ECU Baseball and UNC Baseball advance to Super Regionals

This is the best of the Adam Gold Show Podcast brought to you by Coach Pete at Capital Financial Advisory Group.

Visit us at capitalfinancialusa.com. This is the Adam Gold Show. At some point today, Dennis, we need to talk about pickleball. Do we? Yeah. Can we bet on it? Probably. There's a pro circuit.

I'm sure there are odds out there somewhere. The Professional Pickleball Association. It's owned by Carolina Hurricanes owner, Tom Dundon. Oh, nice. Oh, yeah, absolutely. So, yeah, I was just at the gym this morning and they devote like there's two full court basketball courts that you can play on, but one of them has been like stolen by pickleball players. Really?

Yes. I have opened pickleball for like four hours a day. I've been told I would enjoy pickleball. Look, I have no problem with it. I'm fascinated by like people take it very seriously. I saw a guy like headbands, wristbands, KT tape. Yes.

Oh my gosh, they're so serious. Did he have the Rex specs on too? No, no, no. Please tell me I have Rex specs.

I didn't see anybody with Rex specs. Here's the thing. You ever do bowl? Oh, yeah. Or play pool, anything like that? Yeah. The people that bring their own ball, right?

Or the people who bring their own pool cue. Oh, there you go. Yeah. Yeah.

Screwing it together. Not gonna lie, when I was in college, I had my own pool cue. Did you bring your own chalk too? No, I did not have my own chalk. I trusted the pool hall to have its own chalk. So, but guy walked into the gym and had a backpack with a pickleball, with like his pickleball.

He had two pickleball paddles. Okay. I didn't realize you needed two. I guess.

Gotta have a backup. Gosh, it's awesome. People are very into it. Very into it. And again, I'm not, I'm not knocking the sport.

It's fascinating to me, but it is, it is exploding. So to me, it's better than, better than Frisbee golf. All right.

Let's, let's start this thing. I said Frisbee golf. Oh, not disc golf. Yeah. I said Frisbee golf. Cause they're Frisbees. Not ultimate though.

That's a different discussion. That is a great sport. I love ultimate. Great, great sport. If you go online, you like the ESPN.com and like their highlights of the day, there's always like two or three highlights from ultimate. It is just tremendous. So all the respect in the world for ultimate.

All right. So a great day for college baseball here in the state of North Carolina yesterday. Was it not? Tar Heels took care of VCU 7-3. They scored 19 runs on Sunday.

They hammered out 17 hits, including four home runs. They only scored seven last night. They're into the super regionals at home against Arkansas.

Razorbacks with the upset of Oklahoma state. Think about this Dennis, the Cowboys, Oklahoma state had scored 65 runs in the previous four games, 65, 65. They had 29 in one previous four games. They had scored 65 football team.

Ridiculous. Uh, but the hogs held them down 7-3 win. So Carolina gets to host a super regional.

Otherwise they would have been on the road at Oklahoma state. Uh, by the way, nine times in the last 15 season, I believe if I have this right, North Carolina has made it to the super regionals. They have seven trips to the college world series. So I believe if that, if my math is correct, there's seven and one in super regionals. It's pretty good, right?

Is that, that, that would be the math, right? Uh, East Carolina walloped coastal Carolina 13-4 in Greenville. They too will host Texas. One of the most storied programs in college baseball history will be visiting and we will talk with Cliff Godwin in about 10 minutes.

The head head pirate, if you will. We talked about this yesterday with Will Brinson, but Aaron Donald Dunn got the whole bag from the Los Angeles Rams. They made Donald the highest paid non quarterback in the NFL. And as the best player in the league, I think it makes sense. Here's media comments from ESPN on the deal. On one hand, the fact that they gave him this much more money without, you know, adding years does suggest that Donald had some leverage, uh, in terms of threatening his retirement. Uh, but on the other hand, it's kind of hard for me to believe, uh, an NFL player in the peak of his career who loves the game as much as he does is still so utterly dominant.

