February 25, 2026 • 21 mins
Petros Papadakis of Fox Sports Radio in Los Angeles joins Dick Fain to talk about USA hockey winning gold last weekend, how much politics he talks about on his show, the Olympic in general, and the event heading to L.A., plus both of their kids playing sports.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's time for our weekly conversation with college football analyst
Petros Papa.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
DAKASO that I'm a smart guy, I'm stupid.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Brought to you by Sweet James Accident Attorneys forty one years.
If you're hurt in an accident, called Sweet James right
away at eight hundred, five hundred and fifty two hundred.
Sweet James will be sweet to you, but tough on
insurance companies that will bully you rue. I don't know
buh now with Petros Peers Dave's Softy Muller loss.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Welcome back, rolling into the four o'clock hour here on
a Wednesday, head of cracking hockey coming up less than
one hour from now here on ninety three point three
KJRFM and Wednesdays at four.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
You know what that means.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
It means our man, Petros Papadakas, brought to you by our.
Speaker 4 (00:52):
Friends and Sweet James, the dense Beard of Justice eight
hundred and nine million. That's eight hundred nine million or
Sweet James dot com. He is the best personal injury
attorney in the world. Give him a call if you've
been hurt in an accident.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Beautiful Petrols, where were you Sunday morning, were you sleeping
in your bed?
Speaker 3 (01:13):
You were asleep in your bed.
Speaker 4 (01:15):
And went up to go to the bathroom. Yeah, check
the phone, and it said it was tied. And I
said to myself, Wow, that's gonna be a real nutcutter.
And then I went back to sleep, and then I
woke up and I watched You know, YouTube is just
amazing the way they put the highlights together, and it
(01:35):
really really saves time and emotional effort. So I watched
it on YouTube and I was able to absorb it
and discuss it with some efficiency on the air, though
I'm not a hockey expert, and that was that. But
it was great. It was a great moment and all
(01:57):
that and a lot of fun for everybody. And I
think easy to root for those guys, no doubt about it.
And it's kind of interesting to watch guys get their
teeth knocked out for their country and then just go
right back and play in the NHL. And the flip
side of that is the NBA and the load management
era and a guy at Kansas who doesn't want to play,
(02:20):
letting himself out of the first in the draft. He
kind of juxtapose those two things. But I think it
goes down to something that you know well covering the sport,
and I only know peripherally. I mean, the Kings have won.
I think it's three championships, three Stanley Cups since I
have been doing media in LA. And before that, there
(02:43):
was that heartbreaking loss against gosh, the Canadians with Wayne
Gretzky and Marty mcsorley's stick got They got a penalty
because the stick was bent too much. You know, some
big controversy that people talk about to this or they
did in LA. And just like you guys used to
(03:05):
with the Seahawks before they won their first title, right,
we were so close in whatever year if it wasn't
for that holding penalty against the Steelers. Yeah and now,
and that's true. That holding penalty was on my best
friend who's passed away since. But the linebacker for the
Steelers that was rushing on that play. But it's kind
of interesting because those terrible memories, you know, Bill Buckner,
(03:29):
A lot of that stuff just kind of fades away
into memory because these teams end up winning championships. But
I do remember that being the thing in La forever was,
oh my god, if that one thing didn't happen and
then they won. It feels like an abundance of titles
since then. And it's not that important. But dealing with
(03:51):
hockey people and covering the sport of hockey is a
totally different animal from the other. I guess you would
say Big three or popular sport. I mean everybody, Well,
I would say that everybody's got their nuances, right, Baseball
players and a lot of things have kind of evened
out because they're all kids, and they're all on the
(04:13):
Internet and stuff like that. Like some of the nuances
of our youth, like the fact that all the baseball players,
no matter who they were, where they were from, they
were all indoctrinated into daytime television. That used to be
a thing for like thirty years, right, Like if you
ran up on John Olerud and asked him about days
of our lives, he'd probably go off because that was
(04:35):
like something that they were.
Speaker 3 (04:37):
In the clubhouse before the game.
Speaker 4 (04:39):
That's yeah, Well, there were sitting around all day in
same town playing minor league baseball. You know, Now the
Internet and video games and all those different things they
kind of even things up. Football players were always a
certain kind of way. I mean, it's much more of
a black culture, so you're doing things that are popular
(04:59):
like that. Like you know, there's not a lot of
baseball teams that would gather around a guy with a
ghetto blaster while he danced, But we did that all
the time, right, someome guy from Saint Louis on our
team just dance around. That's how bored we were. I mean,
we didn't have the internet, you know what I mean.
So anyway, what I'm saying is with all these different sports,
talking to these people is one thing, hockey people are
(05:21):
by far, by far the best people to deal with
in sports. They're the most honest, they answer the questions
the most I think thoughtfully, and I believe it's because
of their juniors programs and the stuff like that. Most
of them. If you're a great hockey player, if you're
(05:43):
thirteen years old, you're gone right from your parents' house.
