September 14, 2022 • 63 mins
Game, set, match! Michael Kosta, Daily Show correspondent and host of the podcasts ‘Choosing Sides: F1’ and ‘Tennis Anyone,’ gives us his take on the business sides of tennis and what it takes to even afford to fail at this sport. Kosta breaks down his life during and after the hard court that spreads across multiple genres, including selling shares of his potential earnings, tennis groupies, scams on the comedy club circuit, and his investment in water equality. How much do tennis players make? And how many people are in their pockets? Frances Tiafoe made a lot of noise at the US Open, but was the media fair to him? Bow Wow wants $1000 for you to meet him. @Rod4Short has choice words about this and a country club with an appalling 9/11-themed seafood menu. As the world watches King Charles III take on his new job, the team agrees on the American equivalent of a monarch.
New Math: Hawaii ÷ @RoyWoodJr x @TPain + A Gentlemen’s Club = X
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
You're listening to Comedy Central. You're not gonna like this one.
J G. Why I know you and I know you're
not gonna like this one. No, you assumed these things.
How do you know? What is it now? Hiring Queen
Elizabeth the second is dead in the country. If England
(00:23):
needs somebody to take the throne, please submit your applications.
W W, it's so wrong. That's not how that works.
The old queen passed away, uh due to complications from
being nineties. Look, I told you that told you stop
(00:53):
making me laugh and stuff like that. King Charles the
Third takes the throne. Good for him, You know, I
don't know what, But who would be the American equivalent
of like a monarch, like somebody we all respect, but
they ain't really got no like legal power, like like
she's not like the Prime Minister, super respected and influence. No,
(01:17):
I'm not saying, but the same legacy like quenel I'm
just saying, just someone who walks around like they in charge,
but they really got a lot of legal leverage. But
that well she does. Now wait a minute, she did
ensued or sent a cease and desist letter to one
of our over yest so yes, she does quean, yeah, yeah, over.
(02:05):
My name is Roy. This is my job, fair little
raspy this week. I apologize in advance. Don't adjust your
listening devices. Uh why ended up in a strip club
of tea, pain and things? Got a little lot of
hands next, and I felt it. I felt it because
(02:28):
I don't want your fucking mom guilt on me right now.
This is so third about every eighteen months, I lose
my voice just like clockwork, just inexplicably, my voice just goes.
I'm taking a personal week, Good luck to you. And
when that happens, Jacqueline goes into mom mode and your
(02:52):
voice is your instrument. And I don't understand why you
would allow that man to take you to an establishment
like that, knowing that you had gigs to do. You
had to do Stephen Kovid, you had to do and
promote confess Let your movie, so many other things. The
Emmies were coming up. There you are in Honolulu in
(03:13):
a strip club, screaming at the top of my lines.
You're damn right, I was. How did that work out? Though?
Just just don't ask me. I have made better decisions
in my life, Roy. There is nothing wrong with having
fun However, you have to protect your instruments, and your
(03:37):
voice is your instruments. Jacqueline. Yes, when the Strip Club
Genie appears script, you cannot say no no. That's what
tep and t paint. He was doing shows in Honolulu,
and I was in Hollolulu doing shows, and he came
by my my spot after his show. Hey man, what
(03:57):
you're doing in that? Hey man? What was on? And
the strip Club Genie took me. I have words club
in Hawaii. It wasn't bad. It doesn't sound bad. A
little weird. So tennis, What do we know about tennis
(04:17):
other than it's expensive to play? Oh, the outfits are cute.
Arthur Ashes from Virginia. Yeah, that's what I know. I
like the fact that the young brother that's been killing
killing in at the US Open, he's from the d
n V. I know that much. And I know that
he uh. I know he Milly rocked the other day
when he beat that dude like a mug. He was
(04:39):
all on the court Millie Rock and I support that
all day. I don't know, but I know one thing.
There's a member of the staff who went to the
US Open and didn't invite anybody else but I believe
that that is unfair. I'm not gonna let you do
that to her. She she did invite people. You just
happened not to be on the team. Who went, Who
went to the US South Tennis girl is a good
(05:00):
as time. Let me let me just just as an aside,
if you're a fan of food and atmosphere. The only
thing I can compare the US Open to it like
it's tennis with a fucking tailgate broke. There's just food
and activities, and you could go to the US Open
and literally not see a match. You can just be
(05:22):
walking around outside the stadium and if you go in
the early rounds, it's like thirty fucking tennis matches happen
and just pick one and you can go in center
court where you have a ticket. But it was I
haven't gone in years. I think I went like four
or five years ago, and it was a legitimately good time.
