for the first time.
Speaker 6 (43:00):
And I've come up now eight times.
Speaker 8 (43:01):
You come home and you kind of feel like people
want that, you know, they want the brick back.
Speaker 6 (43:05):
Home in Minnesota.
Speaker 8 (43:06):
It's a big thing for everybody that's been there, and
the kids still wear the Minnesota gears, So to me,
it represents just bringing it home to a bunch of
kids that have played here too. And this team, and
we've been together for this team had been together the longest.
We got these kids together about two and half years ago,
and we just kind of felt like it was kind
of a team of first So Colton was the first
on Razer ever to return. It was the first time
(43:29):
that we'd ever gotten together to two or three years
in advance. We had a perfect storm with Kyloposo joining
us this spring.
Speaker 6 (43:37):
Stous our d guy, our defensive coach. He's a big
guru up in northern Minnesota.
Speaker 8 (43:42):
He was a captain of Denver, his two older boys
that played in the Brick, and I asked him to
be on the.
Speaker 6 (43:46):
Bench this time. He han't been on the bench.
Speaker 1 (43:48):
With us before.
Speaker 8 (43:49):
So if you look at our defensive totals, they're a
lot lower.
Speaker 6 (43:52):
Than they've been. You know, I'm an offensive mined.
Speaker 8 (43:54):
Coach, so to have that firepower up front and have
unbelievable defense, it just it was a game changer for us.
Speaker 7 (44:02):
So you guys executed the game plan I thought, almost
to perfection. You guys locked them down. Your back end
is strong, Wagner, and the pipes is also strong. It
just as you mentioned, it's kind of a perfect storm
this group. Just how special is this specific.
Speaker 6 (44:17):
Age group floor, this Minnesota squad.
Speaker 8 (44:19):
Well, you know, we knew this when we get off
the plane to come to Edminton.
Speaker 6 (44:23):
Every year, it's such a hard tournament.
Speaker 8 (44:24):
It's so difficult, respect it so much that we just
hope to get to the playoff.
Speaker 6 (44:29):
Round every year. This year, when we got off the plane, this.
Speaker 8 (44:31):
Group had a lot of success back home and tournaments
and traveling around North America for the last year and
a half.
Speaker 6 (44:37):
And when we got off.
Speaker 8 (44:37):
The plane up here, this group you kind of felt
it that they wanted you know, that the goal was
to win it, and that usually isn't the goal when
you come to the break. The goals to be competitive
and make the playff round. But Internally, we knew we
had something special and we wanted to put our head
down and get through the finish line and just stay
humble throughout the week.
Speaker 7 (44:54):
I know your message when you come to these things
is about.
Speaker 6 (44:57):
The journey, is about the experience. But it's kind of
feeling us to win one, doesn't it.
Speaker 8 (45:01):
It feels great. And there's also another side story. My
best friend, his son is on the team, and a
couple of years ago we got together and tried to
master playing.
Speaker 6 (45:11):
Sorry jud Peterson, He's been like.
Speaker 8 (45:15):
A second son to me, so I'm kind of feel
like I'm talking about my own son. But me and
Corey we've best friends our whole life, and we play
NHL ninety five on saega U Sports.
Speaker 6 (45:24):
We just love sports, and we're like, let's see if
we can win the Brick.
Speaker 8 (45:27):
And we kind of started putting pieces together and bringing
people in and it just formed a perfect storm.
Speaker 6 (45:33):
Billy, We're happy for you, We're thrilled for you.
Speaker 8 (45:34):
Go enjoy the moment, all right, Thank you so much,
Thank you Brick and the Brick staff.
Speaker 6 (45:39):
It's best.
Speaker 8 (45:39):
It is the best tournament in North America, in the
world in youth hockey, and we're It's honored to be here,
so thank.
Speaker 1 (45:45):
You the Brick.
Speaker 2 (45:47):
For those wondering a hockey tournament for nine and ten
year olds.
Speaker 5 (45:56):
In for Barrera, this is justin guard on the fan
from the one eight hundred ask Gary traffic sent
We're telling the truth.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Yesterday at six twenty four, when we said Dan Barrero
should be back tomorrow, we expect that Bumper to Bumper
will be full strength. That's debatable from three to six thirty.
The big ticket will be back after the fourth of
July weekend. As Brett Blakemore is my witness, that was
the intention. As Rich Spielman once said, we have no
intention of trading Percy Harvin. But things change, conditions change,
(00:25):
and in this case, I'm sure when Dan returns, hopefully tomorrow,
who knows. It sounds like he will have quite the
travel tale to tell. I got a text about seven
in the morning, which is early for Dan and me.
We like to get things going just in case I've
got to find a guest to book, or I think
there's someone he should reach out to get on their radar.
(00:46):
Day of We usually talk between eight, eight thirty nine o'clock.
If it's ten, then I really feel guilty as a
producer that I'm not doing my job. But I got
the text around seven this morning. I'm the usual host
of this show saying not going to work gonna be
surprising if I make it back in time for the show.
(01:08):
I will let him give all the details. But I
had every intention of mailing and end today and just
being the usual goofy sidekick. A couple of cheap shots,
couple of jokes, a couple of takes while he's reading texts,
and that's your plan today. But here's the thing. I
was locked in early for the show yesterday. I had
(01:31):
all the guests I wanted to have on. I knew
exactly who we needed, I knew exactly what regulars we had.
I really liked what we had today or yesterday. Today
we're going old school. I didn't say I'm just going
to force a guest in. I didn't say I'm just
going to pop on Alec Lewis to.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
Talk to Vikings. What's going on with the Vikings? Nothing?
Speaker 2 (01:52):
Even lu Nani, the Tuesday regular. I texted him and said,
I don't know what your plans were, but if you
weren't planning on coming in, feel free to take the
day off. And he said, I'll do that, thanks, because
there's nothing going on with the wild right. In fact,
there's something I'm going to talk to you about later.
Is it time to pivot off of Dylan Larkin mull
(02:12):
that over for a minute.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
I saw that on social media today.
