March 18, 2025 • 41 mins
On this episode, the second in the series of guests favourite sporting memories, ESPN/ SEC network & Marty and McGee's Ryan McGee joins the Chaps to recall some of his memories from over the years covering sports.
Hear Ryan talk about,
Hear Ryan talk about,
- his entry into sports with Johnny Majors at the University of Tennessee
- being taken out by a North Carolina State linebacker aged just 13
- playing kids end zone footbal wtih Lane Kiffin
- Ryan's Rose Bowl memories
- sideline reporting on his Dad's final game officiating
- Scooping up some Fighting Irish dirt!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
I'm not going to comment on that. I'll get fine
for the rest of my life if I get comment
on that.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
National championship that young stirl.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
Everyone and welcome to the College Chaps podcast. On our
last episode, we started a new spring series with our
guests talk about their favorite sporting memories, and we continue
this with a very special guest in this episode. But
first with the chapter and George jump by all of
our how are you my friend?
Speaker 4 (00:43):
Yeah, I'm doing it well. I was very saditimous the
episode with chippendun Lap where we started this series. It
was yeah, very exciting and very entertaining. A great product
of your mind, Joyce, to come up with this concept
for a spring series, and we've got a great, great
guest to continue.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
There's an admission of pleasurism coming up the second, but
we should also just make a point about why our
other coast isn't here. Mister Chinnery is on the eve
of back to back national championship finals for Essex volleyball,
So Alex is up to his eyes and whatever he's
doing at this moment in time, So good lucky see.
We hope you do well tomorrow. On this episode, our
(01:29):
guest joins a very exclusive third appearance fraternity. So exclusive
as this club that only six guests have made three
or more appearances in two hundred nine episodes so far.
And I also have an admission to make. It was
listening to our guest show when you interviewed a collective
of football helmets that the idea for this series came from.
So with that admission out of the way, you know
him as one half of the greatest Southern duo since
(01:51):
Parting and Rogers. You hear his voice on Game Day
and Assac Nation every Saturday during football season. And if
that wasn't enough, he is the author of multiple York
Times best selling books. So it's awesome to welcome to
start Ryan Mickey. Welcome, Ryan. How are you.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
I'm doing great, It's good to talk to you guys.
Good to talk a little. I feel like football college
football season just ended like an hour ago. It's right
on the calendar. It was only two weeks, but it
felt like so much longer than that because there were
so many more games. But yeah, I'm kind of I'm
recovering now, and so it's I'm recovering enough that I'm
i can talk college football anytime. But now I'm actually
(02:26):
rested enough to make sense, so I appreciate you guys
having me.
Speaker 3 (02:29):
And it was and it was the longest college football
season of all time, wasn't it. So it was from
a sec media days all the way up to the
championship game. It was a long year for you.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Yeah, and you know, I covered NASCAR exclusively. Marty Smith
and I both did the first part of my career.
And it's the longest season in American professional sports. I mean,
even longer than golf. It starts the middle of February
or really early February, runs all the way until the
late thanks late November to Thanksgiving. And my wife said,
(03:00):
this year was the first time in all the years
I've been covering college football that as I was leaving
to go to the championship game, I have what she
calls my Homestead look, because the NASCAR finale used to
be in Homestead, Florida, and I had that look like,
all right, I'm pulling for a good game, but I
do not want overtime. I want to get I want
to go home, I want to sleep. So, yeah, it
(03:21):
was a long season, and they're going to get longer,
you know, in the next couple of years. But it's uh,
but it was great. I mean it was the season
was unbelievable and so but yes, I was definitely ready
to take a nap once we hit January twenty second.
Speaker 1 (03:35):
And you.
Speaker 3 (03:37):
Watch basketball, but you don't participate so much in basketball
base bawls year, I'm sure will come onto that base
bowls your real things, would you?
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Yeah, I do basketball. It just looked like I did.
I did a couple of store rode a couple of
stories this year. I worked a little bit on their
Bracketology show at ESPN. I did the open and voice
that and then I have a feature that will run
next week. But I've not I was supposed to cover
the Final Four in twenty twenty, and then obviously that
(04:05):
was canceled. And in the years leading up to twenty twenty,
I was doing a lot of basketball, like particularly I
live in North Carolina, so on Tobacco Road, North Carolina Duke,
I was there. The last game I covered, I believe
was the Zion Shoe game when his shoe exploded in
the first thirty seconds of the North Carolina Duke basketball game.
And I was headed to the SEC Tournament when I
(04:26):
got the call as I was literally as I was
pulling into the parking deck at the Charlotte North Carolina Airport.
I got the call, turn around and go home. They're
about to cancel the SEC tournament. And so so that's
the way of saying I used to do a lot
more basketball than I do now, so I dabble in it,
but it is very nice to fill out my terrible bracket.
And that's going to fail, and I can just sit
(04:48):
and watch and maybe work a little bit, but not
a lot.
Speaker 3 (04:53):
Well, if it contain me in this podcast, you can
explain to me the tobacco roads and scenario because I
hate it a lot. I think I know where to asked,
but I'll talk about that towards the end if we
get any time. And the purpose of this series is
to talk about sporting memories and then go on and
talk about some of the stuff that's hiding behind you.
But let's talk about some of your favorite sporting memories
for what jumps out in terms of what really kind
(05:16):
of what's your favorite sporting memories that you that you've
accumulated over the years.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Ryan, Well, I'll answer your tobacco road question right now
because it lends, it leans into a lot of one
we'll talk about during this conversation because Tobacco Road is
what they refer to. It's basically an interstate Highway forty
in North Carolina and it connects North Carolina State University,
(05:42):
the wolf Pack, Jim Valvano, and the Cardiac Pac back
in nineteen eighty three. Only about twenty minutes down the
road is Chapel Hill, you know, home of the Tar
Heels and obviously Michael Jordan and our buddy Brad Darty
and everyone else. And then just a few minutes up
the road from there is Duke University, Duke Blue, David Cucliffe,
all of our friends there. And then about an hour
(06:04):
down the road to the west is Wake Forest, the
Demon Deacons, and that's Tobacco Road. Those four schools when
I was growing up, they called those the Big Four
and they always played each other. And that's that's where
I grew up. And my dad, as you guys know,
was not a basketball official. He was a football official
in the Atlantic Coast Conference for years and years and years.
I grew up a big North Coronta State Wolfpack fan.
(06:26):
One of the biggest reasons I ended up at the
University of Tennessee's because it reminded me of NC State.
But that's Tobacco Road, and I saw that because a
lot of what I talk about here is my life
growing up on Tobacco Road during the nineteen eighties, the
height of ACC and my mind college basketball, and then
(06:50):
you know, my dad being on the field in the
fall as an ACC football official. And so my greatest
sporting memory as a kid, just as a fan, I
was a huge fan of the North Kinta State wolf
Pack and my favorite player was Thorough Bailey. And the
first year I really followed the NCAA basketball tournament, I
think it was thirty two teams then is one North
Carolina State and the Cardiac Pack with Jim Valvano, and
(07:12):
those guys won. You know, on the last second buzzer
beater slam dunk by Lorenzo Charles to beat a keem
Olajuan Clyde Drexler, the five slam of jama Group out
of Houston. And so I say all that to show
you something because at the Rose Bowl two years ago,
(07:34):
so the semi final game between Alabama and Michigan, I
was talking to our friend Holly Row the great sideline reporter,
the great voice of every sport. It feels like on ESPN,
but particularly when I think about women's sports and college football,
and I just I just casually making small talk with Holly.
I goes, so, what are you up to these days,
like when football is over? And she goes, well, you know,
I'm She goes, I work on the Utah Jazz NBA
(07:57):
broadcasts and I go, well, do you work with Thorough
Bailey And she said yes. I go He's my all
time favorite basketball player. He wore number forty one. So
when I was a kid to this day, when I'm
playing in like, you know, the old Man Knee Brace
League at the YMCA, I wear number forty one. And
she says, I had no idea, and I said yeah.
So about three weeks later we did Marty McGee On
(08:18):
Saturday morning. I got a text from Holly right when
the show's over with what are you doing tonight? And
I said nothing, and she said, you need to get downtown.
I live in Charlotte. You need to go to the
Hornets game. I'll leave two tickets for you and your wife,
you know, at the box office. So we went and
she said get there early and sure enough, I get
there early and I look and here comes Holly Row
(08:40):
and she's got Thorough Bailey with her, who's the color commentator,
and U and so I took some pictures with Thurrell
and and then she he brought a couple of cards
of his own and autographed him for me. And I mean, listen,
Holly Road was already one of my favorite people in
the business, but now I am indebted to her for
(09:02):
the rest of the time. Because my greatest childhood sports
memory was when in c State won the national championship
with Jim Valvano and Thorrow Bailey. And I got to
tell THORW. Bayley that person and my wife said she
had never seen me out like that. She said, I've
seen you talk to famous people and you know, great
coaches and players, you never acted like that. I go,
I was twelve again, you know, talking to throw Bailey.
(09:23):
So that was to me as a fan, as a
kid like that was that was the moment for me.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
That's a that's an awesome piece of college football, of
sporting Billia just right there, and that's only recently just
falling into your possession.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
You've got, I mean, all manners of.
