After Hours with Amy Lawrence PODCAST: Hour 1

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That's BetterHelpHELP.com slash positive. I'm joined by Hall of Famer John Smoltz. Smoltz, tell me this. What's harder, winning a Cy Young or an Emmy Award? Oh man, winning a Cy Young takes a lot longer to happen. You know, it's funny when you mention something like that, I just go back to all those years of being predicted to win and just feeling like a failure. But in 96, fortunately, I was able to at least get that off my back because that was starting to bother me.

Download the Brett Boone Podcast, available on the Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcast. Every now and then you'll hear me talk about the chaos that is breaking behind the scenes, the fear that is unfolding as we try to get ready for a show or sometimes even after we have turned on the microphones and you've heard the music and we've started the show, they're still all hell breaking loose even though you can't see it. And I pride myself on being a host who can navigate the choppy waters. I do, just mostly because I'm old and I've been doing this a really long time.

It's one of those acquired skills. It just takes reps where everything else is falling apart around you or things aren't operating or running or working the way they're supposed to or you're out of your regular routine. Just things are wrong, everything's wrong.

Oh, our equipment from 1985, it's not functioning the way that it's supposed to. And yet the whole goal, well, one of the goals of the show is to make it sound like to make it sound like it's calm and serene and peaceful. Now that can apply to the sports world as well. Sometimes when we go on the air Sunday nights during football season, it is chaos, total chaos.

And everything is changing really by the minute as we try to keep up with all of the NFL storylines and bring you the football shows that we do on Sunday night. Sometimes it's equipment, sometimes it's personnel. To be perfectly honest, sometimes it's personnel. Now, before I explain, it's not what you think, right? It's not about the personnel sucking up the joint, screwing up.

No, it's actually the opposite. And so even as we start the show, before I do anything else, I have to acknowledge the people who are working on the show tonight because producer Jay is on vacation from now until middle of next week. I know he's an odd duckling. He does take weird days off, but it's okay. He needs his time off before we get to football season. All of us do.

That's our business. People are encouraged to take time off during the summer because football is all-consuming. And so producer Jay has got a quick trip or I guess an extended weekend to Chicago with his dad. He is going to see Wrigley Field for the first time. He's really excited about that. But poor producer Jay had to work on Wednesday afternoon. He's supposed to be on vacation, but even before I could call him, he called me because he knew.

He knew the plan had already fallen apart. We hadn't even started it yet. So Jay not here means we have someone step in for producer Jay. And we have different guys who are trained to work on the show.

I wish I could say we had gals, but it's just guys, which is okay. So different guys that we have trained to work on the show. And there's essentially a list of people that their manager can choose from. So he chose one guy to fill in who did accept the responsibilities for tonight and tomorrow night. And then for whatever reason, the personnel who shall not be named decided to call out at the last second. Oh, great. So producer Jay was all stressed out because he thought he had a plan in place and he'd been working with the guy who's supposed to fill in.

And then as it turned out, that guy bagged it at the last second. So I want to say huge thank you to David Sheppard, who is actually not my producer, but he's sticking around to be part of the show. He's the producer of the JR Sport Brief Show.

You hear him a bunch on the air with JR. Then you hear him host sometimes on the weekends or sometimes filling in for JR on CBS Sports Radio. So David, thank you. He's doing a double simply because we need to be on the air.

And poor guy's already running on fumes and yet is here and has a smile on his face, though he does want to kill the other personnel who shall remain unnamed for putting him in this position. So David, thank you. You know that I always appreciate your help. We've got two new peeps that are working on the show tonight. And so I want to say thank you to Ryan, who's learning on the fly. This is how I met Ryan last week. I had cupcakes for July 4th, you know, the Funfetti cupcakes.

And I was trying to give them away because I didn't want to take them home. And so I walked into the newsroom from the hallway. I think Jay and I had been in the kitchen. We walked back in and there's this new guy sitting in the newsroom that we didn't know. So this is what I do when I don't know people. Hi, what's your name?