Speaker 2 (02:16):
Sure I could have Jason Frederick on, or Pat mcletty on,
or the voice of the Gophers, Mike grim On. I
could have all the usual guardsy crutches on today, but
we're not going to do that.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
We're going to grow a little bit. Brett Blake Moore.
Speaker 2 (02:27):
It is going to be a talker Tuesday and in
some cases a talkback Tuesday at the bottom of the hour.
I'm gonna need a lot of feedback, and I think
we're going to open up every channel. The branch on
Brian Cafe in text line six four six eighty six.
My Twitter handle is open. That's at guard Zy, that's
with a hy not ie. We're going to open the talkbacks.
I don't even know how to log into the talk
back over there because it's been so long since we've
(02:49):
actually used them, and we may even dust off the
phone lines. I think the number is eight hundred and
three to two zero five three two six. Used to
have a sixty five to one nine nine five three
two six number. I don't think we have that one anymore.
I don't think we're straight up toll free. If you
don't know what toll Free is, well, you're probably not
listening to this station because you're too young.
Speaker 1 (03:12):
Eight hundred and three to two zero five three two six.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
We might open it up because, like a lot of
people today, we're gonna do the audio think piece on
how to fix youth sports or how to fix youth soccer,
because that is the think piece that I think every
columnist in the country had in their drafts ready to
send to their editor about ten minutes in to the
(03:38):
round of sixteen match last night in the World Cup,
and that's where we begin today. The joy ride always
ends fast, doesn't it. I feel that way when the
Wolves are out of the playoffs or the Wilder out
of the playoffs, you're in this meat grinder. Every other
night there's a game, you're reviewing a game, previewing a game.
(04:01):
What are the adjustments going to be? How's this series?
Jade McDaniel said, they're all bad defenders. Jokis tried to
kill him, women Yama tried to kill nas Reed, what's
going on with Jamie benn Is, Kapriesov gonna score?
Speaker 1 (04:13):
How good is Quinn Hugh's been?
Speaker 3 (04:15):
Man?
Speaker 2 (04:15):
If we can just get by Colorado, then it's basically
a bye to the Stanley Cup Final. Like there's all
these things that you just break down and then you lose.
Speaker 1 (04:24):
And it's it. It's over.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
You're on to the next thing. I remember feeling that
with Gopher women's basketball. You're on this amazing ride. You're
top ten in the country, you're a number four seed,
You've got eleven thousand people at Williams Arena, game winning
shot with three tenths of a second left. You go
out to Sacramento, you play UCLA, you lose, and then
you're home and it's over.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
You just have to move on with the rest of
your life.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
It always always ends abruptly and ends fast. And the
most fun run of US men soccer in my lifetime.
And some people might say, oh, two right, that was
the quarter final year. Was that the landed non e ingol. Yes, okay, yep,
some people might say that. But the most fun run,
(05:13):
at least for me, the first time I really got
into it.
Speaker 1 (05:17):
And I think a lot of people are in my boat.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Here ends in the most painful, dreadful way possible and
could possibly haunt these guys for a really, really, really
long time because when you think about everything that was
set up, and I know that a lot of them
talked about it last night. Expanded field waters it down
a little bit. Right, Teams that you weren't even thought
(05:41):
to have had a chance to play because they just
started soccer ten minutes ago or just got into.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
The World Cup.
Speaker 4 (05:46):
You got to play relatively easy group. Right, they were
in pot as they are Pop one. It's as easy
as it gets.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
Easy as it gets, relatively easy, first knockout round opponent
right in Bosnia Herzgovina. I think they've been that far
one time in history to the knockout round. We even
got the controversial FIFA corruption decision. We had the presidential
trump card, We had everybody mad at us, You had
(06:15):
the undivided attention of the sporting public, You had the
undivided American public attention at large. And from everything that
Mike Trudell not my pillow, Guy, Pierre Nusium, Brett Blakemore,
all the people that love soccer that are in my life,
those three, and they were all on the show yesterday.
What they say about Belgium not great form, been a
(06:38):
little choppy, They might be getting older, their best football
is behind them. It was all laid out you're in
the perfect soccer city, Seattle. Will cloud Cover Softy from
kJ R.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
Was there.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Disaster disaster last night, so much of a disaster that
even the other soccer fans in my feed were commenting.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
Man, this could really actually sets you back.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
We were all excited about the growth of the game
and the popularity of the game. A performance like this
with forty million people watching, this is something that really
halts that momentum. We're going to talk about it first
couple of segments. Everybody's bored and bitter with Polistic. Now
everybody's done with him. I think I understand some of
the reasons why. To me, it comes down to a
couple of things. Belgium was ready to play. Obviously, whether
(07:33):
they were mad about the Balligan red card or not,
they were ready to play. They scored less than ten
minutes in after the US got the Tillman shot, which
was again awesome, like, hey, we're back in it. Bad start,
nothing good, We're back in it. Well, they hadn't even
like reset the field yet and we were already down
two to one. Again, It's almost impossible to give up
(07:53):
a goal sixty seconds after you've scored one, but we
did if there's one word to describe the effort early,
I don't know how you feel.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
I tweeted it out. Nervy.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
You can tell that because and I get it. When
you're trying to do something that you've never done before,
and all of a sudden, the spotlight is on you,
and you know what everybody's been talking about, that this
is the match. You'd already kind of been giving the
mulligin next round, lose to Spain, no harm, no foul,
But this is the one. Let's get to the quarters,
let's do it. They played like it. They were tight,
(08:25):
The passes were all over the place, just horrifying defense
that you know when our coach is just throwing his
arms up, like, what are we doing? Cam Dnsler, what
are we doing? The Belgian four check? That's what I'm
calling it. I thought was outstanding. Like they gave us
no time in space like my hockey analogies, noe, like
(08:47):
we had it.
Speaker 1 (08:47):
They go, no, we're just gonna run up on you.
We're going to make you get rid of it.
