Do you remember that sandwich? Oh, yeah, I remember everything. I'm Dan Pashman from The SPORCK Fool podcast. We're celebrating our 10th anniversary by sharing our listeners all time favorite episodes, each with a brand new update, including the story of our search for a beloved sandwich shop in Syria. What made it special? Is it still there? Are the owners alive or dead? We'll take you from Aleppo to Austria, from Detroit to New York to Istanbul, all in search of a sandwich.

The sportcoat.

Subscribe now, wherever you listen. Web site. How you doing, man? I'm good, I'm good, the tables have turned. Now you're in the hot seat and I like it not quite yet, but I could turn it back any time now.

I know you know you're better at this than I am. I need to learn from you. You're a pro. But see, that's the thing. I don't know what the hell I do. I never figured out what I was doing. That's why I'm doing it. If I knew what I was doing, they would like me. She got. Hello, everybody, welcome to Literally with Rob Lowe. First of all, I just want to thank everybody for being a part of this podcast.

I mean, turns out we're kind of crushing it, and that is a function of you, not me. God only knows that is the truth. It's all you.

But I really feel like we have like a family out there, like we have a real fan base of people who just really get what we're trying to do.

And I read all the comments. So if you're posting reviews on Apple, please do, because I read every one of them and I learn a lot from them and I'm learning how to make it better and better and better. But I'm glad you guys are loving it and we have a really good one today.

Very excited to get my sports freak on with one of the true Adonis on the planet and one of the nicest guys, if I could bottle his work ethic. I would be. The most successful man on the planet, Michael Strahan, we're going to talk to him, he is the NFL defensive player of the year, multiple year's Super Bowl champion, 2008 against the undefeated New England Patriots and literally is on every television show that's made.

I mean, he's he's Mr. Good Morning America. He's got the one hundred thousand dollar pyramids.

It's enough already with all the stuff this guy is doing.

So we talked to him a few weeks back, but I'm really happy to finally get this out for you guys to hear it, because it's a really fun conversation.

So sit back and enjoy really fun talk with a really great dude, Michael Strahan. Isn't it true how like ignorance is bliss? It really is because, you know, when you go in and you don't know what to do there, you don't know what's right, what's wrong. You just go by instinct and then people can relate to that. I hate it when people are trying to be too perfect.

Nobody's perfect. Nobody. So when you screw up, you flub a word. You do this, you do that naturally. Like on the news especially, I used to always be so worried. Make sure you say the word correctly, but you screw up in a conversation with somebody and you automatically correct yourself. And I learned to eat the same way.

Did you have a news voice? I like that news voice. You were just doing as good. Well, I've had to develop one, right? Yes. This is Michael Strahan. This is Michael Strahan at ABC News.

And it's really good. It's buttery. You know what I did?

I don't think I have a new voice, but it's funny. I wish that I was probably somewhere that I shouldn't have been, I think of that Krispy Kreme or something. And I ordered and the girl said, boy, you have a news voice. And I'm like, Oh, yeah, I do. Thank you very much. Made me feel good about myself.

I saw today a headline as I perused the headlines every morning that there was some famous poll that said 57 is the age. You're officially old. That's my age, and I will say that, like I'm I have a look, I'm talking to NFL all star, but I guess I'm stiff when I wake up. What you must be like the Tin Man.

I you know what I stiff would I wake up? I'm stiff. What? I'm sleeping. I wake up out of my sleep because the stiffness are so good for me to go to bad and I don't know what you know what. It's so funny because I feel great. I'm forty eight now, fifteen years retired at thirty six and I feel great body good in working at Fox. How long would always go. One day Michael. You just wake up and shit just start hurting and I'm like Howie please just shut up like your old man.

Be quiet. Yeah right. He's right, he's right. The first thing I do years ago I said to him, Howie man I woke up my my my freaking knee is just killing me. And he just just started laughing at me and I'll call you Jinx Me. But he's right now my back is hurt. I get twinges in my legs. I'm like, is it coming from my knees still hurt. I never had any problem when I played.

I think age just get shit my shoulder now, but fifty seven. I got a little ways to go. But that's not all that's like that's old back in like nineteen hundred. This twenty day is nineteen ninety hundred like now fifty seven. You're just getting started. Look at you, you don't have a wrinkle on your face, I feel I actually do feel that way.

I mean, I know I've I've never been in better physical shape for sure, in spite of how it feels and just in terms of my life and meant all of it.

I wouldn't trade I wouldn't trade this year age for any year I've ever had in my life for sure. So if this is what all this, you know, I'll take it right.

Do you have a high definition camera on your face right now?

That's a good technical question.

You are a broadcast that is, and you don't have a wrinkle, man. You know, they say black don't crack. But I argue with that point looking at you and non cracking white guy right there. Thank you. Thank you for that. Click on my my dad's like that, though.

My dad my one of my earliest memories of of my father is back in the day in Ohio. We'd go to the county fairs and they used to have guessed your age and guess your weight booths and we would clean up. They'd be like, you're twenty five. And and then my dad would, you know, be like, no, I'm forty.

That's a good thing to kill it. That's how you compromised by their age, you know, like, oh, you know, I'm this age like they're mad that they're older. I might take it while you can get it because one day you're going to look great. You're not going to like it.

So I was obsessed with the the Michael Jordan documentary Last Dance. I'm assuming you are right.

Oh, yeah, man. Best thing on TV in a long time. Well, he is like, wow, Michael Jordan had the attitude. The only closest guy has got to hit with Kobe to me totally, and I love LeBron, I think LeBron is an incredible this generation's Jordan, of course. Yeah, but the killer instinct and the guy who want the ball in his hands, every shot or at least the last shot or the biggest crunch time or who had a switch that nobody else had, nobody had like Michael Jordan.

And you cannot be a nice guy. I mean, people talk about how Matt Meany is. I'm like, oh, I get it, because I had to be an athlete who at times and it's amazing because there's teammates like pro teammates going, what is he, a nice guy? No, and I'm thinking, well, I don't know, because, like from where I stand, he's just a gnarly competitor.