Speaker 4 (09:43):
Things behind you that I can see right now as well.
Pitt Pitt little Pitt helmet that yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
Yeah, the Pitt helmet is signed by Johnny Majors. So
coach Majors was Coach Majors was my coach. You know
when I went to Tennessee, I was there for Coach
Majors last four years. The last three of those years,
two and a half of those years I worked for
the football team on the video crew, the great Link
(10:11):
Hudson who just retired, and Barry Rice and all these
legendary guys that started what we call now we call
VFL films. I worked with those guys when I was
in college. And every day at practice I got to
be on the tower shooting practice film or video every
day of offense of the offense, and every day Coach
(10:33):
Majors would come up on that tower with his bullhorn
and coach from that tower. He stand up there with
me for an hour and a half every day, and
he was boys, he was larger than life. Like. The
building was on Johnny Major's boulevard. When you came into
work every day you passed his retired jersey, and you
know he should have one heisman in nineteen fifty six. Sorry,
Paul Horning and Jim Brown, But you come in and
(10:56):
you see all this Johnny Major stuff and a huge
portrait of Johnny Majors. And then I go to work
and Johnny Majors would be on the tower with me.
But he would talk to me every day about what
game is your dad officiating this weekend? How'd you do
on your math test? Are you still dating that girl
from Nashville? I mean every day? And so when when
Coach Majors passed away a few years ago, I wrote
a column about that because he was my coach. So yeah,
(11:18):
And and of course Coach Majors one with with with
Tony Dorset Tony Dorsett, as Coach called him in nineteen
seventy six, the year before he returned to Tennessee to
be the head coach, and uh, and coach gave me
that Coach gave me that helmet, yea, I've got I
don't have any a lot of full size helmets, but
I have a lot of I got a lot of
(11:39):
many helmets. I got the the Tennessee smoky gray, which
I always loved. Some people didn't. And then back here
is the most valuable of them all boys, which is uh,
of course the Duke's Mayo. Yeah you got me. That's
on the other side, Duke's Mayo Classic. So yeah, that's us.
Speaker 4 (11:59):
He got as he got mail on it.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Yeah, no, well it did it. It did at some point, yeah,
it did it some point.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
You fell up with me.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah. You dip stuff in it.
Speaker 3 (12:11):
It's that Tennessee helmet. It's that got there's a shadow
on it. It's that the Rocky Mountains, that.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
The Smoky Mountains. So they called that, called that smoky gray, right,
they called that smoky gray. And they will turn this
ringlet off. They call that smoky gray and the yeah,
because that's the outline of the Smoky Mountains. This is
these are the uniforms. This is the first time and
it's got the checker board on the back. This was
the first time when they rolled these helmets out that
they wore those smoky gray uniforms that were very divisive
(12:41):
at the time, and they didn't win I think the
first couple of games that wore them, but I think
they're the coolest. And that was when alternate uniforms were
still like new, particularly in the southeastern corner of the
United States. I mean it was Oregon and pretty much
no one else was messing with it. But I always thought,
I still think the smoky gray uniforms were.
Speaker 4 (12:59):
Just the best the work of art. You it feels
like every time you're come on the show, Ryan, your
show is something amazing, something cool. What is ultimately your
most favorite prize possession piece of memorabilia the own if
you could nail it down to one such a thing.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
Yeah, it's so I kind of have two. I kind
of have two collections of things, which is, you know,
I have the stuff that I've collected over the years
from events that I've covered. You're like, back here, like
I've got this chunk of it looks like nothing, but
I've got this chunk of grass. And that's roseball turf
(13:45):
right there. That's from that same that's from that same
semifinal game two years ago. So it was the Michigan
Alabama game and for SEC Nation and Martin McGee, they
wanted someone to ride on the We had a float
in the parade, the Rose Parade that was the the
(14:06):
ABC College Football Playoff you know ESPN float, And I'm like, yeah,
I'll ride on it. And I rode the whole four hours,
and it was very emotional for me because my dad
officiated that game twice. And I've got a little souvenir
football up there. I think you guys can see that.
But my dad officiated the rose ball twice in one
of those This was two thousand and seven Michigan USC Michigan.
(14:33):
I think as I'm speaking, they still give up three
touchdowns in that game. It's like that game we just
cad of rolled. But my dad worked the Arizona State
Jake Plumber versus Ohio State game in ninety six, I
believe it was. And I sat in the grand stand
there on Colorado Avenue with my mom and my brother
and my mom's entire life, a little girl from North
Carolina dreamed of attending the Rose Parade. So we sat
(14:56):
there watching the Rose Parade with my mom. It was
one of the greatest days ever. My mom died just
a couple years later. So for me to go ride
in that that Rose Parade float for four hours, I
was with like a Broadway star and a guy from
the Bachelor and a country singer and we had a
great time. But it was very emotional for me. And
then when the ride was over with. You know, when
(15:18):
when you make a rose parade float, it has to
be natural materials. It has to be rose pedals, it
has to be seeds, it has to be dirt. And
they go, well, you know that turf that that you're
sitting on there, that's actual, Like that turf came from
the stadium. And so when no one was looking, I
just ripped a corner of it off and stuck it
in that bag. And it's kind of dried up, but
I say that. So there's I collect things as I'm
(15:39):
covering things, and then I collect the things that I
collected as a fan or if I was there with
my dad. And so I'll give you some more dirt.
I have a lot of dirt in my office. This
is from don't know if you see it is in
this vial and you can kind of see his gold
right there. This is from the miracle at South Bend
(16:01):
in nineteen ninety one. There's gold turf right there. Tennessee
was getting smoked by Notre Dame in nineteen ninety one.
It's thirty one seven, I think the score was. And
my college roommate David Montgomery, super Dame Montgomery, who I
talked about on Martin McGee's on Dave, and I went
to the game, had no money. We sat in a
(16:22):
little wooden grand stand actually in the end zone down
on the field, like the wall was behind us in
the end zone. And Tennessee came back, took the lead.
Late Notre Dame had a chance to win the game
with the late short you know, chip shot field goal
and it got named Floyd Miley, defensive player of Tennessee
(16:42):
blocked that kick with his butt. Floyd Miley and Jeremy
Lincoln where the guys got in there. And as soon
as the game and we rushed the field only time
I rushed field my life. We rushed the fielder Notre Dame,
and they it was one hundred and fifty anniversary of
the school. So instead of their normal like slash end
zone that they have, they had painted this thing of
(17:03):
the Golden Dome and it said one hundred and fifty years.
And I would have ran over there and scooped up
a big chunk of gold turf. And so this this
has been in this vial since nineteen ninety one. Yeah,
so I kind of have two collections. Boys, I have
my stuff. I collected as a fan or with my dad.
And then I have the stuff that I've collected professionally,
(17:24):
like I have every credential I've ever had, like I
don't I don't ever throw any of them away, much
of my wife' chagrin. It's like the Troubles and Star Trek.
They're completely taken over the house. The credentials have.
Speaker 3 (17:36):
And I find as I clearly collect a lot of
stuff as we all, right, but as I've gone through
the years, maybe as I get older, it's the stuff
that has a story behind it and a meaning behind it.
You've talked about you talked about the Rose Bull and
how meant how much it meant to you. What's a
piece of memoribula that perhaps means the most to you, right,
(17:58):
And what's the one that can jump stick so that
you know, if you had to hold onto one piece
of memory, Billia, this would be a nice.
Speaker 2 (18:07):
I took this down from this, actually, Haynes, my office
I always you know, with the sitcom everybody Loves Raymond
and always Sam ray Barone. It was a sports writer
who worked out of the basement of his house. While
so my office is in the basement of my house.
I worked out of my house for twenty years. I
was the original like you know remote uh, you know,
working guy. And in my bathroom, my executive bathroom, which
(18:31):
is about basically an indoor porta John. I have this
picture that I keep, and this is from a game
is Virginia at North Carolina, Virginia. The date is, uh,
go go back to nineteen eighty three, on November twelfth,
nineteen eighty three. My dad made this for me. This
(18:52):
is the top half of the of the program for
the game, and then that picture right there. I took
that picture. And the running back for Virginia's name is
Barry Word. And the guy back here who's behind the
play is a great linebacker from North County, Micah Moon.
(19:13):
And you have to remember now this is nineteen eighty three,
and if you're a linebacker at North Carolina you're a
big deal because Lawrence Taylor had been there just a
couple of years earlier. This was a top ten game
and it was the first time I had sideline credentials.
I had just turned thirteen years old, and I had
my camera that Santa Claus had brought me, and I
(19:35):
was taking pictures on the sideline and my dad was
officiating in the game, and I took that picture as
Barry Word dove over the pylon for what was the
game winning touchdown. What you don't see is is that
Michah Moon, the linebacker in the background of that picture,
after he missed the tackle, hit me and I'm boys,
I might have weighed ninety pounds back then, and he
(19:58):
blew me up. I mean me up. As Marty says,
it's like a yard sale. Everything blew out of my pockets.
My camera was laying there and it was this super
super cheap astro turf they had at Scott's statement at
UVA Virginia. And I hit my head and the whole
deal and everybody ran over a uoka and I popped up.