Speaker 4 (08:50):
They were gripping the stick too tight, they were, That's
exactly what was happening.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
And they were trying to be too cute, and you
just got to get shots on net. You just got
to throw it go high side on Crawford. They weren't
going to give us any time to start passing it
around and doing our version of the Pentagon.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
They weren't doing any of that. We were going backwards
a lot, and.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
I know that's a thing you go backwards to set up,
but we felt like we were going backwards because there
was no place else to go, and then we couldn't
do it, and then they would for check again and
we'd lose the ball.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
It was bad.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
That doesn't even mention the goaltender meltdown. I've never seen
anything like that in a high stakes game. It was
a buzzkill. It was a bummer, and just like that,
it's over. The dream is dead. You've already moved on.
You're already looking at transfer windows. Your Polisic jersey nowhere
to be found. And it was a fun three weeks.
(09:40):
We're going to talk about get Blake Moore's thoughts on
the match as our official World Cup correspondent when we
come back. I'll also get to the polistic problems, because
people are bitter with him for a number of different things,
including some postmatch comments that we will play big picture.
(10:00):
I think it's still an absolutely successful World Cup for
the US. We can argue about that, we can talk
about that. I love opinions, but that one's mine. The
last three weeks were fun. I thought they played really well.
The Paraguay match will always stand out to me.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
It was great.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
But when it ends, man, it ends quickly. So where
do we go from here? That will be a theme
in terms of the soccer next segment, in terms of
everything else in this country, sports related, more specifically you
sports related that's coming up at the bottom of the
three o'clock hour.
Speaker 1 (10:34):
When we will need participation from the audience.
Speaker 5 (10:38):
Justin guard In for Barrera on the fan from the
one eight hundred Ask Gary Traffic Center.
Speaker 4 (10:44):
This report is sponsored by GenZ Ryan Heating. Bonus Bucks
is coming back to KFAM starting next week. We'll have
nine chances for you to win one thousand dollars every weekday.
It's every hour from nine am till five pm. Tenner
keywords and learn more. Head to kfam dot com. Bonus
Bucks is presented by big deck dot Com.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
Kike Show Edition Bumber to Bumber rolls on guards he
In for Barrero today, Bret Blake Moore back as well.
Speaker 1 (11:17):
We expect Dan back tomorrow.
Speaker 2 (11:19):
We expected him back today about help never know, airline travel,
Lill Dicey, Litt Dicey nowadays. So we are here until
six thirty. Guests free Top five at five coming up.
Something to monitor, or at least something will bring up
at some point during this show as it relates to
the Minnesota Timberwolves. Brian Windhorst, ESPN dot Com, ESPN Wendy
(11:40):
apparently via ESPN Cleveland said, Lebron absolutely knows what team
he's going to sign with, and the vibes are pointing
towards returning to the Cleveland Cavaliers.
Speaker 1 (11:54):
Religion.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
Continue to monitor that wait for the white smoke. We'll
wait for everything there with Lebron, and later probably in
the five o'clock hour, maybe four thirty, we will talk
a little bit about the Wolves plan, with or without Lebron.
Speaker 1 (12:07):
I know you've been thinking about it. I have for
the last fortnight.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
You've been dying to try to figure out what the
Wolves are trying to piece together.
Speaker 4 (12:13):
It just makes so much basketball sense. Cardsyes, that's what
I see.
Speaker 1 (12:17):
So how are you doing? How how are you doing?
Speaker 2 (12:19):
Today before we get into how you were feeling last
night as one of the number one soccer people on
the station. Really you and Nordo are the two football fiends. Yeah,
I would say even you more so because you don't
have three kids like him. You're locked in on Premier
League and everything that goes with it.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
So you are.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
That's why you were the bumper to bumper World Cup correspondent,
because of your connection to the beautiful game. So as
a guy who I've seen you three times in the
last three weeks, and each time you were wearing the
pallistic kit, how are you doing today?
Speaker 4 (12:51):
I mean, fine, it sucks. It's about the worst way
you can imagine. If they would have played their best
in Belgium would have just been better. We're not having
any of these conversations. Yeah, it's like, well there's the
better team. It is what it is. I think people
are being a little dramatic. You know, you were mentioning
it's gonna set soccer back in this country for you know,
(13:12):
seeing a performance like that, it's like, well, they were't
going to win the whole thing, you know, and who's
to say they don't lose three to Zil to Spain
in the next round and we go boy didn't even
show up and it's the same thing. So I think
that angle of things is a little dramatic. But the
performance was just hideous. I mean you could go to
a man and just say this guy stung. And the
(13:34):
tactics that Belgium had they subbed off their two best
players from more athletic, bigger guys to just bully us
and it worked to perfection.
Speaker 1 (13:43):
Yep.
Speaker 4 (13:44):
They moved their striker. I I was just watching a
video on this. They moved him to just float next
to Tim Reim, our oldest and slowest defender, and they
just used and abuse him. I mean it was The
first goal was on Realm, the second goal was on Reem.
The third goal could have been by Rien but he
couldn't manage to turn his body around because the goalkeeping feet.
(14:04):
You know, the disaster that was the goaltending situation there.
All four of the goals were completely preventable and individual
mistake caused them to happen. So when you see that,
it's just it just stinks, and no one. Polistic wasn't good.
The build up wasn't good. They couldn't string together two
(14:25):
passes it felt like just the cohesiveness and organized we
have a game plan and we're sticking to it that
we saw every other game that the starting eleven played
was gone. So that angle really sucks of it. I
think in two weeks time it'll be, oh yeah, it
was a good World Cup. They played well, they had
some good moments, fell flat at the end, but we're
(14:46):
you going to do.
Speaker 2 (14:46):
I get Belgium credit for making them uncomfortable. I think
you nailed it, though. When you have a big opportunity
and this was as big as it gets, right, you
could argue this is maybe. I mean, you would know
better than me. I don't think I'm being hyperbolics, like
you're never going to have a better opportunity to really make.
Speaker 1 (15:05):
A big splash.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Hugh the Lavelli and Neal the third sounder make a
big splash and really get everybody at a fever pitch
for that match on Friday against Spain.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
But it's how it happened.