(05:42):
It really was, you know, and you know, our guest today,
Michael Costa, who's also a Daily Show correspondent, went to
the US Open with Trevor Noah because you know, Trevor
gets the box seats and apparently my fucker's think I
don't like baseballs, you know, tennis, the U them and
turn on the US Open and see my boss and
(06:03):
my my fucking coworker just in theate giggling and just
eating elephant. Isn't looking old types a little but pastries.
It is weird with like, you know, you see your
boss on I don't know, throwing out a picture of
the baseball game, and you kind of said there like
maybe he just thinks I like soccer. I don't know, so, yeah,
you're right, it is weird. It's strange. So yeah, tennis,
(06:24):
let's let's talk. No no no no no no no
no no no, you can't say that because you are
actually promoting a movie. So you can go to the
tennis match anyway, Mr the best Blacks getting personal today.
I didn't know that tennis would be the topic of
a Divide us like this. The game of love. It
brings things out of people, you know what I mean?
Love one love? Okay, I like that little research here
(06:46):
from down South Georgia. Girl. It's not an un lucrative business,
but god damn, everybody's in your pocket. Yeah. The top
tennis coaches usually received ten percent of their players prize money. Okay,
and then you have an instructor, you gotta pay. You
got all the traveling tennis coaches you gotta pay. You
(07:07):
got trainers, you gotta pay. That's that's that's not a lot.
The average tennis pro in America only makes about thirty
five thou dollars a year. And that's not so they're
high married. That's that sounds that sounds like that sounds
like a little grimy in there for real. If they
only make them like that, it's a lot of people.
And that's not a lot. But people that that do that,
(07:30):
that's that's that's sleeping out your car money type stuff.
It's different than minor league baseball. But when they do
the when they do the numbers on minor league baseball,
the hours spent at the field versus what you paid,
it's less. It's literally less than minimum wage. So, you know,
if you want to have a chance of making some
real prize money, you've got to you know, you gotta
pay your dues. Master racket technician, what is that? Master
(07:54):
racket technician. Yeah, they fixed the strings on the racket,
don't they. Yeah, And all so matches athletes with the
best racket for their type of play, and it focuses
on every detail of the racket, from the string material
to the tension, to make sure that the racket is
customized and just right a year m Lastly, before we
(08:18):
get into the CMO here, thank you again Ron to
hear some of the ways that tennis players get played.
And this is why I think that tennis isn't seen
as as immediate of a path out of the hood.
We're gonna get the pay out of a fucking tennis tournament.
You do this once or twice a year, it's not
a bad lick dog. So let's look at the breakdowns
real quick. Um bonuses of course, or into every player's sponsorship.
(08:43):
You signed with Nike, and if you win as many tournaments,
we're gonna get you a little more money. Exhibition fees,
endorsement deals, sponsorships, apparents fees which always do Roger one
million in appearance fees just to show up to smaller
tournaments like this, Momber. You're just it's not even an
official tournament, it ain't sanctioned by nothing. You're playing and
(09:05):
one street ball tennis. If the money is right, how
tennis players get paid. This is a breakdown from the
teen you was open If you get eliminated in the
first round, you get fifty eight thousand dollars. Second round,
hunted thousand, third round, hunted sixty thout, full round to eighty, quarterfinal,
(09:25):
half of milk Simbos, nine hundred, runner up one point
nine if you win. If you won the US Open,
you got three point eight million dollars. Now what's a
decent Now keep in mind you're paying for your own travel,
you're paying for other and and Michael Costle is gonna
break down why fifty eight thousand dollars for the first
round really ain't as good as we think. It is
(09:46):
half to taxes and ten percent to your fucking coach
and your tennis pro and the motherfucker that's stringing up
the strings on your racket. I guess he gotta get
a little pinch to everybody getting a fucking pinch. It's
time most outstand employee of the week. Now, as you
were talking earlier, third, we got to give props to
this brother, Francis Tiafo. He was the first American since Andy.