I was the greatest thing that ever happened. But that
was a day that changed my life. Because my dad
(20:21):
had been an official in the ACC. I think it
was his second full year. He'd work small college games
when I was growing up. I knew I didn't want
to do that because I saw how people even back
then would yell at him and scream at him. I
don't want the pressure how to make that call. I
knew I wasn't a good enough athlete to play college football.
But I looked around that day with my sideline credential
(20:44):
and realized everyone there was getting paid to be there.
Everyone on that sideline, whether they worked for the team,
or there were a photographer for a newspaper, or there
were a local TV reporter, or there were a sports writer,
the trainers, everyone there was getting paid. I'm like, all right,
so how in the hell do you get paid to
go to college football games? And so that day changed
my life because it made it all feel accessible, and
(21:08):
that was the goal. The goal from that day began
became how do I get to do one of these jobs?
And so yeah, so I took that picture and and
that's that's the day that changed my life. Right there.
I still have the credential, I still have the negatives
for the picture. Back here, take to the back of it,
and so you see this name here, Doug Rhodes, Washington,
(21:30):
d C. On the back of it. Doug Rhodes was
the one that got the program and helped my dad
and he the Doug actually had this framed and Doug
Rhodes ended up becoming the head of officiating for the
ACC and then worked for US at ESPN. For years.
Doug passed away few years ago, but that was the
day that changed my life. That was the day I
was like, all right, I got to figure out how
(21:51):
to do one of these jobs, because you guys know
this the best part. To me, the best part of
these events is when you to go in early, like
get kickoffs at some forty five and you get into
the stadiument one. That's the coolest. When they're still mowing
the grass or painting the lines or you know, everybody
(22:13):
testing out the PA system and they're rehearsing for the
national anthem and you know, and then you then you
go into the press box or you go into the
locker room with my dad or whatever, and you come
out and there's eighty five thousand people there, like it's
just to me, that's the best part. And uh and
so behind the yellow rope that was the goal and
it started on that day.
Speaker 4 (22:34):
I mean, Trigue, I've got a direction to where this
question is going. But I'm intrigued. As a thirteen year
old boy, me and George A two years ago we
were an event in London and for the opening of
Tottenham Hawkspur NFL Stadium, and it became a standing joke
that like every single play, we were like, and we're
(22:54):
fully grown man. I'm forty now, George's, you know, a
year or two older. We're fully grown man, and we're
like big, live, big lot. They were all they're all huge, right,
thirteen years old getting bold over by. Yeah, even even
at the college football age and stage of development, it's
(23:16):
still really big.
Speaker 2 (23:18):
They're just giant. There's massive and and then the cool.
I see George is wearing his old miss shirt. So, uh,
I grew up in Raleigh, North Carolina, Capitol of North Carolina,
Sir Walter Raley, he's from y'all's neighborhood. And uh and
and you know, uh when my dad, So the rule
was a couple there's a couple of rules in place
(23:39):
for officials. They cannot officiate games of their alma mater.
They cannot officiate games of their children's alma mater. So
my dad could not later work Tennessee or what Forest
games because my brother and I went there. He couldn't
work East Carolina games because he went to school there.
But he also could not work in North Carolina State
games because we lived in Raleigh, which was which is
(24:01):
where NCA State. So if you live in Miami, you
can't work Miami games, or you can't work you know,
FIU games. You know, if you live in Austin, you
can't work Texas games. Now, it didn't matter that Duke
and Chapel Hill were. It was close to us as
N Sea State was. We lived in Raleigh, but Dad
couldn't officiate NC State games. But he would get calls
all the time from North Carolina State to officiate their scrimmages,
(24:24):
and it was reps for Dad, but it was also
an opportunity for officials to explain to players, all right,
this is what the rule change is going to be
this year, and to talk to the coaches about all right,
this is what you know. This is how I probably
would call this. I probably wouldn't call that. Monti Kiffin
was the head coach at North Klina State for a
couple of years during this same era in the early
(24:45):
nineteen eighties. So my brother and I would go with
Dad over to Carter Finley Stadium or over to their
practice field which was on campus, and while Dad was
officiating the scrimmage, my brother and I would play football
with the children of the coach staff, and at Carter
fin and he disputes this story. I tell it all
the time. Anyway, wrote we wrote it in our book
(25:06):
a couple of years ago, Sidelines of Blood Lines. We
were Carter Finley Stadium. Back then they had the hill,
which is just a grass hill side where the team
runs out now and there stands there. So while the
team is practicing, we're up on the hill playing like
North football with all these coaches kids. And there's this
one little kid and he keeps calling penalties and he's
calling holding, and he's calling dpi's and he was just
(25:29):
and finally this guy, coach Kiffin Money Kiffin runs down
in the field blows his Wilston and he goes, Lane,
damn it, you're blowing up my practice, shut up. And
it was Lane Kiffen. So fast forward to twenty howard
many years later, and I remember my brother calls. My
brother's three years younger than me. He's in Lane's just
(25:51):
a little bit younger than my brother. But my brother
called me and he goes, hey, you remember that little
mouthy kid from n C Sea. Yeah, And my brother goes,
I think he just got the am Raiders job. And
and it was the truth. Now, Lane to this Day
disputes that story, but his dad verified it for me.
When Lane was it was at f a U in
Boca Raton. I covered the Shoel Ball. I was in
(26:14):
town to cover Homestead cover the NASCAR from the line,
I drove up to the Shoela Bowl and Monte Kiffin
was up in the press box. They just gave him
like an empty luxury boxes to hang out watch games.
He was an advisor, you know, for the team. One
of the greatest defensive coaches of all time invented the
Tampa Too defense. You know that they made the Buccaneers famous.
And uh. And I told coach Kiffin that story. He's like,
(26:35):
I remember that, and but Lane denies it. I'm gonna
see Lane next week. He'll deny it. And then too
with the uh. But it was that was that was
my introduction link Kiffin.
Speaker 4 (26:46):
I can't remember where I was going going.
Speaker 3 (26:51):
The next question disappointed me only I thought that you're
going to be your Taltenham hot sports story. I think
you think you could tell Ryan that you and I
scored the first touchdown at the Talking to hots Fars Stadium.
But I mean, hey, never never an opportunity to talk
about that.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
Yeah, yeah, but what you're putting, Yeah, what you were
saying all is you're talking about how big these guys look.
And that's so again, I was on I was on
the sideline. My first side like this before a game
was that game at Virginia nineteen eighty three. But I
had been on the sideline for practices and NC State
before that. And when those guys came walking out, and
(27:24):
these are old school shoulder pads, right, and they were
wearing those big neck rolls on the back and all
that stuff. Those guys, I mean, they were the biggest
human beings I've ever seen in my life. And and
you know, and again I was, I mean I was twelve,
I was ten in some cases, and so it was
so skinny. And so the goal was, I learned how
to navigate the sideline at a very young age. So
(27:46):
when I'm on the sideline now for the last few
minutes of a game and everybody's all nervous or whatever,
you know, when I was in the pitts and NASCAR races, whatever, dude,
I got run over by a two hundred and fifty
pounds you know, linebacker when I was thirteen. I'm not
I'm not worried about getting hit with a lot a nut.
Speaker 4 (28:02):
There's enough, there's enough college football memories in that, like
last ten minutes alone, to fuel like an entire book
running the Ball. Yeah, can you narrow down the past,
you know, thirty plus years of your college football experience,
(28:24):
like one defining favorite college football moment. That's where I
was going.
Speaker 2 (28:31):
Yeah, no, no, it was. It was a crossroads game
for me because my my father's last game as an
official was the two thousand and nine BCS Championship and
it was Sam Bradford of Oklahoma versus Tim Tebow and Florida,
and Florida won the game, and uh, but the last
(28:54):
and we write, you know, I wrote, we wrote a book.
My dad, my brother and I wrote a book, Sidelines
and blood Lines few years ago, and the book opens
with this story. Was me back on the sideline for
the last few minutes of that game and talking to
Dad during the game, And I remember Bruce Felman was
standing next to me, and I know Bruce was still
(29:16):
at ESPN, and I know Bruce for forever and Dad
and I are just talking and I took a picture
that's in the book. I took a picture of Dad
kind of turned. He's looking downfield, but he's talking to me.
I took it like going with a BlackBerry. But but
we're just talking, and Bruce is like, what are you doing, dude.
I'm like, man, I've been doing this since I was twelve.
(29:36):
I mean, I standing on the sideline talking to my
dad during games. But to be on the sideline talking
with dad for the last couple of minutes of his
last game, which, oh, by the way, also was a
national championship game. And I remember when the game ended,
and you guys, know, when the game ends, you're on
the sideline. Everybody run all the everyone runs out onto
(29:57):
the field, and all the all the media members ran
out into the field. The team that we just won
runs out into the field, and everyone ran out onto
the field. We're in the red zone on the kind
of you know, we're we're at the tunnel side of
the stadium Joe Robbie Stadium or land Shark or where
the hell we're calling it now where the Formula one races.
And everybody ran to the right because Florida was headed
(30:22):
to the middle of the field. You know, stoops and urbane.
