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Episode: Armchair Anonymous: Little League/Coaching

Author: Armchair Umbrella
Duration: 00:48:04

Episode Shownotes

Dax and Monica talk to Armcherries! In today's episode, Armcherries tell us a crazy little league/coaching incident.Follow Armchair Expert on the Wondery App or wherever you get your podcasts. Watch new content on YouTube or listen to Armchair Expert early and ad-free by joining Wondery+ in the Wondery App, Apple

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Summary

In this episode of 'Armchair Anonymous: Little League/Coaching,' hosts Dax and Monica share humorous and chaotic experiences from youth sports, exploring their nostalgic ties to Little League games. They recount tales of coaching challenges and confrontations during games, including an aggressive reaction from a parent that led to a physical altercation. The episode reflects on the unpredictability of youth coaching, the emotional dynamics of participation, and the often absurd behaviors exhibited by adults in sports environments. Ultimately, the conversation underscores the common vulnerabilities associated with youth sports.

Go to PodExtra AI's episode page (Armchair Anonymous: Little League/Coaching) to play and view complete AI-processed content: summary, mindmap, topics, takeaways, transcript, keywords and highlights.

Full Transcript

00:00:00 Speaker_10
Wondry Plus subscribers can listen to Armchair Expert early and ad free right now. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondry app or on Apple Podcasts. Or you can listen for free wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome, welcome, welcome to Armchair Anonymous.

00:00:16 Speaker_10
I'm Dan Rather and I'm joined by Miniature Mouse.

00:00:21 Speaker_02
Here I am.

00:00:22 Speaker_10
Hi there. Hi. How you doing?

00:00:24 Speaker_02
Pretty good.

00:00:25 Speaker_10
Pretty good?

00:00:26 Speaker_02
Yeah, I'm in the holiday spirit.

00:00:27 Speaker_10
Did this prompt make you wish you had played Little League baseball?

00:00:33 Speaker_02
No.

00:00:33 Speaker_10
No, me neither. I went to a ton of Little League games because I supported Aaron. I'd go to all his games.

00:00:39 Speaker_02
Oh, that's cute. I do love going to a Little League game or to a high school game. There's something very nostalgic about that.

00:00:49 Speaker_10
I'm about to enter that phase. Yeah, where Lincoln goes to a school that has sports, and I get emails inviting to sports. She's not even on, but you know, should we go support the school? And I very much want to. I think that sounds really fun.

00:01:03 Speaker_02
That's so fun. I want to go.

00:01:04 Speaker_10
Yeah, you can come. They need support.

00:01:06 Speaker_02
I will critique the cheerleaders.

00:01:08 Speaker_10
I don't even know that there's cheerleaders.

00:01:11 Speaker_02
That's sexist. Instead, I will start a cheerleading squad.

00:01:18 Speaker_10
Okay. I don't even know if there is. I'm just, if ever there wasn't going to be one at an all girls school, I feel like maybe that would be the place.

00:01:25 Speaker_02
They should still have cheerleaders. Cheerleaders are their own thing.

00:01:28 Speaker_10
Let's just get clarification for you. You like competitive cheer.

00:01:31 Speaker_02
No, I hated sideline cheer. Okay.

00:01:34 Speaker_10
So you're not, you don't really want Gail's.

00:01:37 Speaker_02
No, but they can do competition.

00:01:39 Speaker_10
Okay, but just, it wouldn't be a part of the sports game I'm going to see, right?

00:01:42 Speaker_02
No, it is. It's the same squad. So for us anyway, our competition squad cheered varsity football.

00:01:49 Speaker_10
But you didn't? You did.

00:01:50 Speaker_02
Yeah, we did. We had to. But you didn't like that part? No, I didn't. It felt annoying.

00:01:55 Speaker_02
I like the vibe of the games and the ambiance, but I wasn't really into sideline cheering very much, but we did use it as like, we practiced stunts and anyway, it was part of it. It was part of it.

00:02:08 Speaker_10
Now what I liked, and I know you guys didn't have this, but we had pom-pom. And they came out at halftime. They weren't there on the sidelines bouncing around during the game, but halftime came and they put on a full dance routine.

00:02:21 Speaker_10
And that was, Sassy Feld was one of the premier members of that team.

00:02:26 Speaker_02
JV, we did that. So when I was in JV or freshman football, we did have a halftime dance.

00:02:35 Speaker_10
And you liked that.

00:02:36 Speaker_02
Yeah, but it was nerve-wracking, but yeah.

00:02:38 Speaker_10
Okay. All right. Well, this is about Little League coaching disasters, and we have four of them coming your way. All of them are pretty PG. You might want to skip it because there's really nothing to see.

00:02:48 Speaker_02
Oh, don't say that.

00:02:49 Speaker_10
Okay, now we... Okay. I like the idea that you shouldn't listen no matter what.

00:02:53 Speaker_02
Okay. Yeah, but I'm scared of that one a little bit. Oh my gosh, hold on. Okay. When I was at Sephora the other day, I ran into a very fashionable arm cherry and her son, and her son listens.

00:03:06 Speaker_10
How old was he?

00:03:07 Speaker_02
I didn't ask, but my guess is 13. Oh. And it was so sweet.

00:03:13 Speaker_10
Yeah, I like that.

00:03:14 Speaker_02
I hope he enjoys this episode.

00:03:16 Speaker_10
Yeah, he might get some PTSD. Maybe he's been in one of these situations.

00:03:19 Speaker_02
Okay, then I hope he doesn't listen.

00:03:20 Speaker_10
Okay. Did you call him Tiger?

00:03:22 Speaker_02
Champ.

00:03:23 Speaker_10
Champ, okay. Please enjoy Little League Coaching Disaster Crazy Stories.

00:03:28 Speaker_05
The Grinch is back again to ruin your Christmas season with Tis the Grinch Holiday Podcast. Listen as his celebrity guests try to persuade the Grinch that there's more to love about the holiday season.

00:03:39 Speaker_05
Follow Tis the Grinch Holiday Podcast on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts.

00:04:02 Speaker_02
Hello.

00:04:05 Speaker_10
Hi there. Oh, wow. Immediate connection.

00:04:09 Speaker_02
We love that. That's very rare.

00:04:10 Speaker_10
Almost never happens. Hey, I do what I can to help you out. And you sound phenomenal. Are you a podcaster?

00:04:17 Speaker_07
I have to do a little bit of podcasting for my job, but yeah, they hooked us up with some sweet gear. Yeah, you sound phenomenal.

00:04:23 Speaker_10
Maybe even better than us.

00:04:24 Speaker_02
I know, I'm jealous of your mic.

00:04:26 Speaker_10
Are you recording? I am recording. We're set. Matt, you're on top of it. Are you an overachiever? Sometimes.

00:04:32 Speaker_07
My wife would tell you I need to slow down.

00:04:36 Speaker_02
Oh, that's good. You sound like one of us.

00:04:38 Speaker_07
Where are you at? I am in the Western suburbs of Minneapolis, Minnesota. Oh, we love Minneapolis.

00:04:45 Speaker_02
Nice guys.

00:04:46 Speaker_07
Yeah, good guys. Oh, and this story is all about Minnesota Nice. Let me tell you. Oh, wonderful. Tell us. Set the scene. It's pretty raw because it just happened. It happened in June.

00:04:57 Speaker_07
It takes place at my daughter's eight and under machine pitch fast pitch softball game.

00:05:04 Speaker_02
Oh, what's a machine pitch?

00:05:05 Speaker_07
In Minnesota, we use this funky blue spring-loaded arm, and you'll put the ball in, and you pull this little lever, and it shoots the ball in at about 35 miles an hour.

00:05:16 Speaker_10
It's mechanical, yet it's not automated, so you still have to load it. A person has to pull it.