Speaker 2 (15:18):
When you have an opportunity like that, and I remember,
we can go through it in every sport, every team
when the build up is as big as it was,
and I don't remember one bigger and you've got the
scenes in Seattle and Tom Rinaldi's saying against Bosnia they
played with ten tonight, they'll play with twelve playing off
(15:39):
of that. That's just classic Grinaldi. Right, You've got all
of that going to play so poorly. That's where you've
said the word it stinks because it feels like you
didn't even give yourself a chance. You didn't even give
yourself the opportunity to make things interesting. And by the
way they said it that halftime, the first assistant coach
(16:01):
whoever it was, to talk to Jenny Taft after all
that we're only down one, like it could have been
much worse. It felt like they didn't have the ball
for the first fifteen minutes. They get the free kick,
which was awesome, and you're like, all right, you're you're
back in this thing. It was a disaster to start. Everybody,
calm down, We get why you were nervy. This is
the biggest match that really any of these players have
(16:23):
ever played in, right, so there's going to be pressure
and you could feel it just on the simple for
me tou passing that they couldn't quite figure out.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
But when you.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
Melt down that badly, that's where when I say this
could haunt them for a while because you never know
you're gonna have that opportunity again. Like when you have
a performance like that, I'm guessing as a competitor, the
one thing you want to do is just get back
out there and play like that wasn't us, and it
wasn't Polchettino said it after the match, that wasn't who
we've been for this entire tournament, and he was right.
(16:55):
And unfortunately, in a one and done situation, when the
other team has a say in it, you make a
couple of mistakes and that's all.
Speaker 4 (17:02):
She wrote. How many that's just playoffs? Playoffs, soccer playoff?
How many times do we see that in the NFL.
You've got a great, you know, stretch of games going
into the playoffs, you have one game where you don't
show up and that's it.
Speaker 1 (17:15):
It's over.
Speaker 4 (17:16):
So I don't know it. No one played well that game,
but I don't think. And we can get into the
polistic stuff too, because I'm as you mentioned, I was
wearing his shirt for you know, three weeks long practically, yeah,
a long time. It's gonna need multiple washes. I think
that a lot of the slack heat or a lot
of the criticism he's the slings and arrows he's getting
(17:37):
is mostly unjustified. He was terrible in this game. Yeah,
Like there's no getting around that. He was losing the ball.
No one was particularly good, but he was one of them.
He wasn't good. But I feel like that's coming from
a lot of people. I don't want to do that.
You don't know what you're talking about, you know you don't.
But it's like I watched this team play Nation League
(18:00):
games against Jamaica, you know what I mean. Like I
watched this team play Gold Cup games against Costa Rica
in here, so like I'm I don't just watch once
every four years, and I know that Polisic when he's
on the pitch, it's different and it feels different.
Speaker 1 (18:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (18:16):
So, did he have a horrible, no good, very bad day. Absolutely,
he's stunk. But that doesn't mean let's strip him of
Captain America and get him off all the commercials, you
know what I mean. It's just no one played well. Yeah,
so I don't know. He got hurt trying to score
a goal, trying to have a shot and he kicked
somebody's ankle who tried to make a play on it.
Speaker 2 (18:37):
So where are you starting, because that's one of the
big I'm with you to this extent. There's a lot
of people that have said, out of the seven World
Cup matches, he's missed like three of them or something like,
he's not been available very much and that could just
be bad luck. That and you mentioned the injury last night.
That's bad luck. Like you're going to try to score
(18:58):
the guy's foot gets in your way.
Speaker 4 (19:00):
I'm sure that hurt, Like, hey, kick the hell out
of it, you know, Calf.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
I'm sure that really hurt.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
Now where do you stand on The broadcasters are saying, bro,
we love you.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
You got to get off the field. You got to
get down.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
You got to put your hand up, like, we appreciate
your trying to cut it out here, but if you're hurt,
you're not helping us. And I think they scored. Was
it the last goal at that point or whatever it was.
Speaker 4 (19:19):
I think it was the third one.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
Regardless, you got to get They were pretty adamant that
you got to stop trying to be the hero there.
I get you want to stay in but if it's
that bad, and here's what he had to say, by
the way, after here's Jenny Taft and Polisic.
Speaker 3 (19:33):
You know you're in a lot of pain, had to
be stepped off.
Speaker 6 (19:35):
What were you dealing with fighting through?
Speaker 3 (19:38):
Yeah? I mean I just twisted my ankle and just
just sprained my ankle. I mean it's just frustrating to
end like that, of course, but you know, now I
get time to rest so for a little bit.
Speaker 2 (19:48):
Okay, So everybody's mad about that last part. Now he
gets time to rest. I don't know, nice attitude, that's
what you're thinking about.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
Now you get to rest.
Speaker 4 (19:56):
Someone sent this to me with that exact same like
what a pansy.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
People are mad about it. So you're saying that's trumped up.
You don't buy that.
Speaker 4 (20:03):
I don't understand the frustrated What do you want him
to say?
Speaker 5 (20:05):
Oh?
Speaker 1 (20:05):
Man, well now I get to rest. Yeah, we know,
because you're out of the World Cup.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
He.
Speaker 4 (20:10):
Was saying. They asked about the ankle. He said, well
I get to wrestle. Hopefully it'll be okay.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
Are you a polistic pocket protector.
Speaker 4 (20:18):
Of one hundred percent? And I'll stand by it. So
I just think some of that and he's not. I
think a lot of it comes from when we expect
the stars, the Captain America, the Anthony Edwards, justin Jefferson's there.
Their personalities, you know, just jump off the screen. And
Polistic just doesn't have that personality. Sorry, he's an introverted,
(20:40):
soft spoken guy, and I think that just rubs people
the wrong way. Yeah, like maybe if he was sobbing
in that interview, Oh.
Speaker 1 (20:46):
My gosh, I can't believe we lost. It's going to
be four years.
Speaker 4 (20:49):
But that, I'm sure people will go the other direction
and go he's soft. He's crying. You can't be blubbering.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
Oh, he's polarizing in general.
Speaker 4 (20:56):
He's polarizing in general. That he's a soft spoken keep
to yourself die. He's not a super he's not an
Anthey Edwards that you know has got his logo everywhere
and his shoes and it's just he's not that type
of personality.
