November 7, 2025 • 9 mins
Clay has a new book out called "Balls." Did the Democrats try to use sports to highlight and promote the LGBTQ community?
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Insight from the inside.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
This is seven to ten woors markon show.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Well with us right now, Clay Travis superstar. Of course
you listen to Buck and Clay and every day twelve
noon to three, the Clay Travis Buck Sexton Show noon
to three every day right after me. Seem all over
television of course, OutKick all that stuff. And he's a
best selling author. This is another bestseller that has just
come out. His new book is called Balls. It's actually
(00:30):
a fascinating book. And Clay Travis, thanks for actually coming
into the studio.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Well, thank you for having me. Most importantly, thanks for
being a tremendous lead in for the show for all
these years. And you are dominating in New York City
as you long have, and we appreciate you passing the
baton to us at noon, and we get to talk
to a lot of people all over the country and
certainly a lot of people in New York who are grappling,
(00:56):
as we were talking about off air, with what has
been a challenging week, I think to say the.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Least, Yeah, it's been a long week. I don't know.
We'll get through this, and let's talk about the book first.
That's an interesting subject because it's called balls, but it's
about sports, and you know, I never thought about it.
I read this book The Democrats going into all these
dangerous areas with people, but screwing around with sports. Yeah,
(01:22):
that's bad.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Well, I think there's a sense among young men that
they have been villainized for many things that they've had
absolutely nothing to do with at all. And I think,
when when I think about my lifetime, I feel I
grew up in the era that girls and boys should
be treated equally under the law, and Title nine probably
(01:46):
is a is a strong component of the era that
I grew up in. But it wasn't that there was
something wrong with being male or being female. It was
that both sexes should be able to aspire to be
the high level of success possible, which seemed very very
healthy to me. And then in the last I would
(02:06):
say decade, certainly we moved into a world where being
male would there was something wrong with it and and
something toxic with it. And so many young men who
are growing up in this era are looking around and saying.
There's a couple of anecdotes in here, but one of
my favorite is one of my kids friends came home
(02:27):
one day with me, and he said, mister Clay, we
learned today at school that white men cause all the
problems in the world and we're the reason that everything
is awful. And they told us, you know that we
have all this power, and he said, my mom doesn't
even let me pick what I eat for dinner. Mister Clay,
what power do I have? And it's a silly, funny anecdote,
(02:51):
but I think it kind of gets at the representative
issue here, which is we have created a world where
young men feel like they're blame for everything, given credit
for nothing, and in this twenty twenty four election, they
pushed back against that in a pretty aggressive way.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
So do you think Democrats targeted sports thinking it's too
macho or was it just a yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
I don't know how targeted it was or how much
it was just a natural outgrowth of their attempt to
take overall culture. But this book goes into to me
when it really began in earnest and you may remember
this story, some of your listeners will, but it kind
of feels like a long time ago now because so
many stories have happened since. But Michael Sam was a
(03:39):
star defensive end for the Missouri football team in the
SEC SEC Player of the Year defensively, I think, but
like a lot of guys going to the pros, they
saw him as not an ideal fit. He wasn't big
enough to play defensive end, he wasn't fast enough to
play linebacker. There were all these issues, and so he
ended up getting drafted late. And when he got drafted,
(04:01):
he made out with his boyfriend on ESPN. You know,
they were sitting there with a camera right in his face.
And then the entire Michael Sam's story was obsessively covered
by ESPN. And that was the first time I remember
someone becoming a star of coverage without being a star
(04:22):
on the field. The only reason people were following that
story was because he was gay. And when I go
back and look at it now, then you had Caitlin
Jenner situation, certainly Colin Kaepernick taking a knee. They tried
to turn sports into politics by any other name. And
you know, I came one of my prior books as
(04:42):
Republicans by Sneakers Too, which is from the Jordan era,
when hey, I want my excellence in athletics to speak
to anybody, why would I want a way into politics?