I mean, might as well act like we're in third grade. Hi, what's your name? And he said, my name is Ryan. Hi, Ryan, would you like a cupcake? Ryan, did you say, I think you said no, you turned me down, didn't you? You turned me down for the cup. Oh, that was his first mistake. Ryan, why did you turn me down for a cupcake? And yet here I'm letting you work on the show anyway.

It was like, I think it was like five o'clock at that time. I was not in the mood. What? Wow. Okay. So not a morning person for Ryan, but here he is flipping his schedule.

Yes, it was five o'clock Eastern time. And I understand cupcakes are not everyone's favorite choice for breakfast. Okay. But thank you for stepping in at the last second. And then not in the control room.

Ryan's going to be learning how to operate the equipment because he and I will be flying solo tomorrow night at this time. So if everything breaks apart and blows up, it's Ryan's fault. No, no, it's not. It's my, it's because you didn't take a cupcake. I'm just kidding.

It's not. I tell people all the time who work on the show to take pressure off. You cannot ruin the show. Only I can ruin the show. So there's no pressure.

It's easy peasy, lemon squeezy. So Ryan, thank you. And then out in the newsroom, I'm also very grateful for Andrew who stepped in to help us with some extra responsibilities to get ready for the show because we do have a fairly extensive prep schedule as well.

So you guys are the best. Thank you. I really mean that from the bottom of my heart that yes, this is not easy to do. And the hours are tough.

And yet you all, you coming to help me, which means a lot. So all that to say, producer Jay better be sleeping after he had to work on a Wednesday afternoon when he wasn't supposed to. Yeah, he and his, his dad are taking off for Chicago on Thursday morning.

And when I did text him a couple hours ago, he did not respond. So I'm hoping that means he is sleeping probably on the phone. Sleeping probably on the couch because he's allergic to his own bed.

He always falls asleep on the couch. So little known fact about producer Jay that you better not repeat because he probably be mortified that I told you that it's after hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS sports radio. Please find me on Twitter, a law radio, and then our Facebook page after hours with Amy Lawrence. And for those of you who sent questions for ask Amy anything going back to our hump show. Well, I did actually respond to a bunch of them on both Twitter and Facebook, whatever producer Jay did not ask on the show. I generally go back and I try to answer them. If I can answer them succinctly, I do that. If I can't answer without writing a novel, I do not.

But if it's a relatively easy question, then I will go ahead and I will answer it. So make sure you check out not just our show, Twitter after hours, CBS, but also our Facebook page if you're looking to see what other ask Amy questions I answered. And we've also had a couple of nights now of Shohei Ohtani chatter.

Guess what? It's a Shohei free zone on this edition of the show for the most part. I mean, who doesn't want to talk about Shohei Ohtani? It's a lot of fun. People got really mad about the question that I asked on last night's show, not understanding where the question came from. So I really did have some people who were quite offended that we put up a post asking if Shohei Ohtani is among the top 10 players of all time. Some listener got really upset and made it sound like I had nothing better to talk about, but some type of ridiculous question like that. That's not me. I always have things to talk about. You know, you should know me by now. I never run out of things to say.

I can be rendered speechless now and then, but I never run out of things to say. Now the question was, it was about Shohei as a top 10 player all time because of what Ken Rosenthal said on the Fox broadcast during the All-Star game. What he said was, and I quote, Shohei is arguably the best player of all time. And I nearly spit out my drink when I heard him say that because Shohei Ohtani's not been around long enough, or given us a large enough sample size in my opinion, to be considered the greatest player of all time.

So that's where the question came from. So you all were salty about it in some cases. And to be fair, there are some of you who said yes, he is not only a top 10 player, but he should be considered the greatest player of all time because of what he's doing, both pitching and hitting. That is a debate that will continue. And as we get closer to the Major League Baseball trade deadline, which I will actually not be here during the baseball trade deadline, though it seems pretty clear the Angels are not going to trade him, also seems pretty clear most people believe he will not be in Anaheim past this season, but that the Angels are stubbornly refusing to trade him, holding on to any hope that he might return to the Angels. So we will definitely talk more about Shohei Ohtani, but on this edition of the show, we're going to take a little break from showtime. I'm showtimed out, if you will, unless we're talking about the Showtime Lakers.

