2-8-24 After Hours with Amy Lawrence Podcast : Hour 2

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Offer valid for a limited time, $10 minimum per order. Additional terms apply. We get out of the accreditation center and, to my understanding, you're supposed to be walking a few hundred feet to be able to get into the media center. Oh no. It's got to be a two mile loop.

You do a ginormous circle to go out of the building, go through NFL security, and then you come back in the building, you end up exactly where you started. For your right. So yes, my feet already hurt, I've already got blisters from my heels, tomorrow I'll be wearing sneakers with my dress, and I don't care. To party.

From the home of Super Bowl 58, it's After Hours with Amy Lawrence, sponsored by Southern Recipe. We are feeling it. And yes, I got a lot smarter on Wednesday. In fact, I wore slacks and shoes that I could walk in. And then after we got into Radio Row, I put on my heels.

I did not walk in the heels. Because even though it wasn't quite as far, we already had our credentials, it's still easily, Jay, wouldn't you say it's a mile from our hotel to get to Radio Row? And then once you're on Radio Row, CBS Sports Radio set is on the far side, so we have to loop all the way around. The Mandalay Bay Convention Center is enormous, but it really does reflect the rest of the property, which is urban sprawl.

It's so spread out. And wait until we tell you where they're building or planning to build the new stadium for the A's. Our Uber, oh, Lyft driver, sorry. Our Lyft driver gave us some intel that we think is really important to share, so we'll do that a little bit later on.

Also, even though I haven't yet told you here on the show which former player was holding court, laughing, I mean, large crowds the entire time that he was on Radio Row, I did put up a photo on Twitter, so if you would like a sneak peek of the photo, I snapped, and you want to know before I tell the story, well check it out on Twitter, ALawRadio. Also on our Facebook page, Producer Jay is putting up reels and photos, he's taking the ones I have on Twitter and he's putting them up on Facebook, so check it out there as well. We did a little buzz-worthy video from inside the Mandalay Bay Casino, I took some photos in there too. So we have a lot to share, it's just so busy during the daytime that we don't get a chance to post a whole lot on social media.

It's three days and it's an all-out blitz, but we wouldn't have it any other way. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence from Las Vegas and Super Bowl Week and we're so pleased that you're with us. We've gotten so much reaction on both of our sites, we know that the traffic is up on our podcast as well, so we will continue on next three hours here full of great conversations and fun stories, as well as some of the headlines out of Vegas that have to do with football, because right now we're not spending a whole lot of time talking about the actual Super Bowl, which is funny. You may know the name Jen Welter, she was the first female coach in the NFL. She actually got hired by Bruce Arians to work on his staff with the Arizona Cardinals and that goes back almost a decade ago. I ran into her at Super Bowl 50 in San Francisco and she was just becoming a name that was worthy of buzz. A lot has changed for Jen since then and it was really cool to be able to catch up with her on Radio Row.

I actually said that to her. It's been a long time. 2015 in San Francisco was when we met for the first time. You had just finished up with the Cardinals. Now Bruce Arians is out of the league and my goodness, my life has changed. How much has your life changed since then, Jen? Well, I don't know if Bruce is ever going to be out of the league.

You might say retired, but I think he's still very active with Tampa Bay. But my life is the same and different. It's still very much football focused.

It's just in what capacity. I do a lot of designing, programming to make the game more inclusive. Whether it be girls and women, like girls through my gridiron, girls nonprofit where we've done 60 free girls camps across the country to date. Or a day in the life where we bring women onto the field and into the game by teaching them the game of football. Or I also work with Snoop Special Stars where we create first camps and then we ended up starting a league for kids with special needs. So it's really important to me that we open up the playbook and open up the access and opportunity to this game. Because this is the game that changed my world.

I say this sometimes on my show. There is very little in this world that brings people together. In the United States, we can't agree on anything except football. It continues to grow. Why do you think it's so popular and so appealing outside of just the football fraternity?

I think the game itself is a game that fundamentally requires diversity to work. Who's your favorite player? My favorite player right now?

That's a good question. I want to go away from quarterback. I don't even know about Cam Hayward. Okay. Cam Hayward.