Speaker 1 (04:52):
In alien?
Speaker 2 (04:53):
Eight half the country, which I actually think is the
way that a super smart sports league or a super
athlete would be. And by the way, this all culminated
to me with Leah Thomas winning a women's swimming title
as a man, and also in the for those people
who remember it, in the twenty twenty bubble, when the
(05:16):
NBA players actually took their own names off the back
of their jerseys and replace them with political slogo, which
is it's all crazy, but that is chronicled here as
as what we saw in twenty twenty four was I
think a backlash to that era.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Well, get the book. It's fascinating. It's Klay Travis's new
book called Balls, and it really explores all this. But
why did guys like Roger Goodell? Why did they cave
to this? Why didn't they stand up for their sports?
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Because they did what was best for them personally that
was worse for the league's I think it's such a
good question. If you're an old white guy and you're
making forty million dollars a year, as Roger Goodell is,
and your league is made up of majority black athletes,
do you want to be the guy that steps in
front of the media train to be seen immediately by
(06:06):
all of the sports media as the old, racist, white
guy who is trying to run the league. I think
he recognized, and certainly the owners did that this was
bad for the overall brand of the league and bad
for the outreach of audience. But they did what was
in their best interest to preserve their jobs as opposed
(06:27):
to what was in the league's best interest.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
Now, there are some psychologists to say that's the reason
the Democrats go so crazy about Donald Trump, that's the
reason for this Trump arrangement syn him, that he's such
an old fashioned, macho, kind of fifties kind of guy,
And you think that's part of.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
The well, look, I think the reason why the left
hates football in general is because it represents alpha masculinity.
I mean, there is no woman who's ever going to
make a football team, And in order to play football
at a high level, you have to be a physical
beast who puts your body on the line every single play.
(07:05):
And you know, there's a reason that football, and obviously
it's much less serious, has been analogized so often to warfare,
because it's just physical carnage on the field. Our most
aggressive There's a great quote at West Point, one of
their football coaches, and I'm not going to remember it perfectly,
(07:26):
but on you know, basically, the idea was, at West Point,
we train men through football to be able to eventually
win on battlefields because it's about following orders, it's about
being in the right position, and so there's always been
a militaristic component of football that I think also makes
left wingers a little bit uncomfortable.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
Well, talking about Clay Travis Gain his latest book, it's
already a bestseller, but go get the book. It's called Balls.
You'll love this book. Hey Clay Travis, you found it
out kick now? Yeah, I ask you way back in
the beginning, all the big sports sports Illustrated, ABC, ESPN.
How come they didn't see you coming? How did you
get ahead of them?
Speaker 2 (08:08):
It is I think we have the most culturally influential
sports site now at OutKick, and Fox now owns it,
and we have a lot of impact. I think that's
part of what I write about in the book is
I think there's an advantage to being sort of a
speed ship, a speedboat when everybody else is an aircraft carrier,
(08:33):
because it allows you to adjust on the fly quickly
and see oncoming issues without having to run everything through
a bureaucracy in order to make it happen. And so
I think also the thing that is remarkable to me
is not that OutKick worked and continues to work so
well for Fox. It's that no one's ever competed with us.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
You know.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
I sometimes look around and I say, boy, it's like
IV beer, and nobody else will come out with their
own version of a beer. So that's maybe the most
remarkable thing about it. And if people aren't familiar with
the story of OutKick in sports, I think there's a
business and entrepreneurial story that is built into into this
book as well.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Absolutely, we'll get the book. It's a brand new book
from Clay Travis. It's called Balls. You will love the book.
Listen to Clay Travis and Buck Session today noon to three,
and of course you'll see them all over television. But
the book is called Balls. Go get it. Clay Travis,
thanks for starting.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Thank you for killing it for us for so many
years as the lead in. We really love this station
and everything you guys do, and we look forward to
talking with you guys for years and years to come.
