0:04

Countdown with Keith Olderman is a

0:06

production of iHeartRadio.

0:21

Donald Trump may be indicted

0:24

for the January sixth coup attempt

0:26

today or not.

0:29

But if Jack Smith repeats

0:32

the timeline from the stolen classified

0:34

documents case with his Florida Trump grand

0:36

jury, when Smith's Washington

0:39

Trump grand Jury meets today, as

0:41

it usually meets on Tuesdays, starting

0:43

at one pm at the E. Barrett Prettyman

0:45

Courthouse in DC, that

0:48

grand jury will seemingly be just stepping

0:50

into that part of the timeline in which we can

0:52

actually say the indictments

0:55

should be handed up anytime now. In

0:57

fact, today could be exactly

1:00

the same day on that timeline

1:03

that we were on the first indictments

1:05

timeline when the indictments actually happened.

1:08

With the understanding that this is academic,

1:12

unless they are taking bets on this

1:14

in Vegas, I'll take the Mets over the Yankees,

1:17

Japan over Costa Rica at the World Cup,

1:19

and the Trump indictments today, and I'll take

1:22

the over With that understanding,

1:25

let me walk you through my math. It

1:27

was two Sundays ago, the sixteenth, Trump

1:30

says, anyway, when his attorneys

1:32

notified him they had received the target

1:34

letter for January sixth indictments,

1:37

assuming that date is correct,

1:40

even though it was a Sunday, which would

1:42

not seem to make sense. We are

1:44

now right now at the start of

1:46

day ten on this timeline. Fix

1:49

that in your mind day ten of

1:51

this timeline. The timeline

1:54

on the first Smith indictments for the stealing

1:56

of documents and stashing them at Mari Lago

1:58

is a little hazier because Trump never

2:01

said exactly when he got

2:03

Target letter number one for that first

2:05

set of thirty seven counts. But there

2:07

has been a lot of source reporting as to when

2:09

that letter was received, and unfortunately

2:11

dates barry. Some real time

2:14

reporting said the letter arrived in the last

2:16

few weeks. Other reporting

2:18

said last week. If it

2:20

was in fact the preceding week, that was

2:22

the week of Memorial Day. So what if

2:25

the letter had been received on the first workday

2:27

of that week, Tuesday May thirtieth.

2:29

Trump's lawyers met with the Smith team on

2:32

Monday, June fifth. News of the target

2:34

letter leaked on Wednesday, June seventh. Trump

2:36

revealed he had been indicted on Thursday, June

2:39

eighth. Shortly thereafter, we learned

2:41

that the grand jury had handed up the indictments earlier

2:43

that same day, June eighth. That

2:45

makes the time span from the first

2:48

target letter to the first indictments

2:51

day ten of that timeline ten

2:54

days. As I mentioned, today

2:57

is day ten of this timeline

3:00

many many caveats. Even

3:03

if that timeline is exactly

3:05

accurate, he didn't have to stick

3:08

to a timeline for this second

3:10

set of indictments or any other indictments.

3:13

The span between the first target letter

3:15

and the first invitments could have been amazingly

3:17

fast. It could have happened

3:19

far earlier than May thirtieth. The span

3:22

might have been seventeen days or

3:24

twenty four days, and just as dubious,

3:27

the second target letter arrived on a Sunday.

3:30

A Sunday, what they drove the letter

3:32

from Washington to marri Lago. If

3:35

the second target letter actually got there

3:37

earlier than Sunday and Trump

3:39

misled people I know,

3:43

or for whatever reason they delayed

3:45

notifying him I know, then

3:48

today is not day ten of

3:50

the second timeline. It could be day eleven

3:52

or day twelve. The only

3:55

purpose to this silliness really

3:57

is to underscore what I said at the beginning today

4:00

that Jack Smith Trump DC grand

4:02

jury seems to be stepping into that part of

4:04

the timeline in which the actual

4:06

second set of indictments seems possible,

4:09

practical, doable, or

4:12

as I once heard it phrase by a long ago

4:14

anchor on the CBS All News radio station

4:16

in New York, in a statement that has literally

4:19

stuck with me since nineteen eighty one, quote,

4:22

the next development in the baseball strike negotiations

4:25

could happen as early as today. And

4:28

if you think about that, you will recognize that not

4:30

only does that have to be true,

4:33

it cannot possibly not be

4:35

true, because the next development in

4:37

anything in the universe could happen as early

4:39

as today. If the next development could happen

4:41

as early as yesterday, we're all in big trouble.

