Sept. 12, 2022 - Doug Collins Podcast
49:43
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| You want to listen to a podcast? | |
| By who? | |
| Georgia GOP Congressman Doug Collins. | |
| How is it? | |
| The greatest thing I have ever heard in my whole life. | |
| I could not believe my ears. | |
| In this house, wherever the rules are disregarded, chaos and mob rule. | |
| It has been said today, where is bravery? | |
| I'll tell you where bravery is found and courage is found. | |
| It's found in this minority who has lived through the last year of nothing but rules being broken, people being put down, questions not being answered, and this majority say, be damned with anything else. | |
| We're going to impeach and do whatever we want to do. | |
| Why? | |
| Because we won an election. | |
| I guarantee you, one day you'll be back in the minority and it ain't gonna be that fun. | |
| Hey everybody, it's Doug Collins. | |
| Welcome back to the podcast. | |
| Glad to have you with us. | |
| Today is an exciting day. | |
| It's been a big week, several weeks here. | |
| We've had a lot of great guests on. | |
| Can't think of one more appropriate as we get ready for the best time of the year. | |
| It's fall. | |
| It's not only football season and college football, pro football, it's hunting as you well know here on the podcast, but just a lot of great things. | |
| But I can't think of one who, over the last few years, has signified more endings of weekends than my next guest. | |
| Because she was on the sidelines with NFL football. | |
| Michelle Tafoya is with me today. | |
| I had the privilege of being on her podcast. | |
| She's now part of the Salem faculty as well, so to speak, that Seb Gorka talks about. | |
| She has her own podcast. | |
| And it is just a great time to have you, Michelle, with us. | |
| Welcome to the Doug Collins Podcast. | |
| Thank you for having me and thank you for coming on my podcast as well. | |
| Someone said they just adored your southern drawl. | |
| Got that draw just going. | |
| Look, I'm not Chuck Kelly, so at least it was authentic. | |
| We get it going. | |
| All right. | |
| I mean, a lot of people have watched you through the years. | |
| You were at the top of your profession. | |
| I mean, in sideline reporting, reporting, and sports reporting, it was just a name. | |
| And now you've hit the ground running with a podcast talking about current events. | |
| Talk, if you would, just sort of catch us up. | |
| I mean, because a lot of people I've talked to, they said, I told them I was going to have you on the podcast or I was on yours. | |
| They said, wait, isn't she still doing football? | |
| Talk to us a little bit about where we're at right now. | |
| You know, it's funny. | |
| I was checking out of the grocery store the other day and the woman checking my groceries said to me, My husband was a huge fan of yours. | |
| He passed away. | |
| And I said, that's so nice. | |
| And she said, are you still doing football? | |
| And I said, no, I retired. | |
| And she said, that's just not right. | |
| That is not right what happened to you. | |
| And I said, what happened to me? | |
| And she said, yes, this is just wrong. | |
| And I said, well, hang on a minute. | |
| I chose this. | |
| And this had been in the works for several years. | |
| So I like to clear up that misconception. | |
| I think because of an appearance on The View... | |
| Where I said maybe some things that some people thought were controversial and people thought I got pushed out at Sunday Night Football. | |
| It is just not the truth. | |
| I've been planning on this departure for several years and the story of how it ended, you know, why it kept getting pushed until this year is too long to tell, Doug. | |
| But that's where I am. | |
| And the reason I wanted to leave was because I wanted to use my voice for something that I really care about. | |
| And it's not to say that I don't care about sports. | |
| It gave me a great career. | |
| But I'm really, really concerned about the state of our country, the division in the country. | |
| I'm not sure if it's real or imagined still, how divided we are. | |
| I think it's closer to real than imagined, although I don't know. | |
| It's sometimes you go to a baseball game or you go to the park and you feel like I'm getting along great with everyone here. | |
| What's the story? | |
| So this is why I made this choice. | |
| I want to be able to speak when you're on the number one show on television, which was Sunday Night Football. | |
| You can't do that without drawing some controversy to the show. | |
| And I had too much respect for the people who created and run that show to do that. | |
| And so we mutually agreed that's not, you know, tweet out too much here while you're on the air with us. | |
| And then once you're gone, you can just go to town. | |
| So I have. | |
| I love it. | |
| Michelle, one of the things, though, is from the perspective of someone who has done a lot of TV, you know, on a different perspective, you, of course, being a reporter covering NFL, which we'll get to a little bit, but the idea of going on The View itself. | |
| What was that like? | |
| Well, it was a lot like what you might expect. | |
| I was on Gutfeld the other night with Harold Ford Jr., who does The Five as well, and he said to me, oh yeah, I'm on an island every day that I'm on this network. | |
| And I said, it's one thing to be on an island with your opinion, but it's another altogether to have the audience against you and... | |
| Not just the opinions of the hosts against you, but you don't feel really... | |
| They tried. | |
| I will give them credit. | |