Yeah, but I think there's a fine line to be a competitor and being how could I put it, motivating to being a good teammate, being it's a balance. And I think Michael leaned more toward the I'm going to ride your ass until you get it done instead of the you know, everybody vote different, differently. Me coddle this guy a little bit like I knew it. When you play football, you got like 50 something guys. Right? It is so hard to get everybody on the same freakin page like, hey.

We all I got to motivate each guy in a different way if you're the leader of that team, so I could go to one guy and I got to scream at him like, come on, let's go. I yeah.

And then I going to look at Eli Manning, who just sitting there, like, go, you know, go well at Eli, you got to just say like no did you can't yell.

It's simple Jack. No you can't yell. It's simple Jack can't.

Do you want to lose them. You lose simple Jack real quick. Yeah but that's what I learned man. You just got to like motivate each person differently. A basketball team. I think it's a little different. You can win with two or three great guys. Football. I need like special teams, offense, defense, like everybody. But I think this has been one of the most fascinating documentary that I could watch it over again and it would get me excited and.

I've had to tape it and watch it like today morning. That gets me too amped up. Yes, yes. So what? What is everybody saying about like I was some of my greatest memories would be sitting with MJ and Imod, like, and those two are inseparable. Inseparable. And it is used to make me laugh at the end of games when a mod would play the journalists talking to Michael and like their total homies, like it just when they're both playing a role like Jordan's playing, it's like it just that dynamic used to make me laugh because they were so close.

But what do people what are people in the sports world saying about about the doc?

But everybody loves it. Everybody loves it. And I'm on a tred thread like a text chain with the the defensive line from the Super Bowl back in 07. Wow. And everybody watches it. We always you know, we always talk about it in the one thing that we all we all understand. We understand his mentality. And on our team, I probably was more like the Michael guy because I didn't like I was older and I wouldn't put it up in anybody's bullshit, you know, it was like, OK, I'm here to win.

I don't have much time left. Right. I always had one six. I wish I was Tom Brady. But if Brady is the same way, like Tom, the same way in every team, I hate to say it put it in these terms, but we always say you got to have a few thugs on your team. Yeah, you sure have a team of nice guys. I mean, that's the Dodgers problem. I'm a big Dodgers fan, huh?

That's that's the problem with the Dodgers. They're all too nice. I love them, but they're too nice. You got to have a few guys that are just go slap somebody just for the hell of it. You know, I'm saying, why did you do that job? Just because your face is there? I don't know. It's like you got to have a few guys who have some dog and you can't all be nice guys. And and that's how that team was.

That's one thing I every player we talk, they understand it. We've had the debate on our chain about who is the best player goat. Jordan's Jordans. The guy. Right. Jordan and Kobe. Yeah. You know, and that's the thing. Kobe is as close to Jordan as we'll see. Yep. Man and rhythm size mentality. And I was friends with Kobe too, man and dad, like even said those two and seen Kobe, you know, last week.

And I just got a reminder, friend set me up like two years ago with Kobe, a picture of us and like, oh, just you.

So it makes you so happy that you knew him, but makes you so sad that he's not with us anymore. But what that that all star thing with him and Jordan off, I hear Jordan talking about a little Laker boy, a little Laker kid. He's not even letting the game come to him. He's taking it. Yeah, I like this. This is great. Like, this is stuff we would never see in. No, they've been sitting on that for twenty, twenty years.

Amazing. I mean that whenever you guys get miked up for a fan like me, it's the best. I mean, hearing whether it's Belichick talking shit or whatever it is, because, you know, the guys are talking, you can see it, you're watching the game and you see the mouths maybe have no idea what's really being said. And I was alive.

It's cool to I would love to see more miked up stuff going on. I would love. But sometimes you're being nice. Hey, how's your wife? How's your kid? How's your mom, you know, and then other times you like f your mom, f your wife, your kids as a kid. It's crazy man. All within like you just have guys who get along. You've got to Haiti. It's the most insane thing to be on that field and hear some of the talking going because any place outside of that, it would literally be like, call the police, we're going to fight.

Right. It's amazing. That's one thing I do love about football, that if you do if somebody has a problem and somebody do something illegal to me, I would tell them I'm about to put you on the ground. Yeah, I'm I would tell you. And for me, it would motivate to me because I didn't talk a lot of smack unless you basically talked to me. And then the floodgates are open. And I don't care what I said.

I don't care about your feelings at all. You mean nothing to me. And it was so funny because I remember pregame speech, Super Bowl year and Fox came. They had the executives or somebody at one of the Giants people come and said, Michael, you know, you do the pregame, stomp your speech, blah, blah, blah. Can you not curse for like, fifteen seconds of it so that they could air it? And I'm like, get the fuck out of here.

Like get out of here.

I'm not a man. I don't care about the networks and who want the air. What I'm here. We try to win a game, get out of my face and a lot of bleeping goes on because I never knew I was going to say those speeches anyway, just kind of came out. And that was one of my favorite things. That's what you miss the most. I don't miss like I don't miss practice. Of course I don't miss getting beat up.

You miss the guys and you miss the crap talking. You miss the just the competition in a game like the physicality of it because you could talk all the crap you want is nothing better than being able to talk it and actually back it up and physically get in touch with somebody and not get go to jail for it.

Now, I kind of miss that. That's the great Jordan quote for me. Says, Yeah, they were. He was. It's easy to talk shit when you're up five points. Let's see it. Let's see it. Talk shit when the score zero zero and you're down five. That quarterback. Talk the most smack, wow. You know, quarterback, a lot of them try to contain themselves because, you know, I never I never thought, you know, I always become like a quarterback, whatever, with the funny guy, get all the girls get paid more than everybody else.

But I played quarterback and Kurt Warner's charity, Football likes flag football thing, and every celebrity football player has to play quarterback. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I throw a nice deep ball. I really surprised myself. I like it like I see that.