00:05:22 Speaker_07
Yeah, and there's a little bit of skill to it. You know, we have a couple coaches who put on a little tutorial, and they teach you how to do it. And the ball will go everywhere.

00:05:28 Speaker_07
If you put the ball in wrong or it's wet, next thing you know, you're putting it into the girl's ear. Oh, boy.

00:05:34 Speaker_10
And can there be a strike or does it always throw a perfect ball? Oh, God, no, it is terrible.

00:05:38 Speaker_07
Oh, it just really depends about the user. There's a spring. So if the spring goes bad, if there's a wind, I feel like it's bad. The point of me saying it's machine pitch, though, is like this is entry level softball.

00:05:50 Speaker_07
Nobody's getting the full ride tomorrow. We're learning how to throw the ball, catch the ball, where to throw the ball, all those pieces. Last question. Is it co-ed or just girls only? Girls only. This is girls fast pitch softball.

00:06:03 Speaker_07
So my daughter has been playing now for a few years, since she was like five. And now she's going on 10, but she'd been in machine pitch for a couple of years. And this year was unique because she wanted to try out for an A-level team.

00:06:14 Speaker_07
So like an advanced team. When you sign your player up, you check the box to be a parent volunteer. I always do that. I love to coach. I've been a head coach. I've been an assistant. So I always check the box.

00:06:23 Speaker_07
And this year I got to be head coach of an A team. There's some differences. One, the players actually give a damn. They want to play. They love practice and they really want to win.

00:06:34 Speaker_07
The parents are in the same place and they may want to win a little bit more than their player sometimes. I've been very fortunate. Our parents were great people.

00:06:41 Speaker_07
I didn't ever really get that vibe, but some of the teams we've played, mom and dad are living vicariously through their eight-year-old. Oh, God, okay. So it's a Saturday morning.

00:06:51 Speaker_07
We're an A team playing in the top tier of the Minnesota State Tournament.

00:06:56 Speaker_10
Oh, wow, you made it to the state tournament. When you play AU, everybody makes it to the state tournament. I got it. Okay.

00:07:01 Speaker_07
But we're in the tier one, which was shocking to me because I wouldn't say we won a lot of games. All right.

00:07:08 Speaker_07
Everybody gets ranked and they have some weird algorithm and I don't really understand it, but they're going to rank these eight year old girls and we're like the 15th seed out of 20 in tier one.

00:07:17 Speaker_07
And if you follow March Madness in a bracket, you know, the bottom seeds are going to play the top seed. So we're going to play a team that has won more than they've lost. In fact, I don't know if they had lost more than like three or four games.

00:07:27 Speaker_10
Well, I was gonna say given the fact you made the top tier with a losing record tells me that there are a handful of teams that want every fucking match and then everyone else is kind of normal.

00:07:37 Speaker_07
Yeah, in fact the first team we played for the season beat us by one run. They went undefeated the rest of the year. So we get into this tournament and it's a Saturday morning. It's beautiful. We have a 9 a.m. game time.

00:07:51 Speaker_07
Before the game, we met with the umpire at home plate. You know, it's both coaches, a couple of players from the team, and the umpire's walking us through the rules. And there's some key rules for AAU softball. You can't advance on an overthrow.

00:08:04 Speaker_07
Girls can't run extra bases on ground balls that are fielded in the infield. So really the game is kind of a checkers match and they go one base at a time.

00:08:13 Speaker_07
Unless you've got girls who are like five, six, and they say they're eight or nine, but they might be 11 and they're hitting bombs to like left center. They walked us through that you could have a couple coaches in the field.

00:08:22 Speaker_07
We had a 70 minute time limit. The kicker is the umpire who's walking us through this is holding the rule book because she's 13 years old. No, no, no. Interesting. And this is her first game. That's a lot of pressure.

00:08:38 Speaker_02
I know.

00:08:39 Speaker_07
She's on the umpire track. Welcome to the Thunderdome. You know, it's like, holy shit. Here you go. Good luck. So we get into it. I'll just fast forward to the fourth inning. We're winning seven to nothing.

00:08:51 Speaker_07
We had a girl backhand a ball and throw it from third base to first on a line. And she had never done that in her life. Wow. We were on fire. So there's some run limits, too. In AU, you can only score five runs an inning.

00:09:02 Speaker_07
When you get into the fourth inning of a five-inning game, you start doing some math, and you're like, oh, if we score four runs, this game's over. So I tell our coaches, and our coaches are like, great, here we go.

00:09:12 Speaker_07
And we went out and just wet the bed. And we went one, two, three. We get through four innings at seven to three. We go in to the fifth inning. We have now run out of time.

00:09:22 Speaker_07
All the other games are letting out and the teams that are playing next on our field are warming up in the outfield and all their fans are coming in. So we have a crowd and it's getting heated.

00:09:34 Speaker_07
And as they start to score, things start coming out of their mouths, like, they don't deserve to win.

00:09:38 Speaker_12
Oh, jeez.

00:09:39 Speaker_07
Typically, you hear them coach each other's kids up. But now they're coming at my players. So all of a sudden, it's 7 to 6. There's two outs. And the bases are low. In the bottom of the last inning, we have an audience.

00:09:53 Speaker_07
This girl comes up and hits a BB at my third baseman, who thankfully was probably our best player on the team. She was a stud. And she misplays it. And it bounces off of her knee.

00:10:03 Speaker_07
She fields it, she gets to the third base, steps on the bag, beats the girl, and I'm thinking, game's over. And the umpire, 13-year-old girl, calls her safe. Uh-oh. Oh no. Was she just at a disadvantaged viewing spot?

00:10:16 Speaker_07
I'll get to it here in just a second. Oh, okay, okay, okay. My wife would tell you I jumped about 14 feet in the air and yelled no at the top of my lungs. I did not argue with the umpire. She's 13, they're gonna miss the call.

00:10:27 Speaker_07
And we didn't have umpires all season. Mostly coaches called the games because it's beginner softball. So who gives a fuck?

00:10:34 Speaker_10
Yeah, sure. Also, though, Minnesota honor policy works probably in Minnesota, not everywhere.

00:10:39 Speaker_07
Nobody lies here, right? I start running to third base because I got to check on this girl. Both of my coaches out in the field now huddle the girls up because based on what has happened, the game's tied seven to seven.

00:10:51 Speaker_07
And they can win it with one more run because they can score five in an inning and that'll be their fifth. I have another coach who asked the umpire, can you just clarify what you saw?

00:11:00 Speaker_07
And the umpire said, oh yeah, your third baseman beat her to the bag, but she had to tag her. And our manager coach goes, why? It was bases loaded. And the umpire like has this aha moment. And she goes, you are 100% right.

00:11:13 Speaker_07
And she announces very loudly, coaches, I'm reversing my call. The runner's out. I'm like, it's a force out. The game is over. And she goes, you're right. Coaches, line them up. Game's over.

00:11:24 Speaker_10
Oh no, this poor. This poor 13 year old girl.

00:11:28 Speaker_07
So now she's changed the call.

00:11:29 Speaker_10
No, no. When you get a third person out, you automatically get five runs. We won by six points.

00:11:34 Speaker_07
You're right. And I'm like, great, line it up. And the fans in the other stands have gone ape shit. Oh, wow. And they are screaming at the 13-year-old girl. Like, they are letting her have it. Oh, no. How dare you? You can't do that.

00:11:51 Speaker_07
You're not allowed to change calls. You're such a bitch. They're calling your names. They're like, how the fuck could you do this to us? They are lighting her up. The parents are screaming at our girls. Oh, boy.

00:12:03 Speaker_07
They're now also telling the girls, don't line up, shake their hands.

00:12:06 Speaker_03
Oh my god.