I suppose I could go back and talk about those Lakers in the 80s and the early 90s. Now we've got a break from baseball here for a couple of days. And while we maybe have a little bit of a look ahead to the second half, for the most part, we're going away from the base paths. We're getting away from diamond drama. And we're going to talk about, oh well, the drama in the golf world. Because as the golfers get together at the Scottish Open, the PGA Tour is getting ready for the Scottish, I think they tee off in actually a couple hours because of the time change across the pond. They will be teeing off in the last tune-up before the Open Championship, which is next week. But because of what happened in the United States on Tuesday, they're all talking about the live PGA merger again.

Do you know what happened on Tuesday? On Capitol Hill, various members of the live organization, as well as the PGA Tour in different capacities, were asked to testify about this merger that's been proposed. Not Jay Monahan, because conveniently, the PGA Tour Commissioner is dealing with a medical issue.

Funny how that worked out. Apparently he's scheduled to return sometime soon, but Jay Monahan did not testify on Capitol Hill. But in light of that, the golfers are now fielding questions again at the Scottish Open about this merger and what they think and how they feel. And trust me, when I say that they are still edgy over the whole thing, and that includes Jordan Speed, then Xander Schauffele and Scottie Scheffler.

So we'll hear from them a little bit later on. Wimbledon is getting down to the Final Fours in both the women and the men's brackets, so we'll talk Wimbledon a little bit. We had a couple of Americans that were still standing into the quarterfinals, but now all eyes on Novak Djokovic to be sure.

Novak and potentially a final against Carlos Alcaraz. We've got soccer too to talk about because for the first time in, gosh, nearly a decade, the Americans are out of the CONCACAF Gold Cup before they get to the finals. So Team USA going into not just extra time, which was, you want to talk about dramatic, against Panama, but also to penalty kicks again, and the Americans were exhausted. The game is actually re-airing on FS1 right now.

I watched it when I was home. They were exhausted. They were running on fumes in the first half.

Found some legs in the second half against Panama, but if you remember, they had the game against Canada that also went into extra time and went into penalty kicks in the quarters, and so they had a very quick turnaround. You could see that it was really wearing on them. So they were tired, and I get it, they're pro athletes, but it was hot and humid in San Diego. Apparently it was really even more taxing because of the heat. You could see both for Panama and the United States, they even had hydration breaks where the two teams were sent to the sidelines so that they could drink water and not pass out from heat stroke.

So the heat was definitely a concern in San Diego on Wednesday evening, so we'll talk about soccer as well. Before we get to our first break though, a couple of moments that I want to note. I did not watch the entire ESPYs program, but I do appreciate that there are always emotional moments around some of the awards, and any time DeMar Hamlin is in the spotlight, I am interested to hear what he has to say. Now, in this case at the ESPYs on Wednesday evening, he came out on the stage already extremely emotional.

There's so many things to love about DeMar. After his near-death experience, in which he has told us before, he died twice on the field, and that was in Cincinnati, remember early January. That's how we started the NFL year, and he suffers that cardiac arrest, and it requires not just the athletic staffs of both football teams, but also the quick thinking, the quick work, the instincts of the medical staff, the doctors and nurses, and the first responders there in Cincinnati and then back in Buffalo as well when he finally traveled, and you remember for a couple of days, the NFL shut down essentially while we were waiting for some word about DeMar Hamlin. And so DeMar is now getting ready to play football again, which is another miracle in and of itself, and as he walks out on stage at the ESPYs to honor a special group of people with the Pat Tillman Award for Service, as he comes out onto the stage, he's already in tears. They just overcome by emotion, so as he's crying, the fans are all fans, everybody in the auditorium is rising, tons of athletes.

I think Travis Kelce was the first one to stand. You can see other athletes who are crying, they've got tears running down their faces, they're significant others, celebrities, that type of thing, but they all rise with him to kind of support him, even as he struggles to get the words out on stage. Please welcome this year's recipient of the Pat Tillman Award for Service, the training staff of the Buffalo Bills. And who better to introduce them than DeMar, and you can hear the emotion in his voice. I love how authentic he is, I love how genuine he is. He has, at what 24 years old, been so mature and has such an incredible perspective about what he's gone through, recognizing that he now has a plan and a purpose moving forward and doesn't want to waste this opportunity that he's been given. So as he is standing there on stage and he introduces the Bills training staff, they come out behind him, they're all in tears as well, and they give DeMar a group hug. It probably lasts for a good 30 seconds because he's still crying, they're crying with him. It was very emotional and very poignant to see the relationship and the bond that has developed between this young man, this player that they saved, and this group of trainers who were honored there on stage. So they all are gathered around him, they're rubbing his back, they're hugging him, they're encouraging him.