| They tried to make me feel comfortable, but it's difficult to feel comfortable in that role when all the rest of the hosts and the audience are basically... | |
| Booing you. | |
| Not necessarily literally, although the audience would, but in this way that you end up feeling not just like your opinion is different, but that you are inherently kind of a bad person. | |
| I don't want to go into too many details about what happened behind the scenes because that happened behind the scenes, but... | |
| It's not for the faint of heart. | |
| Just got through the podcast, Michelle. | |
| You just mentioned something, talking about the fact that when you felt there at The View and the folks who was listening, it was not a matter of just your opinions. | |
| And I think this is one of the things that I'm glad to have you on my podcast, but your podcast as well, doing this, is when did we lose sight of the fact that A view is what you believe. | |
| And now we seem to be attaching evil to either side if they disagree with what you say. | |
| Do you see that more and more happening now in this sort of the cancel culture mentality of if I don't... | |
| It's not that I just disagree with you. | |
| I want to take you out and destroy you. | |
| Absolutely. | |
| And it's by design. | |
| Because then people will be less inclined to talk and share their opinions. | |
| Although your dog is sharing an opinion right now. | |
| And I'm glad I have earphones in because my dog's sitting here and would bark right back at your dog. | |
| So they would have a debate and who knows who'd get canceled. | |
| Canine cancel culture. | |
| There's no telling. | |
| This is bad. | |
| And when I have friends telling me they're afraid to post something on social media, they're afraid to Doug, this is America. | |
| You know that better than anybody. | |
| You should not be afraid to post your opinions, your thoughts, your point of view. | |
| Someone can disagree with it, but this threat of just having the rug pulled out from under you, losing your job, losing your friends, it's crazy. | |
| And I've seen it firsthand in my extended family. | |
| I've seen it among my friends. | |
| I've seen it happen to people. | |
| And I don't know how we resist this and get back to normal except by having people say, you can't cancel me because I'm not going to allow you to do that to me. | |
| And I'm going to stand up and you can say whatever you want. | |
| I think there is a growing chorus of voices who want to say something. | |
| Go ahead. | |
| Try it. | |
| See if you can. | |
| And they're not going to allow it. | |
| I think apologizing for your opinion is something people should avoid at all costs. | |
| You know, if you hurt someone's feelings, if you offend someone, that's not all on you. | |
| It's them too. | |
| When someone gets offended, they're choosing to be offended. | |
| They could say, oh, that Doug Collins, whatever, he and I just, we don't agree. | |
| Or they could just shout it from the mountaintop and call all your sponsors and say, you know, this is hurtful and, you know, silence is violence and words are violent. | |
| So silence is violence, words are violence. | |
| Everything's violence? | |
| It is so out of control, Doug, that this is a big reason why I decided to step down from one platform and say, I'm going to stand up for all those people who maybe don't feel quite emboldened yet, and I'm going to encourage them. | |
| Did you sense this coming, I mean, and I've sensed this in what you've said and everything else, coming out of the NFL, which is so image conscious. | |
| I mean, you know, down to the fact you can't even wear a shoe that is not approved, you know, which I've always thought was the dumbest thing I've ever heard of in my life. | |
| But, you know, or a headband. | |
| And you and I would remember the old, and this started back in the 80s with Jim, was it Mack? | |
| Quarterback for Chicago. | |
| Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. | |
| Why am I forgetting his name too? | |
| I'm just blanking on his name as well. | |
| We're going to get it between us. | |
| McMahon. | |
| Jim McMahon. | |
| Good Lord. | |
| Yeah, Jim McMahon. | |
| He had the headbands on, and the NFL got all crazy about it. | |
| But in working that, were you starting to see that more and more You know, frankly, the broadcast, more influence on what you were to cover, not to cover. | |
| Was that beginning to creep in or was that still sort of off limits a little bit? | |
| I didn't feel like the league told us what we could or could not broadcast. | |
| I never felt that. | |
| I think that we made our decisions about what was worth documenting and what wasn't. | |
| And, you know, for instance, get to the elephant in the room, which was the kneeling for the anthem. | |
| This began and it started to get a lot of attention. | |
| And then, of course, then President Trump or candidate Trump, whenever it was that he started screaming and yelling about it and how he felt about it. | |
| Look, it blew things up. | |
| But I think the league mishandled it. | |
| And I've said this before. | |
| With all due respect to the league, there was a knee-jerk reaction to not allow it or to say, if you don't want to stand for the anthem, stay in the locker room. | |
| Well, I believe in freedom of speech. | |
| All speech. | |
| All of it. | |
| Especially the kind that you hate because when we start deciding what shouldn't be said, what kind of speech can or cannot be allowed, we are on a very slippery slope. | |
| It'll come around to everyone eventually if we allow it. | |
| So I just thought they should have let this thing happen organically. | |
| Let the guys kneel who wanted to kneel. | |
| There were plenty who wanted to stand. | |
| Some would stand with their hand on the shoulder of the guy kneeling. | |
