REShow: Steven Wright - Hour 3

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Seriously, though, see terms and check it out for yourself at discover.com slash match. This is The Rich Eisen Show. Live from The Rich Eisen Show studio in Los Angeles. We just got the Roku channel its first ever sports Emmy nomination for best studio show. The Rich Eisen Show don't sound surprised. I appreciate that act like you've been there before, which we have let's take one home this year earlier on the show host of ESPN. First Take Stephen A. Smith, NFL veteran and quarterback coach John Beck. Coming up, legendary comedian and author Stephen Wright. And now it's Rich Eisen. What a fun conversation we just had with John Beck, the quarterback instructor, throwing coach, throwing guru, whatever you want to say.

And, and he, you know, he's got Bryce Young and CJ Stroud is his part of his client group and Zach Wilson was part of his client group before the draft and Justin Herbert part of his client group just talking, just talking ball and talking draft and talking quarterbacks and talking this year's draft and these years quarterbacks in particular with John Beck. Was amazing. If you missed that conversation, so many different ways to cover it. Um, there's a, this right, right here on this, this feed through the Roku channel, we're live streaming right now and channel two 10 on the Roku channel, which is free on all Roku devices, select Samsung smart TVs, Amazon fire TV.

Also, uh, free on the Roku app because the Roku channels free within it and the Roku channel.com channel two 10, as soon as we're done, we rear, uh, there's our podcast version of the show. I think we kind of just did like an hour long podcast with John Beck. That was awesome. That was hardcore deep ball talk.

That's what this is about, right? We're in that time of year. That was awesome. I was in this time of year. The draft is in, uh, there's 15 days from now. This is when I get excited. Brockman knows I hate mock draft talks in first week of February.

Just like, what's the point now is when I went that weeks out. So there's a podcast version of the show, all three hours, every single day through the cumulus podcast network where all your podcasts can be acquired. Uh, and then there's also our Twitter feed or YouTube feed. And that in particular is what you need to stay tuned to for the rich eyes and show, uh, Twitter feed and YouTube feed, because what we just did with John Beck essentially was the first edition of our new segment called from the combine to the draft sponsored by noble, which is a training brand for people who work hard.

Don't believe in excuses. Nobles performance, footwear, apparel, and accessories are worn by some of the fittest athletes on earth and is now the official combine training partner of the NFL and the official on-field supplier of apparel and headwear for the NFL scouting combine. Go to noble project.com slash NFL to see how noble forever changed the NFL combine in a shop football training, essentials, and more gear for your day-to-day workouts. Again, we're going to be talking about profiles and player journeys from the combine to the draft all the way up until next Thursday, uh, or two Thursdays from now, uh, when the draft goes down in Kansas city. So check out our Twitter feed at rich eyes and show youtube.com slash rich eyes and show from the combine to the draft sponsored by noble. We just did that with John Beck, who look, I mean, when you have the top two quarterback prospects available in the draft, he said that teams are asking him like, what are you, if you were the general manager, what would you do?

He's like, get out of here. Like, all right, so you have your two children, you know, if you're the father, honestly, honestly, but don't secretly really always stop. Come on. You sound like my kids. Come on. We know Taylor's your favorite. We all know that.

No offense to them. Sam will look at me sometimes ago when we're just the two of us. So you go look at me, he goes, I'm your favorite, right? Literally my oldest will do that.

And coop is just like, see ball hit ball. He's just like, that's what he is. But at any rate, I mean, I don't know. So you're saying Taylor's your favorite. We get it.

Let's move on. You just look at CJ Stroud and everybody else that Frank Reich has coached. That's the guy.

I mean, that's who it looks like to me. But you're saying now all of a sudden Bryce Young strolls on there and hangs out in Charlotte for a couple of days. And now everybody, the betting favorite, if you will, is Bryce Young.

I'm saying that's crazy to us knows things. So after the Panthers trade, suddenly Bryce Young was the favorite. Now it's Stroud. Now we're two weeks out. Young is visiting the Panthers.

Young now the favorite. Great chat again with with our new friend, John Beck, right here on the Rich Ozzie show in studio. Steven Wright is in our green room, the comedian from back in the day. He's got a new book out right here.

I've got it. It's called Harold. It's his new novel right here. There's Steven Wright, the author. And, you know, one of the all time great comedians. Much like Steven Wright, I too like to reminisce with people I don't know.

