After Hours with Amy Lawrence PODCAST: Hour 4

Jay, in case you're wondering, 99% of social media agrees with you. These are my favorite moments when no one in the world agrees with me and I can still stand on my own laurels. It's funny because earlier in my career, there's always a temptation. I think it's more with women, just our our basic personalities, that when what we want to be like to write and when people don't agree with us, and not even need to speak for other women, I'll just speak for me in my own career. When people don't agree with me, this is when I was younger, the temptation is to waffle or to change your opinion or to try to figure out a way to circle back so that people like you again.

I don't know what happened to me. Maybe I just turned into a grumpy old lady, but now I like it when the fight and the odds are so completely stacked against me. I prefer that. I like it when the crowd and the world are going one way, I absolutely have to go the other. Something else, and this is not one of those situations, but it's also a skill that I try to encourage young broadcasters to develop. Be able to argue a side of a debate that you don't actually agree with. Be able to take the other side because it's better radio. It's just better to get your audience involved and engaged when you've got two people who feel very passionately about two sides, but if you happen to be on the same side and yet you want to have a better discussion on the air, somebody needs to take the side they don't agree with. The number of times in my career that I have had to take an opposite side where I didn't actually agree with it, it's actually, it's a fun skill to work on.

Now I'm not saying that that's the case. Jay and I are arguing about whether or not the NFL should punish Aaron Donald for swinging helmets at a practice, and I disagree completely. The NFL can't be spending its time policing practices. That's what coaches are for. That's what these fights break out for because guys are taking liberties and are tackling or making contact where they're not supposed to be tackling or making contact.

In this case, I agree completely with self-policing. I do not agree with Aaron Donald swinging helmets. That's not what I'm saying, but it's not up to the NFL to be looking at every video of a practice.

And then some guy took my media comment and went completely off the rails with it on Facebook. My point is there's a lot of practice that happens where there are no cameras other than the team cameras, right? So there's no media. You know that in every practice there's a media portion where reporters are allowed, cameras are allowed, and then there's a whole portion where they're not and they're kicked out. And so unless you're going to start confiscating every video from every single practice that takes place during the preseason and training camp, what you're doing is going based on social media.

What you're doing is going based on that portion of the practice where the media might have been there. And I just don't think that's up to the NFL. I think if the teams want to do this, you're taking a risk.

You are in fact walking a fine line. Did we not see with the Patriots and the Panthers that it was Mac Jones who was in the middle of a bunch of skirmishes where fights broke out on multiple days? That's a risk these teams are taking. And if they're willing to take the risk, which many of them are because they find the value in joint practices leading into a preseason game, if they're willing to take the risk, well then you better hope your guys are mature enough not to get into a fight because you could lose someone for the season. So the idea is, in my opinion, that the teams have to be responsible. If you're going to put your guys in this situation, then you better self-police. And I don't think it's up to the NFL and this is the tack that the league has taken. This is not on us. If you're going to do this, you're going to police yourselves.

The NFL does not step in. So I do not agree it's the same as a game and that's where Jay and I kind of differ. But I do think it's hysterical that right now, and I already knew that Jay was far more popular than me, that's just how it goes here on the show, that Jay has 99% of the support and Amy is dead wrong according to anyone who's weighed in so far. That's just how I like it. Jay, you're so popular.

It wasn't the point. It's totally fine. I enjoy being in a minority, absolutely. It actually makes my heart rate a little bit faster, makes my adrenaline rush. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio. Thanks so much for hanging out with us. Good Friday morning to you. We only have so many of these Fridays left in the summer. Oh my gosh. In fact, it's today and it's next Friday leading into Labor Day weekend.

That's it. And then the official start to the fall. Now it's not until later in September. And so we don't, I guess, technically have to say goodbye to summer until a little bit later next month. However, for all intents and purposes, with school starting, for the rest of you, my mom's been in school now for two weeks. I have a lot of friends whose kids are already in school in the south and I've been in school now for a couple of weeks as well. Colleges are back in session too. You know, my younger niece started college earlier this week.

Her final semester, actually she's going to graduate in December at Virginia Tech. And so there's a lot of people who have already bid farewell to summer. And the weather though still feels a lot like summer. To me, because I work in this business and have for so long, the official end of the summer for me comes when football starts.

