David Pollack joins Josh Pate - Pate State Speaker Series

This is an I Heart podcast. Guaranteed human. ["I Heart"] David Pollack in Nashville. What are you doing here? Right down the road, man. This dumb defensive lineman wrote a book. And so I've been doing some stuff with the book, with the publishers and stuff. And by the way, hardest thing I've ever done. You know, it's hard to, first of all, it's hard enough to get still. But then read about it over and over again. And like, I told my wife at one point, I'm like, will you please read this and make sure it's accurate? So writing a book and then speaking with a bunch of folks about it and stuff and getting this situated. And then I got to talk to you. So perfect. It's funny you mentioned the book. I don't know anything about it. Oh, snap. Here it is right here. There it is. Everyday counts. Everyday counts. Everyday counts. This is thick. OK. So it's an easy read though. Serious work. I promise it's an easy read. Like it's big font, thick pages. It's not as bad as you think. It's not about the good things in my life. It's definitely about the difficulties and the struggles that we've had. You got Sleigh Ball writing this thing. Yeah, thank God. Yes, thank God. Yes, that's a little bit of a lie. I've been in Marksons High School, by the way. I remember talking to Mark. I was like, Mark, where should I go to school? Should I go to Georgia? So that's how long I've known him. So it was kind of easy to have somebody that knew your background and your family and your wife, all of it. Well, here's what I want to know. Why did you wait this long to write a book? It took four years to do it. Honest to God. Like, I'm not lying. Like, it took so much time because you write and then you hate it. And then you write. Listen, read about yourself and you hate it. And then you hate it. And it's just, it's just so much. But like, really my wife, like with her stuff the last year and a half, it's kind of been the catalyst too. Because I've been a lot more still than I'm used to. Like, we had a good three or four month stretch after her surgery, after her last surgery that, I mean, I was just a nurse. And so I sat there all day every day. So I had a lot more time to think and get still and make myself do more of it. And but now it's hard, man. It's just, it's hard to articulate things. But I just, I wanted it to be used for God. I did not want it to be used for me and my story. So I was like, how can you put these things together and these stories? And how do you tell them? How does it make sense and have fun? So it took a while to get it all together and a lot of conversations with Mark and figuring that out. Yeah, I don't want to gloss over this. You mentioned your wife, like a lot of us are aware of what's going on there. But someone may be watching who's not aware. So as much as you're comfortable, like, can you share with people what's been going on? Yeah, she got diagnosed with brain cancer about a year and a half ago. And it shocked us because we went to the doctor and then we had the biopsy first surgery and then it was like six weeks, eight weeks. And we were like, they said the longer it goes, the better it is. And I'm like, sweet. So we're going to be good. And then we got the news that it was cancer. So she had brain cancer, had to have surgery. And then we've just kind of bad. It's just she's really had to learn how to do a lot of things over again, which which has been a struggle, like using her left hand and speaking. Like, by the way, I've not told this story. My mom's going to hate this. But like when my mom got back, we got back to the house in Georgia. Like it took my wife about it was like AOLs, like signing on the AOL. Like it took a while to log in and answer. And so my mom, I'll never forget, she's sitting on the bed and my mom was like, is she okay? Man, I was going, mom, she can hear you. She just can't get it out. Like she can hear what you're saying. She didn't even have her way message up. Like she's okay. Yes. But but like so learning how to do all that stuff again, but it was a big emphasis on the book, man. Like because you want to wrestle. The hardest thing about that versus the other hard things in your life is when it's you. But when it's you, when it's your wife and your baby, you just want to take it away. And so not being able to take it away. You wrestle with God and all you get is a dislocated hip and a broken back. Like you're not going to win that wrestling match. And so I think like learning how to let go and like God, she's yours before she's mine. And we've had a lot of hard times, but like you talk about an appreciation for, for life and where you're at and now humbled to be, you know, taking these next steps of healing and being healed and you don't deserve that either. Right. So it's just, it's, it's been a fun journey. We've learned a lot and there's definitely a lot about it in the book. So it's funny, like, you know, people do book tours all the time and you'll see them go on morning shows and whatnot. And it's just, it's very clear. They're there to talk about a book. This dude walks in today and says, dude, we don't even have to talk about the book. You don't want to. But, um, most of the stuff I was going to ask you about is probably in that book anyway. So, so it's going to sound the way it normally would sound. But it's, I just think back. What, what would your life have been 10 years ago? You're on game day at that point, right? That would line up. All right. So four years ago. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So we don't even, I'm just used to saying 10 years. So we go back a few years. You got what most people in sports media would consider either the or a dream job. Then the layoff wave happens in 2023. All right. And that probably didn't make a whole lot of sense to you at the time. I don't know if it makes sense to you now, but like at the time you were one of those names that when the list comes out, people looked at, including me saying, hold up, that is that a typo? Like some of this I get, but no way. All right. So take that, then fast forward to the stuff that's happened in your personal life and with your wife. How did those things like overlap? Was there anything that clicked into place and made you say, ah, some stuff makes a little more sense now? Yeah. I think if you even go back a little further too, you know, I, since I was six years old, I told everybody, like, I'm going to play in the NFL. Like that's my goal. That's my dream. And I got all those pets on the head and I got to make it come true. And then my second season, the second game, it's gone with a broken neck. And so that was our first, like real taste of adversity. And that's in the book. And then, then you come down the road. Well, now you've already had a little bit of that, which is cool, which was, I was, I experienced that at a young age that really it took a dream away from me. So when I say this, I'm serious. Like I wasn't bitter. I was surprised. Like when fitting called me, I was like, what's up, dude? Hey, how's, how's Drew? How's, how's your kiddos? And that, and like 45 seconds in, I was like, oh wait, I know it's about to happen. Like this is going to be bad. And, and then he told me, and, and, and you know, you wonder why, like you always wonder why, but like, I was like, man, I got to do that. And that's one of the things I love about you, dude. Like you love the sport of football. I don't listen to many people, like, but I can tell you freaking love it. You eat, sleep and breathe and not just big football, all football. And I love football. And I got to go to all of these destinations. My son got to go to 29 campuses. Like my daughter got to go to like seven because she hated going. She didn't like going as much, but like I got to do something that people would dream about doing. So man, I was just thankful. I'm like, I'm not, I'm not crying because it's over. Like I'm going to smile because that happened. Like I got to experience something that, and here's the thing. I didn't deserve that. I didn't earn that. Like my second year of TV, I'm on game day. Like I was very fortunate to be given an opportunity. College football is the best sport on the planet. It's not even close. Um, so I didn't really consider it a job, but it was definitely a shock. And, and, and I got a lot of questions and a lot of things. But then I think it was like all of us, we get on that bicycle, life that hamster wheel and you're 10 years down the road and you're like, OK, now what do I want to do when I grow up? And that's kind of now like the phases you go to next is like, what do I want to do next? What's crazy is you, you told a story there. That's like three life stories for some people. Now, granted, most people aren't going to play major college football. Of course, they're not going to go on to be drafted, play in the NFL, and then have a career cut way short. So that already feels like a lifetime and you're what? Like early 20s at that point. Yeah. Then you've got the ESPN chapter, the media chapter, at least part of a media chapter. And then that closes in 2023. You're what age in 2023? 40. OK. So you, God willing, have at least the second half of your life to live. And so you sit there at age 40. Everybody has their story about man, here's what it's like by the time you get to 40 years, body's breaking down. They're talking about, I'm just starting to figure things out at 40. All right. So there's the professional several chapters you had. All right. Then there's the personal stuff and people may look and say, well, you know, this guy is not figuring stuff out anymore because he's already done all this. And that's looking from the outside in. You're on the inside of the bubble. What kind of stuff have you figured out just since that ESPN chapter ended? Well, I figured out like, you know, it makes you stop and go, what do I want to be? What do I want to do? And it stops your plans. And so my plans are gone. And now I got a son that's going into high school. And my biggest concern was how am I going to do game day and coach him on Friday nights? Like that was a big deal for me. And I know Kurt got to do it, but I was wondering how I was going to get to do it. And that was off the table. I coached my baby girl in basketball at the high school, like girls basketball, varsity basketball. So like really my family got to take center stage in my life. I didn't I didn't realize it, man. But like I said, hey, I'm only busy during football. You have four days a week for 17 weeks in a row. Like I didn't realize how time-consuming it was. Man, I really got to build some some cool rhythms in my life. Like I got to be home and be consistent. Like just getting in the gym like more and being with my friends more and my family more. You know, I didn't know anything about what I was going to do next. But I was like, it's the same thing I said when football got taken away. I'm like, I was like, baby, I don't know what's next. But if God gave us this, I know it's going to be special. And then it was college game day. And then that's gone. I was like, I don't know what's next. But it's going to be fun. And the speaking, I love speaking. I get to go across the country now and speak and tell and share my story for his glory. Like that's that's one of my favorite things to do. But I remember calling you not too long ago. I'm like, bro, I don't know this world at all. Like what is going on? Like I love ball. I want to talk ball. And you gave me great advice of how to do it and what to do. But like I know I can't fathom just like when I get retired from the NFL. The one thing I said was I can do a lot of things, but football is going to be part of it. And then when when ESPN was gone, I can do a lot of things. But football is going to be part of it. And it's always going to be college football. But now it's kind of cool when you do it yours. And like with my show now, I can do it my way, which is cool and unique and fun. And obviously challenging at the same time. Like it's so hard to build and grow and learn. But but now that's the fun part of changes the fun part of life. Right. Like we get a new stuff. You were talking about sharing your story. So this is like a sort of an awareness I've developed in the last maybe seven to ten years as I started to get some modicum of professional success after just being broke for a long time. And I like I attribute a lot of the situation that I used