Michele Tafoya Is Forging Her Own Path
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Welcome to the Jason and the House podcast. I'm Jason Chaffetz. Thanks for joining us. I think you're going to enjoy it. We got Michelle Tafoya joining us. And some of you, if you watch football, if you watch like Monday Night Football, you watch big games, you know who she is from the sideline reporting there. She's done some amazing things as a reporter on the sidelines and a great career.

But we're going to talk to her about breaking through those barriers, women's sports, how she got treated in what was a male-dominated area. It should be a good discussion. So I hope you're able to stick with us and hear that out. But we're going to talk about, give some highlights of the news, and then, of course, highlight the stupid because there's always somebody doing something stupid.

stupid somewhere and then we'll phone a friend when we call Michelle Tafoya. But let's I want to get into the news because two of the topics that are kind of piquing my interest right now. There was this story. It's horrific story out of Tennessee. This is Giles. I think it's how you pronounce it. Giles County Sheriff Sheriff.

They came in and warned people, said, do not pick up or open up folded money. And I saw this on FoxNews.com, and I'm like, wait a sec. You see a $20 bill, $50 bill, whatever it might be that's folded, and it's just sitting on the ground or on a table or something. You've got to pick it up. But they've had two incidents where people pick it up, and then there's a white powdery substance in it.

And these had some deadly drugs that were found at a local gas station. Now, it is an incredible perversion of somebody who would take joy or satisfaction or do something to poison people. But there's this drug out there called fentanyl, and it is a powerful synthetic opioid that

um that has just caused an untold number of deaths last time last year last year more than 100 000 americans died of drug overdoses in a 12-month period a lot of this is fentanyl i mean huge numbers of fentanyl now it's pouring across the border because we have an open border thanks joe biden and kamala harris it's pouring across the border

A small fraction, just like, I mean, a little grain of this can provide a lethal dose to kill somebody instantly, if not a slow, painful death.

I remember there was a, I think it was Bill Malusian, a Fox News reporter, was reporting from the border that they had seized two pounds of fentanyl. Now, if you say, oh, two pounds of marijuana, you're like, ah, whatever, big deal. You know, that's not going to end the world. Two pounds of fentanyl could kill literally hundreds of people.

thousands of people and ultimately millions of people that's how lethal this drug is so if you put it into a folded bill and then open it up that can kill you and it's that dangerous it's that serious now you've got kids got elder I mean you have all walks shapes of life all ages it goes back to this commonality that is guess what folks

something that can kill you that is pouring across the border because we have an open and secure border. Now, we got a fight on our hands. The war on drugs, so to speak, is kind of a joke in some areas, but this is really serious stuff. In fact, Colorado Republican Representative Lauren Boebert, of which my brother does some work for her, introduced fentanyl as a weapon of mass destruction. It's the WMD Act,

And it's a bill aiming to classify the dangerous opioid as a weapon that can be used to cause widespread death. I would argue that it already has achieved that. But literally a few pounds of this drug can wipe out the entire country, the entire United States. It's a stunning number. It's hard to believe. But my guess is if you're listening to this podcast, you've heard of or know somebody personally who,

who has had a drug overdose and unfortunately, increasingly, the odds are that it was fentanyl. You got to lock down the border. You got to go after the people that are producing this stuff and distributing this stuff. And you got to make it really painful because they're killing people. This isn't some fun recreational drug, but it's actually killing people.

The second thing that's really on my mind is inflation. I mean, we're just living it, breathing it. It's avoidable, folks. We've talked about this on the news before.

Don't spend so much money. Milton Friedman, who is one of the more famous economists out there, back decades ago, it was like 60s or 70s, he talked about this and he said, it's very clear, it's very simple. It's too much money chasing too few goods. That's what causes inflation. That is the pure definition of inflation.

The only people, the only ones that can increase the money supply, print and spend more money is the federal government and the Federal Reserve. Now, President Biden appointed the current Federal Reserve chairman.

And these massive, massive spending bills that we have exacerbated the problem. We didn't have inflation before Joe Biden. We had it very minimal. We had it smaller, but it was also more manageable where income was exceeding, increases in income were exceeding the inflation rate, which brings us to our next topic because you know what, folks?

It's time to bring on the stupid because there's always somebody doing something stupid somewhere. All right. Right at the top of my list. And in part, I give him credit for coming and telling the truth now, but he didn't before. And that is MSNBC's Joe Scarborough. Now, he, along with former Obama advisor Steve Ratner, Steve Ratner's pretty accomplished person along the way.

But MSNBC's Joe Scarborough, praised. Praised.

Joe Manchin for derailing President Biden's Build Back Better Act. Remember the BBB and how everybody in the Democratic machine, including and especially MSNBC, was railing on Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema for not passing Build Back Better? In fact, it was Joe Manchin who held the line and said, this government spending is absurd.

Now, you've heard others like Bernie Sanders and say, oh, it's amazing. And AOC, oh, it's amazing that there are these two people that can hold up the whole government. No, it was 50 Republican senators plus two Democratic senators that killed the BBB. But now, isn't it interesting that.

that inflation is hitting and Joe Scarborough and Steven Ratner, former Obama advisor out there praising Joe Manchin for blocking. It was going to be a $6.5 trillion spending Ratner. Here's the quote from Ratner to Scarborough in an ironic way. You almost have to thank Joe Manchin for blocking that because $6.5 trillion is spending in this economy would make those numbers look small and

But earlier, Joe Scarborough had been giving advice on how to pass the BBB. It's just so stupid, right? It's a basic thing. The federal government cannot be all things to all people. The bigger, more expansive, more money. The Democrats answered everything, but unfortunately...

You have some people I think are going to be a slow learner on this. On the good side, they did still spend too much money with the other bills that did pass. But that's why we're having this rapid inflation. That's why your money is worth less. That's why the price of gas is so much. That's why that and bad economic policies related to energy development. But it's also why it's making things so, so, it's just so, so bad.