4:45

So welcome to day ten. Maybe

4:49

unless it's really day eleven or

4:51

day twelve. I

4:53

was told there would be no math. Just

4:56

remember these other numbers. US Code eighteen,

4:59

section two four one. That is conspiracy

5:01

against rights that would be interfering

5:03

with the counting of legitimate votes, the post

5:06

Civil War Law for Reconstruction voting

5:08

against the KKK with or without violence,

5:11

US Code eighteen, section three seven to one,

5:14

conspiracy to defraud the United States,

5:16

and US Code eighteen Section one five

5:18

one to two correctly obstructing

5:20

an official proceeding, and

5:24

those indictments will happen today or

5:27

Thursday, or next Tuesday

5:30

or next Thursday, but probably

5:33

earlier than two weeks from today, unless

5:37

there are other factors in

5:41

developments that are slightly less like nailing

5:44

jello to the wall. NBC News

5:46

says that Richard Donahue, the former acting

5:48

Deputy Attorney General, has met with the Special

5:51

Council's office. You may remember Donahue

5:53

from the House Committee hearings. He was

5:55

one of the good guys. He and his boss, Jeff

5:57

Rosen, were the ones to whom Trump said, just

6:00

say the election was corrupt and leave the

6:02

rest to me and the Republican congressman,

6:05

and to whom Trump insisted there was a suitcase

6:07

full of fraudulent ballots, and

6:10

they said no, they would not say that, and quote,

6:12

no, sir, there is no suitcase. Presumably

6:17

Donahue would be supplying still more

6:19

grist for Jack Smith's mill on

6:21

his central theme that Trump knew

6:23

damn well the election was not stolen, but still

6:25

pretended that it was. Section

6:28

three seventy one does say conspiracy

6:30

to defraud the United States, and

6:32

there is that entire separate line of inquiry

6:35

about literally defrauding those who

6:37

donated to his assorted packs and campaigns

6:40

and funds to audit votes and file

6:42

for recounts, but otherwise stop the

6:44

steal that wasn't stolen. So

6:48

would those who were at a February twenty

6:50

twenty Oval Office meeting that CNN

6:53

says has now become a subject

6:55

of some fascination among the prosecutors.

6:57

Trump told election officials and his own

7:00

staffers at that meeting February

7:02

twenty twenty how pleased he was

7:05

by improvements to the security of American

7:07

elections, and specifically improvements

7:10

to the security of paper ballots and

7:13

audits of vote tallies. Within

7:15

two months, of course, Trump would be claiming that paper

7:18

ballots, especially the ones that were mailed

7:20

in, were insecure and rife

7:22

for fraud. By September he

7:24

was screaming that. By November he was

7:26

insisting the entire election had been compromised

7:28

by that. And there's

7:30

one development which I actually think is less

7:33

important than we are being led to believe.

7:36

The ex New York City Police commissioner

7:39

and also ex Cohn Bernie Carrick,

7:41

has turned over quote thousands

7:43

of documents produced by Rudy

7:45

Giuliani's team as it tried

7:48

to find or create non existent

7:50

voting fraud after the twenty twenty election. The

7:53

same boatload has also been turned

7:55

over to Ruby Freeman and Shay Moss

7:57

in their suit against Giuliani. And I'd

7:59

be a lot more intrigued, and my mind would

8:01

turn to the rhetorical question did Carrick

8:03

flip on Rudy if Carrick's

8:06

lawyer Tim PARLATORI, former

8:09

Trump lawyer Tim PARLATORI, had

8:11

not revealed that he and Carrick had shown all

8:14

of those two thousand or so documents

8:16

to the Trump legal team at one

8:19

eight hundred insurrection, and the Trumpers

8:21

said they saw no need to claim executive

8:23

privilege on any of the documents. Parlatory

8:26

says he will sit down with the Special Counsel's

8:28

office in about two weeks to discuss,

8:31

presumably with Bernie Kerrick sitting there

8:33

too, trying to remember where he is

8:37

on the Trump temperature front. Yesterday's

8:40

social media posts were heavily vainglorious

8:42

boasting along with polling, plus

8:44

one shot at Biden, one reposting about

8:47

Merrick Garland being guilty of collusion,

8:50

and one reposting of the standard brilliance

8:52

of Marjorie pornography Green from a week

8:54

ago in which Green called Jack Smith

8:56

quote a weak little bitch for the

8:58

Democrats unquote, which I

9:00

am putting on a post it for when Marge

9:03

gets indicted by Smith Lee this year.

9:06

Am I guessing on that? I'm guessing on

9:08

that? Did the odds of my being

9:10

right just go up? The odds of my being right

9:12

just went up? But mostly it

9:15

was Trump posting moronic

9:17

polls, moronic even for him, the exemplar

9:20

of which came from the British tabloid The Daily Mail,

9:22

in which New Hampshire voters were asked to select

9:25

not just their favorite for the Republican nomination

9:27

or for the general election, but quote,

9:30

New Hampshire Republicans picked Donald

9:32

Trump over Ronald Reagan

9:34

as their dream president. Trump

9:37

thirty five percent, Dessantis seven

9:39

percent, Chris Sinunu six percent,

9:42

Ramaswami three percent, Romney three

9:44

percent, Tim Scott three percent, Ronald

9:47

Reagan three percent. As

9:50

you may know, I am

9:52

no fan of Ronald Reagan, but

9:54

in his defense, I would like to point out

9:57

that even Republicans are smart

9:59

enough to realize that he is dead and

10:02

that a dead president slow

10:05

down those cabinet meetings. I

10:11

would also note here that over the weekend it

10:13

turned out that obeying rulings by

10:15

the Supreme Court has apparently become

10:17

optional according to the Republican Party.