Great player. Yes. Can you win if you had 11 Cam Heywards?

No. There's no player that you can take that you didn't want just one or maybe four or five. Right?

Like four or five at the max. If you give me four or five Tyreke Hills, I'm going to run spread and I'm going to crush you with speed all day. But I can't have 11 Tyreke Hills. Right? I can run an OO offense, go spread or even throw him back at running back.

And yeah, you're going to have trouble. But I also need the trenches. And so it's a sport where really what makes you different makes you special and on the field and in the locker room. We see that it brings us together. I'm the woman that I am now today in this world with my love of diversity because of every woman and man that I've played with.

Domestic and abroad. Every woman and man that I've coached or been coached by domestic and abroad or competed against. Because this game shows you what someone's about. When someone will go in, let's say use check, right, take that full back position where you're fully running through and taking the biggest hit that somebody's got to not always be the one who gets the glory, but to open a hole. So one of your teammates will run through that guy.

I don't just want on my football team. I want to know him as a person because I already know the core of the person. The rest is just details, right?

Great human, great ballplayer. Now I just want to know, like, okay, like, what's your favorite color, right? Like, I want to know more about you. But we already have this turf that's our common turf. And I think if we did more things in the world that way, right, if we met people first how they are and then ask them their opinions, we would get to a lot better places with people. But so many times we first meet somebody's opinion and we don't even know the core of who they are or how they operate or, you know, if they truly run a lead block for somebody. Because that tells you a lot. I can tell a lot of what I need to know about a person by how they play this game. The NFL makes a big deal about trying to expand its diversity.

They've got the Rooney Rule. They hail more and more women who are working. You've been in the locker room, you've been on the field.

How would you evaluate the way the league is expanding and attracting diversity? You know, it's so hard, right? Like, if you look at where we are at any one day, they say patience is a virtue, right? Clearly I have lost mine. Because I never had any right. Like, I'm not sure I ever had anyone.

I'd be like, really? That's virtuous? This is how we're defining virtue now?

Oh my goodness, I'm in such trouble. Because do we want it to be better? Of course we do.

We want it not just in football, but we want it in the world. Women aren't making the same money in any area of the world, right? So are we happy with that where we are right now? No. But are we making progress?

We are. And so would I like more? Yes.

Of course I would. But do I think that we're doing a great job? Well, let's look at it this way. Ten years ago, could you even talk about a woman coaching in the NFL? No. Didn't exist.

She didn't. And now there are so many examples of these amazing women who are, you know, not only blazing trails in the NFL, but like, you know, just in so many areas, right? Like, you know, you see women coaching college, right? You see, like, Katie and Liz Sowers crushing it at Ottawa, right?

Katie and Liz weren't a part of the conversation ten years ago, right? We see Callie Brunson, Jennifer King, Lo Locust, women doing the damn thing in the NFL. And we have to be proud at where they are and consistently look at ways that we can continue to perpetuate change.

So the fact that the league is proactively looking to do that, that's the money shot, right? And we can't ever say that we're satisfied because then we'll stop working, right? Like, if we say, yeah, it's good, then that's when things slow down and go the other way. So we need to keep pushing forward and also be really proud of how far we've come. Dr. Jen Welter, back on Radio Row. It's so great to connect with you again.

It's after hours here on CBS Sports Radio. It's not easy to be the first at anything. What was it like for you to be the first?

I think the hardest thing about being the first is that, first of all, there's no roadmap, right? And I look at my own career and even some of the decisions that I made and I think, gosh, I could have done that better had I known. And at the same time, at the same time, I have to give myself some grace because I didn't know and the people who I grew up in the game with didn't know either. I am the woman that I am because of the strong backbone and motivation of the women in football.

They drive me forward. But they weren't there either, right? A lot of the guys, the advantage that they have is they've got that locker room where they've got that fraternity, right? And so they can call so-and-so or so-and-so knows such and such and they can build on that.

I didn't have that. All I had to do was think, like, okay, well, maybe this. Or, you know, talk to somebody like Nancy Lieberman in basketball and be like, sis, what do I do? And do the best that I could that way. So I think that's what's really challenging when we look at advancement for women or being the first is that lack of role model and maybe mentorship. Now, obviously, like, I try and challenge myself to be the woman that I needed and didn't have.

