Transcript of Dan Threatens Jeremy (Again) Over Jelly Beans | Local Hour

Chris Cody, I'm a little bit worried about Yemirchek in the Zazz and Cody seat. He's already spinning around in circles. He's got way too many thoughts and ideas because he's not doing a show often enough. He needs to be doing a show about— I'm gonna say hourly. 29 hours a day, I think, would be the right amount. If you allowed him to do a show for just 24 hours, you might get a sane person, but if you gave him 29 hours a day, if Donald Trump were to extend daily daylight savings time to make the day 29 hours long, I think we might get the Yammercheck we need here. But Ameen and Yammercheck on the same day means that we might have a collision of old people thoughts, given what Ameen's been doing lately with his general fossilization.

Ah!

Why?

You got dragged into this.

What do I have to do this? What? What are you talking about?

The aging process around here. Damashek comes in here and by way of hello, he says something about autogram.

It's so true.

And it's like, I don't care about autogram. And he's like, football's back, Dan. Like, that's why I'm here. It's Football America. There's football tonight. I've got a show and I want to talk football. And he starts, he begins the bidding with autogram.

Well, he wore number 60, you understand. He was a quarterback. That's why you have to hold him up. If you're going to talk about quarterbacks, are you serious? If you're not going to bring up Otto Graham, clearly you're not. Number 60.

Again, I'm trying to figure out how I'm old like that.

Well, you came in talking about AI wage suppression like you're a different kind of old.

That's new shit, man. You know, my guy wore number 60.

Worrying about money is new shit?

Worry about AI suppressing money. That's new shit.

How'd they do that?

Yeah, it's a weight suppression. Oh man, you're not ready.

Otto Graham was number 60. I didn't know that Otto Graham was number 60.

In the, in the AAFC. That's why you have to talk about him. That's why he's relevant, because he won 4 titles in the late '40s AAFC before he became an NFL superstar.

I don't know what that is. Uh, put it on the poll at Levitar Show. Do you know what the AAFC is? And also, did you know that Otto Graham was uniform from number 60, because that is not something that I know, uh, or knew. What is the weirdest number a quarterback in the NFL has ever had? Is there any such thing as a quarterback in the NFL who has had a weird number?

I think that, that, well, they, they only allow you to go from 1 up to 19 now, but I assume they may— John Hayden wore in the AFL, I believe, 20. Oh yes, I'm pretty sure Flutie wore 22 at Boston College. No, Yeah, yeah. And but yes, we're still an odd number for you.

Think that that rule has been in place all time for the NFL, that it's been 1 through 19 for the quarterback.

Sammy Ball was 33. Now that I think about it, 33.

Jeremy just Googled it and said that a millisecond before David checked in with the internet. And Dave doesn't even have his laptop in front of him.

Yeah. No, the thing about Dave that's great is it would be A Beautiful Mind if any of the things that came out of it were actually beautiful.

Here's something not beautiful but weird. Do you know that until 1976, a collection of college all-stars would play the reigning Super Bowl champions, and into the early '60s, the college team would sometimes win? Can you imagine? They beat Lombardi's Packers. College all-stars. What an embarrassment. If you need any further proof that the NFL didn't really matter until the Super Bowl era, There you go.

That's weird, right? You are listening to the Don Levitan Show in partnership with the DraftKings Sports App, now live in all 50 states. How do we feel about the jelly bean as a Hall of Fame candy? Because the jelly bean is one of my favorites. It's just a flavored cube of sugar. And Tony, I don't want your judgment on this. It's a historic, famous candy. The most famous jelly bean candy for a reason. Like, it's got an endurance that not all the other candies have. There are plenty of come-and-go candies. The jelly bean is here and here forever.

The Bob Cousy of candy.

Yeah, it's still great though. That's the difference.

The difference for a certain subsection of people that saw it black and white.

Yeah, put it on the poll at @LebatardShow. I like a lot more than black and white. In fact, I don't like the black or the white in this case, but I like all the other colors. @LebatardShow.

Well, the white one could be coconut flavored and then that would be very nice.