00:12:07 Speaker_07
These girls are cheaters, they're liars, they don't deserve it. Our girls are hearing this and the tears start rolling. Oh no. This guy comes screaming through our dugout, making a straight line for the umpire. He's charging at the 13-year-old girl.

00:12:23 Speaker_07
What the fuck? Jesus. What. The. Fuck. People lose themselves. One of our coaches sees this and he steps in immediately. And this guy's like 6'2", 220. Okay. And the guy's onto the field yelling, fuck you, you bitch. I have words for you.

00:12:38 Speaker_07
You fucking ruined our season. He's going off on her. Oh my god. My coach gets in between him and her at about the first base bag. Our girls are sobbing. And my other coaches are now like put their heads together and like bear hug them.

00:12:54 Speaker_07
And they're like giving them positive love and affirmation. You know, they're like, you're great. You're beautiful. Gosh darn it, people like you. Meanwhile, I'm listening to this assistant coach who's like my brother.

00:13:05 Speaker_07
I'm listening to his voice go up and up and louder. And I'm like, this is getting bad. And I look and this guy's like poking him in the chest. The angry dad's poking your buddy. Yeah. Except he's not a dad. We didn't know that yet.

00:13:19 Speaker_07
And he shoves my assistant coach. And I watch like the slow motion of his arms cocking back to like light this guy up. And I go running and I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Get out of here. You need to go get our girls lined up. I've got this.

00:13:33 Speaker_07
And now I'm face to face with the angry citizen who wants to crush this umpire. Pretty sure I heard the sea water. Wow. It was unbelievable. And I'm like hurting him off the field like he's a cow. And I'm like, sir, you have to quit cussing.

00:13:50 Speaker_07
I need you off the field. And he's screaming at me like at an 11, so I'm talking to him at like a three. My wife hates me for it. I do it all the time. So I'm talking to this guy, and I think I've got him calmed down.

00:14:00 Speaker_07
And all of a sudden, I'm arms out, I'm ushering him off. He goes, don't you dare fucking touch me. And boom, right under my left eye. No. He throws a punch. Throws a punch. Now, I did not know I was in a boxing match.

00:14:15 Speaker_10
Yeah, your three backfired on you. You went to three, he went to 17.

00:14:19 Speaker_07
He went to 17, popped me in the eye. I go tumbling backwards. I've never been punched before, and I would say it was a good punch. It wasn't the best punch, but he got me. He tagged ya. He surprised the shit out of me.

00:14:33 Speaker_10
Sure, sure. Been there. And it takes you a good 20 seconds before you put all the pieces together. Like, okay, huh, I was standing, I'm laying down. Oh, and I heard a crack in my head. Oh, right. I've been punched. Oh, here we are. Right.

00:14:44 Speaker_10
You got to kind of like catch up to what's happening.

00:14:46 Speaker_07
All of that. I mean, I'm on the ground, I look over, the girls are still sobbing, and now they're really freaked out. Yes. Coach Matt just got put on his ass. This is so traumatic. I know.

00:14:56 Speaker_07
Coach Matt is on the ground, looking around, dazed and totally confused. And our fans obviously erupted. And it's the state tournament, so it's aunts, uncles, grandparents. But other teams had made their way listening to what was going on.

00:15:12 Speaker_07
So now there's coaches from other teams and they're chasing this guy out. Meanwhile, I'm sitting in a pile of dirt and I look at one of our parents and I said, did that guy just fucking punch me? And she goes, yeah, he did.

00:15:25 Speaker_07
And I'm talking to the police right now. Oh. So 9-1-1 gets called. Now other teams players are sobbing. Oh boy. They've seen it. It's become like a crime right here on this field. So this guy and his girlfriend tried to flee the scene.

00:15:41 Speaker_07
We had parents that had to sit on the bumper of this car. Then we had to look at our players and say, OK, you just won. You have to go play again. I'm like, good luck. Use this energy. I mean, they were a mess. Half the girls wanted to quit.

00:15:55 Speaker_07
We have players from other teams that wanted to quit. And now I'm like, somebody has got to clean the dugout because I've got to go talk to the police for the next 45 minutes and press charges because you don't get to do this.

00:16:07 Speaker_07
You don't get to behave like that on the field. The worst part, I think, about it, too, was that the other coaches never came and checked on us. They denied knowing this guy. This was an uncle of a player. Okay, uncles, yeah.

00:16:18 Speaker_07
Uncles get serious at 8U softball. Okay, they get fucking irate. And now we're like picking up the pieces and I became a celebrity at that tournament for all the wrong reasons that day.

00:16:29 Speaker_03
Yeah, that's huge.

00:16:30 Speaker_07
So did you guys lose the next game? You guys, I'm gonna be really honest. We kicked the shit out of the next team.

00:16:35 Speaker_03
Nice!

00:16:37 Speaker_07
And then we went home for the night and then the adrenaline went away and we came back the next day and got thumped. Yeah. But we finished fourth in state, which was great.

00:16:46 Speaker_07
I will tell you, the core memory of these girls is not fourth in state, it's Coach Matt in the dirt. What did your daughter think of all this? So my daughter, thankfully, she had her back to me when I got hit.

00:16:56 Speaker_07
So she had a lot of questions about, why would someone get so mad about a Little League game?

00:17:02 Speaker_02
There's no answer for that.

00:17:03 Speaker_07
Yeah, hard to answer.

00:17:05 Speaker_02
Yeah.

00:17:05 Speaker_07
We went to Zoom traffic court, basically. He had come to terms with his mistake and pled guilty. Oh, good. He could have gotten some jail time, I think, but they pled him out with some money, a lot of community service, anger management.

00:17:19 Speaker_07
I hope that sticks.

00:17:20 Speaker_10
Sure. Did you find out if he had any priors for cold cocking strangers in public?

00:17:25 Speaker_07
He had never been arrested for cold cocking somebody. He'd been arrested for other things.

00:17:30 Speaker_02
Okay. He almost punched that 13-year-old. That was going to happen if no one had intervened.

00:17:35 Speaker_07
If he had gotten to the umpire, I think that probably gets pretty ugly, right?

00:17:38 Speaker_02
Yeah.

00:17:38 Speaker_10
Even when you call her an umpire, I lose track of it. I know. She shouldn't even have called that, but yes, I understand.

00:17:44 Speaker_02
The 13-year-old girl who's trying to do her best.

00:17:47 Speaker_10
I'm picturing a 62-year-old man on the weekend making 20 bucks.

00:17:51 Speaker_07
It's not like she was even out there in ump gear. She was out there in shorts and a t-shirt. This was like her warmup. Like, do I want to go be an umpire and get paid on the weekends when I'm not playing competitive travel softball myself?

00:18:03 Speaker_07
And the next day she showed back up. She was there. Now, her mom came with her the next day, and I think I probably would have too.

00:18:10 Speaker_10
Oh boy. Madness.

00:18:12 Speaker_02
That's crazy. Yeah, really devolved.

00:18:14 Speaker_10
We have a friend who's almost permanently at a little league game. He's got two boys. Two weeks can't go by without him reporting on some dad who goes berserk. It's crazy to me that people don't enter going like, okay, we know the bad thing.

00:18:26 Speaker_10
I can't be that dude. It's not like we don't know about this archetype.

00:18:30 Speaker_07
What's fascinating to me is I played competitive sports growing up forever. So I've been in this for 35 years. I've never seen that. I've seen some crazy.

00:18:38 Speaker_07
I've seen guys throw buckets of balls on the field and I've seen guys get thrown out for arguing balls and strikes and dropping F-bombs and saying inappropriate things to umpires. But I've never seen someone go onto a field and chase down an umpire.