Speaker 1 (09:42):
All Right, we'll do it. Again soon thank you wo
Insight from the inside.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
This is seven to ten woors markon show.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Well with us right now, Clay Travis superstar. Of course
you listen to Buck and Clay and every day twelve
noon to three, the Clay Travis Buck Sexton Show noon
to three every day right after me. Seem all over
television of course, OutKick all that stuff. And he's a
best selling author. This is another bestseller that has just
come out. His new book is called Balls. It's actually
(00:30):
a fascinating book. And Clay Travis, thanks for actually coming
into the studio.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Well, thank you for having me. Most importantly, thanks for
being a tremendous lead in for the show for all
these years. And you are dominating in New York City
as you long have, and we appreciate you passing the
baton to us at noon, and we get to talk
to a lot of people all over the country and
certainly a lot of people in New York who are grappling,
(00:56):
as we were talking about off air, with what has
been a challenging week, I think to say the.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Least, Yeah, it's been a long week. I don't know.
We'll get through this, and let's talk about the book first.
That's an interesting subject because it's called balls, but it's
about sports, and you know, I never thought about it.
I read this book The Democrats going into all these
dangerous areas with people, but screwing around with sports. Yeah,
(01:22):
that's bad.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Well, I think there's a sense among young men that
they have been villainized for many things that they've had
absolutely nothing to do with at all. And I think,
when when I think about my lifetime, I feel I
grew up in the era that girls and boys should
be treated equally under the law, and Title nine probably
(01:46):
is a is a strong component of the era that
I grew up in. But it wasn't that there was
something wrong with being male or being female. It was
that both sexes should be able to aspire to be
the high level of success possible, which seemed very very
healthy to me. And then in the last I would
(02:06):
say decade, certainly we moved into a world where being
male would there was something wrong with it and and
something toxic with it. And so many young men who
are growing up in this era are looking around and saying.
There's a couple of anecdotes in here, but one of
my favorite is one of my kids friends came home
(02:27):
one day with me, and he said, mister Clay, we
learned today at school that white men cause all the
problems in the world and we're the reason that everything
is awful. And they told us, you know that we
have all this power, and he said, my mom doesn't
even let me pick what I eat for dinner. Mister Clay,
what power do I have? And it's a silly, funny anecdote,
(02:51):
but I think it kind of gets at the representative
issue here, which is we have created a world where
young men feel like they're blame for everything, given credit
for nothing, and in this twenty twenty four election, they
pushed back against that in a pretty aggressive way.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
So do you think Democrats targeted sports thinking it's too
macho or was it just a yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
I don't know how targeted it was or how much
it was just a natural outgrowth of their attempt to
take overall culture. But this book goes into to me
when it really began in earnest and you may remember
this story, some of your listeners will, but it kind
of feels like a long time ago now because so
many stories have happened since. But Michael Sam was a
(03:39):
star defensive end for the Missouri football team in the
SEC SEC Player of the Year defensively, I think, but
like a lot of guys going to the pros, they
saw him as not an ideal fit. He wasn't big
enough to play defensive end, he wasn't fast enough to
play linebacker. There were all these issues, and so he
ended up getting drafted late. And when he got drafted,
(04:01):
he made out with his boyfriend on ESPN. You know,
they were sitting there with a camera right in his face.
And then the entire Michael Sam's story was obsessively covered
by ESPN. And that was the first time I remember
someone becoming a star of coverage without being a star
(04:22):
on the field. The only reason people were following that
story was because he was gay. And when I go
back and look at it now, then you had Caitlin
Jenner situation, certainly Colin Kaepernick taking a knee. They tried
to turn sports into politics by any other name. And
you know, I came one of my prior books as
(04:42):
Republicans by Sneakers Too, which is from the Jordan era,
when hey, I want my excellence in athletics to speak
to anybody, why would I want a way into politics?
Speaker 1 (04:52):
In alien?