He's become an adult very quickly. Yeah, you're living in
somebody else's house and it's yes, sir, yes, ma'am. And
there's a little bit of that in baseball with the
summer would bat leagues and stuff, but not in the
same regard. So what I'm saying is hockey people, even
though I don't understand the sport well and don't cover
(06:04):
it closely, are always the easiest to root for, and
Canadians used to be really easy to root for.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
But they seem kind of bitter in this loss.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Oh well, and there's a bit of you know, it's
kind of a bit sad on the hockey side of things,
not on the baseball side of things. That they also
lost the World Series bye literally one half of an inch.
They've had those two I've seen those those two photos
juxtaposed in the same tweet with the play at the
plate and then also the wide open back of the
(06:36):
net for Canada that they didn't end up end up
getting and it could have been much much different. Baseball's
just different because, hey, it's the US of sports, you
know what.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
We were just talking about it. You're right, it's their sport,
and we beat him at their sport.
Speaker 2 (06:49):
It's like our fifth sport, man, and they couldn't beat
us at their best sport.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
And it just brings a nation to the turmoil.
Speaker 4 (06:58):
Man, Like, they dominated the game the particulars of the game,
but the part where you win or lose they didn't, obviously,
and that makes people more better if you think dick
of Canada.
Speaker 3 (07:09):
As America's hat.
Speaker 4 (07:12):
Think of these things that have happened, the hockey thing,
the baseball thing has like one of those scenes in
the movie where Cowboy gets his hat shut off and
looks all surprised, like, whoa, that's that's what's happened to Canada.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
In fact, we were just talking about it.
Speaker 4 (07:29):
One of the Dodger that one of the guys that
travels with the Dodgers radio crew is here today and
he was there in Canada when they lost Game seven.
And we had a guy on the MLB network. Guy,
he's a tall guy, Amsinger.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
I remember that guy he's on.
Speaker 4 (07:47):
He was there, he described this, Yeah, Greg Amsing, it's
pretty good interview. We had him on and he described
this to us as well, and they said, like you
cannot imagine the horror in that stadium with the Dodgers won,
Like it was so quiet, it was like the country
just got punched in the gut. You could hear the
(08:09):
Dodgers screaming and yelling in ecstasy almost completely clearly on
the pictures mound and celebrating the World Series, and you
could hear grown men like weeping and babies crying in
the stand, Like you could really feel that absolute dejection
(08:30):
in that moment. And I can't imagine this is any
better with the women the men, and as you said,
and then of course, uh, the World Series, which you
guys I think took some pride in it.
Speaker 3 (08:42):
We were drinkings.
Speaker 2 (08:46):
We were drinking the Blue Jay fans tears after that game.
And I cannot think of a World Series that more
Mariner fans were so one sided on we were all
Dodger blue. Because we've found out we kind of already
knew that Blue Jay fans were d bags. We've found
out over the two weeks prior to the World Series
(09:07):
how big a d bags Blue Jay fans were.
Speaker 4 (09:10):
Yeah, I and that surprised me a little bit too,
because you know, you listen to the Blue Jays song
and it's so nice.
Speaker 3 (09:16):
You ever heard that song? I don't know, maybe I
haven't a Blue Jays. Let's play ball, and.
Speaker 4 (09:24):
You know, you think of Canadians is very benign people,
but apparently not the case when it comes to sports.
But yeah, it was. It was a fun. It was
a fun, unifying moment. I suppose at a time of trouble.
Speaker 2 (09:37):
In a time of trial, and speaking of time and trouble,
I don't know how how where you stand on talking
politics on your air when it intersects with sports, But
certainly politics and sports have intersected this week without question,
with the criticism of the team that the team took for,
you know, agreeing to go to the State of the
Union address and the convert you know, laughing at Donald
(09:59):
Trump and the in the locker room. Where did you
have you addressed that on the air, and where do
you stand with all that cruticy?
Speaker 3 (10:06):
I don't care.
Speaker 4 (10:07):
I mean, the Dodgers go to the White House and
somebody from the La Times always writes an article and
tries to shame them, And you know, the media is
a certain kind of way, so if it goes the
other way around, it doesn't happen as much. But I
do think it's a I think it's trying to I
think it's trying really hard to insert whatever public narrative
(10:31):
that everybody has to deal with in their daily lives
when you go run around and ask people at the
Olympics or at tennis tournaments or wherever. Of course, if
the US team wins, the President's going to get involved.
He was involved in the last thing. He's involved in sports,
and I think it's something that people have an opportunity
to insert something in and get people to react to
(10:55):
it and act one way or another. I don't think
it's a big deal whoever is in power as far
as the presidency, that people go to the White House
and have that experience or talk to the President on
the phone or even act like, you know, he's not
a hitler, so that's good. I don't think it's that
big of a deal. But people that I love and respect,
(11:17):
you know, write those articles and get all hufffled and
hufflepuffed about it, like the Harry Potter place, and I
think it's a sad place to put our energy. I mean,
we work in the toy department as the sports people, right,
and if you want to talk about that stuff, there's
plenty of outlets to do it and get people to
be mad at you or happy with you. But I mean,
(11:40):
I think one of the things about the shows that
we do, or the least that I try to do,
is to keep people from really noticing what way I
lean in that regard. It's not about that at all.
