Ernie Boch Jr. and Former Massachusetts Governor, Charlie Baker, joins the show! Live from Sam Adams Boston Taproom!
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00:00That's for the great Ernie Bach, who's here, Ernie.
00:03Good morning.
00:04Hey, thanks for having me, Greg.
00:05I'm honored to be here amongst all those other guests you've had so far.
00:09Well, we we appreciate it.
00:11We we got you and Jim Cook and Robert Krass.
00:15So three billionaires, I think, on the show.
00:18I got Bon Jovi, I heard.
00:20Yeah, we almost got Bon Jovi.
00:22I was going to bring Jimmy Page, but, you know, I wish I had.
00:26Well, thanks for thanks for supporting the show.
00:29Five years. Can't believe it.
00:30You know, I brought a gift.
00:31Oh, I brought a gift.
00:32I know you're a wine guy.
00:33And also also, you know, I was on your island recently.
00:37What on Nantucket? Oh, I love it.
00:39Yeah. What did you think?
00:40You're a vineyard guy.
00:41Well, you know, you're either one or the other.
00:43Oh, I thought you've been back on one of the other.
00:45I mean, you know, I'm from around here, but I haven't been to Nantucket
00:49that often because I'm a vineyard guy.
00:52And I walked on that island and and I bought this shirt
00:56because I felt I was underdressed.
00:57Yeah, I seriously it's different.
01:00The two are different.
01:01But you're either a vineyard or yeah, and I'm a vineyard guy.
01:04And, you know, Nantucket's good and everything.
01:06But it's it's so glitzy.
01:08Yeah, it's so it's it's what Curtis Curtis doesn't like.
01:12I'll be on the vineyard in two weeks. Oh, really?
01:14Yeah. Why don't you go buy Ernie's house?
01:16You can buy my weekend of the 16th.
01:19I'll be down there.
01:20Yeah. For the comedy show and the festivals and all that stuff.
01:23So why don't you bring 30 people over to I'll be there.
01:26So hit me up.
01:27Me and the wife will swing by the house and we'll come by quickly.
01:31You know, do you have a beach?
01:32Yeah, well, yeah.
01:33OK, you know what?
01:34Do you know what they do?
01:35You know what he and Mrs.
01:36Wiggins like to do on on various beaches?
01:39Tell me they like to christen it.
01:40OK, they're beach.
01:42They are beach sex people.
01:43I mean, it's the stars.
01:44So would that be would that be?
01:46Well, it's kind of far enough away where I could, you know, not look.
01:50The rocks may present an issue, though.
01:52I mean, you don't want to be laying on that.
01:54So I brought a gift.
01:55Yeah, I brought a gift.
01:56I know you're a wine guy and it's tough to get you something, you know,
02:00because you have everything.
02:01Oh, well, yeah, right.
02:02But this I don't have a jet.
02:08This bottle of wine, it's it's more difficult, more difficult to get.
02:12Yeah. So, you know, I I'm gifting it to you in celebration of five years here.
02:18Oh, yeah. All right, Ernie.
02:19Thank you very much.
02:20In that case alone.
02:21Wow. Barefoot.
02:22This is well, this is fantastic.
02:26Chateau Margaux, 1982.
02:30Legendary. Nineteen.
02:31Is that one of the better years?
02:33I do. Sixty six and eighty two.
02:35OK. All right.
02:36The oldest thing Greg's going to bring home in a long time.
02:40How dare you?
02:42How dare you?
02:43Ernie, thank you.
02:44You know who's you know who's on the phone right now is the standby for this.
02:49One of our very first guests on this program,
02:51the former governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Charlie Baker.
02:55Nice. Now the president of the NCAA.
02:58Round of applause, if you could, for Charlie.
03:00Charlie, good morning.
03:02Hey, guys, how are you?
03:03How are you doing?
03:05I'm good. I got to tell you that
03:08I really hope Ernie understands that
03:13you may or may not be the guy, Greg, to give a bottle like that to.
03:17We'll see.
03:20Greg, Greg loves wine.
03:22What do you mean by that, Charlie?