I mean, I was really struck by the bond that this group of people, this group of humans has formed. And so then it was up to head trainer Nate Bresky to talk, even though he was really emotional. My name is Nate Bresky. I'm the head athletic trainer for the Buffalo Bills. I'm humbled and honored to be speaking tonight representing the Buffalo Bills athletic training and medical staff. By the grace of God and divine intervention, we had the best outcome we could have prayed for or imagined. It was a massive army of specialists who came together on and off the field to do their jobs that night.

That team includes the Bills and Bengals athletic training and medical staffs. DeMar, first and foremost, thank you for staying alive brother. Seriously, we are so honored to be standing up here next to such a strong and courageous human being.

How about that? And it went on. Nate also honored the medical teams in both Cincinnati and Buffalo, named a bunch of different people. But I was just really struck by how much this group cares for one another, cares for DeMar and how much this experience has really brought them together to care more about their jobs, but also the number of times that they have been highlighted and their roles have been honored. And I think we understand more how important these people are at every single stadium, not just football, but other sports as well. So I'm glad these first responders and these training staffs have been in the spotlight a little more.

So we get that they always have to be ready for a situation like this. So love to see DeMar. He's up there in a tux on stage and just being DeMar.

Emotional, real, great ambassador for football, a young man who will never take his life or football for granted and also really loves his family, his little brother too. So pretty cool to see that. One other moment at the SBs that we'll talk about after the break, and that's the Jimmy V award, which is always extremely powerful, very often given to a cancer survivor or someone who is battling cancer.

And so I know that many of you watched, I'm not going to give it away. We'll hear from him after the break. I would love it if you would find me on Twitter, ALawRadio, and then also on our Facebook page After Hours with Amy Lawrence, despite the fact the fact that the plan just didn't quite work out the way that it was supposed to.

I actually think we're in a better shape now because we've got a cast of three behind the double pane glass. You guys are the best. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence, CBS Sports Radio. You are listening to the After Hours Podcast. Thank you so much for hanging out with us.

I hope you survived your hump day Wednesday. I can't decide if this week is going fast or it's going slower. We always miss producer J when he's here, but it stretches me to work with different people, which is good. And we're training new people on the After Hours experience. It's like a roller coaster ride. Welcome. Welcome to the After Hours experience.

If you survive, well, more power to you. Find us on Twitter, After Hours CBS, if you didn't answer our Shohei Ohitani question about whether or not he's a top 10 player at this point. And that does mean all time, not just in today's major league baseball world. And then our Facebook page too, After Hours with Amy Lawrence.

If you missed our latest video version of Ask Amy Anything, it's the Sum Sum Summertime Flare, and it's on our YouTube channel, which is named After the Show. The highlight of the SBS is always the Jimmy V award. And if you don't know the background, Jimmy Valvano, he is the one that delivered the speech years ago with the SBS, even as he was battling brain cancer hard, don't give up, don't ever give up. And so now every year, the Jimmy V award is given to an athlete or a member of the sports world in some capacity who embodies the spirit of Jimmy V. Now, you may not know my background. Before I was at CBS Sports Radio, I worked at ESPN for almost a decade and had the privilege of being part of the V Foundation auction every year. It was an honor because we would touch base and connect with cancer survivors, not just in the sports world, but in the media world and also just outside of our industry.

And there's support, there's great support in that, in being able to connect with someone else who is facing a similar battle and a similar struggle. And as Liam Hendrix, the Chicago White Sox pitcher, was honored on Wednesday evening with the Jimmy V award, I love what he had to say about reaching out and supporting other people and also making sure that the loved ones in your life that are going through a battle against cancer in some form or another or another health challenge, that you remind them that you are with them. Because right now, our friend John Kincaid, who is a former CBS Sports Radio host, but is now with 97.5, the fanatic in Philly, he is going through chemo treatments for his colon cancer. Now he's very open about his battle.