It's about a break from that and just trying to
enjoy whatever our commonality is as people in a town
(12:01):
that enjoy the sports. And I do think that, I mean,
I understand there's always going to be some element of it,
and there always has been, right long before I was born.
You think about Jesse Owens, and I mean that was political,
and that's something that nobody looked down on in America
at the time.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
Right of course, I'm looking at the Olympics eighty four Olympics.
Speaker 4 (12:20):
Politics has always interjected it and no one's mentioned like, hey,
Russia was pretty good in hockey. Where were they for this?
You know, we're acting like they just don't even exist,
you know. So there's always some there's always something going on.
But I do think in this in this particular regard,
it's it's a it's it's shoehorned in.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
You may have already answered this question at the beginning
when you said you went back to sleep after seeing
that the game was tied.
Speaker 3 (12:43):
But I mean are you as invested?
Speaker 4 (12:45):
I mean I checked on the phone, gotcha, like you know,
to see the score, like you know, on a website,
not even like you know, turning the game on.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
Are you as invested in the Olympics in general, as
you used to be or did you were?
Speaker 3 (12:58):
You never? I think it just depends.
Speaker 4 (13:02):
There's some Olympics that I've gotten really into and really enjoyed.
The one with Bob Costas and Pink Eye. I couldn't
tear myself away. I just couldn't, you know. I mean,
the stories intrigue you, right. I mean, the Olympics are
just like any football game every once in a while.
I mean the other day, I was just sitting around
(13:22):
and I turned on a women's basketball game and it
was that big the big wide girl, Audie Crooks, Crooks
at Iowa State, and then these long girls with glitter
in their hair from TCU and they were going back
and forth, and you know, it was a crazy and
I was like, I was into it, you know. I mean,
I don't have a dog and any I've been to ames, right,
(13:44):
you know, I've done a lot of horn frog games,
but you know what I mean. So it's kind of
like that for me. If there's something that interests me
about and I'll watch it. And sometimes the Olympics happen,
and there's things happening in sports in the town and
they're just kind of peripheral thing and you say, oh, yeah,
they ran out of condoms, and you use a story
like that, you know, without really watching. I mean, we
(14:07):
got the Summer Olympics coming here, and we're going to
show our ass to the whole world.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
I mean, is it gonna be a nice, cleaned up ass. Oh,
it's going to be dirty.
Speaker 3 (14:17):
Yes, Why did you clean it up?
Speaker 4 (14:24):
Me?
Speaker 3 (14:24):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (14:25):
You go down the skin round Tell me where, dude.
We have three towers right Like they were showing the
pat Riley thing the other day and they're like, hey,
look at.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
All these statues you got over here.
Speaker 4 (14:37):
There's Magic, there's Kobe, there's you know, chick hern at
the desk and blah blahah be. And you look at
it and it's like, oh my god, there are those
three zombie towers in the background that are covered in graffiti,
that are filled what's the most vile hive of murderers
and psychos and deprivation, Like, my god, what's going on
in there?
Speaker 3 (14:57):
Yeah? Right across the street and it's like the shadow.
Speaker 4 (15:00):
Of one of the venues, one of the crypto Staples Center,
whatever you would call it. I mean, we're a we're
in a tough way we're gonna have the World Cup
here too, and there's gonna be World Cup games. It's
so far. And they'll do what they did in Englewood,
like when the Super Bowl was here. They'll clean it
all up and move everything.
Speaker 3 (15:17):
Well, you got the super Bowl again next year too.
Speaker 2 (15:19):
Yeah, I mean you got all sorts of stuff in
the next three years in your town.
Speaker 4 (15:23):
Well, l I can kind of absorb these things, yes,
in a way, like a punch.
Speaker 3 (15:27):
But the Olympics are not that way. I think.
Speaker 4 (15:30):
I think the first week of the Olympics when they
were here in eighty four. Obviously there's a different town,
but when they were here in eighty four, I remember
the first week being like no one was on the
roads because everybody was so scared of traffic, right, And
then the second week it was like Carmagan, which is
what they call.
Speaker 3 (15:46):
It, like, Oh, this isn't bad, let me go back
to work again. Bam.
Speaker 2 (15:53):
You know.
Speaker 3 (15:53):
I saw Betriss Bampanegas joining us.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
I saw this story about a listle look and how
much yes, and how much money her dad spent on
her kate skating career.
Speaker 3 (16:07):
Did you did you see that?
Speaker 2 (16:08):
The number he says he estimates upwards to a million
dollars he is spent on her on his daughter's skating career.
Speaker 3 (16:19):
It does try and it's just I mean, it's just
stunning to me.
Speaker 2 (16:21):
But I mean, I don't know how much you know,
you spend on your kid's youth sports, but it can
get I got very very expensive.
Speaker 3 (16:28):
One word for you, dick less less. Yes, well, yes,
less than a million.