10:20

A federal court has ruled that the new congressional

10:23

map in Alabama had been drawn

10:25

in a discriminatory way against minority

10:27

voters, and that two majority black

10:30

districts would have to be created. Alabama

10:32

took that to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court

10:34

upheld the lower court's ruling against

10:37

Alabama and for the two majority

10:39

black districts. On Friday,

10:41

the Republican legislature approved

10:44

a new Alabama congressional map one

10:47

majority black district, and Governor

10:49

k Ivy signed the legislation

10:52

quote, the legislature knows our

10:54

state, our people, and our districts

10:56

better than the federal courts or

10:58

activist groups, and I am pleased

11:01

that they answered the call, remained focused,

11:03

and produced new discs ahead of the court

11:05

deadline. The ante

11:08

was raised hours later when the state senator

11:10

who sponsored the new map, he is from

11:12

Scottsborough, of all places, broadened

11:15

the list of elected officers who had just

11:17

ignored the Supreme Court from

11:19

just the governor of the state, and now

11:22

to include Speaker of the House

11:24

Kevin McCarthy to quote State Senator

11:26

Steve Livingstone. I did hear from Speaker

11:28

McCarthy. It was quite simple. He said,

11:31

I'm interested in keeping my majority.

11:33

That was basically his conversation. Well,

11:37

there you have it. I once suggested

11:39

it was time to ignore the Supreme Court, and

11:41

Marco Rubio put out a tweet implying

11:44

I had just committed a federal crime.

11:47

And here the Republicans have beaten the

11:49

Democrats to ignoring the Supreme

11:51

Court altogether. Supreme Court

11:54

now optional. Roe v.

11:56

Wade not overturned. Elimination

11:59

of affirmative action never happened. Clarence

12:02

Thomas have to lower his prices.

12:05

Oh in the Second Amendment case that etched

12:07

it in Stone, even though the Second Amendment doesn't have the

12:09

word own in it or any synonym

12:11

for own, as in right to own a gun

12:14

District of Columbia versus Heller now

12:17

optional. Thank you k

12:20

Ivy and Kevin McCarthy

12:28

also of interest here, Yes, Meta

12:31

and not Elon Musk owns the

12:33

rights to the letter X for social

12:35

networking, but the supposed

12:37

replacement of the tweet with

12:40

the xeet presumably

12:42

pronounced sheet, as

12:45

in yeah, I sent

12:47

that out on social media. I just took a

12:49

sheet. Apparently that's not

12:52

true. And also

12:54

in a new, all new edition of Countdown,

12:57

Baseball's new Hall of Famers, one of them

12:59

was traded away by the New York Yankees at the insistence

13:01

of a Yankee player You've

13:03

never heard that's the before and the other one.

13:06

Scott Roland once told me that his

13:08

highlight of the year nineteen ninety six

13:11

was an elaborate and superb practical

13:13

joke that he and his minor league

13:16

teammates and managers pulled

13:18

on me in

13:20

nineteen ninety six. And I said, wait, nineteen

13:23

ninety six was the year you made the major leagues,

13:26

whereupon Scott Rowland said, that's

13:28

next. This is Countdown. This

13:31

is Countdown with Keith album

13:42

postscripts to the news, some headlines,

13:44

some updates, some snarks, some predictions.

13:46

Dateline Bismarck, North Dakota,

13:49

the sentient pair of eyebrows

13:51

running for the Republican presidential nomination

13:53

has done it again. Governor Doug

13:55

Bergham not only offered anybody

13:58

who donated a dollar a twenty

14:00

dollars gift card, but he put

14:02

biden twenty dollars relief card

14:04

on it without every thinking that

14:06

that might sound like Biden gave

14:09

you the twenty dollars, might it

14:11

not. Now he is selling

14:13

t shirts for thirty five dollars that read

14:16

Doug Bergham. Try that in

14:18

a small town if you don't

14:20

get that reference. That is the name of the Jason

14:22

Alden song banned from country

14:24

music television because it basically

14:26

says, if you protest in a small town,

14:29

you will be and should be lynched.