I think entering the greatest of all time territory would walk away not only from that, but the significant amount of money he was already owed, but either case it worked out for the Rams for a football perspective. Obviously they remain in a win now mode and they remain the favorite. I think, uh, close to Tampa Bay in the NFC. Oh yeah. They're the favorite. Uh, it doesn't mean you're going to win. You still have, you know, every year is a new thing. Uh, in all it's a three-year extension. The last two of those years are dummy years.

He will not play on those. I mean, if he's still playing at that time, it wouldn't be worth his time to play for the amount of money that they're going to pay him for those two years. Uh, but they tacked on to dummy years to stretch out the salary cap hit, uh, which is, I mean, pretty significant, not necessarily this year, but next year. It's like one of these two years, it's a $38 million cap hit for a defensive tackle. It's a lot of money.

You just can't, you're just not doing that. Um, I mean, and it would be more if they didn't stretch out the deal because they basically just handed him $40 million in cash. Yeah. So the over 30 million this year, I think it's actually slightly under $30 million in terms of his take home next year.

So he'll have to get by, uh, on a, on a pay cut. Um, Sean McVeigh called him one of one. Think about that. Yeah. He's one of one. You expect he's one of the best, blah, blah, blah. One of the top, no, one of one.

And like, I'm not going to litigate, uh, silliness on Twitter. Uh, there are people who don't even believe he is the best defensive player today. There's almost no second place. He's dominates the game. Second place is TJ watt, but that's fine. Well, TJ watt is amazing, right? Reigning defensive player of the year. Nobody is taking, nobody is calling TJ watt like a bus driver. Oh, I know.

Right. Or, or his, or his brother, JJ watt, who for four or five years was trending to be this injuries took its toll on JJ watt. Aaron Donald is like nothing we've seen since Lawrence Taylor. He completely changes the math of your offense.

Two players. Isn't enough. He, he destroys double teams.

You need to put three guys on it. You need to do everything you can to, to mitigate his appearance on, on your, on the defense. Otherwise he's just going to blow everything up. He's better than Reggie white. He's better than Warren Sapp.

He is. He is better than every defensive player I have ever seen other than Lawrence Taylor. Taylor is still the greatest defensive player I've ever seen.

I would argue that Taylor might be the greatest football player of all time, but Aaron Donald is right there behind just behind him. He is that dominant. I got no problem at all with this contract.

Zero. He deserves to get paid regardless of whether or not you pay defensive tackles. Call him whatever you want. You, I mean, lines up sometimes on the end, call him an edge rusher. We pay edge rushers.

You pay Aaron Donald because he's, uh, he's that good. All right, Adam golden studio with my friend, coach Pete DeRuta with the Capitol financial advisory group. We are talking retirement coach. How does longevity risk figure into our retirement and income plan? This is the best of times and the worst of times, Adam, the longevity risk means we're going to live too long, but to me, every day I live is not too long. Right?

Absolutely. So we want our money to outlive us. And unfortunately, many people I've seen you out there listening, maybe one of them, your money is not designed to outlive you. You might outlive your money.

And that's not what we want to have happen. Cause when we get to that day after you run out of money, it's not going to be a fun time. So let's design a plan that guarantees you'll never run out of money. We call it the GPI plan, growth protection, lifetime income for the next 10 people.

This is a golden ticket, Adam thousand hour value. We're going to do it at no cost or obligation. And all you have to do is call. We make it so easy.

Would you like financial independence into your retirement and beyond it? 800-661-7383. That golden ticket is a $1,000 value.

Or you could text Adam to 21000 for coach Pete DeRuta. Uh, every major championship. Oh, wait.

Oh, good. Every major championship has a pre-tournament press conference. Right? So why not the Bonesaw Invitational?

They're playing for a lot of money. First event on the live series, Dustin Johnson up first. Second biggest draw on the Money Bags Tour.

Had his own hello world moment. I resign my membership from the tour. I'm going to play here, um, you know, for now.