Speaker 2 (16:33):
I can guarantee I've spent less than a million as well.
Speaker 4 (16:35):
But well, there are some sports you know that one
is in particular. You know, hockey is very expensive because
of the ice part and the traveling around to other
places that will play you in places like southern California
where there's no ice outside kind of thing. But there's
some sports like white boy sports, like a like Little
(16:59):
League baseball.
Speaker 3 (17:00):
Yes, travel baseball.
Speaker 4 (17:02):
Yeah, that dads can really have the opportunity to throw
money at it. Like there's plenty of people that will
help you burn your money for bats for hitting lessons
for you know, hitting clinics, for hitter's house, you know,
batting place at the mall to you know all the
different things, the sliding gloves, the the bruce bolt gloves.
Speaker 3 (17:26):
And all the different stuff.
Speaker 4 (17:28):
You know. I mean, they find a way to really
suck you dry. It's like going to Disneyland, except it's
not as entertaining. So there's a I mean, I enjoy
watching the kids compete, but as far as you sports go,
it's it's a great way to burn out your kid
by the time they're thirteen.
Speaker 3 (17:46):
Oh, there's no question.
Speaker 2 (17:47):
And that's why it was great though when we when
we talked to Bo Jackson bow Nos at the at
the Super Bowl, I mean he talked about he spent
a good four or five minutes talking about how important
it was to spend to not specialize your kid in
a sport.
Speaker 3 (18:02):
I mean, here we are talking.
Speaker 2 (18:04):
To the great, in my opinion, the greatest athlete of
my lifetime, and he's like, are you kidding me?
Speaker 3 (18:10):
Like, you cannot do that.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
You have to just allow you have to allow your
child to play whatever they want to play and allow
them to develop skills in a multitude of sports. It's
only going to enhance whatever sport they end up wanting
to play.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
Down the road.
Speaker 4 (18:25):
Some of the best people, I mean I always think
about Andrew Luck who was a soccer player growing up
in Europe. Part of the time because his dad was
out there Oliver with a NFL Europe. Yeah, I think
about Sam Darnold was not just a basketball player, but
he was the league MVP two years in a row
at San Clementy High School playing basketball and every quarterback.
(18:48):
A lot of them that I played with, Mike Van Raphors,
Carson Palmer, they were all basketball starters. Even Mark Sanchez
was a starter on the basketball team. And I think
we've gotten I mean, base balls its own thing, but
I think we've gotten a little bit away, hopefully from
discouraging kids from playing more than one.
Speaker 3 (19:08):
Stentilm swinging back a little bit. I've gusked the last five.
Speaker 4 (19:11):
I think it is because because we see that being
more well rounded is a better thing, not only for
your body, but probably for your staying power. If you're
going to be playing for you know, into your twenties,
if you're kind of do something into your twenties, you know,
doing it when you're ten years old without any kind
of respite, which is what these a lot of these
(19:33):
people are asking is I don't think is very feasible.
Speaker 3 (19:37):
Well, a lot of these kids, how we create a
twenty three year old failure? That's right?
Speaker 2 (19:41):
And a lot of these kids, if they play one
sport and they're just so serious, and a lot of
them attach their identity to that sport. So if they
happen to fail in that sport, even for a short
period of time, they think they're a failure as a person.
Where if you have lots of different interest and lots
of different skill sets, I mean, I will go back
to a Listle Louise she's a perfect example. Like I
don't know if you saw her gold medal winning performance,
(20:03):
but she just skated with joy and free and they
told the story before the her performance was she quit.
I mean she just flat out quit skating for like
eighteen months and said I've had enough. I don't want
to do this anymore. And she went off with her
friends and she traveled and she did this and she
got she went to a ski trip with her buddies
(20:24):
and she had such a great time skiing.
Speaker 3 (20:26):
She was like, you know what, I want to kind
of try this again. But she didn't.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Ident she no longer identified herself just as a skater.
So when she got back to skating, she was like, you.
Speaker 3 (20:35):
Know what if I fail, I fail, I know.
Speaker 2 (20:38):
I have a great life outside of skating now, and
I think that's one of the things that lifted her
up to that gold medal because she wasn't she wasn't
as nervous as all the other people were.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
Try take it eighteen months in football, you come back,
get your head punched clean off. That's right, there's no
question about that. I'm not frolicking around the ice. Oh
my god. Well, Petros, it's it's always a pleasure. You're
the best, dick. It's always great to come. It's great
to talk to you.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
Speaking of ice, we got we got the resumption of
cracking hockey. You know, we're fighting for the Stanley Cup
playoffs here in Seattle for the first time.
Speaker 4 (21:13):
And if you heard about that, I thought you were
like going to ask me another political question here speaking
of ice.
Speaker 2 (21:18):
Yeah, you're the best brother. We'll talk to you, right,
sounds good, Petro's poppadaikas And yes, speaking of ice, the
one you skate on, the cracking go for their seventh.
Speaker 3 (21:31):
Win in the last nine.