We're going to shake hands and all stuff, and they're
all following t bow. I went with my dad's the
only time I ever did this all the games. I
went to the officiated. I ran with him off the field,
like through the end zone, up the tunnel to the
locker room. And that was the last time he was
ever going to do it. And my dad and my uncle,
(30:43):
my dad's brother, were sitting my brother rather and then
his brother, my uncle were sitting up in the stands,
and we waved at them and ran off the field.
And that was cool and all right. So I got says,
we're going through stuff. So I got all my Star
Wars stuff, and I got this warm Stormtrooper back here
that has a hat on. That's my dad's hat from
(31:04):
his last game in two thousand and nine. And I
have the I have the whole uniform. That was his
penalty flag that he very rarely ever threw. H that
was his whistle, you know, his bean bag. He always
had a sweat band. My dad. The whole time officiated,
he wore a sweat band, and he wore a like
(31:25):
a watch over the sweatband. And he did that so
that we would know that was him, Like he did
that from Tom's Little kid and then the rest of
it has folded up in this uh, in his container,
and much of my dad's chagrin. You see the white
knickers back here with the with the elastic bands. My
dad lobbied his entire career for officials did not have
(31:46):
to wear those knickers because they look like you know,
Bobby Jones playing golf, you know, with Augusta in the twenties.
And and the very next year, the year after dad retired,
they went to those black athletic pants. You see that
you see officials wearing now. So yeah, but that's the
moment because because I and then I had to go
(32:07):
cover the game like I had to. I wrote a
column that night about the game. And so for me
that was that was like the cross roads moment because
I go back to that first game where I had
credentials in eighty three and then the last game that
I fished that that I covered with ESPN while my
dad was in the game and rode a Kyle Road
(32:27):
a column in the ESPN the magazine leading up to
it about this was gonna be his last game and uh,
and then rode a column at night and it was
the great ron cherry was the white hat in that game.
You know, giveh him the business, you'll rolling Iran and
the uh. But it just that was that was it.
That that night was great and my and my my uh,
my dad, my brother was there, my uncle was there.
My mother had passed away years later, but my my
(32:49):
stepmother was there that night. So it just that was
that was it for me because that that was that
was the cross roads, like we did it kind of
moment dads working in nice championship game and I'm there
covering it.
Speaker 3 (33:02):
That's awesome?
Speaker 4 (33:03):
Is that?
Speaker 2 (33:04):
I mean?
Speaker 3 (33:05):
A final question was about the one sporting memory that
will stay with you forever? Is that? Is that the
one thing that you just remember to the to the
very end. Is that the pinnacle of your your sports career?
Speaker 2 (33:19):
Yeah? I think so, just because again it was that
that feeling of I was doing exactly what I wanted
to do and Dad was a fit that was finishing
what I believe is a college football Hall of Fame
officiating career. He worked almost two dozen ball games, a
couple of national championships, a couple of Rose Bowls. He
worked every New Year's Day game except for the Sugar Bowl,
(33:42):
and worked most of them. A couple of times and
just knowing when I was a little kid and thinking
about going to Carson Newman and Cataba and Mars Hill
and these small college games, or even even when I
was a little kid, the high school games in eastern
North Carolina. My dad would be leaving on a Friday,
(34:04):
you know, to go work a high school game in
some town you've never heard of and we'll never hear
of in eastern North Carolina. And to see him go
from that while he also was so successful in his
day job, to see him, you know, get to walk
off the field on his own terms after a national
championship game and me being having the goal of wanting
to get paid to cover games and I was getting
(34:25):
paid in the American dollars boys to be there that night,
and so yeah to me that that's the night. And
then my brother was there, who's also had an amazing career.
For all of us, it was it was a full
circle moment for us as adults. And you know at
that point, I mean I had a daughter at home,
my brother had a daughter at home. We could come
home and tell him about it. It just it was
(34:46):
it was we were all grown up, but we were
still doing exactly what we wanted to do. You know,
when we were kids, I.
Speaker 3 (34:53):
Had a strong feeling we would run over. And none
of us are complaining on this call about listening to
these stories, right, and we're taking up enough of your time.
But I just wanted to ask you one thing before
you go. You've mentioned a few many legendary names, and
you talked about meeting some of your heroes. These always say,
don't ever meet your heroes? Have those been as great
(35:18):
and experiences as you hoped they would be? When you
meet the people that you admire the most, and in sports.
Speaker 2 (35:25):
Yes, but you hold your breath because you worry, you know,
because you know there. I'm not going to lie and
say that every famous person I've ever met was awesome,
because they weren't. But in the realm of collegiate athletics,
which is where I've spent most of my life, you know,
(35:47):
everyone I've talked to, I wasn't. Very rarely was I
let down. Usually it was the complete opposite. Like I
think about when I was a student at Tennessee and
Brent Musburger is Brent Musburger, right, the voice of college
football for most of my life, and I remember Tennessee.
(36:10):
Florida was playing at Tennessee. Shane Matthews was a quarterback
at Florida. Heath Shuler was a Tennessee huge game, pouring
down rain, and I remember was sitting I mentioned Link
Hudson and those guys who were sitting there eating a
hot dog before the game, and Brent Musburger comes walking
through the press box with Dick Vermeal and Brent goes,
(36:30):
we go, Brent, Brent, and we never met him, and
he turned around, he goes, what's up, young men. We're like,
what do you think? You know it was raining, you
think that I'll slow Florida down? And he goes, boys,
is Shane Matthews can grip it? Shane Matthews can throw it?
And then he sat out and talked to us for
like ten minutes, and I'm thinking, man, kickoff's coming. You
gotta go to work. And then I got to work
(36:51):
with Brent later, and he was the nicest guy in
the world, you know I worked with I worked with
all the big names at some point or no, and
they were all amazing, and and I that that I
have always been because you know, I started in this
businesses in the production as a production assistant, like like
grunt level, you know, entry level of ESPN cutting highlights
(37:13):
and answering the phones and running teleprompter. And not everyone
that worked with me was great. But in college football,
everyone I have worked with, all the legends have been
just amazing. And that is it's proof that you can
be a good guy and and still it'll be a
good person. And still, I says to Laura Reutlis rule,
(37:33):
you can still be an amazing, like nice person even
as your career is completely taking off and you're you're
doing stuff and you never dreamed of. And that's when
I meet when I met those people, and they still
were like that, that was pretty good.
Speaker 3 (37:47):
Well, you're one of the good guys, and we do
appreciate you taking a time out to speak to us
because we know you're a busy guy. What you mentioned
this a little bit at the top of the show.
What's going to keep you busy between now and football season?
And what can what can our listeners and watch out for.
That's coming from Ryan McGee over the over the summer.
Speaker 2 (38:05):
Well, you are our greatest publicist, George and Martin McGee,
and we appreciate that you're our international pr rep the uh,
but nor Martin mcgeez every Saturday morning. You know, we'll
be on TV until well, and we're still on TV
in the summer. We just do radio on TV in
the summer, but we'll be in the Wilder Slode studios.
Speaker 3 (38:23):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
You know, when May shows up, it's time for Indy
five hundred, uh, the Miami Grand Prix. I'll do Formula one.
I still do motorsports, and then we start thinking about
Omaha at the end of June, where we'll see if
my Tennessee volunteers can defend their national championship. And at
some point I'm going to sleep and you know, and
maybe try to take some time off, but it'll be
(38:45):
sec media days before we know it. But yeah, Martin
McGee never sleeps, so I will see everybody on Saturday
morning slash Saturday afternoon.
Speaker 3 (38:56):
Well, it just to just to remainder favorite listening. You
can listen to My Mickey Live on the ESPN Radio
via the app for free in this country, which is
seldom you can listen to anything for free. And I
also think Ollie and you should get together to do
a motorsports episode of this podcast, because that would be
something I've listened to I have spent this entire podcast
(39:20):
looking at the number forty three Dinaco car, which I
believe is I believe that's what I'm looking at behind
you there.
Speaker 2 (39:26):
You look, so you're looking at the car that inspired
the Dinacode car. So that that's the that's the Richard Petty. Yeah,
that's the super Bird by Plymouth.
Speaker 4 (39:37):
And that was going to be my question while I
was looking at it, was is it the car or
is it the inspiration? Behind and now?
Speaker 2 (39:45):
So in in the Cars films, Richard Petty actually voices
mister the King. What's funny too, because Kyle so and
the King's is still doing great. The King will be
eighty eight this July. But his son Kyle, who also
raised Forever. Kyle is a great friend of mine, and
Kyle said it's funny because when people meet his dad,
(40:07):
like little kids don't remember Richard Petty's race car driver,
But as soon as he starts talking, he says, their
faces changed and they're like, are you mister the King here?
I'm miss kidding. You know what I got here? I
got I got a crossover dealer for you. So Sterling
Marlin a two time Daytona five hundred winner and from
Columbia Tennessee. Uh. He raced this car after Tennessee won
(40:30):
the national championship. He raced this at the Bristol Motor Speedway,
which you guys remember was the well they played the
Virginia Tech Tennessee game the Battle of Bristol. But he
ran that car in nineteen ninety nine to commemorate Tennessee's
national championships. I always keep that one at hand to no, no, hey,
we can do. I got more. I actually have. I
have as much motorsports stuff as I do Star Wars
(40:54):
stuff as I do college football stuff, so we can
do as many different shows as you guys want to.
