The Big K Morning Show
Larry's Hometown Heroes and Steelers
to work on our way through this early Monday, the last full day of September and a week from tomorrow night, we will gather at the Lamont for our 12th annual hometown Heroes event, our lifetime achievement awardee this year. Newly minted Hall of Famer Jim Leland, who is welcome to Cooperstown this summer and to the Pirates Hall of Fame as well, looking forward to the evening. So at this time, all this week, we're going to introduce you to our hometown heroes. And first is John Bento, John. Good morning. Good morning, Larry. How are you, buddy? I know what you're going to say. I don't feel like a hometown hero. That's yeah. I've been thinking that for three weeks since you called and told me about it. Well, for those of you who don't know, John, you will. I met John probably 20 years ago an event for the Lupus Foundation. And he had been performing and as a accomplished singer, song writer, band director, the needs hotel bands, sing or owns a place called Steamworks creative on route aid in Hampton where it's a great little performing space. And then I'm sitting down, John. And yesterday and the Sunday paper in their goodness section, I see chords for a cause. And I'm like, man, that's awfully close to band together. And then I realized, no, it is you guys. Yes, it is. And this is an event coming up this this week already. So first and foremost, we appreciate the work you do on so many different levels. Let's just start here with this show called chords for a cause. And how did you co found band together? And what's it all about? Well, courts for a cause is the brainchild of my buddy Clyde Calicott, who's the leader of right turn Clyde, a great local band. And a few months ago, he came up with a concept combining some live performance with tons and tons of video of Pittsburgh performers that we know and love. And it's kind of like a telephone Friday night. There's going to be a link for voluntary donations to support band together. And it's just going to be fantastic. So it will be based out of Steamworks. The venue you mentioned, however, majority of the performers will be online. And as I said, it's going to be in a telephone format. And we're hoping to raise money to support band together, which is an organization that creates music programs for people on the autism spectrum. How many years has it been now? Because this is a wonderful outlet for a lot of young people in particular on the spectrum who didn't know that music really kind of in some ways sets them free. Well, you know, music affects all of us in a beautiful way, right? Even so-called neurotypical people, even though I don't know how typical any of us are. But for people on the spectrum, music is really powerful. And more important than the actual music itself and the elements, it's the social events that are created around the music. For example, just yesterday, we were at the Lindsay Theatre in so wickly with what we call an open mic. Kids come up and they sing and they play and they do karaoke. And that's all really cool and it's great. But the more important thing is there were 25 families there that didn't even know each other a few years ago. There were young people that had no friends a few years ago. They were playing video games in their bedroom, you know, 24/7. And now they get out and they've made friends and they have connections and I think that's what band together, Pittsburgh, that's what we're most proud of, is creating those social opportunities. And I have seen and heard some of the talent over the years at shows we did at the Oaks Theatre for a Christmas show and other shows. And you're just remarkable talent too that would have never come out if band together didn't exist. So tell us about Moon Dog because people know Moon Dog. >> Moon Dog, the co-founder, he's a huge part of this. And, you know, actually, I am so thrilled to tell you that Moon Dog and I together are being honored this year by Achieva, a wonderful organization, and Easter Seal Society. So it's kind of weird for me and I'm honored for the hometown hero, believe me, and Humboldt. Moon Dog is the co-founder of Band together Pittsburgh. Of course, he's a music guy. Moon Dog's pub in Blondocks has been around forever. He has a son on the spectrum. As just about everybody on our board does, we live it every day. I have family members on the spectrum that I'm very close with. So, you know, it all happened at Moon Dog's Larry. I had the needs hotel band there. I don't know, eight years ago, nine years ago. And I had previously, to the show at Moon Dogs, met three young musicians that were autistic and in the middle of our show, my three professional guys sit down and three young guys come up and join us for a few tunes. And at the end of the night, Moon Dog said to me, what the heck was that all about? And I told him who they were and that they were on the spectrum. And he looked at me and said, we need to do this more often. And that night at Moon Dogs with the birth of band together, Pittsburgh. And it is wonderful. And I highly recommend you research band together. And you are expanding. I know just recently announced in Erie, you got one in Columbus, Ohio, central Pennsylvania. This is growing with its popularity and the impact music can have with people on the autism spectrum. Sure is. Thank you so much for mentioning that. We're so proud to get rolling our first event in Erie, November the third on a Sunday. We've already got great support from the local community. Columbus and central Ohio has been going strong for a year and a half, two years with a wonderful family out there leading the