to find myself in to, you know, not knowing how to think and couldn't get out of my own way for a little portion of time. Anyway, so then you fast forward. OK, well, then you're you're starting to make a click a little bit and then you start to elevate a little bit. Well, now I get to do what I love for a living. All right. Well, then I'm thinking to myself, thinking beyond myself. How do I leverage this? How do I use that for good? And I anytime we're on a college campus, if we can get there on a Friday, I always love to go speak to a college class because you know, you can relate to being 18, 19, 20, 21 years old. And like me at that time, I had no earthly idea what I wanted to do. I didn't grow up poor. I certainly didn't grow up rich. So I was like in between where my back wasn't against the wall. I knew where my next meal was going to come from, but I certainly didn't have any kind of privilege that was just going to start me on third base professionally. And so I was like a tweener. I was just kind of floating in. I think there's a massive portion of society that fits that description who is college age, maybe a little out of college age. So I thought to myself, OK, well, I can fulfill that purpose by trying to aggressively tell my story as much as possible, because there's going to be five, 10, 15 kids in any 100 person setting in a classroom that can immediately relate to it. Not to mention everyone else who may just take one or two things away from what you say. And I imagine that's kind of how you view that, too, of you've gone through what you've gone through. All right, that becomes your story. But then your story is yours to tell because it's really not just your story. There's a lot more to it than that. Yeah. And I think I love that. I love what you say, because like it's all of our responsibilities to try to give back, right? Like we don't deserve where we're at. We don't we don't deserve to be doing this. Like now, listen, you grinded your tail off and you were really hard. You're right. But that doesn't mean that we deserve to get there. I grinded really hard. There's a lot of people grind really hard. They didn't get to the NFL. And so like it's a blessing. How do you use it? Right. And I think in life, too, like I'm way less concerned about what happens to you. What is your response look like? Like what happened? Does it matter? Like perfection, if it's good, if it's bad, it's really the response shouldn't change. Like I'm still trying to do this book. I'm never so they tell me about the book and like, do you want to know the numbers? I said, no, I don't because it's been out for a week. And I was like, I don't want to know the numbers. I said, because it's not going to change my habits. My habits are still going to be the same. So I don't want to get discouraged and I don't want to get like, hi, I want to go win. I want to go try to do as good as I can. So I think that we get we get a chance to speak to people in this business. I love that meeting people in the airport. And it's like, hey, what I knew I was like, listen, here's my cell phone. We can talk about it. Like, here's what I would think. Be you do you, right? Like you can't be anybody else. Like don't try to act. I said, I've been around plenty of people that act. Like they talk one way and the camera comes on and it's different. And so, you know, we get a chance to share our stories and like, listen, we just want people to learn from it. And that's what I'm learning as I get older because I'm so hard headed and dumb sometimes that when I was younger, I didn't learn from others mistakes. And now you're starting to look around. You're like, all right, I'm can I be smart enough to get some wisdom from them? Instead of me having to run off the railroad tracks and crash into the ditch, how do I learn from others? So, you know, if we can give them wisdom and give people just a chance to, and that's, you know, right in the book, that's kind of what you think. Cause like I can't speak to everybody, but I can give you a chance to get a copy and hopefully, cause, cause I think to me, the men the most need a scoreboard. Yeah. We have to create a scoreboard. We are good when we're competing. Like I'll rip your eyes out. You'll rip my eyes out. But like when it's not in life, it's like, no, no, it's cool. It's cool. It's like, no, no, no, there's a scoreboard. Like let's create those scoreboards every day that we can go maximize and try to live a fruitful, abundant life. You know, you were so, so the title of this book, I want to hold it up again. Good artwork, by the way. Again, nothing. Look at that airbrush job. That's beautiful. Everyday counts. Okay. So I'm driving back from Knoxville yesterday. Had to sit down with Josh Hypole, good two and a half hour drive, really scenic drive, blue skies, enough time to let your mind wander a little bit. Basically. So I turned the radio off. Mine's just wandering. And I always go back to that old Andy Bernard quote in the office. I wish there was a way to know you're in the good old days before you've actually left them. So I got no problem being nostalgic about my childhood. Most people can relate to that. Like, man, I miss the nineties or the 2000s, whenever you grew up. And a lot of people are really good at looking ahead and saying, man, I'm working towards this, nothing wrong with either. But I like, I'm in a little bit of a place right now where every time I go on one of those trips, every time we walk in this studio, like this is our, this is our studio, it's our show. Every time I look around at what we're doing right now, I realize, hold up now. 2050, if I'm still alive, God willing, I'm pretty sure 2020s are going to be the era that I look back on more fondly. I also got married. I met my wife in that decade. Like there's so much going on and you're kind of talking about the same thing. That's the title of the book. And there's a portion of this that's talking about, Hey, this moment you're in right now, granted, everyone's not in their best season of life at any given point, but when you're in that thing, having the awareness to look around and say, hold on a second, hold on, let me take a deep breath. Might I actually be there right now? There's a lot