And here we are. We are now inside of two weeks to go until the NFL season kicks off. I know college football is in week zero, if that makes sense to you. Meaning they're kicking off this weekend. So there's just a lot that's going on in sports between baseball and football. And I dare say that in the NFL, it's time for them to be done.

This is the last round of preseason games coming up these next few days. And it's a good thing that joint practices are done because eventually someone will get hurt. And that's not what you want. That's what I mean about walking the fine line and putting these guys out there on the field together and kind of taking the risk that, okay, there may be a melee, there may be a fight, there may be a strongly worded conversation. You just better hope you emerge unscathed or all of a sudden all the value you got out of a joint practice, it's not there anymore.

It just went down the drain. Just for the sake of argument, could you imagine if Aaron Donald hit somebody with the helmet or if Aaron Donald himself got hurt because somebody punched him? I mean, either way, kicking, cleaning, like there's all kinds of ways these guys can get carried away, get hurt.

I mean, he couldn't step wrong and tear an ACL, I get that. But it's good that we're about to be done with this because we've been hearing about it way too often over the last couple of weeks. We are live from the Rocket Mortgage Studios. When you need an expert to help navigate the home loan process, Rocket can. You can find me on Twitter if you two would like to pile on and tell me how Jay is so much smarter and has an opinion that you all desperately agree with and I don't know what I'm talking about. That's on Twitter, Jay Law Radio, or on our Facebook page After Hours with Amy Lawrence. What? Makes me laugh that you're the popular one on the show. I wouldn't say that. No, it's so true. When you're out, people are like, where's producer Jay? When I'm out, they're like, oh, did she get fired?

That's not true. You know it's true. No one reaches out to me because no one cares about me when you're not here. So you mean people forget who's behind the double pane glass if I'm not constantly talking about it? Well, then a good thing that I don't forget you and that I know who's back there. I need you. You do? You need me to pump up your brand? Yeah, the hype man.

Your platform? Like my Flavor Flav. I'm going to hit you with this ball right in the head. That glass was only so strong. Well, it's two panes though, so I think you could do it. It would take me an entire show, probably just to dent the first piece of glass. No one dents glass.

I don't even know where that came from. I'm not throwing a ball at Jay's head for heaven sakes. If I was, I wouldn't announce it on national radio. I would just do it. And then pretend like there was no video, kind of like anybody else who might've swung a helmet this pre-season.

It wasn't caught on video. No, you give up. It's a stalemate. That's where we are.

Yeah. Jay doesn't actually get passionate enough usually to argue with me. And sometimes I just don't let him argue with me onto something else. We do plenty of arguing outside of the show. Just not here on the air. I don't know. That's always good radio.

I've worked on a show where the two hosts or the three hosts, all they did was bitch. Oh my gosh. After a while it gets annoying. Stop it. Seriously. You can only do it for so long. Jay and I are fine.

Also, he has to be fine because technically I outrank him one time. This is what people are doing. Okay.

So this is the part that bothers me. Trevor just wrote it and said, so if Donald gave someone a concussion or broke his jaw, that's okay. Where the bleep did I say it was okay.

Trevor, like that's what I love about social media. Whatever you want to believe, man. Yes.

I think it's perfectly okay if Aaron Donald swings a helmet and smacks someone in the jaw and he's got a broken jaw. Yes. That's exactly what I said. Jackass. I mean, that doesn't, I'm not going to dignify that with an answer. That's not the point at all. So if you guys want to go back and hear what I actually had to say, well then you can check it out on our podcast after hours AmyLawrence.com. So NFL.

Yes. This weekend if you missed what I said about the Buffalo Bills punter, as I said, the details, the allegations from this young woman are disturbing. It's a civil lawsuit. No criminal charges have been filed. I know that that's been a trigger for a lot of people around the Deshaun Watson situation, right? The fact that there were no criminal charges filed, so it must not have happened.

I mean, that's bunk. The problem with sexual assault and rape too in many cases is that the authorities, district attorneys, detectives feel like they can't make a case that's airtight. Now, according to the civil lawsuit, the young woman who is making the allegations against Matt Ariza and two of his former college teammates, she did go to the hospital. She did report her allegations, her accusations.