way. So yes, it's just been a blessing, Larry. It's been a blessing for all of us. And you're part in the Rose Garden at the Flight 93 Memorial, too. So very important and so emotional. It is emotional. I was I was asked to get involved in the summer of twenty one for my dear friend Bill Sink, who's one of the leaders. Bill lied to me completely. I thought there was a Rose Garden in June. When he said, Hey, man, can you come up? I know you're a crazy gardener and help us. I swear he said, help us finish this garden. Well, there wasn't a garden, but with an army of volunteers by September 11th, two two thousand and twenty one. A whole giant team of people created a beautiful Rose Garden in honor of the heroes of Flight 93. And it continues will be up there this week and will be up there next week in order to do some more plantings and prepare for the fall. Well, we're going to look forward to seeing you a week from tomorrow at the Le Mans for our hometown heroes event and comes with a thousand dollars for band together. Yes. Thank you so much, Larry. It's a really humbling experience. All right. John Vento, our first of five hometown heroes that you'll meet this week on the big K morning show and stick around. We're going to check in with our sports director, Jeff Hawthorne. What happened in Indianapolis next? Near side is cut. Touchdown. Pat Frier. Move taking contact and the Steelers inch a little bit closer. Pat Frier moves. First touchdown courtesy of CBS. This is the big K morning show right now. We're joined by our honestly sports director, Jeff Hawthorne, Jeff. Good morning. Is it a good morning, Larry? Is it? Well, I got to be honest with you. I felt a little down after the game yesterday because well, most of the game I felt like, wow, we kept blowing opportunities, but they fought back and put themselves in a position to at least tie or win in the end. They were only yards from being in Chris Boswell's field goal range when disaster struck. So as Coach Tomlin said a lot of self-inflicted wounds, right? Yeah. And I mean, especially you look at that last drive and they have the botched snap, which, you know, of all things to happen to have something simple like a botched snap. And really what happened on that play was the leg kick signifies the snap. So Zach Frazier is kind of looking back. He sees the leg goes go up. He knows to snap. He saw the leg go up, but he made a quick line call. So Fields thought, okay, he missed that. So I'm going to go look at at the secondary. So his eyes are on the secondary. The ball comes, hits him in the face. And that was a big 12 yard loss that really doomed that series. But yeah, I mean, you saw a number of those things turnovers lack of execution early on both sides of the ball. I mean, the defense was getting blown off the line of scrimmage early and giving up chunk plays. So there were issues all around this. It's not like one area you can finger points say, okay, that person or that unit is the reason they lost the game. That said, Justin Fields had a big day. I mean over 300 yards passing and he was able to run make plays happen. And you got to give him credit for that. Yeah, I mean, listen, he's got to take some of the responsibility for some of the slow starts. But what is impressing me is that he's throwing guys open. Like he's making throws to guys that are covered. And I mean, one of the nice things when you could see it at the game is I mean, there aren't receivers running open. It's not like he's missing other guys or why doesn't he try to throw at other guys? They aren't open. So I mean, the throws he's making to George Pickens is making some nice catches, but they're really good throws as well. And obviously, he has the unique ability to use his feet. Again, I think it's a tough call tomorrow for Mike Tomman as Russell Wilson is healthier. Yeah, they've lost the game. But you kind of feel like the offense is starting to find something. Do you disrupt it? Or do you feel so strongly in Russell Wilson that you're willing to make a change there? And you have the Dallas Cowboys coming to Acryashire Sunday night football. There'll be a great atmosphere there. But yeah, that will be the number one question tomorrow for Coach Tomlin. Are you sticking with fields? Or is Wilson actually ready now? Do we really know? Yeah. And Larry, I think he could probably queue up what he said last Tuesday and the Tuesday before because that's probably exactly what we're going to hear is that he doesn't need to make a decision now. Let's see how the week plays out. You know, we'll see how Russell's doing that he made a little progress last week. But you know, still not being able to dress, not being able to go through a full practice yet. He still got a little ways to go. It's not like he was right on the edge last week. Like he wasn't close to being ready to play last week. And here's what Coach Tomlin said about fields. Again, I appreciate his fight, but he and we were a little bit sloppy at times too sloppy to to to comfortably secure victory. Yeah, I mean, when you evaluate that game and you look at the final score, if you didn't watch the game, you'd be like, wow, what a close game. But it was a battle all the way through the entire game to get to the point where they did have a chance to win that game in the very end. And that part, at least, is encouraging. Yeah, I mean, they showed some fight. They were able to get off the mat in the second half. And defensively, they started to play a little bit better. You know, Tomlin said something else that kind of stuck with me that they were slowed in the third quarter, kind of slow to pick up on what Joe Flacco was