of value in that. How grateful can I be, man? Like if you, if you look around and see what you have, and I'll be honest, like my wife's health has changed that. Like now when I go speak to men's groups, I'm like, listen, I would love to talk to my wife about money. I was like, I would love for that to be a contention for us or like what we're going to do in this season. I was like, guys, I would love that. Don't waste that opportunity. Like, yeah, that's a waste of time. Don't fight about it. But like, I have a buddy that's been struggling with this stuff and he's like, I'm just learning to be grateful. The fact of learning to be grateful and when your car analogy is perfect, because that's the one I use, like, can we be in the car driving as opposed to always be looking out the windshield? And then there's those people that look in the rear view. Regret, guilt, shame. I should have done this. I should have done that. Like, can we be present? Like, can we set those because, because everybody wants to do great things. But the problem is alignment affects our assignment. And if we want to be the greatest three point shooter on the planet and we aligned to the goal, we're good. If we're aligning over here, we're not going to be very good. And so like, can we make baby steps? And I love to text myself the night before. What are three non-negotiables? Like, what are three things I'm going to get done? Because we get our phones in the morning. I know that's going to get done. So when I get my phone, I'm like, I'm going to do this. And it doesn't have to, it's spiritual. It's family goals. It's, you know, work goals. It's whatever goals and whatever avenues, but building those little goals. So we maximum, because we all got those great goals. But man, gratitude and being grateful and just looking around and be like, man, I got a healthy body. I got healthy lungs. Like, I got a healthy mind. I can do this. Like, there's a lot of power in that. You know, the other part about that is, I can chase storms. Yes, you can do that. I was just waiting on it. All right. So you finished that sentence. So I'll just move on. No, you're talking about like laying on a field. You could be paralyzed at that moment. Your career is over. You're talking about finding out your wife has a disease that you don't know the status of. Like you don't know the future of that. So, but you're also talking about professionally, talking about losing a job that you worked a long time to get and acquire. So those are multiple stops along the path where at any given point in the immediate aftermath, you could be looking and you could be saying, if you had the wrong mentality, I'm screwed. We're screwed. Or you could look at it on the 180 degree opposite end of the spectrum and you could use it for good. All right. But then I also think back to apply it to me personally. If I'm reading this book, I'm going to apply it to my life personally. All right. Well, I think back and I think there was a point in my life where, man, I don't think I have anything future wise. I just think I'm going to live in Columbus, Georgia. I'm probably going to work manual labor jobs because that's what I'm doing at that point. And I love sports media. I listen to it every day. I consume it every day, but realistically, I mean, let's just be real. Nobody comes from where I come from and they go on to do that. Like that was kind of a mentality I had when I was younger. All right. And then I mix in, there was a little portion of my life where there was a lot of laziness involved too. The reason I think it's so important to point it out the same way you're talking about now, you got a lot more tragedy involved in your story than I have in mind to this point in my life, but they're both very, very easy to utilize and saying where you are doesn't always have to be where you end up. But also, man, the mentality that you adopt in the moment, the decisions you make in the moment, and it may be some of the most sucky moments in your life, but the decisions you make, that's like steering a ship 10 degrees east, 10 degrees west. It doesn't really matter in the moment, but you fast forward a month, a year. You're in different continents. Like you're in different time zones. You're in different worlds, basically. But knowing you, I bet you stayed positive. At least I did. Like most of the time. And so like, you know, we talk about in the book, but like start where you are, use what you have, do what you can. Well, I remember getting to Georgia. So I got recruited as a fullback. They moved me to defense tackle, you know what? Cause everybody got hurt. So everybody got hurt in fall camp. They moved me to defense attack. I'll never forget. They're like, Paul, well, actually it was Pollock. Hey, Pollock, line up. So get off the ball with a short first step, have good pad level, be quick, get your hands inside, strike, separate, and go chase the football. I'm looking like rush hour. Like, what's going to y'all kick me? Like, what, that is way too much to entertain. Right. And so like, I'll never forget, I didn't know I was doing this, but I was like, all right, I'm just going to, I told the GA, I was like, Earl, like, I'm getting off the ball like a demon and I'm taking a short first step because I keep you in balance and in line. I was like, and that's, that's all I'm doing today, dude. Like I can't do all of that. Like, and so that's what I'm going to start with. And I started with that. And then I added my pad level and then I added my hands. And I think that's like life. Like start with that first step, like make the next right decision. Make that next thing you can do because we can't go down the road. We can't jump. We can't skip steps. And here's another thing too, man. And, but what'd you want to, right? Like, would you really want to looking back now? Like, I wouldn't want to skip steps. Like breaking my neck, it sounds tragic. And I told you, it was my dream since I was six years old. It's one of the best days of my life because of that moment at 22, I got more perspective than I would have had at 40. And I'm a better husband. I'm a better wife. I'm a better dad. Like, I'm better at it. I'm a better son. Like I'm better at all of it. So like those