03:24It's a suffice it to say that I know I would not appreciate it at all.
03:30He gave it to me.
03:33I'm just I'm just starting with an assumption.
03:35You have to have a certain kind of palate to really appreciate something like that.
03:38And I got it.
03:39You're starting out.
03:40You're starting off with an attack on my taste buds.
03:43I don't think that's I don't think that's right.
03:46I'm actually assuming your taste buds and mine are kind of about alike on this one.
03:50But I could be wrong.
03:51Probably. Probably true.
03:52Probably true.
03:53Greg is the man of the people.
03:54I don't know how you could be a man of the people.
03:56And, you know, he's used to drinking booms.
04:00Well, I got to tell you, I've been here a long time, bud.
04:04Yeah, it has been.
04:05And you were great to the show when we started.
04:08And I know you're you're doing something different to you.
04:12Are there things that you miss about being the governor of the state?
04:17I miss the people a lot.
04:19You know, to me, the best part of the job was always the chance to be out and about
04:24and talking to people about what they're up to and what they were doing.
04:28And I was a very retail guy in that job.
04:31And for me, that was, in some respects, the very best part of it.
04:37I will say this.
04:38The the comparison to it with the one I have now is probably the amount of time I get to
04:44spend with with young people.
04:48I've, you know, it's now a national footprint, right?
04:52Which means the logistics and the travel are a little different.
04:55But but the kids are just awesome.
05:00They're, you know, they're so squared away.
05:02And they all believe in the grit and the grind.
05:06They all understand that nothing gets handed to you.
05:09They're really good teammates.
05:11And and frankly, you know, at a point in time when there's a lot of reasons to wonder about
05:16the future, they make me feel much better about it.
05:18So I really enjoy the time I get to spend with the kids.
05:24Charlie, what's been the biggest surprise for you taking on this new role?
05:28I mean, I'm sure you figured what the good and bad was going to be taking on a role with
05:33college athletes, with college sports.
05:35But what's been the biggest surprise?
05:37I think the the incredible spread of programming, you know, there's 1100 schools in the NCAA
05:45and some of them spend five million dollars on college sports on their campus and some
05:50of them spend 300 million.
05:53I mean, that that in many respects to me is like the the thing I I probably should have
06:01appreciated. But but just seeing how different the issues and the problems and the
06:09opportunities and the challenges are from the very, very top end financially to the to
06:17the folks who literally are doing this almost as the labor of love is really different.
06:22And and figuring out a way to sort of get that kind of diversity to agree on what it is
06:30we're going to focus on and what it is we're going to work on is reminds me a lot of my
06:36time in state government, actually.
06:40I think the you hear the good and the bad, I'm sure all the time, but the the where are
06:46you at when it comes to the the portal and do you feel like that's working the way it
06:50should? Or do you are you guys looking at that?
06:52Maybe I'm I'm kind of hoping that we're currently in the process of negotiating a
06:59settlement that would solve a whole bunch of lawsuits that predate me by 10 years that
07:08the NCAA has.
07:10And if we can if we can actually land those lawsuits and we have a long form agreement
07:15in place with the plaintiffs and put in place a framework based on that settlement that
07:23gives the schools the ability to do a lot more direct work in terms of NIL and that type
07:29of thing with the student athletes, I actually think it'll take it'll make it easier for
07:35schools and for young people to develop relationships that will be developmental and
07:42financially beneficial to the kids.
07:44And I think it'll take some of the the just constant churn that's currently going on in
07:50the transfer portal out of it.
07:52And that will probably be a good thing for the kids and a good thing for the schools.
07:55But, you know, that said, I'm a big believer that kids ought to have the ability, you
08:00know, if you play the trumpet or or you're a or you're a guitar player or you are a
08:09mathematician or whatever it is, you know, you can transfer from one school to the other
08:13and and put your skill to work.
08:17And it's got to be that way in college sports, too.