And at this point, authorities have declined to file any charges, though it sounds like it's still a possibility. I don't know what the bills do here. I think back to what the Texans did. Now, Deshaun Watson, this is going back to last season, Deshaun Watson had already requested a trade or he requested his trade. And then these allegations, the first allegations from the women, the massage therapists came out pretty quickly.

I don't remember the exact timing, but it was kind of bang bang. He did not want to play for the Texans in 21. They did not want him on the field. By mutual agreement, they paid him, but he was inactive pretty much every game, may have been every single game. He never was going to play.

I just remember trying to have the discussion with one of our Houston Texans insiders, John McClain, who's, I guess, technically retired, but actually is still very active covering sports. So I'm not sure if we'll have him on the show this season or not. But he kept trying to tell me, there's no way Deshaun Watson sees the field, regardless of whether or not Davis Mills gets hurt, Tyrod Taylor gets hurt, which is exactly what happened. He's not going to play for the team. They don't want him to play.

He doesn't want to play. So now thinking about the bills situation, I don't know if they might take action, right? So the bills have indicated that right now they have no further comment.

They're going to let the legal system play out. These are disturbing allegations. And I know they're at this point allegations.

That's what they are. I don't know how the NFL handles this moving forward generally. I mean, we think about the Alvin Kamara situation in New Orleans where there's video of him and a few of his friends, guys that he was with after a night at the club, attacking a guy near or beating up a guy near an elevator. And, you know, there's allegations that the guy said some really inflammatory things and made some really inappropriate and offensive comments and that that's why he got beat up. But the allegations are that he was unconscious and they were still beating him up.

And Alvin Kamara is in these videos. The NFL is waiting for that to play out legally. And so generally that's the approach that the league takes and that teams try to fall back on is we're going to wait. We're going to wait until we see what happens in the court system or we see what happens with the authorities and whether or not they move forward.

Sometimes though public pressure becomes a factor. And I wonder if the Pegula family who now owns the Bills, if any of the Bills teammates themselves may speak up. If you read the allegations, if you read the accusations from this young woman who has not even been identified. I mean, I put it off as long as I could.

I knew I had to mention it on the air, but it may be sick to my stomach. And I know they're just allegations at this point. There's no proof of anything. At the same time, you think about the Trevor Bauer situation in Los Angeles and how when the Dodgers themselves, the team, the team, I don't mean Dodgers management or the ownership. I mean, the team heard about the allegations against Trevor.

In his case, it was choking a young woman that he was having sex with, even if it was consensual, choking her and rendering unconscious and kind of beating her up. The team was so disturbed by it that they made it very clear they did not want him around ever again. And he's never been back with the Dodgers since.

Are we going to our second season now? It was middle of last season, right, where he was sent away from the team and has never been back. He's still getting paid. They do not want him around. So I don't know if there's a situation here where the ownership of the Bills, which is a family, maybe it's Bills teammates.

I'm not sure. I mean, sometimes it is the nature of the allegations that can't be overlooked or that won't be overlooked. He just got named the starting punter for the Bills. And here we are getting close to the start of the season. So we'll see whether or not the Bills change that approach. If they do anything, at some point, the NFL will try to launch an investigation. But we'd need more information, right? I mean, we've seen this pattern before.

We've heard this song and dance before. And at this point, it feels like it's in a bit of a holding pattern while the authorities are still considering. Still, it is disturbing to even read the allegations. Similar is, well, let me be careful not to use the word similar so that people don't think I'm saying that Deshaun Watson is accused of rape because that's not true.

But when you read some of the allegations against Deshaun, they're also disturbing. Just can take a long time to play out. And I don't know if the Bills take any action.

They can. He's on their roster. So if the Bills want to, they can either suspend him or make him inactive or decide that they don't want him on their team anymore. So we'll see if anything changes as we get closer to the season. Alright, we're gonna dive into baseball because there's still a baseball season going on. We're getting close to the stretch run. September stretch. Stretch in September.

It was a lighter night, but there were still some pretty big storylines. And then ouch. If you're the Oklahoma City Thunder, I know it's not basketball season, but oy, costly injury for a team that was hoping to rebuild and do so around a pretty unique superstar. And the little thunders?

Well, not so little, but yes, definitely the thunders. I mean, really, are you trying to derail me? Is that what you're doing in there? You're mad because I won the argument? No, everyone's on your side.