Speaker 1 (21:10):
So a big picture, was this a successful World Cup
for the US men's national team? World Cup correspondent Brett Blakemore, I'm.
Speaker 4 (21:21):
Standing by what I said yesterday. If they lose it,
it'll be a good World Cup, won't be a great
World Cup. They would have won, it would have been
a great World Cup. It's a good one. They played well.
They showed they can play an organized game. But the
weaknesses that we knew coming into it were the goalkeeping
is a problem.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
And.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
How does that happen? What is he doing on the
third goal?
Speaker 4 (21:44):
I have no answer for you. I don't know how.
You don't just you're you had it right there. Maybe
you're expecting that you're going to get a cleat in
the calf, so you you pull up on it. I
have no clue.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
But he did his foot get caught in the turf
a little bit. It feels like I got tried it,
so I.
Speaker 4 (22:01):
Think he hesitated on one, he got caught on the
turf two and then they get an open shot. But
then Tim Reim is there. Yeah, I can't do anything
about it.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
That's tough, though. It's tough.
Speaker 4 (22:12):
All you get you don't even have to stop it,
just redirect Iteah away from goal. That's hard though, But
you're also not expecting it. You're not expecting your goaltender
to completely throw up all himself out there.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Yeah, when you're like I said.
Speaker 4 (22:27):
It was like Marty Turco, but he you know, caught
an edge and slipped and slid to the red line,
That's what it was.
Speaker 2 (22:33):
I do think it was a good World Cup. I
might even say great. Now I look at it as
I'm the casual. I'm the guy that just came into
this literally first half of the Paraguay game, Like that's
a great place to come in though. But watching that
and going this is fun. This is entertaining, and I
can see why people like this. And I've lived through
I've had We've been on the fan twenty two years.
(22:54):
Whatever it is, oh good for me. So how many
World Cups have we gone through? We mentioned Jamie Watts
and Sneaky Pete's Poor Richard's Lavelle Neil the Third doing
the show with Pa and Dube down Highway one hundred,
Uncle Sam waving people in to come watch with us,
like we've been I've been through a lot of these
as the casual observer. This is the first time, certainly
(23:16):
since I started working here in three that it all
felt It felt different, It felt real, It felt like
something cool could happen.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
Not that they were going to win the World Cup.
I don't think anybody expected that.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
But because of all of that, and because of just
how the conversations I feel like have changed between the
hardcore is like you and.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
The casuals like me.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
Globally, Yeah, I feel like it was a very successful run.
And women come here next year, right, and that's a
totally different deal because they win the World Cup. Quite frequently,
I've turned watching every second of nineteen ninety nine. I
remember exactly where I was watching all of it. Brandy Chastain,
the whole deal, her sister and law coaches soccer at
the U.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
It's all good.
Speaker 4 (23:57):
But I think they've got a new core too. A
lot of their old card is gone. Morgan and yeah everyone, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
So it'll be interesting to see.
Speaker 2 (24:05):
Where it goes. But I think it was a successful run.
I think it was a good run. We can split
hairs on good to great. I think you probably lay
it out pretty fairly there. But I know I enjoyed it.
I know the regular host of this show enjoyed it.
I'm sure he'll have a lot of thoughts if when
he ever gets out of Chicago, he'll have some thoughts
for all of us. But I hope you enjoyed it.
Speaker 1 (24:25):
Hope you. I know you're bombed.
Speaker 4 (24:27):
I got more than sixty seconds worse, that's for sure.
Exactly now, we'll go back to that for a while.
We'll go back to that limit. Worst case scenario. If
you can get Max to talk a little bit more soccer,
that's fine. But we'll get sixty seconds of soccer on
this show from.
Speaker 1 (24:39):
Time to time.
Speaker 4 (24:40):
What if the US is in like a big final
against Mexico, is it that Teca could be pro probably
in Vegas or something.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Yeah, No, not really, No, I don't know. We'll see,
we'll see. If you would have asked me three weeks ago,
I wouldn't have thought.
Speaker 4 (24:56):
That said definitely.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
No, Yeah, three weeks ago, I wouldn't have thought I'd
be this invested in this team in this run and
enjoyed it as much as I did. We've got more
soccer to sprinkle in as we go. As it pertains
to the men's national team. It's the last day really
for the post mortem for our World Cup correspondent Brett
Blake Morman. We said yesterday, we hope it's not the
end for the US side of things. We'll maybe keep
(25:18):
you on retainer as the later rounds go, because the
tournament still goes on for like six months.
Speaker 1 (25:23):
We've still got that going.
Speaker 2 (25:24):
But when we come back the day after the day after,
when the US loses, there's always the think pieces. We're
in think piece time. Now, what to do? How do
we fix it? This is a problem with the youth system.
This is a problem with how kids are raised in
the game. Why does Europe have it so much better
than we do? Why are we the only country that
(25:45):
can't figure it out? Well, it's not necessarily a soccer problem.
It's not unique to one sport. We're going to try
to tackle it. I go in eyes wide open that
we're probably not going to come up with many solutions today.
I do think when it comes to the youth sports
problem that we have in this country, and by the way,
we have it big time. I came up in it.
(26:06):
I'm in it right now with my own kids. I'm
living it like a lot of you are out there.
But I want some feedback on a couple of different things.
When we come back, we will try to tackle the
untackleable the youth sports problems in America.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
We will get to that when we come back. Let
bumper to bumper.
Speaker 4 (26:30):
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Speaker 2 (26:52):
All Right, techs have already come into the Bradshawn Brian
Kfean text line sixty four six eighty six, and we
haven't even really introduced the that I do.
Speaker 1 (27:00):
Want to spend a lot of time on. It's a
topic that's not new.
Speaker 2 (27:03):
It's a topic we've spent time on on this show
and other shows for many, many years. But it's something
that if you're listening to a sports talk radio station
or like sports, you're probably in the thick of it,
or have been in the thick of it, or at
least know someone that is, and it has to do
with you. Sports and soccer is the natural jumping off
(27:23):
point because the World Cup just ended, and I swear
the second that the match was over, like actually over, not.