Put it on the poll @LebatardShow. Is the jelly bean the Bob Cousy of candy? I think you guys are being disrespectful to the jelly bean. You're being a bit ageist to the jelly bean.

The root beer jelly bean is my favorite candy.

That is disgusting.

Okay, that should be incarcerated. What? It should be. That should be prosecuted. It's delicious. That should be prosecuted by— A fan of the show just sent me a whole pack of root beer jelly beans. I ate half of them on the way home. I am only okay with ICE in this one instance. If they want to come in here and take you away, I'd be good with that. Like, I'd be told— like, that's— what you just said is an insanity. Put it on the poll at Le Batard Show. Does anyone think that root beer is the greatest of the jelly beans?

I thought I was helping.

That is nuts. That is just—

well, Dan, you, you can attack Tashay, but of course you must follow up with the right answer then.

What is the best flavor? I like the reds and the pinks. I like the cherry, the bubble gum. I like— but I also like— I— what did you call me? Root beer breath just called me a basic ass.

Yeah, that's right. B-A-B.

I like that Jeremy actually opened his mouth. The first thing he said today was, in effort of supporting you, and you immediately cut him down. You will be no ally of mine.

Saying something I would never say.

A root beer flavored jelly bean.

Don't knock it till you try it.

I have tried it. This is not me speaking of ignorance. Look at me. You don't think that I'm a jelly bean connoisseur if I'm telling you I like the jelly bean. The jelly bean is one of the few candies— I don't know what this is for you guys in terms of food. Damashick, what is it for you in, in terms of food, the thing that you can't stop eating? Like, you know you're gonna eat too many, you know it's not gonna feel good once you start. I have, uh Addictive and compulsive tendencies. I've told the audience before, the reason I've lived in Miami all my life and never tried cocaine is because I don't want my life ruined. Like, I just— I know that when I really like something, I have trouble with impulse control. What is the thing that you have— if I made— I'm asking all of you this question, so give it some thought. Uh, the one thing that you had to put at the top of your list on, if I start eating it, I can't stop. And I'm taking Pringles and potato chips sort of out of the equation here because too many people say that.

Whiskey.

Oh, you too?

No, it would— I mean, so you just immediately took my answer away from me before I gave it. I know it's basic, but I cannot go to a Mexican restaurant and no matter how hard I try to resist, the chips and salsa will consume me, or I will consume them. I'm full before my food arrives.

Right.

What about you guys? I mean, what would you choose as something that you just, once you've had a couple, whether it's the saltiness or something else, you just, you're gonna, you know, you're gonna eat too many once you've started. That chips and salsa is a great one because That chips and salsa have to be— put this on the poll, @LeButardShow. What is the bigger ruiner of your appetite for a meal, chips and salsa or just bread? Pick between the two. Rolls?

Easily bread.

Yeah, easily.

Not easily for me. Like, it'll kill a Mexican meal for me if I start hitting the chips and the salsa. For me, the answer is chips and salsa. It's not bread.

Is the bread nice and warm, and do they give a butter on the side? Yes, a salted butter. Something to go with that. And then let me just throw an option C in there, even though you don't see it that often. It's the flat, wide fried noodles that begin your Chinese feast. Those are very good.

They are delicious.

Yeah, but they're too small to be in this category of thing.

Like, and they give you the little sweet and sour sauce to dip them in.

Oh, Dave.

Talk to me.

He is talking to you.

Talk to me.

That's all he was doing.

Keep doing it.

Say more. I had a whole clam pizza last night. I got in at 10:30 at night. You had a what? I had a clam pizza and I didn't, I was like, well, I love the clam pizza. When I arrive in Miami, I immediately get myself one of those nice pizzas in the Elser Hotel. Downstairs, and I ordered up my— I went, I walked in with my bags, and before I checked in, I went into the restaurant and said, uh, is the kitchen still open? They said, we close in 2 minutes. I said, put in an order of that clam pizza. I ate the whole thing. I ate the whole thing standing right there at the bar.

Clams.

My belly's full of clams.

Clams, number 3 on my list of foods to eat in the nude.