| Khalil Mack did that. | |
| He would kneel and his quarterback at the time, Derek Carr, would stand next to him and put his hand on his shoulder. | |
| So there were lots of demonstrations of unity even across this. | |
| And I think that it should have just been allowed to We're good to | |
| go. | |
| But people did not like seeing these millionaires, these guys who were playing a game for a living, and it's hard work and I'm not belittling it, but they're making a small fortune doing it and kneeling for an anthem in a country that allows them. | |
| To do all this. | |
| Now, look, go for it. | |
| You've got freedom of expression, freedom of speech. | |
| I disagree with you, but I would defend your right to do it all day long. | |
| So it just got to be to the point where I just think the league could have just sort of breathed, let it happen, and see where it went organically. | |
| Well, I mean, the league had that image, and you saw the decline. | |
| I still have people come up to me to this day when I mention NFL. I don't watch that anymore. | |
| And it's like... | |
| Are you not watching it because of these opinions? | |
| Are you not watching it because it's no fun anymore? | |
| Do we seem to have this... | |
| Much thinner skin. | |
| Maybe that's the way to put it. | |
| Michelle? | |
| Yeah, I think unfortunately so. | |
| I remember being raised to be a resilient, tough kid. | |
| To be able to stand on your own two feet and tackle whatever comes your way. | |
| And these days, look, I have two kids in school. | |
| I see what goes on. | |
| And we've seen it all over the country at every level. | |
| They have safe spaces. | |
| They have places where kids feel victimized. | |
| Why in the hell are we teaching our kids that they are either victim or oppressor? | |
| Why are we teaching them that in order to feel safe, they have to go in a special room that is limited to its population? | |
| Why are we not teaching For lack of a better word, arming our kids with the resilience and the power, the inner strength to handle what's out there. | |
| Why are we not doing that? | |
| Why are we creating a nation? | |
| Again, I get back to the, if you don't say anything, you're complicit in the crime. | |
| Or when you say something, that's hurtful. | |
| Well, what the hell am I supposed to say? | |
| And what about the people who just would kind of choose? | |
| They're strong on their own. | |
| They've got their own lives. | |
| They just want to stay out of the fray. | |
| And that you're going to call them out for not taking a side? | |
| And, oh, by the way, only your side is acceptable? | |
| I mean, it is so nuts. | |
| And I'm worried. | |
| And you know what's interesting, Doug, and I don't know how much you've seen this, but people who come here from countries where there was real oppression, where there was socialism, where there was Marxism, where there was communism, they see it. | |
| And they're saying, you don't want to go down this path. | |
| So why are we? | |
| And that's the part that doesn't make sense. | |
| And I was just, like I said, in this previous time, this is becoming a theme, it seems like, with some of our podcasts this week, is this idea that we've just had it... | |
| I don't want to make this blanket statement. | |
| We've gotten too good at this in this country, blanket statements. | |
| Everybody's one way or the other. | |
| I mean, we had a president do it the other night, basically, from the platform in what was one of the worst speeches I've ever seen in my life, dividing speeches. | |
| But it's this idea that we have it over all. | |
| A very good country. | |
| Okay? | |
| It's a very... | |
| I still... | |
| Look, I'm an old Air Force guy. | |
| I mean, I'm still there. | |
| American exceptionalism still means something to me. | |
| I mean, we are the best. | |
| I make no bones about it. | |
| I'm like a... | |
| You know, I'm an SEC fan. | |
| I make no bones about it. | |
| There is nothing else. | |
| But, you know... | |
| But it's amazing that that... | |
| I never understood the argument from those that want to point out everything and bring down the U.S. I've always looked at the U.S. as 200 plus years of screwing up and getting better. | |
| Screwing up and getting better. | |
| I mean, it's just who we are. | |
| And that's what life is supposed to be. | |
| Exactly. | |
| But why is it this seemingly... | |
| It's sort of biblical to me. | |
| It's the old chaplain in me that says, when the nation of Israel called out to God, they said, give us a king because we want to be like every other nation. | |
| Why is it in our country right now that we seem to have a group of people who say, well, we're good. | |
| Yeah, we may be good, but we're not good. | |
| And look at the other countries. | |
| They're okay, too. | |
| It's like, wait, when did we lose this idea that we've been given a great gift? | |
| The very reason you can go off saying that is the country that you have, but yet we're tearing it apart as if we want to be like everybody else. | |
| Well, I think a large part of it stems from whether they're financially elite, educationally elite, and they feel guilty. | |
| And there's that book, White Guilt. | |
| It's this notion of... | |
| We have it really good here. | |
| We do. | |
| Not everybody, and there are people struggling. | |
| Look, we acknowledge all the imperfections, right? | |
| Given that, given all other things, we have it pretty good here. | |
| And the people that I hear from the most shouting about how bad America is or how we stole this or that or built everything on slavery are people... | |
| A lot of them wealthy, a lot of them well-educated, a lot of them who maybe just aren't facing a struggle anymore, so this is the best adversary they can come up with. | |