putting down, which as many times, some of those guys have faced Joe Flacco. You thought they would have been able to adjust to that a little bit earlier. And, you know, to Sean Elliott, who's the new safety with the Steelers said that he didn't think they practiced well enough this week. Now, sometimes that can be an easy thing to say, but an interesting observation from someone who came from another team that the Steelers may not have been as focused during the week as they needed to be. Yeah, that said you're three in one. Unfortunately, what the Ravens looked like? World beaters last night with Derek Henry. Wow. And since an addict out of win two, it's amazing that a guy that size can pull away from people and run 87 yards. I mean, you think someone like that is going to get chunks of yards run over people and he does that. But he can also run by people and for anyone that thought he was done and didn't have anything left in the tank. He's landed in the perfect situation. Unfortunately, for the rest of the league, because I think that offense, much like the Steelers who I think are heading in the right direction, Baltimore starting to put it together. And that's that scary. I'm it's good for the Steelers. They don't play them for a little while. All right. What about Dallas? They've had their early challenges and they come here, you know, on a big stage Sunday night football still a big deal. Yeah. Larry, a nice modest organization where the owner never meddles and you never get sick of hearing about them because they're, you know, talked about all the time. Listen, Dak Prescott is someone that you've got to watch. They've got some playmakers on offense. They've had issues putting things together defensively. They've struggled and Mike Parsons, the Penn State star is dealing with an injury. So Dallas has some question marks. Obviously, they're coached by a greenfield native who beat the Steelers and the Super Bowl and Mike McCarthy. I mean, Dallas is a dangerous team, but they're also a team that could lose to anybody. So this is this is an interesting matchup because, you know, the Steelers looking to get off the map. Dallas needs to get going because all of a sudden you look at Dallas's division and and it's not Philly leading it. It's Washington. That's off to a quick three and one start with a rookie quarterback. How about that and look for the Dallas Cowboys at either I yellows or minnows on Murray Avenue. Yeah, you see buses going through Greenfield. You know, the Cowboys are going for a meal somewhere. All right. Jeff always appreciate your time, brother. We'll talk to you later this week. All right. Thanks, Larry. All right. I see sports director Jeff Hathorne on the big K morning show. This is the big K morning show in this half hour. We'll check in with Marty Griffin and get a preview of Get Marty 10 until two right now. We're going to check in with Colin Ferguson University of Pittsburgh student part of our next tank Pittsburgh overnight show four hours where we have some of the up and coming talent and collegiate minds. Good morning Colin. Good morning, Larry. Colin is on our video stream so you can see Colin at kdk radio.com. So what's the first thing you thought about when you woke up today? Uh, right now exams. It's just getting to that midterm season. So that it's on the forefront of everybody's mind and things have changed significantly due to technology and the way this works. So what are some of your courses? Um, right now I'm taking four courses for major specific. I'm taking sports writing and introduction to radio broadcast the irony that I'm sitting here right now. Well, you've been then I hope so. I hope this counts. Um, and then I'm taking Virginia Ed's physics and introduction of basic logic. And what were some of the topics that you shared over the weekend with your classmates on the campus? Uh, over the weekend, a lot of the, a lot of the buzz, um, came up around another anti-Semitic attack that happened in South Oakland. That was, that's been a really, really big, um, driving point for an talking point this this past weekend. Apparently that was the second attack. One of the attacks happened in the strip district prior to this. So, uh, apparently they have a suspect, correct? Uh, they have six for the one in, uh, Oakland. Oh, I didn't realize there were that many involved. There were. Uh, I believe the, the report that came out from the university's emergency notification service said that six people, um, basically came out and, uh, decided to assault, one individual in like a gang thing and then they were stopped by a bystander. Are they in the morning? Were they students? Uh, indeter, indeterminate. Very troubling, uh, on a college campus that that would happen just because someone's Jewish. Dementially. Yeah. It's, it's really sick. And then, uh, in terms of the semesters, so you hit the mid point and then, uh, you're on trimesters. Uh, semesters. Semesters have hit? Yeah. Uh, the midterms sometimes come around a little early or if you're lucky enough to have two. I mean, this is when it starts to pick up. So physics, yay. And what are some of the subjects that you're covering, uh, on next take Pittsburgh? Uh, this week, uh, we're actually lucky enough, um, to have representatives from both, uh, the pit, um, Democrat society and the pit Republican society. Um, both are going to be joining us tomorrow night. Um, on the show, so we'll be able to get kind of a, an in-depth student look at, uh, the upcoming election and where, you know, the different party lines here, uh, on campus stand. Do you think a lot of the students will watch the vice presidential debate or is