A conversation with SEC basketball legend and social activist, Shan Foster
Adventures Of A Black Belt Sommelier
A conversation with SEC basketball legend and social activist, Shan Foster
Shaine Foster, welcome to adventures of a black belt sommelier. My podcast is sponsored by four-paws restaurant in St. Paul, Minnesota. It's the iconic fine dining restaurant in St. Paul. We are very -- I am very excited to have you join me today. I'm not exactly sure why you agreed to. You don't know who I am. We've never met. We must be a little puzzled by how you relate to black belt and sommelier, but you didn't ask. You just said -- well, maybe you just asked so I'd stop at -- you said yes because I'd stop asking you because I think I asked you three or four times. Thank you for having me. I'm really honored that you would reach out and I'm someone who lives by the creed that if someone cares enough to reach out, then you should respond and so I'm happy to be here. Well, I was lucky enough to have seasoned tickets for Vanderbilt basketball during your career there and I'm pretty sure my son and I were at every single home game that you played, which was an incredible experience. Thank you. I've seen a lot of great players play at Vanderbilt, Shaquille O'Neal, Pete Merovich, you can imagine. If I saw Pete Merovich play and I went to a lot of games, you can imagine all the players that I saw play. It's awesome. Great basketball. I think your game, your basketball game, was the most beautiful to watch of any player that I saw play in the world, Jim. That's high praise, man. Thank you. Well, it's true. I have this memory of you on the left wing just kind of rising from the court and burying these three pointers that you've made so many of. I know it wasn't, but it seemed so effortless. It just seemed like, almost seemed like there was a string in the basket pulling the ball into it because so many of them went in. How much of your game would you say was talent you were born with and how much of it was hard work? I would say all of it was hard work. Oh, man. But certainly-- And it helps it. How tall are you? Six, six. Yeah, that doesn't hurt. No, it doesn't hurt at all. So I was blessed to have some height. My dad is six, eight and did play basketball. And so I have a pretty athletic family. And so I certainly got some athletic genes from them. However, the athletic genes don't put the ball in the basket. Neither do they play defense for you, so I had to work extremely hard to make myself competitive and to accomplish a few things. How did you choose Vanderbilt University coming from Louisiana? Well, I'll never forget I was at a tournament, an AU tournament that was in Houston, Texas. And I'm a guy by the name of Jeff Jackson who was an assistant coach who came up to me after a game. I explored 40 points against Charles Rhodes and Monte Ellis. And so he comes up and he says, you know, have you heard from Vanderbilt? Do you know who Vanderbilt is? And I was like, no, I've never heard of it. And he said, well, you will now, you'll be here for me for sure. And so that started their recruiting of me. And Kevin Stallings, the head coach, actually came down to New Orleans in Kenner, Louisiana. And as he was recruiting me, along with a bunch of other coaches from LSU, Notre Dame, I mean, you name it, they were probably there. And so he didn't really feel like he had a shot based on some of the other coaches and major programs that were in the gym. And so he, you know, came up to me at the end of my workout and said, I want to make a deal with you. And I said, okay, he said, if I can beat you on your floor in a game of horse, then you got to give me a verbal commitment to Vanderbilt. This is Kevin. This is Kevin. And Kevin is a little older than me and, yeah, and was in, you know, some suit or, you know, and so I said, sure, let's do it. You know, he didn't even have on Jim shoes. I said, let's do it. And we get all the way down to H.O.R.S. And so I had one letter left, he had one letter left and he goes to half court and he shoots a behind the back pass to the rim and he sinks it. I had never seen anything like this before in my life. Not alone from a coach that's recruiting me. And so that was the start of it, obviously, you know, had to take visits and really go and see what Vanderbilt was all about. And, you know, fell in love with Nashville, fell in love with the Vanderbilt community. The school obviously has great prestige and speaks to ourself. Really, really, you know, messed well with those who would be my teammates coming to the school and they had gone to that. They went to the sweet 16 that year had a really, really good year. And so, you know, I thought that it was the best decision for me. And so I chose them over the likes of Kansas, LSU, Mississippi State, Notre Dame, Illinois, and Miller, many others. You were a great student, too. I did all right. [LAUGH] According to Wackypedia, you were a great student, too. You kind of have to be to go to Vanderbilt. They don't play. Whether you're an athlete or not, you have to go to class and you have to do well. I, Tim Corbin, do you know Tim Corbin? I do. You know, we'll get to this eventually, but this message that you preach publicly is very similar to Tim, to Corbin. We're pretty good friends. Okay. And I don't really remember why, but when he first came to Vanderbilt, I thought this guy has a chance to be really special. And I contacted the athletic director and said, "I'd like to support Tim Corbin, but I don't have any money. What can I do?" And he said, "Well, you could donate something to the baseball banquet." So I got, I donated dinner at my home with wine from my wine seller with Tim and Maggie to the baseball banquet every year, because