00:18:50 Speaker_07
That's next level crazy. And I blame participation trophies. Everybody thinks they deserve to win. It's like, come on, you gotta lose. That's part of the game.

00:19:00 Speaker_10
The majority of people don't win the championship.

00:19:02 Speaker_02
That's right. Yeah.

00:19:03 Speaker_10
Monica wouldn't know what that's like.

00:19:05 Speaker_02
I do majority win the championship, so I don't know, but I can only imagine.

00:19:08 Speaker_10
I know what it's like to be a loser, yeah. Well, Matt, that was delightful. I'm sorry you got tagged, but also I'm glad I got to hear about it.

00:19:16 Speaker_07
Thank you for having me. I appreciate it. I'm sorry I got tagged too. I think at the end of the day, we're glad I was the one that got hit.

00:19:21 Speaker_10
And this is a very weird thing to say, but I also think it's good for a man to get blasted once in the face before they die. You know, we should all have that experience. I mean, not really, but also I kind of feel that way. It was eye-opening.

00:19:32 Speaker_10
You live in fear of it your whole childhood, and then it happens and you live.

00:19:36 Speaker_07
I just, I think was always really good at evading the right hook, and this time I just was ill-prepared for it. Right. All right, well, great meeting you. Thanks for telling us that story, Matt.

00:19:44 Speaker_10
Yeah, I hope you guys have a really nice holiday season. Okay, you too, brother. Take care. Bye-bye.

00:19:50 Speaker_02
You missed my really good joke. Luckily, Rob heard it.

00:19:52 Speaker_10
I know, I looked over and you guys were giggling to each other.

00:19:54 Speaker_02
Yeah, because you said it was eye-opening and I said it was eye-closing.

00:19:58 Speaker_10
That's really good.

00:19:59 Speaker_02
Do you want to punch me in the face a little bit?

00:20:01 Speaker_10
Never.

00:20:02 Speaker_02
I kind of do want to know what it feels like.

00:20:04 Speaker_10
Right. That's what I'm saying. It's like, I can only speak as being a boy. You're seeing your buddies get punched all the time. You're so afraid of it happening. And then it happens and you're like, that's okay.

00:20:11 Speaker_02
Yeah. Except you wouldn't say that about a car crash.

00:20:13 Speaker_10
I might.

00:20:14 Speaker_02
No.

00:20:15 Speaker_10
Okay.

00:20:15 Speaker_02
If you can go through life without getting in a car crash, that's best case scenario.

00:20:19 Speaker_10
Oh yeah. Maybe that's better.

00:20:20 Speaker_02
Do you want to try to punch my leg? So that could be kind of like it.

00:20:23 Speaker_10
I don't want to punch you at all.

00:20:24 Speaker_02
Rob, do you want to punch my leg and see what it's like? Have you ever punched anyone?

00:20:30 Speaker_10
Just Vinny. When I was a kid, probably. Can you imagine if someone punched Vinny?

00:20:36 Speaker_02
No, that's what I'm saying. You don't want Vinny to get punched in his life. I don't.

00:20:40 Speaker_10
Well, only if he was afraid of it and he lived in great fear of it and then it happened and he was like, okay, I don't need to worry that much about that. It's not a big deal. Only in that scenario.

00:20:48 Speaker_10
It's a very, very specific set of guidelines I want Vinny to get punched under.

00:20:53 Speaker_02
To the armchairs who heard that, don't take this as an invite if you see me on the street to punch me, okay?

00:21:09 Speaker_05
Hello, ladies and gerbs, boys and girls. The Grinch is back again to ruin your Christmas season with Tiz the Grinch Holiday Podcast.

00:21:16 Speaker_05
After last year, he's learned a thing or two about hosting, and he's ready to rant against Christmas cheer and roast his celebrity guests like chestnuts on an open fire.

00:21:26 Speaker_05
You can listen with the whole family as guest stars like Jon Hamm, Brittany Broski, and Danny DeVito try to persuade the mean old Grinch that there's a lot to love about the insufferable holiday season. But that's not all.

00:21:38 Speaker_05
Somebody stole all the children of Whoville's letters to Santa, and everybody thinks the Grinch is responsible. It's a real Whoville whodunit. Can Cindy Lou and Max help clear the Grinch's name? Grab your hot cocoa and cozy slippers to find out.

00:21:52 Speaker_05
Follow Tis the Grinch Holiday Podcast on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Unlock weekly Christmas mystery bonus content and listen to every episode ad-free by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Spotify, or Apple Podcasts.

00:22:09 Speaker_00
They say Hollywood is where dreams are made, a seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant.

00:22:24 Speaker_00
When TV producer Roy Radin was found dead in a canyon near L.A. in 1983, There were many questions surrounding his death.

00:22:32 Speaker_00
The last person seen with him was Laney Jacobs, a seductive cocaine dealer who desperately wanted to be part of the Hollywood elite. Together, they were trying to break into the movie industry.

00:22:44 Speaker_00
But things took a dark turn when a million dollars worth of cocaine and cash went missing. From Wondery comes a new season of the hit show Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder.

00:22:56 Speaker_00
Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of The Cotton Club Murder early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus.

00:23:16 Speaker_06
Hello.

00:23:17 Speaker_10
Megan, is it?

00:23:18 Speaker_06
Yes, Megan.

00:23:19 Speaker_10
Nice to meet you. Where are you?

00:23:20 Speaker_06
I'm in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

00:23:23 Speaker_10
Oh, okay. Okay. Okay. Yes. Monica's on a pun kick right now. This is like the third in a row. I swear we had very little Oklahomans and now we've had like three in a row.

00:23:34 Speaker_06
Yeah. It's spreading there. I've been proselytizing you guys to everyone I know.

00:23:39 Speaker_10
Oh, thank you. So are you the parent of a Little Leaguer?

00:23:42 Speaker_06
Not yet. I have a five-year-old son. He's about to start playing basketball.

00:23:45 Speaker_10
But you have a Little League story.

00:23:47 Speaker_06
This is my story.

00:23:48 Speaker_10
Oh, wonderful. It's a personal story. First of all, can I see your t-shirt?

00:23:53 Speaker_06
Yes. It's you.

00:23:54 Speaker_10
Oh my God. I've never seen that. That's incredible.

00:23:59 Speaker_06
It's from Etsy. So it's not off your website.

00:24:01 Speaker_10
We encourage people to make as much shit as they want. We're not litigious.

00:24:04 Speaker_02
Oh, absolutely. Yeah. We are going to have a new March drop coming soon for anyone who wants more merch.

00:24:11 Speaker_06
I was wondering about that. So that's awesome. I'll be on the lookout.

00:24:14 Speaker_10
All right, so yeah, hit us with Little League.

00:24:15 Speaker_06
So this story takes place in 1994, small town, Oklahoma. I was nine years old. My brother, he's five years older than me. So he had been playing Little League for several years before I got to the age where I was ready to start playing.

00:24:29 Speaker_06
I loved every part of being at his games and my dad was always his coach. So my parents just kind of thought, well, we'll throw her in Little League with the boys versus softball. I was all for that. So. I was a decent player.

00:24:40 Speaker_06
I was pitcher for my teams most of the time.

00:24:42 Speaker_03
Oh, wow.

00:24:43 Speaker_06
I didn't throw super hard, but I was really accurate and consistent. But because I was pretty good, I hadn't really had a whole lot of boys teasing me about being a girl on the team or anything like that yet.

00:24:54 Speaker_06
But one day we were about to play a game and me and my teammates were warming up. And this kid from the other team comes over and he says something to the effect of, you guys have a girl on your team. We're going to kill you guys.

00:25:05 Speaker_06
Like girls suck at sports, basically, is what he was saying. I was pretty pissed and my dad, he was an assistant coach on this team and he saw that I was pretty upset.