So this is going to be fun. I Have a Pony is one of the most famous comedy albums ever. You know, and he had quite the run with HBO specials and whatnot. Steven Wright will be here shortly. I'll ask him his favorite joke. Maybe we'll stroll down memory lane about being on the Carson show. I love talking to comedians about this sort of thing.

So 844-204 Rich is the number to dial. Shane Steichen just spoke from the Indianapolis Colts talking about was asked about Lamar Jackson. And he responded saying he's focused on the draft and focused on the players that are in the building right now. Right now. Right now.

Ah, it's such a key phrase talking about where the players in the building. No, he's saying right now. He didn't right now the situation he's talking. I'm just talking about. As you know, there's coaching cliches.

It is what it is. I don't have a crystal ball. And, you know, I'm only talking about the players who are here, which you usually do that when when somebody's holding out. But nobody's talking Lamar Jackson right now. Anywhere.

Period. They are now 15 days from the draft and nobody is signing this guy to an offer sheet right now. They'll go through the draft and see. And plus, why are you signing him into an offer sheet right now?

When they just acquired Odell Beckham Jr. is getting introduced tomorrow. My colleague Ian Rappaport at the NFL Network said he he signed with the with the belief that Lamar is coming back. And if you didn't sign Lamar to an offer sheet before. Even if you were inclined to cough up two first round draft choices and two connects to draft. Even if you were inclined to pay him the freight that he's apparently asking for. The other. Narrative as to why teams didn't sign him was the Ravens are just going to match anyway.

Why would you do the work? Well, now the belief I would think that the Ravens are going to match anyway is as strong as ever. They just got Odell.

What do you think? They're just going to let Lamar walk. So nothing's going to happen on that front. And you could ask Shane Stike until he's blue in the face and he'll basically just say we're just focused on who we have here and what we're just focused on the draft because they're fourth overall.

And if Adam Schefter, what he threw out there does, in fact. Happen that the Texans do choose somebody second overall who isn't a quarterback. Hold on to the pick and choose somebody who's not a quarterback. Well, then Anthony Richardson is flat out in play or C.J. Stroud or Bryce Young is flat out in play fourth overall.

That would be the Colts dream. That they have one of those two to choose from from the current spot doesn't cost them any more draft capital to move up. Yeah, I wouldn't sign in Lamar to an offer sheet between now and the draft. We'll talk after the draft. But Odell signing changes the dynamic. And that's what I said before.

I thought it was brilliant. I know that the Ravens have been ripped. By a ton of people. For how expensive the contract was and for to give it to somebody who hasn't performed over a year coming off of a knee injury, looking. You know, at how old he is and how what a dreadful contract that was, according to many who definitely no football and no contracts and no salary caps. I push back by saying. If this gets Lamar to sign, if this solves the Rubik's Cube that Lamar and the Ravens have not been able to solve over the last two years, even if he does sign, it's tender.

Just two weeks ago or a week ago, the concept was. Never know what Lamar's thinking. If he's a man on principle, he'll just he'll just hold out on you. You won't come in from the cold. Well, now Odell's the one who's saying. Come back, I'm here.

And at the very least. Don't disappoint my little boy. Who looks so beautiful in his Ravens eight jersey.

Like, how can you turn them? How could you? How could you disappoint Odell's little baby? Maybe. Come on.

It does like a red roof and we'll leave the light on. Yeah. Motel six. Come home.

Motel six. Whatever it is. Whatever. Whatever it is.

Bottom line is I've never been to the signing of Odell Beckham Junior. It works on many levels. It works on the level of communicating to Lamar.

We get you. And it communicates to Lamar. In a manner that doesn't require the coach, general manager, owner be the same voice in the room that hasn't worked and also to the entire community of the NFL receiving corps. We're not the Bermuda Triangle of receivers.

Works on every level. Maybe the Odell could be problematic. Right. And with the running game and with the defense. Now then, Chris, we will, before turning to Stephen Wright, turn to you. Just when you thought the Heat were coming to visit the Miami Heat still have another basketball game to play. And it's the Atlanta Hawks that will be visiting Boston, Massachusetts, this weekend to start a first round playoff series. It was a pleasant surprise last night.

And why does this a pleasant surprise for you? Because this is going to be a sweep. Okay. Okay. Okay. They're not a good defensive team.