Speaker 1 (27:31):
When we gave up the goal after we tied.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
It, sixty two seconds after we tied it and we
went down two to one, or our goaltender threw up
on himself and we went down three to one, or
when Polisic got hurt and then everybody was mad at
him not then, but when the horns actually went off,
the three horns, only four minutes of extra time too.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
Seemed light. Seemed light.
Speaker 4 (27:51):
Seems like the vibes we were talking about the vibes,
they were dead, so we don't need all four them.
Speaker 1 (27:55):
Vibes were bad.
Speaker 2 (27:56):
Yeah, but the tweets and the thing pieces went out immediately,
and the one that caught my eye, and a million
of them have. And I've spent a lot of time
today just kind of parsing through it because you don't
have to go very far to find people's opinions on this,
and they already made. But was from Clay Travis, out
kick Guy. He's on Twin City's news Talk Buck and
(28:17):
Travis been a sports guy, been all over the place
speaking of polarizing. He's got opinions. He likes to inflame,
he loves to throw stuff out there. He's Clay Travis.
But this tweet caught my attention and some others. One
big US soccer thought Colin. Our youth development has got
(28:39):
to get more affordable. One of my kids plays travel.
It's at least five thousand dollars a year. And this
isn't even super high end. We can afford it, thankfully,
Watts can't. Youth sports costs in the US are out
of control soccer more than most which somebody named Mike
Herndon quote tweeted it and said this one hundred percent true.
(29:03):
If you have a six year old who is any
good at all in the US, your options currently are
a cheap rec league soccer where your child gets zero
coaching and no real competition, or b shell out thousands
per year to a travel club completely broken system. Twitch
that second point one hundred percent right, and the disclaimers
(29:29):
that I would get out there at the beginning, because
I do want to talk about this for a while
and get a lot of different opinions. A couple of disclaimers.
Number one, not every person or group that runs a
for profit club is in it for the wrong reasons,
Because we get that a lot. There's a lot of
(29:51):
There are plenty that are that just want to make money,
that have put all their eggs in that financial basket
to this is how I'm going to make my li
I'm gonna support my family this way.
Speaker 1 (30:02):
I'm club director.
Speaker 2 (30:03):
Why, I've got to recruit a certain number of athletes,
and there's a number of parents that are going to
pay whether I'm delivering on anything that I say I
can deliver on or not. There are a lot of
bad ones, there are a lot of good ones. So
I'm gonna try to I want to get that out
there about the generalities, because that gets thrown out there
(30:24):
a lot. It's like everything's a money grab, everything's about
the dollar.
Speaker 1 (30:28):
I don't think that's true.
Speaker 2 (30:30):
As someone who's grown up with it, who participated in it,
and now currently has not one, not two, but three
kids who are in various stages of these the wreck
to the travel, the fun with very little compelling coaching too.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
You have to turn over your entire life.
Speaker 2 (30:48):
The other disclaimer I will say is I'm not going
to come at this like I have every single answer
in this thing, because I certainly do not, and we
certainly do not. Because I've already, in just the short
amount of time that my kids have been in it,
I've already fallen prey to this stuff. I've already made
poor choices, I've already had to rethink things, I've already
(31:10):
had to back off. I've already had to say this
seems like not a good situation. And I like to
think of myself as someone who's pretty educated on the
whole thing because I'm around a lot of coaches.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
I grew up with a lot of coaches.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
Like I feel like I have an advantage of what's good,
what's bad, what's fake, what's real, what's the money grab,
what's productive? And I still, at the end of it,
a couple of things we've done, like, man, this was dumb,
Like I put my kid in a bad situation here.
So we're all kind of learning as we go, We're
all kind of winging it. So I don't claim to
have all the answers, but what Mike outlines is something
(31:47):
that I've found to be completely true.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
I've said it before about politics.
Speaker 2 (31:53):
If there's no money in the middle, you can't make
any money online, you can't make any money doing a show,
having a YouTube chante. If you're just playing it straight
down the middle, taking it issue by issue, you have
to be insane this way or insane that way, because
what does that do. It drives engagement, It gets clicks,
it gets people talking. There's no money in the middle.
So the reasonable stuff that I think most of us
(32:15):
kind of long for politically and otherwise, it's hard to
find that stuff because there's no money in it. There's
no money unless you're making people mad this way or
happy this way, or vice versa. It's the same here.
I think in the sports world there's no middle ground,
or at least I haven't found enough of it yet.
I found it in some places in some of the sports.
(32:38):
It seems like every sport we've been in or are
currently in, you have two options. And I don't know
if this is like this when you grew up, Brett,
but you have two options. Wreck the community stuff. Every
community center in every community and city, in the lobby,
they'll have the pamphlets or they'll have the guide. Here's
(32:59):
our programming on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from ten twenty
to eleven. We've got soccer, and it's fifty four dollars
for the whole thing. And you show up and there's
ten kids, and two of them really want to be there,
two of them might want to be there, and six
of them don't want to be there at all, hate
everything about it. And they're all on the same team. Well,
(33:20):
that's a tough situation if you're the two that really
want to be there, So what do you look for?
I'm going to look for something a little bit more competitive.
I'm not just there to smell Dandy Lions and get
the icys after the game. My kids like to play.
My kids like to win. My kids want to keep score,
they want to know the standings. All right, Well, we
(33:41):
have an option for you sign this contract that's longer
than the NDA that attendees of Taylor Swift and Travis
Kelce's wedding guests had to sign.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
Make sure you book every.
Speaker 2 (33:52):
Weekend for the next fifty two weeks and do the
next thirty six just to be safe, because we might
qualify for some other tournaments.
Speaker 1 (33:58):
We're gonna need a year and a half out of
your life.
Speaker 2 (34:00):
We're gonna make you try out for a team in
August that doesn't start until March, and we're gonna need
two thousand dollars now and probably two thousand dollars later.