| I don't know, maybe that's simplifying it too much. | |
| But it seems like every new generation, when I was growing up, you remember Roots, that's special, and everyone in America seemed to be watching that. | |
| And we all sort of shared this sorrow and guilt about our history together. | |
| Okay, but that's not enough. | |
| Now, the next generation comes out. | |
| They don't know about Roots or they didn't watch it. | |
| So now they've got to have their outpouring and their, you know, their catharsis. | |
| And then that goes. | |
| And then the next generation comes out and they learn about it and they say, well, we haven't paid enough of a price yet for this. | |
| Let's keep paying. | |
| Wow. | |
| I think part of what it comes down to is we're not teaching history in a meaningful way in this country anymore. | |
| We're teaching it through a certain lens. | |
| We're teaching it in a way of, you know, well, we are a patriarchal, white supremacist society. | |
| They are looking at history through the lens of the present, which is not the right way to look at history. | |
| And now what's troubling me, Doug, so much is when you have the president of the American Historical Association come out and apologize for saying something that maybe was a little offensive to the 1619 project when all he was doing was basing his commentary on that so much is when you have the president of the American Historical Association come out and apologize Like what is happening to history? | |
| History is supposed to be this sort of very concrete way of building the layers of a story. | |
| And by the way, history goes back further than 1776 and further back than 1619. | |
| And so, you know, just a little bit. | |
| So this focus on these specific things on which we can build the vision, which Marxism is all about, it's really troubling. | |
| And I just really hope people start opening their eyes and waking up to it and seeing what it is, seeing it for what it is. | |
| It is. | |
| I heard this the other day, and I wish I could remember. | |
| I was sitting here as you were thinking about what you were talking about. | |
| Somebody made this statement and that it was that the biggest mistake we can make is to judge historical figures by today's standard. | |
| Not to say that they were not evil, not to say that they were not good, but you take them in the era in which you take policy there. | |
| And it doesn't make them right. | |
| It doesn't make them wrong. | |
| But you say at this point in this time, this is what was happening. | |
| And it's almost like trying to take airplane travel. | |
| You and I both been on planes a lot of our adult lives. | |
| I can remember flying in the 80s, in the 90s, and it seemed like the only thing they would do is fly into thunderstorms instead of around them. | |
| Now, you know, at least they know they got the radars, they fly you around, and it's relatively, you know, good flights. | |
| To compare that to flying in the 1920s or the 30s is just, I think we have a perception problem here. | |
| And I think that is that everything has to be looked at, as I understand it, as if I have every answer. | |
| And I think that's a concern. | |
| Well, I spoke to Professor Mary Graybar the other day, and she wrote a rebuttal to the 1619 Project. | |
| And one of the things she said about critical race theory is that it's based on anecdotal, experiential feelings, that kind of stuff, not on the overall sets of data. | |
| And so, yes, if you read a Kendi book about how awful certain stories of slave life were, you want to throw up. | |
| You want to cry. | |
| It breaks your heart. | |
| And you think, how do I ever live with us having seen this? | |
| Well, let's fast forward to today. | |
| I mean, there's evil in the world today. | |
| And why we're not focused more on combating what is in front of us rather than what is behind us? | |
| We can learn from that. | |
| We should learn from that. | |
| We have learned from that. | |
| And yet, what about combating the evil in the world today? | |
| You know, and so this is... | |
| There is so... | |
| Look... | |
| One of the ways in which I see the view of evil as evolving, which is really scary, is these criminals who kill someone, they don't pay an adequate price, or they beat someone up on the street or throw a woman down the stairs, and they're out of jail within 24 hours. | |
| These people... | |
| Are not fit to be on the streets of New York City or Chicago or anywhere else. | |
| And yet we're making excuses for them. | |
| We're making excuses for the evil of today or maybe the mentally ill and saying, well, we got to give them another chance. | |
| But God, heaven forbid you did something 100 years ago, 200 years ago, you get no redemption and no good that you did in your life can compensate for For the bad. | |
| I had someone tell me that all the Winston Churchill statues in England, in the UK and Great Britain should be taken down because they believe he was a racist. | |
| Well, Winston Churchill happens to be the most revered man today in the United Kingdom still for what he did, for having a spine against Hitler. | |
| But no, take his statues down. | |
| He does not deserve this praise. | |
| Well, it's interesting. | |
| I have a theory on that. | |
| I think one of the reasons why you see so much what I call the battling of the decades of past as opposed to dealing with the inequality and evil that we see today is actually if you tried to do it today, it means you actually have to do something. | |
| If you're talking about it in the past, it's theoretical. | |
| Well, I mean, I just pontificated wildly about the sins of Grover Cleveland. | |