But the short passes were a little tough. The tough passes. I put too much zip on them. I that was a little off, but it gave me such a respect for the quarterback because stuff is flying by people across and coming from everywhere. And I'm like, oh my God, what do I do? I can't imagine being in a game. Well, all this happened yet. This guy actually hit you. They want to hurt you. So I have all respect in the world for quarterback, but most of them try to stay really focused because they got to get up and call plays and do all that stuff right.

McNabb, Donovan McNabb would talk to you. You know, you need to do soup commercials together. And, you know, so I was I would hit him and I'd be like, yeah, call your mama for someone chunky soup.

You know, I would say that I would just be all about it.

He would talk back far, would talk Tom Brady. Tom is no pump man. Tom, Tom, man. Now, the reason this guy is who he is because he would get hit, you can say whatever you wanted to him and he would give it back to you, like basically say bring it you pump or he would curse out his linemen if you were hitting him too much like a Super Bowl. I'm actually surprised, like, yo, yo, yo, let people like this and you think they're going to block better for you.

Wow. I would let you get more.

That's amazing to hear about Brady, because he is kind of an enigma. It's really interesting. It's like there's something unknowable about Tom, I think. Yeah, I think I think Tom doesn't want you to know. Right. Kind of keeps it that way. And but when you with him in person, he talks a lot of smack. That's so great.

I love that. I was like the quarterbacks, you get decimated and then will like come up and pat you on the back. Nice hit. Nice hit. Yeah. That kind of that kind of takes a little bit out of you. That's that's what you call psychology right there man. You hit a guy as hard as you can is can't pat you on the back. It's almost like he's completely taken everything from you. He just sniffed. Yeah, that's what I'm saying.

That's that's the baller move when you see that. Yeah.

That's what you got to get your hands off me. You know, you got to act like you really like her. Get off me. Even though inside you're going, oh man, that was really nice.

He's a sweet guy if you. OK, so my my boys are big football fans and we like to debate and what's the hardest hit we've ever seen.

And I think it has to be. When Drew Brees hung Reggie Bush out to dry with this fluttery little, you know, sideline pass, I don't know who took a running shot at him, but you know what I'm talking about, right? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Reggie's like my little brother, man, you know, Enzo, come on, baby.

That working over here. So Reggie is like my little brother that he got that hit my head. I had detective. I don't know if he could read texts after that. I thought his vision was going to be blamed for at least a good month.

That was. Oh, wow. And you asked him about it, he's like he tried to hop up like it was nothing and then realized that his mind and his body weren't coordinated anymore. They were not in sync. So he just he had to just go down. You know what's so crazy when you're out there on the field like a hit like that, you'll be running over there. You still got get hit. You'll even say to yourself, Oh.

But you don't realize of so many hits like that, and when you're watching the film and you're in the meeting room, the guy get hit like a guarantee. Reggie's teammate laughed at him at the meeting the next day when he watched it best. If they won the game, if they won the game, if you get, like, knocked out and your team won the game, when you get enough meeting Rube's coaches, one of the bad guys, they run it that room at bat, rather, in their cloud.

And you do their clowning. You and I take some hits. And each one, it doesn't really hurt sometimes. But, you know, it looks bad, right?

All I'm thinking is, oh, my God, I'm going to get clown as I'm getting it before I hit the ground. I'm always already going, oh, my God, they're going to clown me on this. Oh, my God. And when you stop playing football, though, and we do one game a year, basically, that we go towards this year. Tuka, we did the Super Bowl for Fox, but other than that, maybe one game a year we go to and I watch guys get hit.

I'm like, who is dumb enough to play football, this is like they're hitting too hard. You guys are too big. What idiot would do this? And I realized that I was one of those idiots. And one of those is putting the hits on. You get hit and put the hits on people. Yeah, I'd like I like to hit him because I better chance of doing the hitting the getting hit. But Reggie and those guys man, I mean the shot that they take out of my running backs.

Do it just. Bam, bam, bam, and no no mercy at all that no none are you? I'm excited to see these new stadiums. We've got to finally got a big stadium here in L.A.. Yeah, I'm saying the expensive stadium ever. But I got to tell you something.

The one in Vegas looks bad ass. That stadium looks nuts. And it like it it opens like a I mean, like a clamshell and all this stuff. It's going to be insane.

Well, honestly, I mean, it's really amazing. The Giants, you know, the Giants, the Jets built MetLife that they stopa that I retired the next season. They opened that. Can we talk about MetLife? Let's go. Let's let's do a little let's talk about this. All right. So I'm friends with the Tisch family, and I'm like, Steve, come on, you I know you have taste and I know you have money and I know you know what's what.

And you built this thing, this nothing, this nothing, it's it's nothing, it's not any feeling you have no feeling when you're there. It's just blah. There's nothing for you and what kind of stadium you have each level. One hundred, two hundred, three hundred level in in order to get from one side to order that side, you've got to get the elevator to go down and go over it and go back to just make the single thing go all the way around the level.

Please, Julian, it just makes no sense to me. I don't have any feeling when I mean, I, I go there and it's just like, OK, it's like blah. And what we had giant stadium, it was decrepit, it was beat up. We did we didn't have a facility. Everything we did was in the basement. So it was like it was old school, which I'm great. I'm happy for because you know, New York is rough, man.

You got to go over there now. And they have private chefs and the skyline to these tall glass windows. You can see the skyline of New York. I would have been over there about three hundred fifty pounds. Looking at the skyline, I want to give a damn about football out a bit too comfortable.

And now, you know, but back then, we had a duty to cook breakfast on a hot plate. The hot plate used to sit in the same room that was our lounge are like our media.

When the media come in and clear out, put a podium where you give your speeches. It was our lunch room.

You know, it was also Jimmy Hoffa's gravesite.