And when we get there, there's probably a uniform fee,
and they're gonna be a tournament or two that aren't
in the original package, so we're gonna need an extra
one hundred and fifty to three hundred dollars for those
as well. And when we get to those tournaments, all
the parents that are gonna be there.
Speaker 1 (34:19):
They're not just gonna want to.
Speaker 2 (34:20):
Go to Culver's or Dairy Queen or McDonald's or dunkin
Donuts to get to breakfast or the dinner.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
After the games are matches, we need.
Speaker 2 (34:26):
To go to a very bougie tap house so we
can have some beers, we can have some dinner. They
don't really have a kid's menu, so you got to
order op. That's gonna be a couple one hundred dollars too.
By the way, this tournament is six states away, which
isn't really drivable, so you might have to fly, but
the drivable ones with the gas prices are still really expensive.
That's your option. There's no middle ground. There's wreck, which
(34:51):
is what I grew up playing for a really long
time house league basketball, and then we started traveling in
like fifth grade. I think we had two teams. We
didn't have A or B until we got to I
think seventh grade or and that that's over now. I mean,
if you're not playing traveling basketball in third grade, now
you're cooked. It's toast. I can't even believe. Why would
(35:13):
you even try to go to tryouts like that's absurd? Oh,
you didn't get him in traveling before they were ten,
well good luck. They're not gonna play, so you've got
the wreck or you've got to literally sign over your
entire life. And there's very little middle ground to the
whole thing. And that's where I think we're cooked and
we're stuck, because I don't blame the people that start
(35:35):
the programs because people are gonna pay for him, and
as long as people are gonna pay for them, there's
gonna be there's gonna be programs for it. So I
guess what I'm saying is the only solution we really
have to the pay for play thing, because that's what's
being blamed right now for the US Soccer and jump
(35:55):
in on this, Bret, because the European mod allegedly is
basically inverted from what we do, where it's a lot
of people to get to participate. The pro clubs have
clubs underneath them, and they have clubs underneath them, and
it's all very easy, it's all very accessible.
Speaker 1 (36:13):
When a player.
Speaker 2 (36:14):
Graduates out of a certain club, they get financially rewarded
for it. The cost isn't really passed on to the
parents as much as it is here where it's literally no,
you're funding all of this, and there's obviously there's scholarships,
and there's need based stuff and all of this. But
part of the reason why I think in sports we
(36:34):
lose a lot of it, and I don't know if
it's soccer or not you could maybe speak to it,
is the second your kid shows any interest in it
beyond reck, you basically need to ask chat GPT how
much money can I get from my kidney and where
do I need to go. There's no ramp up and
I've dealt with this with all three of my kids.
(36:55):
I've got a hockey player. God bless all of us. Okay,
as much as community hockey is a staple here in
Minnesota and most places in the country, say that we
do it better than anybody else, and I do believe
that we do. We talked about the Black Bear Hedge
fun thing out east where this company's just going in
and buying ranks and basically making it all club hockey,
and the community hockey models dying there because it's unaffordable.
(37:18):
You can't the Rex stuff can't happen. Minnesota still tries
to do it. I think that way, but as someone
who has a kid in a huge association that has
great association hockey and great volunteers and great availability and
great affordability.
Speaker 1 (37:35):
All those kids are doing a lot of different hockey.
All those kids are still.
Speaker 2 (37:39):
Doing Team AX, Team Y out, and my son's right
in there with them. I think we do less than
a lot of people, and I still think he's doing
too much. But that's the spot, the tricky spot that
you're in. And I have no illusions that I'm going
to get a text from RUSSOU Radio on the fourth
(38:01):
of July in twenty forty and saying, hey, has your
son decided who he's going to sign with? I'd like
to break it on the fourth of July. He's a
free agent. I have no illusions that one day I'm
going to be a source for RUSSO Radio on which
NHL team my son is going to play on. But
I want him to be able to play as long
as he can, competitively as he can, because he loves
(38:23):
to play. If I let him play ten hours a day,
he would play ten hours a day. Same thing with
my oldest son in basketball. If I told him go
play basketball all day, he would if I could. If
he could play all day, that's what he would do.
I have no idea what my daughter's going to do,
but I even think about her dance when she did
that at ages three and four. She did the dancing.
(38:43):
Think right, none of them know what they're doing when
they're on the stage. Half of them are crying. The
outfits cost like a thousand dollars. You give him the
flowers at the end. It's the greatest thing ever to
go to the next level. And I'm using quotations for
people that can't see me. I seriously got a pamphlet
that was like thirty two pages about what the expectations
were for the group, for the team.
Speaker 1 (39:04):
For the deal.
Speaker 2 (39:04):
I'm like, she's five, it's November right now, and you're
telling me that you need her this weekend in March,
this weekend and April, and this weekend in May, and
it's the expectation that the whole weekend is blocked after that.
You're aware she's five, right, that I sign up for
the wrong group. So that's part of the issue that
(39:26):
we're dealing with now. And the only way out of
that box is we have to stand up as parents.
We have to stand up as a as a parental community.
And say we're not doing it anymore because half the reason,
I'd say seventy five percent of the reason, I don't
know most of the time, the reason you're signing your
kid up for all this stuff is is because Brett
(39:47):
and his wife they signed their kids up, and we
don't want our kid to fall behind or we want
him to be in the frat like we're out. And
I don't even know if any of us really know
what we're chasing or what we're doing. But the pay
for playing model that's being talked about right now with
the soccer community of how we've got it backwards, the
(40:08):
only way we stop it is it has to come
from inside the house, doesn't it.
Speaker 1 (40:14):
These companies like, we'll change the model when people stop
making money out the model.
Speaker 2 (40:19):
Well, the only way they're going to stop making money
out the models if we stopped paying for it. Because
my response to that original tweet that I talked about
was everybody knows what the issues are or what we
think they are. Those have all been diagnosed. Why we
think we're behind in soccer, for example, or why the
best player in the world for basketball in the NBA
(40:41):
the last how many MVPs have not come from America, right,
They've come from Greece, They've come from Serbia.
Speaker 1 (40:49):
You'll go down the list. Canada and I know SGA.