| You know, who cares? | |
| You know, why don't you go out and look at the, you know, the problems in our border, the problems in our inner cities, the problem with mayor in Chicago, who only wants to dramatize the problems in the south side of Chicago, but yet won't get in there with police presence to actually clean it up. | |
| I mean, you know, that actually requires work, Michelle. | |
| You're on to that. | |
| It's easier. | |
| Then to get in there and do something about it. | |
| And that's honestly so much of what was churning inside me when I said, I'm going to step down from arguably the greatest job I've ever had in my life, sideline reporter on the number one show on television, because I can't stand by anymore. | |
| I've got to do something. | |
| Now, do I sit and pontificate? | |
| Yeah, I do. | |
| But I also, what I'm trying to do is make people aware that Of other stories out there, other people. | |
| And behind the scenes, what people don't know is my involvement in some of these organizations. | |
| And actual the doing of stuff. | |
| You're putting yourself out there for all the criticism. | |
| Life could have been really easy. | |
| On the sidelines, even when it was two degrees in Green Bay, you know, that's easier than taking the flack that I take. | |
| But it's not, to me, I had to do something productive to try to change the course of things here. | |
| Just, I'm one person, but if you don't believe one person can make any change, then you might as well give up. | |
| And I'm just not ready to give up. | |
| Exactly. | |
| I think the thing that values most in life is doing something that you value and that is something that is a passion and burning to you. | |
| And I think that's the thing that drives us. | |
| And I think we've gotten away from that. | |
| We want everything easy. | |
| I made this comment the other day concerning the fact that life is hard. | |
| And it seems like we forgot that lesson. | |
| Okay, life is just hard. | |
| Life's not fair. | |
| It was never meant to be. | |
| Get over it. | |
| Shut up. | |
| It's just not. | |
| Okay? | |
| And I'm tired of the participation trophies. | |
| I'm tired of everybody, you know, let's all bring down to the happy medium. | |
| And we do it in education. | |
| We do it in college. | |
| We do it in everywhere else. | |
| You know, the bell curve does not exist, frankly, in many educational settings anymore. | |
| It's flatlined. | |
| It's just, you know, we just don't worry about it anymore. | |
| And I think that's where we're at and gives you a voice as we go. | |
| Your podcast is hitting on that, and I think that is, you know, it is something we need. | |
| We also need, and in a transition, you know, from you, as you just described, the greatest job in the world, as you had, Where a lot of people got to know you and gave you and really has gave you this platform, which I'm so glad to see you using. | |
| As you look back over your time in that, what was one of the things, an interesting, you know, from the last 20 something years, plus years, 30 years almost, you know, what was one of the things you learned Yeah. | |
| Oh, so much. | |
| I learned so much. | |
| I learned about what it means to be part of a team and choosing your spots. | |
| You know, I was sort of like a kicker. | |
| I had to come in in moments when it mattered. | |
| And gosh, that ball better go through the uprights or, you know, you're going to be the goat. | |
| And not the Tom Brady kind of goat, the other kind of goat. | |
| So, you know, in a way, like an offensive lineman, do no harm. | |
| Al and Chris were the stars. | |
| The game was the star. | |
| I had a role. | |
| And I accepted that role. | |
| There were times where I was frustrated. | |
| I didn't get as much airtime as I wanted. | |
| Or I had this great nugget story. | |
| I wanted to get this story in so bad. | |
| And it never made air. | |
| You know why? | |
| Because it didn't fit in the moment. | |
| We never forced things in. | |
| It wasn't about me. | |
| It was about the team. | |
| It was about the game. | |
| It was about the overall product. | |
| I think that's something that people have to learn. | |
| It's been really fun, therefore, watching my son go from I think that was a big lesson. | |
| When a wide receiver gets picked off or when a defensive back comes up with an interception or fails to come up with an interception, you hear cornerbacks use this term a lot, Doug. | |
| They say, I'm on an island out there. | |
| Because, you know, your D-line, they're a group. | |
| Your linebackers are there. | |
| But your defensive backs are kind of spread out and they're on their own little islands. | |
| I was on an island, too. | |
| And the sooner... | |
| And if you make a mistake on that island... | |
| You're exposed. | |
| It's not like you can point to the defensive tackle and it was his fault or anything else or a holding call. | |
| You're exposed. | |
| And that's how it feels. | |
| And the best way to deal with that is to have a short memory. | |
| And I learned that from players. | |
| You've got to let the mistakes go hard. | |
| It's really, really, really hard to But you've got to just practice and practice and practice and practice and practice until you're able to do it. | |
| And even if that means faking that you're forgetting about it, you know, I got to move on, I got to move on, I got to go with what's next. | |
| And so those are a couple that I learned. | |
| And listen, none of it comes like that. | |
| All of it is a process. | |
| It's all about layering, layering, layering your lessons until you become really strong and really well-skilled. | |
| Yeah, and you got to the point where you learned those lessons. | |