Trae Young is one of the worst defensive guards in the league. And so, you know, we have the bigs, we have the wings. They just we have too much firepower and offense for them to stop us. So, I mean, I would expect this to be a four or five game series. In all honesty, I'm not being disrespectful.

I hear you. It was 3-0 in the regular season with these teams. The regular season with this team, I would throw right the hell out. With the Celtics or the Hawks? The Hawks. And why would you say that? Because they're a different team now.

They have a different coach, maybe a different mentality, a different sense in the locker room, a different sense of cohesion. Honestly. I mean, Trae Young, Dejounte Murray, Clint Cappello with his unique stat line of four points, 21 rebounds. That was ridiculous. Clint Rodman last night.

And John Collins. They were really impressive last night actually. Every time they thought Miami was back in the game, gonna take control, maybe cruise to a home win, Murray hit a big shot. Cappello had a nice defensive play. Trae Young got to the rim.

John Collins was out there doing his thing. It was an impressive victory last night. And now they have to play a real team. It's why I didn't want to zig with the rest. I wanted to zag. I didn't want to choose the Bucks coming out of the East. I didn't want to choose the Celtics or the Sixers coming out of the East.

And I was identifying somebody who could make a run that would shock everybody. And that's the narrative going into the Eastern Conference playoffs right now is there's no like good luck. Hey, Cleveland and New York, Cavs and Knicks have a great four or five series. Entertain us. Go seven. You know, let's have Mitchell drop 50 in one and Brunson drop 50 in another.

And let's see if Julius Randle can drop 50. Who's going to drop 50 the most? You know, like, let's go. Let's have a good deal. But you guys enjoy rearranging your deck chair. Because you're going to hit the iceberg of top three seeds in the in the Eastern Conference playoffs. That's the narrative coming in. I chose the Hawks to win the conference before the season just because I'm I'm a big Murray fan. Him being an addition to a very talented team. They're just two years away from going to the conference finals. I thought that we could see Trey Young in a playoff series just take it over. And I'm pleased to see the Hawks are in. But they're you know, they're going up against the defending conference champs who are defending conference champs for a reason.

I understand that, but I would throw out the regular. That's a very long winded way of saying I'd throw out the regular season numbers. So you don't know if the cut hand on Jalen Brown, you don't know where that cut was, was on the outside of his hand, was on his palm that can affect his dribbling. He had a pretty big rap on at the end of the year. So we'll see. So did Rudy Gobert.

All right. The Timberwolves did that to themselves. They should have waited till next season to suspend them.

We're going to suspend them now. You just hurt your team by not having them on the court. Anthony Edwards go three for seven.

That was that was the biggest one. I mean, just an absolute no show in the biggest game of the year when a guy who's like on the precipice of launching himself in the superstar. But wasn't he hurt? Isn't his elbow messed up? He did take a weird fall.

Yeah. Last night and kind of landed on his shoulder. That was that was almost really, really bad, bad, bad. But it was almost 15.

It was 65. Prince's drop in threes. Come on. I thought to myself, OK, so Conley's acquisition, that's going to be the one that was the one that's that's going to be a big difference maker. And maybe nobody was talking about should have got him instead of D'Angelo Russell.

No showed last night too awful. The Timberwolves just could have kept their head. Don't get into a fight now.

Don't punch a wall. They win that game by 15 points last night. I mean, easily.

Come on. Like you were right there and you blew it and they still should have won the game. Timberwolves Nuggets would be a fascinating first round series. Because, you know, even if the Pelicans advance tonight, we don't believe Zion is going to feel like Zion.

Zion is playing this year. How about that sound bite? Let me ask you this question.

Can we play that one more time if you don't mind Mr. Hoskins, please? Because, man, I want to see him out there. Everybody wants to see him out there.

He's a 26 and eight guy when helping. I just want to see him out there. And Stephen A. Smith said earlier about the sound bite you're about to hear. People aren't thinking he's Jake in it. They think he's not working hard enough to avoid it. That he's back here in this situation again. You'd think he'd be on some sort of, well, like, is there a TB12 system for the NBA? Yeah, whatever James Harden was on this offseason.

Because you said he should get on the TB12 system. Let the league in assists. You know, quiet is kept. Get rid of the honey buns.