00:25:17 Speaker_06
He asked me what the kid said and I told him and he said, well, what do you think you're going to do? And I said, well, I'll just strike him out every time he comes up. Dad said, well, I think he needs to learn a lesson.

00:25:28 Speaker_10
I had a hunch maybe dad might say, why don't you beam him, but continue.

00:25:31 Speaker_06
These are two approaches. Two good options. So I'm pitching that game and this kid comes up in like the third inning, which tells you that he sucks. Yeah. Ugh, I hate this kid.

00:25:44 Speaker_10
And then maybe you could even be compassionate.

00:25:45 Speaker_06
No!

00:25:46 Speaker_10
He sucks, now he's insecure, so he's gotta make other people feel bad.

00:25:50 Speaker_06
I don't!

00:25:50 Speaker_10
Okay, alright.

00:25:51 Speaker_06
I didn't feel bad for him. It pissed me off even more, because he thought he was automatically better than me. Exactly. Because I was a girl. So anyways, third inning, kid comes up, and I start pitching to him.

00:26:01 Speaker_06
I pitch the first pitch, straight down the middle, the kid swings and misses. Second pitch, same thing. I throw it right down the middle, he swings and misses, so I've got two strikes on him, no balls.

00:26:10 Speaker_06
Right before I throw the third pitch, I look over at my dad and he's just got this look on his face. He nods his head up and down like, yeah, you know what to do. I love your dad.

00:26:20 Speaker_10
This is uncharacteristic of you, Monica. You're voting for violence.

00:26:24 Speaker_06
This is not like you. Yeah, you never go for violence, Monica. This is my role. This little shit deserves it. Third pitch, I throw it as hard as I possibly can right at this kid's body. I didn't throw it at his head, I wasn't trying to kill him.

00:26:38 Speaker_06
That was nice of you.

00:26:39 Speaker_10
Monica's upset, but continue.

00:26:40 Speaker_06
You could have, but you showed some mercy. The kid panics when he sees the ball coming at him, and instead of turning away from it, he opens his body to it, and it just lands right in the middle of his chest. Everyone can hear the thud.

00:26:53 Speaker_06
And he immediately falls to the ground, he throws his bat, and he just starts bawling crying.

00:27:00 Speaker_10
Okay, so now did it turn Monica? Are you still in?

00:27:02 Speaker_02
I'm still kind of in.

00:27:03 Speaker_10
Okay, okay.

00:27:06 Speaker_02
I mean, he's definitely an incel right now.

00:27:08 Speaker_06
That, I do know, is what the product of this was. The umpire was finally like, hey, you can take your base to first base.

00:27:15 Speaker_06
And about that time, his mom had come down out of the stands, out onto the field, and took the kid out of the game, and they left completely. The country? Maybe.

00:27:24 Speaker_06
Amongst all of that drama, I looked up in the stands to my mom, and she was pissed off, like I could tell.

00:27:31 Speaker_09
At you or your dad?

00:27:32 Speaker_06
Well, she knew I had done it on purpose. She had a hunch that he was behind the whole thing. So later that night we got a pretty good lecture about how terrible the lesson that is for a nine-year-old fair. I felt vindicated. I loved every second of it.

00:27:48 Speaker_10
I hope that's the last time he opened his mouth to a girl, but I'm afraid it maybe got worse.

00:27:55 Speaker_02
I'm afraid too.

00:27:56 Speaker_10
I know love's the answer, Monica. It's hard.

00:27:59 Speaker_02
Tell him love is the answer.

00:28:00 Speaker_10
He sucks.

00:28:03 Speaker_06
Well, the funniest part of the story is years later, I ended up having a one night stand with this guy. No. Stop it.

00:28:09 Speaker_09
Stop it. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

00:28:11 Speaker_10
You gotta give us a little more than that. Under what circumstance? I gotta love this left turn.

00:28:18 Speaker_06
Did you give him blue balls? Was this like a long game? I ended up going to high school with him, and when this all happened, I didn't make the connection at this time. I didn't realize it was the same kid until later on.

00:28:28 Speaker_06
And I don't know if he made the connection either. Obviously, he wasn't too butthurt about it. Let's just say he was about as good in bed as he was at playing baseball.

00:28:37 Speaker_10
Oh, this piece of shit. I mean, the bar is fucking low. No, he sucks.

00:28:42 Speaker_02
He sucks. We knew it then and we know it now.

00:28:44 Speaker_10
That's right.

00:28:45 Speaker_02
Oh, wow.

00:28:47 Speaker_10
Oh my god, I love that you hooked up with him. That's crazy.

00:28:49 Speaker_06
That's hilarious. What would you do in that situation, Dax, if a kid said something to one of your girls?

00:28:55 Speaker_10
It's really funny you would bring this up, because I didn't foresee this would ever be a thing that I would have to deal with having girls, but I'll leave them for you to guess.

00:29:03 Speaker_10
But one of them has a classmate that keeps touching her inappropriately, and she has told her, like, very directly, do not touch me. Again, I'm going to be a little sympathetic. This girl's probably got something going on.

00:29:13 Speaker_10
I don't know why she is this way.

00:29:15 Speaker_02
Oh, it's a girl doing it?

00:29:16 Speaker_10
I hate to, I have to assume something's not great at home.

00:29:19 Speaker_02
At home, yeah.

00:29:20 Speaker_10
and they're young and I said okay well here's what we're gonna do we're gonna make the teacher aware of this and that is step one and if it does not correct itself you have my full blessing to do whatever you want if someone's ever touching you inappropriately whatever has to happen I stand by you in this situation so weirdly that just came up.

00:29:40 Speaker_02
I approve of that.

00:29:41 Speaker_10
Okay, TBD.

00:29:43 Speaker_02
Teacher first, you know, you do all the protocols. Hopefully that will work.

00:29:47 Speaker_10
But you don't want someone to touch your body if you don't want them to. No, you don't. Again, it breaks my heart because I think this girl's probably already got some stuff going on. So I don't also want her to get beat up.

00:29:54 Speaker_10
But I've seen Delta go after her older sister and I mean, that's... It's obvious? Yeah, it's kind of obvious. I've seen Delta go after her older sister and I have had the thought.

00:30:04 Speaker_10
I hope no one ends up on the other end of her because she is a feisty motherfucker.

00:30:09 Speaker_03
I love it. It's good quality.

00:30:11 Speaker_10
Oh Megan, what a story. Yeah, that was fantastic.

00:30:15 Speaker_06
I love that story.

00:30:16 Speaker_10
Monica's horny.

00:30:17 Speaker_06
I want to say something real quick before I go. I know you don't like talking about day seven, but May of 2022, I was in a gnarly relapse. And one day I had a particularly bad night.

00:30:29 Speaker_06
And the next day I was home alone and decided to listen to day seven again. And when you started talking about how it just hit you all of a sudden that you needed to get honest with Kristen and Monica, that sat with me.

00:30:40 Speaker_06
And it was just like, Oh my God, I have to get honest with my wife. wife and everyone. And so later that night, I told her everything I'd been hiding. And a week later, I got into treatment and I've been sober ever since. Oh, my God.

00:30:52 Speaker_10
Congratulations. That's so beautiful.

00:30:56 Speaker_06
Oh, you're killing it.

00:30:58 Speaker_10
Yeah. How liberating is that, huh? To finally stop carrying all that.

00:31:02 Speaker_06
It's great. In fact, we're going through some tough stuff with my son right now. And I'm like, thank God I'm sober, man. It would be.

00:31:07 Speaker_10
Way worse. That's the big gift, right? You can show up for people.

00:31:10 Speaker_06
That's right.

00:31:11 Speaker_10
Thanks for telling me that.

00:31:12 Speaker_06
Yes, of course. You guys take care.

