REShow: Jon Wertheim - Hour 1

Now, your ideas don't have to wait.

Now, they have everything they need to come to life. Dell Technologies and Intel are creating technology that loves ideas, loves expanding your business, evolving your passions. We push what technology can do, so great ideas can happen right now.

Find out how to bring your ideas to life at dell.com slash welcome to now. This is the Rich Eisen Show. Let me see you put your hands up now. Now. Now. Now.

Now. With guest host Steve Weisman. Rich, love you. Brock, no tusco, what's up?

PJ, my brother from another mother, love you. Live from the Rich Eisen Show studio in Los Angeles. Today's guest Sports Illustrated senior writer John Wertheim, seven year NFL veteran Trey Boston, ESPN, NFL insider Field Yates, Chargers tackle Rashawn Slater. And now sitting in for Rich, it's Steve Weisman. It is so good to be back in this chair. Welcome to the Rich Eisen Show.

I'm Steve Weisman filling in for Rich today. You just saw the lineup of guests that we have. It is going to be a spectacular three hours. I've been up for like four or five hours already. Just got back from Paris and the French Open was there for about three weeks. The jet lag has not gone away yet.

Chris Brockman, Mike Del Tufo, T.J. Jefferson. Great to be back in the house with you. What up, though?

Great to see you, brother. So you were in Paris, huh? Paris. That's what rich people call Paris. Paris.

I wouldn't know. But yeah, no, Paris. It's my favorite city. My favorite tournament. Roland Garros.

It was absolutely amazing. Saw the new GOAT. Novak Djokovic. Win his twenty third major singles title. History made on the red clay of Roland Garros.

Absolutely spectacular to see that now. More Grand Slam singles titles than any man in history. And he had the jacket ready to go, by the way.

He had twenty two ready to go in Australia. And Lacoste set him up so that right when he won, he went up to the stands and saw his family and they gave him the jacket. Tom Brady. The other GOAT was there. By the way, there was a herd of GOATS in the house to watch the tennis GOAT. You had Brady in the box next to his wife. Then you had his wife or Brady's wife. It's next to Djokovic.

Yeah, they were talking about the whole the whole match. And by the way, Novak's kids were behind Tom Brady. So Tom got a better seat than Djokovic's own kids. I mean, he's accomplished more. Yeah. I mean, I don't think his kids have won anything.

Seven Super Bowls usurps family blood. Yes, absolutely. 100 percent. All right.

You want to give your kids something to strive for. You know what I mean? Yeah, for sure. Look at that guy in the front. I do give a lot of respect to Brady, though, because when Djokovic went up to the box, you know, to give hugs to everybody, he just kind of waited. He knew his place. And then we actually talked to Novak after the match and he said, I had been in communication with Tom for years and we've really respected each other and supported each other. We had never met before. What? Yeah, that was the first time that Novak and Tom actually met in person. That's incredible.

Yeah, I found that fascinating as well. Game recognize game. You know, go recognize goat. Absolutely. Now about that jacket, right? Yeah.

When did you get that produced? Because was it like after he made the quarterfinals? Was it before? Was it the night before? Like, all right, I made the final.

I might win tomorrow. I better get this jacket made for Djokovic. I would say right after he won the Australian Open, they had twenty two, twenty three was whenever they figured out what Lacoste's kit was going to be for Roland Garros. That's when they made it. OK. You know, they were like, all right, not afraid of the reverse jinx. No, I mean, going into the tournament, there were only a couple of guys who would even want it.

Right. Rafa was not there. So 14 time Roland Garros champion, the guy, clay court king. He was not playing injured. So going into the tournament, in my opinion, Djokovic was the favorite to win this thing.

The betting favorite was Carlos Alcaraz. So the 20 year old Spaniard, youngest ever to be number one in the world. He had never beaten one of the big three in a best three out of five match.

And to me, you're not the guy, whether you're ranked number one or anything like that, until you beat one of those big three, three out of five at a major, you're not that guy. And so they played each other in the semifinals. You saw what happened. Alcaraz could not hang.

His body broke down. I mean, he's 20. Djokovic is 36. We asked Djokovic after the match, would you be would you argue if somebody said you're in you're in your prime right now? I said, I wouldn't argue. Thirty six years.

Oh, that's crazy. In his prime. So so to me right now, you know, Novak Djokovic is is the goat on the men's side.

I break down the goat into a couple of parts. So you have statistics and you have legacy. The stats are the facts.

Those those are the records. The legacy is more emotional and therefore subjective. So some people may get a feeling that that Roger Federer made them feel a certain way or Rafa Nadal, the same thing.

And so to them, they're going to be their goats. But statistically, right now, if you take a look at it, he's got one more Grand Slam singles title than Rafa. He's got three more than Roger Federer. So the first time in history, Novak Djokovic leads that race tied with Serena Williams trailing Margaret Court.

So at the end of the day, this is this is a men's thing. I'm not going to say goat for tennis all time. Then you got the head to head. He already led the head to head with his two biggest rivals. And this is the greatest generation of tennis that we've ever seen with Roger Rafa and Novak. All of them have at least 20 major titles.

Nobody's even even close behind that. And he has a better head to head record against Rafa. He has a better head to head record against Roger Federer. This was his third Roland Garros title. The third title there. He is the first man to ever win all four Grand Slam titles three times.

It's amazing. It's been done on the women's side. Steffi's done it. Steffi Graf, Serena Williams, Margaret Court did it. But the first man to win all four of the majors at least three times. He is also the only man to have won all nine Masters 1000 events. That's the right below the Grand Slam in terms of the level of tournament. He's done that twice.

Nobody's even done that once. He's won them all at least two times. Not to mention, he is once again now by winning the Roland Garros title back to number one in the world. So he is without a doubt, 36 years old, the number one ranked tennis player in the world, and has spent a record 388 weeks and counting at that top spot. So that's the most man or woman that any human on the planet has never been ranked number one more than Novak Djokovic. Twelve different years he's been ranked number one in the world. So he's got longevity as well as the dominance. And to me, those are two very key GOAT characteristics, right?

You do it for a very long time as well as being dominant. He said before this tournament, I play to break more records and make more history. Like he's very open about wanting all these things.

Roger and Rafa, not as much. But he said, I want all the records. I want to claim everything. And so I asked him, I said, what's the next most meaningful piece of history for you to achieve on the court? There are still some things he has not done. He's now two for two in terms of winning Australia and Roland Garros this year.

And he said, I want another chance in New York. He said, I want a chance to win the Grand Slam. So that hasn't been done in nearly a half century on the men's side.

Steffi Graf, last player to do it, 1988, the Golden Slam, won all four majors plus the Olympic gold. But the fact that he's already thinking about that and listen, he's still got to win Wimbledon, which he is the defending champion. That little event in London.

That old thing in London, whatever it's called. That he's won the last four times that he's played, but he needs to win that to then go to New York. And he said, but I'm thinking, he said, I want another chance. Because remember, two years ago, he was one match away, lost in the final to Daniil Medvedev. And that's the closest anyone's been in decades to actually winning the Grand Slam.

But he wants that because that's, you know, a whole a whole nother level. And to me, you know, you talk about the legacy and the emotion. When I talk to Novak Djokovic, the man is so inspiring. On the court after he won the match, he said, I want to give good values to my children.

I want to be able to inspire the next generation. He said, believe it, create it, achieve it. And then when I asked him what he learned about himself over the past two weeks, I said, listen, what you said on court was magical.

But what did you learn about yourself? He said, it's a great question. He said, energy flows where attention goes.

I say that one more time. Energy flows where attention goes. And I'm like, mind blown. Right. Because that makes complete sense. I totally believe in that.

And where you put your energy and where you put your attention, that that that stuff combines. When I moved here to L.A. eight years ago now, I didn't have, you know, contracts or jobs signed up. But I believed I was like, this is where I want to be. This is what I want to do. Totally get that. Now I'm hanging out with the three of you all on the Rich Eisen Show. Dreams do come true. That kind of encapsulates all of us. Paris to El Segundo.

Paris to El Segundo. They're very similar in not a lot of ways. I think that's really interesting what you said about what the statistics say and how someone makes you feel. That's really interesting when you talk about greatest of all time debates or we're debating top five or top tens. You look at the NBA, the whole like Jordan and LeBron thing. Statistically, LeBron James is the greatest player of all time. But for people of our era, we're all kind of the same age here. Michael Jordan made us feel a certain way because our eyes do not lie what we see on TV.

Right, TJ? And so, you know, you're debating all this stuff like Tom Brady is the greatest of all time. Statistically, he does make me feel a certain way because I'm a New England fan. But your eyes might tell you that Aaron Rodgers was a better quarterback, played the position better. Or Patrick Mahomes is on his way to playing the position better and maybe he might be the greatest of all time. It's a very interesting way of looking at it that I never thought before.

So thank you for bringing that up. And I think tennis wise, yes, Roger Federer made us all feel a certain way. I think for maybe our generation, Pete Sampras made us feel a certain way and we thought he was the greatest we'd ever seen.

Yet he never won the French Open. And statistically, Djokovic is the greatest of all time. But he makes people feel a certain way sometimes in the negative because of how he acts, his demeanor, his whole anti-vaccine stance. Where whatever side you feel about that can make you feel a certain way. And it's a very interesting way of looking at it.

Yeah, because, you know, at the end of the day, not everybody has the same opinion. And there's a reason for that, because statistically there is no more argument. He has now surpassed both Roger Federer and Raf Nadal statistically in virtually every category.

You can't deny it. Stats don't lie. So he is the GOAT statistically. But that legacy, that emotional subjective quality is not always going to be that case.

And there are millions of people, believe me. When I tweet out that Novak Djokovic, and I believe he's the greatest athlete on the planet right now. The greatest athlete on the planet right now. Bar none, in my opinion. The individual aspect of the sport, what he's doing at his age, the physicality. And then you factor in the mental strength that he has as well.

There's nobody that touches him, in my opinion, right now. Greatest athlete on the planet. Yeah, you were looking at that final, the championship match. The first set I think took, what, an hour and twenty minutes? And you're like, wow, if this thing goes five, they're not going to be playing for six and a half hours. I couldn't imagine doing anything that long. Let alone something as grueling as one-on-one individual tennis at the highest of highest levels.

And yeah, I think you're right. I mean, that's a good debate. Well, if we're just going to talk about how they made you feel, then I'm sorry, he's never given me the feeling that Andre Agassi did. Because for my era, like that guy, when I was much younger, it was Boris Becker. Because I remember going, wait a minute, this dude's like seventeen and he's winning Wimbledon?

And then Agassi came along with all the flash and the headbands and the colorful, you know, tennis attire and the sneakers. And you couldn't tell me Agassi wasn't the greatest. And it kind of made me dislike Pete Sampras a little bit because that was a hurdle that Andre didn't seem like he could get over. And even though Pete, I think most people would agree, was the better player. I always held it against Pete because it was like he was impeding Andre's progress for him to be the greatest. So, yeah, the how they make you feel argument does get brought in a lot. People get caught up in their feelings, right, when it comes to discussing all the fields, how who's the best and who you like the most.

And I'm with you. I'm an Agassi guy. So I grew up, you know, it was Pete and Andre. And to me, I resonated with Andre, you know, everything, everything that he did on and off the court, I thought was so cool. You know, so Agassi to me is my favorite tennis player of all time. That doesn't make him the greatest tennis player of all time. Because when I mean, when you have eight majors and then you have I mean, even with Pete, 14. Right.

But now 23, there's it's tough to argue with those numbers. That said, he's still my favorite. Yeah. When the minute that he followed me on Twitter and Instagram, those were moments in my life.

And I still check to this day. Like, I'll be like, let's see if Andre, because he doesn't follow a lot of people. Right. So I'm like, does he still follow me? He does.

He does. All right. So the idea of like your heroes now knowing who you are is just the craziest thing ever. Especially for us in this world now, like, oh, so and so. They will recognize me. That's incredible.

I had your poster on my wall when I was a kid. Yeah, that that is something, man, because even though I'm not 100 percent sure that they would remember my name, I know for a fact that if I went somewhere and I saw Deion Sanders or Michael Irvin. Right. Drake, man. Stone Cold Steve Austin.

They might not be like, hey, T.J., but they'd be like, yeah, that guy. That kind of makes you go, oh, man, like, I can't believe it's wild. It's wild.

It's awesome. I do want to tell one story, because like you mentioned, there are certain people out there that may not be emotionally drawn to Novak Djokovic. And over the years, I've gotten to spend a lot of time with them. And then those moments I cherish so much, because whether it's Novak, whether it's Roger Federer, whether it's Nadal or some of these one of one humans, every time I get to spend that time with them is a real privilege because I'm learning something.

The energy flows where attention goes. Right. Like, I'll remember that for the rest of my life now.

I'm going to make a song with that. There you go. Put the remix in it. Right.

This is the remix. So after after he wins, you know, his his twenty third major title, he's on the court for probably another hour doing interviews on the court, doing all the the photos, all that stuff. He has to go to press.

He's got a million obligations. Our set, the Tennis Channel set at Roland Garros is not it's outside of the stadium. It's a beautiful set. Amazing background. It was. But it's not super close. I mean, you've got to you've got to walk there.

It takes it takes effort to get to our set. And for 15 days in Paris and this never happens. It was beautiful weather. It was perfect. The sun was shining every single day. They have a roof now on Chatrier.

They did not need to use it. And it was literally could not have been a more perfect fortnight in Paris. About an hour after the tournament ends, the skies erupt. It is a monsoon. It is a thunderstorm. I mean, John Wertheim, who, by the way, is coming up in about four minutes on the show.

We'll we'll talk a little bit more Paris. But we're on the set kind of nervous, scared for our lives because the rain's coming down. We're seeing literal lightning bolts. And this hasn't happened for two weeks. And our boss, Ken Solomon's like Novak's coming.

He's he's doing one set interview and it's going to be Tennis Channel. I'm like, OK, great. You know, so but in the back of my head, I like how you downplayed it. OK, great.

No, no, no. In the back of my I'm like, if I was Novak and I just won, you know, I just won my twenty third major title. I'm probably tired.

Right. I've been spending two weeks playing tennis. I was doing all these obligations to then have to travel all the way in the rain to the Tennis Channel set to do another interview before I just can go home. I might be like, yo, I got you Wimbledon. Like, it's good. Like, you know, thanks.

But I'm going to pass on this one. But he came he came in the rain all the way to the set and spent 15 minutes with us, you know, talking about life, talking about tennis and was like, I'm happy to be here. I'll do anything for Tennis Channel.

I love you all. And that to me, I have so much respect for that, that at nine thirty at night after winning the biggest title. He decided to come in the rain with no like no handlers or anything. He's like, he's wet. Wow. And sits on set for 15 minutes.

So, you know, if you have some hate, get rid of it. Djokovic is the man. Big congratulations to him. And as I mentioned, we got John Wertheim, who has spent the last two weeks with me on set in Paris. He is coming up next. You are watching the Rich Eisen show. Steve Weissman filling in for Rich today.

We'll be right back. Rich Eisen here for sleep number. My sleep number setting is 60.

My wife's is 70. It's just 10 numbers apart. But guess what? It is the world of difference because with a sleep number smart bed, you can individualize your sleep experience and make high quality sleep effortless every night. You can choose your ideal comfort and support on your side of the bed and change it whenever you like. And then your sleep number bed shows you your sleep quality. You can see how well you slept along with personalized insights for even better sleep.

And that's how you sleep next level. Unlock your unique potential with a smart bed that can perform as well as you. And now the Sleep Number Queen C2 smart bed is only eight hundred ninety nine dollars. Save two hundred dollars plus special financing for only a limited time.

Only at a sleep number store or sleep number dot com. See store for details. 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. Doubled all the cash back from that trip where you sort of learn to snowboard.

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

Seriously, though, see terms and check it out for yourself at discover dot com slash match. Back on the rich eyes and show Steve Weissman filling in for rich today. Give us a call.

Eight four four two oh four rich. We are on the Roku channel as well as Sirius XM and we have our first guest coming up. It is my friend. He is a 60 Minutes correspondent, the executive editor of Sports Illustrated, New York Times best selling author and one of my analysts at Tennis Channel, the great John Wertheim joins us now on the phone. John, thanks so much for calling in. You spent 16 straight days in Paris with me, 12 hours a day. Have you recovered from the trip? That's going to say, are you not sick of me?

You didn't want another guest. You've heard a lot of this voice. Good to be with you. How are you? Doing well, doing well. I just named all of your jobs. So obviously you just got back from what are you working on now? Oh, man, I'm putting the finishing touches on a documentary. So about the amount of freezing.

You got to explain this to me. I'm out of freezing cold L.A. 55 degrees. Yeah. I mean, Paris, Paris was much nicer.

I don't know. I was driving into the studio today. It was it was misty. It was rainy.

I don't like it at all. I was hoping, you know, for for the Paris weather to come back to L.A. But it's interesting because whenever we have you on Tennis Channel, a lot of times we have you on Skype when you're not on location.

We're like, where in the world is Wertheim? And you're always, you know, doing some story in some other destination of the planet. What what do you enjoy most about each of your different roles that you have? Oh, man, it's just it's variety.

And, you know, it's no it's no secret media is in a very strange, fast moving, uncertain place. But the flip side is you get to do a lot and sort of all the old guardrails are off. And the idea of just being whatever you need, you know, the two you're doing, you know, 72 hours ago, you were doing TV and an ocean away. And now that nine time zones from there, you're doing radio. So, yeah, I don't know the fact that one day you're doing tennis and the next day you're doing, you know, you're talking to Bruce Springsteen in Rome and just kind of the location is different. The rhythms of the day are different. The medium is different. I can't imagine in retrospect what it was like, you know, 25 years ago or whatever, when all you did was radio, TV, newspaper, whatever. And it was a huge taboo. You know, if somebody crossed over and Bob Ryan did an ESPN show, it was like big news. Now it's like you do a little of everything.

And that, to me, offsets a little bit of the instability and uncertainty. We're all dealing with the media right now. John Wertheim joining us now on the Rich Eisen Show. Steve Weissman filling in for Rich today. John, you brought it up.

Bruce Springsteen in Rome. Tell me about it. What were you talking about?

What was that like? Oh, man. Yeah, I don't know. In 60 minutes, I've kind of, I don't know how I ended up. I do a lot of music pieces. And it was, you know, this is a forthcoming piece, so I should probably be a little kiss for the fall.

But yeah, I caught Bruce Springsteen when they were going through Europe. And, you know, it's hard. I mean, tell me if you disagree.

I heard you're just talking about Novak. One of the things I thought that he does really well is he gets interviewed so often and he still finds a way to sort of be interesting and not go into robot mode. It's very hard. I mean, you talk to someone like Bruce Springsteen, he's been interviewed so many times and has honestly has so little to gain just transactionally by talking. It's really a challenge. And talking to some of the other members of the band, I thought was a lot easier just because they don't get interviewed as much and they don't quite have Bruce Springsteen's, you know, the risk reward ratio is a little different.

But yeah, that was the week before the French, yeah, I don't know, three weeks ago. So yeah, it's at some level, don't you feel like at some level what we do, you know, it changes a lot, but at essence, what do you try to do? You try to like have conversations and tell people things they haven't heard before and hopefully make a few points with some insight and expertise.

And I'm sure you're the same way. Like our jobs have been a lot different than what they started out being. But in some other ways, basically the essence of what we do is pretty much the same, even if we're doing it in places and on platforms that we never imagined when we got into this game. Yeah, just making connections, human connections, telling stories, I totally agree 100%. I mean, you also recently did a profile on Charles Barkley.

What did you learn about him that maybe you didn't know going into that story? You know, I think the beauty of that piece is that we went to Leeds, Alabama, we went to his hometown. And so if we'd done it at, you know, if we'd done it in Atlanta at the studio, it would have been fun.

You would have gotten Kenny and Charles and told stories. But this was just a totally different look at Barkley. And what you realize is, you know, it's funny because Leeds, Alabama is actually maybe 90 minutes from Atlanta. So people say, oh, you came such a long way.

And you're like, actually, geographically, it's not that far at all. But, you know, we spent we spent two days where where Charles grew up and we just you get a real sense of his upbringing. You get a sense of his values. And in a weird way, he was sort of raised in a two parent home. But the parents were his grandma and his mom.

And it's sort of he was very, very sort of generous with his time and his candor. And there was no I heard what you're saying about Novak. It was the same with Charles. There was no entourage.

There was no publicist. It was just Charles taking me around his old stomping grounds. And I think the the producer driving my hell of it is sort of a sports producing legend. I think his his genius of like, look, we don't want to do the obvious story and just camp out Atlanta and have this be the 60 Minutes version of inside the NBA. The fact that we did it outside of a usual context, I think really helped the piece. Who's been your favorite person that you've been able to profile on 60 Minutes? Oh, man.

I think I think this weekend they're rerunning the Red Hot Chili Peppers piece. I would I put Flea up at the top of the list. He was great. But, you know, a lot of times, you know, sometimes it's a celebrity, but I honestly more often than not, it's just. It's like a cool person, you know, someone with the throat singer, some pool player or the piano player in Berlin. You know, the celebrity thing, it's a whole different beast when you're dealing with. You know, you're dealing with who is Gary Seinfeld, who is great. And he was he was like really fun to talk to.

And it was during covid. But, you know, it's that's a much different interview than when you go to the World War Two veteran's home. And the 88 year old guy is telling you war stories, literally. I mean, a lot of times you talk about building connection.

And a lot of times the more the most rewarding interviews aren't with the person who's got the biggest Instagram following. Now, that makes a lot of sense. I walked into the studio today and I noticed right in front of Del Tufo was was your book, Al Michael's memoir.

And what it's been here forever. And I was telling Brock when I was like that, that's our guy that's coming up. It's worth time. He's going to be our first guest. What what's your best Al Michael story?

Oh, man. You mean from the book or from from life? I'll tell you one thing is that I had, you know, we would the way we did this book is we would have meals or we would go out to, you know, we'd get breakfast or we'd go to a bar. Sometimes it was in in Brentwood where he lives. Sometimes it was in Palm Springs, sometimes in New York. We went to it.

I think I met him at a Patriots Broncos game. You know, we stayed at the hotel in Boston. But anyway, we'd have these conversations and it was honestly an easy book to read. I mean, to write just because he's such a good storyteller, kind of like, you know, story time with Al and it was really entertaining. And then I just kind of tried to structure it and fill in some gaps, but I would get it all transcribed. And, you know, it's like a court stenographer. They're not really listening to the content.

They're just kind of whatever gets said, gets on the page. And Al's a really finicky eater and he doesn't like vegetables. But, you know, I'd be reading the transcripts and it would say, you know, Howard Cosell came out of the Metrodome and he was already drunk by then and the car was waiting and capers. Those are capers.

I didn't want any capers. What I realized after a while was that everything that came out of his mouth, including his like instructions to the wait staff to get the vegetables off his plate, made it onto the transcript. So every now and then I would come across something and I would say, wait a second, where does that fit? And then I realized it was just the stenographer, just the transcriber taking everything out of Al's mouth. So I have a lot of great stories about sports from the, you know, the 70s, 80s, 90s and O.J. and World Series. But I also have a lot of Al telling the wait staff that he couldn't have capers on his plate.

No capers for Al. Is he kind of like our friend Ian Eagle in terms of the foods? Yeah, exactly. Just strange eaters. Maybe you're onto something.

Maybe there's a trend in... The best play-by-play players on the planet just eat like children. Yeah, there's no intersection. He's never had salad in his life. That's wild. He's at the top of his game still, but not a young guy.

You've got to try to go 70 plus years and never eat salad once. Yeah, I think you're onto something. John, obviously you do a ton of sports stuff with Sports Illustrated. You've done all these profiles with 60 Minutes as well. But outside of sports, what's been the most rewarding assignment or story you've done? Oh, man.

I mean, you know, a lot of the things like the sports washing piece is kind of sports, but kind of not. And that's obviously, you know, a top of mind story right now. But yeah, I did a story on these World War II soldiers, this intelligence unit, that nobody knew about. Just, you know, the documents came declassified. And so basically it's what started as the CIA, but these were sort of German. A lot of them were Jewish, but a lot of German immigrants to the U.S. And they sort of enlisted in this camp and were used for intelligence because they could speak the language.

They knew not just the German language, but they knew the culture and the slang and the food and, you know, even the sports stars. And so they were really good spies. And the story came out a few years ago. And basically, you know, I had access to it in these names because a lot of it became declassified. But before these guys died, you know, the story came out and there was a lot of attention and people wanted to option it for film. But also the, you know, the government basically began bestowing awards on these guys.

They couldn't do it previously because a lot of this was classified information. But the story came out in a lot of these guys before they were, you know, these guys are in their 90s now. And some of them have passed away in the last two years, but they've gotten in any number of awards. And some of them were, you know, they were brought to Washington, D.C. And they met President Biden and, you know, these guys are in the very, very tail end of their life. These were, you know, they played a huge role in World War II success in 1944 and 45. And here they are almost 75 years later getting recognized.

That was just sort of from a gratification standpoint. I'd put that one up there. That's fascinating. We're here with John Wertheim from Sports Illustrated. 60 Minutes, Tennis Channel, New York Times bestselling author Steve Weisman in for Rich on the Rich Eisen show today.

And you brought up the sports washing and I know you sat down with some folks in Saudi Arabia. What was your reaction? We're watching the U.S. Open right now go on at LACC. To that latest news of the PGA Tour merger with Live Golf.

I would love to say I saw it coming. I'm absolutely gobsmacked. I think it sort of falls into that shocking but not surprising category where especially the way all of this was cloaked in morals by the PGA. And sort of, you know, these guys have a bottomless pit of money, but you really want to be aligning with this regime. I mean, that was kind of their big selling point to keep these golfers loyal to the PGA.

Because then a year later, basically completely 180 that, it was astonishing. You know, whatever. I said to someone else, we're accustomed to having business leaders sometimes gloss over the truth or not.

You know, spin things in a particular. I mean, we're not naive here, but I'm not sure I've ever seen a business leader in sports or outside just complete hypocrisy. I mean, just an absolute 180 with an active legal case and with nothing sort of materially changing the facts on the ground apart from money. It's really interesting to see how this is going to play out. It's interesting to see if this gets, you know, I'm not 100% convinced this will sort of get all the approval. It's one thing to have a press conference and a press release. It's another thing to actually have all the antitrust and all the regulators sign off on it. But I think both in golf and then more broadly now is this sort of been normalized. And next time the Oakland A's or the whatever, Ottawa Senators come up for sale, I imagine there will be a Saudi bid. I mean, I think this is really potentially pretty transformational in sports business.

Absolutely. Here with Jon Wertham from 60 Minutes does a great job there. Obviously, Sports Illustrated and Tennis Channel as well.

So, you work for these just institutions, Jon. I mean, 60 Minutes has been around forever. Sports Illustrated, you know, that was the magazine for me growing up.

Tennis Channel, best tennis team in the game. What is there still something that you would like to do? What's something you'd still like to pursue out there?

Oh, man. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, you know, I think there are always sort of more books to write or more, you know, more documents. I'm sort of playing in this documentary space, but some of it is just kind of seeing where all this is going.

I mean, you've sort of alluded to it. I mean, Sports Illustrated still exists, but, you know, I'm no no illusion that it's not the force it was when you and I were growing up. And who knows what the future of linear TV is and who knows?

I mean, you know, I don't know where podcasting is. I mean, it's just it's such a weird time in media. But I think there's also people are always going to want news. They're always going to want sort of informed opinion. And some of it is just kind of figuring out where the platforms are going to be because they're they're moving very quickly. And nobody nobody knows anything is what I've got. You know, you go to one meeting and it's I mean, two, two years ago, everyone and their brother was on the podcast train.

And now that seems to have lost the momentum. I mean, just no one knows where it's going, but in a weird way, it's actually I think it's kind of exciting and invigorating. I totally agree. And the more things you do, the more opportunities, you know, present themselves.

And if you're not just focused on one thing, you make yourself more marketable to do a variety of things. You said you were listening earlier to our Novak Djokovic conversation. You know, after spending some time with him, with Tennis Channel and what you saw over the past two or three weeks, who's your goat? Yeah, I think we need to take out that there's dirt on the shovel.

You know, there's there's embalming fluid is out. I think the tennis goat debate was, you know, a lot of fun for 10 plus years. And there were a lot of passion and a lot of opinions. But boy, I don't know where you are on this. But just as a as a math exercise, it's really, really hard to arrive at a conclusion other than Djokovic.

And people are still out there trying. But you won the most majors. You've got the superior head to head.

You've won all the majors at least three times, which none of the other two guys have it. Most weeks at number one. I mean, it's just it's really hard, I think, to especially after what happened Sunday. That to me was kind of the final the final squirt of embalming fluid on this debate. I think we kind of retired this, but feel feel free to. I don't know.

How do you feel? No, I got my whole bit was basically statistically he is the greatest of all time. There's there's no debating that, in my opinion. Stats don't lie. And he's got all the stats on the men's side. I don't know if I would say it overall in tennis, I could still make arguments for Serena Williams and, you know, Martina Navratilova as well. I mean, we work with Martina very closely and I've always said she's my tennis goat. You know, the 59 majors, all that she's done over basically four decades, you know, from the 70s to 2006. And and what she's done outside the sport as well factors into that for me. But on the men's side, it's Djokovic. And I did bring up the point that it's it's stats and legacy. And so legacy is more emotional and therefore subjective. And I understand that, you know, if Roger Federer made you feel a certain way because it was so effortless and so beautiful the way he played. He's your he's your goat because of that. And that overrides the statistics. And there are Rafa fans that will say the same thing. But at the end of the day, statistically, on the men's side, there is there's no denying Novak Djokovic, right? Yeah.

But then we're like someone was giving me a similar argument the other night. I'm thinking like my favorite basketball player of all time was Sean Kemp. OK. And he was cool. The Rain Man. He was athletic.

The Rain Man. It was in Seattle. Like grunge was there. And I'm like, he moved me more than Michael Jordan. But you was like, really, you'd like a lot now. But it was past, you know, it's personal. But it's like it's, you know, so it's so.

But I would never argue that Sean Kemp, because I had this connection with him and because he made basketball look easy and just he was, you know, from Indiana like I am. I've never. That's what it is.

So now I got to the bottom of it. No, it's the Indiana thing. Well, yeah, exactly.

He's from northern India. But no, but I would never like I'd never stand out there and make the case of like Sean Kemp. These people are like, you know, I don't care what anyone says. Roger Federer moved me like no other athlete. I'm like, I get that. But like that's not what the GOAT. You know, when we talk about Tom Brady, I don't think anyone's saying like, oh, I have an emotional connection to him. Here's what he achieved. Here's his longevity. Here are Super Bowl rings.

Like, go find me someone else. I don't think anyone's saying like, you know, Brockman, feel free to chime in if you'd like. Yeah, he touched my soul. Chris Brockman has an emotional connection to Tom Brady. John, us in New England are very connected to Tom Brady. We even rooted for him with the Bucks. But that's not why we're calling him the GOAT.

I mean, I feel like once we, then we're just fans, right? When people are like, Roger Federer, like, I don't care what anyone says. Like, he touched my soul.

And I'm like, that's great. But that doesn't make him the GOAT. Well, you know, you know what Andy Roddick says about Djokovic, first he takes your legs, then he takes your soul. Yeah, I don't. Yeah, he doesn't. He doesn't touch your soul. He doesn't touch your soul.

He takes it. L.A. traffic. It sounds like New York. And so, you know, before the pandemic, I've heard of these, you know, events, parties, soirees at the Wertheim residence that would bring together, you know, famous folks from all walks of life. Can you tell us a little bit about those events and what amazing people you've brought together? Oh, man.

Yeah, we got to, that may have been a pandemic casualty to get reinstated. No, but the idea was basically like, you know, anyone to kind of, you know, I'm sure you're the same way. You live in a city and you come across cool people. And instead of just having a meal, like, why not get everyone together? So your friends who are artists can meet your friends who are journalists. And the idea was somebody would, you know, somebody would prepare something. A comedian would speak or you'd sort of learn about the other people from other walks of life. It was all very casual and off the record. And they'd bring random, you know, things like, I think, who like Fab Five Freddy would come to hear Grant Wall's wife talk about infectious disease.

And it would just be like this kind of random mix of people. And yeah, that was, you know, so maybe once every three or four months. We do one of those and it probably needs to get reinstated now that Covid is not Covid friendly. You got to bring that back. Yeah, we got to bring that back.

Would you invite Cara Delevingne to to one of these? A little back story to this. You could tell it, John. Oh, man. Yeah, I don't. Well, I'm not sure we should go here. All right.

We'll stay with that. Briefly resided in my place of residence. Rented John's apartment in New York.

May not have, you know, taken care of it the best way. John. Isn't that what Prince did to Carlos Boozer's house? There you go. Yeah, exactly. You ever hear the we give you hear that the second part of that story, the Carlos Boozer Prince story? Go for it. That's one of the all time great sports stories.

All right. And when Carlos Boozer came and he's like, you know, his dining room was a barbershop and there was like a prince. They ever had this.

It's a great story. This is when when Prince rented Carlos Boozer's place in. Where was it?

Beverly Hills, I think. Yeah. And there's like, you know, you like put a bowling and it's like a dance floor. And he basically said, here's a check. Carlos Boozer came home by mistake and he thought he'd gone to the wrong hole. And Prince basically said, here's a check.

Put in Nesbrough. And if everything doesn't look exactly like it does, you come back, you keep this check. And so Carlos Boozer went one night, he came to this place and, you know, there was like a barbershop where his bedroom used to be. And Prince printed out. And whenever he came back a month later, every single like wine glass was in the exact same place. Wow.

I don't know how they de-purpled it and I don't know how they got the Prince logo out of the cave in the swimming pool. But the guy went from not recognizing his own house to like not a wine glass out of place. One of the all time great sports stories. Amazing. Amazing. John, really appreciate you spending some time with us this morning.

Good luck with the documentary here in L.A. I look forward to seeing you at Wimbledon in like three weeks. And once again, we'll spend, you know, 12 hours together every day for two weeks. Exactly. This is just like a little amuse-bouche. Thanks for having me.

All right. Thanks, John. John Wertheim does a fantastic job with us at Tennis Channel.

60 Minutes, Sports Illustrated. Obviously, you saw the book that he wrote with Al Michaels. Rents his house out to some models when he when he travels to Paris. And he's honestly he's like one of the most interesting people on the planet. And you may not know that without knowing him. But the more I get to know John, the more I love John and just realize he you know, he's into so many different things. He's a he's a brilliant guy.

When he went to Yale, he went to law school at Penn and now, you know, runs runs the media world. But much more still to come here on The Rich Eyes and show. Give us a call.

844-204-RICH. We'll be right back. Don't let underarm insecurities keep you at arm's distance from the ones you care about.

Buy new and improved of men plus care antiperspirant wherever personal care products are sold. Diablo four has arrived as the forces of hell gather. Only you can stand in their way journey across the expansive open world of sanctuary. Choose from five powerful classes that progress them to fit your play style. Adventure with your friends and up to four player co-op with cross play and cross progression on all platforms. Welcome to hell. Diablo four available now.

Rated M for mature. Tap the banner or visit this episode's page to learn more. And welcome back to The Rich Eyes and Show radio network.

Steve Weisman in today filling in for Rich while he is on a glorious trip in Israel. I am sitting at The Rich Eyes and Show desk furnished by Grainger with supplies and solutions for every industry. Grainger has the right product for you. Call click Grainger dot com or just stop by. Call us as well.

Eight four four two oh four rich. Watch us on the Roku channel. Channel two ten. Listen on Sirius XM. Follow us on Twitter.

Instagram at Rich Eyes and Show. The Nuggets just won the NBA title. They have a parade today.

And then basically now this it's going on. And this is the delay of Nicola Jokic going home. Basically, he would prefer he would prefer to be in Serbia right now.

But he sees, you know, got to be at this parade. That man, the MVP and the fact that we talked about Novak Djokovic earlier in the show. But the fact that we have the number one basketball player on the planet comes from Serbia. And the number one tennis player to ever play the sport is from Serbia, a country of less than eight million people. Wow. Less than the total population of New York City. And they have produced two of the greatest current athletes on the planet is mind blowing.

It's it's fascinating. Vegas also winning the Stanley Cup first time. So Nuggets first time NBA champs. Vegas Golden Knights first time NHL Stanley Cup champions. Got us to thinking, who do you think would be the next team to win a first championship? So there's plenty of options across the four major sports. In fact, there are 12 NFL franchises still looking for their first title.

That's nearly 40 percent of the league. Brockman, any of those pique your interest? Let's see. I think first and foremost, you got to look at the quarterbacks of these teams. So you're looking at Cincinnati. You're looking at the Los Angeles Chargers.

You're looking at anybody else really with a great shot to win a Super Bowl this year. Buffalo. Yeah, Buffalo.

OK. I mean, yeah. I mean, they haven't really. Now that now the digs and Allen are cool again. Oh, they're buddies now.

Twenty four hours and something will change. I think you're looking at probably those three as the best shot to get over the hump this year and in the near future. OK, we got eight NBA franchises yet to win a title. TJ, I would say the Clippers with a healthy Kawhi Leonard and Paul George. You know where my heart is in this. And the Suns. I mean, right with with Katie and Devon Booker.

That's a good one. The question is, who do I think will be the next first team to win? Yeah, I've been beat down too much by the Clippers, so maybe the Suns. You know, they get a full year of Durant and Booker together to see what they can do about the point guard situation.

Maybe I'm hesitant to say the Clippers just because I don't want to jinx them any further than they've already been jinxed. You're listening to the Rich Eisen Show. I'm Steve Weisman filling in for Rich today. I think if we're talking about next first to win, I think it's the Tampa Bay Rays. Yes.

Yes. I'm so amazingly baseball so far this year through the first what we had 60 something game, 65, nearly 70 games a month and a half ago. I told you and Rich, Tampa Bay's winning like that's the bottom line.

And you both gave me massive push push back on that. But that was a month ago. I mean, you can't judge April baseball. They were 13 and 0 to start this year.

Early. It was that obvious to me, like sometimes to me, Steve, I say a story is already written. It just kind of seemed with the way that team started that like they're just playing the script as it's already been written.

And I don't know. I agree with Chris, though, that that would be that was my pick. That seems the Rangers are the second best team in baseball and they've never won a World Series either. Both in the A.L.

so potentially would have to play each other. But Rays right now, most most homers in the A.L., most steals in baseball on pace to win one hundred and fourteen games pitch well. And once it comes to the postseason, you never know. Right. That's true.

You never know. We've seen them kind of blow it before. So most recently, what was the pandemic? Bikes now. Yeah. Also, eleven teams still haven't won a Stanley Cup.

So a lot a lot of opportunity. The NHL and one of those teams, the Florida Panthers, were just in the Stanley Cup finals. In fact, we had we were guaranteed a new Stanley Cup champion. So congratulations recently, too, because they had the president's cup a couple of years ago. So president's trophy.

Yes. Apology to the hockey heads, Mike Hoskins. You're listening and watching to the Rich Eisen Show. Steve Weissman filling in today.

Trey Boston coming up. Conspiracy theories, paranormal UFOs, science teacher Andrew Greenwood stated that a child ran into his classroom and was hysterically screaming and talking about the flying saucer outside. Hundreds of children ran out of their classrooms to go outside and see this unidentified flying object that was just above the school. Just imagine a bunch of kids running out of school. Most of them just ran home. Theories of the third kind on YouTube or wherever you listen.