I couldn't help but imagine that once he said he was eating clam pizza because of yesterday's show. I now had a new Dave Dameshek in the Elser Bar eating a clam pizza. And I've got to add the bonus fact of I don't know what a clam pizza is. I've never even heard of a clam pizza.

It's a pizza with clams on it.

Never heard of it.

Didn't know that clams were a pizza topping until this very moment.

It's the only topping? It's just clams?

Are they spread like pepperonis would be? Yeah, basically. Yeah, I mean, what do you think? As opposed to what? How else would they be on there?

So one giant clam on the top?

I don't know, maybe they give you like 5 clams. It's a clam tower. Maybe there's only 5 clams because they're kind of pricey.

Lay's on the cheese, eh?

You know, I'm a man of many colors, Dan, but whereas I was willing to accept— I resented the thought of clam pizza, but then I tasted it, and when I'm wrong, I say I'm wrong, like Jerry Orbach at the end of Dirty Dancing. It was delicious. But that's where we lost the way with jelly beans. They tried to please everybody. Now we're doing— we're— I didn't even know we were doing root beer jelly beans. I don't care for that. That's too far afield. Let's stick to— let's stick to the main flavors, right? I mean, banana is about as far as—

keep talking, talk to me. Uh, put it on the poll at Levitard Show. Yeah, banana.

I—

let me think about this for a second. What is a bridge too far on— we've made too many jelly bean flavors because, uh, root beer's been around for a long time, but I do believe the banana jelly bean is offensive. What you're describing there is too much even for me as a jelly bean connoisseur.

I know what happened. When they started making disgusting flavors— now we've gone to a bridge too far. They had like puke and vomit and fart, stuff like that. It's like, come on, what are we—

disgusting flavors? No, but what is that? Nobody— I agree, that's a joke.

No, legitimately, kids play it. My, my, uh, my little boy loves to have the, the mixed bag of some are okay but some are disgusting. Like What? Who's the winner of this? Why would you play this game? Somehow he duped my poor old 85-year-old mother into playing this game. Ugh, this, I mean, just, I mean, but vile flavors, really vile.

Vomit! He just said puke and diarrhea!

Literally, those are the flavors. Those are literally the flavors and people ingest them on purpose.

Not on purpose. Oh no, it's a prank. Your mother didn't do that on purpose.

No, no, no, it is a game. Correct me if I'm wrong, Tony, isn't it? You open the bag and then you blind taste these and like you either get a good, it's Russian roulette with flavors. Yeah, jelly bean roulette.

You've never played?

No, I have not, because why would I on purpose risk eating something that tastes like poop? Why would I do that? That's just some good wholesome fun as a teenager. Nope.

What does diarrhea taste like?

You don't want to know.

I mean, diarrhea.

Watered down.

I imagine that you feel like you have the bad smell from a toilet sort of in your ears and in your face on the inside of, you know, on the inside of your being.

Some of the official flavors include Stinky Socks, rotten egg, toothpaste, canned dog food, boogers, and baby wipes. Toothpaste has gotta be like, "What am I doing here?" What the hell?

What in the hell?

Why, why, why would you do that? Dan, which candy flavor best approximates the fruit upon which it's based and which is the furthest away? And this isn't an evaluation if it's ultimately of quality. Like, as a for instance, let me start this off with Grape flavor candy is a universal flavor. The same no matter what brand it is, the grape flavor will always taste the same, and yet it tastes like no real grape I've ever had.

Off of the top of my head, I feel like the lime doesn't really approximate the lime the way you would like, but the lemon does. The lemon on a jelly bean generally tastes like lemon. The orange also has you know, pretty decent properties on the fruit. Can we get the video please of the bear trying to break into the jelly bean? And I recognize this jelly bean brand, but off the top of my head, I don't know the name of the brand of jelly bean that this bear is trying to break into the machine of. But this is my favorite brand of jelly bean. What is the name of that?

That one is Jelly Belly.

Uh, that is my favorite. That is, uh, it seems to be a gourmet jelly bean. It seems to be— I don't know how they make these jelly beans better than the other jelly beans, but I believe that you guys, when you judge my Jelly Bean Hall of Fame induction, I believe what you guys are doing is you guys are eating cheap jelly beans. You're not eating these gourmet jelly beans with all of these flavors. I don't know how they do it, but they do it very well.