14:32

So that's Doug Bergham, your pro

14:34

lynching candidate. By

14:37

the way, the small town Jason Aldean

14:39

grew up in Macon, Georgia,

14:42

the metropolitan area of which has nearly

14:44

a quarter of a million residents, two sports

14:46

franchises, and a Division One

14:48

football program. Dateline

14:51

Barbie Land. I don't

14:54

care if you liked Oppenheimer or you didn't,

14:56

or you liked Barbie or you didn't, or you

14:58

went to Oppenheimer or Barbie or both,

15:01

or you didn't. But when did it become

15:03

a law that every news

15:05

organization in this country had to take a

15:07

cheesy stunt suggested

15:10

by pr people and run with it

15:12

and run it into the ground the

15:14

Barbenheimer stuff, or

15:17

if like me, you prefer the other option, Openbee.

15:21

The Wall Street Journal wrote one article talking

15:23

about the arrival of a beloved icon

15:25

in Pink and the article had the punchline,

15:27

what we're not talking about Barbie. And

15:30

it also had another article about

15:32

a blockbuster movie about something explosive

15:35

that was being prepared in nineteen forty five, and

15:37

that punchline was quote, it's not Oppenheimer.

15:41

The Washington Post offered sixteen

15:43

ways we think about Barbie.

15:46

Post writers search for the meaning

15:48

of a toy that has fascinated

15:50

Americans since nineteen fifty nine, and the

15:52

answer is there is no meaning.

15:55

The meaning is it's a toy, and

15:58

the best or worst of them

16:00

all, right wing buffoon Ben Shapiro

16:03

is now forever linked tossing up in the

16:05

same outfit Ken Wars in

16:07

the film, then burning

16:09

the Barbie doll because it was one

16:12

of the most woke movies I have ever

16:14

seen, and noting go woke,

16:16

Go broke, only to find

16:18

out a few days later that in its opening

16:20

weekend, Barbie made three hundred and thirty

16:22

seven million dollars worldwide.

16:39

Thank you Nancy Faust and Dateline,

16:42

New York. One of my neighbors died

16:44

on Friday. I met him six or

16:46

seven years ago in Central Park, not far

16:48

from our homes. Actually, our

16:51

dogs met I had two then,

16:53

one of them, Rose does not

16:55

like other dogs, so as we approached

16:58

a Maltese and its two

17:00

humans near the waffle truck

17:02

in Central Park, I prepared for the worst, but

17:05

Rose liked Happy, as I

17:07

soon learned the pup was named, And

17:09

as the three dogs played happies,

17:11

Bipeds and I started chatting about

17:13

dogs and Malteses and the

17:15

ages of dogs, and what to do about

17:18

red tear stains and the neighborhood

17:20

and who we knew in the place. And finally,

17:22

after about six or seven minutes of this, Happy's

17:25

male Biped and I realized

17:28

simultaneously that we recognized each

17:30

other. I know you, he

17:33

said, I miss your show. Tony

17:36

Bennett said, you're You're.

17:40

I could see the look of alarm as I began to

17:42

tell Tony Bennett he was Tony Bennett. Obviously,

17:44

Tony Bennett did not want anybody announcing his

17:46

presence in the middle of a crowded part of Central

17:49

Park where there was a line to the waffle

17:51

truck. I know you You're You're

17:54

Happy's dad, he laughed.

17:56

We shook hands. He introduced me to his wife, and

17:58

now I noticed he had grown a mustache.

18:01

Always wanted to try one. What do

18:03

you think I think I should

18:05

have had one all these years? Now

18:07

we talked about mustaches. At

18:09

ninety, Tony Bennett was growing

18:11

a mustache. From what he said,

18:13

it was for the first time, and he was thinking

18:16

that the previous seventy years without

18:18

having a mustache were flawed in

18:20

some way, and anybody who can

18:22

be as forward looking at age ninety

18:25

as to reassess something as fundamental

18:27

as facial hair had

18:29

my eternal respect. Well,

18:31

it turned out we lived a block apart.

18:34

His friend, her

18:36

name was Gaga, I think, used to live in the

18:38

apartment above mine. I

18:41

used to see him periodically in the years afterwards

18:43

in the park, and I made a big deal about Happy.

18:46

Tony always showed up on Twitter with his

18:48

dog Happy. You know by

18:51

now about his having been one of the American soldiers

18:53

at the liberation of Dacau, and how

18:55

he recovered from drug abuse in a time

18:57

when it killed musicians' careers

18:59

and killed musicians and his participation

19:02

in the Selma marches, and that the singular

19:04

voice of his was just one part

19:06

of an extraordinarily multifaceted

19:08

life. And now you know about him

19:11

and his malteses and me and my mal

19:13

teses, and how one of my favorite

19:15

neighbors to run into was

19:17

probably the most famous person in the

19:19

neighborhood in either

19:21

role. I will miss him very

19:23

much. Still

19:38

ahead on an all new edition of Countdown. There are

19:40

two new Baseball Hall of Famers this week.

19:42

One of them hit four hundred and ninety three home

19:44

runs, not one of them for the

19:46

team that originally signed him, the New York Yankees.