00:31:14 Speaker_10
You two keep proselytizing. Okay, I will.

00:31:16 Speaker_02
Bye. Bye. She's awesome.

00:31:19 Speaker_10
And I love her.

00:31:20 Speaker_02
I hate that boy.

00:31:21 Speaker_10
Yeah, you really hate that boy. Was it you? Really brought up some stuff. No, I didn't talk to girls like that. I was a nice boy-ish.

00:31:28 Speaker_12
You talked to me mean.

00:31:29 Speaker_10
You talked to me mean.

00:31:30 Speaker_12
I know.

00:31:32 Speaker_10
You're a worthy adversary. Now, you know I say I don't like when people spell standard names differently. I'm really enjoying the spelling of this.

00:31:40 Speaker_02
What is it?

00:31:41 Speaker_10
M-A-D-I.

00:31:41 Speaker_02
Oh, I like that.

00:31:42 Speaker_10
Right? That's good. I reversed my position. Reverse back. Hello.

00:31:47 Speaker_11
Hi.

00:31:48 Speaker_10
I was just saying, Maddie, I generally don't like when people spell a standard name differently, yet here I am. I love M-A-D-I.

00:31:56 Speaker_04
Thanks. My name's Madison. And so when I was little and people called me Maddie, I just cut off the S-O-N.

00:32:02 Speaker_10
Ditch the sun.

00:32:02 Speaker_04
Smart. Efficient.

00:32:04 Speaker_10
Okay, Maddie, you have a Little League story?

00:32:05 Speaker_04
I do. For context, I grew up in Northern Virginia, which is kind of intense with sports, kind of intense with academics.

00:32:11 Speaker_10
Really quick, why? Is that where George Washington is? What's there? Why is it academically hard?

00:32:16 Speaker_04
It might just be because it's outside of DC, but I know that it's like nationally ranked in academics. And I did crew. I rode for my high school and we had to practice five days a week. We had races on Saturdays and it was a whole day affair.

00:32:32 Speaker_04
Also, we were required to go to this training camp every spring break and it was in South Carolina. Our whole team would get in a bus and we would drive eight or nine hours down to South Carolina.

00:32:41 Speaker_04
to go to this crew camp and we would practice and train for six to eight hours every day for a whole week. It was fun. It was a cool destination.

00:32:50 Speaker_04
It was a Boy Scout camp, so the place itself was maybe a little bit run down, but it was fun for high school. We were having a great time. We were a little sleep deprived. It was all together a good experience.

00:33:02 Speaker_04
And we were down there, and I've got two kind of related stories to share from the same trip. Also, our coach was probably as old as I am now. I'm like 27. I don't think this guy could have been older than I am. Oh, oh.

00:33:15 Speaker_10
Well, hold on. Don't worry yet. Don't worry.

00:33:18 Speaker_04
OK. He was in the military, and then wasn't anymore. I think he had some sort of experience with crew, and he took himself very seriously. But we, as a team, maybe didn't take him as seriously as he would have maybe liked us to.

00:33:30 Speaker_10
I can picture it perfectly.

00:33:32 Speaker_04
So he had the idea that we should go on a night row, which isn't a thing. Never done it before, never done it since. But he thought we should go rowing at night by the moonlight.

00:33:43 Speaker_04
And as an adult now, I know that there are requirements for the kinds of lights that you need to have on a boat to go out in the water at night. You need a little light in the front and a light in the back. We didn't have that.

00:33:53 Speaker_04
The coach gift did not have that. And it's kind of a silly atmosphere. It's very leisurely. It's a little whimsical. And we're out here and we're rowing and something hits the bottom of our boat.

00:34:02 Speaker_10
Can I ask, are you in a lake or a river?

00:34:04 Speaker_04
We're in a lake, and you're not supposed to keep going. If something hits your boat, you're supposed to stop because the rudder underneath can break off.

00:34:12 Speaker_04
So we stopped rowing, and whatever it is that's just hit our boat is now sliding towards the front of our boat, but in a way of like a living creature.

00:34:21 Speaker_04
No, like it's not going in the same direction as the current, and we're in South Carolina, so we're sure that this is an alligator that's underneath our boat.

00:34:30 Speaker_10
Of course.

00:34:31 Speaker_04
Oh, I hate your coach.

00:34:32 Speaker_10
I'm going straight to gators.

00:34:33 Speaker_04
So the alleged alligator then hits, like, thwacks the bottom of the boat in the front. So we're spooked. It's dark. And we've been messing around this whole time. So the tatter from us is not probably alerting our coach that anything's wrong.

00:34:48 Speaker_04
The girl in the front of the boat then starts telling everybody that there is water coming in. boat from underneath her feet. Oh, we're trying desperately to get the attention of our coach. He comes over.

00:35:00 Speaker_04
It's really hard to get a little motorized boat next to the really small crew boat that we have. So he's trying to investigate and see what's going on, but he can't really see. So he just takes our word for it.

00:35:10 Speaker_04
And he gets on his coach voice and he's like, all right, we got a power 10 all the way back to the dock. So now this goes from like leisurely, funny, and then we're rowing full speed all the way back to the dock.

00:35:21 Speaker_10
Can I ask a quick question? Did he even bring a flashlight? Did he shine a light at the boat to see if water was coming on?

00:35:27 Speaker_04
He did shine a light. I can't remember if it was his phone flashlight or if it was an actual flashlight. We know it was the phone. So we get back, he sees that there is a hole.

00:35:37 Speaker_04
We can't take that boat out anymore because we have to repair it back in Virginia. So that boat is out of commission. Then we fast forward to the last day of our camp. We would always do like a scrimmage.

00:36:05 Speaker_04
On this day, it was really cold, maybe 45 or 50 degrees, and it was really windy. And other coaches had safety concerns about putting us out on the water because there was white caps and it was really windy.

00:36:17 Speaker_04
Obviously, our ex-military coach is having none of that. So he determines that we should probably go on this race, even if it's just the boats from our school. So he's like, we're going to have our own scrimmage. It's going to be great.

00:36:30 Speaker_10
Oh, boy.

00:36:31 Speaker_04
So we're mad. And it's hard to kind of row against the waves. And we're generally not having a super great time. And we get like five or 10 minutes out from the dock. And then he realizes that the other boat that was with us is lagging behind.

00:36:44 Speaker_04
So he tells us to pull our boat over into this little cove off the main waterway of the lake. And he says he's going to go back and check on the other group.

00:36:53 Speaker_04
So he goes back and we're sitting there and the waves are lapping up on the boat and it's uncomfortable. It's splashing us like it's really cold. Quickly the boat starts taking on water. The waves are coming over the side of the boat.

00:37:07 Speaker_04
We start trying to bail out the boat with our water bottles, with our shoes and by just splashing water out. That's clearly doing nothing.

00:37:17 Speaker_04
I don't know how much time elapsed between when he told us to pull over and when we're, like, waist-deep in water, but I think it was five to ten minutes. And I'm talking, like, I was up to my waist.

00:37:28 Speaker_04
The boat was underneath the water, but we were still sitting in it. Oh, my God. He's coming over, and we're, like, arms up in the air, screaming, panicking. There's crying, there's laughing. Everything's kind of going on.

00:37:40 Speaker_10
At any point, did anyone think to row to shore and get off the fucking boat?

00:37:44 Speaker_04
No one thought about that. And I couldn't tell you why. There wasn't like a shore shore that we could have rowed to. It was houses with docks and like a seawall, but nobody thought that we should move or do anything.

00:37:56 Speaker_10
Right. Cause you've been bludgeoned into submission by a coach.

00:38:00 Speaker_04
Yeah, it's literally Stockholm syndrome.

00:38:02 Speaker_10
Yeah, the military is dicey cause sometimes you gotta break that chain of command.