So you're a big fan of Jelly Belly then, Dan? Okay. You can try their disgusting flavors that are as follows: tobacco juice. It's obviously tobacco spit.

Why would anyone— like, this can't— there can't be a market for this.

There's acid reflux. You can try used chewing gum, moldy bread, dead fish, obviously farts, flat soda, spoiled milk, kitty litter, uh, dirty gym socks, B.O., morning breath, sperm. I'm sorry?

Morning breath.

Morning breath.

Yeah.

Oh, that one.

Okay. Dan Levitar.

I hope he goes to your town so I can laugh because you think he'll make you a contender.

Who's that impression of?

The sports guy.

Oh, oh, do some more.

What part of Massachusetts is that?

Let me hear some more.

Dave Demacek.

I don't do a good Simmons, but that's what I'm doing right now. That's maybe the worst Simmons I've ever heard. Hey man, that's a bad impression. I'm a Heat media.

This is the Dan Levitar Show. The video of the bear trying to break into the Jelly Belly machine reminds me of what I believe to be the longest-standing argument that I had with the producers of our television show at ESPN. Highly Questionable was on the air almost 10 years, and I was always trying to argue on behalf of, please, let's make it sillier. Please let's make it stupider. And I remember the first time I had the argument was I was sitting in, I was substitute hosting on Pardon the Interruption, and I was seeing for the first time a bear fall out of a tree onto a trampoline. And I said to the producers, we have to lead with that. And they're like, Dan, it's Masters Week. And I'm like, yeah, we have to lead with the bear falling out of the tree. Trust me when I tell you the people who are here for sports are gonna stay here for sports if they— They're watching ESPN. They probably want sports. And that was their argument to Dan. The people who want sports, they want sports. They don't want the silliness of a tranquilized bear falling out of a trampoline.

You're not okay with this? It should be blurred. So this is the backstory on the trampoline bear, because this is a great video. They tranquilized it because it's too high up in the tree and it can't get down. And they thought they had a good idea because they put a trampoline there hoping that when the bear landed, it would then again bounce and land on the trampoline. Unfortunately, the bear weighs a great deal. The bear went high in the air, and the bear did not come straight down. The bear then fell to the side of the trampoline, on its side, but successful.

The bear—

It's on its face. The bear is— well, on the side of its face, but the bear is still alive. And it seems while it's at the height of the trampoline bounce, it seems like it's also awake, but then it hits the ground, and you realize, well, no, that bear is not awake. They have tranquilized the bear. You guys agree that that should be leading— if you've discovered that video, That needs to lead whatever kind of show you're doing, even if it's the ABC Nightly News.

Before I answer that question, I'm going to push back on what you said, which is the tranquilizer knocked the bear out. No, I believe the ground did, Dan. Look at this right here. It's awake, boing, it's awake, and then—

Oh, I don't believe it's awake. I believe the trampoline makes it look like it's awake. But look at how this is— you gotta still— the place that I want the still— stop it and freeze it, please, on the spot where, uh, just as it's going down the first time and about to land on the trampoline. It looks like it is absolutely desiring of like, I'm gonna have some fun, I'm a bear and I'm gonna have some fun on this trampoline. Many of you are discovering this for the first time. Can you tell me though, please, you guys don't believe the jelly bean is a first ballot Candy Hall of Famer?

Not for me, but I'll accept it. And I like my fruit flavors and I like my chocolates, dark if you please, but that Bear. First of all, you couldn't sell it in Masters Week as some sort of a metaphor about the Golden Bear, Jack Nicklaus. You think that that would be your in?

There was no amount of sales that I could do that could push them off their position. They're like, Dan, Happy Trails or nothing else. Like, you're getting— you get it at the end of the show. And that's just because we're saying goodbye and we're done with all the very serious stuff that we have done before.

Well, it's jarring, though, because For those of us who have been watching movies and TV for the last 50 years, we've never seen a fictionalized version of somebody jumping out of a window or tree and not being successfully caught by the firefighters. It always— they always retrieve him. This was a failure.