I knew that I had two friends that would pay almost anything for it. And they'd bid against each other every year for several years, and I would have these dinners for 10 with Tim and Maggie and my wife and me and then six people who bought it. That's awesome. Got to know him pretty well. But his message, I mean, when he talks about players, he talks about what kind of man they're going to become, what kind of citizen they're going to become, what kind of husband they're going to become, what kind of father they're going to become, not what kind of baseball player they're going to become. Yeah. That is good. That's good. All right. One time I said, "Tony Kemp hit a home run," I said, "You must be so proud of Tony Kemp for this long career that he's had in the major leagues, when he was in college, nobody's." Most people said he'll never have a career, and he'll never play in the majors because he's so small, and he said, "I'm really proud of the man that Tony Kemp has become." That's amazing. I'm sure Kevin Stallings is very proud of the kind of man that you've become. You know, I've had opportunity to talk with him, post my college career, and he certainly expressed as much. He was really good friends with the head coach of Texas A&M, and he reached out to him and had me go and speak to their team one year when they were in Nashville. He got a chance to kind of hear me speak and do my thing and had an opportunity to express it then, and then also when Vanderbilt retired by Jersey not too long ago, he came and came and spent some time with my family, told stories, and shared how much I met to him and his family. His daughter was such a small child, and Jacob, his son, the police professional baseball now, was in, I think, middle school at the time, and going into high school. And apparently, my basketball number was a part of Jacob's password to everything. And then his daughter, she had made the sweetest little painting, she had painted and colored something. She was, you know, nine, ten years old, if that, and she had made this for me and said that I was her favorite player, and I actually kept it in my locker when I was in school. So, you know, I was very close, very close to them, and certainly, I appreciate the sentiments where we're certainly mutual. What was it like playing for Kevin? Man, you know, Kevin is the best basketball mind I've ever been around. I mean, his understanding of the game, his understanding of players and their tendencies and how to manipulate the game, putting players in position to be successful, I think, is second to none, you know, he really, really taught me the game of basketball in a way that made the game simple, right? He would always say that, you know, it's not just knowing what to do, it's also doing it. And so every defense can be beat, every offense can be stopped, it's just a chess match, right? But you have to first have the ability, and then you have to have the knowledge, basketball is 80% mental, and then you got to be able to execute, and so that I learned from Kevin and certainly carried on in my life as well. Did he ever smile? All the time. So interestingly enough, the end of my sophomore year, my great sophomore year was first team on the SEC after being all freshmen team as well, and at that point in time, he didn't smile a bunch at all, and it was probably, it was probably, you know, due to a lot of things, but we made it a point going into my junior year to say, dude, you got to come have fun. Like everybody else has to have fun being here. It's the only way we get better is the only way people want, the only way people want to be around and work on their game and put in the extra hours, and then we need that in order for us to be successful. So you're going to have to smile, you're going to have a good time. And so, you know, we, as players, decided to show up every single day to practice and scream, let's have a good day, right? Everybody in the gym's got to have a good day. Don't care what happened before you got here, like right now, we're having a good day, right? And that kind of energy was infectious and so I got a chance to see him smile a lot. And he and I developed a really good relationship such that, you know, we shared a lot of private moments together. So I got a chance to see him smile probably more than most. Are you ever lacking in confidence? Oh, goodness, confidence, no, but there was certainly a healthy dose of respect for the game, respect for other players that made me nervous. There was, you know, early in my career, like I think about like my freshman year coming in, it was real humbling to, you know, pretty much start all four years in high school, break records, you know, win championship, you know, I was the number nine small forward in the country and then you come to college and you got to earn your spot, right? You got to earn your minutes. And so I started out the first, you know, 10 games of the season, not only coming off the bench, but really not playing the time. And you know, that was, that was pretty humbling. And so then getting the opportunity to get out there and showcase what I, what I could do, you know, but my dad, one of the things he told me was the importance of not only getting the starting spot, but keeping the starting spot. And so that was just a goal of mine to perform in such a way that I always had the confidence of my teammates, my coaches, in every situation, made the right plays, played really, really hard, maximized opportunities. So I knew that if I prepared well and did those things, you know, that I would play, I didn't know that I'd have the level of success that I did, just because, you know, I never grew up always being, you know, on cover of magazines and