moments, man, like God is for us. And those moments are necessary. And you know what else we develop? This is critically important to me. Like I've developed so much more sympathy and empathy when people are going through those moments. You were texting me about my life. Like that meant something to me. I bet you've been through something in your life where it's been hard or somebody's been struggling. And when you have, you know what it means, man. And you're going to make sure, like God's giving you that, that, that authority to speak from it. And so now you have a whole another person to reach. Like because of your journey and how long it took you and your grind. When you go speak to those kids at those campuses, man, they're like, he didn't quit. Yeah. He kept going. And because he kept going, he did it. If you stop, you're never going to get there. Right. Like you've got to keep trying and keep working and keep swinging. You know, I think the other beautiful part of it, when you come out on the other side, you achieve something that you've, you've been chasing for a long time. You've been working for it for a long time. Man, it could take months. More likely it could take years. Anything worthwhile is probably going to take several years. You don't notice this. If you've got your head on straight, you actually don't notice how thin the crowd's getting around you. Because if you're in any kind of competitive lane, it may start out eight lanes, but then it goes to six and then it goes to four, then it goes to two. Then really when you start to get some altitude about yourself, that road can really be single lane because there really aren't that many people at that point you're competing against. Now, the beautiful thing about having your head on straight is you're not even actually focused so much to your left and right. You got the blinders on. You're just looking straight ahead. And then you get wherever it is you're going and you look around, it's just you. And you withstood all the tests. It made everyone else quit. They tapped out. You didn't even know that people were tapping out. You didn't even know people were quitting. You could be chasing a job in the NFL. You could be chasing a job at a Fortune 500 company. It could be whatever it could be wherever, but then you get to the end and you say, oh, wait, had I been able to achieve this in a matter of weeks? Number one, it wouldn't have meant what it means to me. It wouldn't have the value. And number two, a bunch of people could have done that. I don't know that a bunch of people could do this, whatever it is. And in the thing, the thing I've seen, like, and actually this is, this is one of the chapters in the book and I've never heard this. This is actually original. So like, I don't have very many original thoughts in my head, but this is one. This is big. It's a big one. It's chapter 10. It's 50, 40, 10, but it speaks to that in any level of whoever's listening of business of whatever, whatever business you're in, whatever walk, 50% of the people you can in this world right now, you'll beat and whatever you want to beat in by showing up with a good attitude and working hard. Dude, you can think about that. You eliminate 50% of your competition. That's a fun thing to do is watch 50% go away. The next 40% you can out detail. You can out organize. So with a football player, man, I watch tape, I pick up pointers. Like the offensive line, they're all a bunch of chubby guys. There's a lot of people that are squealers. They're going to tell you what they're doing because their stances, right? Like you're going to learn by watching tape, what you put in your body, like how you're recovering, you're stretching. That's the next 40%. That's 90% so far. Correct. 90% is gone. All right. You did not list a single thing that requires talent so far. Not a single thing. And I'm not going to list another one either because the next 10%, you've got all those people that have done all of those things. Now it's like Terminator, bro. Who can get shot and keep moving forward? Like who refuses to let failure define them? Like failure is failing forward. I'm learning. I'm growing. I'm okay with this. My, my know in sales leads to my next yes. Right. Like I don't think God says, God says yes, no, and maybe, but I think God's like it's slow sometimes, slow to grow. Right. Like you got to, this is going to be slower because we got to grow and we got to go through this. We got to learn some of these steps. You think David, everybody knows about David and Goliath, right? You think David broke out that slingshot and just, and hit him, hit the lie at the first try. That dude hit that fence post a thousand times. I bet you, right? Like just in the back in the yard, just until he could dial it in and get great. And so like having those steps you go through, man, but that, that's something you can use that you can think about. How do I out detail? How do I out organize? How do I out prepare? But the working with an attitude, man, like that's quick. That's quickly getting rid of people and then just having that fight at the end. It's a pretty controversial take on David there because you, you believe that he used a pull and shoot. Whereas other people believe in the sling. Yeah. I mean, either one, either one takes a lot of talent. Sure. Yeah. I would imagine the sling takes more talent. Yeah. You can't even close the one eye and aim on that thing. I mean, that's a big head though. Yeah. It's huge. It's huge. It's huge. So I want to go back to one more thing here and then we'll move on on this topic at least because I think a lot of people are fascinated by working in a place like ESPN. I get questions about my dad asking me about it all the time because people watch it, but they don't understand maybe the machinations behind the scenes. It's just kind of two questions there. How would you describe your time there? How did it compare in other words to maybe how you thought it was going to be? I mean, how do you describe that time when people ask you about it? I mean, it was, I loved every second of it because you got to do something really cool and unique. And the biggest thing that thrilled me that I got jacked up about was like to see everyone's