So expensive. All right, last thing on bringing on the stupid. And Kurt Schlichter, he's the one that pointed this out. He's on the good side of this equation. At Harvard, they have segregated graduation ceremonies. And what was so funny is that they included the chief inclusion officer to speak at the segregated ceremonies. What the heck? Do they not get it? They segregate.

Based on race and other factors for individual celebrations...

The person who comes and speaks is the chief inclusion officer. The chief inclusion officer would say, come on, come all, everybody gets to participate. Oh, no, not at Harvard. They're too woke. And that, to me, is just flat out stupid. All right, time to bring on Michelle Tafoya. Michelle, I have seen her do her work on the sidelines. She's exceptional. She's just amazing.

I've never had a conversation with her, but if you watched Monday Night Football and some of the biggest games along the way, which I've watched my share of, then you've seen and known Michelle Tafoya. And I'm just glad she's been doing some stuff at Fox. She's tried to do some things, I guess, politically. I've never chatted with her, but let's give a call. Let's call up Michelle Tafoya. Hello. Hey, Michelle. This is Jason Chaffetz. Oh, well, how are you?

Just so kind of you to answer. We've never had a conversation before. Yeah, but I saw your name on the caller ID and I just said, you know, I'll take this call. Yeah. You know, Jason's a little I get a lot of positive out of it. I got a good name from my parents. It's not too threatening, right? Well, although wasn't Jason the character that was like the evil murderer in those Halloween movies or something like that? Or, you know what I'm talking about?

Yeah, Jason, you know, with the chainsaw master. But, you know, Jason's still like, come on. Do you really know a Jason other than that guy who's like really a bad dude? No, I can't say that I do. So it's all good with me. And I never saw those movies. I can't I can't take that kind of movie. I cannot take it. So I don't go to them. Yeah. You know, when I was like a little kid.

I went over to my neighbors and the parents weren't really in control of this household. And I saw The Exorcist. I saw all this stuff. And it scared the living daylights out of me. Wait, when you were a kid, you saw The Exorcist? Oh, yes. Like, how old were you? And I do not... I was probably... Think about this. Probably 10. Oh, my... That's like...

How many nightmares did you have? Eleven? Or maybe I was slightly older than that. You had to have nightmares. I still... Like, I could still see parts of the movie, and I saw it, like, that many decades ago. It was not a healthy thing. I waited until I was well into my 30s to see that film. And you know what the amazing thing is? The film is...

Kind of good, the story, but yeah, no, I wouldn't have recommended it to a 10-year-old. But I'm not a horror movie kind of guy. I'm not either. Okay, so if you had to go to a movie, what kind of genre of a movie do you choose?

You're going to get me with Pride and Prejudice and that kind of stuff every single time. I love Jane Austen. I love that. I love the period pieces right now on TV, really into the new season of Peaky Blinders. And that gets pretty violent, but somehow I can handle that. I don't know why that is. Just saw Top Gun. Have you seen the new Maverick film? Yeah, I was almost falling asleep the moment you mentioned Pride and Prejudice. I'm sorry. I'm really sorry. My wife...

is with you. Okay. She, she, yeah, my husband's not going to that with me. No, no. Well, I go with her. I go, I'm not that guy. I go with her. I'll eat the popcorn. And she'll like,

Hey, I got to get a second bugger popcorn. I'm going to fall asleep here. But Top Gun was an exceptionally good and it was so much better than the first one. I thought, you know, it's funny before we went to see it. My husband watched rewatch the first one. I didn't. Yeah, we did, too. OK, I didn't do that. And it's interesting. He just said the biggest difference for him was the age of the film. You know, it's just older and different.

But this was really a good sequel. There aren't you can't say that about a lot of sequels, but this one was very good. I thought it was better. I thought the sort of the Tom Cruise love interest was a better, shorter story. Wasn't. Yeah, it wasn't the whole thing. Yeah. Yeah. And the action, obviously, the way that it was great cinematography is just crazy. I'm a big Tom Cruise fan. You know, and I didn't realize that he flew. I didn't know any. My daughter told me that because she saw it on Tick Tock.

And so I didn't know that. It's pretty cool. Yeah, I saw this interview with him, just a portion of it where they're talking about these different licenses that he has. Oh, he's got a driver's license and a trucker's license and a motorcycle license and this pilot license and that pilot license. And he concluded by saying, and I even have my real estate license, which I thought was pretty funny. That is funny, especially if it's true. But I kind of doubt that it's true. I don't know. But

But it is amazing. And I mean, I remember that John Travolta was a pilot, but I didn't know that about Cruz. And it's pretty cool. Yeah, no, he's been a superstar for like,

He's a little bit older than me and a little bit older than you. But he's kind of been a star my whole life. Here's the thing. Maybe it's just a female thing. I don't know. But when he jumped up and down on the couch about Katie Holmes with Oprah and all that, I kind of went, eh. And when he critiqued Brooke Shields for having sort of the postpartum depression, I kind of went, eh.

You know, you're losing me a little bit here, Tom. But this movie is right in his wheelhouse, and it's so perfect for him. And he did such a good job. And the movie itself was so good and unafraid to be a little bit patriotic that I really loved it. And I was glad to see it make so much money. Oh, I know. I know. And it's the first time I've been back in a movie theater in probably a couple years. Oh, absolutely. For me, first time since COVID. Yeah.

Yeah, and it was good. I mean, it was good, although...

Can I admit something really dorky to you? Sure. I did go into the theater and check that both the exit doors were fully closed and not propped open for someone to come in from the outside. Oh, God. I'm kind of paranoid that way. Yeah, I know. Yikes. I know. Aren't I stupid? But I just wanted to feel better about sitting there with my kids, you know? Well, unfortunately, because we got some tumultuous times. Yeah. But I, you know...