Exactly. You can smell him sometimes when I had breakfast, man. But the guy who the guy would cook freakin breakfast on to hot plate and he had a towel to wipe out the hot plate, but he would get so hot he wipe his face and then the hot plate, you were like, oh, no, I'm telling you, it was it was primitive times back then.

And then they built this new place that, like you said, I agree with you. He has no soul, has no feeling. I don't understand anything, I don't understand why they did it.

I also don't understand when it's the least their billionaire businessman that they have the access to everything. And we know that home field advantage is such a big deal. Why wouldn't you build a stadium acoustically yet that, you know, is going to be loud. You design it, they build theaters that way they build everything. Why? It's when they open Levi's Stadium, right? Yeah. They had like fondue patios and like white wine spritzers and bean bag lounges.

And then meanwhile, you'd be in watching the game and you could you could literally hear a pin drop the pin, drop people too comfortable like a football game.

It's not about that. I know they're trying to play to whatever they feel like the demographic is in the area, but they need to learn. Go to Philly when they got to jail in the basement, like that's what I'm talking about.

That's what I'm talking about. And I tell you, it's my favorite place to play because they did build. France gave not a bad man. We would be on the bus. First of all, you would get like death threats in your hotel room. You know, they call it a threat. Yeah. Which is crazy. Then you get on the bus to go to the game and as you're cruising along, you come into the stadium with your police escort and you can see the stadium like, you know, five hundred yards away.

The closer you got, you realize that the people you go down south in, the worst you get is that people give you the thumbs down, you know, oh, you know, in a way that you like. Hey, we're happy you're here to beat our team or to play. You got to Philly, man. They're giving you the picking up. They're giving you the middle finger and also the grandkids. That's not even the parents yet. OK, I'm telling you, the kid.

Then they would move, you know, they would be moaning in the bus and then they moon you in, put their butts up against the chain link fence. So you got like a pizza board. And they're all it's like, come on, man. And they would throw a battery that you, me, they would. I remember we are playing a game in Philadelphia and I'm old Veterans Stadium, which was the worst stadium in the world that turned suck the stadium, suck the everything.

But it was my favorite place because the fans were literally eight feet. It felt like they were eight feet behind you, like on top of you. And we're we're playing a game. We're getting beat down by, I want to say, 14 to 16 at halftime. We come back, we tie it up, we're going to overtime. And Christian Peter tips the ball. I catch it and I run it for a touchdown. Yes. Now.

And earlier that week, I actually went to a concert with Tiki Barber. Let me throw a few other people name, I think, Greg Camela Field, but we want to see Ricky Martin. OK, so Ricky Martin just come out there in front of the stage and he would just go just like posed in a whole crowd would go crazy.

So I said, oh, I get a touchdown. I'm a hit with the Ricky Martin and they're all making fun of me because, like, I'm a delight and I don't touch the football man. I scored a touchdown and I hit him with that Ricky Martin bounce.

Oh, they were dipping and spit in cups. You know, you spit in the cup. Yeah. All of a sudden I just get hit with all this. Oh, I know. It was worth every second of it, baby. Take that feeling. You take that, take that. Take that. As Puff Daddy would say. That is now Matt.

Hold that thought. We'll be right back. Well, like everything else in these challenging times, it's very hard for business owners to find the people they need to hire, and it's harder, even more so for people who are looking for jobs to find the right jobs.

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I love simple Jack. I love that family.

I I've been made an honorary manning so I can because they give me more shit. Apparently the Mannings have seen St. Elmo's Fire like seventy five times and they quote, but I've I've I've been to parties where the three brothers will sit there and quote lines from and you're like, what the fuck is Peyton Manning doing. Quoting say. And then, you know, I had Peyton on my my Comedy Central roast. He was my first first person invited and he said he was so funny.

But Eli, I'm bummed that it ended the way it did for him, although his legacy is is amazing. And there's I mean, he's there's nothing you can say his legacy is what it is. But I just felt bad that he wasn't as celebrated as I thought he should have been leaving finishing his career in New York.

Now, I agree. I think last year, the year before last, when they said, oh, he started all these consecutive games record for a second record for them, they beat my record for the most game that ran the Giants uniform. And I'm like, get I love like the baby. When I first got there and won the Super Bowl, like, think of third year and they took him out, oh, we're going to look to the future basically with their excuse.

And they take that and they end up making a pretty put in Geno Smith. No, no, no, no hate for Geno Smith, but I'm like, OK, that's not the future of this team and you know it. So if you're going to break a guy's streak who has started almost every game in his career for what you know is not the future, then why would you do that? It made no sense to me, made no sense to me.

It made no sense to me at all. And then to put them back in that bothered me like that bothered me. That was just wrong in every way, shape or form. And if someone should have stepped in and said, you know what, I know you're the coach, that ain't happening. That's not happening.

That's what Robert Kraft is, a bad ass. Robert Kraft was like, you know what? You're not trading Tom Brady this season. It's not happening. And Jerry Jones doesn't seem to get his own way sometimes, which I'm not upset either, cowboy. So, hey, let him go. Keep it up. But yeah, exactly. But then, Eli, man, I'll tell you what the nicest, greatest I got a teammate of a dude.

What you see is what you get. He is funny. He he definitely he he does the public go out there and scream and holler and do all those things to. That's not his personality but a drunk Eli, the funny guy. I'll tell you. I know. Oh I know. Believe me. Yeah. So many boys. It's a wild boys best fun man. And I felt like Eli is a legend. I think people appreciate him now that he's gone.

Yeah, it happened. Daniel Jones, come in. I didn't mind seeing Daniel don't play last year because to be honest with you, you're going to get you like kill. Yeah. Because you know the mind and everything else. I mean, they just they didn't. I don't I don't I felt that time they didn't necessarily give him everything that he needed around him to be successful at the end. He could have been. And yeah, I keep telling him retirement's not bad.

Let me let me ask you this.

If you if you are back in your day at your height and you were up on an unblocked blitz and the running back was George Stephanopoulos, how far would you hit him into the into the next universe?