Speaker 2 (21:32):
If it all goes right in the Western Conference to
night around them, they can find themselves in the fifth
seed in the playoff race.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
When we start the show tomorrow, we'll talk to you tomorrow,
cracking Dallas
It's time for our weekly conversation with college football analyst
Petros Papa.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
DAKASO that I'm a smart guy, I'm stupid.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Brought to you by Sweet James Accident Attorneys forty one years.
If you're hurt in an accident, called Sweet James right
away at eight hundred, five hundred and fifty two hundred.
Sweet James will be sweet to you, but tough on
insurance companies that will bully you rue. I don't know
buh now with Petros Peers Dave's Softy Muller loss.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Welcome back, rolling into the four o'clock hour here on
a Wednesday, head of cracking hockey coming up less than
one hour from now here on ninety three point three
KJRFM and Wednesdays at four.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
You know what that means.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
It means our man, Petros Papadakas, brought to you by our.
Speaker 4 (00:52):
Friends and Sweet James, the dense Beard of Justice eight
hundred and nine million. That's eight hundred nine million or
Sweet James dot com. He is the best personal injury
attorney in the world. Give him a call if you've
been hurt in an accident.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Beautiful Petrols, where were you Sunday morning, were you sleeping
in your bed?
Speaker 3 (01:13):
You were asleep in your bed.
Speaker 4 (01:15):
And went up to go to the bathroom. Yeah, check
the phone, and it said it was tied. And I
said to myself, Wow, that's gonna be a real nutcutter.
And then I went back to sleep, and then I
woke up and I watched You know, YouTube is just
amazing the way they put the highlights together, and it
(01:35):
really really saves time and emotional effort. So I watched
it on YouTube and I was able to absorb it
and discuss it with some efficiency on the air, though
I'm not a hockey expert, and that was that. But
it was great. It was a great moment and all
(01:57):
that and a lot of fun for everybody. And I
think easy to root for those guys, no doubt about it.
And it's kind of interesting to watch guys get their
teeth knocked out for their country and then just go
right back and play in the NHL. And the flip
side of that is the NBA and the load management
era and a guy at Kansas who doesn't want to play,
(02:20):
letting himself out of the first in the draft. He
kind of juxtapose those two things. But I think it
goes down to something that you know well covering the sport,
and I only know peripherally. I mean, the Kings have won.
I think it's three championships, three Stanley Cups since I
have been doing media in LA. And before that, there
(02:43):
was that heartbreaking loss against gosh, the Canadians with Wayne
Gretzky and Marty mcsorley's stick got They got a penalty
because the stick was bent too much. You know, some
big controversy that people talk about to this or they
did in LA. And just like you guys used to
(03:05):
with the Seahawks before they won their first title, right,
we were so close in whatever year if it wasn't
for that holding penalty against the Steelers. Yeah and now,
and that's true. That holding penalty was on my best
friend who's passed away since. But the linebacker for the
Steelers that was rushing on that play. But it's kind
of interesting because those terrible memories, you know, Bill Buckner,
(03:29):
A lot of that stuff just kind of fades away
into memory because these teams end up winning championships. But
I do remember that being the thing in La forever was,
oh my god, if that one thing didn't happen and
then they won. It feels like an abundance of titles
since then. And it's not that important. But dealing with
(03:51):
hockey people and covering the sport of hockey is a
totally different animal from the other. I guess you would
say Big three or popular sport. I mean everybody, Well,
I would say that everybody's got their nuances, right, Baseball
players and a lot of things have kind of evened
out because they're all kids, and they're all on the
(04:13):
Internet and stuff like that. Like some of the nuances
of our youth, like the fact that all the baseball players,
no matter who they were, where they were from, they
were all indoctrinated into daytime television. That used to be
a thing for like thirty years, right, Like if you
ran up on John Olerud and asked him about days
of our lives, he'd probably go off because that was
(04:35):
like something that they were.
Speaker 3 (04:37):
In the clubhouse before the game.
Speaker 4 (04:39):
That's yeah, Well, there were sitting around all day in
same town playing minor league baseball. You know, Now the
Internet and video games and all those different things they
kind of even things up. Football players were always a
certain kind of way. I mean, it's much more of
a black culture, so you're doing things that are popular
(04:59):
like that. Like you know, there's not a lot of
baseball teams that would gather around a guy with a
ghetto blaster while he danced, But we did that all
the time, right, someome guy from Saint Louis on our
team just dance around. That's how bored we were. I mean,
we didn't have the internet, you know what I mean.
So anyway, what I'm saying is with all these different sports,
talking to these people is one thing, hockey people are
(05:21):
by far, by far the best people to deal with
in sports. They're the most honest, they answer the questions
the most I think thoughtfully, and I believe it's because
of their juniors programs and the stuff like that. Most
of them. If you're a great hockey player, if you're
(05:43):
thirteen years old, you're gone right from your parents' house.