traditions, like to go to every university in the power for like and go and you go, you go to Husky Stadium west and you're like, oh man, I know it ain't big, but that sucker is loud out in stadium, like, into experience the traditions and the sayings and to learn all the different things about the schools and why they throw tortillas. And like just, I mean, all that stuff was like, you were literally educating yourself on the fly and then their chance went during game day. And then, you know, watching coach Corso do his thing was, I mean, that dude was a lesson in humility every week, man. Like the way he treated people, it was unbelievable. Like he was so good to a runner, to the boss, to the, to the, to a teammate. And I never forget, especially with me, because he called me Mr. Mr. Serious Football Guy, because like I just, I so desperately wanted to watch tape and find that one nugget, man. They're like, hey, watch for this in the game and this is going to come to fruition. Like I wanted to find that one thing and he was like with his pencil, he's like, it's entertainment. And I was like, I know, I know coach, but like having, having fun with, I think that was the thing, you know, we can have a lot of fun on the road with your team. It made me feel like I was in a locker room. Yeah. Because your locker, you show up every week with your squad. Like you got your managers that pack all the stuff and then do all the work, but you got your guys and you kind of go into enemy territory and set up a camp. It's a big camp now. It's a big old footprint from when it started. And so just doing it with your boys and stuff, but like it was fun. It was, it was, it was, I really got those moments more when my friends came and my wife, my wife came, wives, that'd been bad. And so like, when they were, oh my gosh, this is crazy. Like you just walk up here and do this. And I think like you, my son, so, so Georgia, obviously I played at Georgia. Like my son was in front of me on the sidelines, about up to here. And now he's six, three, two, 25, about up to here when Ringo caught that interception and ran it back for a touchdown. And I'll never forget, like we're sitting on the sidelines of the national championship game and I'm like, this is pretty cool. This is a moment. This is a moment. So I think you realize, like, I mean, I got a cool job and it's unique. It's different. And I wanted to make sure that, like, I used it the way God wanted me to use it and you fail some and you succeed some, but like it was, it was definitely awesome. I mean, it was fun. You look at the sport right now. I'll let you take this any way you want to. Just how do you feel about where the sport is right now? I love it. Yeah. I mean, here's why I love it. The second worst program in the history of football, Indiana, just won a national championship. So I love that. Like you can't tell me you don't love the, the competitiveness across the sport. Is it different? Heck yeah. It's way different. Like it's way different than it was. And some people are going to like that. Some people are not going to like that. I tell you who I want to be in this new era. I want to be Indiana and Oregon and anybody in Texas that can find a couple of million dollars in a couch cushion, right? Like, you know, George and Batman used to be really nice to be at. Like it's, they don't have the billionaire boosters that doing, they can do some of the same things that some of these other schools are, are able to do. But the sport, I know there's a lot of change and there's been so much fluidity, which nobody loves. Nobody loves a moving goalpost. Like nobody wants to play a game that's consistently changing, but the sport is great. We're still following it. We're still loving it. Like we're still watching it, all of us. And it's still raining. There's, there's a reason, but, but I do worry a little bit about the fabric of it. That's why I love the transfer portal got shut down a little bit, like to one, because the fabric of the fans, it will erode at some point. Like that diehard nature and love and passion. If it changes too much, too fast, I think it could erode some of it. But the sport still is, is, I mean, what's better? This is what I say. Basically what you just said is what I say. When someone asks, how do you feel about the sport? And I say, Saturdays are still awesome. I'm there every Saturday. I'm watching every Saturday. I want a field somewhere every Saturday still feels. Every bit is incredible to me as it's always felt. TV ratings are really big right now. Okay. So I'm certainly, if I've got a problem with the sport, I can't point to Saturday or TV ratings as ammunition in my argument that there's something wrong. But what you mentioned there, let's just say theoretically what you mentioned there, those would be the first signs of apathy creeping in. The football games on Saturday are the last thing people are going to walk away from. But maybe there's a guy out there who used to follow recruiting hardcore. And he just, he kind of checks out. He just kind of shows up in August now. Maybe there's a guy who used to make it a point to take his wife and three kids to the spring game, because those are the only events that he could probably afford to take the entire family to. And now they kind of, they know, spring ball started, but they're not really checking in on it all that much. Those are just really, really like early signs. It's real too. And I see it. Yeah, we hear it all the time. Yep. All right. So that doesn't mean that there's a five alarm fire. There doesn't mean there's an immediate emergency. But when we're in this period of flux, just great transitional period right now, that's where anytime we're doing a show, I always say, look, we got to have where we're going to get somewhere and get there as quick as possible. Because what you don't want is another decade of uncertainty, which you don't want is another decade of churn. And no one really knows. We feel like we're standing on sand right now. So wherever we're going, just get there. I heard Ryan Day talk about it the other day. Hey, wherever we're going, let's just go ahead and get there. Instead of just hanging out in the tunnel forever. We don't even know there's