Speaker 2 (04:53):
Eight half the country, which I actually think is the
way that a super smart sports league or a super
athlete would be. And by the way, this all culminated
to me with Leah Thomas winning a women's swimming title
as a man, and also in the for those people
who remember it, in the twenty twenty bubble, when the
(05:16):
NBA players actually took their own names off the back
of their jerseys and replace them with political slogo, which
is it's all crazy, but that is chronicled here as
as what we saw in twenty twenty four was I
think a backlash to that era.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Well, get the book. It's fascinating. It's Klay Travis's new
book called Balls, and it really explores all this. But
why did guys like Roger Goodell? Why did they cave
to this? Why didn't they stand up for their sports?
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Because they did what was best for them personally that
was worse for the league's I think it's such a
good question. If you're an old white guy and you're
making forty million dollars a year, as Roger Goodell is,
and your league is made up of majority black athletes,
do you want to be the guy that steps in
front of the media train to be seen immediately by
(06:06):
all of the sports media as the old, racist, white
guy who is trying to run the league. I think
he recognized, and certainly the owners did that this was
bad for the overall brand of the league and bad
for the outreach of audience. But they did what was
in their best interest to preserve their jobs as opposed
(06:27):
to what was in the league's best interest.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
Now, there are some psychologists to say that's the reason
the Democrats go so crazy about Donald Trump, that's the
reason for this Trump arrangement syn him, that he's such
an old fashioned, macho, kind of fifties kind of guy,
And you think that's part of.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
The well, look, I think the reason why the left
hates football in general is because it represents alpha masculinity.
I mean, there is no woman who's ever going to
make a football team, And in order to play football
at a high level, you have to be a physical
beast who puts your body on the line every single play.
(07:05):
And you know, there's a reason that football, and obviously
it's much less serious, has been analogized so often to warfare,
because it's just physical carnage on the field. Our most
aggressive There's a great quote at West Point, one of
their football coaches, and I'm not going to remember it perfectly,
(07:26):
but on you know, basically, the idea was, at West Point,
we train men through football to be able to eventually
win on battlefields because it's about following orders, it's about
being in the right position, and so there's always been
a militaristic component of football that I think also makes
left wingers a little bit uncomfortable.
Speaker 1 (07:48):
Well, talking about Clay Travis Gain his latest book, it's
already a bestseller, but go get the book. It's called Balls.
You'll love this book. Hey Clay Travis, you found it
out kick now? Yeah, I ask you way back in
the beginning, all the big sports sports Illustrated, ABC, ESPN.
How come they didn't see you coming? How did you
get ahead of them?
Speaker 2 (08:08):
It is I think we have the most culturally influential
sports site now at OutKick, and Fox now owns it,
and we have a lot of impact. I think that's
part of what I write about in the book is
I think there's an advantage to being sort of a
speed ship, a speedboat when everybody else is an aircraft carrier,
(08:33):
because it allows you to adjust on the fly quickly
and see oncoming issues without having to run everything through
a bureaucracy in order to make it happen. And so
I think also the thing that is remarkable to me
is not that OutKick worked and continues to work so
well for Fox. It's that no one's ever competed with us.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
You know.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
I sometimes look around and I say, boy, it's like
IV beer, and nobody else will come out with their
own version of a beer. So that's maybe the most
remarkable thing about it. And if people aren't familiar with
the story of OutKick in sports, I think there's a
business and entrepreneurial story that is built into into this
book as well.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Absolutely, we'll get the book. It's a brand new book
from Clay Travis. It's called Balls. You will love the book.
Listen to Clay Travis and Buck Session today noon to three,
and of course you'll see them all over television. But
the book is called Balls. Go get it. Clay Travis,
thanks for starting.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Thank you for killing it for us for so many
years as the lead in. We really love this station
and everything you guys do, and we look forward to
talking with you guys for years and years to come.
Speaker 1 (09:42):
All Right, we'll do it. Again soon thank you wo
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