But it would have been really nice to also have that woman, right? You are preaching to the choir, girl. I hear you.

So you have these camps that you mentioned. And I know you're doing a couple here in Las Vegas. I'm really intrigued by the one that you title a day in the life. How much do you see women and girls get into that? That must be so cool.

So a day in the life is 21 plus. Ladies, I love the girls. But they say home on this day.

This one is for you. OK, so for the ladies or for the husbands, boyfriends, whatever, this is the best day. Guys, if you like watching football and you'd like your lady to understand it, send her to me. It's almost Valentine's Day. There's nothing better than your lady taking her XOXO love of football and dropping that X's and O's game day knowledge. OK, so you should invest in sending her I think it'd be a great Valentine's Day present.

Ladies, if you don't have that or he doesn't buy in, buy it for yourself because you will be a better date when you understand the X's and O's. I promise you. But for me, it's we're going to take these women in. They get to come out on my field, have some beverages which will either hydrate you or dehydrate you, depending on which beverage you choose. I'm just saying we're after dark right now. We can have that conversation.

We should be cheersing ourselves or maybe we are it's radio and you don't know. And then we'll have breakfast. And then we hit the field starting with coach intros. We have an amazing I feel like a really good head coach right now.

Head coaching is all about collecting talent. When I tell you I've been collecting talent, I'm just going to name drop a little bit because I'm like rolling my sleeves up, y'all, if you didn't know, because I mean, when I say I have like, I don't know, pro bowl punter Mark White King, who's going to teach the ladies how to punt. I have all time Green Bay Packers leading rusher. I'm on green.

Awesome. I have 49ers legend Ricky Waters. I also have, you know, we can't just talk about men. I would be remiss if I didn't say I have my two time gold medal winning sister.

We used to play against each other and then we became teammates on Team USA. Yes, we have the rings to prove it. We got two gold rings, y'all Adrian Smith. Then we have Lois Cook, who is a DC diva.

And I don't I don't mean just in life, like she actually plays for them, too. And one of the bright up and coming content creators and just amazing humans and a heck of a wide receiver coming. So we have this collection of fantastic men and women. And then, of course, you know, we got D.J.

Lexi, who's going to have the tunes right all day. This is a party with football, right? It's come out coach Centro's. So you get to meet everybody and then playbook. You're going to get an install. So in a day in the life of a player at training camp, when you come in, you get an install. Those are the plays that we're going to install that day as coaches.

They're going to get a base install. So we're going to learn a couple of defenses, a couple of run plays, pass plays. You learn how to read a playbook. OK, then we'll transition into a dynamic warm up.

Got to get you warm. Then we'll go station rotation where you learn each position. Right. Like let's use the big boys, for example. OK, let's talk about how we read football on defense. You don't look at the quarterback.

His pretty face is a lie. Quarterback's job is to misdirect you. He's to bring you in. Right.

Run pass option. He's waiting for where you mess up and he's going to go opposite. His job is to be a liar. He's cute, but he's that boy you don't want to date.

OK, ladies, you do not want to date the quarterback. He is a lie. The truth is in the trenches.

The big boys in the trenches are the ones who tell you the truth. They come forward. It's a run play. They kick back, kick step backwards.

You're not doing that for no reason. It's a pass play. So when you come to the O-line station, we're going to teach you how to run block and a pass block. So when you see it on Sundays, you'll be like, oh, it's a run.

It's a pass. And we put all of those positions together and then we'll run offense on air and defense on air. So you get to see how the plays come together. Then, of course, we'll have more beverages that will either hydrate you or dehydrate you. I'm just saying.

And, you know, some food to round out the day. Oh, sounds like fun. And how do people find out more? I want to find out more.

Yeah. So you can find out any information on my website, which is Jen welcher dot com. You can also go to my Instagram, welcher 47, see some of the talented men and women. I only gave you a few of them. You know, I only dropped a few names for you all.

And you can also buy tickets either right on Jen welcher dot com or on my Instagram. Very cool. Well, it's great to connect with you.