(10:09):
This is this is when you know they're getting deep
into them tennis statistics. He's the first American since Andy
Roddick in two thousand four to make it to the
like not even the last American to win. They was
just like, did you know an American hedn't even got
this goddamn fall in twenty years? Holy Ship this year
Rhonda's Moonlight and giving them no steps. It was dope
(10:32):
to see him play. But the thing that I liked
about watching Tifo in the US Open was that he
played with emotion, And I really did appreciate that because
he didn't mute himself and the wool I almost be button.
He was like, Nah, yes, I've beating a doll. This's
my funer's number two in the world. Listen to me
throwing out tennis names like I watched the Ship every
(10:53):
week he beat the dude who's bad and the motherfucker
and then did the salt may sprinkle on his As
I support anybody bringing flavor to mainstream sports, you might
as well have done the crip walk like Serena did
so many years ago when she beat somebody. That was
amazing to watch. So I enjoyed when when when folks
(11:15):
come up there and you know, let let them know
a little bit, let him know that the rest of
us is watching too. I dig that I haven't seen
it yet, but I can't wait. You like his story,
you tell me whether this is fair a file. It's
very difficult sometimes for us to just be allowed to
just sit back and enjoy an athlete being a good
ass athlete and being new dominant and being refreshing. How
(11:40):
soon is too soon to tell the struggle stories about
the athlete because he's his star is now, so you
kind of got to know everything now. But do you
have to? Because it be the way that they bring
it up, you know what I'm saying. You know what
I mean, Like when they started talking about the struggle,
like while he's playing in the match, and as we oh, no,
(12:00):
he came from nothing. His daddy was a janitor and
they ate a mop every day? Is in this family
they ate a mop with they had mop selens kind
of thinking this guy's situation. You gotta tell that story
right now because because I mean, we talked to Costa
(12:23):
and you know how much of a struggles. There's no
bad boys, there's no there. You know, they don't they
don't get the harassed rookies to carry their stuff. They're
their own rookies. They carry their own equipment. They pay
their own stuff. You gotta tell this guy's story now
in hopes that there's somebody out of this willing to
give this brother money to continue doing this very expensive sport. Okay,
So then middle Ground, let the white tennis professionals call
(12:45):
the match, and then when it's time to tell the
story and go into the news package about him during
one of the time outs, you're calling a black person
and let them struggle, announcing like you have play by play,
you have color trama table, and you have struggle. You
have struggled person now now and with that ball, it
(13:05):
is now forty tiafo to serve after this spreaper real quick,
we have Jacqueline, and Jacqueline tell us about the struggle
of this room. Well, his name is Frances and his
father used to work at a tennis center and he
had really bad equipment, and those white kids used to
tease him when he had that bad equipment. But he said,
(13:25):
I don't care, I'm gonna go out there and beat you,
and that's what he did. Thanks, Jaqueline, sound like that.
It was a head. Not for me, It was a
total head. Was overcoming and coming to and truly be
in the American dream and getting out that U bus
(13:46):
open and whipping ass and making sure that people know
your name henceforth and forever, going into three Francis Tifos
Most Outstanding Employee of the Week, brought to you by
Sackles and State Community College. So worse than first time, Jacqueline.
What if I do the whole show like this nice
(14:07):
and deep voice to protect the fact that I have
a little bit of rasp today, then I'm going to
have to answer a bunch of emails from women who
will be like, Okay, that's kind of sexy. Do that?
That would be a hit podcast. Just sex sounds like
(14:28):
not sex, but okay, just the sounds like when you're
faking it in a movie. Okay, Jack will be the
world's first girl. Oh my god, your hair like just
just welcome home would be the name of the podcast.
And just when you come home as a woman, you
put it on and then it's just me and you.
Damn you look like you had alone day. Baby. We
(14:51):
have guests, Roy, we have guests. Jacqu w be the
world first audio intimacy coordinator. This this person that we
have today, his careers spreads multiple genres, like I would
say he's checked a lot of boxes. Professional athletics, check,
professional entertainment, check, college, all of that, working in the
(15:16):
regular world check. He is a good friend of mine
and I we um. We share a hallway together over
there the Daily Show. But before that we random l
a joke streets together. J G. Who do we have
on the line. We welcome comedian and Daily Show correspondent
Michael Costa to the show. While Michael is best known
(15:37):
for his work and comedy, we were surprised to learn
that he is also, like you, said, a former professional athlete.