Oh. Oh, I don't know if I want to hit him and drive him, like, knock him back. I think with George I would do what, you know, you hit him and you lift him. And then when you land, you put all your weight or drive all that. Yeah, you pile drive him. So he feels his bones kind of together is your weight. And then you stand up and you say, oh, I didn't mean to do that.

Are you OK, George?

You know how it's is for Rob. I tell you, it is so much fun when you see a guy standing there and he doesn't see you come in and you are full speed and you're like, oh, baby, I like it like that.

I like it like that. Oh, it's going to get oh it's so much but and we can hit it because you don't hear anything when you're on the field, when you get up, when you get down to like line up. Eighty thousand people screaming but silent. Only thing you hear you had a quarterback, you can hear the guy across where you breathing. You can hear guys talking, you're talking to your linebacker. Only thing you hear is within like twenty feet.

But the second you hit somebody like that, all of a sudden it's like they crank the crank the sound up on your headphones and like the loudest they could do, it is the best feeling in the world. Oh, you're the best. Do you remember your your what's your greatest hit?

My greatest hit was probably Gus forgot one.

Oh. Oh gosh. Yeah. Redskins' it actually was on a two point conversion. Oh it would suck because I got a sack but it doesn't count on a two point conversion. But I set up this move all day long, live inside move man. And I was perfection and Gus is just standing there, he doesn't see me. And when I, I try to, I mean I want to be OK people. I used to be violent in a controlled violence and not anymore very docile now.

But at that moment in my life, young and crazy, I was trying to take his spine and make it come out of the front of his chest, like I just wanted to run through him that hard. And when I tell you, I think I almost accomplished it, I almost accomplished it, it was the hardest hit to the point where you hit somebody like that, you're like, oh, I know that hurt. Oh, it's fantastic.

Did I like. Did he get up? And he didn't get up. He was there for a bit. He was down there for being big for a bit. He was that it would be Joe. I heard.

Is this true that when you were you were really little like like 12 and 13, that you're like your brothers or sisters were like, you're fat? I can't imagine that. That is not, you know, what fat. They were nicer than that. They called me Bob and I didn't know what Bob meant. So, like, for years I thought Bob was like a nickname, like, OK, go, Bob. But I'm I'm like I'm the youngest of six.

So I'm hanging out my brother and all the friends that call me Bob. I think that's cool. Like I'm a young kid in this group. I got a nickname in Bob Booty on Back. No big old, but yeah, that's what it meant. So I mean, I will. But yeah, I was a little chunky, you know, I was big boned as I like to say. So but I'll be honest with you, without them doing that to me, man, I would not have ended up where I ended up.

I would not apply play football, worked out or done anything that motivated me to, like, get in shape. And and still to this day, it motivates me to this day. I bought the Jane Fonda workout on VHS tapes. I started doing those Herschel Walker coming out of Georgia on the Herschel Walker workout book. And I went to Heidelberg, Germany, when, of course, what they're doing, like an appearance for Kodak overseas. And I met him when I was 13 and took a picture with him.

And later on I played with him with the giant and a gift him with he was a dad with in Philadelphia, in Minnesota. So it's like it was like full circle, but without them making fun of me out of the out of building a big boned dude walking around right now.

Yeah, that's the thing is like I know look, the bullying is bullshit. We don't like it. I get all that stuff man. It's funny. It's like the Michael stuff we were talking about earlier.

Sometimes how you handle that can can really fire you up.

I used to get the same thing. I you know, I wanted to be an actor when I was little and I was in a place where, no, there were no other actors and people thought it was only a girl would want to do it. And they used to call me terrible names and stuff.

And I was like, you know what? I was like, I'm going to make this happen. I'm going to make this happen. And I don't know if I did it. I don't know if I would be where I am today without that kind of adversity. But I got to say, the notion of you watching Jane Fonda's did you wear those leggings she had?

Did you get some of those going you made my head for fall? Well, you know damn well I did not wear those leggings.

Oh, I don't know. There. Well, I'm not wear those leggings. Well, at least the ones I wore weren't pink. How about that? Yeah, exactly. But no, I did not did not wear the leg that I did not do. But but you right though I think, you know, bullying is awful. I mean we all we talk about it and it's like something in society especially that the cyber bullying stuff, it just it's just so much.

Yeah. But I think at the same time how you handle certain things, develop a certain character that you're going to need later in life. But how are you going to handle adversity as well. And so all the people, I'm sure who told you all you want to do, that's what girls do are going, all right, that's my guy.

I'm well, I used to always talk about acting with him back here. I knew he could do it. I know he'd be successful. That's how it works.

It's true. Is it now when you when you made. The transition into television, I mean, I think people who aren't in entertainment don't realize the level of competitiveness that there is in and in our world, too, we just can't hit each other.

I used to. I used to.

I remember so vividly having a meal with with Magic Johnson in the day. And I and I remember telling him, I'm so envious that you can back down Larry Bird and like, you guys can go at each other and one of you is going to win. And there's no denying it in our business. It's like, well, I think he's funnier than that one.

Well, I don't I think that and there's no appreciable way to go head to head with a peer, a rival, somebody in your league, whatever. And I was always envious that in sports, you could you could do that when you when you transition to entertainment. Did you find that to be a different experience with your competitiveness? Absolutely. I think I've had to change my outlook on a lot of different things in ways that I approach work and I approach relationships at work, because these coming from sports, especially football, is a team game like I have to learn how to.

Be the best I can, so I don't let other people down. And also at the same time, I want them to be the best so that we can all come together and have the ultimate goal, which is the being the best. And it's not an individual thing where I found, I think, anything at entertainment. And a lot of it's more individual because everybody's trying to figure out their career, get their career going. So it's not as if me being on your team is necessarily helping my career.

I'm the one who is in control of my career, so I have to be more assertive for myself. And I just have never operated that way, and I still don't to this day, I mean, like you said, you know, there's this podcast is like, OK. I mean, how do you even go to school with this? How do you learn to do this? You know, you just talk to people, you have a conversation.