He's put videos up, so I'm not telling you anything that isn't public in what he has said on his radio show. He went through chemo treatment number three on Wednesday. And there are times over the past month and a half or so that I have felt like I'm bothering him by reaching out to him. And I know I can be a pest, but I check in with him multiple times for a week and say, hey, how are you doing? What's going on? I'm praying for you, thinking of you. I know you have another treatment today.

And I'm not joking. Sometimes I do feel like I'm bothering him. And why would he want to keep hearing from me when he's got so much going on? So when Liam Hendrix stepped to the stage on Wednesday evening to accept the Jimmy V award and had some encouragement for people who are supporting those people who are going through cancer, it actually really meant a lot to me. If I leave you with anything, and I cannot stress this enough, please reach out to anybody going through anything similar to this, whether it be cancer, whether it be anxiety, whether it be depression, whether it be any number of things. Trust me, you are not annoying. You will not be an annoyance to us. All that matters is that you give us that little bit of a text. That could be the singular moment of us picking up our spirits and being able to advance to the next stage, being able to advance that next day of treatment, being able to advance past anything that we're going through. That one text can be the difference. So like Jimmy V said, don't give up, don't ever give up.

And I won. I just have to say thank you, Liam Hendrix, because I will never again question if I'm being a pest or if I'm being a bother or if I'm sending too many texts or asking too many questions. I mean, there is, I'm sure, a time when the people that we love who are going through either a battle with cancer or another health challenge, as Liam outlined, maybe they can't respond.

Maybe they're in a place where they just don't want to. But it doesn't mean that we as family and friends can't keep trying and can't let them know that we're thinking of them every day or every week. And so John Kincaid, I will not stop texting you. John and I have known each other for nearly 20 years now, going back to our previous network. And not only is he a close friend, but he's been an ally in this business where I haven't always had allies as a female who's in the minority, to be sure, in the sports radio industry. John has always been not just a friend, but someone who would speak up for me as a fellow host and speak up for me as an ally to the point to the point where he's actually gone to bosses about things that I didn't know anything about, right? So things were happening. I was unaware.

John was so angry on my behalf that he went to our bosses because he was ticked off. So he's been a great ally. And I now want to support him as he goes through yet another battle. He's already a cancer survivor. I'm so proud of him, proud to call him my friend.

But thank you, Liam, for saying that because it really did remind me that I need to keep in touch with not just friends, but family members who are going through similar challenges. And of course, what a great inspiration he is now that he's gone back to pitching and the emotion with which he has returned to baseball and his family has returned to baseball. Yeah, it's great.

It's great to see him doing what he loves again, similar to Damar Hamlin getting ready to play football again. So I hope you enjoyed the SBs. I actually was not watching them, but I was watching U.S. versus Panama in the Gold Cup semi-finals that took place in San Diego. The Americans, they were struggling, especially in the first half. Got a little better in the second half. We'll talk about it coming up because once again, it went into extra time and then it went into penalty kicks.

No, no, they should not be settling a semi-final at the Gold Cup with penalty kicks, but that's how it happened. Also at the top of the hour, really excited to welcome back to the show our friend Rob Motti, who covers the NFL for the Associated Press and recently had a chance to sit down with not just Patrick Mahomes, but Jalen Hurts in advance of the season. Did you know NFL training camps begin in under two weeks? Stop it, NFL. I feel like the I feel like the season never ended. We've been talking about you non-stop since the beginning of the year and now your training camps are about to get underway. So yes, Rob Motti after he spoke with both Patrick Mahomes and Jalen Hurts and just in general some of the big news like the Jets on hard knocks, of course. Of course, that seems to be scripted.

Yes, let's put the Jets on hard knocks with Aaron Rodgers changing teams and joining gang green. So all that's coming up as we head through this edition of the show. Again, on Twitter, ALawRadio, I'd love to hear from you and then on our Facebook page, it's After Hours with Amy Lawrence.