light behind us. There's light in front of us. We don't know which one we're headed towards. That's my biggest concern. And it has been crazy because we know the stories. Like we've heard these stories. This is, I mean, there's some nut stuff that are going on in college football. And like think about Kirby Smart. Like he's next. It's his time. Like he knows how to do this system. He's mastered it, learned from the master, like back to back champs. Like this reigns about to go. Like this is the next dynasty. And then it's like, wait a minute, no, no, no, no. Now you can transfer anytime you want. Now this, this, this and all the rules change. Like in everything's different. And the coach, I'll tell you what, and you know this from talking to the coaches. They're the ones that have been drinking through a fire hose. Sure. Cause, cause they're trying to figure out all the stuff that changed. And now listen, and here's where I think it gets cool. Um, sports, the different sports are different though. And then that's what, like I'm doing a documentary right now. And, and visiting with the other sports in this, in this NIL world, it's totally different. How it's affecting them versus how it's affecting football and lower sports versus upper sports. And, um, it's just, it's fascinating because we're seeing all the numbers. We don't know all the numbers to a T and correctly. And, um, I think once we start to figure that out and everybody's hard to have some transparency, I think we can move towards the right direction. You just mentioned something there that I know they don't know about it yet, but you mentioned the documentary. All right. So you brought that up. So let's talk about it. What are we, what are we willing to share here? Cause I've, I have not shared this with anybody. I've gotten some eyes on you. Oh yeah. I have not shared this with anybody. So I'm excited to share about it, but we're doing an NIL documentary. And it's, and it's kind of interesting because I came into this with a good side and this side is the good side and this side is the bad side. And it's amazing how much it's like, wait a minute, is this the good side or is this the bad side? Is this the right side? Is this the wrong side? Um, but the most important thing for me was I wanted transparency and I'm not going to tell you what to think. I'm going to show you how the sausage is made. So we're going to show you power for, we're going to show you non-power for, we're going to show you baseball, basketball, football, we're going to show you wrestling, we're going to show you women's softball. Like we're going to talk to coach K and Mac Brown, who are legends. And, and when you sit down with coach K, like I was blunt, I had an aha moment when I sat down with coach K and I was like, coach, that makes me sad. Cause coach K looked at me and said, if this was the world I coached him, I would have never coached. And I was like, you're telling me the best basketball coach in the history of college basketball would have never existed. And I'm like, why? Like I need to know more. Like, so talking with those guys and then talking with the guys that are, that are in it now and GMs, getting price tags, like real price tags, like real price tags of their room, um, talking to ADs and how it would it's like to manage now, um, talking to agents, talking to players, the first ever NIL deal, which is amazing in and of itself. Like it's literally a story. Like, um, but just all of these things that all work together, boosters, sitting down with Cody for a long time, like in discussing all these things and booster fatigue and, um, man, it's, it's just, it's so, it's so cool to get all the angles and put them all out there. And then here's the thing. I'm not telling, I'm talking to lawyers. Like that have been suing and suing and suing. And what are you doing? Why are you doing this? The strategy of how they're attacking and why they've done it, like they've done it. And then you get to sit back and you be like, all right, like, I'll make, I'll make the diagnosis of how I feel about this, whether I like NIL or not, but you're going to have every angle that you could possibly think of. But here's the other good thing. All right. So first off, I watched this and I realistically can't tell where you land on stuff. Yeah. So you just basically, you just like sat in a judges chair and you just questioned people. Here's the other thing. You got multiple heavy hitting political figures on this. And what was refreshing is out of every mouth of every political figure that I listened to, they said, you don't want Congress running college football. You don't want Washington running college football, which is great because that's kind of the fear that a lot of people have is man, once you get DC involved, well, then that becomes the entity that wants to run college football and they're sitting there like, no, no, no, no, no, that's, that's not what we want. That's not what you want. Yeah. Which is, which is crazy because, you know, when I, but when you sit down and then yes, all the politicians and crews and all those guys, they said, Jordan, they all said that. They're like, you don't want that. Um, but you have a lot of people that are in the industry that said they do want that. And they'll say, which is ironic. They'll say, I do want that. I want that because, because here's, here's the hard part. The hard part is when you have a big sport that's across the United States of America and all these different states and you have, it's like, it's like not having national law. Right. If we didn't have national law, it would be hard. So it would be hard to function, right? We need national law, a lot of national law to keep us safe. Right. So you need national law to govern and that's what the NCAA used to be the national law, right? They're telling you how you can do all these different things. So now that all the different states are popping up and making their own rules, they're playing different games within different states. And so it makes it difficult to hear them say that and hear others say that they need it and to hear everybody's fixes. Like at one point I've gotten so many of those, Hey, we need all sit down in a room. I'm like, why