Get rid of the honey buns. But here, hit it, hit it. How close are you to feeling like you'll be ready to play? I mean, physically, I'm fine. Now it's just a matter of, like, when I feel like Zion, you know, I know the atmosphere I'd be in based off, like, the playoff experience.

So, nah, it's just a matter of when I feel like Zion. How frustrating was the setback back in February or two? I mean, it sucks. I don't know how else to say it. It just sucks. I love this game. I say it over and over. For those people that think that I just want to sit on the sideline, just to sit over there, I don't know why people think that.

But nah, it sucks. I just want to be playing basketball for real. I'll just say this once again, and I'll front my comments that are going to sound critical with the fact that I'd love to see him out there. Him, could you imagine him, Ingram, McCollum, Valanciunas, Murphy, Jones, just off the top of my head here. Top three team in the world.

And Zion, you throw Zion in that mix. They're not playing it. They're not hosting the second night playing game.

They're hosting in the first round. Right, that's the idea. And I'd love to see him out there.

He's just such a dynamic player when healthy. And I know that the NBA just had their collective bargaining agreement hammered out. I just want to see if, can you open it up again to make a rule that if you miss a certain amount of games, you're not allowed to refer to yourself in the third person. Right. You must refrain from that.

I mean, I wouldn't say you lose a draft choice, but maybe fine. Is that right? That might be a little harsh. You can't miss as many games as Zion had and then refer to why you've missed it and when you're coming back using the third person. That's a violation, I think. Does that rule extend to Del Tufo, who is Mr. Third Person?

If you've missed a certain amount of days of work, you've got to revoke the third person. By the way, because I'm going to set up the USFL the next couple of days. When I'm Mike, I'll be back. I'll be back.

How many shows are you going to miss? Two, but when I'm back, I'll be back. He's managing the load of his work. It's workload management.

So I guess my point would be that if his workload management extends way longer than expected, he can't refer to himself in the third person. Can't do it. Okay, so what we're going to do is we're going to lead by example here to show the NBA what it needs to do with some of the star players.

Very good. I mean, it depends on how many shows you miss. Well, see, the thing is, Rich, unlike Del Tufo, who has a very more than adequate fill in and feller, you can't replace Zion. They don't have anybody to pick up his road.

That's true. You're you're you're unfortunately not the Zion of this equation. I'm the Jordan, but I mean, that's all right. Let's take a break. Stephen Wright is here on the Rich Eisen Show.

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That's Mint Mobile dot com slash switch. Welcome back to the Rich Eisen Show radio network. Joining our Rich Eisen Show Roku Channel live feed, I'm sitting at the Rich Eisen Show desk furnished by Grainger with supplies and solutions for every industry. Grainger is the right product for you.

Call click Grainger dot com or just stop by and look who has stopped by. One of my favorites for a long time. I've been a fan of this man who's got his first book out, a novel.

I'm holding it up here just to just to prove it exists at Harold by the great Stephen Wright here in the Rich Eisen Show studio. How are you, Stephen? Good to see you. Good, Rich. How are you? I am doing very, very well. Thanks for having me. Thanks for being here.

So I don't know where to just jump in with you. So you are you're a New Englander, correct? That's where you're from originally, from Boston, Burlington, Massachusetts, a suburb outside of Boston. OK, so back in the day, that would make you a Red Sox fan, is that what you are? Red Sox, Bobby Orr, Bruins days, like all of that.

Calia Stremski, Tony Canigliaro. That's it. Sixties, early seventies, early seventies. Jim Rice era of the Boston Red Sox. Yeah. What was your first time you were in Fenway Park?

I don't know. My father took us probably I was probably twelve-ish. You know, it was so laid back then he would come home from work. It wasn't even a plan. It was like, oh, let's go to the game. You know, we get in the Volkswagen, drive forty five minutes in.

I mean, I sound like one of those guys, but it was like you sit in the bleachers like two dollars. Yeah. There's no one. No one was, you know, you have no all this space was it was before they became, you know, even before sixty seven.

Sure. When did you try stand up for the first time? When did you realize, OK, were you always funny or your understatedness was just your personality all the time? You know, this is just how I talk like this. But I was funny with my couple buddies in school. I wouldn't want the classes to make the class laugh.

Yeah. But I was just funny with them. And I would watch The Tonight Show all the time with Johnny Carson. My brother was four years older than me, so we had to watch what he wanted. And so I would just watch him. And eventually I, you know, everyone would be asleep and we'd be watching Johnny. And then I suddenly hooked in, like see a guy come out and talk about life and all this weird angles, funny reflection of what he experienced. And I started to cook into that.