19:49

Fifteen years ago. I was told a franchise

19:52

secret as to how

19:54

the Yankees managed to trade Fred

19:57

McGriff and got nothing for him. Basically,

20:00

an active Yankees player made

20:02

the trade happen, unbeliev

20:05

I will tell this story in Things I promised

20:07

not to tell first time for the

20:09

daily roundup of the miss Grants, morons and Dunning

20:11

Kruger effects specimens who constitute two

20:13

days worse persons in the world. The

20:16

Bronze Fox quote news

20:18

unquote. It has run countless

20:20

segments plus several website stories

20:23

about how the American Women's World Cup soccer

20:25

team mostly did not sing

20:27

the national anthem as it played

20:30

before the first match of their tournament. Fox

20:32

even showed a picture of Megan Rappino taking

20:35

a knee during an anthem at

20:37

a game seven years

20:39

ago. A that's

20:42

what we have our military do, stand in respectful

20:45

silence, especially at international events during

20:47

our anthem. B Fox's

20:49

broadcast network and its sports network

20:51

claim to carry something like seven

20:53

thousand hours of live sporting

20:56

events annually. And ask yourself this question.

20:58

How many times a year does Fox televise

21:02

the national anthem? Once

21:05

at the Super Bowl? So why

21:08

does Fox hate our national anthem?

21:11

The runner up Elon Musk, Yeah, you

21:14

know already what he did. He took a business that

21:16

had its own proprietary

21:18

verb to tweet, and

21:21

he threw it away because the name Twitter

21:23

was not something he could take credit for.

21:26

And taking credit for the work and creativity

21:28

of others is all Elon Musk

21:30

can do. He tried this

21:33

before when one of his companies merged with PayPal,

21:35

and he wanted the name PayPal removed

21:38

even though people used it as a verb too,

21:40

and he wanted to call it x or x

21:42

PayPal because again, if he can't claim credit

21:45

for it out it goes one

21:47

joke and one PostScript to Twitter

21:49

X or ex Twitter. Musk

21:51

had the name Twitter stripped off its headquarters

21:54

in San Francisco yesterday, but he failed

21:56

to get approval from the city first for

21:58

the heavy equipment to do that, so the

22:00

cops stopped it after the first five

22:03

letters had been pulled down, so now it

22:05

just reads er. Also

22:09

the joke, he's calling it X

22:12

because Putin already took Z.

22:15

But the winner the One World Observatory,

22:18

which is the observation deck atop the World

22:20

Trade Center in New York. It has a Twitter

22:23

account which basically exists to try to sell you

22:25

tickets that cost as much as seventy

22:27

four dollars to go to the observatory,

22:30

and it does this by showing you photos taken

22:32

from the top of the building or photos of the

22:34

top of the building. Its latest is

22:36

the latter, a photo of the

22:38

building captured quote captivating

22:40

moments in broad daylight at One World

22:42

Observatory. The image

22:45

is of the World Trade Center in daylight.

22:47

At about two inches to the right of the building

22:50

in the photo is a

22:52

passenger jet. So

22:55

the advertisement to get you to go to

22:57

the World Trade Center Observation deck

22:59

is a photo of the World Trade Center

23:02

with a plane next to it. The

23:06

folks at one World Observatory

23:08

at the World Trade Center never

23:11

forget, except you forgot

23:14

Today's worst persons in

23:17

the world. Shoe

23:30

the number one story on this all new edition

23:32

of Countdown and my favorite topic, me and

23:35

Baseball's new Hall of Famers inducted

23:38

Sunday. And even though Fred McGriff

23:40

and Scott Roland are the Hall of Famers, remember

23:42

this segment is about me.

23:46

Fifteen years ago or so, I

23:49

was having dinner in the press room at Yankee

23:51

Stadium in New York with the then vice

23:53

president of the Yankees in charge of keeping

23:56

all the other vice presidents from screwing

23:58

things up, the man who was their

24:00

former general manager, their former field manager

24:02

twice, and in my youth, their starting

24:05

shortstop, Jean stick Michael.

24:08

Of all the hundreds of people who

24:10

worked for George Steinbrenner when he

24:13

lived and owned the Yankees, none

24:15

has ever been more undisturbed by

24:18

the experience. Geen Michael took

24:20

the abuse, Jean Michael took the money.

24:22

Jean Michael took the plane out of town, and

24:25

when George offered him more money to come back, Jeene

24:27

Michael took the plane back into town. He

24:30

was also a delightful man, possibly

24:32

the nicest man to work for the Yankees

24:34

under George Steinbrenner, and

24:37

he continuously, for the length

24:39

of time I knew him, tried to coach

24:41

me on how to improve something

24:44

from the TV show, the bit at the end when

24:46

I would crumple up a piece of copy paper and

24:48

throw it at the camera. If

24:50

you just tighten up that wadded

24:52

up piece of paper, it'll move better, You'll have more control

24:55

of it. You'll actually hit that camera. As I said

24:57

to him, stick, you understand, this is the

24:59

shortstop of the Yankees from when I was a

25:01

kid, from when I was nine until

25:03

when I was fifteen, and he's explaining

25:05

to me how to improve my throwing.