He's become an adult very quickly. Yeah, you're living in
somebody else's house and it's yes, sir, yes, ma'am. And
there's a little bit of that in baseball with the
summer would bat leagues and stuff, but not in the
same regard. So what I'm saying is hockey people, even
though I don't understand the sport well and don't cover
(06:04):
it closely, are always the easiest to root for, and
Canadians used to be really easy to root for.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
But they seem kind of bitter in this loss.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Oh well, and there's a bit of you know, it's
kind of a bit sad on the hockey side of things,
not on the baseball side of things. That they also
lost the World Series bye literally one half of an inch.
They've had those two I've seen those those two photos
juxtaposed in the same tweet with the play at the
plate and then also the wide open back of the
(06:36):
net for Canada that they didn't end up end up
getting and it could have been much much different. Baseball's
just different because, hey, it's the US of sports, you
know what.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
We were just talking about it. You're right, it's their sport,
and we beat him at their sport.
Speaker 2 (06:49):
It's like our fifth sport, man, and they couldn't beat
us at their best sport.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
And it just brings a nation to the turmoil.
Speaker 4 (06:58):
Man, Like, they dominated the game the particulars of the game,
but the part where you win or lose they didn't, obviously,
and that makes people more better if you think dick
of Canada.
Speaker 3 (07:09):
As America's hat.
Speaker 4 (07:12):
Think of these things that have happened, the hockey thing,
the baseball thing has like one of those scenes in
the movie where Cowboy gets his hat shut off and
looks all surprised, like, whoa, that's that's what's happened to Canada.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
In fact, we were just talking about it.
Speaker 4 (07:29):
One of the Dodger that one of the guys that
travels with the Dodgers radio crew is here today and
he was there in Canada when they lost Game seven.
And we had a guy on the MLB network. Guy,
he's a tall guy, Amsinger.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
I remember that guy he's on.
Speaker 4 (07:47):
He was there, he described this, Yeah, Greg Amsing, it's
pretty good interview. We had him on and he described
this to us as well, and they said, like you
cannot imagine the horror in that stadium with the Dodgers won,
Like it was so quiet, it was like the country
just got punched in the gut. You could hear the
(08:09):
Dodgers screaming and yelling in ecstasy almost completely clearly on
the pictures mound and celebrating the World Series, and you
could hear grown men like weeping and babies crying in
the stand, Like you could really feel that absolute dejection
(08:30):
in that moment. And I can't imagine this is any
better with the women the men, and as you said,
and then of course, uh, the World Series, which you
guys I think took some pride in it.
Speaker 3 (08:42):
We were drinkings.
Speaker 2 (08:46):
We were drinking the Blue Jay fans tears after that game.
And I cannot think of a World Series that more
Mariner fans were so one sided on we were all
Dodger blue. Because we've found out we kind of already
knew that Blue Jay fans were d bags. We've found
out over the two weeks prior to the World Series
(09:07):
how big a d bags Blue Jay fans were.
Speaker 4 (09:10):
Yeah, I and that surprised me a little bit too,
because you know, you listen to the Blue Jays song
and it's so nice.
Speaker 3 (09:16):
You ever heard that song? I don't know, maybe I
haven't a Blue Jays. Let's play ball, and.
Speaker 4 (09:24):
You know, you think of Canadians is very benign people,
but apparently not the case when it comes to sports.
But yeah, it was. It was a fun. It was
a fun, unifying moment. I suppose at a time of trouble.
Speaker 2 (09:37):
In a time of trial, and speaking of time and trouble,
I don't know how how where you stand on talking
politics on your air when it intersects with sports, But
certainly politics and sports have intersected this week without question,
with the criticism of the team that the team took for,
you know, agreeing to go to the State of the
Union address and the convert you know, laughing at Donald
(09:59):
Trump and the in the locker room. Where did you
have you addressed that on the air, and where do
you stand with all that cruticy?
Speaker 3 (10:06):
I don't care.
Speaker 4 (10:07):
I mean, the Dodgers go to the White House and
somebody from the La Times always writes an article and
tries to shame them, And you know, the media is
a certain kind of way, so if it goes the
other way around, it doesn't happen as much. But I
do think it's a I think it's trying to I
think it's trying really hard to insert whatever public narrative
(10:31):
that everybody has to deal with in their daily lives
when you go run around and ask people at the
Olympics or at tennis tournaments or wherever. Of course, if
the US team wins, the President's going to get involved.
He was involved in the last thing. He's involved in sports,
and I think it's something that people have an opportunity
to insert something in and get people to react to
(10:55):
it and act one way or another. I don't think
it's a big deal whoever is in power as far
as the presidency, that people go to the White House
and have that experience or talk to the President on
the phone or even act like, you know, he's not
a hitler, so that's good. I don't think it's that
big of a deal. But people that I love and respect,
(11:17):
you know, write those articles and get all hufffled and
hufflepuffed about it, like the Harry Potter place, and I
think it's a sad place to put our energy. I mean,
we work in the toy department as the sports people, right,
and if you want to talk about that stuff, there's
plenty of outlets to do it and get people to
be mad at you or happy with you. But I mean,
(11:40):
I think one of the things about the shows that
we do, or the least that I try to do,
is to keep people from really noticing what way I
lean in that regard. It's not about that at all.