And you have remained busy. I see your name and hear your name every now and then in football circles. Do you feel like you're a part of this?

Even though, as you point out, you were the first. So but like being here with the NFL convention of sorts. Does it feel like a home to you a little bit when you run into people? It's always a home. You know, they say the home is where the heart is, like the home is where the locker room is. And this is my locker room.

You know, the people in and around the game like that's family. You know, I walked in the first person I saw was none other than Hall of Famer Warren Moon. And he said, Coach, I may come see you Saturday. Like, I know you got the best of the girls in Vegas coming. Can I come out and coach the girls? I'm like, yes, Hall of Famer.

Like, yes, please come coach the girls with me. And that's that's what home is. Home is always about people.

And it's the place where you feel loved and welcome. And anytime I'm in football circles, that's love for me. Well, I'm excited to connect with you again.

Dr. Jen Welter, first among the women to coach in the NFL. It's so great to have you here on Radio Road. Thank you so much. Absolutely.

Thanks for having me. She is different, and yet she is the same from when I first met her in 2015. So would be nine years ago. She has expanded her business and is a true entrepreneur as a former player and a coach. She has morphed into a different role and yet still teaching the game that she loves. She's passionate about it and she's funny and she's clever. And she shares her heart, which I love about Dr. Jen Welter.

She's a Ph.D., which is pretty incredible. Again, all of our conversations are podcasted separately. And so if you miss any with Mark Ingram, with Jen Welter, upcoming with the Thunderbirds. Oh, and we got the best of the best.

You can catch it minutes after the show is done. And even though we're upside down, we know you all are still in your regular schedules. We don't know what day it is. We're sometimes forgetting what date it is.

Half the time I don't even know what the weather is like outside because we don't ever go outside. Until this afternoon, we went on an adventure. Jay and I will share our Wednesday afternoon adventure with you. I got duped by the lady at Dirt Dog, but we did in fact visit one of the Las Vegas locales that you all told us to find.

Oh, and also, Jay just posted a video that we took from inside the Mandalay Bay casino. It's goofy. We're goofy. But you get the scene set and also me trying to decide what game we should play.

But you'll hear the dings and you'll hear the rings and you'll hear the pings and you'll see the blings. Right? So check it out. Right now it's on our Facebook page. After Hours with Amy Lawrence. It's also on our Twitter. Coming up, A-Law Radio or After Hours CBS. Straight ahead, Dirt Dogs. It's After Hours with Amy Lawrence CBS Sports Radio.

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I haven't shared all of my scene set photos yet, my personal photos. But I did take both of the ones that I just posted in the last half hour, a pair of cams on Radio Row. And when I tell you I was standing that close to the mountain of a man, Cam Hayward, yes, I was that close. I could hear his conversation with former Steelers running back, his former teammate James Connor. Cam was actually interviewing James for his podcast. So every athlete has a podcast these days. Cam is one of those that I think is worth listening to. He's funny, he has a ton of experience, he's the leader of the Steelers. Now in his mid-thirties, what hasn't he seen on a football field, right?

And he also has a great personality, a lot of humor. He was cracking up James who was a little more reserved. The other Cam on Radio Row, I didn't even see him, but I heard him. He was surrounded by a glut of people all morning long, well morning.

We got back to Radio Row around 1130, so it was lunchtime. He was doing his live radio show, which is 4th and 1, I believe is the name of it, 4th and 1 for Cam Newton. And the entire time we could see a mob of people around this space.

It's a whole set. Again, check out the Twitter photo, ALawRadio, or you can go to our Facebook page, Jay repurposed it there. I didn't, again, I didn't see him because there were so many people, but all of a sudden I heard him. He was demonstrative, he was jovial, of course, that's Cam Newton. He was holding court in a very different way from Cam Hayward. So at one point, there weren't quite as many people around him, so I went up and I managed to grab a photo. You must see what Cam Newton is wearing.

I dare not describe it, but you must check out what Cam Newton is wearing. He was busy, he was larger than life, he's as typical of Cam Newton. He was doing his show, he had different guests, and as I say, he was very popular.