25:08

This is surreal anyway.

25:12

For whatever reason, that night we started talking about

25:14

terrible trades made by the Yankees, and

25:16

lord knows there were enough of them, and Gene

25:18

confirmed that most of them, when he was nominally

25:21

in charge, were foisted on him

25:23

by that singular owner, George Steinbrenner.

25:26

When George got suspended from baseball

25:28

for paying a small time hood

25:31

for blackmail against one of his own players,

25:33

Dave Winfield. And by the way, it was a small timehood

25:36

whom I once employed as a radio stringer,

25:39

a guy named Howard Spira. George,

25:41

being suspended, was unable to make any

25:43

more of those terrible trades, which were

25:46

always young players like Jay Buhner

25:48

for gaudy baubles like Ken Phelps.

25:50

You may have heard about that one on Seinfeld,

25:53

or there were trades he wanted to make, like

25:56

sending a pitcher named Marianna Rivera to

25:59

Seattle again for a shortstop named Felix

26:01

for mean, because George did not think his

26:03

rookie shorts s eye that year was going to make it.

26:05

His rookie shortstop that year was named Derek

26:08

Jeter. So

26:12

within a few years, the players that Steinbrenner

26:14

could not trade won four

26:17

World's Championships in five years, including

26:19

fourteen consecutive World Series games.

26:22

And I don't think we'll ever see anything like that again.

26:25

So, talking about those terrible trades,

26:28

without which the Yankees might have won ten

26:30

World's Championships over fifteen years,

26:33

we naturally came to the Fred McGriff

26:35

trade. On December ninth,

26:37

nineteen eighty two, the Yankees traded Fred McGriff

26:40

to the Toronto Blue Jays with outfielder

26:42

Dave Collins and pitcher

26:44

Mike Morgan for a

26:46

relief pitcher named Dale Murray. Fred

26:49

McGriff went on to hit four hundred and ninety three

26:51

home runs plus two more against

26:54

the Yankees in the nineteen ninety six World Series

26:56

and reached the Hall of Fame and never play

26:58

one day with the team that drafted him.

27:01

Dale Murray pitched in sixty two games

27:03

for the Yankees and got a

27:05

save one save.

27:10

The McGriff trade Stick said that

27:13

one was Lou. I

27:15

was very confused, Lou Stick,

27:18

You mean George, right, Lou, I

27:21

said Lou Panella. He

27:23

wasn't general manager. Then he wasn't general manager

27:26

for another five years, exactly,

27:29

said Gene Michael, matter of factly. That

27:31

was the problem. Lou was still a player. He

27:34

took a bite out of his meal. Blue

27:36

Jays went around Bill Burgish. I think Bill was

27:38

the general manager and I was the vice president,

27:40

or the other way around, I don't remember. And he went

27:42

around me, and he went to George

27:45

and he offered to take Dave Collins off

27:47

his hands and give him Dale

27:50

Murray, and all they wanted was his minor

27:52

league kid named McGriff or something. So

27:55

naturally, George didn't tell Bill or

27:57

me because he knew if there was a minor leaguer involved,

27:59

we'd try to stop it. He just called

28:01

Lou Panella instead. Now,

28:03

look, the first rule of trades is never

28:06

ask a player about a trade, because

28:09

what can happen next is, well,

28:11

what actually happened next? Lou

28:14

said, George, you

28:16

mean to tell me you have the chance to get Dale Murray.

28:19

Dale Murray is the toughest relief pitcher

28:21

in the American League, George, and

28:24

you get rid of that terrible contract you signed

28:26

Dave Collins too. Don't hesitate.

28:29

Take it before they change their minds. That's

28:31

what George did, Stick said, I

28:34

found out about it when I heard about it on the radio.

28:38

I sat there, unable to speak. Finally,

28:41

I asked Jean Michael why Penella thought

28:43

Dale Murray was the toughest relief pitcher in

28:45

the American League, when in fact, he was not even

28:48

the toughest relief pitcher in the American League named

28:50

Dale. See,

28:53

that's why you don't ask a player about

28:55

a trade. Dale Murray was tough

28:57

on only one hitter in the entire American

28:59

League, and the hitter was Lou Panella. Lou

29:02

could not buy a hit off of him, could

29:04

never pick up the ball in Dale Murray's

29:06

delivery. There was only one guy Dale

29:09

Murray could get out. It was Lou Panella. Of

29:11

course, lou Panella thought he was the toughest. He was

29:13

the toughest on Lou Penella. And

29:15

that's why Fred McGriff

29:18

went into the Hall of Fame with a plaque

29:20

on which he is not wearing a

29:23

New York Yankees cap on his head. The

29:27

player Fred McGriff was inducted into the Hall

29:29

of Fame with Scott Rowland him

29:32

I have a far more personal connection to.