that too far off the grid? I think they should. Uh, I think that, you know, it may not carry as much like name notoriety as the, as the presidential debate, but it's still incredibly important. I mean, these are still people that we are voting for. They may not be like the big name in bold, but there's still a significant part of this race. And I, I, I'm of the opinion that you should be, you know, as well informed as possible before you go into that decision. And this is a big source of that. Yeah, five weeks from tomorrow is election day. And then, uh, after that, it'll be interesting to see what happens next, but I think all of us, no matter what party your affiliation or if you're affiliated with any party, we'll be happy that the ads, political ads will end. Yes, I am very excited for the, the letters to stop appearing in my mailbox. And I know you're a sportsman too. You have the women's volleyball team number one in the country. They just, uh, won again over Georgia Tech. And you have a men's soccer team, which has been tremendous and an undefeated football team going into ACC play on the road at Raleigh Durham, North Carolina. So do you follow all that? Oh, yeah. Without a doubt, um, I was working, uh, for the Eastern Carolina game for volleyball, I was there working sideline. That was, that was a blast. Um, it was interesting to, you know, kind of see, because that was right after the Penn State game, it was interesting to see how the, uh, how the team was kind of dealing from, uh, what Coach Fisher described as, uh, a bit of a hangover from that Penn State win. I mean, that was huge. And the way that they're just continuing to power through is insane. Um, you've got this men's soccer team that, uh, I went, I've been to two matches so far this season, uh, and the level of support that's coming out for a program that, you know, hasn't really been getting that support. I mean, the stands are full to the point where students are overflowing and they're just, they have to stand around the, around the stadium. They can't, there's nowhere for them to sit. Um, and that's, that's also fantastic. Uh, it's, it's so great to me to see this level of support coming in for programs that aren't football, um, to, to see this excitement, um, to, to grow this athletic program because it's, it takes every single team that we have to continue to, to grow and evolve this athletic thing, especially with the way the NCAA is evolving now. Well, good luck with your mid terms and we'll catch up next Monday. Sounds great. You got a Colin Ferguson University of Pittsburgh student part of our next take Pittsburgh Overnight's from one until five here on the Big K Morning Show. We're going to check in with Marty Griffin next. 10 until two. Marty Griffin's in the house. He's already, uh, working with Patrick O'Connor. They do the lights in here, bro. They put in the operating lights. Uh, it's like working on the surface of the sun. We have installed new lighting. Why partially Patrick's fault because he said on the stream we looked jaundice. Is that what? Is that why he did this to us? That's why he's being so smug. All right. Lighting can't help, bro. So what they do is we have this track lining and they replaced them with these super nuclear effervescent balls. Yeah, yeah. It's, uh, no doubt taking our sight away, but it looks good on, on the stream while we're still here. The stream. Larry, your Trumpian glow is gone. That's orange. Yeah. Wow. How you doing? Super. All right. What's up? When you wake up Monday, do you feel like the apocalypse is near? Like Monday morning just sucks. Do you ever have that feeling on Sunday night when it could start that like you hate the world? To do. Trying to make a drug deal in the streets so you can be high. Yeah. Yeah, I am. Oh, man. My son gets up for swimming at 5 a.m. And even he's in a bad mood. That kid's always happy. I give him a lot of credit, man. That kind of discipline to do that. He must love it. I don't know, but he does it. Huh? It's a good boy. Um, this permitting thing annoys the F out of me. So let's just Ricky D. Who I love, I will never go to permanis again. Good time to start your diet, sir. They don't need you. That's a knee jerk. We can kiss my, you know what? Before they knew the full story. Even if they knew the damn stories. So, so Larry, I've seen this happen. At my favorite, some of my closest friends, Billy Sarris, one visit. Patrick, remember, says one visit by Trump's family. He's Satan. Death threats. Mark Sarayo, one visit by Trump family. You're a loser. You're a moron. We hate you. We're never buying donuts again. Sales are up 30% at Sarris and 30% at Oakmont Bakery. So go to hell, all these angry losers. You're going to boycott a restaurant for life. This is your stand in life, Larry. This is good as it gets for you. You're not going to raise money to help folks that are in these, these uh, in the wake of this hurricane. Nah, you're not going to help your neighbor. Nah, you're not going to help anyone elderly. Nah, I'm going to boycott promannies. Good. You need to lose the weight anyway. They don't need your, sorry ass. This, this kind of thing is really, look when they try to do this to Chick-fil-A. Their business exploded. Some cases they do them a favor. Sophomoric, seventh grade mentality. And by the way, JD fans does this stuff on purpose. Shows up uninvited. Patrick goes, you know how restaurants work, Larry? The man who's like, oh my God, what do I do? Seriously? Because it, because they know what happens. Before she gets permission, all the angry white men outside turn this into an attack on JD and they're going to burn down promannies.