I think it's just America kind of waking back up and getting back together. And it felt good that way. Yeah. Good. And the popcorn tasted so much better than my microwaved popcorn. I just, there's something about it that from the oil slash butter, whatever that crap is that I put in it. Yeah. Just, I don't know. It's just better popcorn. They have some sort of secret sauce. Truth be told, Michelle, I, early on in my career, I,

I call it career because I worked in a movie theater. It was one of my first real jobs. Is that right? Yeah. Oh, yes. I worked for the General Cinema Corporation.

I had my powder blue jacket. I had my short sleeve white shirt, my clip-on bow tie. This is in Arizona. Nice. So it was kind of toasty. Yeah. We're taking out the garbage, cleaning up the theater, popping the popcorn, ripping the tickets, selling the candy. I did it all. You did it all. You renaissance man. Yeah. It was kind of the formative years for me. You're listening to Jason in the House. We'll be back with more of my conversation with Michelle Tafoya right after this.

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And you've done some amazing stuff on All In A Way. So I kind of want to talk through kind of what you're seeing, what you're feeling, and your perspective. You've been sharing it with us for years on air. Yeah. But I'd love to kind of peel it back a little bit. When you were growing up, what was life like growing up for you? And what was your first job outside the house other than, hey, Michelle, can you help us take out the garbage? Right, right, right.

So I was really, really lucky. And I'll say that right out of the gate. But that luck was created by my parents who grew up during the Depression and were very, very poor, extremely poor. Where were they?

And my mom grew up in Richmond, which is on the East Bay of San Francisco. And they were both just dirt poor during the Depression. And they wound up both going to Cal Berkeley. My dad was one of 11 kids. He was the only one that went to college. My mom was one of three kids and the only one that went to college. And they happened to meet. My mom, Irish and German. My dad, totally Hispanic. Well, I think a little bit of French from his mom's side, but not much.

They met, and my dad became an aeronautical engineer. They moved down to the center of that, which was El Segundo, Manhattan Beach, Redondo Beach, the South Bay of California. And that's where I was raised, in Manhattan Beach, before anyone knew where it was. I'm not kidding. No one knew what it was. I've got to interrupt you a little bit. Age...

7 to like 10, 11, right in there. I lived in Palos Verdes. I was your neighbor, but I was a little snotty. Yeah, I was going to say, we always thought of the PV kids as up there on the hill, you know, the rich kids. Yeah, we kind of were. Did you have a pony and stuff? I didn't have a pony, but I remember going to Montemalaga, which is down near the beach, and you

You could just to show, let everybody know how kind of snooty this was. You go to Montemalaga, you can bring your boogie board. And then after school, you just carry the boogie board down to the beach. Oh, sweet. Yeah. And then also for like science, I guess it was science class.

You'd go down to the tide pools and try to find little octopus and things like that and sea urchins. But the tide pools were great. I'd visit the tide pools growing up. I love the tide pools. I love that place. Yeah, but there's not many schools where in your 45 minutes of that class, you have time to walk down. Right. Hey, bring your sandals. Yeah. And we can go check out. Anyway, we digress. Keep going. Yeah, you were snotty. I was in the neighborhood. Yeah.

But I get it. The Palos Verdes was a little... Yeah, you guys were the up-the-hill rich kids. But, you know, I won't hold that against you. I won't. I promise. Thank you. I snapped out of it. Well, you know what? People hear Manhattan Beach and they automatically think that. But remember that my dad was an engineer. My mom was a schoolteacher. We were very much a middle-class, upper-middle-class family. I think middle-class probably...

And they raised four kids and they put us all through college. And so I do feel very, very lucky, even though, you know, we stood out in my neighborhood because we weren't we didn't come from money. And my dad very much looked his Hispanic background and we were called names by some of the neighbor kids.

I don't doesn't like live in me and bother me, but it was part of my life. And all of my relatives were I mean, I had Chicano relatives. I had Mexican relatives. I had a ray and they all spoke Spanish when they congregated at my house. So we were kind of that house, you know, on the block. But but.

I'm grateful for it. I'm grateful for all of it. And my first job, I guess, outside of the house was being a paper girl. I rode a bike around and threw papers in people's yards. Now, how early in the morning were you waking up doing that? It was early. It was early. It was like 6 a.m. I had to be on the bike. But I was really— Was your mom doing it? No. Was your dad really doing it for you? No, I swear I did it all myself. I got up, I rolled the papers, put the rubber bands around. If it was raining, I put them in the plastic bags.

put them in those big canvas bags that you throw on the handlebars of your bike and ride all over the neighborhood and deliver the paper. That was my first job. That's a real job. It is a real job. When you kind of wake up that early, that's not fun as a kid. I was 13 and we were allowed to do it at that age. Well, I kind of lied about my first job. Oh, now here we go. Yeah, I did.

Because I wasn't going to work for the General Cinema Corporation without, you know, kind of fudging on the age. But, you know, back then it didn't matter. No, it didn't matter as much. I still remember they had a sign posted at the General Cinema Corporation that said minimum wage, you know, I think it back then it was like $3.50 or $3.25 right in there. But I was making $2.88 a month.

And I said, Dad, what's up with that? You know, I saw this thing at work and he said, well, go talk to your manager. So I went in to go see Mr. Hobie. And Mr. Hobie said, we're in the entertainment industry. You don't have to pay minimum wage. Oh, see. And I said, OK, I went back to work like I didn't even care. We just wanted to. I mean, I had a work ethic. I swear I've never not worked in my entire life. So from the time I was paper girl, I've I've never stopped working ever.