The Michigan native enjoyed a successful college tennis career before
going pro and eventually coaching. His coaching gig allowed him
time to try his hand and stand up comedy. And
(15:58):
I guess they say the rest is history. Welcome, Thank you. Wow.
I thought this is already more researched than I anticipated.
You had a mean year when you're in tennis, man,
I think you reached all of eight sixty four. We
have clips of that year with you were killing it
at eight sixty three two and uh well no, and
(16:21):
this you know, this is the for those the that
are unaware. Eight and sixty four was my highest a
t P Association of Tennis Professional World rankings. Okay, that's
the highest, that's the best I ever got. Okay, that's me.
I mean it's still to this day of the signature
(16:43):
on my email, it is. It is what I am
most proud of. But it is like, you know, maybe
it's just because I love in sport. Unlike in comedy Roy,
there is no subjectivity. There is no oh I'm eight
sixty four, but I actually am number one. I actually
(17:06):
am a Grand Slam champion sport. You are your number.
That is it? Okay, So then let's let's start there
for the worst and first part of this conversation. Now,
being a college athlete. We spoke with Candice Parker Um
a while back and she was talking about her time
at Tennessee and how when you're a student athlete there
(17:27):
is no time to deliver pizza, there is no time
to work retails. So were you pretty much from your
childhood on, were you always in athletics and just you
just were never the kid that worked at the drive through?
Like what were some of those first Michael Costa pay
stuffs or did none of that happened until the world
with tennis. Yeah, it's a good question. And you know,
(17:49):
Candice is right, it actually doesn't matter what collegiate sport
you play. If it's a varsity sport, they got you,
They got your schedule, they have your was on lockdown,
they feed you at feeding times. Um. So when my
when my bell like cling cling, tennis, people eat now pinging.
(18:16):
I know I made it sound like we're a bunch
of Gerbils, but you kind of are. You kind of are,
and you're representing. You're representing that the team in the
jersey that you're wearing. And for me, it was University
of Illinois. But um, to answer your question, when John Costa,
my father realized that college might be free for me,
(18:39):
he said, he said, he said, you can spend your
summers working on your serve in your forehand. Um. So
I didn't have to do those drive through jobs. I
didn't have to, you know, man, my my sitting. Yeah,
they did everything. It was nice, except in the back
(19:00):
of my head, I kept thinking I better get a scholarship, uh,
which which thankfully I thankfully I did. But you know,
I mean, truly my job became to get very good
at tennis. So that's that's what I focused on. To
me Tennis is an interesting sport in that you know
what's your fault, Like there is no teammate to blame. Okay,
(19:26):
there's no the coach called the wrong place, like your coach.
Your tennis coach may call the wrong strategy for the match. Well,
you want to play against the net, but ultimately you
had to hit that ball. Pitch coach, you can hit
that ball. You didn't know you didn't you. It's on you,
third coach fault. It's not my fault. I don't know
(19:53):
how it works. There's the reason his name is third
and not first. I'm just I'm just messing obviously, But Roy,
what does that remind It reminds me of comedy, of
stand up comedy, like I can you know Friday Light Show.
(20:16):
I was in Kansas City. It didn't go well. You know,
I walked off the stage. I was ready to bitch
about the server. I was ready to bitch about the
Czech spot. I was ready to bitch about the group
up front. That was complaint, that was loud. At the
end of the day, it's like, yo, it's you. You're
out there, man, do your job and um So tennis
(20:36):
is very similar to me to stand up comedy in
the sense that the responsibility falls on your shoulders. So
let's get into the world of professional tennis. You're out,
you're on the A TP Tour, and you're doing your thing,
and you're winning matches and you're losing matches, and you're
trying to figure your way through this particular world. What
are their hurdles as a young because like, is it
(20:59):
are they called rookies? Like what is the beginning level?
Because it seems like tennis is just it's beautiful in
the sense that you know, anybody can kind of sign
up for an open qualifying low level professional tournament. So
in theory, if you you can win your way into
(21:22):
the US Open um Now technicality, I was probably playing
the majority of my matches on the i t F,
which is the International Tennis Federation Circuit, which is like
the double A, single A sometimes triple A version of
what you're watching on TV right now, the U S Open.