You guys have really hurt my feelings here on making me feel alone on the Jellybean being a first ballot Hall of Famer.

You killed your only ally. You took out a sword and whack!

I don't want him as an ally though when he's saying something that I'm saying ICE agents, I'd be okay with them arresting him. I'm not Cuban, you gotta stop doing this. Or worse, or worse, arresting him or worse. That's how bad that take is. The root beer cannot be your favorite jelly bean flavor. This is Samson-esque, and Samson thinks that the black licorice is the best jelly bean flavor. He can't taste it. Now we can't taste it, but back when he had taste and COVID hadn't taken his taste and smell, uh, which plenty of people in my life believe he's just doing that for attention. They don't actually believe him because it doesn't make sense that David Sampson is still claiming he can't taste and can't smell but still eats an unbelievable amount of fattening foods. Like, if you can't taste and smell, my guess is you'd go to broccolini and broccoli and salads and you wouldn't bother. You just do healthy stuff. You wouldn't be bothering.

He still has a bag of candy and he can't taste Guys, I'm gonna seize upon something Dan said, because what Dan, I think, wanted to say was many people are questioning whether it's real or he's doing it for attention. But what Dan actually said was many people in my life, which means these are personal connections. We'd like to know some names, Mr. Leprechaun.

The reason I said it the way that I did is because I'm protecting those people, my skeptical friends, his sources.

Is one of those people the man in the mirror, Dan?

No, I'm not one of them, actually. I had never considered until they brought me their skepticism, and I'm like, well, like he's doing it for excitement.

But your point checks out. Of course, why would he, if he in fact does not have taste, why would you ingest candy then?

Doesn't make any sense to me. Even as a habit, he walks around.

But you have no opinion. You're saying still other people saying it. You, you have this sound thought, but you don't buy that that Samson might be up to no good.

I didn't say I didn't have an opinion. You've now coaxed it out of me with a great deal of interrogation. I didn't have the thought before it was presented to me, and now I do have the thought that that can't be so. That it's not— no one is that craving of attention that they would fake the "I can't taste or smell" in order to get icebreaker.

It's just, "Hey, I can't taste or smell, guys. What's up?

My name's Dave." This is the exact plot to the movie Inception. Like, someone said, how do we get Dan to have the idea? They went into your dreams 3 levels deep, Dan, and put the idea in your head, and now the idea is your idea that David Sampson is doing this for attention. Congratulations, guys, we did it. I can go home now.

We have been discussing in the faintest of terms the idea of the Hall of Fame, and I wanted to bring up something here that Jeff Passan is doing because Jeff Passan is essentially in baseball baseball, what it is that— Sean, there aren't many of these baseball insiders. There are fewer than there are in football by miles, and basketball has more than baseball does. But do we consider Jeff Passan the preeminent guy? Is it Tim Kirschen? Is it Buster Olney? Like, who is now considered the preeminent baseball information person?

It feels like Passan. And to distinguish the baseball guys from the football guys, it does feel like they veer into or they blend their insider stuff with some, with some punditry informed by actual knowledge. Do you agree with that? I feel like now Adam Schefter— and I don't mean to just call him out— but I feel like this role of being an insider has become now the transcriber of what agents and teams want to be shared with the public. But now It feels to me like, I don't know if Schefter chose this or ESPN chose this, but now he's sort of in the seat of like, evaluate this team's prospects for the 2020— who asked for Adam Schefter's insight on how good a team is going to be in a given season?

Whereas it's natural starting with Peter Gammons on, uh, the argument can be made, and I don't remember who it is that made it, but they said some form of, uh, Adam Schefter is no longer a journalist, Adam Schefter is a mailbox. I don't— you guys can look it up. I want to credit the person. I don't want to steal the joke. But the— I just heard, this was surprising to me the other day, Will Bon came out and said Stephen A is no longer a journalist. He just said— and that, that one had to at least wound Stephen A a little bit.

Stephen A responded.