There were people around him almost the entire time. So Cam is certainly in his element whenever he's the center of attention. He knows what to do when the spotlight is on. Again, I took both of those photos. A lot of the photos you're seeing, producer Jay has taken.

But I've taken a few, and I've shared them on Twitter, and he's putting them on Facebook after hours with Amy Lawrence. We did give you a quick 15 second video of the Mandalay Bay casino. It is cavernous like the rest of Mandalay Bay, and that's just one of the casinos.

The one in Luxor where we're staying is also huge. And as we got back to the hotel around 3.30 early on Wednesday morning following our show, it was thicker smoke than what it had been when we left. There were still a ton of people out. There were still a few food outlets that were open. There was at least one Starbucks that we saw that was open.

There were plenty of people still taking advantage of the Vegas nightlife. So we get back, we have some food, try to catch a couple hours of Z's and then head back to Radio Row, and that's pretty much the pattern that we follow. But by the time we got done on Radio Row on Wednesday afternoon, we were famished. I didn't have breakfast. Did you have breakfast?

No, I did not. When we ate at 3.30, 4 a.m., I opted to just get ready and do some prep. I slept in a little extra more rather than go down and get something.

I don't know. I chose to sleep over food yesterday. Well, I stood a 20-minute line for Starbucks because I needed coffee. The one that is kind of off the beaten path that opened at 10 a.m. in the food court still only took cash. So now I have cash, but I didn't have cash on Wednesday morning. Anyway, so I was standing in line at Starbucks.

Jay was still sleeping. Neither one of us ate. So by the time we got done around 4 o'clock on Wednesday afternoon, we were completely starving. So we decide we're going to do the dirt dogs thing. All right, we're going to do the dirt dog things.

And actually, Jay, if you want to share the photos because we're telling the story now. So we walk. The way that it's set up in Vegas, just so I can explain it, you don't walk in a straight line. You zigzag across the street, up a staircase, across a bridge, over the road, back down the other side. You loop through hotels.

You go around gardens. It's not a straight shot. As the crow flies, it was probably what? A quarter of a mile? Yeah, if that. It's right there.

You're looking right at it. But it took us 20 minutes to get from our hotel, past the Excalibur, and then across the street to the MGM Grand and the Tropicana. And then around the MGM Grand, up another staircase, down the other side, to get to not just the food court where Dirt Dog was located.

It was in a food court, but also to find a target in a CVS because we both needed a couple of things. Anyway, so as we make our way to Dirt Dog, yeah, it's crazy that it's in a food court. And I would say kind of a dumpy food court, too.

Not a real nice one. Yeah, not a ritzy food court. So we walk up to the Dirt Dog counter, and the lady can tell.

Jay's taking photos of the menu, right? So the lady can tell, we haven't been here before. Your first time at Dirt Dog, she says?

Yes, I admit. We're visiting because it was recommended to us. So she tells me, this is what I recommend.

These are the two favorites. And she points to a couple of different dogs on the menu, and then she points to the section with the fries. I mistakenly assumed, this is what happens when you assume, that every item on the menu was a dog.

So I'm thinking I get the carne asada fries on the dog, right? So that's what I order because I needed something green. There was avocado. I've had no greens, no vegetables, no nothing in three days.

So I needed something green. Also, I love carne asada. So I order the carne asada thinking it's fries on a Dirt Dog. The dog, by the way, is wrapped in bacon. Every dog is wrapped in bacon.

Which Jay didn't know because he orders one. It was the patty melt, right? Patty melt I went with. Jay gets the patty melt Dirt Dog, and he says, I got bacon. Well, you got a double dose of bacon because every dog is wrapped in bacon. So we get our dogs, we take photos, we sit down, and I start digging through my pile of carne asada fries, only to realize there's no dog.

The lady duped me. I think she was hoping we would buy both a dog and fries. But like I said, I mistakenly assumed that there was a dog buried under every pile of food. And it reminds me of, I don't know, whenever you were in college, if you ever went out, and there were all these places that you could go, whether it be a diner or some other kind of hole in the wall that offered a garbage plate. And so it's like everything just piled on a plate. Yes, exactly. And because a lot of times people are not in full possession of their senses, they'll eat anything that's on the plate.

