Libsyn Directory

402: The Milwaukee Bucks Origin Story - With Jordan Treske

Release Date: 07/07/2025

426.5: The NASL Players’ Strike of 1979 – With Steve Holroyd [ARCHIVE RE-RELEASE]

Good Seats Still Available

[We say goodbye to a crappy 2025 with a fond remembrance of frequent guest and long-time friend-of-the-show Steve Holroyd - whose untimely passing earlier this year still stings mightily. In this classic ARCHIVE RE-RELEASE from April 2019, we tapped Steve's encyclopedic knowledge of US soccer history for an essential look at an oft-overlooked event in the life of the original North American Soccer League (1968-1985), that arguably marked the "beginning of the end" of that influential circuit.] + + + Professional union labor lawyer and Society for American Soccer History sports historian...

426: The 6th Annual(-ish) Year-End Holiday Roundtable Spectacular!

Good Seats Still Available

It's our year-end Holiday Roundtable Spectacular, featuring a look back at the year's newest additions to "what used-to-be" in big-time sports (RIP Pro Volleyball Federation, Utah Hockey Club, three UFL teams, half of Major League Rugby, and the NCAA's LA & Bahamas Bowls); AND semi-educated guesses as to what might be ahead for 2026 - with three of our favorite fellow defunct sports enthusiasts: Paul Reeths (, ; ); Kenn Tomasch (, ; ); and Scott Adamson (; & ). Buckle up for our annual mashup of amusement and bemusement at the fringes of the pro sports establishment, as we...

425: Fox Sports Soccer Rules Analyst Dr. Joe Machnik

Good Seats Still Available

He’s been called “American soccer’s renaissance man,” and in this episode, Dr. Joe Machnik returns to trace the remarkable arc of a life spent pushing the sport forward in the United States. When Machnik first joined us for back in 2017, he brought a rare, firsthand view of American soccer’s highs and lows. Today, with his new memoir, "" freshly in hand, we revisit that conversation with even richer context and perspective. Dr. Joe’s story began in Brooklyn, where an immigrant neighborhood and a love of the game planted the seeds for a career that would — like the domestic...

424: Baseball's Most Outrageous Promotions - With Joseph Natalicchio

Good Seats Still Available

Baseball has long been America’s pastime — and the stage for some of the wildest, most outrageous marketing stunts in sports history. From the postwar era through the 1970s, team owners and promoters pushed the limits of spectacle to fill seats, generate buzz, and entertain fans, often blurring the line between creativity and chaos. This week, "" author Joe Natalicchio joins for a wild ride across some of the sport’s most infamous attempts to spice things up at the ol' ballpark - where good marketing intentions went mightily awry. Natalicchio takes us behind the...

423: Philadelphia's "Broad Street Bullies" - With Sam Carchidi & Jeff Hare

Good Seats Still Available

The Philadelphia Flyers didn’t just win hockey games in the 1970s — they changed the sport, the city, and the culture around them. In this episode, we dig into the rise, reign, and mythology of the "Broad Street Bullies," the decade-long era (1971–1981) when the Flyers transformed themselves from an NHL expansion afterthought into the toughest, most polarizing, and most beloved champions in league history. To unpack how a group of gritty, bruising, blue-collar players became civic folk heroes, we sit down with long-time Philadelphia Inquirer sportswriter Sam Carchidi and...

422: The "Super Bowl Shuffle" - With Jeff Cameron

Good Seats Still Available

Few sports moments have left as lasting a mark on pop culture as the 1985 Chicago Bears’ recording of the “.” This week, we go behind the music, the madness, and the myth with NFL Films Senior Producer Jeff Cameron — director of HBO’s new documentary short "" — who takes us inside the making of the iconic rap video that transformed a championship football team into cultural icons. "The Shuffle" reveals never-before-seen, behind-the-scenes footage and fresh interviews with Bears legends Mike Singletary, Jim McMahon, Willie Gault, and Gary Fencik, who recount...

421: "There Is No Place Like Dome" - With Bruce Reynolds

Good Seats Still Available

Baseball may be a game of numbers, but Tampa Bay's Tropicana Field is a place of stories — and no one knows those stories better than Bruce Reynolds, longtime Rays "fan host" and author of "There Is No Place Like Dome." In this delightfully off-beat episode, we venture under the famously tattered fiberglass roof — currently undergoing repairs and slated to reopen next spring — to explore the quirks, characters, and quiet magic of a ballpark that has been loved, mocked, misunderstood, celebrated, and everything in between. Reynolds shares 16 seasons’ worth of memories: the oddball fan...

420.5: "Banned" - With Michael Ray Richardson & Jake Uitti [ARCHIVE RE-RELEASE]

Good Seats Still Available

[We mourn the passing of pro hoops great Michael Ray Richardson with an archive re-release of our conversation with the former Nets/Knicks star from last year, featuring his biography co-author Jacob Uitti.] + + + Former NBA All-Star Michael Ray Richardson and his co-author Jacob Uitti () join the show to discuss Richardson's riveting new memoir that chronicles his extraordinary journey on and off the basketball court. Hailed as “the next Walt Frazier” coming out of the University of Montana as a first-round pick (fourth overall) in the 1978 NBA Draft, "Sugar" was a force to be reckoned...

420: America's "Cricket Odyssey" - With Beth Simpson & Mark Greenslade

Good Seats Still Available

Cricket and America - two words that rarely appear in the same sentence without a smirk or a shrug. Yet, as authors Beth Simpson and Mark Greenslade reveal in their new book "," the game’s roots here run deeper than most realize — and its revival is one of the great under-told stories in modern sport. We trace the sport’s improbable journey - from its 19th-century heyday, when Philadelphia was a global cricket power; to its near extinction after baseball gained popularity; and finally to its 21st-century rebirth, fueled by immigrant passion and the game's modern-day incarnation,...

419: Basketball "Prophet" Moses Malone - With Paul Knepper

Good Seats Still Available

The story of Moses Malone is one of basketball’s most remarkable - and underappreciated - journeys. Rising from poverty in segregated Petersburg, Virginia, in the early 1970s, Malone became the first modern player to jump straight from high school to the pros, quickly establishing himself as one of the game’s most dominant forces. A three-time NBA MVP, relentless rebounder, and driving presence behind the rise of the early 1980s Houston Rockets and the Philadelphia 76ers’ 1983 league championship, Malone redefined greatness - quietly, humbly, and unstoppably. This week, biographer Paul...

More Episodes

It's a Wisconsin road trip this week for a sit down with Jordan Treske, author of "Building the Milwaukee Bucks: Kareem Abdul‑Jabbar, Oscar Robertson and the Rapid Rise of an NBA Franchise," to explore one of the most astonishing turnarounds in modern American pro sports history.

Treske walks us through how Milwaukee rebounded from the loss of the MLB Braves to become an NBA basketball powerhouse in just three seasons — thanks to savvy ownership, an historic draft coin flip, and the ultimate pairing of two all-time greats: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (née Lew Alcindor) and Oscar Robertson. We’ll also unpack the racial and cultural tensions of the era, the ABA bidding war, and the community’s unique investment in the team.

Whether you're a Bucks fan or a basketball history buff, this conversation offers fresh insight into how a franchise — and a city — found its "big league" identity through the game.

PLUS: From 1977, the Milwaukee Bucks theme song "Green And Growing (The Bucks Don't Stop Here)!"

+ + +

SUPPORT THE SHOW: