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Monday Night Football’s Joe Buck, Troy Aikman and Lisa Salters Media Call
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Thursday, June 9, 2022
Tommy Roy
Dan Hicks
Paul Azinger
Justin Leonard
Notah Begay III
THE MODERATOR: Good afternoon, everybody. Welcome to the NBC Sports U.S. Open media conference call. In a moment, we’ll be joined by members of our broadcast team, including producer Tommy Roy, Dan Hicks, Paul Azinger, Justin Leonard, and Notah Begay III.
NBC Sports is going to present more than 100 hours of the U.S. Open from The Country Club in Brookline, Massachusetts, across NBC, USA Network, and Peacock comprised of championship coverage, featured groups and featured holes and 40-plus hours of studio coverage with Golf Central Live From the U.S. Open on Golf Channel, starting on Monday, June 13.
We’ll begin with opening remarks from each of our speakers, a number of interesting connections to Brookline, as you all know. We’ll start with our producer Tommy Roy.
TOMMY ROY: Thanks, Jamie. Appreciate it. It’s a real honor to televise the U.S. Open and to do it with our great team. My goal is to give the viewers the best seat in the house as if they were right there on the tees, the fairways, and the greens themselves, experiencing the pressure of this cauldron and the ultimate reward for one player at the end.
To do this, we’ll do it through a robust technical facility setup, but never losing sight of the fact that this golf event more than any other requires story-telling. As it is an Open with many unknown qualifiers in the field and each having their own special story.
I still believe that every player who has earned the right to play in this field deserves the right to be shown on TV. So we’ll do our very best to get all 156 players in the field on the air, and yes, that includes the LIV players.
What a venue and its ties to the history of our game. We’ll be all over that, I can assure you, being in one of America’s great cities.
So really looking forward to next week, and I’ll turn it over to Paul Azinger.
PAUL AZINGER: Thank you, Tommy. Well, being a professional golfer for 30 years turned broadcaster and TV guy, now having landed here at NBC, I’m amazed at what goes on behind the scenes. When Tommy Roy says he’s going to get all the players on TV and can do that, it’s really only a feat that probably only he can pull off.
Honestly, it’s pretty chaotic for us on Thursday and Friday, but you know what, it’s the right thing to do. The effort that goes into scouting a course like Brookline from the network’s perspective, and now being deep into it and seeing what they do, blows my mind. 100 hours on the air. Then when you have all the Internet feeds and what have you, it’s such a sophisticated and complicated thing, it’s a miracle to me it ever comes to pass. I don’t know how it happens, but it does.
It’s an honor and a privilege to do it. I’ve done several U.S. Opens now actually. I wish I could have won one, I really do. I had a couple of chances. I had a decent chance right here at Brookline. I had a terrible front nine on Saturday in 1988, and it really cost me the championship.
But this is a really fun golf course. One of the great things about the U.S. Open to me is that they travel around and players have to come to an event where everything is extreme — the width of the fairways, the depth of the rough, the speed of the greens — and the fact that it travels to these golf courses makes it a mystery to the players. Some come in weeks early to figure out: how can I conquer this championship? And others don’t. They try to prepare in the nick of time because they just qualified.
In the end, isn’t it the greatest reward for any golfer to win a United States Open? It is. I’m thrilled to be a part of it. I love my broadcast team. There’s a couple of them still on the line here, so I’m going to turn it over. I know Brookline is a fabulous place. It’s not an easy course to learn. It’s hilly. It’s really hilly. There’s some quirky doglegs. Maybe there won’t be a lot of drivers off the tee. It’s a great second shot course.
So I can’t wait. I don’t know anybody who knows it on our broadcast team better than Justin Leonard, who had a thrilling moment there that will last forever. I’ll turn it over to Justin now.
JUSTIN LEONARD: Thank you, Paul. Brookline, the history there going back to 1913, the fact the 11th hole is going to be used for the first time in major competition since that U.S. Open in 1913 won by Francis Ouimet in the playoff. It’s cool to bring that touch of history back to it.
The routing’s changed quite a bit since we were there for the Ryder Cup in 1999. I was going through a yardage book last week, not one from ’99. I don’t have those anymore. Those have long been cleared out.
Current day, the big holes have gotten bigger. There’s still some great short holes. There’s a lot of areas where the fairway’s obscured off the tee, maybe not completely, but in some part, and it just plants that little seed of doubt in a player’s mind when they’re standing over a tee shot.
There’s a lot of options. You can take on some risk off the tee, create an easier second shot, but with that risk comes the possibility of having to chip the ball out back in the fairway or not having a second shot.
Just so cool how the change has been made. The 3rd and 4th hole, how they share this meandering fairway obscured by some rocks. Then the middle of the golf course has changed quite a bit as far as the routing, but it seems to make a lot of sense to host a U.S. Open with this current routing that will be used next week.
Then getting down to the last four holes, a lot happened there in ’99 and the Ryder Cup. Those holes are going to remain the same routing. Some minor tweaks have been made to those, but I expect the rough to be thick and deep. I expect we’re going to see a real U.S. Open. The green complexes are small, and within those green complexes, the areas that are pinnable are very small as well.
There are some areas you can use the slope to feed the ball into the hole. There’s a lot of false fronts. I think this test is going to require a very high level of proficiency from a physical standpoint, swing mechanics and all those things, but also the decision-making, understanding when to take on risk, understanding when it’s time to maybe play a bit safer shot, because the penalty, if you get on the wrong side of the green or wrong side of a hole location, it is severe, and as it should be when you’re deciding who’s going to win the U.S. Open.
With all that, Notah Begay is on the call. He’s going to be down on the ground doing a lot of things for us next week. I’d like to hand it over to him and hear his thoughts.
NOTAH BEGAY III: Thanks, J.L. Well said. I really love the championship for one reason and one reason only. It’s the single most democratic major event that we have in golf.
We’ve been talking and focusing on inclusion and DEI concepts in corporate America, nonprofit over the past two years now, but the U.S. Open has always been an inclusive process for anyone that has been willing to put the time and effort into the game, have their dreams focused on playing in this championship, possibly winning it, and then surviving an 18-hole qualifying and then sectionals.
Like we’ve seen in the past few days, players like Fran Quinn, Michael Thorbjornsen, a young player out of Stanford, working their way and playing their way into our nation’s championship, I really embrace that part of this championship. I get down on the ground, and I really love being part of the atmosphere because it’s not just the usual suspects, which are great and contribute to a wonderful storyline and really accelerate our ability to tell stories around their own personal pursuits of winning a U.S. Open, but it allows us to really dive in.
That’s where I feel like we’re the best. We really do our homework, we do our research, and we really care, genuinely care about the 156 persons that made it into the field. And why it matters, it’s because our executive producer, our team, and our entire production staff care about their story. We do anything and everything we can to bring the great, wonderful highlights to air so that we educate our viewers.
We try and articulate just how difficult. Just hearing Paul and Justin explain the intricacies of navigating a traditional venue, which is a major convergence between modern golf and old traditional design, it just tells you that that story-telling is difficult. But we do a wonderful job of being able to dive into the minutia of the field, the venue, and pull out what we feel is a very valuable storyline that embraces the game and everybody that chooses to take part in this game.
DAN HICKS: I’ll be brief with my opening comments. It’s been very nicely covered by the rest of our team.
This U.S. Open got into my DNA. Everybody that’s involved since it first came to NBC in 1995 at Shinnecock, when Corey Pavin hit the fairway, went up the hill, and Johnny (Miller) uttered the comments that he did, just a great call, shot of his life. It just became a part of who we are.
Even though we were out of it for a few years, it just seemed like it never left. I’m so looking forward to another U.S. Open at The Country Club. I had a chance to visit a few weeks ago to do some research. Even though we’ve been there before for some other events, we did the U.S. Amateur there, it looks dramatically better.
I’ll tell you, if you haven’t had a chance to see it, with the golf course restoration with Gil Hanse’s team with the U.S. Amateur and the upgrades to the clubhouse, the locker room, et cetera, it’s just going to be a tremendous U.S. Open. I know we say it every time, but it’s really going to be special with that history.
And I’ll add that The Country Club, with all that history and the fact that Francis Ouimet won there in 1913, that really launched golf in America, and we’ll get into that a little bit throughout the telecast.
In this particular time that we find ourselves in, the world of golf and what’s happening today in London and the divisiveness that it has created, I’m sad with that. But at the same time, I’m so looking forward to getting the focus back, even for just a week, if we can get everybody away from all this talk, for what makes the game great.
It’s the history, and it’s the quest by these players to be a part of that history, and I really look forward to diving into that 100 percent full-time next week.
THE MODERATOR: Danny, did your research include taking your golf clubs?
DAN HICKS: I did not. I was so immersed in trying to figure out what the new routing is going to be, I did not take the golf clubs. But Justin mentioned this little par-3 11th hole. I think it’s going to be fantastic. They’re going to put that hole on the back edge there, and it’s just going to be a departure from the monster par-3s that seemingly we’ve been in the habit of seeing in major championships.
This place has got charm. It’s got history. It oozes character, and it’s just going to be a great venue again.
THE MODERATOR: Awesome, Dan. Thank you very much. I recognize, as Dan referenced, a number of notable topics in the world of golf right now. We ask the media, before we open this up, that you do your best to keep the questions to the U.S. Open next week.
Q: Hi, everyone. Two questions on two totally different topics. Tommy, any technical things you want to point out that we may be seeing next week for the first time or any cool things to watch for?
TOMMY ROY: I would say we have tracing ability on all the shots, except for 1 and 11, and there we have speed shots for that opening tee shot. Particularly the 11, the short par-3 that falls off on all sides, that’s a much better way to cover that shot.
We have bunker cams at 5 and 16 and a 130-foot wire cam behind the 18th green. Scorpion crane that can see 15, 16, 17, 18. The front of the 8th green slopes way off, so balls are going to be spinning back. So we go on to the robo onto a tree to see that. Live drone, airplane, our hole models, our virtual graphics. The Ross virtual graphics that we used in the Super Bowl and the Olympics, we’ll have that this U.S. Open.
Pinpoint wind technology and pinpoint greens technology to calculate the breaks. We have the 4D replay system at the 12th tee that has the AD8 cameras there and a couple Super SloMos, X-Mo, et cetera, et cetera.
Again, lots of technology, but the key thing we need to pay attention to is the storytelling, which happens to be right in our wheelhouse.
Q: Then for Paul, Justin, or Notah, whoever wants this, Dan referenced the 2013 U.S. Amateur. Lo and behold, Matt Fitzpatrick shoots 64 today in Canada to start off his RBC Canadian Open. How much of a confidence boost is it to, A, play well the week before and then, B, know that you’re going to an event next week that you’ve won at before?
PAUL AZINGER: Are you trying to handicap Matt Fitzpatrick? Do you want us to handicap him for you?
Q: If you want, Paul, go right ahead.
PAUL AZINGER: He’s so good anyway, but it can only serve him well to play great and then go to a place where he’s going to be very confident, great memory. So heck yeah, he’s going to love it. If he keeps it up — I don’t know, maybe if he wins, he’ll have a let-down, but if he’s going in there with any kind of confidence at all, I would watch him like a hawk.
JUSTIN LEONARD: And I think there’s value to having played the U.S. Amateur there because in a lot of ways, the USGA tries some things with the golf course and keep those notes knowing that the U.S. Open is going there. Although it’s been, what, nine years now, the routing will change some, but he’ll have a familiarity there. He’ll understand the things that he’ll need to do around the greens.
Yeah, I certainly like the guys — not many will have that kind of an advantage. I don’t know what the total number of guys who played in 2013 at the U.S. Amateur that will be at the U.S. Open, but it can’t be more than eight to ten guys. But, yeah, I think in this day and age, everybody’s trying to find their advantage, a way to give themselves a little bit of an edge. And I’m sure he’s going to think of that as an advantage, and that’s as important as actually having one is the fact that he thinks he has one.
NOTAH BEGAY III: On the back end of that, I think one of the most intriguing things about the venue is the number of blind shots the players are going to be dealing with. It’s not something that we love, but certainly it’s a part of the design, and championship golf at that highest level requires you to hit as many shots as you possibly can with absolute certainty.
Being able to get rid of any doubts around potential lines that you can take, maximizing the width of the fairway because you know where those boundaries are because you’ve played there, and you not only played there, you played there with success.
So to Paul’s point, any time you’ve had success at a venue and you’re pulling into the parking lot, you feel better. If you were to come off a successful week in Canada, you would feel even that much more confident about your ability to contend.
Q: This is a question for the group. The U.S. Open has a tradition of being the toughest test in golf. What unique test do you think Brookline will present to the players next week?
JUSTIN LEONARD: I think it’s unique. As Notah just mentioned, the number of shots that players hit where you can’t see everything — the 3rd hole, the fairway’s obscured from you because of a big kind of rock outcropping on the right-hand side; the same thing down the 4th — that happens all over the golf course.
Just the guys who really put their time in in the practice rounds and get comfortable off the tee and understand kind of their strategy and how they want to go about doing it. There’s going to be holes where guys are going to hit driver or be more aggressive. There’s other holes where some players, like the 9th, they’re going to lay way back at the top of the hole and not hit in the penalty area on the right and play more conservatively.
Just the difference in strategy, but really I think the U.S. Open is about committing. Whatever a player and a caddie decide to do, they’ve got to be 100 percent committed to it.
Q: Paul, Notah, any comments from you guys?
PAUL AZINGER: I’ll say that Brookline is a very strategic course. I think it will keep the players off balance. You have to drive the ball in the fairway, and you’re going to see a variety of clubs off the tee at Brookline, I feel like, and different philosophies maybe on how certain holes are going to be played there. It is a masterpiece, it really is.
You’re going to see a variety of strategies taken on Brookline, but the key to me, all U.S. Opens, generally the rule has always been put it in the fairway first. Bryson [DeChambeau] kind of maybe put an end to that for a little while by saying, hey, look, I’m going to take on the golf course with my power and hit it as far as I can, and he came out on top at Winged Foot. I don’t know if that will work here with all the uphills and downhills and stuff.
Inevitably what happens in these U.S. Opens, the winner has an incredible short game feel that week. Geoff Ogilvy even at 6, 7-over par winning at Winged Foot had an incredible short game that week. Mickelson stayed alive because of his short game. It’s going to come down to that. We’re going to see a dramatic highlight reel of short game magic, whoever hoists the trophy.
NOTAH BEGAY III: Yeah, that’s 100 percent true with regard to surviving a U.S. Open. I mentioned earlier sort of this crash of modern golf and the mindset that young players that are coming onto the TOUR arrive with. Covering the NCAA Tournament on the men’s side last week and just seeing just how just much power — and we understand. We’ve all talked about it over the last ten years, but it’s front and center now where, if you’re in college and you’re not seeing 120 miles per hour, you’re losing ground.
I think that mindset is not going to do you well at The Country Club. I think it’s going to be difficult for players that week after week trying and hit it as far as they can to get the shortest club into the green because that’s what is dictated on the PGA TOUR for the most part from week to week. That’s not going to be a sound strategy.
It’s very difficult for the modern player to back down because they feel like they’re not maximizing the statistics. They’re not opening up these different opportunities that all of these various algorithms have spit out over the last 10, 15 years.
The player that can pick and choose — like Paul said, you’ve got to pick and choose when to push the gas down, when to push the envelope a little bit. And then as Justin stated, you have to know when to hit less club to find the fairway because you will not access any of these hole locations if you’re coming from the rough.
Q: I wanted to ask something for all the players and then a quick thing for Tommy. Kind of on the back of what you’ve just been talking about with the golf course, and also I guess maybe thinking a bit about the Old Course, but players, it seems like right now, are really on this ‘show up Monday, learn the course, have the caddie kind of do a lot of scouting thing, and play nine holes a day.’
I’m curious how you feel that current mindset — and it may change now that Justin Thomas did a scouting trip at Southern Hills and won — but that’s kind of the thing. Do you think that’s going to work at The Country Club? Then I guess I’m kind of curious too about the Old Course and how you — I know I’m getting a little ahead of myself, but I’m curious what you all think.
NOTAH BEGAY III: Great question. I always felt like the more rounds, the more looks you can get at a venue, especially ones that aren’t regularly seen on the PGA TOUR schedule, is a huge advantage. But history has proven that players aren’t willing to take scouting trips just to define start lines off tees or boundaries with regard to when and where they can be aggressive.
One of the things that was critical to Tiger Woods’ win at St. Andrews was he had old notes from the first time that he went around St. Andrews — you know, where TV towers were located, buildings, churches, hotels — and because the terrain is so flat there, sometimes you can’t get a good bearing because all of the dunes kind of look the same after a while.
But he was using landmarks to frame tee shots for himself, and then he would frame those tee shots based upon wind direction and take notes on that. Then he would study them every night before he would go out just to make sure he had a good understanding of — regardless of where the wind was coming because the wind direction would shrink some fairways and would make other fairways bigger — he wanted to know exactly what club to pull out of the bag off those tees.
Point in case, he didn’t hit it in one bunker all week, which tells me, number one, you’re hitting it really well, but you also have a good approach to navigating yourself around the venue. And I think that’s sort of similar to anyone that’s had a look. If I were playing in the field, I’d call Justin Leonard and just kind of pick his brain to see what he thinks they need to do to get around that place because he’s got a pretty good feel for it.
JUSTIN LEONARD: My phone is not ringing off the hook, I can tell you that (laughter).
It’s kind of a fine balancing act between — you know, it’s a U.S. Open. It’s going to be difficult. So the players feel like going out and playing a six-hour practice round two or three days in a row is too much, and I understand and appreciate that. But playing the front nine one time and think you have an understanding of The Country Club, I think that’s naive.
So I think the scouting trips are important. Obviously these players have to manage their rest. With all the devices that are available to you for recovery and all those things, finding that balance. I think, one, you have to play The Country Club at least twice, 36 holes, to really be somewhat comfortable off the tee. I don’t know if you’ll ever really get there as far as being comfortable, but it certainly helps.
I know that when I’ve been over and played a new golf course or go to play links, it’s like after the second day, I feel somewhat comfortable. But it’s really that third day where I’m seeing 18 holes for the third time that I’m really comfortable off the tee, and I don’t have to have my nose in the yardage book quite as much.
So the guys that took a scouting trip, I think there’s an advantage. And the guys who — you know, their caddies — this is a big week for caddies, as is every week. But playing a new golf course where there’s so much going on off the tee, it’s important for caddies to be able to help players define, ‘okay, here’s your left edge, here’s your right edge with this club in these conditions.’ And understanding that you’re going to have to be able to make adjustments on the fly. Those things are important and very underrated as far as what a caddie brings to the table.
I think players are going to need — it’s going to be a long week regardless, but they’re going to need to put some time in the golf course. Same thing with St. Andrews for the guys that haven’t been there before. The guys on the PGA TOUR have gotten so much younger, there will be a lot of guys who haven’t played St. Andrews. To get out there and define your tee shot by the left edge of a grandstand or a TV tower or a steeple off in the distance, it’s a little disconcerting at first.
Certainly, I think the European players understand it more than most of the American players do, but these two next major championships are going to require a lot of homework from these players.
PAUL AZINGER: Well, I’ll just say that I pretty much always believe there’s no real shortcut to success, and if you’re not going there early — you know, I said this in the opening. One of the great things about the U.S. Open, one of my favorite things is that the event travels, and it travels to really phenomenal golf courses. Look at what’s coming up in the future of U.S. Open venues is incredible.
But it’s kind of you’ve got to get there early if you’re in — and not everybody has that option because some of these players just qualified. But if you’re a serious contender, I’ve always believed that you can’t hope for this or wish for it. You have to prepare to win the U.S. Open, and I think getting there early is so important because you can then know that you have out-prepared everyone who didn’t get there on time.
To me, on time is getting there at least once before the event, maybe twice; playing with a local caddie and the best member at the club; utilize everything you can to gain an advantage in preparation for an event like this.
Not everybody can set up like that. I’ll tell you one great story. Tony Jacklin’s son qualified, Sean, for this event, and it will be his first ever PGA TOUR event, and I just told him, I said, this is an interesting golf course, Sean. If I was you, I’d go on the Internet and start looking at the holes and start studying this course. Francis Ouimet is a heck of a story, but if Tony Jacklin’s son wins the U.S. Open, it’s a pretty good one too. You might want to wrap your mind around that.
What’s the first thing I tell him? Start looking at that golf course. That’s the key. So if you’re not doing that, I think that you are hoping and wishing. If you do get there early, you, like, have an intention.
Look, Dustin Johnson didn’t play Oakmont before Monday or Tuesday, and he won the tournament. So not everybody’s the same. That’s just my feeling on that.
Q: Tommy, real quick on trying to show all the players, can you just tell us, is that something you — do you start out with a game plan, or is it you just start covering golf and Tommy Randolph keeps a list and you check off names? How do you do that?
TOMMY ROY: Yeah, we do check off the names. And by the way it starts with Brandt Packer, who’s producing the mornings each day. He’s keeping track of it as well.
But yeah, it’s trying to get as many of them in as possible, and then some of them slip through the cracks. We’re trying to find them and get them on the air in some sort of meaningful way. Just showing a shot, you can do that, but I want it to be a good shot, some sort of a meaningful shot so that the guy gets a little bit of love on the air.
By the way, I wanted to say one thing. We’re talking about the 11th hole. In my opinion, it’s going to have a huge impact on the outcome of this championship, but wait until the world sees the 15th hole next year at LA North. This thing is shorter and even more diabolical and spectacular. And I know you had something to do with that, so it’s the way to go with that.
Q: Phil’s got such history with the six runners-up at the U.S. Open. What do you expect from him next week? How do you think he’ll handle the pressure? What do you think the response will be from him being in the event to begin with?
PAUL AZINGER: Hey, that’s why we watch.
NOTAH BEGAY III: That is why we watch. We want to see what’s going to be the response. This is a major thing that’s going on. It’s a major disruption to the sport. I don’t know how the American golf fan — especially in Boston, there’s no telling how that reaction’s going to be. I think it’s going to be much anticipated.
PAUL AZINGER: That’s for sure.
JUSTIN LEONARD: I think the response will be mostly positive because he has been a fan favorite for so many years.
But that Boston crowd, they’re going to let you know how they feel. Not everyone, but a lot of people in Boston, they like to not only attend these sports, but they become active participants. I’m sure there will be some participation by the fans in Boston, both positive and negative.
I’m really more curious where his game is, just because he hasn’t played competitively in so long. U.S. Open tests with a thick rough, he’s had a lot of success at U.S. Opens, and certainly it would be a remarkable story if he does get in contention, but it’s going to require very sharp skills and skills that Phil Mickelson doesn’t always shine with as far as hitting fairways and being extremely strategic in that sense.
So I think we’re all curious to see both how he plays and how he’s received.
DAN HICKS: I think if Phil gets in contention, he’ll be cheered on very enthusiastically. I think it’s just a natural reaction in sport because people know he’s been chasing this U.S. Open forever. It’s the final piece of a grand slam puzzle. It would be an unbelievable story, with everything that’s happened with him in the last several months. I think, if there was any negative kind of reaction, that would be totally drowned out by people watching what was happening in front of him.
So I think it’s in large part due to how he plays. And let’s face it, Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson are the two biggest — you never know what they’re going to do. Look at what Tiger’s done. I would not be surprised if Phil gets there next week and hangs around the leaderboard. He lives for that kind of thing, no pun intended. He lives for weeks like next week. He absolutely, that’s been his whole DNA his entire career.
So I wouldn’t be surprised, first of all, if he is. If he is, I know the Boston crowd — and we know especially now in the NBA Finals, you get a feel for how vociferous those guys cheer, the fans cheer — I think they’ll be on his side. It will be something you can’t take your eyes off of if he plays well.
NOTAH BEGAY III: I think Dan brings up a great point. We’ve had athletes throughout history end up in jail and do things that were extremely controversial, but if they have success in their respective sport on the field, the public seems to be very forgiving with regard to that.
I mean, look at Tiger Woods’ struggles off the golf course a number of times, and all seemed to be forgotten when he became the Masters champion back in 2019.
I think this is a slightly different take on the whole thing. Those were personal choices that athletes made that had an adverse effect on their lives. Phil’s choices have kind of fractured the locker room, so to speak, and lent itself to sort of more deeper ethical thought as to how athletes do utilize their time to support various types of initiatives related to the promotion of different ventures that have ties to things that not everybody agrees should be promoted.
So that’s the first thing to overcome is there are going to be people in the locker room that don’t agree wholeheartedly with what is happening now with the Saudi or the LIV Tour.
Also, Phil’s always been one of the favorites amongst spectators, and he feeds off of that energy. That might not be the case starting out. Now, I agree with Dan, if he does get in contention Saturday, Sunday, I think that will all shift back behind Phil. But initially starting, not everybody there is going to be a hundred percent supportive.
As Justin stated, they will speak their mind,
And that’s going to depend on whether Phil can sort of fight through all that and let his game do the talking. The fact that he’s been on the shelf for the better part of the beginning of this whole year, I just don’t see that happening.
PAUL AZINGER: I predict that, if Phil’s missing the cut, like on Friday afternoon or something, it can get pretty rough on him, though. I just think — this is a big step these guys have made. They’ve changed the game forever probably.
But I agree, he is so popular, Notah. You’re right, and people do forgive. If it’s Phil Mickelson — I’ve always loved Phil Mickelson. He’s always been great to my kids. I’ll always appreciate him for that. I don’t necessarily agree with everything he’s ever done, that’s for sure, but if he does get in contention, it would be a miracle, I really think. A minor miracle that that guy could get in contention with all that’s been going on. But we’ll cover it fairly, I’ll tell you that.
Q: What did you learn about the championship makeup of Jon Rahm, the way he finished off the U.S. Open last year? And what have you seen from him in the last few months that makes you think he possibly could defend the title?
PAUL AZINGER: I don’t know if we’ve seen a whole lot from him. He’s played okay, but definitely not Jon Rahm standards. He’s definitely slipped a little bit. We’ve all seen that.