Speaker 4 (40:59):
Good man, I'm down, I'm there.
Speaker 3 (41:02):
Well, that's definitely all we've got time for. As the
recording tape comes to its end. Thanks to Ryan Or
and Ollie for their excellent input. Thanks you all for
listening and supporting us. Stay safe and well, and catch
you all next time.
I'm not going to comment on that. I'll get fine
for the rest of my life if I get comment
on that.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
National championship that young stirl.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
Everyone and welcome to the College Chaps podcast. On our
last episode, we started a new spring series with our
guests talk about their favorite sporting memories, and we continue
this with a very special guest in this episode. But
first with the chapter and George jump by all of
our how are you my friend?
Speaker 4 (00:43):
Yeah, I'm doing it well. I was very saditimous the
episode with chippendun Lap where we started this series. It
was yeah, very exciting and very entertaining. A great product
of your mind, Joyce, to come up with this concept
for a spring series, and we've got a great, great
guest to continue.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
There's an admission of pleasurism coming up the second, but
we should also just make a point about why our
other coast isn't here. Mister Chinnery is on the eve
of back to back national championship finals for Essex volleyball,
So Alex is up to his eyes and whatever he's
doing at this moment in time, So good lucky see.
We hope you do well tomorrow. On this episode, our
(01:29):
guest joins a very exclusive third appearance fraternity. So exclusive
as this club that only six guests have made three
or more appearances in two hundred nine episodes so far.
And I also have an admission to make. It was
listening to our guest show when you interviewed a collective
of football helmets that the idea for this series came from.
So with that admission out of the way, you know
him as one half of the greatest Southern duo since
(01:51):
Parting and Rogers. You hear his voice on Game Day
and Assac Nation every Saturday during football season. And if
that wasn't enough, he is the author of multiple York
Times best selling books. So it's awesome to welcome to
start Ryan Mickey. Welcome, Ryan. How are you.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
I'm doing great, It's good to talk to you guys.
Good to talk a little. I feel like football college
football season just ended like an hour ago. It's right
on the calendar. It was only two weeks, but it
felt like so much longer than that because there were
so many more games. But yeah, I'm kind of I'm
recovering now, and so it's I'm recovering enough that I'm
i can talk college football anytime. But now I'm actually
(02:26):
rested enough to make sense, so I appreciate you guys
having me.
Speaker 3 (02:29):
And it was and it was the longest college football
season of all time, wasn't it. So it was from
a sec media days all the way up to the
championship game. It was a long year for you.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Yeah, and you know, I covered NASCAR exclusively. Marty Smith
and I both did the first part of my career.
And it's the longest season in American professional sports. I mean,
even longer than golf. It starts the middle of February
or really early February, runs all the way until the
late thanks late November to Thanksgiving. And my wife said,
(03:00):
this year was the first time in all the years
I've been covering college football that as I was leaving
to go to the championship game, I have what she
calls my Homestead look, because the NASCAR finale used to
be in Homestead, Florida, and I had that look like,
all right, I'm pulling for a good game, but I
do not want overtime. I want to get I want
to go home, I want to sleep. So, yeah, it
(03:21):
was a long season, and they're going to get longer,
you know, in the next couple of years. But it's uh,
but it was great. I mean it was the season
was unbelievable and so but yes, I was definitely ready
to take a nap once we hit January twenty second.
Speaker 1 (03:35):
And you.
Speaker 3 (03:37):
Watch basketball, but you don't participate so much in basketball
base bawls year, I'm sure will come onto that base
bowls your real things, would you?
Speaker 2 (03:43):
Yeah, I do basketball. It just looked like I did.
I did a couple of store rode a couple of
stories this year. I worked a little bit on their
Bracketology show at ESPN. I did the open and voice
that and then I have a feature that will run
next week. But I've not I was supposed to cover
the Final Four in twenty twenty, and then obviously that
(04:05):
was canceled. And in the years leading up to twenty twenty,
I was doing a lot of basketball, like particularly I
live in North Carolina, so on Tobacco Road, North Carolina Duke,
I was there. The last game I covered, I believe
was the Zion Shoe game when his shoe exploded in
the first thirty seconds of the North Carolina Duke basketball game.
And I was headed to the SEC Tournament when I
(04:26):
got the call as I was literally as I was
pulling into the parking deck at the Charlotte North Carolina Airport.
I got the call, turn around and go home. They're
about to cancel the SEC tournament. And so so that's
the way of saying I used to do a lot
more basketball than I do now, so I dabble in it,
but it is very nice to fill out my terrible bracket.
And that's going to fail, and I can just sit
(04:48):
and watch and maybe work a little bit, but not
a lot.
Speaker 3 (04:53):
Well, if it contain me in this podcast, you can
explain to me the tobacco roads and scenario because I
hate it a lot. I think I know where to asked,
but I'll talk about that towards the end if we
get any time. And the purpose of this series is
to talk about sporting memories and then go on and
talk about some of the stuff that's hiding behind you.
But let's talk about some of your favorite sporting memories
for what jumps out in terms of what really kind
(05:16):
of what's your favorite sporting memories that you that you've
accumulated over the years.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Ryan, Well, I'll answer your tobacco road question right now
because it lends, it leans into a lot of one
we'll talk about during this conversation because Tobacco Road is
what they refer to. It's basically an interstate Highway forty
in North Carolina and it connects North Carolina State University,
(05:42):
the wolf Pack, Jim Valvano, and the Cardiac Pac back
in nineteen eighty three. Only about twenty minutes down the
road is Chapel Hill, you know, home of the Tar
Heels and obviously Michael Jordan and our buddy Brad Darty
and everyone else. And then just a few minutes up
the road from there is Duke University, Duke Blue, David Cucliffe,
all of our friends there. And then about an hour
(06:04):
down the road to the west is Wake Forest, the
Demon Deacons, and that's Tobacco Road. Those four schools when
I was growing up, they called those the Big Four
and they always played each other. And that's that's where
I grew up. And my dad, as you guys know,
was not a basketball official. He was a football official
in the Atlantic Coast Conference for years and years and years.
I grew up a big North Coronta State Wolfpack fan.
(06:26):
One of the biggest reasons I ended up at the
University of Tennessee's because it reminded me of NC State.
But that's Tobacco Road, and I saw that because a
lot of what I talk about here is my life
growing up on Tobacco Road during the nineteen eighties, the
height of ACC and my mind college basketball, and then
(06:50):
you know, my dad being on the field in the
fall as an ACC football official. And so my greatest
sporting memory as a kid, just as a fan, I
was a huge fan of the North Kinta State wolf
Pack and my favorite player was Thorough Bailey. And the
first year I really followed the NCAA basketball tournament, I
think it was thirty two teams then is one North
Carolina State and the Cardiac Pack with Jim Valvano, and
(07:12):
those guys won. You know, on the last second buzzer
beater slam dunk by Lorenzo Charles to beat a keem
Olajuan Clyde Drexler, the five slam of jama Group out
of Houston. And so I say all that to show
you something because at the Rose Bowl two years ago,
(07:34):
so the semi final game between Alabama and Michigan, I
was talking to our friend Holly Row the great sideline reporter,
the great voice of every sport. It feels like on ESPN,
but particularly when I think about women's sports and college football,
and I just I just casually making small talk with Holly.
I goes, so, what are you up to these days,
like when football is over? And she goes, well, you know,
I'm She goes, I work on the Utah Jazz NBA
(07:57):
broadcasts and I go, well, do you work with Thorough
Bailey And she said yes. I go He's my all
time favorite basketball player. He wore number forty one. So
when I was a kid to this day, when I'm
playing in like, you know, the old Man Knee Brace
League at the YMCA, I wear number forty one. And
she says, I had no idea, and I said yeah.
So about three weeks later we did Marty McGee On
(08:18):
Saturday morning. I got a text from Holly right when
the show's over with what are you doing tonight? And
I said nothing, and she said, you need to get downtown.
I live in Charlotte. You need to go to the
Hornets game. I'll leave two tickets for you and your wife,
you know, at the box office. So we went and
she said get there early and sure enough, I get
there early and I look and here comes Holly Row
(08:40):
and she's got Thorough Bailey with her, who's the color commentator,
and U and so I took some pictures with Thurrell
and and then she he brought a couple of cards
of his own and autographed him for me. And I mean, listen,
Holly Road was already one of my favorite people in
the business, but now I am indebted to her for
(09:02):
the rest of the time. Because my greatest childhood sports
memory was when in c State won the national championship
with Jim Valvano and Thorrow Bailey. And I got to
tell THORW. Bayley that person and my wife said she
had never seen me out like that. She said, I've
seen you talk to famous people and you know, great
coaches and players, you never acted like that. I go,
I was twelve again, you know, talking to throw Bailey.
(09:23):
So that was to me as a fan, as a
kid like that was that was the moment for me.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
That's a that's an awesome piece of college football, of
sporting Billia just right there, and that's only recently just
falling into your possession.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
You've got, I mean, all manners of.
Speaker 4 (09:43):
Things behind you that I can see right now as well.