And that's, that's the plan. Um, you know, but what the consequences are going to be, obviously I can't comment on how the tour is going to handle. Regards the majors, are you majors? Um, I mean, it's again, I can't answer for, for the majors, but you know, hopefully they're going to allow us to play. Obviously I'm exempt for, for the major. So, um, I plan on playing there and unless, um, I hear otherwise.

Yeah. And Phil Mickelson also said he planned on playing, uh, the U S open next week at Brookline. Mickelson will head over to London is already on en route.

Uh, he has, I don't believe he has met the media there yet. Uh, no word from the USGA in front of next week's US open. I know I was watching Golf Channel yesterday and Mike Wan, uh, with the USGA, uh, basically sidestepped the question. Um, my personally, my read on all of this before we get to more DJ is that the majors would like to all exclude the live series from their tournaments.

They would like to, I don't know if they can, don't know if they can. Uh, all right, so more from Dustin Johnson. Inevitably people will say, you know, on social media and even in here that you've chosen many of your country. What would be your reply to that?

Um, I chose what's best for me and my family. All right. That's a follow up to a Ryder cup question. Um, apparently I did not know this to be true and it might not be true. I don't know, uh, that DJ basically forfeits, uh, his potential involvement in the Ryder cup by leaving the PGA tour. Uh, he's the only golfer, maybe Taylor Gooch is a good young player. Uh, the only golfers that put themselves in that, I guess, risk.

Um, but then DJ goes, I'm doing what's best for me and my family. Dustin Johnson has 24 career PGA tour wins. He's earned $74 million in winnings.

Throw in the $27 million that he gets or that he has received in FedEx cup bonuses and the more than $100 million in endorsements. And you can certainly see how it was time for DJ to think about his family. Clearly times are hard out here on these streets. Rough. Yeah.

Very, very difficult out here on these streets. So, uh, we hope, we hope the DJ will be able to scratch it together, uh, on the live series. Um, first event starts Friday in London. Uh, all right, we got one more thing before we get to, uh, Cliff Godwin. This because he picks up the, from the high stick or potential high stick and picks it up himself. That has to be above the shoulder.

Oh, talk on the stick above the shoulder. Holy shit. Just sucks. That's going to be shucks.

Don't even why, why now say shocks. Yup. Come on.

Donco Harski. Uh, the TNT crew. I loved it. It was great. I was watching it live. I was like, that's what we're all thinking.

Absolutely tremendous. Uh, the TNT crew discussing whether or not our Terry Leconin's overtime goal should count. And look, if you are an Edmonton oiler fan, and I know there are my, there might be three of you out there. If you are an Edmonton oiler fan and you are salty because you think that that goal should not have counted. I don't know that you're wrong.

I really don't. It was close. I'd have to Zapruder film it up, which I don't believe, uh, we should ever do, but it was very close.

Uh, because the shot didn't go in clean, then, uh, it, the, the stick height is shoulder or below, not crossbar or below. Anyway, uh, six, five overtime when we'll talk more about it later, avalanche back into the Stanley cup finals for the first time since 2001 Eastern conference finals game for tonight in Tampa Rangers with a two, one lead. We'll talk to John Forslund about this later. Bruce Cassidy, Boston Bruins head coach fired yesterday and everything you read coming out of Boston during the playoffs against the hurricanes was how brilliant Bruce Cassidy is as a coach. How he was coaching rod, Brenda Moore's, uh, pants off. I don't get it.

So brilliant. Why is he have to go? Truth is, I think he's a really, really good coach.

One of the best in the league. Uh, I don't really understand what Boston is doing. Uh, but June 19th, 2006, but it all started May 6, 1997 with the announcement that the Hartford whalers were coming to North Carolina.

It's a story of transition of heartbreak of figuring it out on the fly. The canes corner. Look at the 25th anniversary of the move presented by the aluminum company of North Carolina.

Listen, now find James 25th anniversary wherever you get your podcast. I don't know coaches. Uh, you know, he got paid very well to be a coach.