(21:44):
So I was in the Bull Durham minor leagues. But
the biggest, one of the biggest turtles, not a sexy
answer is money, yourself funding. It's like golf, I don't
have a team, I don't have I'm not playing for
the you know, Toledo mud Hens. I'm playing for Michael
(22:07):
Costa and so what my one of the greatest gifts
my dad gave me was he didn't give me money.
He said, I will help you create a business plan
where you sell shares of your potential earnings two investors,
and we basically created Michael Costa Tan Company and people.
(22:32):
People bought shares of me for five thousand dollars and
we raised a hundred and seventy five dollars and I
played on that and once that was done, guess what
I switched to com yourself? You yah, yeah, in nine myself.
(22:54):
That's pretty fire man. You're you're you're a trailblazer, sy Leach.
You didn't have to get only fans of working to
pull appreciate that. But you also, you know, think about, like,
what a great gift from my dad. It wasn't money,
it was it was entrepreneurial spirit. It was believing in yourself.
It was also calling his friends that had money. But um,
(23:14):
you know, what a great what a great uh, what
a great parenting move. That's that's something serious. It's one
thing to call uh I got kid, It's one thing
to call your friends to get them to buy like
girls Scout cookies or whatever dow hikies that they're selling
for the basketball team. It's a whole another thing to
call somebody and make a serious investment. Say I want
you to put your money behind my child, who I
(23:35):
believe in, who can to actually do something. You know,
that's that's pretty dope. Dollars. Will give you one per
cent of his earnings, yeah whatever over X amount of years,
which means they'll get the tin k back over the damn.
It was more like I still have the business plan.
But it was like they got thirty They got the
(23:59):
first two years, and it went down after that, and
long story short, they all got about half their money back.
But Michael Costa and Tennis, you know, from from a
from a venture capitalistic standpoint, I was a failed company.
But um, but I'm to this day extraordinarily Yeah. Well,
(24:21):
and I just was so appreciative they gave me the
opportunity to travel the world and to compete, to compete
at a sport that I that I was good at
and loved. So in stand up, if I'm working a
city in the early days, bro, if I was somewhere
more than two days. I went to a temp service
and I got a day job while I was in
(24:42):
that city. So when you're touring for tennis, could you like,
because the tournament could be two weeks long, right, if
you're if you're going far into that tournament, what is
the day to day you just training and practicing, like
there's just no time to get any type of because
it seems like the type of job where you can't
(25:02):
get aside hustle. You know, you're when when you're playing
in these tournaments that I was playing, the tournaments are
only one week long, but the ones that I was
playing it, you know, the major tournaments are two weeks long.
But dude, your job is to sleep. You sleep. Don't
underestimate sleep. Sleep. Professional athletes sleep. That is your healing time.
(25:22):
That is your downtime. You sleep, you eat, and you train.
That is quick break. When we come back to home
in the right a k A right for short, maybe
we talk a little tennis with him, see if he's
done a little bit of tennis, and then I want
to get into the world of tennis groupies with Michael Costa,
a little scam action, John Fair, We'll be back job
(25:48):
Fair talking tennis the homian Michael Costa is standing by,
and you'll get back to Costa and talk a little
bit about the world of tennis groupies, and we'll probably
talk to him a little bit third about the shadiness
and comedy club since he does stand up now and
you know, scam gonna do what scam gonna do? Uh
real quick before we um take the show off the rails.
(26:11):
J G. Did you not that Sackleson State Community College
now has a faceless tuition policy. That's right, if you
are less than an eight, sack Wilson State is still
willing to invite you to end person classes. As we
already know, Sackleson State Community College the only community college
for good looking people. The distraction of ugliness is a
(26:38):
scourge on our educational system. But with the new faceless
semester at Sackleson State, if you are an ugly person,
you can still attend in class. If you agree to
face the wall, you get the same correct in the
same education, the same lectures. All we asked that you
do at Sackleson State is point your desk at the
wall to not distract the more intelligent scott Us Saxon
(27:01):
State Community college. You can get a four point Oh,
but not if you're a four visiting online sex state
dot com where the graduation rate. Who ship? God damn. Yeah,
that's the chemical that released in your brain. You see
an ugly person just shuts down its ship. Damn ship.