Pitt Pitt little Pitt helmet that yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
Yeah, the Pitt helmet is signed by Johnny Majors. So
coach Majors was Coach Majors was my coach. You know
when I went to Tennessee, I was there for Coach
Majors last four years. The last three of those years,
two and a half of those years I worked for
the football team on the video crew, the great Link
(10:11):
Hudson who just retired, and Barry Rice and all these
legendary guys that started what we call now we call
VFL films. I worked with those guys when I was
in college. And every day at practice I got to
be on the tower shooting practice film or video every
day of offense of the offense, and every day Coach
(10:33):
Majors would come up on that tower with his bullhorn
and coach from that tower. He stand up there with
me for an hour and a half every day, and
he was boys, he was larger than life. Like. The
building was on Johnny Major's boulevard. When you came into
work every day you passed his retired jersey, and you
know he should have one heisman in nineteen fifty six. Sorry,
Paul Horning and Jim Brown, But you come in and
(10:56):
you see all this Johnny Major stuff and a huge
portrait of Johnny Majors. And then I go to work
and Johnny Majors would be on the tower with me.
But he would talk to me every day about what
game is your dad officiating this weekend? How'd you do
on your math test? Are you still dating that girl
from Nashville? I mean every day? And so when when
Coach Majors passed away a few years ago, I wrote
a column about that because he was my coach. So yeah,
(11:18):
And and of course Coach Majors one with with with
Tony Dorset Tony Dorsett, as Coach called him in nineteen
seventy six, the year before he returned to Tennessee to
be the head coach, and uh, and coach gave me
that Coach gave me that helmet, yea, I've got I
don't have any a lot of full size helmets, but
I have a lot of I got a lot of
(11:39):
many helmets. I got the the Tennessee smoky gray, which
I always loved. Some people didn't. And then back here
is the most valuable of them all boys, which is uh,
of course the Duke's Mayo. Yeah you got me. That's
on the other side, Duke's Mayo Classic. So yeah, that's us.
Speaker 4 (11:59):
He got as he got mail on it.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Yeah, no, well it did it. It did at some point, yeah,
it did it some point.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
You fell up with me.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah. You dip stuff in it.
Speaker 3 (12:11):
It's that Tennessee helmet. It's that got there's a shadow
on it. It's that the Rocky Mountains, that.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
The Smoky Mountains. So they called that, called that smoky gray, right,
they called that smoky gray. And they will turn this
ringlet off. They call that smoky gray and the yeah,
because that's the outline of the Smoky Mountains. This is
these are the uniforms. This is the first time and
it's got the checker board on the back. This was
the first time when they rolled these helmets out that
they wore those smoky gray uniforms that were very divisive
(12:41):
at the time, and they didn't win I think the
first couple of games that wore them, but I think
they're the coolest. And that was when alternate uniforms were
still like new, particularly in the southeastern corner of the
United States. I mean it was Oregon and pretty much
no one else was messing with it. But I always thought,
I still think the smoky gray uniforms were.
Speaker 4 (12:59):
Just the best the work of art. You it feels
like every time you're come on the show, Ryan, your
show is something amazing, something cool. What is ultimately your
most favorite prize possession piece of memorabilia the own if
you could nail it down to one such a thing.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
Yeah, it's so I kind of have two. I kind
of have two collections of things, which is, you know,
I have the stuff that I've collected over the years
from events that I've covered. You're like, back here, like
I've got this chunk of it looks like nothing, but
I've got this chunk of grass. And that's roseball turf
(13:45):
right there. That's from that same that's from that same
semifinal game two years ago. So it was the Michigan
Alabama game and for SEC Nation and Martin McGee, they
wanted someone to ride on the We had a float
in the parade, the Rose Parade that was the the
(14:06):
ABC College Football Playoff you know ESPN float, And I'm like, yeah,
I'll ride on it. And I rode the whole four hours,
and it was very emotional for me because my dad
officiated that game twice. And I've got a little souvenir
football up there. I think you guys can see that.
But my dad officiated the rose ball twice in one
of those This was two thousand and seven Michigan USC Michigan.
(14:33):
I think as I'm speaking, they still give up three
touchdowns in that game. It's like that game we just
cad of rolled. But my dad worked the Arizona State
Jake Plumber versus Ohio State game in ninety six, I
believe it was. And I sat in the grand stand
there on Colorado Avenue with my mom and my brother
and my mom's entire life, a little girl from North
Carolina dreamed of attending the Rose Parade. So we sat
(14:56):
there watching the Rose Parade with my mom. It was
one of the greatest days ever. My mom died just
a couple years later. So for me to go ride
in that that Rose Parade float for four hours, I
was with like a Broadway star and a guy from
the Bachelor and a country singer and we had a
great time. But it was very emotional for me. And
then when the ride was over with. You know, when
(15:18):
when you make a rose parade float, it has to
be natural materials. It has to be rose pedals, it
has to be seeds, it has to be dirt. And
they go, well, you know that turf that that you're
sitting on there, that's actual, Like that turf came from
the stadium. And so when no one was looking, I
just ripped a corner of it off and stuck it
in that bag. And it's kind of dried up, but
I say that. So there's I collect things as I'm
(15:39):
covering things, and then I collect the things that I
collected as a fan or if I was there with
my dad. And so I'll give you some more dirt.
I have a lot of dirt in my office. This
is from don't know if you see it is in
this vial and you can kind of see his gold
right there. This is from the miracle at South Bend
(16:01):
in nineteen ninety one. There's gold turf right there. Tennessee
was getting smoked by Notre Dame in nineteen ninety one.
It's thirty one seven, I think the score was. And
my college roommate David Montgomery, super Dame Montgomery, who I
talked about on Martin McGee's on Dave, and I went
to the game, had no money. We sat in a
(16:22):
little wooden grand stand actually in the end zone down
on the field, like the wall was behind us in
the end zone. And Tennessee came back, took the lead.
Late Notre Dame had a chance to win the game
with the late short you know, chip shot field goal
and it got named Floyd Miley, defensive player of Tennessee
(16:42):
blocked that kick with his butt. Floyd Miley and Jeremy
Lincoln where the guys got in there. And as soon
as the game and we rushed the field only time
I rushed field my life. We rushed the fielder Notre Dame,
and they it was one hundred and fifty anniversary of
the school. So instead of their normal like slash end
zone that they have, they had painted this thing of
(17:03):
the Golden Dome and it said one hundred and fifty years.
And I would have ran over there and scooped up
a big chunk of gold turf. And so this this
has been in this vial since nineteen ninety one. Yeah,
so I kind of have two collections. Boys, I have
my stuff. I collected as a fan or with my dad.
And then I have the stuff that I've collected professionally,
(17:24):
like I have every credential I've ever had, like I
don't I don't ever throw any of them away, much
of my wife' chagrin. It's like the Troubles and Star Trek.
They're completely taken over the house. The credentials have.
Speaker 3 (17:36):
And I find as I clearly collect a lot of
stuff as we all, right, but as I've gone through
the years, maybe as I get older, it's the stuff
that has a story behind it and a meaning behind it.
You've talked about you talked about the Rose Bull and
how meant how much it meant to you. What's a
piece of memoribula that perhaps means the most to you, right,
(17:58):
And what's the one that can jump stick so that
you know, if you had to hold onto one piece
of memory, Billia, this would be a nice.
Speaker 2 (18:07):
I took this down from this, actually, Haynes, my office
I always you know, with the sitcom everybody Loves Raymond
and always Sam ray Barone. It was a sports writer
who worked out of the basement of his house. While
so my office is in the basement of my house.
I worked out of my house for twenty years. I
was the original like you know remote uh, you know,
working guy. And in my bathroom, my executive bathroom, which
(18:31):
is about basically an indoor porta John. I have this
picture that I keep, and this is from a game
is Virginia at North Carolina, Virginia. The date is, uh,
go go back to nineteen eighty three, on November twelfth,
nineteen eighty three. My dad made this for me. This
(18:52):
is the top half of the of the program for
the game, and then that picture right there. I took
that picture. And the running back for Virginia's name is
Barry Word. And the guy back here who's behind the
play is a great linebacker from North County, Micah Moon.
(19:13):
And you have to remember now this is nineteen eighty three,
and if you're a linebacker at North Carolina you're a
big deal because Lawrence Taylor had been there just a
couple of years earlier. This was a top ten game
and it was the first time I had sideline credentials.
I had just turned thirteen years old, and I had
my camera that Santa Claus had brought me, and I
(19:35):
was taking pictures on the sideline and my dad was
officiating in the game, and I took that picture as
Barry Word dove over the pylon for what was the
game winning touchdown. What you don't see is is that
Michah Moon, the linebacker in the background of that picture,
after he missed the tackle, hit me and I'm boys,
I might have weighed ninety pounds back then, and he
(19:58):
blew me up. I mean me up. As Marty says,
it's like a yard sale. Everything blew out of my pockets.
My camera was laying there and it was this super
super cheap astro turf they had at Scott's statement at
UVA Virginia. And I hit my head and the whole
deal and everybody ran over a uoka and I popped up.
I was the greatest thing that ever happened. But that
was a day that changed my life. Because my dad
(20:21):
had been an official in the ACC. I think it
was his second full year. He'd work small college games
when I was growing up. I knew I didn't want
to do that because I saw how people even back
then would yell at him and scream at him. I
don't want the pressure how to make that call. I
knew I wasn't a good enough athlete to play college football.