I'm not sure it's the case everywhere, but we have a very good coach, a very successful coach and a coach who is headed again to a super regional Cliff Godwin East Carolina. First of all, congratulations on getting over on coastal yesterday. How you doing? I'm doing good.

Just lost my voice, but other than that, I'm doing great. Well, look, uh, you, you have time to get it back before Texas shows up. So, uh, excluding the year that did not happen third year in a row to the supers described because we didn't, you and I didn't get a chance to, uh, to speak. Uh, we texted a little bit last week, but, um, what kind of team is this?

This doesn't seem to be don't you don't have a ton of stars. Although, uh, we can, we can certainly talk about one. Uh, this doesn't seem to be a typical East Carolina team. What, how would you describe this group? Well, a group that just was challenged a lot early, a lot of adversity, um, some publicly, some not publicly, and we played a really tough schedule. We played more road games and we did home games up until, um, almost the end of May and just told them, just keep grinding, keep showing up every day. And if we can keep our head above water, you guys are going to be tough as leather when it comes to the end of the season. And they've just really bought into playing team selfless baseball. And in a society when, uh, you know, everybody's out for NIO money and everything that you can do for yourself, it's been as cool of a group as I've been around the past couple months because they just show up every day. They do things the right way and the collective effort of the units, uh, a lot bigger than what the individual units are. So it's been special.

I know the last couple of games, you guys have set records of hope. The fire marshal wasn't, uh, wasn't hanging out over at the stadium. Uh, although maybe the fire marshal was, uh, was watching baseball out there.

Yeah, I was probably the fire marshal was in the crowd. I mean, that's great. I mean, the culture, your, the culture of your program, how would you describe it? Um, tough, you know, gritty grinders, uh, guys that come in the program and develop, um, probably not the most highly recruited. Some are, but it reminds me of a lot of the East Carolina teams I've played on for coach Claire, to be honest with you. And if there was ever a team that coach would want to make it to the college world series, I think it'd be this team, just because everybody counted them out early in the season, we're 14 and 13, you know, coach Godwin sucks. The players suck, you know, everything's going wrong.

And, um, to be where we are today, it's like, we're playing with house money. All right. There, nobody, nobody said coach Godwin sucks. Come on, come on. Nobody, nobody says that, uh, Cliff Godwin is joining us here.

All right. Uh, and nobody said, uh, Bryson Worrell sucks. Uh, like he was a monster, uh, in the, ultimately the championship game four for four for the box score is just crazy. Um, but what was more impressive what he did with the bat or with his glove?

Um, oh man, that's a tough one. I mean, it was just a special day and, you know, Bryson had an opportunity to sign as a free agent and probably make $20,000 last summer. And I remember exactly where I was. I was on the golf course, which I don't play golf.

It was at the key for Claire golf tournament. And I just called him and I said, Hey man, like, I don't think she signed for 20 grand. I think you should come back and just do something special here.

And look, it's a storybook ending and nobody knew it would shake out this way, but I'm just so happy for him. He's been a great leader in our program, but he's been Superman for the past couple of weeks to be quite honest in the conference tournament. And then, um, you know, of course this weekend he's played outstanding and, uh, somebody definitely should have a chance to play professional baseball. I didn't know that look the, the way, and I know this has impacted, uh, college baseball too, because there's fewer guys drafted.

There are fewer professional spots available. Uh, how has that trickled down to college baseball? I mean, you can, it might even be able to make an argument that in the long run, it might help college baseball because there were fewer spots, but, uh, what's your feeling on that? No, it definitely makes college baseball better. I mean, we wouldn't have had Gavin Williams, uh, back for last year if COVID hadn't hit, the draft hadn't been shortened. Um, Bryson same way that year, cause in the shortened COVID year, Bryson was off to a tear at the beginning of the season.

And I think if the draft has been 10 rounds, he got drafted that year and wouldn't be here. So, um, it's definitely made college baseball a lot better in my opinion. Cliff Godwin, head coach, East Carolina, they will take on Texas. Uh, if I, as somebody who's been in the college baseball world for as long as you have, uh, how would you describe the legacy of the Longhorns baseball program?