And then Johnny himself, I loved it. And it became like this magical thing. I really that's when I was really drawn to it. And I thought, wow, maybe I would like to do that, maybe to be one of those guys. And then speaking of the Bruins, so I would listen to the Bruins on the radio in bed. And one night I was fooling around with a dial and I stumbled on this comedy show, a guy in Boston.

He played two comedy albums every Sunday night, two whole albums. So then I hooked into that. So I'm tuning into that for like two years.

And I'm like studying it without knowing it. I'm thinking, oh, I like that guy. Oh, that's me.

Oh, I don't know. So then The Tonight Show and Carlin and then it became like my dream, like a kid wants to be a baseball player or an astronaut. And you wanted to be a comic. Yeah. So when did you when was your first big break?

Stephen, right? What was that? Well, I went I started doing it when I was twenty three in Boston and then the clubs. And in Cambridge, there was a Chinese restaurant comedy club called the Ding Ho Comedy Club. It was just this, you know, the front was a bite where the audience and everything, the bar and then the back was a Chinese restaurant and someone wrote an article about it because it was such a bizarre situation. Yeah. And for some reason it went in the L.A. Times. I don't know why. And then Peter, the Sally, who was the producer of The Tonight Show.

Sure. He saw the article and then like eight months later, he was going to Boston. His kids were going to get out of high school. So they had a summer trip to look at colleges, New York and Boston.

And they remembered the club. So he called up and he said he was going to go there. And he went there and then he saw me. And then three weeks later, I was on The Tonight Show on The Tonight Show.

So it was like a fairy tale. So, you know, if you didn't do your comedy in a Chinese restaurant, do you think you'd have been discovered, Stephen? I mean, obviously, or maybe not as quickly by not as not as quickly. What the hell is that like for you to be on The Tonight Show three weeks after being in a Chinese restaurant? I mean, what did what I just say was that was that if that's false, if anything, it's just the way you assembled it three weeks after you could have said that to Neil Armstrong.

Well, you're on the Chinese restaurant, then you're on the moon. Like, how do you like it? Yes. One from column A, one from column Johnny. I mean, my gosh.

And back in the day, Johnny. Yeah. It was surreal because they just explained how big that show was to me for all those years. Sure. So then to be on there, it was just magical.

And I've remained friends with Peter all these years. You know, I mean, a lot of my career has been a lot of flukes, a lot of accidents. But I mean, I know that I do what I do, but there's other things involved to dress for something to happen somewhere. You know, like the Chinese restaurant, the person writes the article. Why is it in the L.A. Times, the places in Cambridge, Massachusetts? The kids going to college.

Go on summer trip. So when this you start taking off, HBO reaches out to you and you you were one of the first to have a comedy special on home box office. Steven Carlin had them. Steve Martin. So when I went on The Tonight Show, then everything changed.

Touring live clubs and then HBO and then an album and then playing theaters. It was all because of Pewter, Sally and Johnny Carson. You got a good Carlin story, Steven? Well, I met him several times, which was like, oh, my God, I'm talking to George Carlin. He was a very regular guy, was just a regular guy with genius. He's a genius. A lot of people from my generation of comedians have him on the Mount Rushmore for sure. You know, I mean, the amount I think he did 18 HBOs.

So even the volume and the quality. He's one of my heroes in my whole life. So who else is on your Mount Rushmore of comedians? Richard Pryor.

David Brennan, Robert Klein, those guys from when I was watching all that. Right. Starting out.

Right. Tell me about your book, Harold. Why write it? What made you want to sit down and and come up with your first book and a novel?

What made you do this, Steven? Well, I wrote a fairy tale about how the beach was invented. It was in Rolling Stone magazine along 1986. And every few years I would read it again. And I thought I should write something else. So then I was on Twitter and I started writing. I thought, I'll write a story, but I'll write it on Twitter. I write two sentences at a time rather than jokes. So I kept writing it. And people were leaving messages saying, doesn't he know this is for jokes? He's writing a novel on Twitter.

What does someone should explain this to him? But I didn't like the idea of the jokes on Twitter. To me, the joke is a live experience where they're feedback from the audience.