(27:22):
We turn it over now briefly to a brother who
was the author of the New York Times bestseller How
to Make Love to Your Woman on a Public Bus
and Not Misschell Stop, sold over three million copies. Hard
(27:43):
back is Mama named in Murado. We call him ride
a short ride. We're talking tennis today. He was talking
a little bit about all the US opening that brother
a couple of weeks ago was running things. Francis Tiful
m black Man, first generation immigrant from Sierra leon Rod.
(28:08):
Do you like it when they have the struggle story
about the athlete while the athlete is still being great
or does that feel a little out of pocket to you? Yeah?
I don't. I don't like that. It's uh, it's very annoying.
It's what it's It's like my top two like two
things that really bothered me in sports is these super
(28:29):
struggle stories that are like totally irrelevant to what they're
being great at and when like the announcers are like
coming up with these weird stats to make some ship
more interesting. You know, they're like, this is the first player.
He just became the first player to hit eleven consecutive
free throws in black Sox And what are you talking
about by the left foot? For me, the issue with
(28:57):
the struggle story, I think it holds war to what
third said earlier, makes perfect sense. You have there are
people watching who have to know that no matter what
situation they're in now they can overcome it. But can
we do it at the end of the match. Can
we do at the end of the tournament? Can we
do it before like before the game starts, but like
when they're in the game, actively playing the game constantly.
(29:21):
And just a reminder that gentleman you're watching used to
sleep in a fucking trash can at McDonald's and he
would eat whatever whatever food came down that trash can
at McDonald's. And his family came from Sierra Leone and
they survived on that middle bread in the big mag
that nobody likes they which is eating big mcmiddle bread.
(29:42):
And now you see him here at the tournamentful to
serve it's disrespectful, man. I just find it real disrespectful.
Like they don't tell you about they only do that
with people of color, like they I'll tell you about
the white selling that tennants who moms is in a
mental acitlement, the peel problem. Now talk about that ship
that's so fast, but they always quick to take this,
(30:06):
Oh this black person, you better believe, buddy, this is
even more amazing because yeah, both their parents died from
AIDS and had drug problems, and they were homeless till
last night and all that ship. But then on the
opposite side of that coin, that means that we people
of color and so on and so forth, we need
(30:28):
to take control of our own narratives. The only thing
you're gonna know about me is what I tell you
and what I put out there. So I just can't
do that for the turn. You can't do that during
the tennis like all those people. Everybody like that's that's
public information, so to speak. But like, I just don't
like it. You can only if you start doing that
with white people. Tell me about this white lady's brother
(30:51):
who fucking is in prison for manslaughter because he killed
his girlfriend and a drunk driving accident when he was sixteen,
talk about they never tell the stories of the Eastern
European players. Like that's why I agree with Like if
you are if you are black and you are from
the UK, you are from America, or you are from
somewhere in Africa, they find the hardest luck. Your family
(31:13):
used to sleep on straw and date elephants type story
to tell by you on the screen. But don't let
them be from like Poland and Romania or one of
those Eastern European countries where they have some horrible ship happened.
They just skip over all of that ship. It's the
subtle it's the subtle racism of lowered expectations. And somebody
(31:33):
is white enough on my heart background, nobody cares because
they they're white, so they're expected to be great, so
that's not something to overcome. But if you're black and
you got a parking ticket, they're gonna talk about that
ship forever. I agree that racism is there. I agree
that all the things are there. However, if that's not
(31:54):
the story he wants told, and we don't know what
story he wants told, or whomever, of course, go to
ESPN and tell them this is my story. Let me
tell you my story the way I want you to
share my narrative. That is not how journalism works. Those
people they were laughing, they were they were laughing. Your faith.
You're coming in, You're coming there and be like, this
(32:15):
is a story that Look, I love the fact that
you guys talked about my broke as background. But I
went to college and I had a scholarship. Yeah, here's
whats gonna happen. So we're gonna run the story we
already got. You're just going out there and keep playing
tendants saying though, and let me give you an example.
And this is some ship y'all can actually google about me.
So when I do podcasts, right, there is a difference
(32:40):
and the way the episode description of the podcast is
written when I mentioned getting arrested versus not mentioned and
getting arrested if I straight up, if I straight up
don't bring up getting arrested in a conversation, they go,
tell me how you're gotting a stand up? We know
the truth, you gotta said. I thought I was going
(33:01):
to prison. I did comedy to deal with depression until
I got sentenced, and then I got probation, and I
kept doing comedy the rest of my life. That's the truth.