No one's on my side, which is tremendous. I love it that way. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence. Good Friday morning to you here on CBS Sports Radio.

You are listening to the After Hours podcast. The pitch swung on. Line drive. Base hit left field. Trevino scores.

Right behind him is Connor Falefa. It's a two-run single for Giancarlo Stanton in his return to the lineup, and the Yankees have a 4-0 lead. A 1 pitch. Into the air well left center field.

Tony Kemp turning and looking. This one, he's one hop off the wall. Torres got a great jump.

He's coming around third. The throw is not in time, and it's an RBI double for Josh Donaldson. The Yankees lead 5-0. Bases loaded. Ground ball right side. Second baseman, Bridefield. Nobody at first need.

Couldn't get there in time. It's an infield hit. It's an RBI for Anthony Rizzo, and it's an 8-0 Yankee lead.

There it is. Welcome to the Pardee-Glaber-Torres. It's a line drive. Base hit to left field, and now all nine Yankee batters have recorded at least one base hit. I thought he looked great. I thought he had a couple of really good swings. Obviously, a few RBIs. Really good walk to knock Caprilion out, especially after he got behind in the count there. I thought he did a good job of just being real disciplined.

This is After Hours with Amy Lawrence. Every single guy in the lineup got a hit for the Yankees. It was a hit parade, if you will, on Yankees radio Brendan Burke and Susan Waldman. 20 hits.

I mean, it is against Oakland, but hey, you play the teams that you're dealt in your schedule. 13 runs on 20 hits. More than enough support for Jamison Tyone, who's now 12-4, and Giancarlo Stanton. Welcome back to the lineup with three RBI, and it comes at the right time for the Yankees. This is their fourth consecutive win.

They have not lost since Aaron Boone went ape on the table. Can I do it? It won't have the same effect unless I lower my microphone. Nah, it doesn't. It's right in front of us. Our console, our desk here is too solid.

It doesn't move the microphone and vibrate that much. So anyway, since Aaron Boone had his outburst, he's normally the mild-mannered Clark Kent of major league managers, since he turned into the Incredible Hulk or the She-Hulk, if you will. Right in front of us.

Exactly. That has changed this team. Well, that and a couple games against the Mets in which they got Aaron Judge home runs and now a series at Oakland.

So the Yankees are maintaining that lead in the American League East, but man, if you're watching what's happening, three of the other four teams, not the Boston Red Sox, but three of the other four teams are also locked in or making what may be their last big push to try to catch the Yanks. The 2-2. Swing and a high fly ball to the left.

Adil takes a couple of steps back and watches this one sail on out of here. He sucked for the It's a two-run shot. The Rays have opened this one up. Armstrong and his two-strength pitch on the way to Fletcher. Swing and a ground ball right to second base. Paredes has it on the short hop. He throws to first and it is indeed a four-game sweep for the Rays against the Angels. Well, you can get used to this coming out of the dugout shaking hands thing. The Rays go seven and one on the home stand. Well, that's sweet, right?

Good work if you can get it. The Rays sweep the Angels. They win their sixth straight. Andy Fried and company on Rays radio and yeah, manager Kevin Cash has watched his team have a near perfect stint at home. We needed to play well here.

No doubt about it. I think that we know that it's going to go down to the wire. There's a lot of good teams right in the thick of things, but if we can kind of just focus on the game, the series at hand will be better for it, but really impressed with the way the guys went about their business over the last eight days.

It's after hours with Amy Lawrence here on CBS Sports Radio. So this is how it looks. The Yankees are up seven and a half games on the Rays who have won six in a row, eight of their last ten. This may be their last best charge. There's still a month to go, but this is the Rays at their finest and they're gaining confidence.

They're gaining some ground, not as much as they need to. They're going to have to go two to one really to be able to catch the Yankees. The Blue Jays have also won seven of their last ten and in the second consecutive night, they go extra innings to beat the Red Sox at Fenway. But none of that is as dramatic as how the Orioles got their victory on Thursday. Pitch, Stowers drives it to center field. Robert going back at the track, at the wall.

It's gone. It's the first major league home run for Kyle Stowers and in an 0-2 count against one of the game's best closers, he hits it out and it ties the game. It is 3-3 in the bottom of the ninth. The 0-2 slider driven out to center field. It'll get over the head of Robert and the Orioles are going to walk it off. Mullins jogs down from third, touches up and Anthony Santander, it's a mob scene between first and second base. He has got his second walk off of the season and the Orioles take this series against the White Sox, winning it 4-3.

To do it at home, super cool. To do it in a high leverage moment off of a really, really good pitcher and to give this team more life and a chance to win the game, couldn't have asked for a better moment. We were so empty offensively for so long in that game and we finally got a little bit of life there in a timely spot. Two outs and two strikes off one of the best closers in the game. Huge hit for us. Kyle Stowers, seventh career major league baseball game and he comes up with a home run that ties it for the Orioles against the White Sox at Camden Yards in the ninth and then the O's are able to walk it off as you hear with Jeff Arnold on Orioles radio and they keep referring to one of the best closers in the game, that's Liam Hendrix and so he gave up the home run.

Brandon Hyde of course, proud of his young stud. I guess we can call him that since that home run was clutch and so the Chicago White Sox are still stuck in this cycle where they go one step forward two steps back but right now three, well four actually, four of the five teams in the AL East are playing some of their best baseball of the year. Not quite that way for the Yankees but at least they put together four wins in a row. The Rays have won six in a row, the Blue Jays have won three in a row and the Orioles, they're still right there in the wildcard mix.

They're still above 500 and they are still one of the best stories of the 2022 major league baseball season. So we've got that whole division except for the Red Sox right now that's involved. We'll see if the Red Sox have any juice left but that whole division is fun and then you think about the Central, the White Sox and the Twins, they're going the wrong way right now. The Guardians weren't able to win last night but still have a four game lead over both the Twins and the White Sox. Astros, they made the Twins, so you kind of wonder if the Twins would make the playoffs, let's say they would get a wildcard and they win the AL Central, the way that they failed to come up with really anything at all to challenge the Astros. Is that how it's going to be in the postseason?

Peter Schwartz is here in studio. I know things can change and postseason is a different animal but sometimes you see the Astros match up against some of these other teams that are contenders, I'm using my air quotations, and you think, huh, that's not very competitive. Even against the Yankees, remember those, what was it, six games that they played against each other, five games that they played against each other earlier in the season? Yeah and at the time the Yankees and Astros didn't match up very well, well the Yankees didn't match up well with the Astros.

It's tough to say now, you look ahead to the playoffs and obviously it comes down to starting pitching, to me. When you have teams that are, when you have Justin Verlander pitching the way he's pitching this year and you have it in the Ed Tramancini to that lineup, listen, to me, for my money, I'd be shocked if the Astros weren't in the World Series this year and I don't want them to be, obviously, but I mean it's hard to go up against a team like that that's battle tested in the playoffs and they have that kind of pitching, they're going to be tough to beat. Really quick on Mancini then we'll get to your update. When I did this, an interview on Baltimore, our Baltimore affiliate, 105.7, the fan, Baltimore radio on Monday morning, I mentioned Tramancini and I hate that the Orioles traded him away, right, to the Astros and Rob Long, who I was talking to on the air, said, oh well, it's a good story but he really didn't mean that much to the Orioles. Do you know what he's done since he's gotten to Houston?

Holy cow. In 18 games, he's got six home runs and 16 RBI in 18 games with the Astros. I mean he may not have been doing a whole lot in Orioles, with the Orioles, but he's certainly making a difference with the Houston Astros. I don't know if I have a perfect explanation. I've been working a lot with the hitting coaches on making some adjustments and my teammates have been helping me out too, you know, on things they see, so that's been, I think the name of the game for me. Yeah, a little bit like what Joey Gallo's done with the Dodgers, right, since he was traded away by the Yankees where he was so despised, exactly, since I mean like the Yankees couldn't, the Yankees fans couldn't wait to get rid of him and now he goes into the Dodgers lineup and he's coming up with all kinds of clutch hits.

Changes scenery. Yeah. Sometimes, listen, and here's the thing with Gallo in New York, it's not like he wanted to stink. It just didn't work. It just didn't work out. I mean some guys just don't. He wanted to stink. He didn't want to stink. I mean he took a beating from Yankee fans, including myself, but I mean he didn't want to suck, but I mean it's just what happened. Sometimes you need to change that uniform.

Sometimes divorce is good. Sometimes what you need is to be surrounded by a bunch of other power hitters in a Dodgers lineup where there are no holes. That's what you need. Maybe he was just encouraged by the fact that there's In-N-Out Burger in Los Angeles that's not in New York. Maybe that's what it is.

Or the beach everywhere you look. Okay, so coming up we got a Triple Crown winner in the National League. That's fun. And we got our boom moment of the week as well. Actually have we decided what our boom moment of the week is yet? Oh, Jay decided.

This is Jay's department. I think you'll be on board. Oh, okay, you think I will. You can find me on Twitter A-Law Radio if you too would like to tell me how wrong I am.

Also on our Facebook page where you are telling me how wrong I am. It's a happy Friday, peeps. You are listening to the After Hours Podcast. As we wrap up the week, we contemplate the mysteries of the universe.

I just laid down the A-Law. Boom! The best highlights. Full, running up and down the line. It's a direct snap and it goes to Clemon who gives it off to Burton the tight end who then throws in the end zone. Touchdown! Falls! Put the ball! And you're fired. Thanks for taking my call.

I really appreciate it. The greatest sports show in America. Boom! After Hours presents the boom moment of the week.

Here's Amy Lawrence. Boom! And the next pitch to him. Set high and deep. Left field. Backing up his half.

He looks good. And it's gone! Another Albert Pujols big fly.

Number 693. And the Cardinals take a 1-0 lead in the seventh inning. I just react on that fast. I mean, you don't look for pitch up and three feet or four feet off the plate, you know. I mean, it's just something that you react on and just put a good word on always being a good fast ball hitter up, especially way up and, you know, just glad they went out of the ballpark and gave us a lead. Good wood is what Albert Pujols said. Oh, he's been putting good wood on a lot of pitches these days. Though he remains at home run number 693 here and there on Cardinals radio. Did not homer the last couple of days against the Cubs. But we've seen the fireworks and we know he's got plenty of time left in this regular season to hit 700. People keep asking me, is he going to retire or would he stick around if he doesn't quite get 700 and he has said the numbers don't matter to him. He's not playing another season. This is it. We need to see it.

This is what I need in my September. It's after hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio. His teammate, I know that he's maybe not getting as much attention right now because Albert Pujols is the draw as he marches toward baseball immortality. But Paul Goldschmidt is crushing any and all pitches that come anywhere near him. Three for four last night with five RBI.

Get this. He's got 105 RBI to lead the National League. His batting average is 339, which is also tops in his league. And he's now at 33 home runs. He's two back of the pace set by Kyle Schwerber. So he is a definite Triple Crown candidate. It was kind of funny, too, because he had a day off Wednesday and he said, oh, I think that's what gave me my extra juice. Nah, I feel like you've been doing this all season long.

So we also saw Dakota Hudson go a season high seven innings. I mean, he's just liking what he sees from Paul Goldschmidt. It's what you're trying to emulate as a ball player yourself, hitter, position player.

But just as a person, too, it says a lot about it's fun to watch, right? Like, I mean, if you don't show up and you're ready to watch a great baseball game, I mean, come out and watch us play some time. It's a lot of fun sitting on the bench or being out there in my best seat out there on the mound.

It's a it's a great time. St. Louis Cardinals up six right now in the Brewers in the NL Central as we head into the weekend. I forgot who are they playing? The Cardinals are playing the Braves.

That's right. Huge weekend series between two World Series contenders, including the defending champion. It's after hours here on CBS Sports Radio. If you missed it, on Thursday evening, there were a couple of preseason games in the NFL, and one of them featured the Kansas City Chiefs, and they were at home and they're wrapping up their preseason schedule. And when they started the game, now originally against the Packers, we were not going to see Patrick Mahomes. In fact, I daresay he might have been in street clothes had it not been for the chance that they wanted to take to honor Len Dawson, their Hall of Famer who passed away earlier this week at the age of 87. A Super Bowl champ, an AFL champion, he's a Hall of Famer, just meant so much to the Chiefs organization. So they, Patrick Mahomes led the team out onto the field and they did one of the classic huddles that Dawson used to keep in the 60s and 70s. And then there was a penalty that was called actually on number 16, which was Len Dawson's number. I had a chance to catch up with Dana Hughes, who is a former Chiefs wide receiver, now TV and radio broadcaster, to ask him what Dawson meant to the franchise.