| You were really good. | |
| Interesting. | |
| I got to get, you know, just on interesting life. | |
| I know travel was a lot with that job. | |
| And, you know, now that you're able to have family time. | |
| But a curious question, speaking of that, I think some hot takes here. | |
| Because you were on the sidelines. | |
| I mean, you got to know, at least through the reporting, What's up with the Tom Brady deal this year? | |
| I mean, he takes two weeks off. | |
| I mean, everybody's saying that Giselle told him he had to spend time with the kids. | |
| I mean, is this just Tom being Tom? | |
| Well, it depends on which Tom we're talking about. | |
| Tom is an incredible competitor. | |
| But, you know, over the years, we would ask him, and we covered the Patriots a ton, and we have what we call production meetings. | |
| A couple days before the game, or the night before the game, depending on if the team was home or on the road, we'd sit, Al, Chris, and I, our producer-director, we'd sit in a room with Bill Belichick for a while, then Tom Brady for a while, then, you know, maybe a defensive player for a while, and you get this opportunity to really ask your own questions to make your broadcast unique. | |
| And Just about every year for the past five years, we'd say, so Tom, someone would say, what do you think? | |
| How much longer? | |
| And he'd always bring up his family and his wife and, you know, that his wife really wanted him to spend more time. | |
| I don't think that was any secret. | |
| It was out there, you know, look, he's 45 now. | |
| And she's been holding down the fort. | |
| Now, we can all accept that they've probably got a lot of help at home. | |
| But who knows? | |
| I mean, look, she's a very involved mom. | |
| I've seen it when she brings the kids to the Super Bowl. | |
| Having said that, this whole time you're saying, okay, so Tom, when are you going to wrap it up here? | |
| It surprised me. | |
| It didn't surprise me that Tom retired. | |
| It shocked me that he went back. | |
| It shocked me because I thought once he made the decision... | |
| That was a done deal. | |
| And there was no way he was going to turn his back on that decision. | |
| So I was really surprised that he decided to go back. | |
| And my hunch is maybe his wife was too. | |
| And look, there are a lot of rumors out there. | |
| That seems to be the consensus. | |
| But that's the background I can tell you about that relationship. | |
| Exactly. | |
| After 34 years of marriage to the woman who still absolutely takes my breath away, he had that look in a couple of interviews after he came back as if, yeah, I'm here, but I didn't talk to somebody and I got to go home. | |
| You know, that, oops, I got to go tell, for my case, I got to go tell Lisa that, honey, I made this decision. | |
| And I get that look like, well, it's your decision. | |
| You're going to have to live with it. | |
| You know, it's like, Yeah, exactly. | |
| Own it, baby. | |
| Own it. | |
| But I think, you know, she has really wanted his program. | |
| I think it surprised a lot of people he came back, especially to a team in which it doesn't frankly seem like, I mean, you know, you just, again, I'm an observer watching it. | |
| You've been a closer observer. | |
| The chemistry's there, but Gronk, you know, left. | |
| I mean, it's just like, what? | |
| There's a lot of people out there scratching their head because he doesn't seem to like it. | |
| There's all those rumors about the coach and everything else. | |
| That's why Bruce Arians stepped out of the coaching position. | |
| Who knows what's really all the inner workings. | |
| We can guess and guess and guess. | |
| I no longer have contact with the team. | |
| Trust me with any information. | |
| It's an interesting development. | |
| It'll be really... | |
| I think sad for a lot of people if it doesn't go well for the Buccaneers this year. | |
| Yeah, I can say that. | |
| Speaking of another hallucinogenic trip... | |
| I've never been on one of those. | |
| You've covered Aaron. | |
| Another one that you had... | |
| I mean, you were in Lambeau as much as you probably were up in Foxborough. | |
| So, I mean, one of the sure things, though, I knew you didn't have to come to Atlanta very often because, frankly, nobody cared for the most part. | |
| But Aaron Rodgers, The revelation of him taking time off to go to the mind-freeing I'm trying to put this in proper perspective. | |
| Yeah, I don't even know how to pronounce half of it, so don't ask me. | |
| I don't even know what it is. | |
| Go and get hot. | |
| I mean, I've heard of comedians doing this. | |
| It's like really weird, but did that really surprise you? | |
| Nothing surprises me. | |
| Aaron is one of the smartest, most interesting, creative minds I've met in or out of the NFL. He is... | |
| Willing to try a lot of things. | |
| And as we learned during the whole COVID thing, not necessarily one who likes to put his body at risk with stuff he doesn't know enough about. | |
| I remember he was recovering from a surgery and he didn't want to go through metal detectors at the airport because he was told that some of that radiation could impact his progress from surgery. | |
| So Aaron is very wary of and very curious and Very studious about these things, and he makes his decisions. | |
| So nothing surprises me about Aaron. | |
| I've had nothing but great interactions with Aaron. | |
| He sat for a piece that I wrote for Artful Living magazine and gave me a lot of stuff. | |
| This was back when he was still with Danica Patrick and revealed a lot of things to me about their relationship that he had never revealed before. | |
| I've known Aaron since he was a rookie. | |
| So, no, I'm not surprised. | |