But in certain conversations you can feel that ship. I
can't explain it, but you can feel it, and it's
like it's very much. So tell me about your struggle
and about everything, and sometimes and this is like, you know,
(33:24):
I'm talking five ten years ago type ship where I
would mention the arrest right and will be eloquent and
explain why and what's happened, and I am remorseful, and
then we would talk for another fifty minutes about other
ship in my life. But then it would be boiled down.
In the news article of the podcast description, Roy Wood Jr.
Talk about I'm going to prison and doing comics. That's
(33:48):
not all that I am. That's not so I just
I would just straight up not talk about it. I
just straight up would not bring it up. And I
get what j G Is saying, like, in certain instances,
to manipulate the people that you're talking about, Rod, who
literally are only gonna write what you say and only
gonna put out what you say, you just gotta straight
up not tell them ship. And if you already know
(34:08):
that about me, then motherfucker just write it. Because that
was the thing that was really they used to really
be fucked up, is j G. They wouldn't they wouldn't
know that part of my story because they've done the
research and then they would what they want me to
say it to them for they by it. So I'm
not going to verify what do you need to verify for?
I talked about getting arrested, oh three on Star Search
(34:29):
motherfucking us twenty years where they go get it. So
so in those interviews where I feel them fishing for struggle,
let's call it struggle fishing, Rod, struggle fishing, that's the term.
Talk about your damn talk about talk about what you've
overcome and struggle your comedy, understand your early days in comedy,
(34:53):
the struggle, right, and just be like, yeahs hard on
the road, let in my car, yes, yes, but what else?
What else? Struggle? Yeah? Man, everybody struggled. But I'm here
and I'm thankful. So I give what you're saying, but
thank you for that, Rod, because I just I think
(35:13):
there is a place to know where someone is overcoming.
But I'm just not sure if in the middle of
while the matches in progress, That's all I'm saying now,
while it's in prior or we bring in a struggle
comment you add a third person to the blue Rod.
This is what I propose. You add a struggle commentator,
but you let it be a brother, because a brother
delivers struggle on the upbeat, So it doesn't sound it's
(35:36):
painful to bring Tracy Mortgage in his hustle man struggle
for welcome back. We're in the third set. Tiafa was
down six too, and he's been through a lot. Uh
to tell a little bit more about his story, it's
go to struggle commentator, Tracy Morgan. Tracy, what can you
(35:56):
tell us about Francis Tiafa? Well, yes, daddy was the
janitor's a genital me snapping the motherfucker tennis and said
that's how you earned that fucking tennis. You can nothing
earn tennants sweeping around tennis. Have you seen Tracy Morgan
voice is the face you can't We bring right on
(36:23):
this program every week to give you topics to break
the ice for co workers. You can't stand co workers
in the opposite race. Rod will let you go ahead
and break it down for folks this week. A man
for your black co workers. A huge conversation raging right
now uh rapper Shad Moss, better known as bowsers Weuser's
(36:45):
better known also as Little bow Wow. He is currently
getting ready to set up on the Millennium Tour once
again and in the Gang Show, and this time features
a one thousand dollar a Little bow Wow v IP
backstage package where if you give bow Wow a thousand dollars,
(37:09):
he will give you a tour of the facilities where
they're performing, and he will let you hang out in
his quote unquote private club for about thirty to forty
five minutes, and you also get a personalized backpack and
a picture RHN to find me Chris Brown's pressure. So
why are people complaining about this? Well? You know, well
(37:33):
the well, the joke is, you know, why would anybody
pay a thousand dollars to meet and greet with bow Wow?
Because that's the same price Chris Brown has a picture
in like ten fifteen minute package four thousand dollars, and
it's just like, okay, that's Chris Brown, but this is
bow Wow. He should be willing to take twenty five
(37:53):
dollars to hang a Trihanna's ex boyfriend. He don't even
get Chris Brown like that is yeah, yeah, okay, thank
you down South charge. Yeah, but but Chris Brown is
only charging a thousand let's see, but you don't get
to hang and be around. So bow Wow is the
better value. You get a lot more. But the problem
(38:14):
is for people is that it's about wow. It's paying
a thousand dollars to hang out with Chris Brown. First
is spaying of thousand dollars to hang out with a
little bow But what if w is your Chris Brown,
then you should be. You do not need to be
in the cut. You don't, you're dangerous, dangerous society and
(38:36):
yourself die hard. You know what, no funk that. I'm
not gonna let y'all attack like this, this man said himself.