Well, just because it's Will Bon. Like, he respects Will Bon so much. There aren't a lot of people in the world who I think can actually hurt Stephen A's feelings. Things because he respects them so much. And, uh, Wilbon saying that as one of our mentors is something that I can imagine that Stephen A. wouldn't like very much. We can get both Wilbon's comments and Stephen A.'s response here. But the Jeff Passan story— the— he gave up his Hall of Fame vote because of a letter that was roughly 1,200 words written by the late Joe Morgan, possibly the best second baseman that there has ever been. And Passan's quote is, he was essentially saying to all the voters, this place is sacred, do let in people who are going to ugly it up. And I'm sitting there like, there's some real pieces of shit in the Hall of Fame already, terrible, terrible people. And you're telling me that Barry Bonds, because he chose to pursue an area of the game that was beyond things, that makes him worse than Ty Cobb? That makes him worse than people who are racist? What are your thoughts here, Damashek?

Well, the immediate response is that we need to send all these Halls of Fame where they belong, back to the 20th century and on top of Mount Pius. This, this rolling sort of evaluation of morality and whether or not someone has earned it when we know who's already in all these Halls of Fame means that they're rendered now in this weird murky place where we should just do away with them and start fresh. Dan, my idea is goodbye Halls of Fame, hello Hall of All. Let's start nice and new. How say you? Let's, let's figure out the 20 or 25 names in our inaugural class, and we're not going to evaluate them based on morality, we're going to evaluate them based on their deeds between the lines. How say you?

Well, I gave up my Hall of Fame vote because of the way that it was being done to keep out Barry Bonds. And I'm like, you can't keep the best baseball player I've ever seen out of the place that honors baseball excellence. Like, you can't be so moral about this stuff as sportswriters that you are somebody who's guarding the gates to the Hall of Fame and ignoring the greatest of the baseball players who have ever played. And, and the greatest of the baseball players who have ever played— if I took away all of his MVP seasons and all of the numbers from his MVP seasons, he'd still have 400 home runs and 400 stolen bases, which no other player has done. So he was a Hall of Famer before he inflated and his head got big and whatever it is you think steroids were doing to his body, when he was just doing steroids to up with Mark McGuire and Sammy Sosa, who weren't as good as he was.

Dan, when you gave up your vote, did you give us a big announcement that, "I'm giving up my vote because this"?

Did you do that? I mean, yeah. Enough.

Get out of here. He had a press conference up on Mount Pius.

I don't know how you— There you go. That's exactly what that is. It's a press conference on Mount Pius. You and Jeff Passan and everybody else who's like, "Come in. Come one, come all. Hear ye, hear ye. I I am renouncing my Hall of Fame vote henceforth. Thank you.

Thank you. Teddish me.

But I didn't do it quite like having a press conference. Are you not— do you not know this story? Like, it's— I think it's the first time I got in trouble at ESPN.

I know that you, like, you raffled it. I thought you were being silly. I didn't know you had, like, an actual moral stance behind it.

I was being silly, but it's still a moral stance behind it. I was being silly. I sold it to Deadspin for— and I didn't actually take any money. I sold it, quote unquote sold it.

Yeah, so giving it to Deadspin, like, watch this piss everybody off. I love that. That's what I always— that's the mythology I grew up on.

But they wanted an explanation. They wanted a written explanation for why it is that I was doing that.

That's when you went up to Mount Pius.

Dan Levitar. Let's throw it to my boy Jeremy Taché, who's sideline right now.

Cash money, what you got for me?

Jeremy Taché. Thanks, Jax.

This is the Dan Levitar Show.

People go up to Mount Pius It's the peak of sanctimony, understand? It allows— it gives you the right point of view to look down on all the rest of us, the mere human beings, so you can evaluate us. Listen, it's so deep with your peer group, Dan, that the commitment to being self-righteous trumps the actual Hall of Fame. It's amazing. Imagine what father would take his child who likes baseball— let's go to the Hall of Where's the home run king, Dad? Like, well, he's not in here. He's not in here. Well, okay, well then can you show me the guy who has the most hits in the sports— well, he's also not in here. How about the most dominant pitcher of the last half century? Yeah, also not. What the hell are we doing here then? Why did you drag me here? Because here's Harold Baines. He was pretty good for the White Sox for a few years.