But I looked around that day with my sideline credential
(20:44):
and realized everyone there was getting paid to be there.
Everyone on that sideline, whether they worked for the team,
or there were a photographer for a newspaper, or there
were a local TV reporter, or there were a sports writer,
the trainers, everyone there was getting paid. I'm like, all right,
so how in the hell do you get paid to
go to college football games? And so that day changed
my life because it made it all feel accessible, and
(21:08):
that was the goal. The goal from that day began
became how do I get to do one of these jobs?
And so yeah, so I took that picture and and
that's that's the day that changed my life. Right there.
I still have the credential, I still have the negatives
for the picture. Back here, take to the back of it,
and so you see this name here, Doug Rhodes, Washington,
(21:30):
d C. On the back of it. Doug Rhodes was
the one that got the program and helped my dad
and he the Doug actually had this framed and Doug
Rhodes ended up becoming the head of officiating for the
ACC and then worked for US at ESPN. For years.
Doug passed away few years ago, but that was the
day that changed my life. That was the day I
was like, all right, I got to figure out how
(21:51):
to do one of these jobs, because you guys know
this the best part. To me, the best part of
these events is when you to go in early, like
get kickoffs at some forty five and you get into
the stadiument one. That's the coolest. When they're still mowing
the grass or painting the lines or you know, everybody
(22:13):
testing out the PA system and they're rehearsing for the
national anthem and you know, and then you then you
go into the press box or you go into the
locker room with my dad or whatever, and you come
out and there's eighty five thousand people there, like it's
just to me, that's the best part. And uh and
so behind the yellow rope that was the goal and
it started on that day.
Speaker 4 (22:34):
I mean, Trigue, I've got a direction to where this
question is going. But I'm intrigued. As a thirteen year
old boy, me and George A two years ago we
were an event in London and for the opening of
Tottenham Hawkspur NFL Stadium, and it became a standing joke
that like every single play, we were like, and we're
(22:54):
fully grown man. I'm forty now, George's, you know, a
year or two older. We're fully grown man, and we're
like big, live, big lot. They were all they're all huge, right,
thirteen years old getting bold over by. Yeah, even even
at the college football age and stage of development, it's
(23:16):
still really big.
Speaker 2 (23:18):
They're just giant. There's massive and and then the cool.
I see George is wearing his old miss shirt. So, uh,
I grew up in Raleigh, North Carolina, Capitol of North Carolina,
Sir Walter Raley, he's from y'all's neighborhood. And uh and
and you know, uh when my dad, So the rule
was a couple there's a couple of rules in place
(23:39):
for officials. They cannot officiate games of their alma mater.
They cannot officiate games of their children's alma mater. So
my dad could not later work Tennessee or what Forest
games because my brother and I went there. He couldn't
work East Carolina games because he went to school there.
But he also could not work in North Carolina State
games because we lived in Raleigh, which was which is
(24:01):
where NCA State. So if you live in Miami, you
can't work Miami games, or you can't work you know,
FIU games. You know, if you live in Austin, you
can't work Texas games. Now, it didn't matter that Duke
and Chapel Hill were. It was close to us as
N Sea State was. We lived in Raleigh, but Dad
couldn't officiate NC State games. But he would get calls
all the time from North Carolina State to officiate their scrimmages,
(24:24):
and it was reps for Dad, but it was also
an opportunity for officials to explain to players, all right,
this is what the rule change is going to be
this year, and to talk to the coaches about all right,
this is what you know. This is how I probably
would call this. I probably wouldn't call that. Monti Kiffin
was the head coach at North Klina State for a
couple of years during this same era in the early
(24:45):
nineteen eighties. So my brother and I would go with
Dad over to Carter Finley Stadium or over to their
practice field which was on campus, and while Dad was
officiating the scrimmage, my brother and I would play football
with the children of the coach staff, and at Carter
fin and he disputes this story. I tell it all
the time. Anyway, wrote we wrote it in our book
(25:06):
a couple of years ago, Sidelines of Blood Lines. We
were Carter Finley Stadium. Back then they had the hill,
which is just a grass hill side where the team
runs out now and there stands there. So while the
team is practicing, we're up on the hill playing like
North football with all these coaches kids. And there's this
one little kid and he keeps calling penalties and he's
calling holding, and he's calling dpi's and he was just
(25:29):
and finally this guy, coach Kiffin Money Kiffin runs down
in the field blows his Wilston and he goes, Lane,
damn it, you're blowing up my practice, shut up. And
it was Lane Kiffen. So fast forward to twenty howard
many years later, and I remember my brother calls. My
brother's three years younger than me. He's in Lane's just
(25:51):
a little bit younger than my brother. But my brother
called me and he goes, hey, you remember that little
mouthy kid from n C Sea. Yeah, And my brother goes,
I think he just got the am Raiders job. And
and it was the truth. Now, Lane to this Day
disputes that story, but his dad verified it for me.
When Lane was it was at f a U in
Boca Raton. I covered the Shoel Ball. I was in
(26:14):
town to cover Homestead cover the NASCAR from the line,
I drove up to the Shoela Bowl and Monte Kiffin
was up in the press box. They just gave him
like an empty luxury boxes to hang out watch games.
He was an advisor, you know, for the team. One
of the greatest defensive coaches of all time invented the
Tampa Too defense. You know that they made the Buccaneers famous.
And uh. And I told coach Kiffin that story. He's like,
(26:35):
I remember that, and but Lane denies it. I'm gonna
see Lane next week. He'll deny it. And then too
with the uh. But it was that was that was
my introduction link Kiffin.
Speaker 4 (26:46):
I can't remember where I was going going.
Speaker 3 (26:51):
The next question disappointed me only I thought that you're
going to be your Taltenham hot sports story. I think
you think you could tell Ryan that you and I
scored the first touchdown at the Talking to hots Fars Stadium.
But I mean, hey, never never an opportunity to talk
about that.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
Yeah, yeah, but what you're putting, Yeah, what you were
saying all is you're talking about how big these guys look.
And that's so again, I was on I was on
the sideline. My first side like this before a game
was that game at Virginia nineteen eighty three. But I
had been on the sideline for practices and NC State
before that. And when those guys came walking out, and
(27:24):
these are old school shoulder pads, right, and they were
wearing those big neck rolls on the back and all
that stuff. Those guys, I mean, they were the biggest
human beings I've ever seen in my life. And and
you know, and again I was, I mean I was twelve,
I was ten in some cases, and so it was
so skinny. And so the goal was, I learned how
to navigate the sideline at a very young age. So
(27:46):
when I'm on the sideline now for the last few
minutes of a game and everybody's all nervous or whatever,
you know, when I was in the pitts and NASCAR races, whatever, dude,
I got run over by a two hundred and fifty
pounds you know, linebacker when I was thirteen. I'm not
I'm not worried about getting hit with a lot a nut.
Speaker 4 (28:02):
There's enough, there's enough college football memories in that, like
last ten minutes alone, to fuel like an entire book
running the Ball. Yeah, can you narrow down the past,
you know, thirty plus years of your college football experience,
(28:24):
like one defining favorite college football moment. That's where I
was going.
Speaker 2 (28:31):
Yeah, no, no, it was. It was a crossroads game
for me because my my father's last game as an
official was the two thousand and nine BCS Championship and
it was Sam Bradford of Oklahoma versus Tim Tebow and Florida,
and Florida won the game, and uh, but the last
(28:54):
and we write, you know, I wrote, we wrote a book.
My dad, my brother and I wrote a book, Sidelines
and blood Lines few years ago, and the book opens
with this story. Was me back on the sideline for
the last few minutes of that game and talking to
Dad during the game, And I remember Bruce Felman was
standing next to me, and I know Bruce was still
(29:16):
at ESPN, and I know Bruce for forever and Dad
and I are just talking and I took a picture
that's in the book. I took a picture of Dad
kind of turned. He's looking downfield, but he's talking to me.
I took it like going with a BlackBerry. But but
we're just talking, and Bruce is like, what are you doing, dude.
I'm like, man, I've been doing this since I was twelve.
(29:36):
I mean, I standing on the sideline talking to my
dad during games. But to be on the sideline talking
with dad for the last couple of minutes of his
last game, which, oh, by the way, also was a
national championship game. And I remember when the game ended,
and you guys, know, when the game ends, you're on
the sideline. Everybody run all the everyone runs out onto
(29:57):
the field, and all the all the media members ran
out into the field. The team that we just won
runs out into the field, and everyone ran out onto
the field. We're in the red zone on the kind
of you know, we're we're at the tunnel side of
the stadium Joe Robbie Stadium or land Shark or where
the hell we're calling it now where the Formula one races.
And everybody ran to the right because Florida was headed
(30:22):
to the middle of the field. You know, stoops and urbane.
We're going to shake hands and all stuff, and they're
all following t bow. I went with my dad's the
only time I ever did this all the games. I
went to the officiated. I ran with him off the field,
like through the end zone, up the tunnel to the
locker room. And that was the last time he was
ever going to do it. And my dad and my uncle,
(30:43):
my dad's brother, were sitting my brother rather and then
his brother, my uncle were sitting up in the stands,
and we waved at them and ran off the field.