From last year, that tournament was up for grabs. Really any number of tremendous players could have won that tournament. If you go back and look at it, Bryson’s there for a while. Then it looked like Rory McIlroy and then Oosthuizen.
For Rahm to come out on top and the way he did it under the circumstances with all those great players there, the enormous pressure on Rahm, it was just such a massive step for him as a man and as a player to hole those two putts at the end of the golf tournament. And to put on that kind of short game — which is never his strength — but to put on that kind of short game display there at the U.S. Open and to hold that trophy was a real battle of nerves and will.
I think everybody has so much respect for him. His legs and the way he’s built, he just reminds us all of Jack Nicklaus when he was young. He’s got that kind of power and that big, long swing. I just feel that Rahm is mentally a real testament to what players have to become to win huge events.
Rahm epitomizes what hard work is all about and intestinal fortitude because he made putts when he had to. And it’s not his strength, and I really respected him for that.
Q: Just wanted to follow up on Adam’s first question there. I’m wondering, how do you guys approach covering the Phil and the Dustin Johnson situation heading into next week? How do you guys face that as sort of journalists and people in the media covering the tournament?
Tommy, you want to start with that?
TOMMY ROY: Yeah, I’m glad to. Bottom line is no matter what player we end up showing, if they’re coming off a significant finish in an event the week before, we’re going to mention it. Obviously whoever wins in Canada, we’re going to show him. We’re going to mention he won in Canada.
If we show a LIV player who won last week, that will be mentioned. That’s being journalistically sound. We’re not going to shy away from something like that. But in terms of getting into fracturing the game of golf and all that, we’re not doing that. This is U.S. Open week now and not talking about that stuff.
DAN HICKS: Yeah, I think there’s one way to cover it, and that’s what Tommy said, journalistically. If a guy’s in contention, you cover him. You mention that he’s part of the LIV Tour. You cover that because that’s been obviously a gigantic talking point, and then you see where the championship takes you from there.
That’s the great thing about live sports. It’s unscripted. We don’t know what’s going to happen. Sitting here right now, we can’t predict what the field is going to be. If hypothetically Dustin Johnson is coming down the back nine looking for his third major championship, there might have been things that happened during the week that we’ll have to deal with. Maybe it’s something that Dustin Johnson added to his whole reasoning why he’s playing over there or whatever.
It’s a reactionary type of thing, but in the basic, basic journalistic ethics, you cover the people that are playing in the U.S. Open, and you cover them appropriately depending on where they are on the leaderboard.
MODERATOR: Thank you everybody for joining today. We really appreciate it. We’re going to have a transcript available on this call for NBC Sports later this afternoon. Our comprehensive coverage next week begins at Golf Central Live From the U.S. Open and Golf Channel, Monday at 1:00 p.m. Eastern. Coverage begins next Thursday, June 16th, across NBC USA Network and Peacock.
Thank you everybody for joining. Have a good day.
Thursday, May 26, 2022
Morgan Pressel
Tom Abbott
Jerry Foltz
Kay Cockerill
Karen Stupples
THE MODERATOR: Hello, everybody. Thanks for joining today’s NBC Sports U.S. Women’s Open media conference call.
In a moment we’re going to be joined by a number of our commentators from our broadcast team, including Morgan Pressel, Tom Abbott, Jerry Foltz, Karen Stupples, and Kay Cockerill.
NBC Sports is going to surround the U.S. Women’s Open with more than 25 hours of live coverage on NBC, USA Network, and Peacock next week.
It marks USA Network’s return to golf a little bit having hosted golf coverage of events such as The Masters, the Ryder Cup, and events from the PGA TOUR in the past.
So USA Network is certainly no stranger to golf. We’ll also have some exclusive windows on Peacock and we’ll have featured groups coverage on Peacock each day, as well as live from the U.S. Women’s Open which is going to be on-site providing studio coverage leading into and following each round on Golf Channel.
MORGAN PRESSEL: Thanks, Jamie. I’m certainly super excited to go back to Pine Needles. It is a special place for me personally, a special place certainly for the women’s game.
I guess the story this year probably being the $10 million purse, largest purse ever, and the partnership of the USGA and ProMedica jumping on board and really trying to draw attention to the pay gap and helping us continue to get closer there.
Pine Needles, the first place I played a professional event when I qualified as a 12 year old back in 2001. I played again in the final group in 2007. It’s just such an incredible test of golf. I actually also covered the U.S. Women’s Senior Open there. I believe that was in [20]19.
So just a lot of history – all Hall-of-Famers who have won there in the past, the three times previously that we’ve played. It just is an incredible test of golf.
Women’s Open is always my favorite event, it was always the biggest event on my schedule, and I’m excited to be calling the action this year.
TOM ABBOTT: Good to be with you. Looking forward to it. It’s going to be my 48th women’s major that I’m going to work for Golf Channel and NBC, so ticking close to 50, which should happen at the Amundi Evian Championship. It’s been an incredible run, and I’m really looking forward to seeing how this plays out.
I think there’s a number of different storylines if you look at the top players from the U.S., we’ve got some question marks about a couple of players in terms of Danielle Kang and Nelly Korda. Danielle is struggling a little bit with her form, Nelly obviously with her fitness, but looking to return for the U.S. Women’s Open.
So I think it’s going to be very exciting. You look at the amateur contingent in the field, it’s extensive, and I think that’s going to be a fascinating story. Wouldn’t surprise me if an amateur player challenges next week maybe all the way until the end. We’ve seen that before at the U.S. Women’s Open.
And then of course Michelle Wie West. I was with her here in Las Vegas last week for a corporate event, and she was very keen to play next week. But obviously the recent news is that she’s going to scale back her career after next week’s U.S. Women’s Open, so that’s obviously going to be a big story. She’s been a huge character in the game, so I think she’ll get a lot of attention.
Really looking forward to it. I think it’s going to be a really big week for NBC Sports.
JERRY FOLTZ: I’ve never been to the course, but I am looking forward to it. Never been to Pinehurst, that entire area. So being kind of the cradle of golf — not really history, I guess, but so coveted amongst golf purists, I’m looking forward to seeing it, visiting it, watching the ladies play, and I’m looking for some of the storylines that could play out.
Tom mentioned, hinted at a couple, but Nelly Korda, her family has been so guarded with information about her recovery from the blood clot, understandably, too, because one Tweet and you get people saying crazy things to you.
But the one thing her dad did tell me was you have no idea how much it hurts her to be watching this today, and that was on Thursday of the Chevron Championship.
I think she would love to make a big splash and return in a big way, if indeed she is fit and healthy to play. I know she has a press conference scheduled early in the week.
Lexi Thompson, who’s playing great coming in, and the U.S. Open is always about ball-striking and nobody is better. Maybe statistically not as good, but statistics can lie sometimes, and I think she’s definitely on the very short list of favorites.
Jin Young Ko doesn’t seem to be at the top of her game right now or she would definitely be the No. 1 favorite on most experts’ opinion.
And Danielle Kang is a question mark. She’s not seemingly playing her best right now. Didn’t play well yesterday in her first match at Bank of Hope Match-Play here in Vegas.
A lot of great storylines to look forward to, and it’s just something really special with what Mike Whan has done in his new leadership at the USGA to bring the purse to $10 million and really help narrow that pay gap that Morgan mentioned.
KAY COCKERILL: Well, there’s not too much more to cover than we’ve heard already, but I am really happy to be here or be there next week. It will be my 21st U.S. Women’s Open that I’ve covered, and fortunate enough to have played in five early on in my career as I was an amateur transitioning into professional golf before I hit the big brick wall and moved into the media side of things.
My first U.S. Women’s Open was in ’95 at the Broadmoor watching Annika win there, and she was obviously well-known in college and had a good amateur career, but she was not really on anyone’s radar.
She kind of came from behind and beat Meg Mallon and Pat Bradley, some of the big names in the game, and it’s pretty cool that we’ll be there. I was there in ’96 when she won again back-to-back.
And then think about Karrie Webb, who also played in the 2001 U.S. Women’s Open at Pine Needles, and she won back-to-back, as well. She had won the previous year. So kind of a neat connection there.
And also seeing Annika tee it up again this year will be very interesting by virtue of her easily winning the U.S. Senior Women’s Open last year.
I actually played in the U.S. Senior Women’s Open at Pine Needles, and even though I had covered two previous Women’s Opens there, until you play the course and you realize just how diabolical those greens are and you almost have to find a 15- or 20-foot center of every green no matter where the hole is located otherwise your ball is rolling off the sides of the green, until you play it, it’s remarkable how challenging the course is.
I look forward to watching the best in the game try to tackle it this year.
KAREN STUPPLES: It’s awesome being in last place because everyone said everything already that can possibly be said.
Putting my own little spin on things, obviously the storylines have been covered, the players, everything, everything that’s going on there with those.
For me, what I’m going to find most fascinating about going there — Like Jerry, I’ve never been there — so this will be my first trip to Pine Needles. I have been to Pinehurst but not Pine Needles.
What I’m really looking forward to and having read through what a number of players have said about it, particularly the past champions, Sörenstam, Webb, and Kerr. Webb says knowing where the slopes are on the greens and knowing where the ball will feed off means precision iron play. Kerr won by making a ton of saves.
And Annika played very much precision golf, as well. But all three of them went into that tournament knowing — into the championship knowing that they were in good form, that they were playing well, that they had what it was going to take to win that week.
When I look through players that have been playing well, players that are ready to be tried and tested this week, Lexi Thompson has been on the verge of playing well, Hannah Green there or thereabouts, Jin Young Ko, as Jerry was saying, has yet to find some form. She hasn’t been hitting as many greens as she normally does, and that’s going to be a big factor around Pine Needles.
A player that nobody has mentioned yet is Brooke Henderson. She’s taken some time off, so hopefully she can come in being pretty fresh.
But for me the interesting thing is how these players — this course it’s incredibly tricky — how they’re going to handle those runoff areas and the slopes in the green, what’s going to challenge them short game wise.
And the other thing, will Yuka Saso be another player to go ahead and back up the victory with another one? Webb was the last person to do it in ’01; Annika did it in ’96. Can Saso do it this year? It’s been 20 years, so it could be time.
Q. There’s been a lot of discussion already about the purse at the U.S. Women’s Open next week, and I know that’s going to be a really big storyline heading into the tournament week. But I’m kind of curious, looking at the sort of light of women’s sports in a different light, I’m wondering what responsibility do you guys feel as the people covering the women’s game to showcase the sport sort of in its most entertaining light?
KAREN STUPPLES: I think we all feel a tremendous responsibility to cover women’s golf in the best light possible. Obviously you want to watch golf for entertainment first, but I think a lot of the entertainment comes from the competition, and it comes from the play that the players are displaying, and how we describe their play and their shots and what they’re actually doing on the golf course.
Perhaps it should be about the competition. It should be about the matchups that you’re seeing and who’s going to prevail and who’s got the game that’s going to win on certain golf courses at certain times, and what have they been doing to make that an opportunity for them to win.
So for me it’s about us talking about the competition, and I think we all feel very passionately about it. Every single one of us, on all of our careers and our teams that cover women’s golf, whether it’s — I’ve just come from the NCAA Women’s Championship — to amateur tournaments, Curtis Cups, whatever it is, to professional events, the women’s game in general, we all feel a huge responsibility to help promote them, but promote them in a manner that appreciate their skill and their talents as much as anything else.
JERRY FOLTZ: I’d like to piggy-back on Karen’s comments really quick. Not only do I agree with them, it’s one thing to want to present it in the most fresh and entertaining fashion, but in doing so, not to take away from the competition, not to take away from describing the golf the way it should be described.
Because the credibility doesn’t come from us telling you how great they are. The credibility comes from them showing you how great they are, and all we can do is set it up and describe the action.
They should be appreciated for their skill more than anything else, for how incredible they are, how tough they are down the stretch, so many of them. If we become cheerleaders for women’s sports and women’s golf, that becomes quite transparent.
I think the growth of the fan base comes from people appreciating the quality of play, and we can sit here because each one of us will tell you how great the quality of play is until we’re blue in the face, but until you understand what goes into these shots, what goes into their emotions, what goes into winning a major championship against probably the deepest pool of talent women’s golf has ever seen, that’s where you become a fan.
That’s where you fall in love with the players and the women’s game. Because it’s a different game than the men’s, but in many, many aspects, they play a far better game than the men because they have to.
I think that comes through in our broadcast as much as anything else, and I think that’s why year over year for the last 12 years the ratings have continually ticked up for the LPGA Tour on GOLF Channel, NBC and on the other various NBCU platforms.
TOM ABBOTT: I think when you look at sports broadcasting in general, it’s very rare that one network or broadcast partner has exclusive access and rights to every event.
That’s kind of the case for NBC Sports Group with the LPGA. As a group, we do pretty much every single event that there is, especially from the U.S. As a group we don’t tend to do the events in Asia, but they air on our network, but all of the domestic events and those in Europe we are part of.
And so I think you do have a connection with the product maybe more so than some other groups who don’t do every event, and I think in terms of taking responsibility, I don’t think it’s necessarily our responsibility to push up the purses.
I think we need to concentrate on what we’re doing as broadcasters, but I think we certainly feel a responsibility in entertaining the audience and producing a great product, and I feel like as a group, we do that.
I think we do have a pretty strong connection to this Tour, and I think when you look at some of the opportunities that the players have on the women’s side compared to the men’s, it does trouble you a little bit.
I think this week is very important in terms of purse equality and the players earning a lot of money like the men do. I think we’re happy that this is moving in the right direction, and I don’t think we can take credit for that in any way, but I think it certainly is nice to know that we’re involved in this movement as the purses begin to tick up.
I think it’s going to be a very important week, and I know as a group we’re going to be very excited to see how that affects the play. This is going to be a huge amount of money for players coming down the stretch.
The majority of the top players, I’m not sure that will change their mindset, but there are definitely going to be players competing on Sunday who this is going to be kind of a life-changing day for them, so I think that’ll be very interesting as part of the storyline.
Q. I have an Annika question. I was just hoping one or several of you could put in perspective how difficult it is to come back to a major after such a long layoff, and then maybe weigh in on what you expect from Annika next week. Thank you.
KAREN STUPPLES: For me with Annika, I’ve had a lot of time off away from golf, as well, and so for me, to mentally prepare myself if I was to go and try and do something like Annika is doing now, it would be almost like the mountain would almost seem a little too high.
I watch the women play week in, week out now and their golf games are just ridiculously good. The increase in talent level and depth on Tour has exponentially grown since Annika stepped away and since I stepped away. It just continues year in, year out to get better.
With that in mind, knowing that you’re up against competition that’s deeper than you’ve ever competed against, I’m not taking away from her competitors in their prime. You think of the Se Ri Paks and the Karrie Webbs, and we can’t take anything away from them.
But in terms of depth of competition, it’s not really much of a comparison. It’s just so deep right now.
I do think that she is super competitive and always has been, and she throws herself at it like nobody else would, but you cannot escape Mother Nature and age, and she knows she’s at a disadvantage now.
She doesn’t hit it as she used to hit it distance-wise. She’s going to be behind a lot. It’s going to be a little tougher for her in terms of putting that scoring in. She’s a full-time mom and she’s a businesswoman and she’s got everything else going on, as well.
She’s not only trying to compete against players that all they do is just play golf, but she has a whole other life away from golf, as well. So she’s going to try and channel that to try and compete, to try and play.
And she’s been very good recently about keeping everything in perspective and about how she goes about it, and I think people genuinely are curious and interested in how she does it.
But to me, the fact that she’s trying and that she wants to do this speaks a testament to her competitive nature and how much she wants to do this for her kids and for her family, just to prove to them, again, look, you can achieve anything if you put your mind to it.
It’s a pretty big deal what she’s doing right now.
KAY COCKERILL: I think about Helen Alfredsson who won the Senior Women’s Open at Pine Needles, and she did not take the opportunity to play in the Women’s Open after that, although she had a spot. That’s an example of just knowing her own parameters.
You know how much more difficult it is to try to go out and compete with 20-year olds and teens on a golf course that’s several hundred yards longer than you’re playing in the Senior Women’s Open.
But Annika always has a game plan and a strategy for whatever she does. She is the best at preparing for things.
I think she’s going to prepare the best she can. She’s played a few events — few LPGA events and celebrity events — and gotten a little bit of competition under her belt. I think it’s very brave of her to tee it up, and I admire her for doing it.
MORGAN PRESSEL: Yeah, I agree. Just even seeing what she did after 13 years off from competitive golf, to come back and win the Women’s Senior Open last year, it’s truly incredible. She was working hard to get to that point of teeing up there; that was a huge goal for her. Don’t doubt her in any fashion. She has really been working hard leading up to this, like Kay said, getting some experience under her belt, and I’m sure there’s a bit of nostalgia returning to a special place. Maybe if it was at a different venue she would potentially feel differently.
But I think it’s really neat, especially for her kids, Will and Ava, to watch her compete on the biggest stage again, and I think it’s going to be fun to watch.
Her making the cut at Lake Nona was just a really impressive feat. She definitely does not hit it as far as she did when she was on top of her game. So the length, I think, will be a bit of a struggle. But she is a competitor like maybe nobody we’ve ever seen in the women’s game, so it’ll be fun to watch her compete again.
JERRY FOLTZ: I’ll add just a really quick comment for you. Annika to me is one of the most impressive athletes I’ve ever been around on and off the sporting field.
The curiosity for me isn’t how she’s going to make the cut this week, because she is going to make the cut. She doesn’t know how not to. Unlike my playing career, Annika doesn’t make plane reservations on Saturday morning in advance. She will find a way to be there and make her family proud, and you never know, she might make a little noise — not a lot I don’t think, but she’ll figure out a way to get it done, play the weekend, and prove to us once again, like Morgan said, how competitive and determined she is and how when she sets her mind to something, she does it.
This is a huge goal for her, and I’m so happy that she’s playing.
Q. For the players on Tour this year who haven’t played well up until now, haven’t made much money but qualified their way into the U.S. Women’s Open, how valuable of an opportunity does this major and its $10 million purse present to turn their season around not just for CME points and status but just economically, as well?
KAY COCKERILL: Yeah, it’s huge. You look back, and when this championship — when I first started working it in ’95 or ’96 when it was here, what, the purse was $1.2 million, winner’s share $212. Now $10 million purse, $1.8 million to the winner.
I think Tom said it earlier, it’s going to be interesting to see how these women handle it down the stretch. Even if you’re not going to win the tournament, finishing top 20, just making the cut and having that amount of money in your bank account is going to be huge, life-changing, like Tom said.
But what I’ve noticed is these women, when you give them the stage, a grand stage to compete on, a great golf course, and you put cameras on and then you boost the purse, they rise to the occasion.
In the U.S. Open, the USGA events, always there’s this feeling of it’s very democratic; everyone earned a way to get in there and everyone is deserving of that spot. It’s almost like you can come into it as someone who’s a, quote, no-name and feel like I’m on equal ground; anything is possible this week; let’s start from ground zero here and see who can come out the best.
I think for a lot of these players who haven’t done anything, shoot, a top 25, top-10 finish would be like winning.
MORGAN PRESSEL: Yeah, Kay, I agree with that. It’s truly life-changing. I think about it even more so than players with LPGA membership, but on mini-Tours or on the Epson Tour certainly, who have never had the opportunity to play for any kind of a large purse, let alone this kind of money.
And it’s a hard life playing the mini-Tours, especially in the women’s game. There’s not very much money, often driving to events, often wondering where their next paycheck is going to come from.
To think that they have the opportunity next week to post a top 20 and just really make life a little bit easier for themselves while they are grinding to make it to the LPGA Tour, because obviously they have the talent to do it — I mean, I watched my sister play on the Epson Tour for many years, and it’s a tough life, and with it, like Kay said, the qualification process, these women earn their spot.
Now they have the opportunity of a lifetime.
KAREN STUPPLES: Well, honestly, the thought of a $10 million purse just absolutely blows my mind, to be perfectly honest. I don’t even know how to think about money in those terms and what it means going into your bank account, what the potential is there in one big chunk, even for like a 30th place or a 40th place.
I mean, I can’t even conceptualize it in my own mind. To me, this is just such a big step. I mean, I can’t even wrap my head around it.
But I will tell you this: When I was in my first year on Tour and I was just trying to keep my Tour card, I was trying to just do well, I had my first ever top 10 in Springfield at the State Farm Classic, and I earned $22,000.
I felt like I had won the jackpot lottery. Literally I felt like I was the richest person alive because I had never seen that kind of money going into my bank account ever. And the total purse at Springfield was $750,000.
So to think about the total purse being $10 million, I just can’t wrap my head around what a difference this could possibly make for somebody. I can’t even properly speak about it because it’s just — I mean, my goodness, what a move this is.
Q. Morgan, just wanted to know what stands out the most when you think about your experiences at Pine Needles, particularly competing so young in 2001 and then being in contention Sunday in ’07.
MORGAN PRESSEL: Yeah, I mean, they were both very special experiences for me, playing in 2001, that was really my first opportunity. I had only been playing golf for four years. I had watched certainly my idols on TV.
I think actually one of the first events I really remember watching was the Women’s Open when Se Ri Pak won at Blackwolf Run against Jenny Chuasiriporn in a playoff. I just remember being glued to the television for that.
So to be out there as a young kid, and I remember there being rain delays and I didn’t want to leave the locker room because I was just so star struck being just even in the same room as all of these people that I had watched on TV.
And for me that was life changing because that was the moment where I decided that this is what I wanted to do. I’m going to do everything that I can to play golf for a living, and that really was the moment where it really became my dream to play on the LPGA Tour.
Then in 2007, I was right there in contention coming down the stretch. To watch my friend Cristie (Kerr) win, Lorena (Ochoa), of course, just doing Lorena things, playing incredible golf. Definitely disappointing for me. I’d say it took me a little bit of time to kind of collect myself and get over that one.
But two completely different experiences in my two times competing at Pine Needles, but it’s just a really special place and I’m excited to go back.
Q. This is a question for the group. What kind of test do you think Pine Needles will provide for these players, and does the course favor any type of specific skill set over another?
KAY COCKERILL: I think ball-striking first and foremost because the greens are so severe. It’s not that demanding off the tee. There’s some tight holes, but you have a little bit of leeway off the tee, but it’s about iron play and being really precise on your approaches, otherwise you’ve got these edges of the greens that just melt off.
Your ball doesn’t just go off the edge of the green, it gets taken 20, 30 yards away. Someone that’s struggling with ball-striking is going to have to have a really great short game, and we’re talking total creativity, being able to putt off the greens, hybrid off the greens, hit lob shots off of tight lies.
I just think ball-striking is number one first and foremost and a great short game. Usually, like most USGA championship courses, they demand everything out of your game. But if you’re striking it well, you’re going to have a good chance to win.
MORGAN PRESSEL: Yeah, I would definitely echo that. I mean, like you said, a USGA championship, it demands literally everything. You can’t be weak really in any aspect of your game that week.
But I think the number one thing that comes to my mind when I think about Pine Needles is creativity. Creativity around the greens, creativity to hit different types of shots into the greens to be able to hold the greens wherever the hole location may be.
And I just think somebody, as usual, with a hot putter is going to do very well, because the greens are very severe and you have to even be creative on the putting surface to see the lines properly, to see the speed.
I feel like U.S. Opens more than any event demand a good five-foot putter, somebody who’s really making those clutch par saves coming down the stretch. Those are kind of the things that I really think about when I think about Pine Needles.
KAREN STUPPLES: Jumping off of Morgan there, Cristie Kerr says that she did it by making a ton of putts, and she was making 30-foot par saves. So just to add a little bit of context to Morgan’s comment there.
I would also say that you definitely need an ability to hit your targets with distance control. Everything has to be so precise there. You’ve got to really be disciplined with your targets, and you’ve got to have the ability to produce the shot when you need to.
With regards to the short game, I go back — obviously I’ve not been to Pine Needles — but I go back to Pinehurst, and I remember watching Martin Kaymer win the U.S. Open at Pinehurst.
He didn’t do anything but take a putter from around the greens. He had one shot and he had practiced it all week, and he used it every single chance he had an opportunity. He didn’t try and play 15 different shots or try and practice 15 different shots. He perfected the one shot, so every time he was in that position, he knew what he had to do and he did it. Sometimes he had to play away from the flags because of it, but the overall idea was that he was able to achieve doing that.
I think players need to go into this week with a game plan. They need to be very strategic, and they need to be not emotionally connected to the outcome. They’ve got to be somewhat detached from a bad bounce or a bad break or a tough spot. That comes down to that mental discipline that you expect from a U.S. Open.
All these qualities when you think about the winners here, Annika, Karrie Webb, Cristie Kerr, they check every single box that the three of us have just talked about.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you everybody for joining, both in the media and to our commentators.
Tuesday, May 24, 2022
Mike Tirico
Danica Patrick
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Leigh Diffey
Townsend Bell
James Hinchcliffe
THE MODERATOR: Good afternoon, everybody. Thank you for joining us today for our media conference call to preview Sunday’s 106th Running of the Indianapolis 500. Joining us today is host Mike Tirico and guest analysts Danica Patrick and Dale Earnhardt Jr., as well as our lead INDYCAR race team of Leigh Diffey, Townsend Bell and James Hinchcliffe.
We’ll begin with opening remarks. We’ll start with Mike Tirico.
MIKE TIRICO: Good afternoon, everyone. Great to be on the call, and great to be with our INDYCAR group one more time. It has been three wonderful experiences for me. I’m looking forward to the fourth for me personally. The entirety of NBC Sports, it’s so great to bookend the month of May with two of the biggest races in America, the Kentucky Derby at the start of the month, then the Indianapolis 500 at the end of the month. These massive crowds, traditions that are over a century long in our country.
For me personally, it’s great to be back working with Danica and Dale Jr. I’ve had a chance to do this a few times. It will be nice to enjoy the weekend at the Brickyard, back to the way it was the first time there in 2019 with a full crowd.
Obviously no one there in 2020. Limited crowd in ’21. To be back to full steam like we’ve seen at other events adds to the ambience, experience and the television broadcast as well. Looking forward to being with everyone and being back at the Brickyard. Happy to answer any questions, but I’m sure they’re going to be for the experts.
With that, I’ll kick it over to Danica.
DANICA PATRICK: Thanks, Mike.
Well, great to be back with you, Mike, Dale, the whole crew that does the whole season. I have so much fun when I do this race. I’m already back in Indianapolis as of yesterday. Just driving around, seeing all the checkered flags, Indianapolis Motor Speedway flags out in front of houses, the city is in the spirit.
Even better of course, everyone that wants to come can come to the race as we have full grandstands for the first time in a couple years.
On track, it’s one of the most exciting years. The story line of the young guns, then the old guard, is still going. Even more dramatic right now with the polesitter of Scott (Dixon) being the fastest qualifier in history. But then, of course, the young guys are right there. It’s going to be another super exciting Indy 500 I’m sure.
Can Helio (Castroneves) get his fifth? Obviously that would be dramatic. Being there for when he won his fourth, it was a really fun experience. It was cool to be able to watch that happen. He’s such a good guy.
There’s just lots that’s ready to unfold. What I’ve always loved about the Indy 500 is that there are so many opportunities for different endings. That’s why, from a driver’s perspective, it’s such an alluring race, so sought after. There are so many drivers that can walk away and say, It could have been me if it had just gone this way. It’s the longest, most amount of pit stops, most amount of things that can happen.
We’ll all be ready to report on it and get that to the fans. Just happy to be back. I think from here, turning it over to Dale.
DALE EARNHARDT JR.: I’m excited to get the ask from NBC to return to Indy and work the race. It’s hard to explain to anybody what it’s like to be there in person on that day. I’ve watched that race my whole life, and most of the time was watching it from the garage at Charlotte Motor Speedway, like the rest of the NASCAR industry. We all stopped everything we were doing in that moment and tried to get every minute of viewership we could to see how that was going to play out.
I’d always grown up in the stockcar world; that world had captured my heart. When I went to the Indy 500 for the very first time, it’s not even close what that race is like in person compared to anything I had ever experienced in my career.
I’m bringing my wife this year. I just cannot wait for her to see the size of this event, to feel the tradition that you feel, as the pre-race is sort of playing itself out, it’s so special.
I’m so thankful to be asked to come back. Traditionally in these type of events I would be working with Rut during the pre-race, but I’ll be on the pit box for the pre-race show with Townsend. I’ve really enjoyed working alongside him. It’s going to be fun to do that again.
During the race, I’ll be up there with Danica and Mike, like I’ve done in the past. That will be a lot of fun when they drop in to get our take on what we’re watching. That’s such a great location on pit road. You really get a sense of the speed and the energy. You’re in great proximity to the crowd itself. You’re taking all the things that are happening at the racetrack during the event. You’re in close proximity to everything. You really get pretty fired up. Just really makes for an enthusiastic show.
I’m excited to get into town. It’s going to be an awesome week. Can’t wait to see Diffey and Townsend and everybody. Haven’t seen some of these folks in quite a while.
LEIGH DIFFEY: Dale, you speak about the feeling, you’re bringing Amy this year, what she’s going to experience. There are so many great story lines throughout the field, which we could point to in any direction. But I want to bring everybody back to the fans.
We experienced the most bizarre race and sporting event ever in 2020 with nobody here. This year, there’s going to be in excess of 300,000 people here. It’s the biggest sporting day, single-day crowd, in the world. We cannot lose sight of that because having done Olympic Summer Games, Olympic Winter Games, I went to Super Bowl 50. Everybody on this call has their favorite or a meaningful sporting event. We cannot lose sight of the fact this is the biggest single-day sporting crowd in the world. Nowhere assembles a crowd like Indianapolis.
The other day our new teammate and our buddy James Hinchcliffe and I experienced this, on qualifying weekend, trying to walk from the pagoda to Gasoline Alley was a challenge. There were that many people there on qualifying day, which has not been a rich tradition for a number of years. It used to be back in the day.
For some reason, maybe people are just enjoying going to live sporting events again. We’re back. The world is back. I know there’s still some health challenges. But the feeling this year just seems something different. It’s awesome. We had a terrific GMR Grand Prix of Indy. We had the most mesmerizing qualifying weekend with the fastest ever qualifying field in more than a hundred years. There’s so many special elements to this weekend that we should and rightfully so be excited about. T-Bell?
TOWNSEND BELL: Thanks, Diff. Great opening remarks by everyone. To drill down even further on the energy and the excitement and the size of the crowd, as you guys were speaking, I was thinking to myself, Why is that? Why is this the biggest live sporting event in the world? It’s called “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing” for a reason.
Ever since I was 11 years old and came to this race in 1986, the spectacle was twofold: it was the foundation of insane, regard-breaking speeds, then competition on race day. People showed up for really I think those two reasons, in addition to being an amazing celebration of our country, Memorial Day weekend.
For many years it felt like the first part of that equation, the speed part, kind of flat lined. I think that Diff’s observation of the crowd this past weekend, they’re back because, yes, things are opening up again, everybody wants to get out, but they’re back for a reason. They’re back to seeing speeds that are really pushing the limit again. That is the bedrock for me of the Indy 500.
Conor Daly clocked a back straightaway speed in practice on Friday touching on 245 miles an hour, which is just awesome. You think about Scott Dixon’s qualifying run, the fastest polesitter we’ve ever had, at an average speed — average speed — of 234 miles an hour.
The energy for me, the passion, is just at an all-time high. I just cannot wait for this weekend because the cars are going faster, and that matters. Then the competition side of that, this weekend, on Sunday, I think we can expect a huge amount of urgency from some of the cars that didn’t qualify as well as they wanted because I just get the sense you can’t afford to sit and ride around this year like you have in years past.
If you’re somebody like Josef Newgarden or Scott McLaughlin, with fast race cars, but maybe not the fastest qualifying car, I think you’re going to see some urgency in the beginning. It should just be a fantastic race right from the get-go.
Thrilled to be back. Excited for that foundation and that core attribute of speed to really be back in our sport in a fantastic way. Also love having James as part of the team. It gives us really current experience and a lot of key insights that I’m thankful for.
James, take it away.
JAMES HINCHCLIFFE: Thank you, Townsend.
For me, it’s obviously a huge honor and a privilege to be asked to be part of the NBC team for this event. Bit of a different seat for me from the last few years. That transition so far this year has been very smooth, been a lot of fun. Such a great team with us at the racetrack, back at Stamford that makes this all happen. It’s been a real joy to be part of that team.
For me, the month of May, specifically race day at the Indy 500, no doubt some of the most special memories of my career and of my life. But also some of the most stressful times you’re ever going to spend behind the wheel of a race car or getting ready to get into a car.
I’m so excited to kind of see from this new perspective now with the knowledge that I have from the last 10 or so years of being in the sport. Now getting not to just witness it from the outside, but share that experience with so many people.
One of my favorite things has always been educating people about INDYCAR racing and what we do. Now we have this phenomenal platform to tell the world what they’re watching these drivers do. An incredible feat that every one of these 33 drivers is taking on Sunday. Just trying to make sure we get that point across to the viewers is an important one.
Like I said, just really happy to be part of the team. Really appreciate the opportunity. Can’t wait to follow along on all the story lines that were touched on, talked about, see how this plays out.
Q. Dale, it seems like some of your best Dale Jr. Download interviews are when you get together with INDYCAR drivers and legends, seems like you get immersed into their story. As a fellow racer, you’re able to appreciate what they’ve done and how they do it. How much has Dale Jr. Download, along with your curiosity about the Indianapolis 500 as a youngster, really helped you get immersed for this role to be part of the telecast?
DALE EARNHARDT JR.: I think doing the podcast and the show gave me a little bit more confidence as I do it, as an interviewer, challenged me to sort of get outside of that comfort zone and interview not only non-NASCAR drivers and individuals, but non-racing, non-sports individuals.
We have had a lot of fun talking to a lot of the INDYCAR drivers because each driver’s path to where they are and where they will be this Sunday is so unique to themselves. In other forms of motorsport or in stockcars, the paths are maybe not predictable, but unremarkable. That’s not the case with a lot of these INDYCAR drivers.
Their route, there’s never one the same, no two are the same. They travel all across the world seeking opportunities in racing in different countries to eventually somehow find their way here, end up here, with this opportunity to race in INDYCAR and in the Indy 500. It’s really compelling to hear how they made those decisions.
I think INDYCAR has some of the most interesting and entertaining, fun personalities in the drivers. And they are different than what I’m used to experiencing.
There’s a difference in approach to being accessible that these drivers have; the way that they need to be accessible in their series, at the racetrack, to the fans; the way I think the INDYCAR drivers all seem to recognize the importance of that and all seem to work together to push not only themselves but the organization, their sport, forward.
It’s a fun thing to be around. Yeah, we have a lot of fun when we get those guys in the room. Certainly makes us much bigger fans of not only the series but the drivers individually. It’s pretty cool to get to know some of them.
Can’t wait to run into a couple of those guys this weekend.
Q. How excited have you been watching your former Hendrick teammate do so well this month?
DALE EARNHARDT JR.: I’ve been really excited for Jimmie. I was talking about that today on the podcast. I’m a little bit nervous because he seems to be pushing to the max. Every time he’s on the track, it’s like he is on the edge. Nobody’s going to reach out and tell a seven-time champion, with all the success he’s had in his career, what to do, how to drive, how to approach anything.
I’m just pulling for him to have a great experience in the race and have a result that he can be happy with and smile about in the end.
I am full of anxiety that he’s going to push, push, push too hard, and somehow that might put him in a bad situation. He’s gotten so, so close a few times already this month to some bad situations. But he’s a pro. You trust that he knows what he’s out there doing, understanding the limits of the car.
Q. Leigh, given Formula 1’s growth in the United States, I’m curious what opportunities and challenges you see for INDYCAR moving forward.
LEIGH DIFFEY: Thanks for being on and thanks for the question.
Look, I think it’s a massive positive just for the sport. We are super proud of the production values and the product that we put out for the Indy 500. Actually, frankly, for the entire NTT INDYCAR SERIES.
Part of the family is Sky Sports under the umbrella of Comcast. What Sky does for Formula 1 is very good. It’s a great product. Then you go to more poignantly about your point, sport, Formula 1, its success, which the explosion here in the U.S. can be pretty much directly attributed to the Netflix Drive to Survive multiple episodes and series.
I like the fact that it has been able to attract not necessarily motorsports fans to the sport. We don’t need to really dig into F1 or INDYCAR or NASCAR, whatever it might be. It’s just the sport holistically people are interested in. We’re seeing that. Our ratings are up on INDYCAR. The beginning of the year with FOX for NASCAR before we take over, ratings are up. Formula 1 is enjoying a really good team. The IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar series, which we air on NBC Sports, is enjoying a terrific year.
I don’t know why, but if it is attributable to Formula 1, let’s ride off it, let’s enjoy it. Right now the sport of motorsport is enjoying a really positive time. As I said in my opening remarks, just the crowd at Indy here for qualifying weekend was fantastic.
People are jacked. People are engaged. People are enjoying the sport of motorsports. While we’re in this, because people are all too quick to talk about the glory days, the golden days, back when, blah, blah, blah, maybe the glory days and golden days are just now, so let’s enjoy this moment.
Q. Townsend, James and Danica. As the three on the call who have competed in this race, we saw some of the fastest qualifying speeds in history last weekend. How do you think that affects what we might see in the race? Do you think it favors a specific team, veterans over rookies? What do you think on that end?
TOWNSEND BELL: Yeah, it was awesome to see the speeds up. I don’t know that I could put my finger on any one reason why it’s just a little bit quicker this year. The car obviously has evolved, the engine manufacturers between Chevy and Honda are in a fierce competition.
But mainly I think it’s the track penetrant has also made a little bit of a difference. The biggest thing I think it leads to is on race day maybe we’ll see some fuel consumption that is a little bit more aggressive than we have had in years past. Anytime you’re going faster, you’re burning more fuel. Potentially it’s going to shorten up the stints a little bit and open up the strategies just a little bit more.
Maybe some teams are going to elect to make one extra pit stop than we have seen historically. I’m not exactly sure the reason why, but I’m happy the speeds are up, I think it’s that much more exciting.
JAMES HINCHCLIFFE: I’ll jump in here and say I agree with Townsend. It’s hard to put your finger on what’s causing those speeds. I don’t really mind why it is, I just love that it’s happening.
For the race itself, I think when we went back to race running on Monday, the pace that we saw from cars running up front was probably a lot closer to what we saw in race trim last year compared to the gap that we’re seeing in qualifying trim.
My hope is that, as Townsend alluded to the penetrant, maybe it is adding a little more grip. Maybe that makes following a little bit easier, which hopefully will make passing a little more frequent. Either way, with the fastest field in history, you know it’s a close competition guys fighting out there to make up every spot every chance they get.
I think the race is going to be just as exciting as what we’ve seen the last few seasons.
DANICA PATRICK: From my perspective, I think it’s just really mostly exciting from a fan perspective. It adds drama and excitement to know that we have essentially, like you say, I don’t know if it’s considered the fastest field in history, but we have at least the fastest qualifier. I think that’s just great to tell the fans.
Speed is exciting to people.
As far as what it means inside the car, we’ve been creeping around these speeds for a while. It’s kind of just a little bit more. So I think probably the guys had a better perspective on that, having been more in the thick of it this year, having obviously been recently in the car.
I mean, fuel could be a thing, sure. I remember driving at 230-some miles an hour versus 200 miles an hour, you got to turn the wheel a little bit slower. Just that little bit could make it a little bit more exciting for the drivers. By ‘exciting’, I mean a handful.
Q. Townsend, James and Danica, as the three folks that have raced with Scott at different portions of his career, can you give any sort of perspective of what you feel like finally being able to break through and get that notorious second win at the Indy 500 after 14 years might mean for him.
TOWNSEND BELL: Thanks for the question.
I raced against Scott starting in 2000, I think was my first year in Indy Lights. It was clear back then that Scott was special in a number of ways, particularly his race craft, his ability to compartmentalize what would normally be a range of emotions that I think any human would normally go through during a race, whether that’s exhilaration or frustration or anything in between, he seemed to really manage that well.
When I think about what it takes to be successful at Indianapolis, being able to compartmentalize emotion throughout the race is really important. He’s done it better than anyone. That’s why he’s a six-time champion.
Sure he has one Indy 500 win, but I would put that mostly down to circumstantial. He’s been in the hunt so many times. He’s been at the front so many times. I think we ran the stats the other day. The Andretti family, with Mario, Michael and Marco, 70 total starts, one win. We’re talking about a group of names there that have always been competitive at the Speedway.
I’m going to put it down mostly to circumstance.
Now, if there was ever a year that I think Scott has a better chance than others, it might be this year. His team, Chip Ganassi Racing, all month or all week, if you will, practice and qualifying, we have circled those cars as standouts in terms of their balance, speed, how they handle dirty air, all of that.
They seem to be a cut above everyone. Scott, on that team, is the strongest driver at Indianapolis. He’s got a great shot this year.
JAMES HINCHCLIFFE: Kind of following up on Townsend’s point there, it wouldn’t surprise me to learn deep down part of what motivates Scott to still be an INDYCAR driver, other than the obvious, is that second win at the 500. Six championships in, I know how much a second win would mean to him. I can’t help but think that’s part of the reason he’s still doing this full-time and why the drivers push yourself to be competitive exists.
The big challenge this year, as Townsend said, are his teammates. I think in years past, Scott has kind of always been the clear favorite on the team, the clear fastest on the team. This year has been a little bit more of a struggle for him. Even the start of the month of May wasn’t as smooth as we’re used to seeing. It wasn’t really until Saturday morning where we saw the unbelievable pace. Sunday morning actually where we saw the big pace come out of the 9 car.
While I agree that he has a tremendous shot because of the dominance we’ve seen of the team so far, his biggest competitors unfortunately are in the same stable. You look at what Alex Palou did last year, Tony Kanaan, Marcus Ericsson has been quick, then of course Jimmie having run more 500-mile races than the rest of the 32 drivers he’s racing against Sunday combined have done. We’ll see what plays out. But he is definitely going to be one to watch.
DANICA PATRICK: Yeah, James, I think that’s a really good point, just the struggles that he’s had. He hasn’t had the best start to the season this year.
What I find just so impressive and admirable and rare is how long he’s been at it and how good he is, how much passion. I think that’s a part that’s amazing, just the real passion and drive for it after that much time.
To be struggling, then to sort of end up in the place right now where he’s the fastest qualifier, that drive is still there. I think that’s just rare. It’s exciting to watch that.
As you guys have pointed out, he’s been in the mix so many times, like it just seemed like a clear favorite to win so many times, leading so many laps. I would be really curious to ask him, like, what fuels him, what motivates him. There’s clearly some magic there because he just keeps coming (laughter).
Q. Danica, obviously as the pioneer for females in auto racing, then last year you had Simona De Silvestro run the Indy 500, and it was announced earlier that an all-female INDYCAR team led by Beth Paretta with Simona as the driver is going to compete in three races this year. Danica, having run your last Indy 500 a couple years ago, where is your evaluation of auto racing as far as accessibility for drivers, owners, pit crew members? How much ground has been made, and what ground is yet to be made up?
DANICA PATRICK: Thanks for your question.
Just something unique about me, I’m just not one of those girl athletes that is trying to point out all the girl athlete stuff. I competed against the guys, and I used my femininity to my comfort level, to the extent it helps me in my career with sponsors and really just, honestly, express that side of me.
So I’m not here to – how do I say it – try to promote it. But I think if there are women drivers and pit crew and engineers and personnel that are qualified for the job, they sure as heck should be doing it.
So I think there are more opportunities than ever, to be honest. I don’t think it’s less. I don’t think it’s harder. I think it’s easier, as those that came before me, and then myself, and so on. It clears the path.
Also it makes people want to find something rare again. Women are still not common. So, yeah, I mean, I think there are probably some aspects within a full women’s team of physically it’s going to be hard to be as fast as guys on a pit stop, things like that. I think like pure physicality does play into it.
The car was an extension of me, but it wasn’t just me. So I think that kind of bridged the gap between the difference. But all in all, there are more opportunities I think now than ever. It will be interesting to see how they do. I hope they’re competitive.
Q. Dale Jr., just as sort of a crossover with NASCAR fans, like everyone wants your opinion on things. If you could make a prediction for who you think will win Sunday’s race?
DALE EARNHARDT JR.: Oh, my gosh.
Well, I think as some people on this call said before, the Ganassi car has a lot of speed. (Scott) Dixon being fast, being smart, being such a great talent, probably is putting himself in that conversation as one of the favorites.
Honestly, though, I think Jimmie (Johnson) could surprise a lot of people. I think that he made a good account of himself at Texas. This whole month, he was able to have so much time with the car and the team at the facility, sort of move beyond the enormity of the moment. I know that’s going to be nearly impossible when he walks out on the grid for the race to sort of be beyond the enormity of the moment or the weight of it. I really think Jimmie could do really, really well.
Outside of that, the one thing that I kind of like about this race and where the series is, where the pace is throughout the field, it’s really anybody’s race. At some point somebody could be there that maybe surprises us a little bit or somebody we might not tend to expect to be there. The potential for that shocker is always there.
I guess it depends on how the pace goes for the race, how hard these guys run. If fuel mileage is not an issue or if there’s guys that are trying to work themselves into a certain pit strategy where they have to run a certain pace, we’ve seen that in the past. We’ve seen other teams run hard all day long, not worry about fuel mileage, dictate from the front of the race what’s going on.
It will be interesting to see how they approach it, how the different teams approach it, how the drivers approach it as far as that goes.
I don’t know. I would probably put my money on Dixon if it was me. I’d have a little bit on Jimmie, as well.
LEIGH DIFFEY: Dale, it just blows me away that more people aren’t talking about what Jimmie Johnson has already accomplished. So this Sunday he has the opportunity to become just the third person ever — ever — to win the Daytona 500 and the Indianapolis 500, along with A.J. Foyt and Mario Andretti.
People are saying, Oh, yeah, Jimmie is in the field… They should be talking about him. He qualified in the Fast 12. He had the most miraculous save in qualifying that you’re ever going to see at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. He doesn’t need to do this, he wants to do this.
His results on the road and street courses have not been what he wants. They’ve been pretty disappointing in his own words. But on the oval, he has done more 500-mile races than the entire field put together. It staggers me why more people aren’t talking about Jimmie. That’s to his benefit. If he sneaks in there and does this, we’re all going to witness a special piece of history.
I think we should all acknowledge what he is doing and what he’s done, what he continues to do when he doesn’t need to do it. He could be sitting on a beach somewhere, but he’s not. He wants to do this because it was his childhood dream to be an INDYCAR driver. His hero, Rick Mears, and his dirt bike hero, Ricky Johnson, have motivated him to get to this point.
People talk with such reverence about Dale Earnhardt Sr. and Richard Petty, and Jimmie has the same amount of NASCAR championships.
We shouldn’t forget this moment in motorsports history of what he is doing. Shouldn’t be so blasé about the fact that he’s in the field. This is a guy in his mid 40s and didn’t need to do this, but he is doing it. On the ovals, he’s excelling. He blew past Scott Dixon at Texas Motor Speedway to go into the top five. The team called him back because he had some fuel issues, so he finished sixth. He went past a six-time champion and a guy who has excelled at Texas Motor Speedway and the guy who sits on pole position for this weekend.
We have to take the blinkers off and acknowledge what this quietly spoken hero has achieved already.
Q. Mike, Danica and Dale. Could you expand on how you view your respective roles on the broadcast this weekend?
MIKE TIRICO: I’ll be happy to start. It’s the same thing like any other event that I have the pleasure of hosting. I think it is to welcome us on the air, set the scene, big-picture perspective of what’s going on, some resets within the broadcast. Also all the buildup.
I’ve been lucky enough to cover about everything here in sports in the last few years. I can’t think of a more tradition-filled, dynamic buildup to an event than what we have at Indy. To be right there on the track as all of that is building up, moving around that area with the driver introductions, back home again in Indiana, national anthem, all of that, especially on Memorial Day weekend, it’s part of the essence and great tradition that everyone has been talking about.
My job is pretty simple: to set up those moments and our analysts who are with us, elicit the information that lets the person who is watching feel a little bit more close to the event and a little bit more knowledgeable about what’s going on.
Once the race starts, sit with Dale and Danica and get their responses to what they’re seeing from our perspective.
DANICA PATRICK: Mike, I don’t know if it’s a simple job, my friend. You make it look simple, but you have a big job to carry the broadcast and build the excitement up.
I feel like my role is to help give some perspective from what it would be like if you were a driver, the whole experience of the Indy 500, what it’s like, the ambience, what it’s like the night before, the morning of, going to intros, being on the track, what are you thinking about, what kind of things can occur in the race, what is your perspective. Just everything from a driver’s perspective is really what I’m there to help educate the fans on.
DALE EARNHARDT JR.: I think for me, I have motorsports knowledge, but I don’t go to every single INDYCAR race. I didn’t grow up going to those races. A lot of things that I’m seeing, questions are instantly popping into your head about why did this happen this way, why did they choose to do this? Maybe I’m seeing or triggered by things or excited by something that someone who’s there every single day may take for granted.
I think just being curious and tapping into that curiosity, saying, Why did this happen? How come this was the decision made? A lot of times you end up asking the question that the viewer at home has in their own head. That’s kind of fun for me.
You got to embrace the fact that you’re not an expert. You do have questions and you would love to have some answers. I kind of enjoy that role, to be honest with you. When I’m put in these positions, it’s kind of fun. I’m there as a fan, there experiencing it as a fan. I’m sitting around people who have all these answers to the questions that are popping up into my head. I enjoy it. It’s a great way to see the race.
MIKE TIRICO: If I could tailgate on that answer for a second.
It’s a good point because events like the Kentucky Derby might be the only horse race people watch all year. The Indy 500 might be one of the few, if any, INDYCAR races that you watch all year. There are a lot of fans who are not the hardcores, who are week in, week out watching.
To have us on the show, the pre-race show, some perspective, it’s welcoming to the viewers because, my goodness, Diff and Hinch, Hinch isn’t a rookie. If you watch any of the qualifying or practice, he’s awesome. Townsend, the rest of the crew. Rene, the producer, does such an incredible job. That group does terrific work.
If you watched the qualifying over the weekend, or even the practice show yesterday, such captivating stuff. Hopefully we can just add to it a little bit and help fill out the largesse of a show like this around our team that week in, week out is at the top of their game.
We’ve seen that the last three years during the 500. We’re excited we get to hang with our group, to be with Diff and everybody else who is the regular INDYCAR group for NBC, to get to work together.
It’s a fun experience for all of us, for sure.
Q. Danica, Townsend, Dale, about the record speeds this week, I’m kind of curious really in general how fast is too fast? I understand 230 mph in today’s car is different than 230 ten years ago. How do you weigh the record speeds versus the safety of the cars, being able to put up a banner saying record speeds? I bring in Dale also because I know he witnessed as a teenager NASCAR going through something similar with Bill Elliott doing 200-something miles an hour at Talladega.
TOWNSEND BELL: I think it’s a great question, and the simple answer is I don’t know, but I want to find out. I think that’s really the story of Indianapolis for over a hundred years, is just that question: How fast can they go? How much faster can they go? Where is the limit?
Whether that’s Indianapolis or chasing the speed of sound back in the ’50s and ’60s, that curiosity I think is the reason I fell in love with this race in the first place. It was mind-bending as a kid to go to Indianapolis and just couldn’t imagine these cars going over 200 miles an hour. When you see it in person or on TV, it really brings that fundamental question up.
I will say years ago we started to flirt with the driver’s physical limit at a race in Texas where there was a lot more banking on a shorter course, really high speeds. We started to get to a G-force level where the driver’s physical well-being was compromised a bit in terms of blackout and vertigo.
At Indianapolis there’s less banking in the corners. Right now, from a pure G-force standpoint, we are well below that threshold. I think there’s room to go there, and I’m fascinated to find out what that limit might be, and that’s why I watch, why I’m so curious.
DANICA PATRICK: I mean, of course I agree with Townsend. I don’t know. But I do know that the safety team and everybody that works hard on making sure that the cars are as safe as possible, there’s a meeting where we go over what has been done in the off-season to prepare for the next, what updates and tweaks are they making to make it more safe.
Obviously INDYCARS now have a windshield, which is something we never had for all of history until a couple of years ago. They’re always making improvements.
They would know from a technical standpoint, like, what speed does it take flight, when the car gets to a certain angle. They would know all that information.
What I guess I hope this would do, just the topic of it being the fastest qualifier in history at Indy, it was just like everybody out there racing is reminded of the sheer speed that’s out there.
Look, you can have a big crash at 100, 150, 200, 245 mph. You can have tragic accidents. But let’s hope it’s at least a little bit of a reminder of how fast they’re going out there and to respect each other, not do silly things.
We want an exciting race, but you can do that without touching wheels.
DALE EARNHARDT JR.: Townsend had some really, really great points.
I think a couple boxes need to always remain checked. A few of those being the safety of the fans attending the race. I think outside of making sure there’s no danger to people that are there to attend, things like that, I mean, there is no ‘too fast’.
As long as the cars are somewhat relatable in terms of how they perform, what makes them work, how drivers drive them. As long as the fans can kind of somewhat relate to what’s out there on the racetrack and what’s making that car go fast, they will always be kind of compelled to watch it. They’ll always be impressed with the speed.
Like you talked about, Bill Elliott’s run, even watching the cars at Indy this week, it’s incredible. We can relate to these cars. They’ve evolved, but the idea and the basic makeup of the machine is the same.
So as long as we can kind of maintain that connection, these things will always be amazing, and we will always be excited to watch them try to push them further and make them go faster.
Q. Dale, now that you’ve been to an Indy 500, is there any part of you that wishes maybe 15 or 20 years ago you could have found a way to run one?
DALE EARNHARDT JR.: Of course. Without a doubt there are regrets that I didn’t maybe try to figure out a way to be able to experience that once in my life.
So, yeah, when you’re watching a guy like Kyle Larson talk about it and consider it, you’re encouraged because you want to see him go out there and do it. Having my own experience, my own regret, I certainly think that a guy like Kyle Larson would have the same regrets if he doesn’t ever give it a shot.
I love the crossover. I love seeing other drivers from other disciplines go and try other things. My favorite crossover is absolutely NASCAR Cup and INDYCAR, the Daytona 500 and the Indy 500. Watching the drivers move back and forth between disciplines is pretty incredible.
But that ship has sailed. I’m 47. I’ll always wonder, I guess, what might have been, what I could have had the opportunity to do.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you so much. We really appreciate all of our speakers for taking part and all of the press for all of your questions. Thank you so much, everybody.
Again, Indy 500 on NBC, Peacock and Universo, Sunday, 11 a.m. Eastern.
TRANSCRIPT: Joe Buck, Troy Aikman and Stephanie Druley Media Call
The post Monday Night Football’s Joe Buck and Troy Aikman Media Call appeared first on ESPN Press Room U.S..
Thursday, Feb. 10, 2022
Pete Bevacqua
Molly Solomon
Mike Tirico
THE MODERATOR: Good afternoon, everyone, and thanks for joining us for today’s call. These are obviously historic times in our world with the ongoing pandemic, which has also made for historic times in the sports media space for NBC Sports and our entire company.
Our topics today are NBC and Peacock’s Winter Olympics coverage as well as their Super Bowl 56 coverage coming up this Sunday right in the heart of these Olympics. Reminder that the Super Bowl will also be on Telemundo for the first time.
Mike Tirico is doing something that’s never been done, and likely won’t ever be duplicated, hosting the primetime Olympics from Beijing for several nights, now hosting in our Stamford IBC for a couple nights, and then on to LA tomorrow to host both the Olympics and Super Bowl pregame show, which begins at 1:00 p.m. eastern time on Sunday.
Mike will return to Stamford on Monday to host week 2 of the Olympics, FYI. We’re joined today by Mike, as well as our NBC Olympics executive producer Molly Solomon, and by NBC Sports chairman Pete Bevacqua.
PETE BEVACQUA: Thanks, everybody, for joining us today. Greg, as you said, it’s certainly an exciting time for us and an unprecedented time, when you think about the fact that we’re in the midst of the Beijing Olympics with the Super Bowl right on the horizon, and the fact that we have the power of the Winter Olympics and the Super Bowl at the same time.
It is an absolute honor for all of us at NBC Sports and NBC. As I’ve said to the team repeatedly, if we can’t get excited and revved up about this, we’re certainly in the wrong business.
It’s been a busy time for sure. It feels like it was yesterday we were in Tokyo for the summer Games, and with only a six-month break, to come right into Beijing. I was recently in Beijing, I spent about 10 days there with Mike, and thinking about all the preparation that has gone into these Games, to have had two Olympics in six months with the necessary COVID protocols, everything to bring these Games to life during a global pandemic, it has certainly been a difficult environment to pull these Games off.
When you think about the beauty of the Olympic Games, the Olympic ideal, I really applaud the IOC for bringing these Games to life. Gary Zenkel, who’s the president of our Olympic team and I had dinner with Thomas Bach in Beijing a few nights ago, and we really congratulated him for pulling this off.
For us it’s been difficult. There’s no way around this. To bring these Games to life with all of the different hurdles that have come our way has been a challenge, but we a certainly have the right quarterback in Molly Solomon who you’re going to hear from shortly, and the job that Mike Tirico has done in Tokyo, now in Beijing, soon with the Super Bowl in LA, is really impressive to say the least, and I think he’s at the top of his game.
To go back to the idea that we have these Games and that we have the power of the Super Bowl, certainly there have been some challenges that have come with that, people working hard, people working overtime. But without a doubt, the positives and the benefits of that far outweigh the challenges, from a marketing perspective, from a sales perspective, — I believe that rising tides lift all ships. The Super Bowl is going to help the Olympics; the Olympics are going to help the Super Bowl; and I think all of this will coalesce on Sunday while we’re calling Super Bowl Sunday.
The fact that you can wake up on Sunday and have wonderful Olympic coverage for hours before the Super Bowl and then we move into Mike and the pregame, and obviously our Super Bowl coverage right through handing out of the Lombardi Trophy and then going immediately back to live Olympic Games coverage, if that’s not a powerful combination of bringing the beauty of sports.
Clearly the two biggest events in sports when you think about the Olympic Games and the Super Bowl, and the fact that they’re coming together is important for us, and it’s part of our strategy. It’s no secret when we were talking to the NFL about renewing our Sunday Night Football agreement it was important that we could have our Super Bowl years during our winter Olympic years, and we’re seeing success from that this year as we head towards the Super Bowl.
And we think the Super Bowl is going to provide an unbelievable powerful platform, to have that 100 million plus audience where we can obviously cover the game and every aspect of what’s been a wonderful NFL season, but also promote the Olympics and promote week 2 of these Beijing Games.
We’ve been really pleased with everything so far, despite the difficult challenges that we’ve faced during these Games, and I think we’re set up for a wonderful end of this week, a wonderful weekend, and then hopefully a great week 2 of Beijing.
But nobody can talk more thoroughly about what has gone into these Games than our very own Molly Solomon. Molly, take it away.
MOLLY SOLOMON: Thank you, Pete. It’s so fun to have this phone call today because it’s on the heels of a really exhilarating, uplifting 36 hours in the control room with the gold medal performances of Lindsey Jacobellis, Chloe Kim, and Nathan Chen, such an Olympic story of personal resolve and commitment.
And tonight Shaun White takes his final run in a legendary career live in primetime. And if you haven’t heard, Mikaela Shiffrin is going to race the Super G. So we’re going to have that immediately following the halfpipe at 10:00 p.m. Such an incredible lineup tonight.
Looking back nearly a week into these Games, I really believe we’ve met the challenges of, as what’s Pete called a truly unprecedented Beijing Games, in every way we can.
We’ve kept our commitment to produce storylines that document all of the triumphs and setbacks of Team USA and other key aspects of the game, and we did not shy away from our responsibility to place these Games in the proper geopolitical context as evidenced by our strong analysis during the opening ceremonies.
We did that without diminishing the athletes’ moments and the spectacle of that beautiful ceremony. For today, it’s incredibly easy for me to share with you how proud we are of the presentation thus far. There have been some fierce headwinds for these Olympics, but it’s really only inspired our NBC Olympic team, and we can’t wait for these Games and this work to continue.
For context, I wanted to put together some numbers to share with you so you can better understand our efforts. We have 1,600 people working here in Stamford, and our NBC Sports headquarters — it feels a lot like an International Broadcast Center in an Olympic city. With the Olympic city of Beijing being 13 hours ahead, day is night here and night is day here. We also have 600 teammates based in Beijing. Production, engineering and operations, and many of those people are taking on multiple jobs, playing out of position to help us pull off these 2,800 hours of competition.
And our reporters frankly have taken on even more responsibility because they are our eyes and ears for our production, and many of them are doing double duty.
The complexity of what we’re doing is also kind of mindboggling as we toggle back and forth across 6,800 miles.
Here are some stats for you: we have 203 HD feeds coming from China to our NBC Sports headquarters, and we’ve got 101 feeds going back to our IBC and our venues in China.
How about this one: the figure skating announcers and pictures travel under the Pacific Ocean three times in order to get on the air, so that’s 20,000 miles in seven tenths of a second. An extraordinary job by our engineering and operations team.
And somehow we also got Mike Tirico to Beijing and back, and he was on the air stateside last night. As Pete said, he’s primed for an unprecedented Olympic-Super Bowl double.
A week into the coverage, some production headlines from me: we’ve had several standout new analysts, including a trio of Olympic champs. I don’t know if you’ve heard Hannah Kearney on moguls, but you can catch her tonight in Prime Plus. She’ll be calling the team aerials competition.
Ted Ligety has been excellent on alpine skiing, and Kelly Clark, an Olympic champ, is joining us for snowboarding big air.
They’ve all been incredibly entertaining and instructive. That really is one of my favorite parts of producing the Olympics, is watching these new analysts emerge. They’re champions in their sports, but then they become really good broadcasters over the course of the Games.
There’s some names you might now know. Katherine Adamek has been excellent on short track and replays and explaining that crazy sport.
Tom Wallisch has been a breath of fresh air on freestyle big air.
And finally, my favorite part is waking up each morning, whenever that is, to coffee and curling. I just love listening to Kenny Rice and Tyler George.
So everything is really, really coming together, and I just so admire and respect this production team.
And finally, I wanted to also call out what’s new and improved in our coverage, which is pretty extraordinary when you consider, as we talked about, the headwinds with COVID.
We have the most production technology we’ve ever had in a Winter Olympics, and I think it’s really helping the viewers better understand these sports that they don’t know so much about. If you watched the halfpipe last night we had the jump height meter, and that actually is coming from Germany into our Beijing truck real time.
There’s a speedometer on alpine skiing for the speed events. And if you watched Nathan Chen last night, we’ve added four super slo-mo cameras, one in each of the corners in figure skating to really help you to better understand these incredible quadruple jumps that both the men and the women are performing.
Now we get to look forward to the middle weekend of the Olympics and Super Bowl Sunday, and we will, as Pete said, throw from the Lombardi Trophy presentation back to Beijing for two live gold medals.
We’re ready, and I think Mike Tirico is ready. Have you had any coffee? How are you doing there?
MIKE TIRICO: I am great. I was thinking this morning as I was taking a walk to get coffee about two years ago, and I was in this building where we are now, our NBC Sports headquarters, and Molly and my other boss in terms of production here at NBC, Sam Flood, both presented me with a piece of paper with a plan to work both projects that I’m lucky enough to be the host of — our NFL coverage and our Olympic coverage — and how to pull this off in the same weekend in two different continents.
It sounded really cool. Like, okay, well, I’ll put that in the back of my mind for a while. As it gets closer and closer, we’ve had the pandemic and other issues come in between, but still we are finding a way to do it, and I am eternally grateful to everybody involved to help make this happen.
Here we are, and I could not be more thrilled and more excited about it. When you do this job as a TV sports host, it’s a blessing to work at the network level, and without question the Super Bowl is the biggest sporting event in America. Without question the Olympics are the biggest sporting event in the world.
If you do what we do, what I get the honor of doing, the chance to do both once in a career is beyond belief and beyond dreams, and the chance to do both in the same weekend, let alone the same day, is beyond words.
I am thrilled, excited about it, can’t wait for it, and look forward to answering any of your questions here along the way.
Molly, I’m surprised in the breakout new analyst, you didn’t mention Lindsey Vonn’s studio premier on Sunday with Rebecca and Lindsey. Just for all of you guys, I know you had three straight days of ratings increases over the weekend, but just wondering on earlier in the week and everything how the numbers are looking, and any concern with Monday and Wednesday with Nathan’s skates going beyond midnight on the East Coast, but had to help you out on the West Coast since it was around 9:00 or 9:15 pm.
PETE BEVACQUA: I would tell you, ratings, they are about where we thought they would be in terms of our estimates. We had a strong weekend. It appears that last night is going to be a very strong night for us in terms of where our estimate was. It looks like it’s going to be to have beaten Monday and Tuesday.
You think about the coverage of last night, we’re sitting here today, Molly and Mike and the team are preparing for tonight, and when you think about the combination of Shaun White and Mikaela Shiffrin, seeing how she’ll perform on the Super G tonight, I think we have a good night ahead of us, as well.
So we’ve seen this momentum. Obviously linear ratings are down across the board, but we have been satisfied in terms of what we expected, and we also have been very pleased with the performance of Peacock and the streaming numbers have really been off the charts for us.
I think admittedly, perhaps I’m a bit biased, but I think we’ve made real drastic improvements on what we’ve done with Peacock. When you grade our performance in Tokyo versus Beijing, and when you see the reception that Peacock has received from the Peacock subscribers and the Peacock customers, the fact that you can go there for all things Olympic has been a nice supplement to all of our prime coverage, our prime plus and our prime west coverage.
I also think we’re excited about the impact the Super Bowl will have as we move into the weekend, go through Sunday and really kind of, as I like to say to the team, boomerang into next week.
We think bringing the power of the Olympics and talking about it to the massive Super Bowl audience over the course of Sunday, and using that time strategically to introduce that larger viewing population to some of these Olympic heroes will benefit us as we move into week 2.
Molly, what’s it been like running things from Stamford? Do you find yourself trying to live on Beijing time while doing everything or East Coast time? How are you doing it?
MOLLY SOLOMON: Oh, that’s a good question. We are keeping Beijing hours. We do a 5:00 p.m. production meeting eastern time with our folks in Beijing, so imagine they’re getting up really early.
We’re coming in at midday, and then we’re on from approximately 8:00 p.m. eastern to 2:00, 2:30 in the morning eastern time, and then we regroup until about 5:00 in the morning and they continue in Beijing, which is great.
So as news breaks, and the night events in Beijing happen, they’re making changes and alterations to our primetime format. So while our team goes home to sleep for a couple of hours and comes back midday, we exchange notes and literally hand off from Beijing to East Coast time.
It’s a crazy schedule, but it’s the Olympics. It’s what we expect, and we love to do it.
MIKE TIRICO: Working now my fourth Olympics, three with the primetime and the late night group, Prime Plus, the one thing you realize is you don’t sleep much, no matter where you are.
The most common text amongst me, Molly, and Rob Hyland, our producer who’s done an unbelievable job in the chair producing these shows, is usually followed by the other one responding to one of us, ‘What are you doing up?’ Because we’re all up at hours we shouldn’t be up.
It’s a 24/7 operation right now, and most of us are putting in 18 or 19 of the 24 (hours) each day, and wouldn’t want it any other way. This is what we prepare for and it’s what we do, but it’s been a lot of fun for sure.
From your perspective, what gives you optimism that the linear numbers for these Games are not something that will be a carryover for Paris and beyond, and that is really just about the current environment that we’re in and all of the things that obviously have been discussed about these Games?
PETE BEVACQUA: It’s a good question, and obviously one we’ve given a lot of thought to as we’ve discussed this internally. You know the ratings pressures across the board in the industry, and obviously we don’t need to get into that.
When you think about the fact that we’re holding these Games during a pandemic, that the Tokyo Games were postponed for a year, which kind of threw off this cycle, that we’ve had two Olympics within six months of one another, that despite the fact that these have been unbelievable events for these Olympic athletes who train their entire lives and in the vast majority of instances only have one shot at Olympic glory, and at the end of the day that’s truly what the Olympic ideal is all about, but it’s no secret that athletes in masks, venues without spectators, so much of the passion and excitement, those great moments of Olympic athletes hugging their family and friends and spouses and partners, so much of that magic is just out of necessity not present.
Just think about the 2020 season for major leagues, whether it’s the NFL, Major League Baseball, the NBA, golf versus the ’21 season, and I think the NFL is a perfect example. Look at the difference in NFL ratings in ’21 compared to ’20. I think one of the main differences is because in ’20, we didn’t have the passionate NFL fan base in those stadiums adding to the atmosphere. We did our best out of necessity.
But this year, those fans were back and the ratings showed that. The fact that we’ve been able to bring these Games to life during a pandemic with only a six-month window between the two, the ratings are — of course we always want to have the ratings better — but the ratings for these Games, as I said, are about where we thought they’d be.
Why I’m energized is I think about where we’re going, think about Paris and Italy and LA. And knock on wood, not just for the Olympics, but for the sake of all of us, hopefully this pandemic is well beyond us by then, we have those spectators back in these venues bursting at the seams, we have those passionate family and friends and athletes without masks hugging each other and celebrating these Olympic achievements. We have our eye on that normalized future coming back into focus as we work our way through this pandemic, so that’s why we’re hopeful.
Despite having two Olympics in six months during a pandemic, the media dominance of these Games is still unparalleled. Tokyo, we in effect had 18 Sunday Night Football games in a row. This year we are dominating the primetime landscape again with the Olympics, and layer on top of that the Super Bowl.
Hey, we’re never going to rest on our laurels. We’re always going to try to get better, smarter, and do the best job we can, but we are certainly hopeful that we can turn this pandemic corner and get things closer to where they’ve been in the past in terms of ratings.
THE MODERATOR: One thing I would add on top of that is the social media factor of American fans being there, seeing their families, etc., and putting that stuff out on all the various social media platforms creates a buzz, and we have not been able to generate that buzz with Tokyo and Beijing and those viral moments of people experiencing the host city, etc.
Molly, understanding what the likelihood is of NBC making a formal request to interview Peng Shuai?
MOLLY SOLOMON: We’ve not made that request because she’s gone back into quarantine and left the Olympic bubble. I also think it’s really important — if we were to have an interview with her, we would need to know that we could ask any question and there wouldn’t necessarily be anyone else in the room, and I don’t know that right now is the right place to do that. But I think in the future we’ll have the opportunity.
But I will say, as she went from venue to venue over the weekend we made sure and Mike put into perspective that she was with the IOC President visiting the venues and followed up on that story all weekend long.
Question for either Pete or Molly: We’ve seen some integrations in the Olympic broadcast from the recent Salesforce partnership and some of the data and analytics, what they’ve been doing. I was hoping you could detail how you’re measuring the success or effectiveness of those integrations and in the early going what you’ve found to be the case and whether they are working from a fan engagement perspective.
PETE BEVACQUA: I would tell you we work hand-in-hand with our ad sales team led by Linda Yaccarino, Mark Marshall and Dan Lovinger and the back and forth we have with them, what we are hearing from them, and they are, as you can imagine our colleagues that are having the direct conversations with our ad partners, is that people have been incredibly pleased so far to-date with the integration of the ads.
It’s kind of a constant dialogue between them and our customers and those that are supporting these Games.
I’d like to say, I think we’ve done a good job of integrating these, making them additive to the coverage, additive to the storytelling without being distracting, so I think we’re kind of hitting that in an effective and efficient way.
Then of course after the Games, like we always do, we’ll regroup. We’ll go out and ask for their recommendations and their belief on how it went, and always try to improve it going forward. At this juncture here on Thursday of this opening week of the Olympics, things seem to be going quite well in that regard.
Mike, can you tell us a little more about what the life of Mike Tirico has been like the last number of days with the time zone changes, the flights, and what it was like to be over there for a little while?
MIKE TIRICO: Sure, happy to. I will say that being over there was very interesting. Being in the bubble meant you truly were separated from one of the biggest cities in the world. You would pull up to the hotel and a fence would close behind you and that hotel area was fenced in. Same was true with the broadcast center, same was true with the venues.
So the bubbles, you can go in and out of the other bubbles, but not mix in with the 21 million people of Beijing.
For me, I think for any of us who have covered the Olympics, that’s what you miss. You miss being around a host city. I missed sitting in Rio and having coffee and being able to speak with the people who live in Rio de Janeiro. Same thing in South Korea, to be able to eat kimchi there and get a sense what that’s like. Missed that in Tokyo a little bit and missed it completely in Beijing. For me, that was the disappointing part of this experience for sure.
But I will say, and we can always give teammates credit, but the people who were on the ground working for NBC, Molly gave you the numbers before, what an extraordinary job they have done. Many of them have been over there for over a month, so to be over for two weeks and in the bubble and not be able to really just go for a walk outside when you’d like is a small inconvenience to the sacrifice of a month or two months that they’ve made. I’m eternally grateful to my teammates over there in that regard.
For me, it’s been pretty easy. Try to be on the time of where you’re going. When we got on the plane in China a couple of days ago, the goal was get myself on East or West Coast time, so when we landed I was ready to hit the ground running.
We’ll do that after tonight’s show, head out to Los Angeles and pretend we’re on Pacific time and be ready for Super Bowl meetings on Friday out there before doing our Olympic coverage.
It has been exhilarating, not exhausting. We worked a lot in the month before this was coming up to be ready for this, and my goodness, we have great production teams on both sides. When I get off this call, Matt Casey, who’s one of our Super Bowl producers, Matt is going to FaceTime me and I’m going to walk through the rehearsal for the Lombardi Trophy that I would normally be doing in person. Then we have a two-hour meeting to talk about the content of our pregame show that I’ll just do via Microsoft Teams. And then we’ll hop into our production meeting for tonight’s primetime show and then do the primetime show.
It’s been time management. It’s been get a good night’s sleep where you can, and it has been as good as I hoped it would be. I’m just hoping that the weekend pays that off.
Watching the first couple of nights, the conversations that you had on air, yourself with Savannah, with your guests about the geopolitics in China and some of the very forthright things you were able to say, how important was it for you to be able to say them? And Molly, address how important it was for you as the executive producer for them to be able to be said on air.
MIKE TIRICO: Sure. I’ll be happy to go first. It was important because it was part of the story. We can’t hide from what is a part and essential to the coverage of the story.
I think we tried to make a very fine delineation between becoming a public affairs broadcast and how did it impact the Olympics, and certainly where we were and who was there mattered.
That’s why Molly and Pete both thought it was really important that I was physically there for the opening ceremony, and I’m so glad I was. Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin were 25 yards away in the stadium. You could just get a sense of the history of the moment by being there.
We spent a lot of time getting ready for these Games and what it meant not just to the sports fan, but what it meant to the world in general. I’m very, very proud of my alma mater, Syracuse University and love that my journalism education was there, but I had a dual degree. My other degree was political science. You can ask any of our NBC News colleagues, when our paths intersect I wear them out talking politics and all that is about international relations in our world.
This was something that’s of deep interest to me, and, boy, did we have great experts in Andy Brown and Jing Tsu, who are our experts in China and remain with us as needed for our coverage the next couple of weeks.
And obviously Savannah is as good as it gets, so to have her there, as well. We hopefully addressed the issues that mattered.
You’ll never satisfy everyone, especially in our country in 2022. People may say, “Oh, you talked too much about politics; oh, I want a little bit more of this, a little bit more of that.” That’s what the Opening Ceremony is. The Opening Ceremony is always this incredible mix of politics, what the athletes are wearing, and celebration and party. It’s really this very unique catchall event.
We tried to bring that to folks, and at the same time, spend the time Thursday on the issues that really impact America and the athletes of the world as the spotlight was on China.
I’m really, really proud of not what I did but what our team did. Our editorial team spent hours. Joe Gesue, Ron Vaccaro, a couple of names that don’t get mentioned, but tireless work that we all did to make sure that we did what we thought was the right thing to do to set the table for American viewers.
I hope that the conversation inspired people to spend more time on international relations. We live in a very complex and amazing country, but, man, there’s a really interesting world out there and a very interesting time.
The Olympics helped open my eyes and educated me. I’ve done more international-based reading than I have in years, and it made me realize that we are at a unique time. It was an honor to share some of that, and I’m really proud that under Molly’s leadership, we got the go-ahead to tackle these issues and be straightforward and honest with our viewers. We wanted the comebacks. We wanted to be honest with them, and hopefully we did the right thing by them.
So thanks. It may be a little longer than you asked for, but I appreciate the opportunity.
MOLLY SOLOMON: I think he said it all. It really was, I thought, an extraordinary moment, this nexus of sports and international relations.
Going in, we promised ourselves and we thought it was essential for the viewers to provide perspective on China’s complicated relationship with the rest of the world. It was really essential to set the stage for these Games during that ceremony, and we really accomplished that and were incredibly satisfied with how we pulled it off.
Imagine in the moments when we found out that the cauldron lighter was from Xinjiang, and kudos to Mike Tirico and Savannah Guthrie, to frame that moment, to connect it to all the other perspective we had provided throughout that ceremony.
That’s real-time television, a live opening ceremony, and I thought they did an extraordinary job of presenting that moment.
So incredibly proud of the team. As Mike said, we can’t say enough about the people behind the scenes who prep all of us and our experts, in particular Joe Gesue and Ron Vaccaro, who also worked very hard.
We did extensive interviewing to find the right analysts and experts to join us on air, so we really appreciate Jing Tsu taking time off from Yale and Andy Brown from Bloomberg to really help us frame the moment.
It was an important night for NBC Sports and NBCUniversal.
Molly, I know you mentioned some of the technology and production element highlights at the top, but anything else that’s really impressed you guys this year, especially some of the StroMotion stuff, the motion systems, rail cams, cable cams that OBS is providing? Also, how is the off-tube remote announcing operation working out so far this year in Stamford?
MOLLY SOLOMON: As you know, it’s such a closely affiliated relationship with OBS, the Olympic broadcasting service, and we depend on them even more during a pandemic. We’ve worked really closely with them, and they’re providing pictures at a number of our venues. If you watched Alpine the last few nights, the severity and steepness of this hill, I think they’re doing a really remarkable job covering the Alpine venue with the rail cams.
Have you seen the aerial of the extreme sports venues? When you see in the distance the moguls field to what they’re saying is the best halfpipe ever. I think it’s been really extraordinary coverage, and imagine that OBS is experiencing the same thing that NBC is trying to get folks into the country in the middle of a pandemic.
So the fact that there’s been no dropoff in the coverage is kudos to OBS.
As you said, there’s so many — I can’t list them all, of the enhancements that we’ve added, but the StroMotion in Alpine and also at figure skating, we’ve also got this amazing new tracker which shows how high in the air the figure skaters go on their jumps and how far they jump. So we’ll be using that in enhanced replay sequences.
Overall we are ecstatic over what both OBS and we have been able to pull off in the face of a pandemic.
Any thoughts on the remote announcing, the off-tube factory in Stamford? Has that been successful?
MOLLY SOLOMON: You know, we’ve gotten really good at this. We’ve been doing this for two and a half years because of the pandemic. You would always love to have your announcers on-site, but we had to pivot, like we do every single day with all of the headwinds that we run into, and we made the decision in January to ensure the integrity of the broadcast that we pulled our play-by-play and analysts home, but we made sure that we had reporters on-site because it’s most important to talk to the athletes and cover breaking news, and we have cameras at every single venue in the mixed zone.
In the beginning you wish you were there, but I think we’ve done a lot of really neat things with the fact that we’ve got all these announcers together. I don’t know if you watched the Alpine coverage last night, but Ted Ligety and Steve Porino were in a studio in Stamford, and they explained how sharp the blade of an Alpine ski is, and they cut up watermelon, papaya, and Ligety then opened a bottle of champagne, and that’s something we couldn’t have done in a small commentary booth on the hill in Beijing.
We have made the best of these circumstances, and actually I think it’s enhanced the storytelling.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you, everybody, for joining us today. If you have any follow-up, reach out to the NBC Sports communications team and we will accommodate you. Pete, Molly and Mike, thanks for the time, and thank you, everybody.
MODERATOR: Welcome to today’s conference call with Michele Tafoya and executive producer Fred Gaudelli, as Michele heads into her final three games with the NBC Sunday Night Football crew.
She will finish with Super Bowl 56 in the Los Angeles area not far from where she grew up in Manhattan Beach. That will be her fifth Super Bowl and 327th NFL game on the sidelines, a stretch during which she’s won more Sports Emmy awards than any other reporter.
Michele and Fred will make some opening remarks and then we’ll take your questions. Fred…
FRED GAUDELLI: Usually I start out by saying this is bittersweet, but I’m trying to find the sweet. I hired Michele back in 2004 to be the sideline reporter on Monday Night Football. Unfortunately we only had a couple years together and then I was able to persuade Dick Ebersol to bring her to Sunday Night Football in 2011 and Michele has just done outstanding work on Monday night, on Sunday night.
I said this a few weeks ago, in my lifetime, I feel like she is the best sideline reporter the NFL has had. Really looking forward to these next three games because they are all big and Michele always performs her best when the games mean the most and I know she’s going to be great in whatever she does next. Like I said, I’m trying to find the sweet, Michele.
MICHELE TAFOYA: Fred, now I was doing so well all day, and now I just suddenly got misty because as anyone on this call knows, whenever you get praise from Fred Gaudelli, it’s like, you know, unparalleled. I have been so fortunate to work with Fred for all of these years minus those five between Monday and Sunday.
Today all I want to say is how thankful I am to NBC Sports for all of their support. It really starts with Fred. If anyone asks me, who catapulted your career, it’s Fred Gaudelli for me. It’s a no-brainer. I just feel as though he’s championed me and supported me and coached me for so long now, and we’re kind of like family.
And I do want to thank Dick Ebersol for listening to Fred and bringing me along when he did. Mark Lazarus has been a great friend; Pete Bevacqua, and of course Al Michaels. I believe in miracles because I got to work with Al Michaels. To me, sometimes I don’t even realize like how lucky I am to do that.
John Madden, of course, for those two years on Mondays and Cris Collinsworth who turned into a great friend and Drew Esocoff, our director, there’s just no one like him.
And I just feel very grateful today. It is bittersweet for me. The only “sweet” in it for me, Fred, is that I’ll get a little more time with my family and I’m going on to pursue, and this is something I wanted to do for several years now, to pursue some other opportunities that are really meaningful to me, and I’m not going to talk about those today; that will come at a later time.
But I just want to thank everyone at NBC Sports. Also the Olympic division, Molly Solomon, Rebecca Chatman, Tommy Roy, Dan Hicks, Rowdy Gaines, for all those fun times I had doing swimming the past two Summer Olympic Games. It’s just been an enormous privilege, a great honor and so much fun and so professionally gratifying.
If I wanted to stay in sports television, I wouldn’t be leaving. This is about opening a new chapter for me, so that’s really all I can say, and I guess open it for questions.
Q. How is this decision going to affect whether or not you stay in Minnesota?
MICHELE TAFOYA: It won’t affect that at all. Right now, Minnesota is my home. It’s where I’m raising my kids. My kids love it here. They love their school and so as long as, you know, until they go to college, we are planted right here.
Q. How did that affect how you did the job and the challenges being based out of Minnesota rather than, say, L.A. or New York?
MICHELE TAFOYA: Traveling from Minnesota is a lot easier than traveling across the country from New York or L.A. As you know, we’re right here in the center of the country, and it’s made travel pretty easy for me, I think, relative to others on the crew who are mostly East and West-Coast based.
I will say I have a lot of friends in the Minnesota Vikings organization that did not make me a biased observer by any means but on that note, I wish Mike Zimmer all of the best. He was one of our favorite coaches to have in production meetings and one of my favorite coaches to talk to at halftime. I’m sorry so see him go, and I’m sure he’ll get snatched up in a jiffy by someone.
You know, when I first started here in Minnesota, I was a Vikings sideline reporter for KFAN, so I’ve known that organization for a long time. Again, it’s never influenced the way I covered the team. It just has been sort of a fun — there have been some really interesting times with the Vikings, that outdoor playoff game against the Seahawks in subzero temperatures, I can remember that. Certainly thanking the Lord that they built a new dome. So all those things, you know, I just have — I used to do the Cris Carter show on KFAN radio. So a lot of memories that involve the Vikings for sure.
Brett Favre’s first game, I should say, or his game when he beat Aaron Rodgers and the Packers at the Metrodome, another great memory, I appreciate it.
Q. I don’t know if you’ve thought about this one at all, but when you look back on your career, specifically with either Monday Night or Sunday Night Football, do you have an experience for you that stands above the rest; that means a great deal to you more than any other?
MICHELE TAFOYA: I hope this doesn’t disappoint you, but the experiences that top them all were the times I spent just with the crew. In particular, on Madden’s bus on the way to practice or on the way to games with all these knuckleheads has just been phenomenal. Those are the moments I will never forget.
You know, I think certainly every Super Bowl has provided a great memory, chasing down Malcolm Butler after he intercepted Russell Wilson at the goal line to beat the Seahawks; standing behind Bill Belichick in that moment, seeing his arms go in the air as high as they possibly could, that was a great moment, at least a memorable one. It was a lot of fun.
There have been countless. I will always point to that game as I said earlier at TCF Bank Stadium outdoors at 7 below at kickoff and just battling that weather with a group of people that, you know, it was us against the weather and it was just something that you never, ever forget something like that. You just don’t. It’s seared into your memory or I guess should I say frozen into your memory.
Tom Brady beating the Patriots this year, that postgame, it goes on, Peyton Manning, Brett Favre; Brett Favre beating the Packers when he was with the Vikings, that postgame interview was just — again, I’m so grateful for these opportunities. They just provided me challenges and incredible moments in sports. And I think, too, I don’t want to overlook the Olympic Games, covering Michael Phelps fifth and last Olympics was a treat, a treat. It was absolutely a blast.
Katie Ledecky, just an incredible job thing to watch. There have been quite a few but I would say, to me, what I will miss the most is our time together as a crew and just the phone calls I have with the players every week when I get to talk to them one-on-one, running into coaches and players on the sidelines before and after the game. The moments you never see on TV are to me the most precious.
Q. The last two years have obviously been hard for a lot of sports journalists because of COVID and restrictions and this, that and the other. Did anything happen over these last two-plus years that led to you the decision to pursue something else or was it just a matter of timing and opportunity, you thought now is the right time to leap?
MICHELE TAFOYA: This plan has been in the works for a few years and you know, actually COVID made me want to commit more to this team to get through those hard times. And so without going into a ton of boring details, when COVID struck and we didn’t know what to 2020 was going to be like, I just said, whatever we’ve got to do to get through this, I want to help.
Nothing specific about these last two years has made my decision any different. Like I said, this has been in my mind for several years, and you know, I would say on the whole, no.
Q. Looking ahead to Sunday’s game, everybody thought that the Ben Roethlisberger farewell tour was going to wrap up the last couple weeks with the last home game in Baltimore and now you have a Sunday night in Kansas City and just looking ahead to the Super Bowl, kind of a full circle moment for you, growing up nearby in Manhattan beach in your final game on the sidelines?
MICHELE TAFOYA: Yeah, that is so interesting, I think it probably means more to Al than it does to me because Al loves the home game. And it is, it’s going to be an electric environment. I am really looking forward to that.
Yeah, it’s kind of funny that Ben is still going for another game. I’ll look forward to seeing them and really seeing all of the Steelers, Mike Tomlin is just a joy to cover and so is Andy Reid.
So I’m looking forward to this weekend. It’s going to be a lot of fun. The Super Bowl being close to home, I don’t know, I haven’t lived in L.A. for so long now, I think I’ve almost lived half my life in Minnesota; that that isn’t quite as meaningful as you might think it would be, but it does give me a chance to see my mom and my brother and my sister and my relatives out there, which is always a good thing, always a plus. I think I will be hosting my brother at his very first Super Bowl, so that will mean a lot to him.
But you know, yeah, it’s just — the timing’s great.
Q. And what was it like being on the sideline for that game this past Sunday as far as, you know, Week 18, going down to the final play where who knows if it was going to end in a tie or not; is that one of the craziest games you’ve been on the sidelines for?
MICHELE TAFOYA: Undoubtedly. Honestly, I could think of words here for you to describe that game but I’d be sounding like everyone else. There’s nothing original that I can say about that game. It was astonishing. And it was one of those where toward the end when you thought it might tie, you thought, you know, maybe this is okay and appropriate. These teams have battled. They both deserve it.
And so, yeah, the ending was crazy. All of it was — it was almost exhausting to watch because the players looked so exhausted by the time regulation was over. You didn’t know how they were going to continue. To a certain extent, you thought, how can they even drag themselves back out there? Especially the Chargers offense and the Raiders defense. I thought that they had nothing left.
Clearly, I was wrong. It is one of the most incredible games I’ve ever witnessed. I don’t know how Fred produced it except with a smile on his face is what I’m assuming. I wasn’t in the truck. But those are the kind of games you pray for and we got it.
Q. Will you still have a presence on Minnesota media? You’ve been on the radio, lot of different formats here; will that continue?
MICHELE TAFOYA: I don’t know yet. I think, like I said, the announcement of what’s to come will come later.
It’s funny, because as I’m sitting here with you, I get a text from WCCO Radio, hey, can you come on with us? Those kinds of things will certainly be there. I know the studio does some good fundraising, and I always like to contribute to those days of radio fundraising for hunger, and I will certainly commit to that. But as far as plans for something full-time or part-time, I’m just not going to say right now.
Q. Will there be anything special for your send-off that we can anticipate on Super Bowl Sunday?
MICHELE TAFOYA: I hope not. I really hope not. You know, one of the things Fred and I talked about going into this season was when we would make this announcement, when it served everyone best. And I did not want that kind of farewell tour feel to my season and so that’s why we waited until now to say anything. That was by design — this press conference, I realize is about this moment and me and leaving and going on, and that’s fine.
But I don’t want the games to be about me. The games are about the games, and I’m just fine with that.
Q. What are you most looking forward to? Super Bowl game is over, you take your earpiece out and leave the field.
MICHELE TAFOYA: Probably…just being able to walk into my house and not have a deadline for the laundry and the mail. Like knowing that I can spread it out over the next six weeks if I want to that I don’t have to be somewhere. Honestly, it’s stupid stuff like that. I’m a total homebody. You know, I’m going to love being around my kids and my husband, and then the adventure is going to begin.
You know, I’m very excited about what’s next. You know, whatever transpires, I’m super excited. I really am. This is hard for me. This is sad. These are my best friends in the world, this crew. I know for a fact I’m going to miss them and certain little moments tremendously, but you know, this has been in my mind for long enough that I’m really ready.
Q. I know you said several times that you’re not going to talk about what’s in the future, which kind of destroyed the question that I was going to ask, but I did want to ask a few months ago, you had a much-publicized appearance on The View, and I wanted to ask generally what you took out of that experience.
MICHELE TAFOYA: Generally, what I took out of that experience was an opportunity to go and flex some other muscles, and I didn’t get to flex them as much as you’d want to because there was just two days’ worth of appearance and in those two days, you can probably count the number of minutes in which I spoke.
But it was an opportunity to just try something different and try something where I get to talk about other stuff. That was enjoyable for me and that was the biggest takeaway.
Q. Your role, especially on Sunday Night Football and the Olympics has been somebody who relays information that is empirical facts, and on The View, you mentioned getting to flex your muscles and do something different. Do you think going forward in these unspecified future opportunities that you will be expressing your personal opinions on those platforms?
MICHELE TAFOYA: I think the safest answer to that is yes.
Q. (By Michele’s mother: When will I see you again?)
MICHELE TAFOYA: You will see me hopefully on President Day’s weekend, Mom.
My mom is amazing. My mom, Wilma is on this call, she’s 90 years old. We celebrated her 90th birthday last summer. She is a stud. She is the strongest woman that I know. She’s been a great, great role model for me, an unbelievable support. I adore her. I’m glad you’re on here, mom. You were with me when I won my first Emmy, do you remember that?
Q. I do. I do.
MICHELE TAFOYA: Oh, she’s going to get emotional. Okay. I don’t want to you get emotional.
Anyway, she is — obviously she is just a great support, and so Mom, thanks for being on here. Now, no more questions.
Q. How has the broadcast evolved since you started working on Sunday Night Football?
FRED GAUDELLI: You know, there was a time, especially in my career, where you could pretty much format where the sideline reporter was going to appear after speaking to the coaches at halftime, perhaps before the kickoff, and then if someone got hurt.
One of the things I realized with Michele is she was capable of so much more. She was really able to elicit not only information from players and coaches, but feelings, and she’s obviously smart as a whip and the one thing you have to be a sideline reporter is really fast on your feet because I tend to change things up a lot pretty quickly and Michele was able to handle all of that.
You know, for me, I just kept looking for ways to further integrate her into the conversation with Al and John and then with Al and Cris. So, we didn’t have that — yeah, could you expect to see Michele before the kickoff, you know and after halftime, but really began looking for ways to use her storytelling abilities and in many cases to set up the story so then John and Al or Al and Cris can take it from there.
For me, she just became a more and more integral part of the broadcast, not somebody who had just very specific detailed responsibilities.
MICHELE TAFOYA: And I’ve answered by saying, I never worked with a producer before who put as much weight on this role. That was so refreshing and so empowering and fun, and I think just for me over the course of time, honestly, it’s about developing relationships with coaches, with players so that there’s a trust factor that doesn’t come right away.
You know, you’ve got to get to know these people and you have to get to know what you’re dealing at halftime with each week and who you are dealing with. Every coach is so different and then just the player dealings that I have during the week. It just became every week, they became more and more comfortable, more fun and more fruitful because of the time spent, and the time invested in it and that is something that Fred has encouraged from day one.
I think it’s just grown and grown, and believe me, we have a notebook full of stuff going into each game, the vast majority of which does not make of air, but it’s there and we’re always prepared and ready and I’m supported and I just feel like I hit the lottery of sideline jobs, honest to God, that’s how I feel.
–NBC Sports–
Tuesday, November 2, 2021
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Dale Jarrett
Steve Letarte
THE MODERATOR: Good afternoon, and welcome to the NBC Sports 2021 NASCAR Championship conference call. In a moment we’re going to be joined by a few members of our NBC Sports NASCAR commentary team, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Steve Letarte and Dale Jarrett, who took home the Cup Series title in 1999.
This week, NBC Sports will be presenting the Championship races for both the NASCAR Cup and Xfinity Series from Phoenix Raceway. Live coverage of the Xfinity Series Championship will air Saturday on NBCSN beginning at 8:00 p.m. ET; Sunday’s Cup Series Championship coverage on NBC begins at 1:30 p.m. ET, leading into the green flag shortly after 3:00 p.m. ET.
Also today you’ll be seeing shortly NBC Sports in conjunction with NASCAR is announcing its 2022 Cup and Xfinity Series schedule. That will feature nine Cup Series races on NBC. It’ll also mark the debut of USA Network as NBC Sports’ cable home of NASCAR with more than 25 live Cup and Xfinity Series races next year.
If you’ve got any questions regarding that schedule, please follow up with me directly after this call. I’m happy to assist you with that. Today we’re going to keep our focus on the desert and the Cup and Xfinity Series Championships coming up this weekend, coming off of some great races at Martinsville. We’re going to begin with opening remarks from each of our analysts. We will start with Dale Earnhardt Jr.
DALE EARNHARDT JR.: You know, I think it’s been a long year, but we’ve had a lot of fun with a lot of drama and a lot of great excitement throughout the season. Obviously this past weekend never really fails when you go to Martinsville with all this on the line. I just love how much action we get to see at those short tracks.
I look forward to finally being able to determine the champion and see who can do that. We had a season preview show early in the year before everything got going, and we talked about Kyle Larson, and everybody kind of wondered what season he might have or what it might be like, and I don’t know that any of us had a real great grasp of what kind of speed he might have, but we all knew that this was a real possibility for him to be able to get there and race for a championship.
I think he goes to Phoenix as the favorite to do it, and that could be an incredible thing after everything he’s been through, to see him become a champion. There’s great storylines with all the drivers, Chase trying to repeat, Denny trying to get his first. There’s a lot of things going on there.
It should be a great weekend. We get a little bit of practice, which is going to be fun. I have missed practice as a broadcaster. The practice sessions and qualifying and all those sorts of things help build storylines. We get an idea really how to handicap the field and who might have some unique pace in those sessions, and without that, it’s been a little bit more difficult to understand exactly what you expect to see in the race.
There’s good and bad in that, but I’ve missed practice, so I’m excited to be there Friday and see what’s happening on the racetrack. It’s going to be a fun weekend. Looking forward to it.
STEVE LETARTE: I’ll echo a lot of Dale’s comments, simple enough. I think every driver with an opportunity to win the championship each year, they have earned and deserve that spot in the Championship 4. But I think the fan base this year has been delivered the four best. They’re 1 through 4 in laps led, they won a lot of races, and I can make a reasonable argument how each of them could win the championship and what the weaknesses of each four of them and what their concerns should be heading into the championship race.
When you get to the culmination of a championship, I think everybody just hopes that it’s a great event, a great battle, and with these four drivers I don’t know how it can’t be. Even if someone has an issue, there would be three left to fight it out, so I expect that to be the case.
On Saturday to have four different organizations with an opportunity I think is pretty special, and all three manufacturers represented on Saturday. We don’t have that on Sunday, so I think that’s special, as well, and Phoenix has proven to be a great venue for this event, and last year they did a nice job as we started to see fans come back.
But it was so electric at Martinsville. I’m really excited to go out to Phoenix and see a full racetrack of fans, because as great as the sport is, as great as the competitors are, the fans make everything special. To have it back at full force is really going to be a special weekend.
DALE JARRETT: Dale Jr. and Steve have talked about the drivers. I will agree any one of them is going to be a great champion, and they’ve earned the right to be here. I want to go more towards the venue.
At Phoenix Raceway, there were questions, what would this be like, what would this track present, was it going to be as good as Homestead was for so many years? Were we still going to see the champion have to win the race, as that has proven out? We have seen great racing, and I expect this to be another fantastic weekend of championship-caliber racing and drivers doing whatever it’s going to take to get another championship or that first championship.
I think the thing that makes this special to me is that when I look at the Phoenix track, it takes in and incorporates every single person within that organization of these four drivers, each of the races, to make it work and make it happen. The racetrack is completely different than anything else they race on.
The ins are completely different, so you have to adapt as a driver. Pit road is very difficult. Easy to get caught speeding. It’s so long that you get a little bit anxious and want to get yourself to your pit stall and then exit and get back on the track and get going.
And then the crew chief has to understand and be willing to sometimes take some chances, but to certainly put his driver in the right spot at the right time at the end of this race to go win the championship. Really looking forward to the weekend.
Q. I’m kind of curious, it seems like this year, maybe more so than I guess the past few years, there seems to be a lot of bad blood between different drivers, kind of has that old-school feel. I was kind of curious, do you guys see this as kind of more similar to when you guys raced as far as the rivalries and the bad blood? Everybody is going to Phoenix and everybody is kind of angry at each other right now. Just curious on your thoughts on that as guys who raced back then.
DALE EARNHARDT JR.: I think that the drama and the rivalries is great for the sport. I think everybody would agree with that. When you see the drivers in a rivalry or in a bit of a disagreement or conflict with another driver, even if they’re not really willing to be involved, we get to see a little bit deeper into their personalities. We get to see a little bit more of who they are when they handle these types of difficult situations and how they handle it tells us more about them.
In a perfect world, a driver would be entirely in control with all of the information and content that he’s displaying. He would be in control of all the narrative; he would be in control of every quote and he would never be taken out of context, right?
But in those moments he doesn’t get to choose, and in those moments we get to really learn about their instincts and the real personality behind the driver. That’s kind of fun.
We get to see a little bit different side of Chase Elliott or a different side of Kevin Harvick or Denny Hamlin. It leaves an impression on you, I guess, that’s different. I think it’s good.
The only thing is the rivalries that I remember, and DJ can talk on this a little bit, they lasted sometimes for years; whereas the rivalries that we have had over the last couple of decades tend to be shorter.
Now, the drivers don’t always become friends. They still may dislike the hell out of each other. But you don’t see the rivalry continue on the racetrack like we used to years ago. The best example, I think, would be my dad and Geoff Bodine. They spent two years, I think, running over each other needlessly, several times, doing things that was detrimental to both of them. It was awesome. Even though I would be frustrated with dad at times for doing what he would do, it still fired up the fan bases.
That’s my take on it.
DALE JARRETT: Yeah, that’s a lot of good stuff, Junior. You’re exactly right. And it does go back to the beginning of this sport with rivalries, back to my dad’s time with Junior Johnson and David Pearson and Richard Petty. Those things, as Junior pointed out, the ones that were good lasted for a long time, and that was beneficial to the sport. We enjoyed that.
The thing about now is that I think that drivers are a little more guarded because of social media and every move that they make being put out there for everyone to see. Every single thing. They’re totally under a microscope, so I think they’re a little more guarded to let that happen.
But for some reason this year in particular it seems like everybody said to heck with that, I don’t care what people might think on the negative side of it, I’ve got to show this, and this is who I am.
It’s beneficial for us to see that. Let’s just make sure that we don’t tear them down for being who they are and showing us that and willing to show that. I’ll say that I think one of the reasons is that there’s two things, two words that come to mind that bring these types of situations, and that’s competition and pressure. When you put the two together, when you have a competitive field like it is now that anybody can win — I realize Kyle Larson has won nine times, but still, you show up, you feel that there’s way more drivers that have an opportunity to go win, and you couple that with the pressure to make the playoffs and be one of the four drivers here this weekend racing for a championship.
Whether it’s their first or trying to add to their resume there’s a lot of pressure, and especially to those drivers that didn’t make it that are past champions. Because once you get to that level, nothing else makes you feel good about your season if you don’t have an opportunity to finish off a season with a championship.
This is great, and I love to see it. Fun to see it. The thing is things are going to get said and everybody is not going to agree with it, and there’s always going to be two or three sides to everything; let’s let them talk.
DALE EARNHARDT JR.: I’d like to add one more thing. The Chase Elliott, Kevin Harvick issues and what we saw this past weekend both happened at Bristol and Martinsville, two incredible short tracks that have always produced a lot of drama and a lot of hurt feelings and a lot of rivalries.
You don’t tend to get that at the bigger mile-and-a-half tracks. The drivers aren’t going to beat and bang and run over each other on those faster racetracks.
The sport back in the ’70s and ’80s had many more short track races, and we’ve since moved kind of toward a different style, a different culture with mile-and-a-halfs and now leaning more toward road courses.
So some day we may eventually cycle back toward the short track scene a little bit, we’re likely to see a whole lot more rivalries and a whole lot more drama in the sport.
Q. Steve, what do you see that (Kyle) Larson and Cliff (Daniels) are able to do that Cliff and that team weren’t able to do with Jimmie (Johnson)?
STEVE LETARTE: I know this is an easy answer and people won’t believe it, but it just comes down to raw speed. I think that what Cliff has been able to do — first of all, I think Hendrick Motorsports in general is faster this year than they were last year, last year than they were the year before.
I think if you go over the last four years it’s been a pretty impressive upward trend of just raw speed out of the Hendrick Motorsports camp. I think that allows a driver and a crew chief to continue to work on their craft together.
I really think Cliff Daniels’ approach is not talked about enough. There’s zero doubt that Kyle Larson’s talent is unbelievable. It’s recognizable. We see it in everything he drives. That credit needs to be given to Kyle Larson. I think it is. I’m not sure if everybody sees it as that way, but I think it deserves to be seen that way.
But I don’t want to diminish what Cliff Daniels has done. At the beginning of the year, he explained to us that he goes to some of his dirt races and he talks to Kyle about his dirt cars and these things that I would have never even considered doing, and his explanation was that listening to Kyle describe any racing vehicle helped him understand kind of his vernacular and what he uses to describe a race car.
Kyle self-admittedly doesn’t understand the setups of a Cup car. Doesn’t want to. He’s not a setup guy. He doesn’t care about shocks and springs and setup items. He just gets in the car and drives it as fast as it can be driven or to whatever level Cliff expects him to operate it.
They have a very impressive working relationship, and I’m not sure if Cliff’s approach gets enough credit. He has delivered the car that Kyle Larson needs, because as good as Kyle Larson is at the Cup level, there are a lot of great race car drivers, and you must have a car that can compete. Cliff continues to do that.
When you hear him on the radio, you see why. Cliff is very matter of fact. He almost reminds me a little bit of Chad (Knaus), which there’s not a lot of emotion. He’s to the point, and he’s willing to ask his driver to do whatever it takes. Just this week we had radio, I need you to abuse the rear tires less and do this different, this different, and this different. He’s talking to a driver that has won nine times this year, yet he’s telling him how he wants him to drive differently.
I think the comfort they have to have that conversation is just one more example of why they’re so successful.
Q. Is there anything in either Cliff’s or Kyle’s demeanor or the way they approach things that you think makes them work better together than if they were with other people?
STEVE LETARTE: I think that Kyle Larson, no disrespect to Chip Ganassi Racing, but if you look at the speed of Hendrick Motorsports as a whole this year with two cars in the Championship 4 and all four teams competing up front week after week after week, I think it’s safe to say he’s sitting in the best equipment in NASCAR he’s ever sat in.
I believe that Cliff has been around long enough to see that good cars and good runs aren’t guaranteed. They had Jimmie Johnson and were unable to get him to Victory Lane as much as they had hoped.
So I think that is a lesson you learn. I know that when I was a crew chief later in my career, the last year Dale and I worked together there was zero doubt I appreciated every trip to the racetrack and every chance to have a good car more than I did five or six years earlier, and I think that comes with age.
I think regardless — or experience perhaps more than age, because I don’t think the age matters –how many chances have you got at it? I think the more Cliff Daniels — the more chances he gets at it, the more he appreciates it.
To be honest, I don’t know. The only way to answer that is to see Kyle drive for five or six different crew chiefs, but right now I don’t know why anybody would ever want to make a change. These two seem to be a very potent combination.
Q. I think that all three could probably answer this question. It’s about Chase specifically. He started this year as the reigning Cup champion, which should be a big deal and he should be celebrated all year, but also Hendrick signed the guy that went on to dominate the season and win a lot of races and sort of overshadowed Chase a little bit. It doesn’t seem like it bothers Chase, but I am wondering if you guys have ever seen instances like this and know how these relationships can go when something like that happens.
DALE EARNHARDT JR.: I think Letarte probably knows the best because it reminds me a little bit of Jimmie and Jeff Gordon.
STEVE LETARTE: Yeah, I’ll go. It is exactly like that in my mind. I remember how frustrating it was for Chad and I when Jeff and Jimmie had their frustrations with each other. We could help mediate, but in the end, Jeff and Jimmie had to come to an understanding.
As much as I appreciated the credit the crew chief received for putting the team together or the car on track, the only people that know what happens on the racetrack are the drivers. The stars in that point were Jeff and Jimmie, and they had to come to an understanding of how they were expected to race one another, and I believe they did that. That’s why their careers both continued to blossom and they continued to win races.
Chase is a very quiet guy. He’s a great champion, but he’s pretty reserved. He lives down in Georgia, does his own thing. I think if it was bothering him, we would never know.
But when I look at kind of his approach with Alan (Gustafson), this year is a lot like last year, which is they kind of operate through the year with the goal of winning a championship, and you have to get to Phoenix to do it. They did it last year in fireworks fashion with winning Martinsville and then carried that on to winning a championship.
There’s no way when you watch a teammate as successful as Kyle Larson, it hurts, and I can speak from firsthand experience with Jimmie Johnson, because you know the equipment that that person has and you feel you have that same opportunity, so it stings more that you can’t outrun them.
Now, you wish them well and you’re excited they win, but it stings because you think you have that opportunity. But I believe that this is what Rick Hendrick is the most masterful at, is placing the right drivers with the right crew chiefs, and then he stays out of the fray in a lot of situations.
But when it comes to the leadership, which I consider the drivers kind of the top of the leadership at any organization, he makes sure that they lead appropriately.
I think that it is something worth asking about and something worth watching. I haven’t seen any examples yet, but I’m confident that they’re also not ignorant to the fact that it could happen and that Mr. Hendrick has his pulse on it, no different than Chad.
Remember, Chad and I lived that other experience together. Now Chad is basically running the place with Jeff Andrews, so I think that also allows Chad to run those meetings every day and control the narrative.
DALE JARRETT: I’ll just add that I think Jimmie and Jeff, it’s what came to my mind, too, just as Dale Jr. and Steve said. But I’ll look at this and say that there are ways to go around that and be in that situation.
I think both drivers understand they’re in a great position, and to me, I don’t think Jimmie and Jeff were ever about who had to be the top driver at Hendrick because they both won many championships and many, many races and made it work.
Every owner would like to have this difficult decision and have to deal with two very successful young drivers at this point. I think that — I wasn’t ever in that position, but I always felt like I had to work harder in other areas if I was going to ever beat Jeff Gordon, super talented Dale Earnhardt Sr., who was maybe the best ever, Bill Elliott was there, so many drivers.
But yet there are ways that you find to work around that. You don’t have to go about it. There are going to be places that Kyle Larson is going to be superior. There are also places that Chase Elliott can find that he can out-duel Larson. There’s enough wins out there for both of them.
Plus they’ve got two great teammates. William Byron has had an outstanding season, maybe not with all the wins that the rest of the guys have, but Alex Bowman just won his fourth race. That’s a potent team. They have done everything to position themselves correctly there, and it’s a good problem for Rick Hendrick to have with this.
But I don’t really see it. With the two personalities of Chase and Kyle Larson, I don’t really see this being a problem. I just think you have to figure out where you can be better than that other driver.
Q. You brought up Alex Bowman. I take it you don’t think he’s a hack then.
DALE JARRETT: If that’s what you want to call him, he’s the best damn hack I’ve ever seen drive a car.
Q. Both Steve and Dale Jarrett have both referenced Chase’s quiet personality. You don’t really get to see a lot of his personality yet. This playoffs he’s delivered two pretty money lines, with the merry off-season and happy Christmas and this week about he’s not going to lose any sleep about Denny’s thoughts on his fans. Were you surprised to see that wit come out of Chase, or maybe do you think he’s opening up a little bit more?
DALE EARNHARDT JR.: I wasn’t surprised to see it myself. I think Chase was not going to really be that outspoken until he felt like he had the accomplishments that allowed him to be that way, and he wasn’t going to talk the talk until he walked the walk.
I think when he won the championship last year, he checked a big box in his mind that allowed him to go and say some of these things with more comfort and not feel like he’s just running the mouth.
He was so hard on himself for years, and when he’d run second or not do something right at the end of the race that he felt he needed to do to win, he would get out and say, ‘it was my fault we didn’t win.’ Not, ‘we had a great day, we had a Top 5 finish, I would have liked to have won.’
He got out and was just real hard on himself. Any time anyone tried to compliment him, he shut it down. Didn’t want it. He never was one to speak up in a group setting like that about anything. But once he won that championship, I think that he’s like, ‘okay, I’ve checked this box. I’m absolutely more comfortable sharing my opinion,’ or he’s absolutely going to stand up for himself and not let anybody put him in his place or anything like that.
I think that — the accomplishments on the racetrack as they come and as we see more success out of him, I think he’s going to be much more comfortable standing at the podium and speaking.
STEVE LETARTE: I’ll add I agree completely with Junior’s assessment, and the other part even as NASCAR’s most popular driver he has such a workman’s blue-collar approach. He keeps his head down and he grinds. Him and Alan together have that approach. He doesn’t pick a lot of fights, but when pushed into the corner that requires a response, he has always had a relatively witty response.
It’s clear that he has been in the NASCAR garage since a young, young child. This is not new to him. To Dale’s point, now that his performance kind of defends his responses.
He also isn’t one to kind of say them unprompted, but when he gets put into a corner and has to have a response, they’re normally worth writing down for sure.
DALE JARRETT: I think his responses are ones that are different from others in the way that it makes you think for a minute. You either have to go back and listen to it again or go read it again to really get the full meaning of what he says, so it makes you think before you react and say something, and I would caution any other drivers that are going to think they’re going to get into a big sparring match with him, he has the fan base that’s going to overwhelm anyone else in this sport right now, so you’re not going to win in that situation. But you can have at it anyway.
Q. There was an interesting moment post-race Sunday in which (Jeff) Burton and Steve and Dale Jr. all were asked about their championship predictions, and Burton and Steve picked Denny Hamlin; Dale Jr. picked Chase. We didn’t hear your pick. I guess I’m curious, who is your pick, and does it surprise you or is it maybe to be expected a little bit that even though he’s got nine wins, maybe as the first-timer here in the championship race, is Kyle Larson maybe not going to be top of mind for people as the championship favorite going into Phoenix?
DALE JARRETT: Yeah, that’s a great question. It’s going to be interesting how all of this plays out throughout the week as the drivers start talking more about it. But I still believe that Kyle Larson has to be considered the favorite.
I know that he hasn’t raced for a championship like this before, but he doesn’t seem to let anything bother him. He is so confident in his ability that I don’t think the moment is going to be overwhelming to him as to what he has to go do. He has fast race cars. He has a crew chief and a crew and supporting cast that he fully believes in, and he knows that his talents are at least equal to anyone else if not superior.
The fact that he hasn’t won a race here yet I put to the fact that he hasn’t been in the equipment that he’s in right now. I know that he had pit road issues here the first race this year, and I think that he’ll clean that up, and if he does that, I think that he’s the man that everybody has to beat and that he puts his name up there with a championship, too. He’s my pick to win this on Sunday.
Q. For Dale Jr., you spoke about what you’ve seen from Chase Elliott and kind of that additional swagger since winning the championship. You spoke with conviction about him being your championship pick for Phoenix; is that part of the reason why he’s your guy? Why are you picking Chase as the guy you think will repeat this year?
DALE EARNHARDT JR.: Well, I think that — I feel like he’s kind of — they’ve kind of found a little bit of pace over the last little bit here, but remember last year when they interviewed him about his feelings, his emotions coming into the weekend at Phoenix, and he said something along the lines of, ‘what an incredible opportunity for me; I can’t believe that I have this opportunity; I’m here to embrace having a shot at this.’
Human nature in most cases, I think, would be for someone to feel overwhelming pressure, anxiety, nervousness, maybe some fear, all these things would be difficult to admit, but I think everybody would feel some sense of that, and he seemed to have really none of that. He was like, oh, man, this is great. What an opportunity for me.
I thought that was so amazing. And then he went out there and won.
Some of the most elite athletes in sport can really program their brains, and they can sort of make themselves think the way they need to think and shut out all the anxieties and nervousness that I talk about doesn’t even exist. It’s not fake. It’s not a front. But some of the most elite athletes, like they realize it in their brain. They imagine success, and they will it into existence.
I feel like maybe that’s what is unique about Chase. I know Larson is the favorite and I still think he is the favorite, but I’ve never seen him in this setting, so I don’t know if I can say he goes in there and wins it because I’ve never seen him in such a win-everything kind of moment. We’ve never seen him in this situation in NASCAR. We’ve seen Denny; we’ve seen Truex. I think Truex has the same sort of mentality as Chase, but I don’t know if he has the same race car.
That will be interesting to see what kind of pace both of the Toyotas have in practice and in qualifying, but as far as the mentality and the attitude and personality, I think Chase goes in with the best approach.
Q. Steve, we’re pretty deep into this call and we haven’t heard much of Martin Truex Jr.’s name and he won the race earlier this year in Phoenix. Is he being overlooked at all or is it partially just a function of we talk about Larson being a first-timer and Truex has a first-time crew chief in the Championship Round with James Small; that may be part of it?
STEVE LETARTE: I think that this sport is a very quick news cycle, and what Martin Truex Jr. and the 19 car are going to show up because if it’s the 19 car from the first quarter to third of the season, then it’s going to be a tough battle. But if it’s the 19 car from the final third of the season, he just hasn’t — or they is better than he, because I’m not sure it’s a Truex thing — I’m not sure it’s fair to analyze what it is, but the team, the entire 19 team, has not brought equipment or races or performance that can match the other three.
It’s there. We’ve seen it. We saw it in the spring. Jeff Burton was very adamant all summer long that they’d better figure it out because they just can’t continue to assume they can go back to what they had and what they ran before.
Now, we did see some speed out of the 19 at Martinsville. It was definitely a stressful last 50 laps for the 19 car. To Dale’s point earlier in this call, I’m really excited — things I never thought I’d say in life — I’m really excited to see some practice. I can’t wait to see the overall speed, pace and demeanor of these four drivers in their office, behind the wheel.
Q. Dale Jr. and Steve, you probably know Alan Gustafson the best. What is it about Alan that makes him such a good crew chief for Chase Elliott, and just kind of overall his approach? He seems from the outside as someone that stays below the radar and doesn’t get the credit he deserves having been in this sport for a long time.
DALE EARNHARDT JR.: I believe that Alan was peaking as a crew chief — he had a great year or two with Mark Martin, and I think that really helped him get to the point to where he is now, but he’s like right in the prime of his career as a crew chief right along the lines that Chase comes in.
I think that they both get along really well. They sort of have personalities that connect or work well together.
I always admired Alan’s approach and his effort. He was always trying to learn, he’s always looking around in the garage trying to understand where the garage was, what the garage was doing, what other cars and teams were doing.
One of my favorite parts of the competition meeting was when we would get to hear from Alan about what some of the competition might be doing to try to improve their cars. I was always frustrated with crew chiefs that were very narrow-minded and kind of had the blinders on, and it was their way or no way, and their idea was the right idea and no other idea mattered.
I think Alan certainly has confidence and knows what he’s doing and putting under his car, but he also absorbed anything and everything on the outside of his bubble that he thought might help. So I always kind of appreciated that about him. But Steve knows him much better than I do.
STEVE LETARTE: You know, I was a better crew chief because I had the opportunity to work next to Alan. He’s not only extremely driven and just a smart, brilliant person, but he’s a natural-born leader, has the leader kind of instincts. When you look at that 9 team there’s no doubt to me that Alan leads the team and Chase drives it. I think that’s a good combination for those two.
Now you take a very, very intelligent person who’s very, very driven, who doesn’t let a lot of stuff distract him, who stays very focused on the task at hand, perhaps as focused or more focused than anyone, and then give him the ability to work with some of the most talented people to ever sit in stock cars, he was able to work with Jeff Gordon, Kyle Busch, Mark Martin, it’s an impressive list. He was able to work next to people like Dale Jr., people like Jimmie Johnson. He’s a longstanding product at Hendrick Motorsports. He understands the tools he has, but yet doesn’t allow the bureaucracy of a large race team to get in his way.
Those are very great attributes, and it’s easy to say and it’s very hard to do. He will stand in the face of fire and just continue to calmly crew chief, whether that’s inspection line on a Sunday more than or his final pit call of the race, his demeanor doesn’t change. I think that makes him a very dangerous person on top of a pit box, because he knows what he knows, and more importantly, he knows what he doesn’t know, and he’s not afraid to surround himself with very intelligent, tough-to-manage people, and I think he knows how to build a great race team, and his expectation out of his driver and of himself is as high as it gets. Man, there are a lot of great attributes. He’s one of the reasons why it occurred to me maybe I’m better off to do TV because when you work next to a guy like Alan and a guy like Chad, they are some pretty intimidating fellows to call coworkers that you have to go beat week in and week out and I love the ability now to cover his performance from the TV booth, whether on Sunday or even all week and how he prepares his team for battle.
THE MODERATOR: Thanks, everybody, for joining the call today. We’re looking forward to the championships this weekend from Phoenix. It starts off as everybody mentioned Friday with Cup Series practice 4:00 ET on NBCSN. Again, the Xfinity Series championship Saturday night, 8 p.m. ET on NBCSN, Cup Series championship race is Sunday on NBC at 3 p.m. ET.
Wednesday, September 15, 2021
Dan Hicks
Paul Azinger
Justin Leonard
John Wood
Tommy Roy
THE MODERATOR: Good afternoon or good morning, depending on where you are throughout the contiguous 48 states or perhaps abroad. Thank you for joining our NBC Sports Ryder Cup media conference call today.
We’re going to be joined in a minute by NBC Sports lead golf producer Tommy Roy, lead play by play commentator Dan Hicks, analyst Paul Azinger and Justin Leonard, and our on-course reporter John Wood.
We’re incredibly excited to produce the 43rd Ryder Cup, and it’s an event that NBC Sports has showcased for 30 years now since it came to NBC in 1991 at the memorable War By the Shore at Kiawah.
Since that tiny amount of coverage has skyrocketed, and this year we’re going to present about 100 hours of Ryder Cup coverage next week across NBC, GOLF Channel, Peacock, and rydercup.com, when you factor in live coverage, the featured groups, and studio coverage. The studio coverage is going to begin Monday, September 20th, on GOLF Channel. And that evening, 9:00 p.m. Eastern on Golf Channel, we’re also going to premiere a new Golf Films documentary, Cracking the Code, which details our own Paul Azinger’s captaincy of the 2008 U.S. Ryder Cup team. All of these folks on the call could certainly talk about that.
We’ll begin with a few words from each of our speakers. We’ll start with the man who has been a part of every NBC Sports Ryder Cup production since 1991, our producer Tommy Roy. Go ahead, Tommy.
TOMMY ROY: Thank you, Jamie. I am amazed at how big and all-encompassing this event has become. As Jamie can attest, we have these weekly meetings with the PGA of America, and we go over things like promotion and marketing and social and digital, sales, press and media, ops and fantasy. That’s all above and beyond the operations and the TV shows themselves.
So we have a love affair for this event. It’s right in our wheelhouse, where after all these years of dealing with the nuances of team match play, we’re scheduled to be on the air for 28 hours over the course of three days, and I’ll sit in the producer’s chair for every single second of it. I will not be tired at all at the end because every session, all five many them, will have the same intensity and even more energy than the back nine of a major.
Every match is like its own golf tournament. Every point is so valuable and so important. So we’re pumped and can’t wait to get it going.
DAN HICKS: Thank you, Jamie. Echo, obviously, everything that Tommy said. Ryder Cup is an absolute different animal than any other golf event we do and really any other sporting event we do. For obvious reasons. I think our appetites are whetted for this one even more because we’ve waited an extra year. I think Steve Stricker’s been the captain for like 31 months. He’s got to be jumping out of his skin to get this thing going, like we all are.
But I kind of compare it to an Olympics. It’s one of those events that I think brings in the non — it brings in more than just the golf fan. It brings in somebody who maybe even never watches a golf tournament. You’ve got grandparents and parents and kids watching the Olympics, and I think it pretty much mirrors the same kind of reaction you get from a Ryder Cup.
For instance, my wife Hannah Storm is a big sports fan, doesn’t watch a ton of golf tournaments. Probably watches more than her usual share because I do a lot of them, but she absolutely loves the Ryder Cup and is actually going to her first Ryder Cup in several years because it’s an event that she just connects with.
I’m also looking forward to it because the guy I’m sitting next to, Paul Azinger. I think this event, you’re going to hear things from Zinger that are going to really, really turn you on to the event even more. We’ve been waiting a long time to do it, didn’t happen last year.
Sitting next to Zing is something that I’ve been looking forward to and we’ve been talking about for a long, long time. With that, I’ll turn it back to you, Jamie.
PAUL AZINGER: He’s right. Dan and I have talked about it an awful lot, and we’ve been real excited about it. I think Tommy summed up exactly how every captain feels and how he wants to approach every single match with the same urgency, intensity, whatever it is, that that point provides to the captain because Tommy’s going to try to capture that.
It is so critical to get off to a good start for this American team. I look forward to being the analyst and to see how they react if they don’t get off to a good start or if they do, but in the end, this is going to be, I think, one of the most watched Ryder Cups because of the intensity level.
The fact that the Americans have only won five times in 38 years has us all wondering can this juggernaut of an American team with the second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh ranked players in the world on their team, can those best players beat that team?
Because they’re going to show up as a bonded team, and our guys are going to show up — I don’t know how they’re going to show up. They’re going to show up as the best players.
But the fun part for us is we get to document this clash and record it for history. We’ve got a good team here because Justin’s played in the Ryder Cup, Bones has been on the ground there, and same with Woody. Tommy’s produced it. Hicks has covered it. Koch and those guys know what they’re doing. Roger’s been there a million times. I can’t wait. We’re all jazzed up for it.
JUSTIN LEONARD: Thank you, Jamie. I was so disappointed, as so many people were last fall, when the last Ryder Cup was cancelled. It would be great to have it be played with or without fans, just for another escape from what was going on in the world.
Looking back on it, that would have been a huge mistake. The fans are such a part of what the Ryder Cup is, to the people watching at home, to us as broadcasters, and to the players maybe most importantly. Having home crowd fans is the Americans’ will. It’s a huge boost to what they’re trying to do and trying to accomplish and to be able to show off their skills to people in person.
I know in my own Ryder Cup experience, people ask how nervous is it, or was I. I was more nervous in my Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday Ryder Cup practice rounds than I ever was in a major championship. When you’ve got that bag with your country or your continent on it, you’ve got your flag or symbol on your sleeve, on your hat, you’re coming together as a group to try to accomplish something. There’s no words that can really do it justice.
Then on top of all that, in those practice days, you feel like you’re auditioning a little bit because you want the captains and the vice captains to see that you’re ready to go because you want to get in there and play early. Those matches, as Tommy has pointed out, from the 1st tee on, it feels like you’re trying to win a major championship, but even more so because you’ve got other people relying on you.
It’s a great atmosphere. I’m so excited to be there. The fans in Wisconsin, I know, are going to be amazing, and the venue will be incredible, both on TV and in person. So really looking forward to it.
JOHN WOOD: Thank you, Jamie. I think anybody will tell you, if you know me, this is by far my favorite event. It pains me not to be working it as a caddie, to be honest with you, but I’m thrilled to be doing it as a commentator this time.
Hopefully I can bring some of the stuff that really isn’t talked about in terms of nerves and emotions out there because there’s so much more of that than in a regular event. You’re worried about your partners and your partners’ caddies, and the captains and assistants who are watching. So there’s a lot more emotions, a lot more nerves, and hopefully, I can bring some of that into the telecast.
There’s so many story lines coming in, who knows which one is going to raise its head the highest? Obviously, a very determined European team who is amazing at bonding. They get together, and somehow in this week they raise their games to a different level. Zinger mentioned the talent on the U.S. side, and it’s just going to be a matter of that talent bonding together, and if both teams play well, I expect the U.S. to win.
You look at it, and every Sunday at a Ryder Cup, I don’t care what the score is, you can have a four or five-point lead, every Sunday there’s a point where you look at the board and go, uh-oh, and you think the other team’s got a path to victory. So that’s fun to watch.
Tommy mentioned we have 28 hours of coverage. I’ve already petitioned him to work 29 of those 28 if possible. Justin touched on the nervous aspect of it. I’ve never as a caddie been standing in a fairway trying to add 140 and 10 and gotten confused except at the Ryder Cup. 150, does that sound right? Is that right to you? It’s just as nervous for the caddies as the players and the captains.
It’s by far my favorite event, and I just cannot wait to get on the grounds.
Paul, I’m curious about, obviously, you have some experience as a Ryder Cup captain, and I’m wondering what your advice would be to Steve Stricker and the U.S. team leadership as far as sort of creating a bond with the current team as it’s in its current form.
PAUL AZINGER: That’s always the challenge for the captain. I think it should happen naturally when you get there. It doesn’t always work that way. But Stricker, every captain is going to create an environment for these guys to be successful the best they know how.
I talked to Steve a little bit. He told me that the things that made him nervous, he was going to eliminate, the inspirational videos and stuff like that. And he was just going to sell the message of preparation really hard and try to get his guys to have an advantage on that course.
If the wind blows, I think they’re going to lose any advantage, really mainly on the greens. Everybody can handle the wind tee to green, but on the green somehow Europe makes all those putts in the wind.
I just feel like Stricker has just got to make sure our guys know the course the best. That’s really — in the end, that’s it in a nutshell. If those guys, as far as bonding is concerned, that’s a six-month mission, I think in his case. So we’ll see what happens.
If you were in the position of being the U.S. captain, what would you say to Brooks and Bryson and some of the guys who have had, I guess, prickly relationships in the last few months?
PAUL AZINGER: I would say, can you guys put your issues aside and then get a yes or a no and then deal with whatever their answer was. I personally feel like Brooks and Bryson can put the globe on their shoulder. Not the globe, but the United States on their shoulder and — shoulders and carry this Ryder Cup team, and they can also be a royal pain in the neck.
I personally think they can put this team on their shoulders and they will do it and put their differences aside. Brooks, when I just read that article, I’m not sure he loves the Ryder Cup that much. If he doesn’t love it, he should relinquish his spot and get people there who do love the Ryder Cup. Not everybody embraces it, but if you don’t love it and you’re not sold out, then I think Brooks should — especially being hurt, should consider whether or not he really wants to be there.
Then if you add the Bryson dynamic to that, that would be an easier decision for him. Brooks is one of the most candid, most honest guys there is, and if he’s blatantly honest with himself and doesn’t want to be there, he should come out and say it. I don’t know, I’m a fan of both players. I just feel like it’s going to be one or the other. They’re going to put the weight of the team on their shoulders, or they’re going to be a pain in the neck.
Paul, this U.S. team having the most rookies since your team in 2008, I’d be curious your opinion on the value of experience, and is experience that valuable when a team keeps getting beat all the time?
PAUL AZINGER: No, it’s not really that valuable if it’s always a bad experience. That’s the way I look at it. I love the idea of fresh blood. I think all of our guys on our team were real — I don’t know, they were energized and I think got them engaged.
For the most part, giving them ownership a little bit — Justin can attest to this. These guys had ownership in who they picked, and I thought that was real important. So I don’t know.
Shortest answer ever. Appreciate it. Justin, as we look — and I forgot who brought it up. I think Paul did — in terms of the amount of talent through the world rankings or victories or whatever you want to say, but Europe keeps winning. As a player, this whole argument of this team is better on paper, you want to ignore it. Is that really hard to do when you’re playing and you look at who you’re lined up with?
JUSTIN LEONARD: Well, I don’t think once they’re matched up that players are thinking, well, I’m higher in the world rankings and I won 12 times and he’s won 3. It’s about going out to get your point. But I do think that it plays a part in the attitude of the two teams going into it.
The European side seems to take this underdog role and mentality and use it to their advantage, whether they’re playing at home or in the U.S. With that comes a sense of freedom, of well we’re not really expected to win, so let’s go out and play freely. And I think you see that time and again at every Ryder Cup.
With the U.S. side, if I’m Steve Stricker, I’m trying to talk my players into, you know what, we haven’t won this in a long time and they should be the favorite and trying to embrace more of that underdog mentality where the U.S. team can play more freely.
Because it’s hard to play as a favorite. You see it a lot in regular TOUR events. The player that’s leading through 36 or 54 holes doesn’t go on to win because it’s hard to play out front when you’re the favorite, when it’s kind of yours to lose. I feel like that’s unfortunately been kind of the circumstances that the U.S. team has been under, and they just haven’t been able to perform as well.
So I think for Steve Stricker and his side, the key is to try and convince your players that, look, we’re not the favorite in this. Yes, maybe so on paper. We’ve got plenty of talent, but all that stuff on paper, you can take a match to it because it means nothing in the Ryder Cup. The European side’s won it consistently throughout the last 15 to 20 years, and try and get the U.S. to play with a bit more freedom.
Paul, what would you say is the single hardest part about making the player pairing, making those decisions?
PAUL AZINGER: It really shouldn’t be hard. The way I looked at it, I just felt like just about everybody could play with anybody. It just isn’t that hard.
But I think now you have to deal with these guys wanting to play with each other, which actually is liberating as well. That’s pretty nice. Making the pairings for day one, the first day or whatever, I wanted all 12 of my guys to play on day one. It was real easy to do. If you’re getting waxed, then I think the second day it becomes something different.
But all in all, I just felt like the pairings were so easy and obvious. Then I felt like the ones that you didn’t want were pretty easy and obvious, especially the way we did it with the three four-man teams. But even if you just had 12 individual guys, it always looks so clear-cut to me who should and shouldn’t be paired.
But at the same time, you did invest a lot of time into weighing personality types and all those things that are in Cracking the Code.
PAUL AZINGER: Well, here’s what I did. Because I had six guys coming back to the Ryder Cup who really hadn’t had a lot of great experiences. Justin Leonard had in ’99. But I felt like in my mind I wanted to get these guys engaged in something different, and that’s what happened.
They got really interested in what we were doing rather than dreading the event. It’s quite possible, when you get beaten every time, that you go into that event dreading it. What if Brooks Koepka deep down, if he’s thinking my reward is I have to go play the Ryder Cup because I played so well? It’s possible. I know there’s players in the past who have felt that way.
I’m not saying Brooks feels that way, but the Ryder Cup, it’s a different animal. Getting those right players together, like I said, like I did personality types, and I felt that trumped like games. So that was my philosophy. The players fell in love with it. I gave them ownership of it. They made the decision. So it worked out great.
But it was up to them once the bell rings. The worst part about being a captain is having no control whether or not you’re going to win or lose beyond creating the environment. But if that environment, if on 15 of the Ryder Cup one guy misses and the other guy makes, whatever you did in the team room, I don’t know how much that really mattered.
This is for Justin. Before you made the big putt in 1999, before, Johnny Miller criticized the American team and you in particular. I’m just wondering 22 years later how you look at that and how you look now at your role of what you should or shouldn’t say in the Ryder Cup.
JUSTIN LEONARD: Look, it was motivating for myself. I know it was for Jim Furyk as well. At that point in a Ryder Cup, you don’t necessarily need outside things for motivation. Johnny had the biggest voice in the game of golf. I wouldn’t say that it stung. I would say we just wanted to try and prove him wrong, and he wasn’t wrong at the time that he said it.
It was one of those things where it served as motivation, and Johnny was so gracious. I’ll tell you a story. About a month later there was a charter flight going over to Spain to play in a WGC event in Valderrama. Johnny was on the flight. NBC was broadcasting. He leaped over three rows of chairs and knocked over two small children to get over to me as quickly as he could to apologize for it, which was not necessary.
He apologized. I said, Johnny, there’s no need to. I said, you were doing your job, and you do it so beautifully. I may not have personally liked what you said, but you said the right thing, and I said just thank you for the motivation.
So hopefully, we won’t give either team motivation, but there will be times, I’m sure, where whoever is sitting at 18 needs to be critical in the moment, and Johnny set the bar for that. He spoke his mind. I think it’s all something that we all strive to do each and every day with broadcasting.
Again, no bad blood whatsoever. We had a funny moment when he was doing his last telecast a couple years ago at the Waste Management Phoenix Open, and we kind of relived that moment a little bit. So we’ve had a lot of fun with it over the years.
It was hard not to notice in Steve Stricker’s captain’s press conference that he name dropped both you and the pod system. I’m curious. You’ve seen a lot of captains since ’08. From whatever glimpses you’ve had behind the curtain, is he the most Azinger-like captain since you?
PAUL AZINGER: I have no idea. I have purposely not gotten too deep into what he’s doing. I actually called him the other day and left him a voicemail. I’m calling as an American. I should apologize up front if I ever say we or us or them or they. Tommy already two weeks in advance has let all of us know that we’re not to do that.
But I did call him as an American and just felt like I wanted him to know what I was thinking, just basic things, making sure he didn’t miss anything. But that’s about it. I really don’t know what he’s doing. He’s not told me if he’s going to do the full blown pod system or not. Nobody has delved into it the way we did with the personality types and using my Myers Briggs green light, caution light, red light stuff.
It’s so different now with social media anyway with the way these guys are. The way I did it wouldn’t even work today to be honest, even though the concept was good. Look, I’ll believe this forever — the Europeans are bonded by blood. They’re bonded naturally. This means everything to them. The Spaniards play together. The Englishmen, the Irishmen, the Swedes — that’s how they do it, and they’re bonded by something that really gives them a full blown 1 percent advantage no matter where they are.
Vegas can build hotels on a 1 percent advantage. So you have to as a captain figure out how to get yourself back in there where it’s evened up. But something happened, we’ve only won five times in 38 years. It’s sad really that this American side has gotten beaten like that, but they bring an intangible with them. It’s a fact.
John, there’s so much glory in the Ryder Cup, but you had a front row seat to the opposite of that, how much pain it can bring in 2010. I was just curious, I don’t know if I’ve ever heard you talk about that. I kind of want to hear what you remember from that and sort of how devastating an event this big can be if it goes the wrong way.
JOHN WOOD: Sure. Hunter (Mahan) was put out last, and it’s a huge position to be in. I was pretty happy for him, to be honest with you, that the captain trusted him, that Corey (Pavin) trusted him that much.
It’s weird being the last group out, though. Unless you’re Tiger or Phil or Rory, you play most of the day with not that big of a crowd, to be honest with you. Everybody is watching those opening matches. So we were playing Graeme (McDowell), and for the first 9, 10, 12 holes, it really wasn’t that big of a crowd. Hunter was playing beautifully, just couldn’t make a putt, and Graeme was making those Graeme putts.
I think we birdied to get within one and then we came to that par-3 and obviously hit a little fat off the tee. Hunter had struggled with his short game whether it was Tuesday in a practice round or the biggest moment in the Ryder Cup. That’s no secret, and he would admit to that.
So when we got up there, I was a little surprised that he reached for the sand wedge right away, because at that point, I was expecting him to putt it, but when he didn’t, I wasn’t going to get in his grill because he was very decisive about it.
When it happened, obviously, my heart sunk for Hunter. Obviously, it meant that we were going to lose as a team, but Hunter was my guy, and it hurt a lot for him.
The one thing I would say, and I think Hunter would say this as well, if I could change the outcome I would, but I wouldn’t have traded that experience to be last out in a Ryder Cup with everything on the line, with every single player on both teams and every single fan with your group. Not many people get to experience that. So, yeah, I would change the outcome, but in terms of the experience itself, I wouldn’t change a thing and wouldn’t want to trade it for anything.
It was one of the most meaningful moments of my career, and I think Hunter got over it fairly quickly. He had a great year the next year. It’s just one of those things. I keep harping back to it wasn’t so much that I don’t think he blew it, it just was a shot he’s not good at, bottom line. Like I said, it could have happened Tuesday in a practice round just as easily, but, yeah, I wouldn’t trade the experience for anything.
My question is for Paul or Justin. How big a deal is the course preparation? The captains are so secretive about it. But home crowd aside, are there certain things that can be done to Whistling Straits to give the Americans an advantage?
PAUL AZINGER: There should be something they can do, but you have to think to do it. Apparently, according to Kerry Haigh, I was the first captain on home soil to ever ask to control the course and how it was mowed and that sort of thing. Europe had been doing that ever since I was playing Ryder Cup. I was surprised by that.
I think (Steve) Stricker does have things he can do. He’s just got to set up the course, I feel like in some ways never to disadvantage your guy, if you can. If you can find an advantage, go for it. Yeah, I think Stricker can probably figure out with the makeup of his team how to mow that place.
JUSTIN LEONARD: I don’t know that there’s a particular advantage at the golf course. There’s no regular event that’s played there. So many of their players on the European side play in the U.S. They’ve played PGA Championship there.
I think the fact that the U.S. team was there this past week spending a couple days to really get to know the golf course is very helpful. I don’t know how many European players have been able to do that here recently.
Over the course of two or three days, it’s pretty easy to figure out a golf course, but to be able to go ahead of time and see it in tournament conditions but without all the galleries, without the distractions, where you can really take your time and do the things you need to do, I think that is an advantage.
But the golf course itself, I don’t see it being much of an advantage. I think the biggest advantage will be all the people there to support the U.S. I feel like that’s worth maybe a point in the overall outcome. It’s just the support for the home team, and I would expect, as I’ve seen there in Wisconsin, some pretty rabid fans.
PAUL AZINGER: Can I just add to that? The captain, I think, can control the length of the holes. There’s not a lot of trees out there, maybe zero. There are zero trees. You have bunker carries and distances and that sort of thing.
At Valhalla I was real specific about what my longest hitter’s carry distance was, and I just wanted all the holes to play at length and allowed them to carry the trouble. Then my shorter hitters were so accurate. That’s just kind of how we did it. That’s really about the only thing, and maybe you just don’t have any rough over some of those bunkers. That’s about it.
Obviously, golf is an individual sport for almost every single week of the year except this one, when players are asked to work as a team. What role do you think team chemistry plays in a team’s success or failure?
JUSTIN LEONARD: I think it plays to it in some part. I haven’t been in those team rooms since 2008, but I can tell you in the three Ryder Cups that I did play, we had very good chemistry. You come together really quickly.
As we talked about a lot on this call, in 2008 we were broken up into players of four. I was in a pod with Phil Mickelson, Anthony Kim, and then we picked Hunter Mahan basically to be my partner because Phil and Anthony wanted to play together.
We ate breakfast together. We ate dinner together. Now, we’re all in the same room with the whole team, but we sat at a table together. We played our practice rounds together. So we went in knowing, okay, this is who we’re going to play with, and if something changes up, I’m either going to be playing with Phil or Anthony.
That adds a level of comfort to it, but it’s also we talk about, as we have already, Bryson and Brooks. Ben Curtis was on that 2018, Kenny Perry was on that team, Jim Furyk was on that team. I hardly saw those guys other than at the big dinners where we’re getting dressed up and all those things. I don’t think they even do that anymore.
So you can break up into groups, and I think it’s real easy to avoid players that may not quite get along. You can keep them kind of separate for the week. Like Paul said, I don’t know exactly what’s going on there in the team locker room, but I know that Phil Mickelson was a big proponent of the pods. He loved that system. Him being a vice captain, I feel fairly confident that we’ll see something similar to that next week.
JOHN WOOD: I just want to jump in on Zinger’s strategy, one other thing that it did. We got there on Monday, and we immediately knew everything that was going to happen during the week. Who we can play with, what balls we might need to prepare with, what personalities we needed to know.
To have that taken away right early in the week — that week takes so much energy to play, to caddie, to captain, to do anything. What that did was take away that energy that’s wasted sometimes thinking, I might play with this guy, I don’t know. I’d better hit his ball a few times just to see or talk to him a little bit and see what he’s like. To know that immediately, right when you get there, your preparation is yours and yours alone and you don’t have to do A, B, C, D, and E, you prepare because you know what’s going to happen, that takes an incredible amount of energy waste off the plate that week.
PAUL AZINGER: That’s awesome to hear.
John, from being around the team for the 2017 Presidents Cup, what do you think some of Steve Stricker’s strengths as a captain are?
JOHN WOOD: I think Stricker will stick to his plan, and I don’t think he’s going to be one who, oh, boy, we’re behind on the first day, we need to change everything up.
That was huge in Melbourne with Tiger as captain because there was a point where it looked like we might be down 9-1 or 8-2. At that point, you kind of mail it in. You’re not coming back from that. But Tiger never seemed to waver in these are my partnerships. This is my team. We’re not changing anything. By the end of all these matches, we’re going to be ahead.
I think Stricker is going to be very much like that. This is my plan. I’ve been working on it for three years now. Just because maybe we had one bad session or two bad sessions, to throw all that out the window, which is the worst thing a captain can do. All of a sudden he’s panicking, and the team starts to panic. Oh, boy, we’re changing everything. We’re in trouble.
Whereas I think Stricker will be very — he’s an emotional guy, but I think he’s going to be very matter of fact in his decision-making, and I think that’s huge knowing that this is what we’re going to do, period. Behind, ahead, it doesn’t matter. It just gives you some confidence going in knowing that the captain believes in his theory.
Justin, a lot of talk about length at Whistling Straits, but we’ve seen a variety of players and styles have success there. Is it a place where a variety of players can fare well? Maybe there’s too much reliance on the length talk.
JUSTIN LEONARD: When playing major championships there, the two PGAs, I didn’t feel like length was a huge advantage because the golf course played firm. At least I remember that it did back in 2004. So precision was rewarded there as well.
It’s a different game that these guys are playing now. I would think that the golf course, it won’t be as firm or as fast as maybe it would be in a major championship because you’re not trying to — not that the PGA of America does for a certain score, but they’re trying to test the golfers as much and as thoroughly as they can.
The Ryder Cup is more match play. It’s a different animal. So I don’t feel that the golf course will play quite as fast, at least in the fairways. And I think a lot of that does come down to Steve Stricker, and if he feels like his team has an advantage in length, maybe it’s better to have the golf course playing a little bit slower so that his players will be coming into the green with a little less club, but kind of a softer golf course I feel like length is a bigger advantage. When it’s firm and fast, I always felt like I could get it out there and compete just fine.
But this is a different game. These players, they’re so good from tee to green. I think it will be interesting to see how it’s set up, and Kerry Haigh, who’s one of the best in the business — my guess is that Steve Stricker would have some control over that, and then I think once the week begins, it’s completely up to Kerry Haigh and the PGA of America how they want to set it up.
But, yeah, if you look back at the playoff in 2004, Vijay (Singh), one of the longest players in the game, and Chris DiMarco and myself in the playoff, Chris Riley played well there. In the past when it was firm and fast, didn’t think length was much of an advantage, but with a little bit softer, I think it certainly could be.
Not to belabor the pod discussion and this year’s team, but I’m curious, if you looked at the group, just from what you know of them and thought of possible pods that you would put them in or if you’d ever consider a pod of one looking at some of the issues going into this year?
PAUL AZINGER: Well, I’m not going to speculate on what his pods are. Looking at teams in four-man squads, it’s so easy to do, knowing some of them and using the generalization of their personality types. Are they influencing relaters? Are they steady supportive? Are they dominant controlling? When you look at them and you know what guys you should avoid putting together, it’s pretty easy to see the pods if they want to do it.
Look, it’s going to be an incredible event, whether they do pods or they don’t. I just think the pods — they don’t work all the time. We keep getting beat. If everybody’s still using the pods, pods isn’t the answer. It’s something bigger than that.
We have the best players this year, and obviously they roll in with the most confidence and maybe the best team. It’s going to be an intriguing matchup.
But the pods, obviously, it’s not the answer. There was something different there. The way we messaged that team was just to really take the heat off, to play great, play aggressive, show off for the crowd. We tried to embrace the crowd, and that’s about as big of an advantage as you can get on the Europeans really. That’s about it.
And just a quick question for Tommy. Just watching the Solheim Cup, it’s kind of a reminder that it looks like from the production side that Sunday singles is the hardest day to do because it seems like not a lot happens and then suddenly everything’s happening, and then there’s only a few matches left. I’m curious if that’s something you’ve ever tried to address and deal with, either asking for tee time spread more or situating commercial breaks so that you have kind of more of a window there in the middle, and it seems like basically everybody’s on the course and it’s just going crazy.
TOMMY ROY: Yeah, it’s complicated, the match play, because you never really know when a match is going to end. You have matches that are very close or they’re so one-sided. So it’s hard to pick a time when you can ask for that.
We do happen this particular Ryder Cup, when the last Sunday singles match tees off, we have a one-hour window there that’s commercial free courtesy of Rolex, which is nice. I haven’t seen the commercial load for the rest of the time just yet, but that being said, it is complicated. The thing you try to do is be live with the matches that are furthest along in the course that have a chance to end, the ones that are close.
We used to get criticized because a lot of times Tiger’s matches would be one-sided and we wouldn’t follow his match much at all. That’s in a day when everybody wanted to see every single shot that he hit, but we were concentrating on the matches that were closest and furthest along, about to be decided.
It’s complicated, but it’s a blast, I can tell you, just the whole Ryder Cup. If you’re in contention at a major championship, it’s because you’re playing really well. And what you end up having happen at Ryder Cups is guys are out there playing with all this pressure and everything on the line, but they may not have their best game. They may have qualified for this team months ago when they were playing great and now they aren’t necessarily playing great.
With all that added pressure, you tend to get the good shots are even better, but the worst shots are even worse. Bad shots are even worse. So it just makes for a lot of fun. Capturing all that emotion, it’s not about dissecting swings and the design of the course. This is about capturing the emotion of this whole thing, which is refreshing to do.
John, in general, how is Ryder Cup week different from a normal week for a caddie in relationship with his player? Do you have any stories of something that you felt you did really well and maybe a story to something you felt you did poorly as a Ryder Cup caddie?
JOHN WOOD: We don’t have enough time for everything I’ve done poorly in Ryder Cups. It’s a different week, and you really need to — especially with the pod system and you know your potential playing partners — you’ve really got to learn his game. You’ve got to learn what shots he likes to play, what shots he likes to avoid. A lot of that is talking with the other caddie. Does he like a certain number on layup shots. Would he rather chip, or would he rather play from a bunker?
More than that, though, it’s learning their personalities. Sometimes in these team events, you’re out with somebody and you can kind of tell that, for one reason or another, they may have tuned out their caddie for a little bit, and it happens to everybody, where you hear the same thing over and over and over again. Sometimes it just comes on blank ears.
Sometimes — I’ve had an instance where in Melbourne at the Presidents Cup — not this last one, but the previous one — Hunter (Mahan) was paired with Bill Haas. Bill was playing fine. He just didn’t have a lot of confidence at the time. He had his brother working for him, and his brother said, ‘Boy, you’ve got to go say something to Bill. He’s not listening to me at all.’ So that was a case where it’s easy for me to do that because I’m not worried about keeping my job with Bill. I can tell him anything I want.
So we were walking from 9 to 10, and I said, ‘hey, Bill, Hunter is playing good enough to win this thing on his own right now honestly. You make us one or two birdies on this back nine, and there’s no way we won’t win this match.’ That kind of picked him up, and he made a couple birdies, and sure enough, we won the match on the 17th hole.
There’s a lot more prep and learning other people’s games. And the other thing I would say is I didn’t learn this until my third or fourth Ryder Cup, but sometimes it can be a little unnerving early in the week when your player seems to be listening to everybody but you. Week in, week out, you’re the only guy he takes advice from on the course, reading putts, clubs. You get in the Ryder Cup, and all of a sudden Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, they’re listening to the other players and the other caddies a lot more than normal.
That can be a little unnerving, but you’ve got to know that, once the tee goes in the ground on Friday, you’ll be back in the game. That’s something I used to tell rookie caddies in that thing because it can be a little unnerving.
It’s a different week. You’ve just got a lot more to prepare for. At the same time, it’s such a meaningful week. Those are the weeks I’ll remember when I’m all done doing whatever I’m doing.
With six rookies on the team this year, how does that dynamic work then with trying to maybe — how does the caddie ease the tension, ease the anxiety that those guys may feel?
JOHN WOOD: I have a theory that rookies on home Ryder Cups aren’t rookies. It’s certainly nerve-racking and pressure filled, but not nearly as it is on an away team. I think that’s why you saw Strick pick some rookies and Padraig stick with some very veteran players who have been through this before.
Yeah, there are times when, if I’m paired with Austin Johnson and D.J. We’ve been out with them when I was with Kuch a little bit, and if Kuch is struggling, sometimes the best thing for Kuch is just forget about golf. I’ll pull A.J. aside and say, Hey, talk to my guy about basketball coming up this fairway, talk to him about something else, because sometimes that’s what’s best for Kuch. If I do it, he almost knows I’m trying to get him out of that, but if A.J. does it, it’s something new. Okay, let’s talk some basketball.
Yeah, it’s a good question. Those are some of the things you think about as a caddie in this event.
We talked about Strick a lot, but obviously in ’17 that team dominated. It wasn’t put under the blow torch as such. We also know him as a nice and accommodating individual. Is there such a thing as being too nice for this role if things do get a little bit fiery?
PAUL AZINGER: I don’t know if that matters whether you’re nice or not. I think the captain is going to try to control the controllables. Stricker is pretty organized. Padraig is really one of those cross the Ts, dot the Is guys. So you’re going to have two pretty thorough captains. They had an extra year to get ready.
His emotions and all that might inspire the players. The main thing is all the players love Strick and they respect him. They’d probably run through a wall for the guy if they can. I feel like that’s going to be the environment that’s created for the American team.
JUSTIN LEONARD: Along those lines, I think any coach who knows his team knows there’s certain guys who will respond to a pat on the back and other guys who will respond to a kick in the ass. I think Stricker knows who those players are and knows how to go and approach them if he needs to.
I’ll tell you one great story about Strick that’s kind of unrelated. At the Presidents Cup at Muirfield Village, it was Jordan’s first team event and he was amped up. He’s always amped up and very animated anyway. Fred put Stricker out with him to kind of settle him down and talk to him out there and lead him through some matches.
I remember he came through the first match, and Strick came up to me and said, ‘Woody, somebody’s got to calm that guy down out there. He’s so animated and so amped up, I can’t take it.’ I looked at Strick and said, ‘yeah, I think that’s your job. I’m pretty sure that’s why you’re playing with him.’ He kind of flushed a little bit and said, ‘oh, yeah, you’re right.’
I think Strick is prepared for everybody on that team and knows what to do and how to handle it and knows that you don’t necessarily handle everybody the same way.
THE MODERATOR: Great. Appreciate everybody joining the call. A full transcript of this call is going to be available later this afternoon on NBCsportsgrouppressbox.com. Additionally, for members of the press interested in watching a screener of the new documentary Cracking the Code, as I mentioned, that’s going to premiere Monday evening at 9:00 p.m. eastern, but I do have screeners available that I can e-mail to you. If you’re interested, reach out.
Other than that, again, appreciate everybody’s time. Can’t wait for next week at Whistling Straits. Thanks again. Have a good day.
Tuesday, August 31, 2021
Mike Tirico
Tony Dungy
Rodney Harrison
Drew Brees
Sam Flood
THE MODERATOR: Good afternoon, everybody, and thank you so much for joining us today for our Football Night in America conference call to preview the 2021 NFL season.
As we announced yesterday, Football Night in America, which is the most watched studio show in sports since its inception in 2006, has a slightly new format this year. At the desk in the studio is going to be Mike, Tony, and Drew. Also in the studio will be our new co-host Maria Taylor alongside Chris Simms, and then at the game site we’re going to have host Jac Collinsworth, along with Rodney Harrison who will be stepping outside the studio for the first time.
Mike Florio will continue to provide updates on the biggest news of the NFL that day. Another new element for Football Night this year is that we’ll be streaming all season long for the first time on Peacock.
Also, of note for this call, Mike and Drew are our game callers for Notre Dame Football along with sideline reporter Kathryn Tappen, so Fighting Irish questions are welcome on this call.
The season begins and ends on NBC this year as we have NFL kickoff next Thursday, and Super Bowl LVI in February. Before we begin here today, just a quick reminder that we will have a transcript of this call a few hours after its conclusion. You can find that at our media dedicated website, NBCSportsgrouppressbox.com.