It's about a break from that and just trying to
enjoy whatever our commonality is as people in a town
(12:01):
that enjoy the sports. And I do think that, I mean,
I understand there's always going to be some element of it,
and there always has been, right long before I was born.
You think about Jesse Owens, and I mean that was political,
and that's something that nobody looked down on in America
at the time.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
Right of course, I'm looking at the Olympics eighty four Olympics.
Speaker 4 (12:20):
Politics has always interjected it and no one's mentioned like, hey,
Russia was pretty good in hockey. Where were they for this?
You know, we're acting like they just don't even exist,
you know. So there's always some there's always something going on.
But I do think in this in this particular regard,
it's it's a it's it's shoehorned in.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
You may have already answered this question at the beginning
when you said you went back to sleep after seeing
that the game was tied.
Speaker 3 (12:43):
But I mean are you as invested?
Speaker 4 (12:45):
I mean I checked on the phone, gotcha, like you know,
to see the score, like you know, on a website,
not even like you know, turning the game on.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
Are you as invested in the Olympics in general, as
you used to be or did you were?
Speaker 3 (12:58):
You never? I think it just depends.
Speaker 4 (13:02):
There's some Olympics that I've gotten really into and really enjoyed.
The one with Bob Costas and Pink Eye. I couldn't
tear myself away. I just couldn't, you know. I mean,
the stories intrigue you, right. I mean, the Olympics are
just like any football game every once in a while.
I mean the other day, I was just sitting around
(13:22):
and I turned on a women's basketball game and it
was that big the big wide girl, Audie Crooks, Crooks
at Iowa State, and then these long girls with glitter
in their hair from TCU and they were going back
and forth, and you know, it was a crazy and
I was like, I was into it, you know. I mean,
I don't have a dog and any I've been to ames, right,
(13:44):
you know, I've done a lot of horn frog games,
but you know what I mean. So it's kind of
like that for me. If there's something that interests me
about and I'll watch it. And sometimes the Olympics happen,
and there's things happening in sports in the town and
they're just kind of peripheral thing and you say, oh, yeah,
they ran out of condoms, and you use a story
like that, you know, without really watching. I mean, we
(14:07):
got the Summer Olympics coming here, and we're going to
show our ass to the whole world.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
I mean, is it gonna be a nice, cleaned up ass. Oh,
it's going to be dirty.
Speaker 3 (14:17):
Yes, Why did you clean it up?
Speaker 4 (14:24):
Me?
Speaker 3 (14:24):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (14:25):
You go down the skin round Tell me where, dude.
We have three towers right Like they were showing the
pat Riley thing the other day and they're like, hey,
look at.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
All these statues you got over here.
Speaker 4 (14:37):
There's Magic, there's Kobe, there's you know, chick hern at
the desk and blah blahah be. And you look at
it and it's like, oh my god, there are those
three zombie towers in the background that are covered in graffiti,
that are filled what's the most vile hive of murderers
and psychos and deprivation, Like, my god, what's going on
in there?
Speaker 3 (14:57):
Yeah? Right across the street and it's like the shadow.
Speaker 4 (15:00):
Of one of the venues, one of the crypto Staples Center,
whatever you would call it. I mean, we're a we're
in a tough way we're gonna have the World Cup
here too, and there's gonna be World Cup games. It's
so far. And they'll do what they did in Englewood,
like when the Super Bowl was here. They'll clean it
all up and move everything.
Speaker 3 (15:17):
Well, you got the super Bowl again next year too.
Speaker 2 (15:19):
Yeah, I mean you got all sorts of stuff in
the next three years in your town.
Speaker 4 (15:23):
Well, l I can kind of absorb these things, yes,
in a way, like a punch.
Speaker 3 (15:27):
But the Olympics are not that way. I think.
Speaker 4 (15:30):
I think the first week of the Olympics when they
were here in eighty four. Obviously there's a different town,
but when they were here in eighty four, I remember
the first week being like no one was on the
roads because everybody was so scared of traffic, right, And
then the second week it was like Carmagan, which is
what they call.
Speaker 3 (15:46):
It, like, Oh, this isn't bad, let me go back
to work again. Bam.
Speaker 2 (15:53):
You know.
Speaker 3 (15:53):
I saw Betriss Bampanegas joining us.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
I saw this story about a listle look and how
much yes, and how much money her dad spent on
her kate skating career.
Speaker 3 (16:07):
Did you did you see that?
Speaker 2 (16:08):
The number he says he estimates upwards to a million
dollars he is spent on her on his daughter's skating career.
Speaker 3 (16:19):
It does try and it's just I mean, it's just
stunning to me.
Speaker 2 (16:21):
But I mean, I don't know how much you know,
you spend on your kid's youth sports, but it can
get I got very very expensive.
Speaker 3 (16:28):
One word for you, dick less less. Yes, well, yes,
less than a million.
Speaker 2 (16:33):
I can guarantee I've spent less than a million as well.