Speaker 2 (40:52):
Technically it was a product of the AAU system a
little bit because he was from Toronto, I think, and
played a lot down here. But the European model for
sports development has worked out pretty well, and we all
know how they do it compared to how we do it.
(41:13):
And the only way we're going to change how we
do it is we have to the ones that are
in charge, the ones that had the endless group me's
and endless paypals and endless direct deposits and endless payment plans,
we're the ones that kind of have.
Speaker 1 (41:25):
To stop it. But do we have the stomach for it.
I don't know that we do.
Speaker 2 (41:30):
I'd love some talkbacks on it on how we feel
about the whole pay for play model in general. Is
it as broken on the soccer side of things, Is
it has broken on the hockey side of things, basketball? Whatever?
Is there a middle ground? Can we find a middle
ground on a lot of the sports. That's what I've
tried to do with especially my middle son who likes
(41:54):
to play everything and plays hockey and plays lacrosse and
plays football. He asked me one time, why does every
sport that I play, why do I need a helmet?
It's like, well, you kind of need a helmet your
entire life all the time. Bro, you were just that kid.
You run into walls. You don't care like that's how
it's going to go. And he likes he wants to
do the extra stuff. His friends do the extra stuff. Well,
(42:16):
I can't stomach doing all the extra stuff in any
of the sports. But what's the middle ground? Haven't found
it yet. I want to play one thing here. It's
about a three minute clip before we take a break,
take some talkbacks, take some calls, maybe definitely takes some
texts because they've been pouring in. It's just from a
(42:36):
hockey tournament that I think wrapped up today. Want you
to just listen to the audio. I've got one more
thing to say about it.
Speaker 7 (42:44):
After champion, right beside your name, Billy, You guys have
been knocking on the door finally bust through.
Speaker 6 (42:49):
What does it mean? Well, it means a lot to Minnesota.
Speaker 8 (42:51):
We represent a lot of teams that have come up
here and been close and back home.
Speaker 6 (42:56):
A lot of people.
Speaker 8 (42:56):
Every time we come up, they're like, bring it home
to Minnesota for the first time.
Speaker 6 (43:00):
And I've come up now eight times.
Speaker 8 (43:01):
You come home and you kind of feel like people
want that, you know, they want the brick back.
Speaker 6 (43:05):
Home in Minnesota.
Speaker 8 (43:06):
It's a big thing for everybody that's been there, and
the kids still wear the Minnesota gears, So to me,
it represents just bringing it home to a bunch of
kids that have played here too. And this team, and
we've been together for this team had been together the longest.
We got these kids together about two and half years ago,
and we just kind of felt like it was kind
of a team of first So Colton was the first
on Razer ever to return. It was the first time
(43:29):
that we'd ever gotten together to two or three years
in advance. We had a perfect storm with Kyloposo joining
us this spring.
Speaker 6 (43:37):
Stous our d guy, our defensive coach. He's a big
guru up in northern Minnesota.
Speaker 8 (43:42):
He was a captain of Denver, his two older boys
that played in the Brick, and I asked him to
be on the.
Speaker 6 (43:46):
Bench this time. He han't been on the bench.
Speaker 1 (43:48):
With us before.
Speaker 8 (43:49):
So if you look at our defensive totals, they're a
lot lower.
Speaker 6 (43:52):
Than they've been. You know, I'm an offensive mined.
Speaker 8 (43:54):
Coach, so to have that firepower up front and have
unbelievable defense, it just it was a game changer for us.
Speaker 7 (44:02):
So you guys executed the game plan I thought, almost
to perfection. You guys locked them down. Your back end
is strong, Wagner, and the pipes is also strong. It
just as you mentioned, it's kind of a perfect storm
this group. Just how special is this specific.
Speaker 6 (44:17):
Age group floor, this Minnesota squad.
Speaker 8 (44:19):
Well, you know, we knew this when we get off
the plane to come to Edminton.
Speaker 6 (44:23):
Every year, it's such a hard tournament.
Speaker 8 (44:24):
It's so difficult, respect it so much that we just
hope to get to the playoff.
Speaker 6 (44:29):
Round every year. This year, when we got off the plane, this.
Speaker 8 (44:31):
Group had a lot of success back home and tournaments
and traveling around North America for the last year and
a half.
Speaker 6 (44:37):
And when we got off.
Speaker 8 (44:37):
The plane up here, this group you kind of felt
it that they wanted you know, that the goal was
to win it, and that usually isn't the goal when
you come to the break. The goals to be competitive
and make the playff round. But Internally, we knew we
had something special and we wanted to put our head
down and get through the finish line and just stay
humble throughout the week.
Speaker 7 (44:54):
I know your message when you come to these things
is about.
Speaker 6 (44:57):
The journey, is about the experience. But it's kind of
feeling us to win one, doesn't it.
Speaker 8 (45:01):
It feels great. And there's also another side story. My
best friend, his son is on the team, and a
couple of years ago we got together and tried to
master playing.
Speaker 6 (45:11):
Sorry jud Peterson, He's been like.
Speaker 8 (45:15):
A second son to me, so I'm kind of feel
like I'm talking about my own son. But me and
Corey we've best friends our whole life, and we play
NHL ninety five on saega U Sports.
Speaker 6 (45:24):
We just love sports, and we're like, let's see if
we can win the Brick.
Speaker 8 (45:27):
And we kind of started putting pieces together and bringing
people in and it just formed a perfect storm.
Speaker 6 (45:33):
Billy, We're happy for you, We're thrilled for you.
Speaker 8 (45:34):
Go enjoy the moment, all right, Thank you so much,
Thank you Brick and the Brick staff.
Speaker 6 (45:39):
It's best.
Speaker 8 (45:39):
It is the best tournament in North America, in the
world in youth hockey, and we're It's honored to be here,
so thank.
Speaker 1 (45:45):
You the Brick.
Speaker 2 (45:47):
For those wondering a hockey tournament for nine and ten
year olds.
Speaker 5 (45:56):
In for Barrera, this is justin guard on the fan
from the one eight hundred ask Gary traffic sent
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