Yeah, it's a whole thing. So then I stopped writing it on Twitter, but I continued writing it anyway. Just kept going, like just not knowing where it's going or anything. You know, the jokes are very distinct. Couple sentences through a small window to make the audience laugh.

A concept, you know, and then the audience laughs. But I had other things in my mind that wouldn't go through that window. So I used this boy, his name is Harold. I essentially put a funnel on the top of his head and I poured everything I think about life into his head. So it's like he's thinking it. No seven year old would really be thinking what he's thinking. But I got to express basically my experience and my reaction to this whole thing of having a life with so much information.

So I got to say a lot of it through his mind. In a book where all books can be acquired on May 16th is when it comes out. Harold, written by Stephen Wright. What is, I guess, this may be a ridiculous question, but I'll ask it anyway. What's your favorite joke that you came up with? Jelen? Out of your vast career?

It's my favorite joke, but it's not the audience's favorite joke. I went to my grandfather when he died. I went to the funeral and I was kneeling down at the casket, looking at him inside the casket. And I started to think about my flashlight.

I was thinking about the batteries inside my flashlight. And then I thought, maybe, maybe he's not dead. Maybe he's just in the wrong way. Like in the casket the wrong way? Yeah, maybe if he was the other way, he'd be alive. He's gone over there.

I mean, you said it may not be the audience's favorite joke, but it's Chris is gone. Because that happens. You put that in and it doesn't work.

Well, the joke is based on years. You take batteries out that are dead and you put them on the table. Then you take the new ones out of the pack and you put them on the table.

Then you go in and do something else for something and you come back. You can't tell a dead battery from a live battery just from looking at it. This is what you're saying, thinking at your grandfather's funeral, that if you removed him from the casket and just flipped him over, he'd be alive? Yeah, like the batteries.

Like the batteries. No, as I'm saying this to you guys, as I'm saying this to you, I don't know how or why my mind assembled, connected it. I don't know that part, but my subconscious is like an insane factory that somehow, oh, this could be this. So I'm going to do a follow-up. So in this equation is your grandfather a triple A? Double A? C?

D? No one's ever asked that. That's hilarious. Oh, my God.

I would say that he's a triple A. Is grandpa a 9-volt? Oh, that's so funny. It's so funny.

I never even thought of that. That's great. That's great. Well, there you go.

I'm just trying to leave you in a better spot than I found you. Wow. Did you tell that to somebody on the spot?

Like at the funeral? No. No, that wasn't real. Oh, it's not real? No. Oh. Oh, I'm sorry.

No, you asked me what was my favorite joke. And I said, okay, so I'm at my father's funeral. Oh, you guys thought that was real? Yeah, it really happened. It was real.

At that moment, you were like, I got to think of a joke right now. Oh my gosh. Oh, that's unbelievable to think that really happened. That's a whole other perception. This is a great experience. No one's ever thought it really happened.

And no one said, is he a triple A or anything like that. Well, it's a first for everything. First for everything. Do you have a question over there, TJ?

No questions. It's just like, this is really surreal for me, Steven, because, you know, I think I discovered you way back when I was in elementary school and I was trying to, you know, listen to Eddie Murphy and Pryor and Carlin, but you can just talk to me through your monitor there. But of course, they curse so much that I would get yelled at. But my mom, I could get away with listening to you because you were clean. But what I would do is I would write your jokes down in a book and I would go like fifth, sixth grade and I would do stand up based on jokes that you told.

So this is really surreal to me, man, to see you and just like your style. Like you were just describing. When did you decide that that was the way that you were going to tell your jokes?

Because I imagine people would be like, you're not energetic enough, you're you're really low energy or anything. By the way, I still have four that I tell to this day almost. You do?

Yeah. My great guys say I'm growing up growing up. My parents had the quicksand box in the backyard. I was an only child.

Eventually I spilled spot remover on my dog. And now he's gone. That's a good one. There was one about a dude.

Your friend, Dennis, he had I want to be PC here. He had smaller parents, but he wasn't small. He was a dwarf. And he would pose for trophies.

Yeah, he was the guy that was amazing. So I would tell these in elementary school, that's how much. So like I said, this is a trip for me right now because I've literally had a notebook and I would write these down because I couldn't tell any Murphy jokes at school because, you know, I got sent to the principal's office. That's fantastic. It's real for me to hear you say that because when you're performing writing and everything, you're not thinking about a little kid in elementary school like this. So to you to tell me all that is a whole other very touching story from my point of view. Well, that's wonderful.