And that was cool and all right. So I got says,
we're going through stuff. So I got all my Star
Wars stuff, and I got this warm Stormtrooper back here
that has a hat on. That's my dad's hat from
(31:04):
his last game in two thousand and nine. And I
have the I have the whole uniform. That was his
penalty flag that he very rarely ever threw. H that
was his whistle, you know, his bean bag. He always
had a sweat band. My dad. The whole time officiated,
he wore a sweat band, and he wore a like
(31:25):
a watch over the sweatband. And he did that so
that we would know that was him, Like he did
that from Tom's Little kid and then the rest of
it has folded up in this uh, in his container,
and much of my dad's chagrin. You see the white
knickers back here with the with the elastic bands. My
dad lobbied his entire career for officials did not have
(31:46):
to wear those knickers because they look like you know,
Bobby Jones playing golf, you know, with Augusta in the twenties.
And and the very next year, the year after dad retired,
they went to those black athletic pants. You see that
you see officials wearing now. So yeah, but that's the
moment because because I and then I had to go
(32:07):
cover the game like I had to. I wrote a
column that night about the game. And so for me
that was that was like the cross roads moment because
I go back to that first game where I had
credentials in eighty three and then the last game that
I fished that that I covered with ESPN while my
dad was in the game and rode a Kyle Road
(32:27):
a column in the ESPN the magazine leading up to
it about this was gonna be his last game and uh,
and then rode a column at night and it was
the great ron cherry was the white hat in that game.
You know, giveh him the business, you'll rolling Iran and
the uh. But it just that was that was it.
That that night was great and my and my my uh,
my dad, my brother was there, my uncle was there.
My mother had passed away years later, but my my
(32:49):
stepmother was there that night. So it just that was
that was it for me because that that was that
was the cross roads, like we did it kind of
moment dads working in nice championship game and I'm there
covering it.
Speaker 3 (33:02):
That's awesome?
Speaker 4 (33:03):
Is that?
Speaker 2 (33:04):
I mean?
Speaker 3 (33:05):
A final question was about the one sporting memory that
will stay with you forever? Is that? Is that the
one thing that you just remember to the to the
very end. Is that the pinnacle of your your sports career?
Speaker 2 (33:19):
Yeah? I think so, just because again it was that
that feeling of I was doing exactly what I wanted
to do and Dad was a fit that was finishing
what I believe is a college football Hall of Fame
officiating career. He worked almost two dozen ball games, a
couple of national championships, a couple of Rose Bowls. He
worked every New Year's Day game except for the Sugar Bowl,
(33:42):
and worked most of them. A couple of times and
just knowing when I was a little kid and thinking
about going to Carson Newman and Cataba and Mars Hill
and these small college games, or even even when I
was a little kid, the high school games in eastern
North Carolina. My dad would be leaving on a Friday,
(34:04):
you know, to go work a high school game in
some town you've never heard of and we'll never hear
of in eastern North Carolina. And to see him go
from that while he also was so successful in his
day job, to see him, you know, get to walk
off the field on his own terms after a national
championship game and me being having the goal of wanting
to get paid to cover games and I was getting
(34:25):
paid in the American dollars boys to be there that night,
and so yeah to me that that's the night. And
then my brother was there, who's also had an amazing career.
For all of us, it was it was a full
circle moment for us as adults. And you know at
that point, I mean I had a daughter at home,
my brother had a daughter at home. We could come
home and tell him about it. It just it was
(34:46):
it was we were all grown up, but we were
still doing exactly what we wanted to do. You know,
when we were kids, I.
Speaker 3 (34:53):
Had a strong feeling we would run over. And none
of us are complaining on this call about listening to
these stories, right, and we're taking up enough of your time.
But I just wanted to ask you one thing before
you go. You've mentioned a few many legendary names, and
you talked about meeting some of your heroes. These always say,
don't ever meet your heroes? Have those been as great
(35:18):
and experiences as you hoped they would be? When you
meet the people that you admire the most, and in sports.
Speaker 2 (35:25):
Yes, but you hold your breath because you worry, you know,
because you know there. I'm not going to lie and
say that every famous person I've ever met was awesome,
because they weren't. But in the realm of collegiate athletics,
which is where I've spent most of my life, you know,
(35:47):
everyone I've talked to, I wasn't. Very rarely was I
let down. Usually it was the complete opposite. Like I
think about when I was a student at Tennessee and
Brent Musburger is Brent Musburger, right, the voice of college
football for most of my life, and I remember Tennessee.
(36:10):
Florida was playing at Tennessee. Shane Matthews was a quarterback
at Florida. Heath Shuler was a Tennessee huge game, pouring
down rain, and I remember was sitting I mentioned Link
Hudson and those guys who were sitting there eating a
hot dog before the game, and Brent Musburger comes walking
through the press box with Dick Vermeal and Brent goes,
(36:30):
we go, Brent, Brent, and we never met him, and
he turned around, he goes, what's up, young men. We're like,
what do you think? You know it was raining, you
think that I'll slow Florida down? And he goes, boys,
is Shane Matthews can grip it? Shane Matthews can throw it?
And then he sat out and talked to us for
like ten minutes, and I'm thinking, man, kickoff's coming. You
gotta go to work. And then I got to work
(36:51):
with Brent later, and he was the nicest guy in
the world, you know I worked with I worked with
all the big names at some point or no, and
they were all amazing, and and I that that I
have always been because you know, I started in this
businesses in the production as a production assistant, like like
grunt level, you know, entry level of ESPN cutting highlights
(37:13):
and answering the phones and running teleprompter. And not everyone
that worked with me was great. But in college football,
everyone I have worked with, all the legends have been
just amazing. And that is it's proof that you can
be a good guy and and still it'll be a
good person. And still, I says to Laura Reutlis rule,
(37:33):
you can still be an amazing, like nice person even
as your career is completely taking off and you're you're
doing stuff and you never dreamed of. And that's when
I meet when I met those people, and they still
were like that, that was pretty good.
Speaker 3 (37:47):
Well, you're one of the good guys, and we do
appreciate you taking a time out to speak to us
because we know you're a busy guy. What you mentioned
this a little bit at the top of the show.
What's going to keep you busy between now and football season?
And what can what can our listeners and watch out for.
That's coming from Ryan McGee over the over the summer.
Speaker 2 (38:05):
Well, you are our greatest publicist, George and Martin McGee,
and we appreciate that you're our international pr rep the uh,
but nor Martin mcgeez every Saturday morning. You know, we'll
be on TV until well, and we're still on TV
in the summer. We just do radio on TV in
the summer, but we'll be in the Wilder Slode studios.
Speaker 3 (38:23):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
You know, when May shows up, it's time for Indy
five hundred, uh, the Miami Grand Prix. I'll do Formula one.
I still do motorsports, and then we start thinking about
Omaha at the end of June, where we'll see if
my Tennessee volunteers can defend their national championship. And at
some point I'm going to sleep and you know, and
maybe try to take some time off, but it'll be
(38:45):
sec media days before we know it. But yeah, Martin
McGee never sleeps, so I will see everybody on Saturday
morning slash Saturday afternoon.
Speaker 3 (38:56):
Well, it just to just to remainder favorite listening. You
can listen to My Mickey Live on the ESPN Radio
via the app for free in this country, which is
seldom you can listen to anything for free. And I
also think Ollie and you should get together to do
a motorsports episode of this podcast, because that would be
something I've listened to I have spent this entire podcast
(39:20):
looking at the number forty three Dinaco car, which I
believe is I believe that's what I'm looking at behind
you there.
Speaker 2 (39:26):
You look, so you're looking at the car that inspired
the Dinacode car. So that that's the that's the Richard Petty. Yeah,
that's the super Bird by Plymouth.
Speaker 4 (39:37):
And that was going to be my question while I
was looking at it, was is it the car or
is it the inspiration? Behind and now?
Speaker 2 (39:45):
So in in the Cars films, Richard Petty actually voices
mister the King. What's funny too, because Kyle so and
the King's is still doing great. The King will be
eighty eight this July. But his son Kyle, who also
raised Forever. Kyle is a great friend of mine, and
Kyle said it's funny because when people meet his dad,
(40:07):
like little kids don't remember Richard Petty's race car driver,
But as soon as he starts talking, he says, their
faces changed and they're like, are you mister the King here?
I'm miss kidding. You know what I got here? I
got I got a crossover dealer for you. So Sterling
Marlin a two time Daytona five hundred winner and from
Columbia Tennessee. Uh. He raced this car after Tennessee won
(40:30):
the national championship. He raced this at the Bristol Motor Speedway,
which you guys remember was the well they played the
Virginia Tech Tennessee game the Battle of Bristol. But he
ran that car in nineteen ninety nine to commemorate Tennessee's
national championships. I always keep that one at hand to no, no, hey,
we can do. I got more. I actually have. I
have as much motorsports stuff as I do Star Wars
(40:54):
stuff as I do college football stuff, so we can
do as many different shows as you guys want to.
Speaker 4 (40:59):
Good man, I'm down, I'm there.
Speaker 3 (41:02):
Well, that's definitely all we've got time for. As the
recording tape comes to its end. Thanks to Ryan Or
and Ollie for their excellent input. Thanks you all for
listening and supporting us. Stay safe and well, and catch
you all next time.
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