It looked like that, although a little prettier. So Jay and I took a photo of his patty melt Dirt Dog and my carne asada fries. But yeah, I'm digging through.

Jay can attest to this. I'm digging through my fries and my meat and my avocado, my sour cream and my cheese, and I can't find the dog. Jay, I don't have a dog. Where's my dog?

Oh, we need a PJ Tucker. We got dogs. So I feel a little duped. Like she took me for a ride hoping that I would buy fries with a dog, but I didn't realize there was no dog in there. You think that was her angle?

She wanted you to, oh, welcome. We got to try both of these. The hot dog and the, I mean, that's, that's a huge order though. These are like solid meal size to go to eat that dog and that fries.

I don't know, that'd be a lot. There were signs and videos that were showing off the various recommendations slash reviews Dirt Dog has received. And as I say, Jay's taking photos the whole time.

He's going to share one on Twitter and Facebook. But it's really funny because there's a recommendation from, I think it was a TV show that called it one of the top ten places to eat in Vegas. And red on Netflix. Right. And Jay and I are thinking in here, there's got to be another one somewhere else. I mean, it was this hole in the wall, dirty food court. I didn't expect that. I was a little let down by the ambiance.

Got to say God or lack thereof. Right. But maybe the fact that it's a dirt dog actually emblematic of where it's located.

So he's going to post the photo again. I did not have a dog, though Jay did give me a piece of his hot dog. I was OK with the carne asada fries. But just so you don't get super disappointed in me or believe that I'm not telling you the truth.

I didn't actually have a dog. All right. It's after hours with Amy Lawrence. Check out our photos and videos after hours.

CBS on Twitter, also on our Facebook page. Coming up, our friend Solomon Wilcox, as well as a friend that he always brings along. And a bear will explain between this pork rind giveaway and delicious recipes. You want to ask your friends to pass the pigskin. Do it at pork rind day dot com. Thanks to our friends at Southern Recipes.

Small batch pork rinds for our time here in Las Vegas. It's after hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio. Solomon Wilcox, one of our repeat offenders on radio row whenever we have the chance. He is a great talker. Former Bengals defensive back and has the Believe in Bengals podcast on the Believe Network. He always brings guests had a chance to sit down with them on radio row on Wednesday afternoon. And I asked him what he thinks about the marriage between the Super Bowl, the NFL and Las Vegas. It's been good. You know, the NFL is really about growing its market base.

That's why they're now going to go down to Brazil and play right. Introduce our game to an entirely different population. But this is the intersection of sports and entertainment. And I absolutely love it.

You played obviously in a different era. Is that fair? Yeah, it is.

I think it's fair. When it was only betting and gambling in sports in Las Vegas. And now it's prevalent.

It's everywhere. How would you evaluate the NFL on the way it's melded the two worlds that used to be opposite ends of the spectrum? Amy, when I first came into this league, they put the fear of God in us. When it came to gaming and sports, they told us you cannot be seen in a casino.

And we went through this sort of indoctrination every single year. Right. You cannot participate in any game gaming or gambling.

You could not even be affiliated right with any company that was sponsored by a casino. And now here we are partnering together. The NFL and even the commissioner, Roger Goodell, said that Las Vegas has become the epicenter for sports and entertainment. And that he looked forward to building the relationship here. And I had to wonder, what am I hearing?

What am I listening to? But look, they're trying to grow the sport. And you and I both know, you throw sports and entertainment together, that's big.

You throw gaming in there, that's the trifecta, right? So that's what we're seeing. I'm going to ask you to take me back to when you played and you were in locker rooms. How much of a temptation is it for guys to be in an atmosphere like this? For us, there was no temptation. Because we were fully indoctrinated that it's a no-no. That you would not even be around.

You would be gone and banished from this league. Now what they've done is like a lot of other things. We've seen these barriers come down. And what's happened, I don't think it's been handled as well as it could have been because I think any time that you allow players to participate in that kind of space, there's also an opportunity for things to come off the rail. And so what should happen, there should be a great deal of education saying, guys, here's what the parameters are.