don't you sit down in a room? I'm like, we need to do this. We need to do this. We got to do this. Yeah. We need to sit down in a room. I'm like, who needs to be in this room? Because what I saw at the White House, I don't think we need all those people in a room. Like let's shrink the room down a little bit. Like let's see how we're actually going to get this. That that's what I hope comes out of this. I hope we get just a little closer and we say, okay, I see this. I see this at Oral Roberts University and how this has changed the way they operate their budget. I look at UAV. I look at Oklahoma State wrestling. I look at all these different programs that are trying to function, trying to survive, like how it's affected them. Like I have their voice. I have their voice. I have their voice. Let's all come together and have a collective voice. What do you think was the biggest like aha moment or aha topic that was presented to you during the making of this documentary that you had no idea about when you went into it? When I sat down with Scott Drew of Baylor, so fresh off of their basketball situation where they basically took a pro and brought them in and I'm like, wait a minute, like this is perfect for our documentary. Like, and then to sit down and listen, I had a really big aha moment with him because he was talking about coaching in this era. And I'm like, okay, because, because what you think is like, okay, this is all better for the players. This is all better for the players, right? The players are making money. Players are making money. This is better. And when he, when he sat down and he was like, Hey, so I, he said, I, here's how I look at coaching now. I got you for eight months. So let me ask you a question. Players and everybody out there, if I'm a basketball coach and I'm Scott Drew and I'm breaking, dude, if your shots broken that needs to be fixed, I got to break it down and then build it back up. And in a couple of years, I'm going to make you an all conference player. I'm going to make you an NBA player. If I got eight months with you, I got to operate in your strengths. What can you do? That's what I got to put on the court. That's what I got to put on the field. So really like the lack of development is because we're, we're skipping some developmental steps now. And then, you know, basketball and then Tony Vitello for, for, uh, baseball was amazing, like to hear how it affected them and to hear how it affects them with the eight, with the draft budding up to the season and how the numbers haven't really grown in baseball, like it has, you know, in basketball and in football and what that looks like and what the numbers really are. Um, but, but to hear the developmental piece of it and to, to see that there's a lot of people in college sports that are missing out on opportunities that are from it, you know, the United States that are kids that have dreamed about it, 17, 18, 19 years old that are kind of going to miss out on a lot of opportunities that you would like to see because, because the system currently is the way it is. All right. I got to get you out of here on this. Run me by this point you made about gunner stocking the other day. One more time. What he's got to be for Georgia to be capable of winning a national title this year. You said he's got to be better than what he was last year. I can't, I can't work with that. I got to have something better if you want to compete for a national championship. So what does it have to look like? I love Georgia fans getting mad at me for that. I'm like, you should get better. Like you should with experience get better. All right. So here's the thing about gunner elite competitor. We all know this elite toughness. Okay. If you stand next to gunner, he's six feet. Okay. He has a bunch of super human mutants in front of him. And then by the way, they got a freshman on the offensive line. That's just as good as last year's freshmen. This offensive line is going to be absolutely filthy. Might be the best in the country. It's going to be incredible. They're all six, nine, six, six, six, seven. Okay. So when he's standing in the pocket, that's tough to throw over. So how do I negotiate the pocket and still throw over the middle of the field? Like when I throw over the middle of the field, if I miss over the middle, sure, it's a linebacker interception. If I miss long, it's an interception with the safety. So people don't want to attack the middle of the field. Well, he didn't attack the middle of the field a lot. He's got to be able to attack the middle of the field more. So that means I've got to be able to make more place in the pocket. If you watch gunner, it's a big wind up. And so like him learning last year just because he's got a hose now, he can throw it through a car wash and not get it wet. Like he can sling it. And then you saw him last year, he would kind of just drop his arm and just throw it without stepping. And you're like, all right, sweet. Like, so learning those arm angles, being able to change the arm angles, being able to throw over the middle of the field a little bit more effectively, like take those next strides, they're going to be able to run the football. Like the offense and line Bobo coming back and then they're going to be so good up front. So to take that next step and go to elite and go beat, you know, Julian Sam and company and Arch Manning and company, which George has done a good job of beating Texas, but you're going to have to have the a little bit more explosive nature in the offense. The book is called every day counts. Dave Pollock, appreciate it, brother. If anybody can write a book. Must be 21 plus and present in select States for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus and present in DC. First online real money wager only $5 first deposit required. Bonus issued as non-withdrawable bonus bets, which expire seven days after receipt restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com gambling problem. Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit fanduel.com slash RG call 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut or visit and D gambling help.org in Maryland. Hope is here. 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