newspapers. And I wasn't, I wasn't, you know, the superstar, so to speak, like, you know, LeBron coming out of middle school, everybody knew he was NBA player, you know, and so many other guys. I wasn't to that level, but I had confidence in myself and my ability as long as I was given an opportunity and I worked really, really hard. So I never lacked confidence, but certainly had a healthy dose of respect for not only the game, but also the players that I was playing against. It was the best player you ever played against in college. In college, you know, it depends on how you define best, you know, I think the person that gave me the most buckets was a guy from Florida and Anthony Roberson. That guy scored 30 on me in both games that we played against them, home and away. And there was really nothing I could do about it. Kennedy Winston from Alabama was really, really good. Jody Meakes from Kentucky was really good. Jody Jean Rondo at Kentucky was really good. Devin Downey from South Carolina was really, really good. Marcus Thornton from LSU was really good. Big baby Davis at LSU, who was, was my A.U teammate, Brandon Bass, who was my A.U teammate. Like those guys, those guys killed us and they were really, really freaking good. You know, so there were certainly guys that we played against that got after it and did well. Jeff Green from Georgetown, who, you know, traveled in the Sweet 16, but the ref didn't call it. So we lost, but he was really good as well. Roy Hibbert, you know, all those guys were really good basketball players. I was going to bring that up, Jeff Green. Yeah, and egregious a bad call or not, no call by the refs, which cost you a trip. You would have gone to the elite eight, right? Yeah, absolutely. And your team, that your, that was Derek, you and Derek Byers and AJ Ogleby, right? That was my, my senior year. My senior, no, my senior year, we lost to Sienna in the tournament in the first round. We were four seed, my junior year was the sweet 16 year with, with Derek. Derek was a senior, right? And AJ was a freshman. AJ wasn't here yet. AJ was a freshman, my, myself, you could have, you could have got, you could have, you could have wanted all that team. Yeah. Yeah, we were really good. And when we played very well together, we were undersized, but no one could outheart us. I mean, we, we really got after it. We trusted each other and got hot at the right time. How good a defensive player were you? So it depends on who you asked, right? So most of the time, yeah, most of the time I guarded, the tough is matchup most nights. If they were, you know, the one through the, the, the four, most of the time I guarded the, the tough is matchup and then my team awarded me best defensive player on our team one, one year as I took a more of a scoring load, you know, and my sophomore through senior year that dipped a little bit, but, but again, I, I guarded our toughest matchup most nights. I was, I was not the guy that had ended games with a ton of steals, although I think I'm, I'm some, I'm somewhere on this top skill steals list. Yeah. I don't, I don't know the top 100 or whatever. I certainly had my share of steals, but my thing was putting people in tough situations and forcing them to, to take tough shots and really understanding scouting report and, you know, really playing a chess match offensively and defensively with the opponent. So a lot of, a lot of my defense didn't necessarily end up in the stat sheet, but, but certainly and I don't, I don't, I don't necessarily think I was feared as a defender, but I wasn't taken lightly either. One more basketball question, what do you think of the new coach at Vanderbilt? You know, I think he, he brings a very welcomed pace of play to the, to a memorial that we've not had. I think he, he opens it up for guys to really be able to, to play the style of basketball that fits their game very well. He knows the game is really good with X's and O's, going to put them in position to be successful. I certainly, you know, commend him, my hat goes off to him for putting together a team that can compete, you know, being, I think we were at seven in one right now and, you know, there's only two players on the entire team that were here in years prior and those two don't even play with a ton. So we're, we're depending heavily on players that he recruited to get, to come here and, and they're, you know, they're pending out pretty well. So, so, you know, the, the verdict is still out on, you know, what his career will look like at Vanderbilt, obviously, but, you know, we like what we see so far. He's certainly a lot easier to like than Jerry Stackhouse was. For some, I thought Jerry was an amazing person, man. I really did it. Certainly knew the game. Great coach, phenomenal on the defensive side of the ball. You see, he's shining in that regard with the Golden State Warriors right now. And you know, he's a guy that got a bad rap because of, you know, some of his interactions with, with fans, I believe, and, and, and some of it, you know, to, to his own demise and things that he said, just his way of being. But you know, you got to respect somebody who, who stands on their own two feet and, you know, is willing to be themselves regardless, you know, and, and he's a man of faith, a man of integrity, a man of great character, those who got a chance to really spend time with him, adored him and the person that he was and the man he was, the players that played for him, walked away from that program, understanding the expectations of what it meant to be a man and to be a man representing Vanderbilt University, you know, and the list goes on and on about the, the positives. Obviously, he didn't win as much as, as he could have and probably