Let’s begin now with opening remarks, and first up is Sam Flood.
SAM FLOOD: Well, thank you all for joining us. We’re really excited for the season. This past Sunday night, I was in Atlanta and got to spend time with Tony, Rodney, Mike, and Drew, and the energy of getting back inside buildings and the season ready to roll was fantastic, and seeing this group together fired up to get the football season going is a lot of fun.
Mike has turned off his Tokyo Olympic hat and turned on his NFL brain, and he’s ready to go with the season. Really fun seeing everyone there, and we’re so excited knowing we get to start and end the season, as Chris just mentioned. Nothing better than that, and the Super Bowl in Los Angeles is going to be spectacular. To the guy who spent way too much time in Tokyo and is now back stateside and getting comfortable in this time zone, Mr. Tirico.
MIKE TIRICO: Thanks, Sam. Hi, everybody. I’ll be brief so you can get to your questions and hear from our team of analysts. Like both guys said before, it’s always great when you know you’re going to bookend the season, and to start it in Tampa and to then end it at the Super Bowl, with Super Bowl LVI at SoFi Stadium, will be a great experience I think for all of us. Most of the team is back together, as we’ve been together for the last few years working with Rodney and Tony and Chris Simms and Jac joining us last year. We’re super excited to have Maria Taylor. Maria worked with us on our late-night show, our prime plus show at the Olympics, and we really enjoyed spending the two and a half weeks working with Maria, and she’ll be an awesome addition to our team.
And Drew, you know, I spent 20-some odd years talking about Drew Brees back when he was a backup at Purdue for Billy Dicken at the Alamo Bowl that I called in 1997.
And then over the years, whether it was the Chargers or his decade and a half Hall of Fame run with the Saints, it was always a pleasure to go down there and cover Drew and get to know him and his family. He’s going to be a perfect fit with Tony, who is the absolute best, and Rodney.
I’ve learned so much football the last couple years sitting amongst that group, and to add Drew to that mix will be great.
The last thing I’ll say is that hour-fifteen that we’re on the air is as fun a 75 minutes as any host can have on TV, surrounded by Hall of Fame analysts, games are going on, games are finishing, putting all the plays of the day in context, showing the best highlights, giving analysis, getting ready for Sunday Night Football.
The schedule is awesome, as usual. Just talking about this has me ready for the kickoff game here in nine days and then our first Sunday Night and our first Football Night on September 12th.
TONY DUNGY: I’m excited, too, about this year, having Maria and Drew with us is going to be fantastic and working the new people in. But I’m also excited because of the way this has taken place, getting fans back in the stands. There’s so much buzz down here in Tampa where I live for those fans to be back. I think that’s going to be great for us, the schedule that we’ve got.
But I’m also excited because I don’t know what’s going to happen this year. I’ve never been through a preseason like this where everybody is a little different, nobody is playing a lot of their guys. Usually, you can look at that third preseason game and say, well, I know this team is going to be good because when their regulars got in, we saw this, this, and this.
I don’t really know how these teams are going to be, so I think it’s going to be an exciting year.
And then to finish with the Super Bowl is going to be fantastic. Looking forward to seeing the unknown, and I think it’s going to be fun to broadcast it.
With that, I’ll turn it over to Rodney Harrison.
RODNEY HARRISON: Hello, everyone. As Coach talked about, I’m extremely excited about this opportunity heading to my 13th season with NBC. I really enjoyed watching the preseason games. I felt like guys played with a sense of urgency, and I believe that’s because of the one less game.
Unfortunately, the guys that didn’t get a lot of reps in the preseason, I think you’re going to see a lot of mistakes early on and you’re going to see a lot of sloppy football.
However, I love our schedule. I think our schedule is fantastic. Looking forward to that week 4 game with the Patriots and Tom Brady coming back.
With that, I’m happy to hand it off to my former teammate and future Hall of Famer, Drew Brees.
DREW BREES: Thanks, Rod. It’s been a while since I’ve been a rookie, but here I am stepping into what I think is the absolute best team, and I get to join Rodney again, as he mentioned. He was a veteran that helped show me the way during my rookie year and second year in San Diego. Great to join him.
Also, the opportunity to broadcast games with Mike Tirico for Notre Dame Football I’m extremely excited about, and obviously to be in studio with Mike, Maria, and Coach Dungy.
I’ll also say all the people behind the scenes. I think it’s been such a welcome to join what I think is the absolute best in the business, and that is just not the people you see on TV, but also the people behind the scenes. It’s been an incredible team to join, and I’m really excited about this season.
Hey, Sam. Just wondering what your thoughts are with the league this year in terms of the embracing of gambling more. I saw yesterday that your partner PointsBet got approved as one of the Sportsbook operators from the league, and just with the evolution the past couple years, do you think there will be increased talk during broadcasts or on pregame shows, or how do you handle that balance?
SAM FLOOD: Well, the running rules are still going to be established by the NFL. They’re moving into this space and being very smart about it, making sure they go through the right processes and they’re working with us, letting us know what they feel is inbounds and out of bounds.
So we’re working with them and understanding their running rules to make sure we accomplish what’s needed for them and for us.
It’s a brave new world. I think we all know it’ll be a walk before they run, and we’re doing the same thing. Let’s figure out what works.
Let’s also make sure we’re engaging the audience the right way. We’re the No. 1 show in studio television, and we want to make sure we’re inclusive to everyone that’s watching. We don’t want to alienate any fans, so we’ve got to walk that line and work the right way to make sure we engage the audience properly and make sure everyone feels welcomed the whole time.
For Mike, is your understanding that maybe the rules about gambling talk and stuff, there’s more of an inbounds? As a host, how do you try to marry the two?
MIKE TIRICO: I’m sure before we get going we’ll have a full read on what exactly the parameters are. Obviously there have been times where in the booth or in the studio you make a reference to what happens in a game relative to the spread or the total, and people who need to get it, get it, and people who don’t, don’t.
Remember, not everyone is watching because of gambling. A lot of people do have interest in the game, but they also have their fantasy football interests. You’ve got to serve the majority of the viewers, and I think for the majority of the viewers they want to hear from Tony, Drew, Rodney, and Chris Simms about what happened in the game and why.
I think if you wagered on a game legally, or illegally, you can figure out the impact of the score on your bet. I don’t think we need to necessarily discuss it all the time.
When we know what the exact parameters are we’ll use them as we see fit. I don’t think it’s going to become, or any of the pregame shows are going to become these full-out tout shows that you used to see on Saturday afternoons on syndicated TV. I don’t think the NFL pregame shows will go to that length of conversation around betting.
Since Chris invited Notre Dame questions, I just wanted to ask Drew, I don’t know how much you’ve gotten to see of Jack Coan yet or from his past performances, but how do you think he will fit in in that role?
DREW BREES: Yeah, so I followed Jack obviously in his time as starting quarterback for Wisconsin. I had a chance to be at one of the Notre Dame spring practices in April to watch him and the team. By all accounts, and in speaking with the coaches as well, I think he’s really assimilated himself into that team and the system very well.
They say he’s got great leadership ability. I think the team is really responding to that. I think he brings a level of poise and experience that obviously the other younger guys who were competing alongside him don’t necessarily have quite yet.
Ian Book being a three-year starter and then departing, it kind of left that void. He seems to be filling that role. They’re excited about him. I think it’s unique, as well, I didn’t realize this, but I guess Jack was quite a lacrosse player coming out of high school and was actually recruited to Notre Dame to play lacrosse, and obviously he goes on to Wisconsin and plays quarterback, and here now as a graduate transfer. He’s making his way back to South Bend to play football.
But interesting backstory there.
Coach Dungy, I was just curious about you spoke to the team when you were here for Hall of Fame weekend. Just kind of what precipitated that. Was it because they had such a loaded roster? They say your message was basically about chemistry. Have you had any takeaways of Coach Stefanski, and what impressed you about him while you were talking?
TONY DUNGY: Well, I actually was invited there by Coach Stefanski. He and I became friends when he was with the Vikings. We were talking a lot about culture and creating that winning atmosphere before practice, and he asked me if I wouldn’t mind speaking to the team and addressing them.
So it was a lot of fun. My son Justin is a huge Browns fan, so I got to collect some autographs for him and some pictures, and he was pumped up about it. But I really enjoyed talking to them because I feel like it is a group that is bought in to what Coach Stefanski is bringing to them, and that is that atmosphere that we have to be together, we’re in this as a unit, we’re going to be physical, and that’s how we’re going to play.
It was kind of exciting to watch. I think they’re going to be a very, very good football team. Obviously, my Steeler roots, it was tough being there in the midst of the Browns, but I enjoyed it, and I think Coach Stefanski has really brought something special there. They’re going to be very tough.
Obviously you knew him, but what he was able to do in a year, how impressive was that?
TONY DUNGY: He’s got everybody to buy in. They’re on board. We talked last year, he told me that the one thing he wanted to get to the offense was being physical, knocking people down. They kept charts of who got people off their feet on defense. The leaders of that race were the wide receivers.
When you get guys like Jarvis Landry buying into going down the field knocking people down and then the running backs see this and the linemen see this and everybody is on board, that’s what you see. I see a team that really believes in their head coach, and that’s why I think they’re going to be good.
Drew, another question about the sports betting space. I know you’ve recently partnered with PointsBet. How do you see sports betting as something that grows fan engagement?
DREW BREES: I think as Mike alluded to, there’s many reasons why people will want to watch, people will be engaged. Obviously so much of our country loves sports. They love competitive athletics. They love college football. They love NFL football. They’re going to watch it because it’s entertaining, it’s fun.
What fantasy football brought years ago was just this kind of heightened level of interest based on being able to build your teams, made up of players from different teams, different positions, and competing against friends, competing against others.
Now you add another level, which is the gambling element and the opportunity to win and that sort of thing, I think you’ve just added another level of where you can engage more people or even a heightened level of interest in the outcomes of these games.
For Drew, you’re going to be a Hall of Fame quarterback; obviously had a great career. Why did you want to be an analyst? What motivated you to say, you know what, that’s what I want to do after my career on the field?
DREW BREES: So listen, I love the game of football. It’s been a huge part of my life for a really long time, and obviously coming off being an NFL player for 20 years I figured the transition from being a player to, I guess, being a civilian was going to be a bit of an adjustment.
You figure the ways you can still be involved and engaged in the game that you love and continue to foster those relationships and maybe even develop a different skill set, which I think what I’m learning going through this process is certainly that’s something that broadcasting and being in studio will do for you.
It allows me to stay involved with the game. It allows me to show my love and passion for the game in a different way and develop a skill set and develop other relationships.
I’ve had the opportunity to be around guys like Mike Tirico for a long time, and Coach Dungy, obviously, playing on the other side of the field from him quite a few times, but being able to go deeper with these relationships and being able to sit side by side in studio or in the broadcast booth, and, again, like I said earlier, be involved with a network like NBC that sets you up for success, and I think it does a tremendous job of pulling people together and putting forth a show and a broadcast that we can all be very proud of and that our fans can be very proud of.
I always felt like this would be a potential transition for me. I had the opportunity three or four years ago to attend a Purdue game in Lucas Oil Stadium as they were opening up the season at Louisville, and I was actually invited into the broadcast booth just to talk about the upcoming NFL season. But when I threw the headphones on, I started being asked questions about what was happening on the field at the time, and in a very impromptu manner for about five minutes, I became a broadcaster. I had never done that before, and in doing that, I think I immediately got the juices flowing and my mind thinking that this would be something that I would love to do when I was done playing.
Sam, is there a strategy in terms of how you’re trying to develop Drew?
SAM FLOOD: Yes. We’re giving him the great opportunity to learn. We’ve done a lot of coaching, a lot of meetings out west, whether at his house or at stadiums or team practices or in Atlanta this past Sunday.
It’s a process. It’s a training camp, no different than what Tony and Rodney did with us back in 2009 when they came on board to Football Night in America.
It’s a training process, getting ready, learning new skills and learning how to make television and tell stories and get people to care. The one word we ask them all to do is tell us why, why are things happening on the field, and take us places we can’t go otherwise. That’s the strategy with Drew. We did it, and we loved what we did with Tony and Rodney. They enjoyed the process back in their time, and now it’s Drew’s turn.
Drew, it’s about the 49ers’ quarterbacks and a possible rotation to some extent with (Jimmy) Garoppolo and Trey Lance. Obviously you can speak from experience on that. I’m sure as a starter you didn’t always love seeing Taysom Hill come in, but as an analyst, to this situation specifically, do you see the wisdom in that, and what do you view as maybe the possible benefits and even potential pitfalls?
DREW BREES: I’ll say this: As a starting quarterback, and I’d say this applies more so maybe in my last four to five years with the presence of Taysom Hill, and that is whatever we needed to do to win the game, to put ourselves in the best position to win, I was all for that.
So if that meant Taysom Hill being able to come in and take two snaps at quarterback or 10 snaps at quarterback, if that gave us the best chance to win, I was all for it.
As that situation plays out in San Francisco, I had a chance to view joint practices between San Francisco and the Chargers actually just a week ago. So I had a chance to see both Jimmy Garoppolo and Trey Lance up close. Had a chance to talk with the coaching staff and observe. It’s obvious Trey Lance is a great talent. The 49ers have quite an investment in him when you look at what they gave up to move up to that third spot to grab him.
I think that they’re in a very good position right now because I think you have an established starter in Jimmy Garoppolo. Keep in mind, these guys were in the Super Bowl two years ago, in large part because of their defense but also his ability to execute that offense.
I know a lot of that team was hit with the injury bug last year, including Jimmy, but as I look at that team, I think they’re going to be a real contender in the NFC this year, and I think Jimmy Garoppolo is going to be a big part of that.
I’m not sure exactly how they see Trey Lance’s development thus far. Personally, I think they should not be in a rush to get Trey Lance on the field. I think that there is a development process that will take place with him. Let’s remember that this guy only played one game last fall, and he only started for a year before that.
You’ve got a guy with a ton of these expectations but who’s played a limited amount of football over the last two years. He’s stepping into an environment where there’s a lot of pressure and a lot of expectations.
I think all that’s doing is setting him up for failure. I think you have the opportunity to bring him along slowly. Different than the situation with me and Taysom Hill. Taysom Hill came on the field for us, you didn’t know what position he was playing when he was on the field. In most cases he was playing tight end, maybe receiver, kind of this F- or H-back type position where he was doing something else other than quarterback.
When Trey Lance comes on the field in a game you know he’s playing quarterback. From a game plan perspective or the threat that that poses to an opposing defense, I don’t think it’s in the same realm as a Taysom Hill. All of a sudden playing quarterback and launching the ball 60 yards down the field or running over you in a short yardage situation.
I’m not sure how that ends up playing out at this point, but I think in my opinion and in watching it, I think Trey Lance is still a little ways away from being in a position where he’s really going to be able to provide value at the quarterback position for them.
Do you feel like especially with a guy like Jimmy Garoppolo, do you feel like that could harm his confidence, because this is a guy that, yeah, he’s played, and when he played they won a lot of ballgames, but this is kind of a guy that his confidence kind of goes up and down. Are you afraid that if they start rotating quarterbacks maybe his confidence is affected?
DREW BREES: Well, I think competition brings out the best in everybody. I can certainly draw on my experience back in 2004 when the Chargers drafted Philip Rivers with the fourth pick to basically come in and take my job.
But you’re a Hall of Famer; Jimmy Garoppolo is not.
DREW BREES: But I think he’s playing really well right now based on everything that I observed, and everyone who I talked to during those joint practices, they say Jimmy Garoppolo is playing some of his best football right now.
Listen, we’ll see once the season rolls around if he doesn’t start playing well and two or three games into the season he hasn’t put forth the production that they want. Is he on a short leash? Maybe. But I still think Trey Lance is a ways away from being a full-time starter for San Francisco.
Where they’re positioned right now, they’ve got a great team around them. They’ve got a great defense, great defensive line, great offensive line, a good run game, a good scheme. Those are a quarterback’s friends. At the same time, I think Jimmy gives them the best chance to win right now and let’s see how it plays out with his performance.
Drew, the Broncos’ new quarterback, Teddy Bridgewater, the 11th starting quarterback since Peyton retired, but he was your backup for a couple years there in New Orleans. I’m wondering from your perspective what kind of a player the Broncos are getting in Teddy, and what do you think about the talent that is around him on offense?
DREW BREES: I think Teddy is a great fit for Denver. You’re talking about an experienced quarterback. He’s got a lot of starts under his belt. I think wherever he’s been, the players have loved him. He’s really endeared himself to the team. He’s got great leadership ability.
They obviously were bit by the injury bug on defense last year, losing Von Miller early and others, so if they can stay healthy and play the type of defense that I know they can play, I think they’re poised to have a good season.
Listen, they’re in a division where they’ve got to play the Chiefs twice and they’ve got to play the Chargers and Justin Herbert and the expectations that come with that team twice, so it’s not going to be an easy road.
And yet at the same time I think they’ve made an upgrade with him obviously going in there competing, winning the job, winning over the team, and now being in a position to help them win some games.
I was hoping both Rodney and Drew could answer this question if possible. I’m just curious what each of your thoughts are on Mac Jones and what you make of the Patriots’ decision to make him the starter and cut Cam Newton today.
RODNEY HARRISON: I think first and foremost, I believe, and I said it the entire time, that I felt like Mac Jones was ready. That he was everything that the Patriots wanted and needed as a quarterback.
I think when I watch him play, sometimes I sit back and say, what if that zero that’s on his jersey was a 2? Then he would look just like Tom Brady. He would look just like a young Tom Brady. The fact that they had so much trust in him early, to put him in a no-huddle, to give him different things, their offense was never limited with Mac Jones.
People say, well, the lack of athleticism. Well, they’ve got four or five running backs that can run the football. They need somebody that is going to take care of the football, that can take control of the offense, not only know the offense, but also be able to know the defense and be able to get the offense into the correct play. I think Mac Jones can do that.
Now, did I think that Cam was going to get cut? No, but I understand why. Number one, maybe it’s because he wasn’t vaccinated, and that has to be a concern with most teams, with all teams. If your leader, if your quarterback is not vaccinated, it’s going to affect the dynamic of the team. But I thought Coach Belichick, everything that he preached as far as doing what’s best for the team, making every guy earn his spot.
And I was disappointed with Matt Nagy. I was disappointed earlier with Coach Belichick when he named Cam Newton and he said Cam Newton was going to be the starting quarterback. I didn’t believe that because I believe everyone should compete, and that’s exactly what he promised when I came in in 2003. He puts up a chart and says, hey, you make the depth chart. It’s not about giving someone a job, it’s about earning a job.
When you have a young guy like Mac, you don’t want a 10-year veteran or however many years Cam had played behind him looking over his shoulder, and I think that was ultimately what led to Cam’s demise. But Cam will be fine. He’s made a lot of money. He’s done some wonderful things in his career.
But in order to give the Patriots the best opportunity to win, this was the best decision. If Coach Belichick would have made a different decision, I would have been highly disappointed in him.
DREW BREES: So as I was watching the draft, the minute the Patriots took Mac Jones at 15th, I said, that’s the steal of the draft. It’s probably the guy who is most ready to play NFL quarterback right now, of all the guys who were taken before.
His level of execution last year at Alabama, and I know we can sit here and argue he’s got the best players on the field on his side, on both sides of the ball, but in watching the National Championship game, that’s where it became very evident to me.
This guy’s level of execution, his understanding of offensive football, his timing, his rhythm, his ability not only to make the routine throws, but to make throws that you’re going to need to make at the next level in order to win games and take care of the football the way he did, I felt like he was the most NFL ready.
And to couple that, he goes to a team who has a culture and a foundation already established, different than the top three quarterbacks taken in the draft who unfortunately typically are in situations where there’s a reason those teams were drafting at the very top. They had the worst records, they probably have the most rebuilding to do in regards to building the culture and the foundation, getting the pieces in and around him.
For all those reasons I think Mac Jones is going to have the most success of any rookie quarterback, not just this year but probably for the next few years.
Rodney or Drew, just wondering with the investments that the Ravens have made at the wide receiver position, but then again being a run-first smashmouth team, what do you guys see being the right balance to strike in the way that passing trends are happening, but also how good we saw the Ravens working offensively two years ago during that MVP season (for Lamar Jackson)?
RODNEY HARRISON: I think the Ravens, their goal is to win a Super Bowl, and they’re not going to win a Super Bowl just running the ball and thinking they can play good defense. They’re going to have to push the ball down the field.
Talking of Coach Harbaugh, he was really excited about Sammy Watkins, Rashod Bateman, Marquise ‘Hollywood’ Brown. But the key is those guys have to be able to stay on the field, and if they’re continually getting hurt, especially with a quarterback that’s not the most accurate quarterback, you need that time on the field with your quarterback. You need that communication. You need that timing.
I played against Peyton (Manning) plenty of times and I’d still see those guys an hour or two before the game working on timing routes.
Yeah, I think Lamar is going to have success, but the most important thing for them, is offensively they’ve got to get healthy at the wide receiver position. I don’t doubt that they’re going to be able to run the ball.
And J.K. Dobbins is a huge loss because he came in, he gave them energy, he gave them power, he gave him quickness, he is a guy that can take the hands off and go 60, 70 yards for a touchdown. That’s a huge loss for them.
Now it’s going to be a little bit more responsibility on Lamar Jackson to be able to step up, make the plays down the field outside of the tight end position to the wide receivers. But unfortunately some of these guys, they have a history of injuries. Sammy Watkins, he’s a really good player, but everywhere he goes, he’s injured.
That’s something that they’re going to have to strongly consider.
DREW BREES: That Baltimore Ravens team, and I’d say the success of that team, is built around the run game and defense and their ability to — more importantly on offense, if you execute the run game the way you should, that’s what opens up the opportunities in the pass game.
The design of that scheme is not just to drop back and beat you throwing the ball. The design of that offense is to dent you with the run game to make you play extremely disciplined defense, because in many cases Lamar has the opportunity to pull the ball at any moment and with his legs create an explosive play; but at the same time you’ve got to be able to tackle the runner if he hands it off. And then, oh, yeah, by the way, I’m going to pull it and then I’m going to launch one in the play action game.
That’s what creates the problems for opposing teams and opposing defenses when you play them. But they’ve got to be able to run the ball. I think they’ve been very consistent playing great defense, or a style of defense that is very opportunistic, that focuses on pressure, that focuses on taking the ball away.
Their success is very much predicated on their ability to run the ball.
RODNEY HARRISON: Let me just jump in. There’s no question that a big part of their success is about running the football, but we’re talking about getting to the next level. Okay, I was there when they got their butts kicked by Buffalo in the playoffs because Lamar couldn’t push the ball down the field.
Yeah, there was some weather, but at the end of the day, we know they’re going to run the football. They’re going to have success running the football. For them to get to the Super Bowl, and that’s the goal, to win a Super Bowl, they’re not going to run, they’re not just going to run to get in the Super Bowl. Their defense is going to be a good defense, I don’t think it’s going to be a great defense. They still have question marks of who’s going to be the pass rushers.
When I look at it, Drew, in order to get to the Super Bowl you’re playing against Kansas City, you’re going to be playing against the Chargers, you’re going to be playing against a team like the Patriots, and they’re going to pass the ball.
All these teams can run the ball, but you’ve got to pass the ball to get to that next level.
How are you going to beat Kansas City if you can’t sack Patrick Mahomes and you can’t throw the ball down the field? I just don’t see it.
Coach, you tweeted that you did not like the NFL getting into business with all these sports betting companies. Can you tell me what is your objection, and why do you think the NFL changed its stance after so many years?
TONY DUNGY: Well, I don’t know why the NFL changed its stance, and my objection is just personal. I don’t think we should encourage people who are watching the NFL to gamble, especially young people. I’ve got boys, and I want them to enjoy the game for what it is, the headiness of it and those kind of things. It’s a great game. I know people gamble. I know it’s legal. I just don’t want to see the NFL promoting it.
That’s just my personal opinion. I know a lot of people don’t agree with it. They say it’s money, people are going to gamble anyway. I understand all that. Just my personal opinion, and I know when I came into the league we didn’t. We were counseled about it. You couldn’t be involved with the gambling process.
Now it’s different, and I understand times change, but again, for me it’s just a personal opinion.
I was wondering if any of your colleagues share your objections.
MIKE TIRICO: I do think there should be a little bit more of an understanding that there’s a percentage of the audience we’re talking about. It’s not everyone. So it doesn’t have to be every conversation related to what happened to the NFL.
I think at the end of the day, the higher percentage of a team’s fans, let’s say Lions’ fans in Detroit, they’d be happy if their team won and was making the playoffs as opposed to their record ATS.
I think we need to be reminded that this is something that is new in terms of how prevalent it is in conversation.
As for personal opinion I do see Tony’s point, and in some ways agree with him. Maybe not 100 percent. I think the gambling process has been going on for quite some time, whether in back channels, illegally, however you want to describe it, for people not going to Nevada to wager on a game. So that’s been happening.
So the fact that it’s now legalized in some ways may just legitimize the process a little bit. But I do think it is having an influence on or can have an influence on younger fans, and I think we need to be wise of that in general.
It’s another part of a society where you have more options to do things, and with more options come more consequences.
I hope that the people who are wagering are wagering wisely, like they say in the commercials, but that’s not always the case. I think the balance of not making it the preponderance of our conversation covering National Football League is appropriate for that reason.
THE MODERATOR: I know we have a few questions in the queue, but this does end our call for today. I really want to thank everybody for joining us. Don’t forget, tune in next Thursday night, 7:00 p.m. eastern, NFL kickoff, Cowboys-Bucs; next Saturday Toledo-Notre Dame exclusively streaming on Peacock; and for the first Sunday Night Football game, the Bears-Rams from SoFi Stadium. Coverage begins with Football Night in America at 7:00 p.m. eastern on NBC. Thank you, everybody, for joining us.