And that, I think has been the beauty of my post football life, that I've never done anything that I've necessarily gone to school for, that I've had to really go, oh, you know, I've got to elbow this person and move that person in and hope that someone I know I'm doing it because it's fun. And then the opportunities just start coming my way. And that's what I've learned in this in the entertainment business, in the news business and everything else that I've done.

You know what? You build a team, but yet you still got to understand that there are people with their agendas to get whatever they need out of it. And I get that this business is not sports whatsoever. So I kind of come into everything with a different attitude because this is gravy on top of an already great life and a great career. So I, I don't look at it and think that, you know, if this doesn't work out, going back to my parents now, I am, but I'm good, you know, so I might do it as I have it and just keep going as long as I can.

Now you work. You are, I think, the hardest working person, one of them that I know. I mean, the schedule you keep during the season, I don't know. How do you do it? What's what's the logistics of it? I'm fascinated with logistics. Like your flying, you're sleeping here.

You're getting like, how do you how do you do it all. Yeah, I, I don't know. You know what I got to say this time. And quarantine. Yeah. Has really made me think rethink how I want to live my life and what I want to do now. Granted I got, you know, stuff that I have I'm obligated to do. But at some point I really want to take a little pullback at the pullback, because it's just this has made me realize that there is a lot of life to be enjoyed.

And a lot of times I'm not really enjoying it because I'm always constantly on the go. So Monday through Friday, I mean, I it depends on what time of the year it is, but Monday to Friday, GM every day. I'm up at 5:00 and then I'm done with that at 9:00, and then after that I change and I go home, but then I have meetings for my production company, my clothing company. Management always got stuff going.

So that's Monday through Friday, non-stop, right after work on Friday. I have to go to the airport and go to L.A. to the Fox football. So the plane has become like the greatest place in the world to me. I get on there and I'm just put on the headphones, sleep, do whatever I want to do. Nobody bugs me. And I get to L.A. Friday afternoon, so about four or five o'clock. So I have a nice, you know, relaxed time Saturday.

I play golf pretty much every Saturday in L.A. My only day off in the morning this Sunday. We're in the studio at five thirty until like 5:00 p.m.. So Saturday is my really only day off and every other day I have as long lost in my dad came my dad came to Fox with me one day, five thirty in the morning to 5:00, and then we're done. This is the I could do this every day. I was like, dude, I get back, let's get back on the plane and let's go back to the East Coast.

So literally, I'm right back on the plane after the show. And I've got to get back to New York. Let's work Monday, so it's like it's nonstop and then a hundred thousand dollar pyramid. Oh, that's like a week, you know.

Thirty thousand dollar pyramid. OK, so I'm going to go when we're done with this and I'm going to look at you eviscerating Gus Farat on YouTube two. You are going to go on YouTube and watch me eviscerate the ten thousand dollar pyramid.

What, when I was 15 years old, I will be the Garretti on it.

Oh, it was so I, I'm 15.

I get on at 15 like from child labor law. They like work. Don't give back a certain age. You got to be well. So I was doing it. My very first big job was a TV series on ABC and to promote it they did a chair as like a teen version of it for sure.

But but you are matched up with other celebrities. So I was matched up, I think. No, I played against Tony Danza. He was the guy I played against and and I went to the pyramid every round, wow. Every round I played once it got to the pyramid and then won the pyramid. And it was it was the best because I love that game. That's my favorite game. I grew up loving that game. And then Dick Clark was the host.

Dick Clark, Dick Clark, man. I mean, the man I'm telling you, first of all, you just talk yourself into coming into play.

The one hundred thousand dollar pyramid has gone up since inflation. You know, someplace you just you just talk yourself into getting an invite for that. But I can't imagine playing a game, having Dick Clark, like, be there when when I was I grew to watch the game growing up. And then they had a few versions after. Right. But when I was when asked me to host it and I said, you know, we're going to produce and hosted, I thought, OK, let me go back and like, really watch because I really got to know the game.

And all I was with Dick Clark, I didn't watch anybody else, and the one thing I learned from Dick Clark, first of all, he was so smooth and so smooth with it. Secondly, he was so smart in the sense that you can watch certain game shows and the host you really got to break like you got to carry really carry the game because you guys were going to have quick comedy. You always got to be on top of it.

Pyramid is such a special game that the game itself is the star. Right. And you're just like your Magic Johnson, like you just handed it off. You got the celebrities and they're getting their guests and they're playing with that's half the humor, depending on who the celebrity is. I basically just make sure people at home know what's going on. It is so much freaking fun to do that show and do a show that Dick Clark did with Amazing and and we're shooting it.

And we were going to shoot it in March and this whole situation happened. Now we're hoping for August. We can shoot the season of it. But it is so much fun, man. It's the best. It's I remember Dick Clark and this is amazing because he's the smoothest guy in the world, right? There's nobody better. He's charming, but I will tell you that. And he bungled my introduction five times and we had to reshoot it.

See why he couldn't he couldn't say my name, Rob Lowe, because saw what he couldn't say, Rob Lowe and then and then his ad lib, which made me laugh, was why you look like you're six feet tall. I don't look six feet tall at all. Maybe what he meant to say was, I look old for my being fifteen. I come out, Michael, and I've got this like David Cassidy hair, like like David Cassidy, Karen Carpenter looking, oh, boy.

Shaggs, it's it's so fun. But Yilu, that will be the first thing that I'm looking at the second word. But I'm all over that and the other thing. OK, since you have a production company, here's what I want you to develop and bring back, OK. And I'm dead serious. Right.

OK, I want you to bring back the battle of the network stars. Oh, but for real. Like, here's the problem, because I grew up watching this on TV and I loved it.

We loved. Right. Yeah, but. But it was legit. It wasn't.