should have. But also and not to make any excuses. But Jerry got us through COVID, Jerry got us through NIL, Jerry got us through the opening of the transfer portal. All of these things happened under his watch, which completely changed the landscape of not even just college basketball, but college sports as a whole. On top of that in two of the years that he was here, our very best player got hurt at the beginning of the season and wasn't available for an entire year. So if that same thing happens to any coach, particularly at Vanderbilt, you're going to have the same kind of season. You're going to have to scratch in claw because Vanderbilt is not a place where you can lose your best player and still make the tournament. That's, that's, that's not, that's not who we've been, right? And, and you look at my teams that I played on that, you know, had great years, you take me off of those teams, it's not the same. It's no, it's no, you're close, right? And so, you know, I think Jerry got a bad rap in some ways for, for some of that. But certainly respect what he was able to bring to Nashville and wish him nothing but the best as he continues his success in NBA. If Jerry Scarlet hadn't gotten hurt, the whole trajectory might have been different. I mean, he's, he's starting for the best team in the NBA right now. You know, he's, it's, it's crazy to think what that team might have been if he played that season. Yeah. Yeah. And that was under Bryce Drew. Right. I'm able to, you know, build that relationship and, and, and bring him in, which I think Darius, you know, could have chosen Vanderbilt anyway, but certainly could have gone anywhere in the entire country. And he's a great kid, man. Great kid comes from an amazing family and, and it's having the kind of year and success that, that he really should be. So post basketball, you've become this activist for, against violence against women and about diversity and inclusion in the workplace both finding healthy solutions that, that sign on the wall behind you is, is about inclusion and ethics and appropriate behavior in the workplace that you speak regularly about. But you also speak on treating women with respect and against violence against women on, on, I guess a more personal level, right? Mm hmm. Absolutely. Absolutely. You know, I think for me, I grew up in a house of service, right? Like, I, I certainly had an opportunity to see my grandparents to see my mother, my father, serve. And so that's at the core of my heart and everything I do is for the purpose of making, you know, others lives better, others, organizations better, making situations better. I want to leave the world much better than, than I came into it. And so that's, that's what it's about for me. And when it comes to ending violence against women and girls, you know, just understanding not only the statistics and the data, but the real life stories that come from people who are victims and survivors of domestic violence, man, it's, it's something that's really an epidemic, not only in our country, but in our world, where women are just not treated with, with dignity and value and respect. And that's something that we got to change. Every single one of us who are alive came to earth by way of a woman. It is atrocious to think that they are the worst treated people in, in, in our country and in the world. And so, you know, being able to lend my platform and, and skill set to hopefully ending that violence is certainly near and dear to my heart. And then when it comes to inclusion, I mean, I've lived a very diverse life from being you know, born in Mississippi, being raised in New Orleans, you know, spending my time in Nashville, traveling the entire world, playing the game of basketball. I've lived amongst and had to depend on and build relationships with people from every background there is. And generally, you know, what I've learned is that people are people. Every, every issue that exists in one culture exists in others, right? Like it's, that's just what it is. And to the extent that we can learn how to do life together, it's for the betterment of everyone. And when we try to be exclusive, when we are selfish, when we are harmful to our others, we're also harmful to ourselves. And so business doesn't operate at its peak performance level when we're not treating people with dignity and respect, organizations don't accomplish their mission in the way that they could when that's not happening. And our quality of life as citizens is just, you know, just living life is nowhere near the quality that it could be if we were, if we all treated each other with that same dignity and respect. And so that's what our work is really about reconnecting heads with hearts and making sure that we're, we have some integrity around how we're, how we're acting and behaving with others within the workplace and also others. Well, this is why I wanted to talk to you. We, we're, we have a, you are and I have addressed this issue about violence against women in opposite directions, kind of a big part of my life in martial arts was teaching women's self-defense classes, free, well, women's self-defense classes. And I did that for a long time. And I would generally have 12 women sign up for 12 one-hour classes. And the first class we would sit on the floor in a circle and go around the circle and tell the group why we were there. And my ex, well, it was interesting. At that time, the world was, it was a different place, obviously. But I wrote some women's rights organizations and asked them for feedback on how I could, when I first started this program, how can I make it effective and pretty much the universal response was, well, you're just part of the problem, you need to, you know, stay