| And again, this is a man who is so focused. | |
| He's a curious guy. | |
| He's just always looking for new ways to get better, change things. | |
| I'm a big believer in we are born with a massive amount of potential. | |
| How do we maximize it before we leave this earth? | |
| And I think he's just constantly reminding us of ways to do it. | |
| So I love Aaron. | |
| And who else could show up to preseason camp in a Nicolas Cage lookalike? | |
| Okay, give me a break. | |
| You've got to love that. | |
| Moving on, one of the hardest interviews it seems to me to do, and as someone who does a lot of interviews and now in podcasting has to conduct interviews, would seem to be the at halftime, coming out of halftime, coach's quick two questions. | |
| You did it very well in that give me the worst coach to deal with, the best coach to deal with. | |
| Well, I had a really interesting... | |
| Yeah. | |
| So here's the thing. | |
| On Sunday Night Football, we did ours off-camera. | |
| So I would run into the locker room at the end of the half generally with the coach who was the home field coach. | |
| Or maybe it was the away coach. | |
| It really depends. | |
| It depended. | |
| It depended. | |
| And I would get this quick, and some of them were great. | |
| Some of them would stop and actually talk. | |
| Some of them were like, keep up, run, let's go. | |
| And some of them would give you great stuff. | |
| Mike Zimmer was one of those. | |
| Some of them would just kind of dance around the edges. | |
| I had a really interesting experience with Jim Harbaugh when he was with the 49ers. | |
| How many stories in life have you ever started with? | |
| I had an interesting story with Jim Harbaugh. | |
| Interesting is one word. | |
| It was not pleasant. | |
| And he and I had to have a come-to-Jesus phone call one time because he misrepresented something that I said on the air. | |
| There were a lot of interesting stories with Jim Harbaugh. | |
| I'm happy for him. | |
| He's having success at Michigan. | |
| His brother, John, was a very different story. | |
| He and I got along phenomenally well. | |
| Love John Harbaugh. | |
| And I don't dislike Jim. | |
| He wasn't as... | |
| He's kind in those moments, as many coaches were. | |
| So I'm telling you that, knowing that he may never speak to me again. | |
| And that's okay, Jim, because I don't know that we'll have really a reason to talk again. | |
| But, I mean, yeah, he made it very, very challenging. | |
| I mentioned Mike Zimmer. | |
| Look, there were so many coaches that were just awesome coaches. | |
| Andy Reid, while he may not have given me a lot at halftime, that man was one of the most strong supporters of my career, of any NFL coach there ever was, behind the scenes. | |
| I get a little emotional even thinking about it, because... | |
| He didn't have to do it. | |
| He didn't have to be. | |
| Those are the most important people in your life. | |
| The ones that take the time and touch your life and didn't have to. | |
| And they did. | |
| Chan Gailey, former coach of the Cowboys. | |
| He's a good friend of mine. | |
| He's a good friend of the podcast. | |
| He's been on a couple of times. | |
| We get him on to give interviews. | |
| Chan is always funny in that regard. | |
| He's sort of one of those coaches. | |
| And I don't know how much dealings you had with Chan when he was with the Cowboys. | |
| Interesting guy, just an old country boy from North Georgia and South Georgia. | |
| But it just shows you that there's real people behind these coaches' positions. | |
| There's real people there. | |
| There really are. | |
| And Andy Reid and Tony Dungy each went through a son who died. | |
| Tony's a dear friend of mine. | |
| Tony, Tony Dungy played at the University of Minnesota for my father-in-law, my late father-in-law, who was a coach at the University of Minnesota. | |
| They knew each other before I even knew my future husband. | |
| So it all came full circle for Tony and me. | |
| And we're still very good friends. | |
| He's an amazing man. | |
| I would put Jason Garrett, who's now an announcer, one of the top human beings on the planet. | |
| And people love to slam him because, you know, look, you're the Dallas Cowboys coach. | |
| That's a hot seat, right? | |
| And there were ups and downs. | |
| There's no better man than Jason Garrett. | |
| Mike Tomlin. | |
| God, I just can't forget Mike Tomlin. | |
| I adore this guy. | |
| For so many reasons. | |
| But when you're looking for an example of leadership, all these guys are leaders. | |
| I'd probably follow Mike Tomlin off of a cliff. | |
| He is that powerful of a speaker. | |
| He is that wise of a person. | |
| I just love him. | |
| You know, I've always thought that... | |
| Tom Coughlin. | |
| Tom Coughlin, yeah. | |
| Tom Coughlin was another one. | |
| I love Bruce Arians. | |
| Sorry, Tom Brady. | |
| I love Bruce Arians. | |
| There we go. | |
| Okay, I'll stop. | |
| Curious question. | |
| Okay, you've led me to one last one. | |
| A lot of the ones you just mentioned are what I would consider older school. | |
| Okay, you know, the older school coaches. | |
| And not to dismiss, and I don't think you are dismissing, what do you think about this younger crop of coaches that They don't follow it as well. | |
| Well, look, it's a trend, and look who just led the Rams to the Super Bowl, right? | |
| So these guys, there's an interesting dynamic happening here. | |
| A lot of these younger guys, whether it's a relatability they have because they're closer in age with the players, I'm not sure what's going on, but it's really interesting to watch. | |
| It's really interesting to watch this sort of almost teammate to teammate relationship between a coach and a quarterback like there is in Los Angeles. | |
| And I could say these guys, the guys from... | |
| Sean McVay, I don't even think he's 40 yet, and he has a coaching tree, right? | |
| He's set up all these guys. | |
| So there is something going on here that is really interesting. | |
| And again, I'm not sure... | |
| Players must respect their coaches, and coaches have to respect their players. | |
| There's got to be... | |
| A mutual understanding there. | |
| And in the old school Tom Coughlin way, which I love the guy, it was, hey, and Vince Lombardi. | |
| Vince Lombardi time was, you show up 10 minutes early, that's on time. | |
| You don't show up at noon, you show up at 11.50 or you're late. | |
| So that kind of stuff is the old school. | |
| This new school is, it's different, it's still demanding, but I think it's a little more collaborative and it's really interesting to watch and it seems to be working in a lot of places. | |
| Well, and I think that is, you know, the last question. | |
| And folks, believe me, Michelle and I, we've hit it. | |
| We've been great. | |
| We've enjoyed Tom. | |
| We're going to be on. | |
| We've agreed we probably need to do these regularly, both on me on her show and her on my show. | |
| And who knows what we'll team up with as we go along. | |
| As a... | |
| I have to... | |
| I've told this on the podcast, told it on the radio show before. | |
| My kids went to Georgia. | |
| I grew up 40 miles. | |
| I represented the University of Georgia. | |
| But my granddad was in Alabama. | |
| He loved Bear Bryant. | |
| So I grew up with both. | |
| As long as Georgia and Alabama are doing good, and then when they play each other, I'm Georgia. | |
| But, you know, life is happy. | |
| Um... | |
| But your last game was the Super Bowl this past year on the sidelines in which Matthew Stafford, quarterback from Georgia, had went to Detroit, labored for years. | |
| And could you have thought of a better sort of scenario story for your last game on the side to watch Stafford sort of come full circle? | |
| I mean, to me, that was just an interesting story. | |
| You know, a lot around it. | |
| But from what I have gathered, he seems to be a straight-up guy, him and his wife and his family. | |
| And to have that kind of success, ending your time on the sidelines with that Super Bowl, was that an interesting time? | |
| It was. | |
| And, you know, for all of my experiences with Matthew Stafford have been very, very good. | |
| And he's seen that, again, I talk about that success between coach and player. | |
| And he and Sean McVay really had a connection that was interesting, finishing each other's sentences. | |
| It just worked. | |
| The other part of that story that I love that you may not care about, though, is Andrew Whitworth, who was their left tackle, who had struggled with injuries throughout his career, ends up getting named Walter Payton Man of the Year two nights before the Super Bowl. | |
| And then or may have been the night before. | |
| And then this is his final game, and he goes off into the sunset. | |
| And he is another straight-up Awesome human being. | |
| There are so many good guys in the NFL that... | |
| And we all love to focus on the Marshawn Lynch's and the stories of guys that kind of run into trouble or this and that. | |
| There are so many good guys in the NFL. Whitworth is one of the best. | |
| Jay and Stafford's a great dude. | |
| And yes, so watching that for him... | |
| And knowing all that he went through in Detroit and just the frustration and it felt like he was just beating his head against the wall. | |
| I love the AT&T commercial he ended up doing where he talked about trading in his phone, even though he'd had it for 12 years and loved every minute of it. | |
| It was terrific. | |
| Yeah, it was a great Super Bowl. | |
| It's etched in my memory for sure because I knew it was the last time I'd ever be on a field like that. | |
| That's pretty cool. | |
| Before we get gone, in your own words, tell us about your podcast. | |
| Well, it's called Sideline Sanity because I used to be a sideline reporter. | |
| You spent a lot of time there, Michelle, I'm telling you. | |
| I did. | |
| We wanted to make that connection for people. | |
| But the sanity part is, much like this conversation, just have sane conversations. | |
| And I like to amplify people who are really smart, interesting, wise people with really... | |
| Good intentions. | |
| And that may seem boring to some, but I had a guy on recently named Zuby. | |
| He's a rapper. | |
| He's got like a million followers on Twitter, and yet a lot of people have never heard of him. | |
| He's one of the most brilliant, interesting humans I've ever come into contact with. | |
| I had a woman stop me at the park the other day, and she said, thanks for introducing me to Zuby. | |
| So if I can amplify voices like that or perspectives like that that are sane and rooted in logic and fact, that's what I want to do. | |
| So please, go check out Sideline Sanity. | |
| If you've not checked out Sideline Sanity, you need to. | |
| Michelle Tafoya, I've enjoyed the past month or so, she and I getting to know each other, sharing our podcast, not only here on the Doug Collins podcast, but Sideline Sanity. | |
| You'll see here on my podcast, you'll see on her podcast, we'll see more of each other as we share. | |
| I mean, it's interesting, two different backgrounds coming to the same conclusions in life. | |
| I know! | |
| Politics, yeah. | |
| It can happen! | |
| You never know. | |
| Here it is, it all is, as we get it. | |
| Michelle, thanks for being on. | |
| Thank you so much for having me. | |
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