Um, we don't have enough time for me to talk about it. It's, uh, obviously very storied. Um, you know, the one connection that I have to it is David Pierce, the head coach, he was the head coach at Tulane. Um, and they were in our conference, um, you know, a few years back and he's a great coach and, uh, his staff, uh, does a great job and they're good.

You know, I mean, they're, they're good. This is a storied program. I'm just glad they're coming to Greenville instead of us going to Texas.

Yeah. What does it mean to have, uh, to have the Longhorns here? Well, Adam, first off is the first super regional we've ever been able to host on campus. My senior year in 01, we were the seventh national seed and we hosted the regional in Wilson, North Carolina at Fleming Stadium, won that and then we hosted the super regional in Kinston where the down east wood ducks play now at Granger Stadium. And, you know, this stadium was built years ago to be able to have the opportunity to host regionals, of course, but also super regionals. And I can tell you this, this town's buzzing, man. I've never seen anything like it.

And it's, it's really exciting. I was watching the other day when, uh, and I, and I, I turned on late and you're making a pitching change and I see an infielder running in from the bullpen and he, he clearly was not running into pitch. Um, what does Zach Agnes, uh, allow you to do, um, base? I mean, he's your shortstop, he's obviously a productive hitter. What does he allow you to do by being able to use him in as many different ways? Well, it's just allow a lot of versatility for us, but one of my teammates told me, I guess, I've never seen a guy running from the bullpen.

He said, I thought that was hilarious, but rider has to go get warmed up. And, you know, rider is a key to this team too, because he made a decision to go into the starting rotation at one point in time of the year when we needed somebody just to go and throw innings. And, um, but now he comes off the bench and does whatever we need him to, but sacks, uh, emotion, his energy, his talent.

I mean, all those things. I mean, it's been a huge source for our team of confidence for sure. And what he did the other night against UVA was really, really special. And I'm sure you've heard the story about his father that passed away, Nico, um, in September, uh, for COVID complications.

It was of course, hard on Agnes Stanley. I've known Nico for eight years and I'm just glad that we're playing great baseball. We got Nico on the side of our hats to just honor him, um, and their family. All right, before we let you go, how hard is it to get a shortstop ready to pitch? You just tell them, cause they're warm, you know, I just tell Zach in between innings, like, hey, just make sure that you play catch. And normally we'll, instead of just the first baseman throwing it to all the infielders, Zach will play catch with, um, just somebody off to the side and just kind of hair it out a little bit, his arm, you know, a little bit hotter. Yeah, because I mean, that's, and he came in in a tough, in a tough spot against Virginia and he was, uh, he had a little bit of trouble finding the zone at first and then he settled down and he looked un-hittable to me.

I mean, I couldn't hit him. That's enough for me. I wish you all the best, man. I hope this is the year that we see the Pirates in Omaha. Uh, appreciate your time, uh, coach Cliff Godwin, East Carolina. Uh, good luck against the Longhorns this weekend.

We'll talk to you soon. Thanks, Seth. Thanks for having me, buddy.

You got it. Cliff Godwin, East Carolina baseball coach. Um, seventh trip to the Super Regionals have yet to get to Omaha. What did Aaron Fitt call them the other day?

The best college baseball program to have never made it to Omaha. Yeah. Right.

That is sort of a backhanded compliment, right? Uh, we see it in other sports, uh, best golfer to not win a major, best, uh, uh, best player to not win a championship, Barkley, Ewing, whatever. Um, Carl Malone. We have tons of NBA players that have not won a, not won a title. East Carolina might be the best college baseball program to not make it to Omaha.

Let's get rid of that right now. This is the Adam Gold Show. June 19th, 2006, but it all started May 6th, 1997 with the announcement that the Hartford Whalers were coming to North Carolina. It's a story of transition, of heartbreak, of figuring it out on the fly. The Canes Corner look at the 25th anniversary of the move presented by the Aluminum Company of North Carolina. Listen now, find Canes 25th anniversary wherever you get your podcasts.