Here's Amy Lawrence. Karski had the run coming through the U.S. thinking that was offside, let it go, Turner comes out, doesn't get there, and unless an offside flag can save the United States on VAR, it's Yvonne Anderson who was put Panama in front. The end of this first half extra time is that one's for ALAWR! It's route one stuff, and it's Jordan Morris who wins the first one that sets it up. But take nothing away from this finish.

Oh my goodness, sweet! This is After Hours on CBS Sports Radio. On Fox Sports, man, you want to talk about drama. The U.S. and Panama in the semi-finals of the gold cup, they go scoreless through the first half and stoppage time, then the second half and stoppage time, and finally Panama scores in the extra time only to then see the United States match in extra time, and then they had to go into penalty kicks. Uh-huh. I don't love it.

I know many of you feel the same way. Longtime hockey fans, you don't love the idea that we've got penalty kicks to settle a game or a match. It's worse, though, when we're talking about a tournament or in the case of the NHL, of course, they don't do penalty kicks. Penalty kicks, haha. They don't do penalty shots uh in the postseason because that would not be right. It's a mode that favors the guys who are on the attack, the guys who are kicking, the guys who are taking the pks, and while Matt Turner had a pretty amazing performance against Canada in the pk, stopping two of them, it really doesn't seem like an equitable way to end a semi-final of the gold cup.

It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio. Jesus Ferrer, by the way, has had some kind of a tournament yet continues to rack up the goals. In the penalty kicks, Panama prevails and now moves on to the championship. Meanwhile, the United States bows out. For the first time since 2015, not getting into the championship game of the CONCACAF gold cup. Now, is this earth-shattering?

No, no need to make a humongous big deal about it. I don't think they loved the fact that they had played in since, I think it was Cincinnati where they played, maybe it was Dayton, but they were in Ohio for their quarterfinal match and then had to turn around after playing that game late on Sunday. They had to turn around and play in San Diego in the heat on Wednesday and they were pretty gassed. In fact, Panama possessed the the ball, meaning controlled the ball, had possession 66% of the time, two-thirds of the time in the first half, and generally possession is a strength of the United States. They just looked like they had tired legs and the heat was getting to them. There were a lot of missed opportunities, I will say that. The Americans had plenty of chances, some good looks in both the first half and the second half and just couldn't quite get one to go, but also feeling pretty taxed and pretty worn out.

Now, BJ Callahan is the interim coach manager of the U.S. men's national team until Greg Berhalter returns and takes over again, but he was still leading them when ultimately they come up short of the championship with BJ. We knew coming into this tournament when you get to the knockout stages, the stakes are high, the pressure is high, and it takes a full complete performance. What I said to the guys was I'm super proud of them. I'm super proud how they stuck together. They continue to respond to adversity and this is going to hurt in the short term, but I truly believe in the long term.

We've gotten a lot of players, a lot of experience, and it's going to pay dividends for us in the future. Now, the World Cup in the next rotation is the one that is North American hosted. United States, Mexico, Canada. After what the U.S. did in the most recent World Cup, which would have been last fall, getting to the knockout stage. Ultimately, she was at Holland that they played. I think it was Holland that they played in the knockout stage. Don't quote me on that, but they were outclassed in pretty much every way. They were not even close in that matchup in the knockout stage. It's a very young team, one of the youngest at the World Cup last time.

So all of the building now for the U.S. men's national team is to build on the experience, is to move forward, and make sure that they have the best team possible for when they will host here in the United States. So this is not, as I say, devastation. Yeah, it was the Netherlands.

It was not devastation. This wasn't them missing out on the World Cup. At the same time, in CONCACAF, generally, they get to the championship, if not win the whole thing. There's been a lot of turmoil, a lot of transition for them. They've had different guys on and off the field, of course, because you've got guys who are on loan from their European clubs and so on. And they've been on loan from their European clubs. And so it's a bit of a deck that keeps getting shuffled. Not to mention the whole situation with Berhalter, who hasn't yet returned to take over, but should soon.