29:35

In the summer of nineteen ninety six, I got a note from

29:37

Bill Robinson like Panella,

29:39

a long ago New York Yankees outfielder,

29:41

who I had met as a kid, and who

29:43

I gotten to know a little bit when he was with the Pittsburgh

29:46

Pirates, and who I got to know a little bit

29:48

better when he was a terrific coach with the New York Mets.

29:51

In nineteen ninety six, Robbie was trying his hand

29:53

at managing in the minor leagues. He was managing

29:55

the Phillies, second level farm

29:57

club, the one that played at Reading, Pennsylvania

29:59

in the Eastern League. The Eastern

30:01

League had a team in New Britain, Connecticut.

30:04

Let me say that correctly in the local vernacular,

30:07

New Britain, and it's

30:09

ballpark which looked like something out of the

30:11

seventeenth century, but in fact had been

30:13

built like two years earlier.

30:16

It was literally fifteen minutes from my

30:18

house and thirty minutes for my office

30:20

at ESPN. Boy, we

30:22

go buy that exit for ESPN. Every time

30:25

we go to New Britain, Bill Robinson said,

30:27

players all say, why don't we get off here and go see

30:29

their studios. So Bill

30:31

offered me a deal. If I would take

30:34

his team on a tour of ESPN, he would

30:36

have me join the Redding Phillies

30:38

for one day as a coach. I

30:41

would get a uniform, spikes

30:43

defensive charts to keep to fill

30:45

out during the game, and I would sit on the bench

30:48

with him during it. Guys

30:50

will get a kick out of it. Plus you get to meet our top

30:52

prospect, this kid, Scott Roland.

30:55

So we made that deal. We did the

30:58

ESPN tour. I went over to the

31:00

New Britain Ballpark late one afternoon, and sure

31:02

enough they had a uniform that'd fit a

31:04

pitcher named Wayne Gomes loaned me a

31:06

pair of his size fourteen shoes, and

31:09

they gave me the defensive chart book and showed

31:11

me how to use it. And there I was, for one day

31:14

the bench coach of the Redding Phillies of

31:16

the Eastern League.

31:19

Somewhere it would say Olderman

31:21

was in professional baseball for one day

31:24

as a coach. This

31:26

kid Roland was cordial, very nice,

31:29

but he was so far out in front of everybody

31:31

else on that team and in that league

31:33

that he barely had to pay attention. He

31:35

spent much of his time in the dugout

31:37

practicing his golf swing with imaginary

31:40

clubs, and then he'd go up to the plate and hit the ball

31:42

off the outfield fence. Bill

31:45

Robinson told me stories of breaking

31:47

into the majors as a rookie as

31:50

a teammate of Mickey Madtle, so I told

31:52

him stories about Mickey Maddle asking me for

31:54

advice on how to do interviews. The

31:57

players were great, We all had a good time, and

31:59

around about the seventh inning, I found

32:01

myself sort of pinned between

32:03

two players. I don't have

32:05

any notes or photos from this game.

32:08

To my surprise, I did not even write down

32:10

what number was on my uniform, which

32:13

leads me to think the uniform

32:15

may have been blank without a number.

32:18

But I look at the roster of your nineteen

32:20

ninety six Reading Phillies, and I am certain

32:22

one of the guys wedged

32:24

next to me was a baseball

32:27

lifer named Matt Giuliano, and the

32:29

other guy on the other side wedged

32:31

next to me was a utility player

32:33

named Doug Angeli. So the three

32:35

of us, Matt and me and probably

32:38

Doug, were immersed in a conversation

32:40

about something when one of them suddenly shouted

32:43

towards the home played umpire hunter

32:45

Wendelstett, Hey blue,

32:47

Where the hell was that? Pitch? Blue? Not

32:51

an uncommon event at a baseball game,

32:53

nor an uncommon quote. What

32:55

happened next was uncommon. The

32:58

umpire hunter Wendelstett took

33:00

off his mask and walked towards

33:02

our dugout who said that, and

33:04

the two guys on either side

33:07

of me, the two Redding Phillies,

33:09

both immediately simultaneously

33:12

pointed at me,

33:16

him Hunter, and

33:18

Hunter Wendelstett promptly threw

33:22

me out of the game.

33:26

The Redding bench cracked up. There were players

33:28

doubled over in laughter. I

33:31

thought it was funny, but I also

33:34

assumed it was a gag within a gag, and

33:36

they had not really set me up to be ejected

33:39

from my only game that might be registered

33:41

somewhere as my day as a baseball

33:43

coach in uniform for a professional team. So I

33:45

just sat there on the bench. Come on, con

33:48

Wendelstett shouted at me. Now.