It would feel weird, wouldn't it? To me, it would. I need to be doing stuff and I need to feel productive. It's a weird trait I inherited from my mom. So did you grow up playing sports? I wasn't any good. You commentate about sports, but did you play sports? I did play sports, but I really wasn't...

very good. I'm just going to say that. I played soccer. I played softball. I played volleyball. I played basketball probably the most, but I really wasn't very good. Meanwhile, I had this brother who was 6'6", 6'7", and who was an all-state basketball player. So the way I learned about basketball... All-state in California? Yeah. That's pretty impressive. Let me tell you, he was good. And I'd go and I'd watch those games. And that's

kind of where my love of sport began. I hope it's not too personal to ask. How tall are you? Oh, I'm not even near, like, I'm not even, I met Abby Hornacek and I said, you know, I used to cover your dad and you're way taller than me. So that was my comment. Yeah, okay. No, because my mom's really short. I'm only 5'6", I think, 5'6". Yeah, okay, so you're very average. I'm very average everything. Yeah. I really am. No,

No, but height-wise, if you said you played a lot of basketball, your brother's 6'6". I know. It sounds like, okay, you might be, you know. He's an anomaly. It's very weird because my dad was 5'10", my mom's 5'4", and here was this huge man.

Yeah. Well, okay. So you go in, but you're watching a lot of basketball. Yes, tons, yeah. Trying to play some basketball. And did that give you the fever to kind of get into? I think what gave me the fever to get into it was I became a rabid footballer.

49ers and Lakers fan. My dad grew up in San Francisco. He was a 49ers fan. And so I inherited that mess from him. Believe me, early on, they were terrible. And then, of course, Joe Montana showed up and Bill Walsh. And then the Lakers, my dad was a Celtics fan, but I loved Showtime. I absolutely loved

Showtime. And so Magic Johnson and all those guys were just, I loved it. And it was right there in my backyard. So those two things just had my total imagination. But I didn't really think about getting into it until I saw other women who were in it. Hannah Storm, Leslie Visser for sure, Robin Roberts. And I said, I think I could do that. So what was your, I mean, okay, so it's one thing to say,

Oh, Michelle, I think to myself, I shall do this, but it's another thing to actually get there and, and, and make. So what was the difference in how did you get that first break? How did you make that break happen for you? I think you've reframed it. And I, and that's so cool because you do make your own breaks. I mean, there there's timing and there's luck. There's no question about that. Um,

I went back to grad school, got a master's in business as my fallback. I thought, well, before I really go try, I should have a fallback plan. So I did. I went to USC and I spent two years studying. And then the bug grew in me even more. So I dropped everything and took a job in Charlotte, North Carolina, doing radio for five hours a day, sports talk radio. And while I was there, some things were happening in Minnesota, right?

that I got called about. Like they had a sports station in Minnesota. Hey, we want to talk to you about something that's going on in Carolina or yada yada. It was a weird connection.

And I did an interview from Charlotte. Now I'm in Charlotte. I did an interview on the phone with this station in Minneapolis. And after it was over, the program director picked up the phone and said, you don't know me, but I want to hire you. And so then she took me to Minneapolis, which was where I got to start covering the NFL. I did the Vikings broadcast on radio there. And it just...

It kept going. But the real when you talk about a break, if you remember and a lot of people are too young to remember this, that's cool. There was a time when CBS, NBC and ABC had all the NFL rights. Fox didn't even exist. Right. Oh, I remember that. Fox is born.

And they make this huge play and they steal the NFL broadcasting rights away from CBS. The Tiffany Network lost the NFL to this upstart. Well, John Madden, Pat Summerall, Leslie Vitt, they all left. They all left CBS and went.

Jim Nance, I think, was the only one that stayed at CBS because he wanted to cover the Masters. So they have this huge opening of slots for people and they didn't have much stuff to cover. So they figured, let's just hire a bunch of nobodies and, you know, pay them like it and then, you know, see what happens. And so I just happened to apply and interview and get hired way before I was ready, by the way. Wow. OK, so let's.

I want to go back for just a split second and talk about five hours on radio. Yeah. That's a lot of talk. I know. Talk about fully immersive. Yeah. I mean, everything comes your direction on radio. Oh, yeah. And the thing about it is, and Charlotte at that time was huge NASCAR, right? And they were all about Duke and North Carolina. Yeah.

And the Braves, because that was the closest baseball team to them. They didn't yet have the NFL, but the year that I was there, they were in the process of getting the Panthers, the Carolina Panthers. But you didn't know anything about NASCAR, not growing up in Manhattan Beach. No, I did not. You are correct.

And I got to be honest, Jason, if I'm being honest, the one time I did go to cover a race and talk to like the head of NASCAR, they wouldn't look me in the eye. I don't think they were really that hot on, you know, like a female being in the middle. It was really uncomfortable. But I just sat there and looked at him and interviewed him and said, that's fine. That's your problem, whatever. And I didn't complain about it. You know, it is. It's it.

That's the thing you have to understand when you jump into this kind of career, that there is going to be – there are going to be people –

when I was doing this, they're going to say, whoa, this is a woman doing sports. I was, yeah, I was in that first wave. I certainly wasn't the first, but I was probably in that first wave. And deal with it. You know, if you don't want to deal with that, don't go jump in the water. But if you want the job, then just go deal with it. And I told myself I wasn't going to put myself out there as

a female sportscaster. I was going to put myself out there as a sportscaster and just compete fair and square with everyone that was covering sports. I didn't care. I saw the looks. I saw the, you know, the sort of the, oh, there's a woman in this press conference. I saw all that stuff. I just didn't care. I mean, somewhere inside me, I was aware of it and I was like, oh, whatever. I got to deal with this. Deal with it. If you want the job, go deal with it. Complaining wasn't going to get me anywhere.

Okay, so you do the radio. You somehow make this incredible transition to television. And next thing you know, so go back to the beginning of, okay, they've hired you. They're paying you probably not what you deserve, but they don't have a whole lot to put on the air. So what happens? So, well, I did a bunch of shows. Eye on Sports was one of the things that they had, which covered a variety of sports. I

You know, I really was not well prepared for the job. In some ways I was because I could tap dance, which is what you do all day long on radio. But in some ways I wasn't. I didn't I wasn't familiar with the traffic to commercial from, you know, it was a little bit. It was a huge growing, you know, phase and an exponential learning curve. But I did get to work on the final four and I did get to work on college football and I did get to work on the Olympics. So CBS had enough to make it up.

a great learning experience. I had some great champions there and I'm grateful for it.