out. But I didn't let that discourage me and I had this, this series of classes. The first one, I asked my son who I think was 10 to help me to kind of be a dummy, to demonstrate what to do. So if a guy's choking you, what to do, if a guy's got you in a bear hug, whatever, which was a mistake because when we went around the room that first afternoon and these 12 women explained why they were there, it was way too much for my 10 year old son to hear. Because in several years of doing this, almost universally, the 12 women were not there to learn to defend themselves as much as they were there to learn how to deal with something that had already happened to them. And the stories were sometimes really, really horrific. Sometimes they were almost seen comical in comparison, but some of the stories were of 30 year abusive marriages and things like that were difficult to listen to. And as you say, at that time, I tried to do the research, the statistics I got, I came up with this 35% of women in the United States are sexually assaulted during their lives. I suspect that is a very low number, I suspect it's a lot more than that. But as I work around the country, there are very few spaces that you enter where someone in the room is not a victim of said violence. And everyone in the room knows someone who is a victim of survivor of gender based violence, but most of the time we don't know about it because it's the most unreported crime in the world. And there's all kinds of reasons why people don't report it. There's all kinds of reasons why people stay in abusive marriages and relationships. So it's not just as simple as if you don't want to be treated that way, then you should leave. That is the most dangerous time in a woman's life is trying to end a relationship. It is the time when the majority of the fatalities occur. And so it can be fatal, it can be horrendous. But it could also be as simple as power and control. People utilizing children, pets, property, there are all kinds of different isolating people from their families, their friends, their support groups, using weapons, threatening all of these things are part of power and control that create abusive and domestically violent relationships. And people don't want to call it that because it's gotten such a bad name. So there's a stigma behind it. So people even though they may be in abusive relationships, they don't want to call it abusive. And oftentimes they don't want to face the reality that they chose to be in relationship with someone who is abusive. But nobody shows up, you know, it's not like you go to the grocery store. And there's a nutrition label. And so you know every single thing about what you're eating, right? Like, no, when you're in relationship with somebody, people show you their representative. They show you the best version of them, the version that they want the world to see. And then you find out the rest. Once you're deep involved, then sometimes it's hard to get out. You said you grew up with grandparents who were giving service. What did you mean by that? So we had a family church that my great uncle was the pastor of Macedonia Baptist Church in Slidell, Louisiana. And my grandmother was a missionary and my grandfather was a deacon at the church. My grandfather also laid brick for a living and built the church and built the pool, the baptism pool that I was baptized in. She built my high school. My grandmother also served in the school system in various capacities. My mother has her masters and I believe her doctorate in social work. And so she's been in that field for over 30 plus years. And I remember growing up with her working in a group home, working with those who were mentally disabled. And just serving, being there to help and serving in our church and in our community as well. So that's what I mean. I literally saw them giving of themselves, giving of their resources, giving of their time, inviting people into our home, going and sitting with people who were someone they're deathbed, some of them are sickbed, some just needing someone to come by, going and praying with people, uplifting folks, like that. That was my life growing up and so I saw that on a regular basis. A lot of children that are raised in homes of ministers or other people of really deep faith rebel against that and end up not being of deep faith, but your faith is enormously important to you to do that, right? Absolutely. My faith, I would not be who I am, where I am, if it wasn't for my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And I'm unapologetic about that, you know, and so, but I'm also not one who forces my faith on to other people or forces it down. People's throat. I don't believe in that. I think it's all about relationship and so, you know, my hope is that through the way that I live my life, that people that won't read the Bible will get a chance to see it in me and the way that I treat them and the way that they see me treat others. Why were you drawn to this cause of violence against women? Where did that come from? Well, I wasn't involved in it at all, actually, until I retired from basketball and was trying to just figure out what I wanted to do next, what path God would have me go down and Pat Shea, who was the CEO at the time, reached out to me with an opportunity to join their mission and to help create an initiative that would engage men and boys to end violence against women and girls. And as the more I heard about the mission and the work and the possibilities that could be, you know, it was something that I prayed about and really felt like it was a calling for me that I didn't even know was there. And we had tremendous success very quickly. And it turned into a nationally recognized