00:38:06 Speaker_04
He comes over and he yells at us and he says, listen to me, you need to row. And at the time that was the most hilarious instruction that could have been given because we're almost sunk and it's hard to get the oars up out of the water.

00:38:18 Speaker_04
And so nobody listened to him right away. And then his complex kicks in and he's like, I know what the hell I'm doing. You need to row. And so he's yelling at us.

00:38:27 Speaker_04
So then we do start trying to get our little oars up out of the water and like push the water back. And we get a little bit of momentum and we come up out of the water a little bit, but barely.

00:38:37 Speaker_04
And then his next instruction to us is that we need to get rid of our oars. Because these boats are really skinny and the oars are really long. And so the oars are kind of keeping the boat balanced.

00:38:47 Speaker_04
And the goal is essentially for us to abandon the ship and flip it over. Oh! We need to jump off on opposite sides of the boat. We all get off.

00:38:59 Speaker_04
And at this point, my memory is a little bit fuzzy because we're in the water and it's freezing and we know there's alligators in there. At some point during this predicament, a family came out on their dock and they saw what was happening.

00:39:13 Speaker_10
A bunch of young girls dying.

00:39:15 Speaker_04
And some man yelling.

00:39:17 Speaker_10
Or some dishonorably discharged cadet is screaming.

00:39:20 Speaker_04
They must have beckoned to us or to our coach to say that we could come to their dock if we needed to get out of the water. And our coach informed us that he was going to rescue the boat.

00:39:31 Speaker_04
He was like, I'm going to take the boat back so that the boat is safe. So he hooks the boat up to a tow line and it pieces out of the situation.

00:39:39 Speaker_03
What?

00:39:40 Speaker_04
While you guys are just in the water? Yeah, we're in the water. We're 14. I'm just really glad we could all swim. Did you have life vests on? No. And we had layers on like I had a sweatshirt and this little vortex jacket because it was cold.

00:39:53 Speaker_04
We're like flailing around. He leaves with the boat. We go up onto the dock of these strangers. And then they took us into their house and gave us towels and tea. So luckily they were It's Samaritan strangers. Very well.

00:40:07 Speaker_04
You could have never heard from the nine of us again, because he just left. We had to call a parent chaperone from the home phone of this nice family's living room. And they had to drive from the camp to come get us and bring us back.

00:40:21 Speaker_10
How many girls are in the boat?

00:40:23 Speaker_04
There are nine. So there's eight that row. And then there's one that coaches or is like the captain.

00:40:28 Speaker_10
Oh, wow. They had nine girls in their kitchen trying to warm up.

00:40:31 Speaker_04
Did that coach get fired? He didn't come back the next year.

00:40:35 Speaker_10
Now, how did you guys perform that year? Sounds like you had gone through hell and back. Maybe you would be great after all that.

00:40:41 Speaker_04
We were all right that year. I think that there are other schools that are definitely a lot more competitive than us, but our boat did OK.

00:40:46 Speaker_10
Luckily, it didn't go in the direction you were fearing it would.

00:40:49 Speaker_04
Alligators.

00:40:50 Speaker_10
No, even before that. You hurt 26. Oh, I did, I did.

00:40:54 Speaker_02
Oh, yeah, young coach.

00:40:56 Speaker_10
So at least that wasn't on the table.

00:40:58 Speaker_02
But he sucks. Oh, I bet he was the boy in the baseball game.

00:41:03 Speaker_10
You think he grew up and wanted to take out his frustration against women?

00:41:06 Speaker_02
Yes. It's a through line.

00:41:08 Speaker_10
Wow. Well, you made it. I'm sure you guys had a blast ripping him apart every time he wasn't looking or listening.

00:41:15 Speaker_04
That's a bonding. That part's fun. Absolutely. It went down in history. We talked about it for years and years and years after.

00:41:21 Speaker_10
Well, Maddie, what a disaster. Thanks for telling us that.

00:41:24 Speaker_04
Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for having me. Have a great day.

00:41:27 Speaker_10
All right. Nice meeting you.

00:41:29 Speaker_04
Bye.

00:41:29 Speaker_10
Bye. Hello. Don't cry yet, cry at the end, save it for the end. What name are we going to use?

00:41:39 Speaker_11
So my name is Mary today.

00:41:40 Speaker_10
Okay, Mary, Mary. We love when someone wants a fake name that feels like it's very promising. Like maybe there's residual legal issues or something.

00:41:48 Speaker_11
Exactly.

00:41:49 Speaker_10
Mary, are you allowed to tell us where you're at or do you think that'll be too revealing?

00:41:53 Speaker_11
I'm in the Midwest.

00:41:54 Speaker_10
That works. That's enough of a stereotype as I need.

00:41:57 Speaker_11
And of course, I'm changing some of the details to protect the innocent.

00:42:00 Speaker_10
Okay, great.

00:42:01 Speaker_11
Back when my daughter was in kindergarten, we were trying to get her into different activities to make friends. The sport that she chose first was t-ball. She was so excited about it, made lots of friends through all of that.

00:42:12 Speaker_11
And as you know, with any group sport, you get added to a group text with tons of people.

00:42:17 Speaker_10
If you're the parent, right?

00:42:18 Speaker_11
If you're the parent, you're in the group text for sure. And so. Right off the bat, the first week getting tons of notifications, I put it on silent and I'm thinking, I'll check this when I can.

00:42:27 Speaker_11
So around that same time, something that you should know is I was going through a divorce with my ex and he was having a good time, different lifestyle. He's single, he's free. Okay. He's not really dealing with the T-ball.

00:42:40 Speaker_11
He's not dealing with the T-ball.

00:42:42 Speaker_10
It's hard to be present with T-ball when you have this other life happening.

00:42:46 Speaker_11
During that time, I also wanted to take my kiddo on vacation. You know, you're just trying to make life as normal as it can be when you're going through something like that. And so I invited a new T-ball mom to go on this trip with me.

00:42:57 Speaker_11
And again, daughter was very excited. We actually go to Florida. So we're out on the beach, right? We're doing fun things. Not looking at my phone. Notifications are off.

00:43:08 Speaker_11
We get back to the room at the end of the night, pick up my phone, at least 50 notifications from the group text. I'm nervous because I'm thinking, oh no, someone got hurt at the t-ball, you know, something innocent happened.

00:43:19 Speaker_11
So I look at the text messages and the very first one in the list is my ex-husband. He's asking for a sexual favor from someone. And that was obviously not intended for the t-ball group.

00:43:40 Speaker_02
If you're comfortable, what did it say? Do you want to spell it out instead?

00:43:45 Speaker_10
Do you want to draw a picture for us and we'll describe it?

00:43:47 Speaker_02
Can we do like a base? Yeah, sure. Third base. He wants oral? He's requesting third base from a specific person.

00:43:55 Speaker_10
He thinks he's texting with just one member of this group text.

00:43:58 Speaker_02
I'm guessing. Oh, somebody on the group text?

00:44:00 Speaker_10
Yeah. So he met some other t-baller mom and then he now thinks he's got a side thing going, but he accidentally, he went to her name, Gail, and then got too hasty cause he's in the mood for third base.

00:44:11 Speaker_10
And then he fires off a text and he didn't realize it was the one where they list all the options.

00:44:15 Speaker_11
No!

00:44:16 Speaker_10
Is that right? Is that what happened?

00:44:17 Speaker_11
It's so close, but it wasn't someone from the text chain. I'm looking at these messages, right? And I'm with this fellow mom.

00:44:24 Speaker_11
on the t-ball team and I look up at her and she looks at me and our kids are with us and I'm like I don't know what to do so you had some dads that were cool about it like making jokes like oh lucky guy you are oh boy you know y'all come over and do that oh my god

00:44:42 Speaker_10
No one knows what to do.