So what do you think was sort of the quantum leap or the, oh, wow, that really made a difference? Yeah, I think it was when I got hired at Monday Night Football. I was working at ESPN, ABC. But why do you think you got that? Why do you think? Okay, here's... They got the pick. Yeah, they can pick anybody. You're right. Monday Night Football in America is like... Yeah, I know. And this was at the point where Monday Night Football was still on ABC, not on ESPN, right? It was on ABC, the broadcast network, which is a different...

It was Al Michaels and John Madden, and they had just had kind of an experience with a sideline reporter that didn't work out. I'm going to leave it at that. Al Michaels and I started working on the NBA together because that was also on ABC, and I happened to get the prime job of sideline reporting on the A game, the top game of the week.

And Al Michaels was brought in to do those games, too. The NBA was rather new at ABC. It had long been at NBC and it moved over to ABC. So we got to get a voice. We get they get Al Michaels. And I was I had worked really, really, really hard and found my way into the A job, into the sideline reporter job.

Al and I got to know each other. And unbeknownst to me, I swear to God, I did not know this was going on behind the scenes. He calls Fred Godelli, the producer of Monday Night Football, and says, Fred, I've got our next silent reporter. You got to meet her.

So I flew to New York and I met with Fred and a guy named Mike Pearl, who is no longer with us. I love him. And they hired me and I had to keep my mouth shut about it for about a day or two. And then the next thing I knew, it was all over television. It was like on the lower third on CNN and, you know, ABC hires new silent reporter.

And that was the moment that sort of catapulted me into this bigger conversation, I guess, or whatever. And it was it felt like a turning point in my gut. It really did. Well,

Well, walk us through what that's like. I mean, you don't just show up on game day and say, hey, let me tell you what's going on here. I mean, that is a whole week's worth of...

And then, yes, when that first game approaches, you map out a plan. How are we going to cover this game? What are the main stories? Who are the players we want to focus on? What happens if? And Fred Godelli, who is a Hall of Fame producer, and Drew Esikoff, who is a Hall of Fame director, and I'm not just saying that. That's a fact. Prepare for disaster.

Everything they can possibly think of. And so you are working all week long, talking to players, reading, going over injury reports from the past. I had injury history on every single player in the NFL that I did on my own. I researched and did it on my own, and I developed these injury spreadsheets and all this stuff.

So, there's a lot of work going on during the week. And then Thursday night, I would fly to the game site. Friday, we'd go to practice at the home team. Let's say it's Green Bay. We'd go to practice at Green Bay. And then Saturday, we'd meet the visiting team that would fly in on Saturday. We'd meet with them, interview the head coach, quarterback, and maybe three other players.

Did the three of you sit and do that? Yeah. Five of us. No, it was Al, John Madden and I, and then Al, Chris Collinsworth and I, and then producer and director. So it was a five of us that would sit in on these, whether it was Tom Brady, Bill Belichick, Peyton Manning, whoever it was. Brett Favre was always a ton of fun.

And then we would convene and we'd all say, what have we taken away from all this week's preparation? What's got to make the telecast? We never wanted to force anything because it's...

In the end, the star of the show is the game. And you've got to let that happen. And so to force in another storyline is just now if there's an obvious one. Yeah, you've got to work it in. It's usually in the opening of the game. And that was a lot of my job was setting up a major storyline heading into the game. Sometimes they were controversial. Sometimes they weren't.

Some had to do with the national anthem and the kneeling. Some had to do with a major injury. Some had to do with some other scuttlebutt going on around one team or the other.

So it was always you started with the big picture. Then you let it kick off. And then you just went and you sort of that that old phrase, you let the game come to you and you let it happen. And you respond instinctively with your storylines, with your reporting as the game unfolds. Now, you probably don't know this about me, but I once upon a time I was a place kicker.

Really? Yes, at BYU. Oh my gosh, I didn't know this. I know. And so let's just admit out loud that the kicker is the most important person on the football team. Can we just clarify that for the record? I'm going to tell you this right now, that the two people I had to talk to

So I'd arrive at the stadium four hours before kick, right? And when they'd start going and warming up and with their whole kicking operation, I needed to talk to each kicker. That was so important to me. Not as important inside a dome where elements didn't matter, as you well know, but really important outside, really, really important in bad weather games. And so those two people were critical to me. And I always love talking to kickers. They are some of the most interesting people you'll meet. Well, that's because we always—

Well, we always had the most time on our hands, right? Yeah, but some didn't want to talk. Very few, but they were like, I don't talk to you. Oh, I would have talked to you. Would you? But I wasn't kicking at that level, but still. We played big games against big, you know. Of course. BYU, yeah, that's major. Yeah, we were in the top 20. We were good. But yeah, I would have chatted with you. Are you kidding me? Well, that's nice of you to say. Yeah.

I think the hardest part about kicking, not to have this devolve into a kicking podcast, but is you sit on the sidelines for an hour and a half. Yep.

And then all of a sudden you get one swing and you got to make it through. And so, you know what? There's a lot of parallels between the kicker and a sideline reporter, because the sideline reporter is often just hanging out, waiting for the opportunity to get something in. And then, boom, you know, down goes Victor Cruz or someone with a horrible injury. And now you better deliver and you better deliver right and well.

And smooth. And smooth, yes. Your smoothness is just amazing. It's hard to do that and have concise thing and also pay attention to the game so you're not stepping on it. Right, yes. And Al Michaels, who might want, hey, we're back to play by play here. By the way, Michelle, there's a play going on. Oh, I learned that once. The hard...

Yeah.

Did you ever get like accidentally hit? You know, last season, my very last season in the NFL, and it wasn't during a game, it was during warmups. I had my back to the field, which I rarely do because we were rehearsing the open, which I always do with my back to the field because I'm not in danger at that moment of time. But these guys were, you know, they were throwing routes and this receiver, gosh, who was it?