I'm glad that you told it then, T.J., and I never thought it would be touching that story to be told when it involves apparently somebody who is a model for a small little trophy. Yes. Even like you look at a small trophy and say that must be like to size an actual model. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Oh, man. He say it the way you said it. He's not a midget. He's a midget. Yeah. Careful. Yeah.

He was this big. I'm really flattered that's great that you love it like that. Yeah, man. You asked me how my style, I mean, I just wrote jokes. I went to the comedy club to an open mic and then I thought, I'm going to come back in two weeks. So I wrote things in that two weeks and for some reason they came out like little jokes. Yeah. And I just said them, and this is how I talk. So accidentally that type of joke with how I speak merged and it was just an ad. There was no like, oh, it was no plan.

Like I'll do it like this and then I'll do this. And it was in Boston. There was no show business in Boston. So there was nobody to say, you got to talk louder and you got to make sell stories. We were all left our own and we just very distinct comedians and Dennis Leary and Bobcat Goldthwait and Paula Poundstone and Kevin Meaney and Steve Sweeney and Lenny Clark and when I got Bill Burr, who is his new England as they come. Yes. Yes.

I mean, I love that. He's he's brilliant. That guy.

For sure. Steven, how'd you get involved with Half Baked where you famously played the guy on the couch? There was a talk show on at midnight to one in the morning.

I think Bob Costas was the host. And then one time Dave Chappelle was the guest host and I was his guest. So when the show was over, I said, yeah, we should be in a movie together. And he said, oh, I'm making a movie right now.

Do you want to be in it? I said, yeah, all right. That's how it happened.

All because Bob Costas went on vacation. Yes. Later. I was later. And you were and you're the voice of the DJ in Reservoir Dogs. What it did, did Tarantino just reach out to you?

No, what happened was there's all these flukes. I made a short film called The Appointments of Dennis Jennings, directed by Dean Pariseau and Sally Menke. She edited the movie. And then a few years later, she was editing Reservoir Dogs and she was talking to him.

They had the concept of the guy on the radio, but they didn't have the voice. And she just said, how about Stephen Wright? Because I was friends with her for a few years. And he said, oh, yeah, I like that. See how all these accidents. And it all works out. And I'm so thrilled that you were out here in Los Angeles on your book tour. Again, everybody check out Harold. Get it. You can preorder it right now.

And the books come out, Harold comes out on May 16th. Pleasure. Thanks for being here.

Thanks for having me. Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you. You bet it.

Absolutely. I'm glad that T.J. got to meet somebody whose work he was ripping off as a child. I definitely stole out your jokes and I thank you for it. And I'm thrilled that I was able to add on to one of your favorite jokes. That was tremendous. That's tremendous.

I mean, there's different types of batteries that grandpa could be or your father could be. Thank you for having me. Thank you very much.

Absolutely. Everybody check out Harold May 16th and get it right now. You can preorder it.

Steven Wright right here on The Rich Isaac Show. I just learned Discover credit cards do something pretty awesome. At the end of your first year, they automatically double all the cash back you've earned. That's right. Everything you've earned doubled all the cash back from eating at your favorite soup dumpling restaurant. That doubled all the cash back from that trip where you sort of learned to snowboard.

Also doubled. And the best part, you don't have to do anything ridiculous to get it. Nope. Discover does it automatically.

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Ask your doctor about Ubrelvi, the anytime, anywhere migraine medicine. Learn more at Ubrelvi dot com or call 844-4-U-B-R-E-L-V-Y, sponsored by AbbVie. Back here, we are here on the Rich Eisen Show studio. No Bull is a training brand for people who work hard and don't believe in excuses. No Bull's performance footwear, apparel, and accessories are worn by some of the fittest athletes on earth, and they're now the official combine training partner of the NFL and the official on-field supplier of apparel and headwear for the NFL scouting combine. Head to NoBullProject.com slash NFL to see how No Bull forever changed the NFL combine, and you can shop for football, training essentials, and more great gear for your day-to-day workouts, and No Bull sponsoring a segment that we debuted today with John Beck, the throwing coach, from the combine to the draft. I'm going to profile a few players' journeys from the physical and mental test of the combine all the way to hearing their name and that thrilling moment for them when the picks get announced in Kansas City during the draft and a couple of Thursdays from now.