08:21And to me, the way you deal with that is you create a framework and an operating model
08:26that gives the schools and the kids the ability to just like with scholarships to say, you
08:33know, we're going to enter into a two year, a three year, a four year NIL deal, and we're
08:37going to work on making sure that you get the most out of it as a student athlete and
08:42as a and we're going to get the most out of it from our end as the as the school that's
08:47sponsoring you and use that as a vehicle to try to deal with some of the issues around
08:52the transfer portal. Because, you know, I don't want as general rule, we should not
08:56want kids going to three or four schools in three or four years because that will
09:02dramatically affect their ability to actually get a degree.
09:05And ninety nine percent of them are never playing professionally.
09:08Charlie, one thing I will say about that, just one quick thing about that.
09:13The the college student athletes graduate at higher rates across every division, every
09:23ethnicity, every class than their non-student athlete peers.
09:27It's actually a heck of a success story that no one ever talks about.
09:32That is and it's speaking of success stories, it feels like it's been the year of the
09:36female athlete where because the best the best basketball players are one and done in
09:43the NCAA men's side, you have Kaitlyn Clark, you have Reese, Angel Reese, Angel Reese,
09:50and you have this, you know, Jordan Bird, I mean, a magic bird type reincarnation here
09:55on the female side where you have these unbelievable NCAA tournament games that get
10:0015, 20 million views, which then buoys the WNBA.
10:04What has it been like from your seat to see the development and growth of the of the
10:08female side of the NCAA?
10:10The the growth of women's basketball over the course of the last few years has been
10:17mind boggling and and the best part about it is we were able to leverage that in our TV
10:23negotiation with ESPN.
10:25We just signed a seven year deal with them that includes a very significant increase,
10:30like a really big increase in the piece that's associated with the women's basketball
10:35tournament, which is going to make it possible for us to create a performance fund for
10:40women's basketball, which will return money back to the schools that participate in and
10:45do well in the tournament so that they can reinvest in their program.
10:49It's exactly the kind of, you know, flywheel you'd like to see happen here.
10:54That's not the only sport, by the way.
10:56I mean, but if you're following the Olympics, you know, the vast majority of the women
11:03athletes who are winning medals over in Paris are current or former college athletes.
11:11Folks in the pool, folks on the track, the entire women's basketball team in Paris is
11:18our former college athletes.
11:19I mean, it's I think college athletes so far, not just representing the U.S., but
11:24representing like 100 other countries to have won almost 200 medals.
11:31It's a it's an absolute showcase for men and women who are former and current student
11:38athletes who are literally the best in the world at what they do.
11:42It's a great story.
11:43We'd actually like to put, if possible, put Steve Kerr into the portal after what he's
11:48doing to Jason Tatum.
11:49Booyah.
11:51All right.
11:52Well, listen, it's awesome to hear your voice.
11:55Congrats on everything.
11:56We miss you around here.
11:57Thanks for everything that you have done for the show and the foundation.
12:02And a round of applause, please, for our former governor, Charlie Baker.
12:06Appreciate you calling in.
12:07We miss you, Charlie.
12:09I appreciate it, too.
12:10I miss you, too.
12:10And you take care of yourself, OK?
12:13All right.
12:13There he is.
12:14That's Charlie Baker.
12:14Student athletes.
12:16Ernie, thank you for everything.
12:17Yeah, before I leave, I have two tickets to Kevin Hart is at the Box Center in
12:21November. Oh, he's doing two nights.
12:24And, you know, please feel free to give away tickets to my box.
12:27Yeah. You know, 21 plus, please, because there's alcohol, there's food.
12:32It's going to be great.
12:33The winner is Wermain Jiggins.
12:35That's it.
12:38I'll go with like, you know, somewhat type celebrity, you know, hang around and the
12:44thing to see Kevin at.
12:45Can we give those away here?
12:46You can give them away.
12:47All right. We'll figure out a way.
12:48We'll we'll get Carolyn and everybody to figure out a way that we could do that here.
12:53Round of applause for our great marketing director, Carolyn.
12:56All of our everybody who makes what we do really, really easy is here and hanging out.
13:00And so and Ken, of course.
13:03Yeah. Where is Ken?
13:04Ken's up. What is Ken doing outside?
13:05Security. And that's it.
13:07Look, there's Rob Ninkovich walking in right now.