Just came right into me. I didn't see it coming. Hit me. My whole body just went, wow, that was one hell of an impact. And it was fine. But I thought to myself, now, if this guy had been really running hard, that would have been a game changer. Yeah. Well, it's partly why I was a kicker, because if they touch me, they throw a flag, you know. But no, that... Okay, so...

I don't want to put I don't want to try to disparage anybody, but you could who's like who are some of the best people to interview? Like, OK, if I go talk to this person, you know what? I know it's going to be a good conversation because they're going to loosen up, make it fun. Well, we always had fun with Peyton Manning. We always had fun with his brother, Eli. We had a blast with Brett Favre, who I think probably would have talked to us for as long as we wanted to. He was just.

The most laid-back, easy guy to deal with. It was a lot of fun. Seems like that. Yeah, so many. And one of the reasons people in my position don't want to single out guys is because you end up missing so many. But I'm going to say this. My favorite guys were always the offensive linemen. Always, always, always, always. They're super smart. They're super funny. They live in their own little bubble. And so when you get to talk to them...

they give you some gems, man. And I always wanted to do these stories on the offensive linemen because they were so wickedly smart and funny. And they doled out some lines that were just priceless. So it was always fun to do that. But what you had to do then was say,

I'm probably not going to be able to do a story on what this offensive lineman is doing in the game because it's not – while it's critical, it's not something you can break down easily. So you get the offensive lineman to talk about other people. Okay. Tell me about blocking for Tom Brady. What's Tom Brady like in the da-da-da? You know, that kind of thing. So there's a way to quote an offensive lineman about something that's going to make air, which is a story about Tom Brady. So it's – yeah. Yeah.

I hadn't really thought about it like that, but I think you're right. They usually are the ones that have the best stories. They have to be wicked smart because a playbook is... Especially the centers, yeah. The playbook is thick. There is so much going on with that offensive line. And again, they form this little brotherhood

It's a really unique position because they do get called out for so many things. You know, if you're not highlighted when they do screw up. Exactly. Exactly. And so and and they stick together and they back each other up. And it's a really just a unique group of guys. And, you know.

Andrew Whitworth, who was named NFL Man of the Year, Walter Payton, there are too many Paytons, Walter Payton Man of the Year this last year. It was one of my favorite people of all time. And so to see him win a Super Bowl and then walk off the field and retire was awesome. Yeah, that's very cool. You're listening to Jason in the House. We'll be right back.

Well, let's talk about women's sports now, because obviously women's, you've got a perspective on this. I hope you're willing to share it. Yeah. You know, it's kind of come under attack and this whole idea of how to deal with transgender people who want to participate in male sports. I mean, you've thought about this. I have. Do you have a...

I have. And I've, yes, I do. And I've talked to, I'm not going to name names here, but I've talked to Olympic swimmers in particular, because we're talking about Leah Thomas was such a big story this last year.

And I can tell you that people are afraid to talk about it because they don't want to be called homophobic or anything else or anti-LGBTQ, which they're not. I know some of the most loving people in the world who know that this is just not right. If you are born as a male with all the male attributes, the musculoskeletal makeup, all of that stuff,

And you have, in the case of Leah Thomas, trained and swam with the men's team for many years and competed against males. You are competing at a different level. That's why we have a women's category of swimming and a men's category of swimming. It doesn't have to do with how you identify. It has to do with your physical capabilities. And if you want to make the argument that, yeah, well, I've been taking the hormone, you know,

not enhancers, but the suppressors, whatever it is that they want to say, diminishes that talent in them. I say, no, but you haven't been taking them your whole life. And you've had layer upon layer upon layer of practices. You have stacked a trillion practices, I exaggerate, of being a male with all that comes along with that. And now lately, maybe a year ago, you started taking these drugs and

But you've still built up the body of a male. You don't automatically biologically retrofit into a women's category. This has nothing to do with being homophobic. This has nothing to do. I don't care how you identify. I embrace whatever makes you happy.

But it is unfair competition. And we're seeing it in cycling primarily and in swimming right now. And I think, you know, I think we're going to get it sorted out because I think it's a really reasonable argument to say, Jason, that you are you have an advantage. And I don't care if you came last in another race. I don't care. There are a lot of men who cannot beat Katie Ledecky.

But Katie Ledecky can't necessarily jump in the pool with a bunch of men and do what she's doing in her category. We have categories for reasons of biology, of physical ability, and that's why they're there. It does not have to do with how you identify. That is one of the best explanations that I have heard. And I love the way you prefaced it with

You can love these people. You can care about these people. You don't have to be anti-something to have a perspective on it. So I appreciate the way you said that. Let me talk broader about women's sports in general and where you see it's going. And let me kind of preface it by saying, you know, through the years, my 16 years in the local business community and then Congress and all that kind of stuff that I did, I've hired a

unfortunately had to fire a few people along the way, but I've hired a lot of people along the way. And there's a success rate that I see with people who've participated in sports, in either team sports or individual sports. They just have an attitude. They've got an approach. They know how to win. They know how to lose. They know how to work with others. They know how to work hard. Like all these positive attributes. And so I think it's so good that we have

people participating in sports because I think it teaches you so much about life and and I'm glad to see that there that women's sports thrive more and more and more I think the transgender issue

threatens that quite frankly but getting away from the transgender issue let's just talk about women's sports in general where has it been where's it going what should it be it should be evolving continuously like the men's game and it and it is

Did you happen to catch, by the way, over this weekend, there was a tournament of a golf tournament that featured men and women. Did you happen to see this? My husband was watching this. And and so the women were handicapped, obviously, and they shot from a closer tee. The person who was winning, I think, and may have won after 17 holes, she was she was winning by 10.

20 shots above any other woman. And the closest man was nine shots behind her. It was crazy. It was really, really interesting. It was really interesting. That doesn't mean that she was better than the men because, again, she had a different tee box and all the rest. But the closest woman was 20 shots back. It was crazy. This woman was so good.