So check us out every single day on the Rich Eisen Show or our Twitter feed or YouTube dot com slash Rich Eisen Show at Rich Eisen Show on Twitter for all the videos that we're going to be creating from the combine to the draft, sponsored by NoBull. So Yankees and Guardians playing right now, bottom one, runners on second and third one out for the Guardians, pop fly center field, Aaron Hicks comes in, makes a diving grab, throws to second, double play. Everybody runs off the field. And then during the inning changeover, the umpires get together and the replay that is shown shows Hicks did not catch the ball.

That's a fact. Hicks did not catch the ball, but the way that he grabbed it, his body when he came, you know, went ass over tea kettle, kind of hit it from the second base umpire, Larry Vanover is the crew chief. And what it appears to be, and the initial thought, was that the umpires reviewed it without the Guardians requesting it because they saw the replay.

And as of right now, we're going to find out after the game, it does look like the Guardians did challenge it, but you only get 15 seconds to challenge. But because it was the end of the inning, I guess they didn't start the clock or they didn't know if it was 15 seconds because they allowed the challenge to take place. And after further review, everybody come back out. Not only is the inning not over, two runs are in. And Aaron Boone gets thrown out on the spot.

Instant ejection. And the Guardians wind up taking a 3-0 lead. And the game's now currently 3-2 still. And if the, I'm assuming the Yankees are going to protest this thing because either the umpires, the initial thought was the umpires used the in-stadium replay to reverse their call. They eventually got the call right.

The question is, how did they get there? You get 15 seconds to challenge and the pitch clock, it's tough on the video crews to turn it around and take a look at it. Hicks did not catch the ball. That is not in dispute. And we don't know, there's no baseball sky judge, right? No way.

No, no, no, no. But you see, you always see in the, you see the manager turn around to somebody who immediately gets on the phone and the guy who was on the phone is talking to a video replay person who either says challenge it or not. And then the challenge to keep playing on is, you know, they give this twirl a finger, keep playing, or put the headphones on, let's challenge this thing. And you could see there's a shot of Frank Kona. He doesn't make a move. The 15 seconds goes by and he doesn't say a word and suddenly this thing gets challenged and overturned. And instead of, I think they would have allowed one run to score because there was a tag up situation. And somebody scored, Stephen Kwon was on third.

He's pretty fast. I think he might've scored before the set third out was recorded. I don't know. They made up, they might've looked at the replay to see if that was the case. Did the guys score before the third out was recorded and in so doing, they saw that the ball wasn't caught. And so once replay is opened up, you get to review everything. Maybe we'll find that out.

But the guardians didn't challenge in time and Boone gets ejected. That's a shame. Okay. But I'm not allowed to say anything spiteful about my sports spitees, right? I turn to you now, TJ, since you're the reasonable one here. Well, you should be above that, Rich. You shouldn't be above it. Look, you're a multiple time Emmy nominated- It's okay.

It's all right. Even if the Yankees lose this game, there's still two games above 500 and we're not six out already before tax day. Like his team who can't do a damn thing against the Tampa Bay Rays, try and win a game against the team that hasn't lost yet. Well, technically- On behalf of the rest of the American League East, be great if your team won a game. We're trying. Great. We were also predicted to be last in the division, so there's zero- He's got the Bruins going. There's zero expectations.

He's fine. He hasn't mentioned a word about the Bruins that I've heard all year long. I've been to a game. Have you?

I have not. No, you brought your beautiful boy here to Los Angeles. I get it. Did you bring the Bruins partly? When the Bruins came to Los Angeles. I have a big Bruins futures bet that I'm not going to talk about. Oh, it's like Fight Club.

It's like Fight Club. All I know is if you come in with a new set of wheels, we'll understand. Or if he doesn't come in, we'll understand. We'll find out after the game. I think we'll find out that we were just replayed to see if the run scored and then we saw the ball was loose and we had to change that. So play on. And Boone, I mean, literally got his money.

I think he came out four times. That is pretty ridiculous. I mean, I will say. Thank you for that.

You're right. I appreciate that. Strange bedfellows. Thanks to Steven A. Smith and Steven Wright and John Beck, who is in studio all hour to talk an NFL draft. We will chat on Thursday. Wrestling fans, feel the podcast heat. Join Hall of Fame wrestlers every week, sharing their stories from the past.

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