So there's been a lack of consistency, different leadership, all that kind of stuff. Still, this is short of what the U.S. men's national team generally does in the Gold Cup. Matt Turner, logged some major minutes. This is, I think I read this is the only time, maybe, that the U.S. has ever had two of its games in Gold Cup go into not just extra time, but into penalty kicks. And so from the quarterfinals and the semifinals, he's logged a lot of time and a lot of stress. Yeah, they never played extra time twice in the same tournament.

And now they go extra time in consecutive matches. I know Matt Turner takes these losses really hard. Most keepers do put losses on themselves, but at the same time wanting to be big picture and keep kind of the perspective, which is that this is all preparation for what's to come. Yeah, I mean, no one wants to me to sit up here and complain about things that we had no control of. So we just have to get on with it. And I'm really proud of this group because we battled and it wasn't easy for us. You know, we kept it nil-nil for as long as we could. We did the little things right for majority of the game. But, you know, a small mistake on my part. I say small, but it was a huge mistake.

And kind of go from here, it was zero. And then the team picks me up and then gets into penalty kicks and we didn't get the job done tonight. So it's always penalty kicks can be kind of a 50-50 whatever. But again, just this group resilient to battle back. And it's been kind of like our M.O.

all tournament. We wish we didn't go behind, but sometimes you do and it's a credit. And I think that these experiences will do well for our player pool.

All building toward what's to come in 2026. The United States, they've kind of languished on the fringes of soccer elite. And there are times with some of the superstars that we've had on this team before.

This is going back now to not this most recent World Cup, but the one that they missed. They had a bunch of veterans on that team. We've had some pretty incredible men's national team players.

In fact, a couple of them were on the desk on Fox Sports, which is where that interview was done with Matt Turner. You think about some of the guys who have come through, you know, Captain America, Clint Dempsey, Landon Donovan was at the desk, Alexi Lawless going back even farther. So Team USA has even gotten into the point where they're, you know, they're ranked among the best in the world. But they were starting over, right?

After Bruce Arena, after they kind of made the change, really changing managers for multiple tournaments and multiple iterations. Greg Berhalter had the task of connecting with the young guys and seeing if they could put a foundation and a culture in place so that they could finally get over the hump. It's not just to get to the knockout stage or maybe get to the final eight or the final four. And so that still remains the challenge now with Team USA. But a lot of these other ancillary tournaments, it's really more about finding depth, right? You want to win, of course, but you also want to find different guys that you feel like can be in the mix and that you can bring into camp and that you can create a real competition for playing time. That you can make sure that you have the best of the best on your roster. And certainly the Americans have generated some pretty incredible talent. Christian Pulisic, be excited to see him again. So he's been on and off the men's national team because of his responsibilities elsewhere.

And that goes for a lot of these guys too. They're not always with the men's national team until they get into World Cup qualifying. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence here on CBS Sports Radio. All right, so transitioning to the other kind of football.

Segue! The other football in the United States, we don't call it football, we call it soccer, but the other football, NFL college football, it may not be in the white hot spotlight just yet, but it will be soon. Have you guys checked out that documentary on Netflix called Quarterback, which is narrated by Peyton Manning and features, let's say, it features Marcus Mariota and Kirk Cousins. He is an interesting cat.

And then also Patrick Mahomes. I started watching it on Wednesday evening. It's out there now.

I think it might be all eight episodes have been released all at once, but I could be wrong. I do know that the documentary is available on Netflix now, at least a couple of episodes. And don't tell anyone, but producer Jay gave me his login. We were a little bit worried that it wasn't going to work. I don't have Netflix, but he said to me, try this.

My sister said it might not work on your TV, but it'll work on your device because Netflix is cracking down on password sharing. Now I assured him, don't tell anyone, this is our little secret. I assured him that I would log out as soon as I was done. So while Jay is on vacation, my goal is to watch the entire series, but I did start watching it. And what jumped out at me initially, oh, you've got footage from on the field where these quarterbacks are mic'd up, which is really amazing. Plus Peyton, who, you know, is, is always, I think is always entertaining, but also the footage from behind the scenes too. Now our guest who will join us at the top of the hour writes about the NFL for the AP. He just sat down with Patrick Mahomes and Jalen Hurts, actually. He's next here after hours with Amy Lawrence, CBS Sports Radio.