This is an evolving thing as life evolves, as we evolve, as humanity evolves. We all evolve, and it happens over time, and it happens in baby steps. But I love the direction of women's sports, that the women's national soccer team is making the same as men's, I think is long overdue because they are, in terms of the national teams, they're far more recognizable and far more marketable than the men's team. So that one I thought was totally appropriate.

You know, I covered the WNBA for the first how many years, three or four years. Reggie Miller and I worked together on the broadcast for a lifetime. And his sister, Cheryl Miller, was a coach. And I saw this game evolving. I saw these women can play, man. It is so fun to watch. But the interesting thing was that even though they were so good and I found it so entertaining and I was an ambassador for the WNBA, man, I was selling it.

There were still men who weren't interested. There were some men who were and there were some men who were not. So the market is still the market. Right. But then again, you can go into tennis and Serena Williams is going to sell out an arena every single time. So I just think it's every like everything in life. It's really case by case.

I like the direction it's going, except for I do think the reason we have Title IX is so that women could have their own playing field, right? And that they could play and have the opportunities that men have in sports.

And so please don't chip away at those women's opportunities by putting biological men in their categories. It's just not fair. Well, and yeah, I mean, you go to a college, for instance, and then look, the basketball program or the men's basketball or the men's football is going to – I mean, that's going to drive the revenue. The coach is going to make –

more money than the president of the university. I mean, you're going to be the highest paid employee and all that, but it also is going to allow all these other, all these other sports to be out there that quite frankly, aren't going to get a whole big audience. Right. You know, but I can tell you that, yeah, there's some sports, women's basketball for me personally. Yeah. I probably struggle to get through a game. Women's volleyball. Awesome. Watching it. Awesome. I mean, I could, I, I, I,

men's as well. I mean, there are several sports categories where I think it's great. And I, I guess what I hope is, uh, I'd become a grandpa along the way. I can't believe this, Michelle. I'm now a grandpa. You are now? Uh, yes. Congratulations. I have four kids. I have four grandkids along the way. Oh my gosh. Um,

When I look at their young lives and what they're coming up, and I look at our own kids who did participate in sports and gymnastics and dance and all those types of things, I just hope people go out and do that. I mean, I'm not trying to be preachy, but I'm just saying I think there's a lot of positive to being involved in all those kinds of things.

Boys, girls, it's just a positive thing. There is no question. And it's hard. And you've got to get up early and you've got to run further than you wanted to run. You're tired and all that. But that's good. That's good. That prepares you for life. It's interesting that you said that a lot of people you've hired, you could tell if they were an athlete or they participated in team sports or individual sports that they were going to have a success. There is discipline in sports. There is teamwork in sports. There is accountability in sports.

There are so many good things. I love it. Both of my kids, thank goodness, are very deep into their sports. And

I love talking to them about it. I love hearing about their experiences. I love talking through some of the challenges that are there because there are and they are very reflective of the life challenges. You know, you're dealing sometimes with a coach you don't like. You're dealing with a teammate that's causing trouble. That's right. That stuff's going to happen everywhere you go in life. You could, you know, your in-laws you could end up hating, whatever. So you got to figure out how to deal with. I'm not insinuating anything. I'm not. Yeah.

But it does. I was about to have a joke and say, yeah, tell me about it. But I got like the nicest, sweetest in-laws ever. I do too. Nobody would ever buy it. I do too. I've been lucky that way too. But yeah, so that's what we're talking about. It's just... Dispute resolution. Yes. Yes, all those things. Yeah. All right. So...

Speaking about dispute resolution and dealing with all those things, there's some rumors out there, there's some chatter, and you've kind of let it fester out there a little bit about you and politics. Now, I went from...

If they touch you as a place kicker, they throw a flag to eventually being in Congress where if they don't hit you and smack you upside the face, I'm not talking about literally, then they don't feel like that is just like a daily occurrence. So it is a hand-to-hand combat, full contact sport. Yeah.

Yeah.

I just got finished supporting a candidate for governor in Minnesota. He was a Republican candidate. He did not win the party endorsement. And the way that it went down was so ugly and embarrassing that I thought, I don't know if I can do this again because I just don't trust people to make wise, good decisions in these environments and these conventions and these endorsement contests anymore.

And so that part of it is very difficult. So I've started this podcast because I one of the things the thing the issue that scares me the most in this country is frozen speech. People feeling like they can't be themselves without serious blowback and, you know, that cancel culture and all the rest.

I'm scared of that because if we're going to become a really one-sided or right now we're so entrenched, two sides in really opposite corners are the only ones really making the noise and getting the attention. And like Matthew McConaughey, I believe there's a vast middle in here and that we agree on a lot of things. And so I'm doing these interviews on my podcast to talk to people about

We may not be aligned by party or by background or whatever, but here's what we agree on. We've got to start building on that. We've got to start finding the common denominator. And it worries me that I have friends that say, oh, I could never post that on Facebook because fill in the blank. Or I could never say that at work because – Yeah, they could feel intimidated. Yes, and it's horrible. And Jason, I was invited on another podcast recently –

with the invitation saying, "We want to talk about your very long, illustrious career and your new podcast." And then I agreed to go on it finally. It was with someone I had known from ESPN. And right out of the gate, they said, "Well, we're the woke side and she's the dark side." And they immediately started attacking what they assumed were my views on critical race theory.

Ron DeSantis, and it went on and on. And I was totally ambushed. I don't think people really enjoy that. And I thought it was a terrible podcast. And I really feel responsible that I didn't look deeper into what I was getting into. I tried to hold my own. I did my best. And at the same time, I think this is not where we want to be as a society. I guarantee you, this is not the way people want to converse. Right.

No, we agree on most things. You know, it's funny because when I was in Congress, they would report on this or that or whatever. And we'd all be looking around at each other like, you know that like we go to dinner with these Democrats over here, right? And I'm a pretty conservative, you know, boisterous person on policy and issues, but we still get along. We can get along. You can disagree, but don't be disagreeable, you know? And, yeah.