Here are the guard rails, right? You can participate in sports gaming, but only in this way. And here is what the punishments are. And here is what, look, and it should be not two, three games. You're done. You're going to be done for a year. And after that, you're done. You know, you've got to really be clear.

And I think there has to be a ramp-up period. Now when we were playing, if you were even in the casino, you were done. I mean, we know Paul Horning. You remember Alex Karas? These guys were done for a whole year.

They were banished from the game. And we've seen players lose their entire career. But look, I think the NFL is trying to do its best job.

But I think a lot more education needs to take place as we begin to sort of blend both worlds. Solomon Wilcox is with us here on Radio Row. Always look forward to it every year. And you always bring a friend with you. And one of the things I love about you, Solomon, is that you want to leave the game better than it was when you played. And most of that is about medical. It's about the health of players.

So I've done this before. I'm going to have you introduce your partner today and explain why this is important to you. Why this is an important period. Well, I'm joined with Dr. Scott Sigmund of MEOC Orthopedics. And he is a phenomenal doctor because he is providing a service for athletes, for weekend warriors, people who have torn their ACL.

Right? We all know that is a really bad injury. If you're a football player, you tear your ACL.

You could end your career. But I'm going to let Dr. Sigmund tell you a little bit more about the way that he has the hands for healing. And he'll tell you how it happens. Dr. Sigmund. Thanks, Sal. Amy, you know, one of the worst three letters you can hear if you go to the orthopedist, right? ACL. Anything in sports is not as bad as ACL. ACL.

It's the words, it's the letters you don't want to hear. And we're pretty good at it. You know, ACL reconstructions. We can get players back on the field.

And what do we do? You know, we take that patellar tendon with a piece of bone on both sides. It hurts like hell. It's a long recovery.

Difficult to get through. Patients even after ACL surgeries can even still have arthritis. If you take a look at the epidemic of knee arthritis in NFL alumni, right, for example. So what if we could get your body to heal its own ACL? Where we don't have to take a graft.

We don't have to remove something that God gave you and try and replace it with something else. Instead, we suture the ACL arthroscopically. We put this collagen implant in and your body with its own blood recreates your ACL and creates a healed ACL. How cool is that? It's pretty impressive. Our bodies are impressive beings. Almost like science experiments. It's amazing what the body can do to heal itself. We have to give it the help to be able to do so. And so with this technique in particular, first I want to tell everybody this is totally FDA approved. It is not experimental.

It's 20 years in the making. And we have really great science behind it as well. I've personally done 70 patients at this point. The rehab is much easier at the beginning of their ACL surgery because you don't have to take that piece of bone or that tendon. You don't have to make these extra incisions. So the patients can actually recover early on quickly. It still takes time to get back on the field and recover and do. But really fascinating technology and science and innovation in ACL surgery.

First time in a long time we've seen something new. What's the success rate so far? So we have 2,000 patients that have been done since FDA approval. And I've got to tell you the failure rate is under 2%.

I mean it's really impressive. The literature failure rate for a standard ACL reconstruction with a patellar graft can be anywhere from 10 to 15% depending on the literature. So one of the other really cool things is that when it comes to ACL injuries in particular, we always worry about later arthritis for the patient. Early studies are very promising to show that potentially having a bare implant will reduce your incidence of arthritis later in life. That's the holy grail.

If we can do that, think about how much better it can be for patients in their entire lives. Oh yes. I mean Solomon moves really well, but I see guys who played 80s, 90s, they're limping. They have a gait that looks painful. And so a lot of it has to do with the injuries that came from when they played because the technology wasn't as good. And they didn't have these cool bears. Everybody gets a bear and every patient gets one after they're searching, I swear to God.

Dr. Scott Sigman with us here and Solomon on Radio Rose. So let me ask you this, when you see an athlete go down with a non-contact injury on TV, do you know right away? Does that have to do with angles? You just can see it the way they go down, they grasp their knee and you can actually in slow motion. But yeah, the non-contact ACL is just so difficult to sort of prevent, right? And so there's a lot of prevention in ACL work as well with different exercises and things that can be done as well. So there is hope. We're really pushing hard to change the science and innovation of ACL surgery. And we really think that this bear implant is going to take us there. Is it just about getting the word out so that people know they have this option?