Speaker 4 (16:35):
But well, there are some sports you know that one
is in particular. You know, hockey is very expensive because
of the ice part and the traveling around to other
places that will play you in places like southern California
where there's no ice outside kind of thing. But there's
some sports like white boy sports, like a like Little
(16:59):
League baseball.
Speaker 3 (17:00):
Yes, travel baseball.
Speaker 4 (17:02):
Yeah, that dads can really have the opportunity to throw
money at it. Like there's plenty of people that will
help you burn your money for bats for hitting lessons
for you know, hitting clinics, for hitter's house, you know,
batting place at the mall to you know all the
different things, the sliding gloves, the the bruce bolt gloves.
Speaker 3 (17:26):
And all the different stuff.
Speaker 4 (17:28):
You know. I mean, they find a way to really
suck you dry. It's like going to Disneyland, except it's
not as entertaining. So there's a I mean, I enjoy
watching the kids compete, but as far as you sports go,
it's it's a great way to burn out your kid
by the time they're thirteen.
Speaker 3 (17:46):
Oh, there's no question.
Speaker 2 (17:47):
And that's why it was great though when we when
we talked to Bo Jackson bow Nos at the at
the Super Bowl, I mean he talked about he spent
a good four or five minutes talking about how important
it was to spend to not specialize your kid in
a sport.
Speaker 3 (18:02):
I mean, here we are talking.
Speaker 2 (18:04):
To the great, in my opinion, the greatest athlete of
my lifetime, and he's like, are you kidding me?
Speaker 3 (18:10):
Like, you cannot do that.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
You have to just allow you have to allow your
child to play whatever they want to play and allow
them to develop skills in a multitude of sports. It's
only going to enhance whatever sport they end up wanting
to play.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
Down the road.
Speaker 4 (18:25):
Some of the best people, I mean I always think
about Andrew Luck who was a soccer player growing up
in Europe. Part of the time because his dad was
out there Oliver with a NFL Europe. Yeah, I think
about Sam Darnold was not just a basketball player, but
he was the league MVP two years in a row
at San Clementy High School playing basketball and every quarterback.
(18:48):
A lot of them that I played with, Mike Van Raphors,
Carson Palmer, they were all basketball starters. Even Mark Sanchez
was a starter on the basketball team. And I think
we've gotten I mean, base balls its own thing, but
I think we've gotten a little bit away, hopefully from
discouraging kids from playing more than one.
Speaker 3 (19:08):
Stentilm swinging back a little bit. I've gusked the last five.
Speaker 4 (19:11):
I think it is because because we see that being
more well rounded is a better thing, not only for
your body, but probably for your staying power. If you're
going to be playing for you know, into your twenties,
if you're kind of do something into your twenties, you know,
doing it when you're ten years old without any kind
of respite, which is what these a lot of these
(19:33):
people are asking is I don't think is very feasible.
Speaker 3 (19:37):
Well, a lot of these kids, how we create a
twenty three year old failure? That's right?
Speaker 2 (19:41):
And a lot of these kids, if they play one
sport and they're just so serious, and a lot of
them attach their identity to that sport. So if they
happen to fail in that sport, even for a short
period of time, they think they're a failure as a person.
Where if you have lots of different interest and lots
of different skill sets, I mean, I will go back
to a Listle Louise she's a perfect example. Like I
don't know if you saw her gold medal winning performance,
(20:03):
but she just skated with joy and free and they
told the story before the her performance was she quit.
I mean she just flat out quit skating for like
eighteen months and said I've had enough. I don't want
to do this anymore. And she went off with her
friends and she traveled and she did this and she
got she went to a ski trip with her buddies
(20:24):
and she had such a great time skiing.
Speaker 3 (20:26):
She was like, you know what, I want to kind
of try this again. But she didn't.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Ident she no longer identified herself just as a skater.
So when she got back to skating, she was like, you.
Speaker 3 (20:35):
Know what if I fail, I fail, I know.
Speaker 2 (20:38):
I have a great life outside of skating now, and
I think that's one of the things that lifted her
up to that gold medal because she wasn't she wasn't
as nervous as all the other people were.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
Try take it eighteen months in football, you come back,
get your head punched clean off. That's right, there's no
question about that. I'm not frolicking around the ice. Oh
my god. Well, Petros, it's it's always a pleasure. You're
the best, dick. It's always great to come. It's great
to talk to you.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
Speaking of ice, we got we got the resumption of
cracking hockey. You know, we're fighting for the Stanley Cup
playoffs here in Seattle for the first time.
Speaker 4 (21:13):
And if you heard about that, I thought you were
like going to ask me another political question here speaking
of ice.
Speaker 2 (21:18):
Yeah, you're the best brother. We'll talk to you, right,
sounds good, Petro's poppadaikas And yes, speaking of ice, the
one you skate on, the cracking go for their seventh.
Speaker 3 (21:31):
Win in the last nine.
Speaker 2 (21:32):
If it all goes right in the Western Conference to
night around them, they can find themselves in the fifth
seed in the playoff race.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
When we start the show tomorrow, we'll talk to you tomorrow,
cracking Dallas
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