It wasn't like the fifth guy through the door in CSI and it was the stars, so yeah, so and now because there's more than three networks to really make it work, you'd have to have, like the dude from fucking Game of Thrones and against better call Saul along with I didn't really have to do.

And I don't think though I would love to do it. I grew up watching that, so I always wanted to be on it. And they to be up there like kayaking and volleyball. I do everything. But now I would do it. But how many stars I found out, man. People, people too. Like serious nowadays. Nobody ever looked like they can't do something right. Everybody is not great at everything being human. So I think a lot of people get too afraid to be too afraid to look as if they don't master something instead of looking like, hey, I'm here just to just do my best to have fun.

I used to love it. I was one of the best things on TV and I don't know if you can pull it off because half the time now all the networks used to do it together. Yeah. Now you've got to get clearance from Peter to go with to Paul, the golden girl that had Chuck. And then it's got to go through Suzy, who then got to go through 12 publicists, you know, three lawyers and twenty five agents.

And that's just to let you know, not it's not going to do it. Yeah.

Spoken like now I know your production company is legit because Diyab that's the number one take away from trying to run a production company.

It's crazy. And we'll be right back after this. Hey, everybody, Conan O'Brien here to let you know about Team Koko's virtual comedy show hosted by my good friend, the very funny comedian Moses Storm, Moses Storeman Friends streams every other Thursday on Team Koko's YouTube Twitch and Facebook pages. Past guests have been Chris Read, Joakim Booster, Rachel Bloom, bestselling, Kal Penn Run Frenches, Angela Johnston and so many more. It's really a fantastic comedy show, Jampacked, featuring some of my favorite people, and I'd like you to check it out.

If you get a chance. Follow Team Coco live on Instagram for the latest show dates and guest lineups. Hello there, I'm Rory Scovel, I'm a comedian, I'm an actor, but most importantly, I'm a dad.

And I'll tell you what, as a father, it is my sworn duty to tell you about my new show with Team Coco called Dads, the podcast. On each episode, me and my co-host, Ruthie Wyatt, are joined by a hilarious guest to talk about the mysteries of fatherhood and parenting, people like David Cross, Conan O'Brien, Sabrina Gelis and Roy Wood Jr..

Even if you're not a dad or a parent, I think you're really going to like this show. So please check us out. Find Dads the podcast wherever you get your podcasts.

Don't miss it. I got to ask you a question, man. Yeah. OK, who is favorite? Who's your favorite team, by the way? NFL team.

Well, see, here's the thing, because we've had not had a team for so long.

I've had to develop other. You know, interest and, you know, I'm very good friends of Jim Irsay and Peyton played there, so I've got an affinity for the Colts I love. But on the other hand, I love New England. I'm a weird dude, like I can love the Yankees and the Red Sox because I'm not I don't I don't live in either place. So I don't have that kind of and I appreciate the Yankees. I appreciate the Red Sox.

Like I'm one of those weird dudes that can can do that.

So in football, I'm trying to embrace the Rams now because they're here. But I didn't like last season much.

I love Jared Goff. He's a good dude. Let's see how he does this year. And I mean, it's kind of a mealy mouthed answer, I realize, because really I'm I'm a more fan of of the league because I've never I haven't had a team for so long.

Dude, I'm laughing inside at you right now because I was ask you that because I mean, if you weren't in the NFL, the league you're a fan of the league.

I look at, OK, that what are the greatest things ever do?

I got to tell you. Oh, how funny was that? Please explain that to me. So funny, man. It's it's I like what somebody said that I'm just a fan of Roger Goodell. That's why that's what my team is. Roger Goodell. That's my team. So OK, so I'm working for Fox. Fox has that game. They they're going to I know they're going to they want me to go to the to the game so they can cut to me in the stadium and talk about my new show.

It's coming out. So that's the whole point. And it's great because I love football, so it's going be great. The fuck they send, it's a bunch of us going up, so they send a plane for us and we get on the plane and there's all this swag to where there is no team swag. None. It's only NFL swag now I look at that hat and I go, first of all, I've never seen that hat before other than on a ref.

I didn't know that.

That hat actually, though, actually looks really bad ass. It's so and I'm like, and this is the best thing ever because it's cool. I've never seen it. And frankly, had they had a team had, I probably would have chosen one, but people were on my ass like that booed.

But I tell you, it is truly what is the greatest thing either ever seen in my life. You were just in the names and the comments were like first class I.

My my NFL hat has a place in my office that got so famous.

It was one of those things where I was watching the game and my phone started blowing up in my pocket like crazy, crazy, blowing up and like, you know, is like a public figure. When your phone blows up like that, it's either something really, really, really good is happening or something really, really bad.

Panic sets in. You're like, oh, my God. And though.

And they'll that man. What kind of dog is that?

A miniature golden doodle that's about 30 pounds. And he's wouldn't hurt a fly, but he's being tough right now. He literally sit by the door and looks out the back and looked for a cat that walks on the arm in a townhouse. We sit and look for a cat that walks on the wall between my townhouse and a neighbor and the cat. I think that's how we see his stuff. But never can I see the cat once. So good.

I got a question for you. Who's the best who's the best celebrity like in our business? Golfer. I'm trying to get to the bottom of this. A lot of people say it's Timberlake, just as my golfing buddy. Here's good Justin all the time. Justin, really just as a good golfer.

Now, when you say you mean just after business, I'll I'll throw it all into words, but it's kind of unfair and no one is not sure how many sports guys can't play like a golf, golf and sport in another sport is nothing. Absolutely not a normal sort of worst golf I've ever seen have been some of the greatest athletes in other sports.

Charles Barkley, a player, he represents every sport ever about back office. Charles, you know what's so funny with Charles? I love Charles, man. Charles says to me, the first time I ever met Charles at a golf tournament, he sees me and I never met him. Peg Barkley fan. And he goes, Yeah, a. You've got to you were on my shit list, would you not anymore. And I'm like. But you never we never met.

How could I be on a shit list and we never met, he go, what is the list of people who had great careers but never won shit? But now you want a Super Bowl, so you're off my list. I owe you great.