That's exactly right. So we want to let everybody know where, which is the bearimplant.com slash Super Bowl. Bearimplant.com slash Super Bowl. You can find a doctor in your local area that's doing it. You can get a consult.

You can learn more about it there as well. What's it like walking around with this superstar? Are you kidding me?

Solomon Wilcox. Man, we got to stop every 20 seconds for somebody else to come over and get on. Yes, exactly. He's so popular. So I've asked you this before, but before I let you go, I always love when you respond. What do you remember about your Super Bowl? Wow. It's a lot to remember. Another year in the past, right? What do you remember about it? You know, I remember having a lot of conversations with, you know, NFL guys who are much older than me. I was only in my second year in the NFL, and I just remember almost every single player saying, Look, you can't win the game until you get on the field and start playing the game on Sunday. But you can lose it between now and kickoff.

Think about that. And then we had a player by the name of Stanley Wilson who went running off into the night. And, yes, made headlines.

You've probably heard of it, right? But he never came back. And so think about it as a football team, as a player, because you're family. And I remember Coach Sam Weiss met with us that night. He said, Guy, Stanley couldn't make it. And he told us about what happened. And we were sort of worried about him. What happened? Where is he?

Is he okay? So we went to bed that night with heavy hearts. And our minds on him, you're talking about the ultimate distraction of having to go out and play. And that's what we did the very next day. And we were going up against a 49er team that had Joe Montana, Roger Craig, Jerry Rice, Tom Rathmann, Brent Jones. These were great players, epic teams, obviously.

They're legendary today. But the score was 3-3 by halftime, and we thought we had them where we wanted. But in the end, Joe Montana went riding off in the night with our trophy. That's what I remember about Super Bowl XXIII. Boomer Esiason has told me, your teammates, has told me that he was about to do an interview and the whole, I'm going to Disney World. And all of a sudden, at the end of the game, the cameras, the crew, they go racing off to the other side and just leave him in the dust. It must have been quite the emotional swing. Because Boomer was going to be the winning quarterback.

Every time now I look at that game, I can't look at it anymore. And Boomer's my guy, so I say this in all fun. I went back and I was looking at, you know, because we do that.

We're journalists. We like to study the numbers. I went back and I looked at Boomer. Boomer completed 11 passes that game. The most passes he completed to one player was three to Chris Collins' work.

Three to Eddie Brant. And I'm like, you're not beating Joe Montana with those numbers. I thought we were so close to winning the game.

You know how the further and further you get away from things, you think that you have. Like, no. I was like, next time I see Boomer, I'll say, boom, 11 completions. I'm talking to him this week. He was the MVP that year. He was the golden boy. He was the guy. Amazing.

And I'm like, oh, it broke my heart. So the Wilcox and NFL vet. And remind me the name of your podcast on Believe. The Believe in Bengals podcast. Believe in Bengals podcast.

And Dr. Scott Sigmon and the bear implant technique. Remind me of the website one more time. It's bearinplant.com slash Super Bowl.

Right? It is awesome to connect with you guys. Thanks so much for a couple of minutes. Thanks, Amy. Amy, you're the best. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Solomon always brings friends. He always brings friends. But they're always doctors or scientists. And he is really committed to making the game safer and to making athletes healthier even after they retire. Check out the photo of Solomon and the doctor and me and the bear on Twitter, ALawRadio, our Facebook page too. From Las Vegas, it's After Hours with Amy Lawrence on CBS Sports Radio.

A peanut butter M&M's production. In a world where Super Bowl winners get the world's admiration and a fancy ring, but the runners-up get nothing. One retired cop returns. That's one retired quarterback. Read the script.

Oh, sorry. One retired quarterback returns to claim what's his. Um, that's claim a ring with diamonds made from M&M's peanut butter. But you're on a roll. The Ring of Comfort, coming soon to a Super Bowl new you. There's joy in every journey. 2024 Santa Fe available early 2024. Nobody wants a surprise in their jelly donut.

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