program where we've impacted more than a million boys across the country teaching them how to value and respect women and girls. But it was very organic, how I got into it and it wasn't just a job, it truly became a part in synonymous with who I am and what I'm trying to do in the world. Pat Shea is, I know her as Patricia, the CEO of the YWCA, that's who you're referring to, right? Yeah, former CEO. So Sharon Robeson is now. But you, this didn't come from any personal experience that you had of violence against your mother or your, anything like that. I certainly have people in my family, my mother included who are survivors of domestic violence. Yes. But that wasn't the reason why I did it. It certainly connected me to the, to the vision, you know, once I was introduced to it. That, that wasn't necessarily the, the launching pad for me. Do you know Becca Stevens? I do. Good. You should, in her way, she's, it's a different path, but she's saving the same way you're saving lives, she's saving lives every day with her cafes. Yeah. It's extraordinary what she's done. Absolutely. I, I couldn't agree more and much needed, much, much needed in our community. So we're, we're proud to have Becca here doing that work and not, not only her, but so many others, you know, Tennessee is the volunteer state because we have so many nonprofits. So, so we're so philanthropic and giving and shared through a lot of charity work in this, in our statewide community. But it's necessary because there's so many issues. We have such a long way to go and nonprofit community is important to really bridging the gap between, you know, opportunity that's accessible, you know, assistance from the government. And then those gaps have to be filled because if not, again, as I was stating before, it drastically, negatively impacts our quality of life. I can't imagine all of the things that these nonprofits are doing where they're, you know, providing support for thousands of people. If that was not there, we'd feel it. And we'd feel it pretty immediately. So I'm, I'm so grateful for leaders like Becca and, and, and so many others. Your wife is pregnant. Yeah. We're excited, man. February due dates. I'm going to be the father of an incoming son and I'm, I could not be more thrilled. Well, he's got, he's going to have a great role model for a father. That's for sure. Thank you. I appreciate that. Is your wife a physician? No. So she, she works at Vanderbilt, but she's in student affairs and, and does a lot of change management work and strengths based work, a lot of, a lot of, basically, Vanderbilt's internal consulting. When you speak on violence against women, this is the last question, well, in this here, when you speak against, on violence against women, what is the, what do you say? If you could boil it down into three minutes, what, what do you say? I would say that every single day, three women are killed by an intimate partner, that one out of every four women experience domestic violence in their lifetime, one out of every five women have been raped, one out of every six women have been sexually assaulted and more than 15 million children in our country witness abuse, either in their households or in their communities. And of those 15 million children, the boys are more than twice as likely to repeat the behavior they saw. The girls are more than like, to be victims. It's an epidemic, but it's one that we can fix. It's a learned behavior, violence is a learned behavior. People do not come into the world being violent, being abusive, being harmful to others. It's learned. And so if it can be learned, it can also be an unlearn, which also means we can teach people differently. And that's the work that we're doing, trying to prevent the violence before it ever starts in the first place. And it starts with reconnecting people's head with their heart. That impacts our decision making, changing culture is about changing the way we think, the way that we act and the way that we interact with other people. But we have to be intentional, intentional about our understanding of what is possible and intentional with the actions, the things that we do on a regular basis, how we respond to conflict, how we respond to being upset, how we respond to rejection, how we define masculinity, not only what's bad, but also what's good. We need more role models, we need to teach healthy masculinity, and not just be reactive to the toxic masculinity that has existed for far too long. I can't think, I can't imagine anything that could be said after that would be more profound than what you just said. So I'll say, I've been really excited about talking to you because of my fandom, because I did watch all those basketball games and it was so much fun watching you play and watching your teammates play and all those wins, it's a lot more fun to watch when your team is winning. It's a fact. Unfortunately, I'm a Tennessee tightness man and that's not so much fun, but so I was really, really excited to talk to you today because of that, but I was a lot more excited to talk to you today to share this message that a lot, fortunately, a whole lot of people around the world will download this and listen to it or watch it, and hopefully they assimilate it. I had 110 people download my podcast in Finland last night, which is, I don't know how to explain that, but I did. So it'll be worldwide, it'll be Russia, Italy, United Kingdom, India, China, Romania, your message is going to be heard. I love it. Well, thank you so much for having me, man. I really appreciate the invitation and wish you the absolute best. Email me when that baby's born and send me a picture I got you. Thanks Shane so much. Thank you. Have a good one. Go on. Stick. [BLANK_AUDIO]