The way that this story played out, for those of you who do not know it, because this— I'm pretty sure It's the first time that I got in trouble at ESPN after being full-time at ESPN. And, and the reason that it got people so upset, and I think this is also the first time that Skipper ever got mad at me personally, is because Deadspin and ESPN were at war and I was doing something with the enemy because Deadspin had done some things to embarrass Skipper's mentor. And, and so I was doing something that was actively with ESPN's enemy. But, and this part is funny that it gets forgotten, I told Deadspin that I would only do that if their person who they already had giving them the vote backed out. And that person then backed out. Like they had somebody until the last minute and I wasn't gonna be any part of that. I was just gonna give up my Hall of Fame vote quietly. But then they had their person, whoever was supposed to do it backed out. And so I'm like, yeah, I'll do that. Because I— and, and my reasoning was exactly what it is that he's saying, which is we can't have the sportswriters being so drunk on their power that they're assigning moral judgments to people who are competing against each other.

When all of us, if you gave us a fountain of youth and everyone around us was also using that fountain of youth in a competitive field, very few of us would say, no, never mind, I, I don't need— never mind, I don't need that. I'll try and compete against all the cheaters on just my natural gifts and see if I— I just thought the whole thing was, was stupid. Uh, but a Hall of All seems like you're taking out not just the pious but the special.

Well, you start out with this thought: why did they, the framers of the first Hall of Fame, whatever it was, why did they go with fame over great, over exceptional? Why did they go with fame as the, uh, as the honorific?

It's a great question. It doesn't even make any sense why they would go with fame, especially since that— well, now it would make sense because it's the greatest of the currencies, but it wasn't in the '20s. Like, fame, it wasn't— Babe Ruth didn't even have a way to be famous. He's just coming to your town and no one even knows how to find out that he's coming to your town because there's— they're going— they're getting it by telegram. Hall of Fame? Why is it the Hall of Fame?

I'm fascinated by the idea idea that people would go to baseball games. Keep in mind, Dan, there was— there were no lights, and so games by definition were played during the day, and they were played Monday through Friday as well as on the weekends. Who were going? Who's going to these games?

How did baseball make it?

People were just listening on the radio at work and kids after school? Who were these people sitting in the stands day after day? Well, the first Hall of Fame was German, but you also probably don't want me to say that. You know what? What? El root beer. 2 minutes in the box. Besta tremenda como mierda.

Okay, they have a jelly bean for that. This is the quote from Michael Wilbon to Stephen A. Smith, uh, stop, you're not a journalist anymore. You're not doing what you did at the Philadelphia Inquirer. Stop, dude. I know what you did there because I was shoulder to shoulder with you at press row and in press boxes and at practice. Stephen A is a show. He knows it. He wants to be the show and he's doing a damn good job at it. That's what he wants to be. He has now spawned a whole generation of people who want to be the show. Good for Stephen A.

Then if you want to hear it, we've got the response from Stephen A right here.

Okay, let's see if we have some hurt from him in this response because I have not heard the response.

Yeah, here it goes. I'm gonna hit play right here. Boy, do they make a habit of mentioning me all the time. I don't know how many times a day or per week I'm on their website. I do know, and I can easily surmise, that clearly my name drives traffic. It keeps their website afloat. Wilbon's website?

He doesn't know what a website is. He doesn't know how to get to a website. He's never been on a website. He doesn't do anything with websites.

There's more to You understand? When I say to an athlete that will come at me or anybody else in sports that I'm a journalist, I'm talking about by trade and nature. I'm talking about a body of work that spans decades. No, I don't have to do that anymore. I've graduated. There are journalists, there are columnists. There's columnists and there's commentators and radio hosts. Everything comes with it, but the point is responsibilities change, but the nature of who you are isn't.

Wow. Uh, he is 100% right on that, and he is parsing things that nobody in the world cares about except for journalists because he's making distinctions on hierarchy that I agree with. But absolutely most people that are watching don't make some sort of distinction between even the information person and the opinion giver, never mind graduating from columnist. But he's not wrong that the columnist used to be the greatest position at the newspaper because you were allowed the the freedom of giving your opinion.