00:44:43 Speaker_02
Did any women say, how dare you?

00:44:45 Speaker_11
For sure. Okay. It got to the point where finally the coach stepped in and was like, Hey guys, this group chat is for kindergarten tee ball. So let's keep it to that and move on. So.

00:44:59 Speaker_11
Needless to say, the rest of the T-ball season was very awkward because, you know, I woke up to a mom and you know, they want to ask you about it.

00:45:09 Speaker_10
You must've felt so self-conscious. You're also going through a divorce. I feel like all this would just be so hard to deal with. But yeah, I'm going through a divorce. Yes, my husband's clearly on the war path. And now you all know.

00:45:22 Speaker_02
She doesn't know, thank God, but that people know that your daughter's dad, it's too much men. Keep it in your pants for a little while longer.

00:45:32 Speaker_11
Be considerate, right?

00:45:34 Speaker_10
Okay. Two questions. Did your ex-husband respond ever after he realized what he did?

00:45:40 Speaker_11
He said, sorry to the group, you know, wasn't intended obviously for this group text.

00:45:43 Speaker_10
And did you sidebar with him?

00:45:45 Speaker_11
Oh yeah.

00:45:46 Speaker_10
Oh, you did. Okay. Now, how did that conversation go?

00:45:49 Speaker_11
I was very upset, obviously, you know, I was so embarrassed. Again, you're just going through all this already. And in the moment it felt like my world was ending, honestly. And I was so angry, but we're fine now. And it's a story to tell.

00:46:00 Speaker_11
We've come a long way. Great co-parenting relationship.

00:46:03 Speaker_10
How many years ago was that?

00:46:05 Speaker_11
12 years ago. Wow.

00:46:06 Speaker_10
Oh boy. I can't imagine the searing heat that would shoot through my body the second I realized I had done that. I can't imagine a more embarrassing thing to all the parents. Oof. Oof. Yeah, as much as you suffered, I guarantee he too, probably.

00:46:26 Speaker_12
I don't know. We don't know how he is.

00:46:28 Speaker_10
I doubt he high-fived anyone after that. Did he remarry?

00:46:32 Speaker_11
He did a couple of times.

00:46:33 Speaker_10
A couple times. Okay.

00:46:35 Speaker_11
But yeah, I'd say we all lived happily ever after. And we're good.

00:46:38 Speaker_02
Well, I'm glad everyone's good. Or I'm glad you're good.

00:46:40 Speaker_10
Weird question. Did any of the fellow T-Ball dads see this as a door opening opportunity for you?

00:46:46 Speaker_02
That's so funny that you said that, but no.

00:46:48 Speaker_10
I could see someone going like, ah, this poor gal, she's got embarrassed by her husband.

00:46:53 Speaker_02
I'll take advantage of her in her most vulnerable time.

00:46:56 Speaker_10
You want to get frisky too to show him?

00:46:58 Speaker_02
No.

00:46:59 Speaker_10
No, out of generosity and kindness.

00:47:00 Speaker_02
Okay.

00:47:01 Speaker_10
Okay. You don't like that one bit. How long have you been listening?

00:47:06 Speaker_11
I started listening during COVID. I'm a very uptight person, as you can probably tell by I changed my name.

00:47:12 Speaker_11
And I even told her I want to change my voice when I was telling the story, but listening to your podcast has just like opened my mind in the best way. Oh, I learned so much.

00:47:22 Speaker_11
I actually have a few people in my life that struggle with addiction and it's hard for you to understand. Right. When you haven't been through it, it's been life changing. And I just thank you so much for that.

00:47:32 Speaker_10
Makes me so happy, Mary. Oh my God. What a story. Thank you so much for telling us.

00:47:36 Speaker_11
Thank you. Have a good one.

00:47:37 Speaker_10
All right. Take care. If you could see her face, what a sweet lady.

00:47:42 Speaker_02
So nice.

00:47:42 Speaker_10
The last person that deserves to be on that text chain.

00:47:45 Speaker_02
It's just hard because you're embarrassed, but you're also sad. There's a lot happening. Jealousy. You feel betrayed. That's a sad one.

00:47:54 Speaker_10
That was a hell of a week of her life.

00:47:56 Speaker_02
I don't know if I should state the obvious. I don't think I should.

00:47:59 Speaker_10
Do it. What do you say? Men are terrible.

00:48:01 Speaker_02
A lot of bad men in this crop. A lot of men doing some not so hot stuff in this crop. I'm just going to say that.

00:48:10 Speaker_10
Yeah. We didn't have any ladies who really shit the bed ethically.

00:48:14 Speaker_02
It was pretty much every story had a unbecoming man.

00:48:19 Speaker_08
Sporty men don't tend to be the most evolved of our kind. Yeah, I think we could probably agree on that.

00:48:24 Speaker_02
You think so? Because CTE?

00:48:26 Speaker_08
Probably that, yeah.

00:48:28 Speaker_02
I don't mean to laugh at CTE.

00:48:30 Speaker_12
It's not funny.

00:48:30 Speaker_10
Yeah, I just think if you just live in the sports world, you're just with other boys and men all the time.

00:48:35 Speaker_02
Might be the sport itself. I find basketball players to be fairly evolved. They're just so regimented and disciplined.

00:48:42 Speaker_10
Okay, this is great. You know who I think are the most evolved? Soccer players.

00:48:45 Speaker_02
Yeah, I also like soccer players too.

00:48:48 Speaker_10
Because that was kind of the alternative sport when I was growing up. If you weren't like a jock jock, but your parents wanted you on a team, that was kind of what you did.

00:48:54 Speaker_02
I like both of those types.

00:48:56 Speaker_10
What do we think is the worst? Chess players. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Arrogant. Know-it-alls.

00:49:03 Speaker_12
We know what's the worst.

00:49:05 Speaker_10
Football?

00:49:08 Speaker_12
I love everyone.

00:49:13 Speaker_10
Well, it would make a bit of sense that as you chart the violence of the sport.

00:49:18 Speaker_02
Yeah, exactly.

00:49:19 Speaker_10
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's not terribly hard to imagine that like you're probably over indexing in testosterone. You've been told to be tough nonstop.

00:49:28 Speaker_02
Yeah.

00:49:29 Speaker_10
All right.

00:49:30 Speaker_02
Okay. Love you.

00:49:31 Speaker_10
I love you. And I'm just so grateful that my kids aren't currently yet.

00:49:35 Speaker_02
And they're not in any of those. No, that's kind of funny.

00:49:38 Speaker_10
Well, although someone is trying out today for something.

00:49:41 Speaker_02
I thought Lincoln played soccer, though, for a minute. Didn't take.

00:49:45 Speaker_10
Well, no, it was just, I think that team only assembled to play a couple games, and then they did that. It was like her school.

00:49:52 Speaker_02
I remember she wanted to quit, and you were like, no, remember back then?

00:49:54 Speaker_10
Well, that was when she was a baby, yeah, yeah, yeah. Right, that's what I'm talking about. That's back when we were in the phase of like, they have to be in something, and then why, I don't know.

00:50:02 Speaker_02
Yeah, not necessary.

00:50:03 Speaker_10
Yeah. All right, love you.

00:50:05 Speaker_02
Love you.

00:50:07 Speaker_08
Do you want to sing a tune or something, or a theme song? Oh. Okay, great.

00:50:12 Speaker_09
We don't have a theme song for this new show, so here I go, go, go. We're gonna ask some random questions, and with the help of our jerrys, we'll get some suggestions on the fly, right?

00:50:34 Speaker_10
Follow Armchair Expert on the Wondery app, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to every episode of Armchair Expert early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts.

00:50:48 Speaker_10
Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at wondery.com slash survey.