Well, you know what? If you got a chance to talk to Len, he kind of kind of fit right into this organization. And, you know, when we look around the NFL, when you look at different teams, whether it's, you know, the monsters of the midway and you see different guys on those teams, Hall of Famers or big names, you kind of say, okay, yeah, he kind of fits that. He kind of fits, you know, Lambeau or fits Chicago or fits New York. And that's what you got with Lenny. I mean, he kind of fit this. If you had a chance to get to know Lamar Hunt, you know, very unassuming, quiet, reserved, very humble person for how great he was and all the great things he did with the AFL and the NFL and creating the Super Bowl and all that stuff. And Len kind of carried himself the same way. Like you had to really like realize, whoa, like that's Lenny Dawson. He's in the pro football Hall of Fame and as a broadcaster in the Hall of Fame.

Very few people are in there in both. And you look at the Ring of Honor and you see him and you hear all the stories and then the amazing work that he did on the broadcast when I was playing. And he comes and sits next to you in the locker room and just chats with you. And when the rookies come in town, he goes to dinner with the rookies and just sits down and chats and talks about old stories. And then you look at his, you know, his resume and what he was able to accomplish.

I mean, he was 87 years old, led a complete life, a full life. We heard the stories during the broadcast today that, you know, he would go and practice all day long and then take off his equipment and then interview his teammates, then hustle through the local TV station, do the six o'clock news, go back home, eat with his family, then go and do the 10 o'clock news and then do his more studying for his football job and then do it all over every single day. And then, you know, what he was able to carry into inside the NFL.

We know how that launched the NFL and broadcasting all the teams across the world. I mean, it's just, it's just amazing to think of, but as a person, and I tweeted this out, you know, when he passed away that he was a, a, an incredible man and a Casey icon and it was in that order and it was just such a treat to get to know him. Dannion Hughes is with us from the Chiefs broadcast radio and TV as a seat that Len Dawson held until, what was it, 2017.

It wasn't that long ago that he was doing the color commentary for the Chiefs broadcast. So I can imagine it's kind of neat now to be in that same situation yourself and recognize these are some pretty incredible shoes that I've been filling. And, and I can only imagine too, what it meant to guys like Patrick Mahomes, others who followed along and played that same position to have this hall of Famer who was still around the team and part of the team, even so many years after he played, but it mattered to him to be involved. I have five kids and there were, there was a time where my little baby kids would put on my shoes and put their feet in my shoes.

And you'd recognize that there's no chance that their feet could fill those shoes. That's kind of how I feel in the broadcast because Len, the booth at Arrowhead stadium is named after him and what he meant to that organization, what he meant to guys like Patrick Mahomes, 2017 was when Patrick came into the league and Patrick talked at length about the conversations he had with Len. Leni, you know, was getting up there in age and he recognized how special Patrick was in his first year when he didn't start, but he had that one start against the Denver Broncos in week 17 and Leni at that point told Clark Hunt and everybody around him, that kid is going to be special. And lo and behold, we've seen what Patrick Mahomes can do, but it was just an amazing, amazing thought to, to an experience and watching him interact with guys and Travis Kelce, like Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce were not supposed to go on the field today. They weren't going to play in the game. So there was really no reason for them to go out on the field. And yet they, they made their way onto the field and they said they wanted to be a part of that.

That's how much respect that they had for Len Dawson and how much they wanted to honor him in that huddle for the first play on the offense. He's the epitome of what all of us former players should strive to be on and off the field, how he carried himself, the professionalism that he displayed. I mean, if you look through his resume, like why wouldn't you want to, to have a chance to be in the same zone as him and, and fill the same booth and wear the same headphones and, and try to accomplish the same goals. He was a part of great championship teams and he'll forever be missed. There is more to my conversation with Dana Hughes, who's a former chiefs wide receiver and also part of the Kansas city TV and radio contingent that covers the chiefs. In fact, to hear his story about being in Miami at the super bowl, when the chiefs won a couple of years ago and what was happening in their section as they were realizing the chiefs were going to win their first super bowl in 50 years. Absolutely phenomenal. You want to catch that on podcast after hours, Amy lawrence.com, catch a great weekend and we'll catch you on Sunday night. It's after hours here on CBS sports radio. Boom.