But because I'm not a beat writer anymore in the locker room, folks want to say I'm not a journalist. You don't get the right to say that. Mike Wilbon does, because Mike Wilbon has done it. And I get where Michael Wilbon is coming from because he's speaking in a literal sense about what I do right now.

I think that's pretty lucid on Stephen A.'s part. He understands that he is not— except that he goes back to, well, but except that I am still I'm a real journalist. No, you're not. You're a pundit now. You're just an opinion giver. And I disagree with you, Dan, that the average person doesn't care. I think lumping everybody who talks into a microphone or issues opinion or is a reporter all being blended together is part of the confusion. The greatest thing— I don't give him credit as though it was an intellectual choice, but Donald Trump a decade ago demonizing the media and saying you can't trust them, they're lying to you, not me, and apparently the national political media being no better equipped to respond to what Donald Trump charged them with than what the New York City gossip columnist of the '80s has been really the fundamental, the first strike that really set off this whole—

But what are you disagreeing with me on? I don't believe that the grand majority of people listening listening to this who are tired of me talking about the importance of journalism, even though they're here for this show.

Tell them what it is. Tell them the difference, the distinction.

Yes, people don't know what it is. I didn't know what— I didn't know what it was until I started my career at the Miami Herald. And, um, one of the things that was happening is I was reporting on some of the things that the University of Miami football players were doing that were viewed by a great many people as the wrong things, a program out of control, etc., etc., etc. I did that as a reporter. I had no opinion on those things. I was just reporting the facts. And then when I graduated to columnist, I was allowed to defend those players in a way that wasn't just reporting on the facts. It was reported facts combined with my perspective and my opinion. It was something that the Herald gave me. I was too young to have it. My voice was not formed. I was not an adult. I was in my early 20s. I shouldn't have been a columnist that early in my career, but that was the greatest job that you can have in newspapering. And then what happened— and this is the part that I don't think people care very much about, but it's what happened, because Kornheiser has been saying for 20 years that he's not a journalist, that he's a yodeler— all of the newspaper guys were bought as watchdogs by ESPN.

They used to be watchdogs, and they were bought because the cotton candy of television's vanities are intoxicating, and there's better money in television than there is in newspapers. And so they killed the sports section.

Dude, you put on the poll, is Tony Kornheiser a yodeler?

That's a good reference that he's making as an old person. Tony Kornheiser, another one of these people who has been old since he was young.

Did you put also on the poll, do you know what a yodeler is? Because I feel like this is a very 20CB term. In the 20th century, yodeling was huge. Anytime anyone was in a valley or a mountain, you had to, you had to, you had to to do that. Now I don't know if my kids— do my kids know what yodeling is? I have no idea.

I think you learned it primarily through commercials, cartoons, right? I think that's what—

I learned it through The Price is Right. Ah, I did not know what yodeling was until maybe the best—

is that the best price?

I think The Price is Right is still— is the only place where it's being kept alive. Put it on the poll at Le Batard Show: was yodeling huge in the 20th century? Because I don't think yodeling was ever Jujy, put it on the poll.

Does The Price Is Right keep anything alive?

So they would have people yodel on the show? I don't get it.

No, there's a game that they play where, you know, there's a certain climbing of a mountain that— Yodel-ay-ee, yodel-ay-oh, yodel-ee. That's a very poor rendition of it.

That's what they would do on the show.

The game was called Cliffhangers. I'm a Pittsburgh Jew. How would I know how to yodel? Yodel. I did my best.

It was unnecessary. I wasn't asking you to do your best.

No one was. Yodel-ay-lee-yodel-ay-lee-yo. PJ. Yodel-ay-lee-yodel. That's pretty good.

So do that on the show, and you guys watched it.

Uh, see if you can find, uh, Roy, anywhere in your databank, uh, the ability to play for the people. You're— this is— when we come back from break, okay, I am going to play for you. You're going to take back— Tony, your ignorance is showing right now. You are waving your flag of ignorance. It's just a pole with no flag. That's what's happening.

I don't want to watch it. Okay, no, I'm—

it's not— damn it. This— you will learn both how poorly Damashek just did the yodeling and why The Price Is Right is indeed keeping yodeling alive. Basic ass.