Nice to meet you, too, Mr. Barkley. But you know what? I've had some fun times with Charles, man. He is great.

It's no fun. He's the best. He he is really the honest dude, you know, tell you what he's thinking. He doesn't sugarcoat anything. He is who he is. And I respect that out of him. But I will say Timberlake is a good golfer. We just don't know if you're going to play golf. Make sure you do it in the morning because he may take you. I get a 30 minute the hated shot. Really? Come on, Justin.

How how is the wind? The wind is blowing. This one of those guys just is very deliberate. It takes a while to play. You know what's funny, I, I go to a golf academy in in in Florida, Mike Bender, Golf Academy.

He's on Instagram and it's the best. But one of the things that I've learned is all of the greats there, pre shot routine was was very, very limited.

And from the minute they stood over the ball, I'm talking about every great who ever lived.

From the minute they addressed the ball, it was no more than eight seconds. Wow. Like, go back and look at it. No one stood over the ball longer than eights. And by the way, the eight seconds includes finishing of the swing.

But what's so weird about golf is when you think about I only think about football. I got eighty thousand people screaming, hollering, the ball's movement, people running. I got a track. I got to get through all this crap to make a play and you do it golf. I'm sitting there and outside nature. It's quiet, low ball sitting there. It ain't movin. Nobody screamed after telling people to shut up and I can't hit the thing straight.

I can't, you know, it makes no sense. It shows you how much you could talk yourself out of something because usually don't hit a good shot because you. You kind of talk yourself out of hitting a good shot, but I what's your handicap, by the way, that you're going all these golf lessons? The new special instructors. I'm just curious. I'm a 16. I'm not going to respond to that lie. You're not a 16, I am.

I'm a true 16 because I'm not consistent. That's 16. OK, we've got to play I got to see this, I got to see this. I don't believe it.

Well, when you're if you if you were a 16 handicap, you'd have more wrinkles on your face. You don't have any wrinkles on your face because you're an excellent golfer. So don't lie to me.

Here's what we're going to here's what we'll put together. We'll do a fox with Charlie Collier, me, you, when we're all back at it for sure, because he's a stick.

Our boss at Fox, Charlie, can play like that. Yes. Yes, I didn't know that. Yeah, OK, I love it. Here's I'm going to end with this. All right. I need to know what your least favorite workout for those of you listening to hug Michael Strahan to shake his hand is to encounter a granite statue.

It is. It is. It is quite a thing. So what what how are you managing with your busy schedule to continue to look like a block of iron?

I wish I wish I did, man, but thank you for the compliment. I work at work and I try to at least give it an hour a day every day. I'm like, OK, if I work out an hour that twenty three hours to mess around whatever I want to do right then allows me to eat and drink and do other things I like to do so but work it out first of all.

And I love working out.

I don't like cardio persay.

I will ride the bike like I like the bike. The state's very like bike downstair. I like that.

I hate any kind of exercise that has anything to do with something you would do, like on a football field. You do cross fit classes and they have you doing furphies.

Yes. No, you've done enough of who you are. I don't care what you tell me. I will never do it before anybody ever again. If I if you see me doing a burpee, somebody hold a gun to me. I'm not doing it now.

Did you ever do you ever suggest other workout's other than the perp's, like perchance the Jane Fonda workout? Did you ever say, like to the guys, hey, listen, I got my my scene I'm doing back at my house alone.

Yeah. I'm doing a show of, like, side leg kicks in a side leg. That's all we remember. That's like that was it was like the scissor.

That's all we remember of the Jane Fonda. It was this.

Yeah. Yeah. You see, I'll tell you what, it worked though. Literally worked my ass off. Really did. I'm going to pull out all Betamax copy. I have no way somebody gave it. I got it as a birthday gift from years ago. I have the voice tapes that I had a baby. I had a VHS tape of Jane Fonda's workout yoga. And every time I see her to the point now when I see her, I'm like, you know, she's like, I know my go.

I know you're like, OK, Jay, I'm sorry. So I'm just so good. My blood is tight because of you and.

Well, man, this is the best. This is the greatest. I'm going to come visit you at the Fox when you guys are up and running.

I know you're on the lot, right? You're on the fox. Yeah, we're in a lot. So come come hang out and we'll get some golf in at some point. Yeah, I would love that.

One hundred percent. This was great. You were a dream. I could sit and talk to sports and shit with you another five hours.

I appreciate you my brother, but people listening have lives and they need to do things. These people who are listening are like I now need to go and live a life as well.

They're not doing much right now as well. Hopefully. Hopefully this thing's going hopefully this is over at some point soon, but who knows? But I you know what I am going to do with some of this downtime I have I am about to go pull up Rob Lowe on the ten thousand dollar pyramid at the fifteen year old. Looks tall for his age, tall, four in the hair.

Just wait. You see the hair?

Hey, you got great hair, big guys. Good stuff. All right, man, thanks so much to you. Any time, any time.

That smile, you guys, Strahan could talk about anything and just put a smile on your face everyday. I just feel so good every time I've spent any time with them. And I am a sixteen handicap and I'm going to beat his ass if we ever do play golf. And then I just hope he won't pile drive me like George Stephanopoulos. Thanks for joining me. I will see you on the next, literally. You have been listening to literally with Rob Lowe, produced and engineered by me, Daventry Bryant, executive produced by Rob Lowe for low profile Adam Sachs and Jeff Rossett, Team Coco and Collin Anderson and Chris Bannon at Stitcher.

The supervising producer is Aaron Blair's talent producer, Jennifer Sanders. Please write and review the show on Apple podcast and remember to subscribe on Apple podcast, Stitcher or wherever you get your pockets. I'm so glad to have Atkins' joining us as partners on the show, I've been working with Atkins' now for a couple of years. I've been eating the Atkins way for many, many years, probably starting in my mid 30s when I looked at a photo of myself in US magazine is not a good day.

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