33:50

The manager Bill Robinson came back over. He said,

33:53

you better go. He's serious, and

33:56

so I decided, well, I better get my money's

33:58

worth. I ran

34:00

out of the dugout towards Hunter Wendelstett

34:02

and started screaming at him. But I switched up.

34:05

Everything I said was a compliment. Your

34:07

strike zone has been superb tonight, and

34:10

then you'll make it to the majors and won't

34:12

beat just because your father is an umpire. And

34:15

now he's telling me to stop complimenting him because

34:17

he's about to bust out laughing. So

34:19

I said, all right, try this instead,

34:22

and I re enacted something I had read years

34:24

before in Jim Boughton's

34:26

Matchless Baseball book Ball four,

34:29

something that had been done by the manager

34:31

of the Seattle Pilot's team, Joe Schultz,

34:34

when he was arguing balls and strikes

34:36

with an umpire. I took off my glasses

34:39

and I offered them to the umpire,

34:43

and he threw me out of the game again. To

34:47

their credit, after the little thing with the glasses,

34:50

the Reading Phillies, who had with Bill Robinson

34:52

and Hunter Wendelstead and Scott

34:54

Roland all been in on it, stood

34:57

and applauded my gag. As I

34:59

walked off, I shook a few hands

35:01

as I did, rolling included seeing

35:03

the big leagues. Rolling off,

35:05

I went, I changed out of the uniform.

35:08

I went home my career

35:11

over keeping my Redding Phillies

35:13

game. Used hat as my only

35:15

souvenir of my only game

35:18

in baseball, well, my

35:20

only seven ninths of a

35:22

game in baseball. Years

35:25

later, I got Wendelstett back. He was

35:28

umpiring home plate in a game at Yankee

35:30

Stadium, and I was in my seats right behind home

35:32

plate, and in that moment between the anthem and

35:34

the first pitch, he was scanning the stands

35:37

and doing the whole. I'm the empire,

35:39

I'm in charge, I'm cool bit

35:42

And as he swept the stands with his gaze,

35:45

just as he reached my spot, I screamed,

35:48

when does that revenge?

35:52

And now he's cracking up. Only it's the start

35:54

of a big league game. We're not in New Britain anymore.

35:58

He came over between innings. He handed me a couple

36:00

of Baseball's as souvenirs, and then he invited

36:02

me out for a drink. We had a great visit. Roland,

36:06

who was called up by the Big League Philadelphia

36:08

Phillies no more than six weeks after this happened

36:11

in nineteen ninety six and one Rookie

36:13

of the Year and then eight Gold Gloves and finally

36:15

went into the Hall of Fame comes back

36:17

into this story eight or ten years

36:19

after the incident with

36:22

the yelling at the umpire stuff.

36:25

The next time I saw him was eight or

36:27

ten years later. He was with the Saint Louis Cardinals

36:29

then, and I spotted him on the field in New

36:31

York and I went over to say hello, and he beat me

36:33

to it. Where was it? He

36:35

said? When we punked

36:37

you? And Wendelstett threw you out of the game. Were

36:40

we with Reading or Scranton? I

36:43

said, it was reading at New Britain.

36:45

That's right, we got the ESPN tour.

36:47

The look on your face, the look

36:50

on your face was the highlight of my year.

36:53

And I looked at him really quizzically

36:55

and I said, Scott, the highlight of your year

36:59

that was nineteen ninety six. That was the year you got

37:01

called up to the majors and the now

37:03

Hall of Famer. Scott role and laughed and he said,

37:06

I stand by what I said.

37:23

I've done all the damage I can do here. Thank you for

37:25

listening. Here the credits. Most of the music was arranged,

37:27

produced and performed by Brian Ray and John

37:29

Phillip Shanel, who are the Countdown musical

37:32

directors. Tars based and drums

37:34

by Brian Ray, All orchestration and keyboards

37:36

by John Phillip Shanel, produced by Tko

37:38

Brothers. Other Beethoven selections have

37:40

been arranged and performed by the group No Horns

37:43

Allowed. The sports music is the Olderman

37:45

theme from ESPN two, when it was written by Mitch

37:47

Warren Davis. Courtesy of ESPN, Inc.

37:50

Musical comments by Nancy Faust the best

37:52

baseball stadium organist ever. Our announcer

37:54

today is my friend Larry David, and everything

37:56

else was pretty much my fault. Remember.

37:59

Countdown is now also available on YouTube

38:02

if you want to visit with an animated

38:04

version of me. Anyway,

38:06

that's countdown for this the nine hundred and thirty first

38:08

day since Donald Trump's first attempted

38:10

coup against the democratically elected government of

38:12

the United States. Arrest him again while

38:14

we still can. Would today

38:17

be convenient? The next scheduled

38:19

countdown is tomorrow. Bulletin says the news

38:21

warrants till then. I'm Keith Olreman. Good

38:23

morning, good afternoon, good night, and

38:26

good luck. Countdown

38:37

with Keith Olreman is a production of

38:39

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38:41

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