I don't know. It's somehow devolving too frequently. And we can get into a whole discussion about social media and all that kind of stuff. But I think we need more voices and we shouldn't be afraid of debate and discussion. That's kind of how we get to a better place at the end of the way. Exactly. And stay true to your principles. You know, nobody's, you know, at the end of the day, you got to vote, right? But all too often, Congress doesn't actually vote. But again, those are more

Well, I hope I hope wherever the winds and your desires take you, you've had an amazing career and I'm glad you've had a taste of politics, even though it kind of got ugly there. Yeah. Yeah. You continue to be a voice for. Listen, I am not afraid of it. And the hand to hand combat. I'm not afraid of it. It is ugly.

It can get really ugly. I don't want to expose my kids to that necessarily right now. I'm sure you and I could have a conversation about that another time or how your kids dealt with it. But it's just am I? I think.

The best use of me right now and my time is to try to demonstrate courage, to try to show that, you know, look, I'm not going to apologize for something you think about me. I'm not going to apologize for believing what I believe. And I want to give other people courage.

the courage to feel the same way and to act the same way. I do have to ask you some rapid questions. Okay. I don't care how many games, how many Peyton Mannings you've interviewed or Brett Favre's. You may not have had these questions before. All right. You ready? Yeah. You're going to be okay. I am okay. But they're tough. Go. Okay. First concert you attended. Queen.

Oh. I know. How cool is that? That's cooler than most. That may be the coolest one we've had so far. What was your high school mascot? The Falcons. See, now that's like all American. I know. You get a group of 12 people in the room and ask them to go around and talk about their high school mascot. Inevitably, there's going to be somebody here and I'll raise an eyebrow and say, what was that? First celebrity crush when you were a kid. Yeah.

You know, Roger Daltrey of The Who. Wow. Okay. You were into your rock. I really was. You were a rocker. I was, yeah. We went over first job. We talked about that. Let's say you were on the sideline and Bigfoot showed up. What would you ask Bigfoot?

Where have you been all this time? Yeah. Was that you in that video? Yeah. Let me show you some game film there, brother. I want to see, Daryl, if that was really you. Break that down, Daryl. Yeah. Where have you been? Is there a Mrs. Daryl? Yeah. Are there any baby Daryls? Yeah. Baby Daryls? Yeah. Favorite pet? Well, we just got a puppy. You did? What kind? It's a mini Labradoodle. His name is Jersey. Oh, yeah.

So he is my favorite pet. Although we had an Irish setter named Murphy when I was a kid and I adored him. I don't see as many Irish setters. No, you don't. They're very hyper.

My my a friend of mine, my neighbor, when I was in Palos Verdes, they had an Irish center. It was the coolest dog. They're beautiful. They are hyper. Yeah, I don't see him around anymore. Anyway, most embarrassing moment. Oh, God. Where to begin? Oh, my God. We've only got a few minutes here. We don't have another two hours. Well, one of them has to be. Remember when I was telling you about stepping all over that that running play by in the national championship game, which Jim Nance had to interrupt me.

That's right up there. You still remember it and probably nobody else does, but you remember it. Oh, I always will. Yeah. I said fart once on the air on Fox. It was actually on CNN. I was saying, trying to, I was impassioned. I was talking to Wesley. What's his name? We were talking about Benghazi. So it was a deep, and I felt really adamant about this. Yeah. And I was talking about the firefight. Oh, yeah.

And I said, fire fart. And instantly on my, in my phone, in my pocket, I could feel it start to buzz. Oh, dear God. Because I know that this is like my brother and Trey Gowdy and others. And sure enough, they were watching. Did you just say fart? Yeah.

I said I was calling basketball game once I was doing play-by-play with Jay Billis was my analyst. And there is something called a loose ball foul. And I said loose bowel fall. So there you go. There you go. At least loose bowel. Yeah. That would get people's attention. Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of like a fart. Yeah. Well, even worse, actually. Yeah. Pineapple on pizza. Yes or no? No.

Oh, thank goodness. We knew he liked you. That is the only acceptable answer. Best advice you ever got? Go find the job. Go to work. Go get the job you want. What are you doing here? If this isn't the job you want, go get the job you want. Last question.

If you didn't get that break and you didn't get into that radio job and then get into television, what would you be doing? If it wasn't television or radio, what would you be doing? I'm talking early. Okay, I got my degree in finance. What would you do? What would...

Where was that trajectory life was going to take you? You know, that's such a good question. I'd probably be working behind the scenes in some sort of production capacity if I wasn't in front of the camera. I think that's where I would have wound up is producing, editing, something like that.

because I do love storytelling through pictures and words and music and sound. And so I think that's probably it. I dabbled with the idea of becoming a professor at one time when I was in business school. And one of my professors said, don't do it. Don't do it. It's publisher perish. You'll hate it.

That's interesting. Good advice, even though they were doing it themselves. Yeah, exactly. Well, thanks for joining me on my podcast here. Oh, what a pleasure to talk to you. Thank you. I really do appreciate it. Thank you. It was just wonderful visiting with you. And, uh,

congratulations on an illustrious career and let's be fascinated to see where what you decide to take on next thank you so much Jason Michelle Tavoya cannot thank her enough for joining me so nice so generous they give up you know 45 50 minutes of their time and thanks to you for listening but thanks to her for for sharing those perspectives and she's got a podcast look for it I might be interested I've never I've never heard it but I've now got something else I want to go try if you

If you could rate this one, subscribe this one, that would be very helpful to us. We'd really do appreciate it. Go check out foxnewspodcast.com for other podcasts. And we'll be back with more next week. I'm Jason Chaffetz. This has been Jason in the House.

I'm Guy Benson. Join me weekdays at 3 p.m. Eastern as we break down the biggest stories of the day with some of the biggest newsmakers and guests. Listen live on the Fox News app or get the free podcast at Guy Benson show dot com.