That's that's self checked. I know you don't play a
lot of basketball, but he's literally throwing the ball off
the backboard and catching it and trying to shoot a basket.
This is so you're telling me that paying a thousand
(38:58):
dollars to go backstage and hang out with Chris Rock
is the same as staying of thousand dollars to spend
two extra hours pass Chris Rock. We Willie and Tyler.
You're not gonna disrespect Willie Tyland me telling me a
(39:22):
thousand dollars Willie Tyler Lester is the same as a
thousand dollars crist disrespecting Willie Tyler, not disrespected. I respect
my hustle, I respect the talent. I'm just saying. If
you're telling me they are in the same world, then
I'll drop this old thing. If you're telling me Chris
Rock is equal to Willie Doyland, left dropping. I'll tell
(39:43):
you about what to raise the price to ten thousand
if you would tell me on the record that Willie
Tall and Lester is exactly the same Jimmy Walking. Some
ships say somebody else what I'm saying. The market decides right,
(40:08):
and the market has decided that. Some people have decided
that bow Wow is worth one thousand fucking dollars, which
is a lot of fucking What would you wait in
line for? Is there anyone you would wait in line for? Me? Personally?
Not a soul. I wouldn't wait in line to meet
Jesus fucking Christ. Okay, what about your third? First, for all,
(40:31):
I'm paying the g Second of all, I better be
seeing Chan Grier like or somebody like that. Guys that
I can't and she's the only person I can think of,
because that way I could. I got to justify the
G with my wife, so like that's the other problem.
I got to justify both of y'all. Want to meet
wait for Barack. I'll leave it at Barack. I paid.
(40:54):
I paid a G for Barack. Would you wait three hours?
Thousand dollars to me? Um? This goes back to a
question from way many episodes before Rod and I said
that I can't remember what it was, but I said,
I really want to meet Andre three thousand, but I
would look big Boy because I know big Boy would
actually show up, and three thousand maybe said I would wait.
(41:19):
I don't know if I pay a G, but I
would wait three hours to me, like like if somebody
told me standing right here and in three hours, Samuel O.
Jackson will be here and we'll have a conversation with you.
I probably the state, but Jacqueline, Oh, I would only
wait in line for food. Thousand dollars for a meal.
(41:44):
Depends on what it is now, like that Salt Bay
restaurant or Gordon Ramsey. If it's an experience, I will
pay the money for it. I will wait in line
for it. Is that white table cloth I'm going to
miss star chef. Yes, all that stuff, I'm all in
(42:06):
on that. All right, right, let's flip it up for
the people real quick. For your white co workers, we
got a motherfucking doozy right now. Uh. A country club
in Manassas, Virginia. Shout Out was forced to release an
apology for a special nine eleven themed food menu to
(42:33):
mark the twenty first anniversary of Nah. Well, I'm glad
you asked that, Ralph, because I got the list right here,
my man. Would you like some Flight ninety three redirect
that is hot crab dep with krostini You can't say
(42:57):
first responder? Yeah for the first responded flatbird jack, that's
not an experience. What about nine eleven orysters, the freedom
floundered fried? Uh yeah, they look like yeah, they said that.
(43:18):
With chipotlemolate, you get sick pentic gun pie. The remembered
teeny and the most egregious thing on this list is
a creamy crab in corn with bacon chowder called twenty
nine seventies seven chowder. For those of you who don't
know two thousand seventy seven. It's the official fatality count
(43:43):
of the attacks of book And if you don't know
which one of those things sounds the most delicious. They
do have a never forget sampler. I'm not bullshit. The
only thing that would have made it more egregious is
if all of these food items were likely dusted with
(44:06):
confection and sugar. Like this is insane, man Like, whozy?
This sounds like an idea from a comedy sketch that
you tell another comedian, you know, because when comedians talk
to each other, there's absolutely nothing off the table, And
that's what this sounds like. This sounds like a joke
(44:27):
between a couple of comedians of the group chat, and
somebody turned it into a real A fucking restaurant manager
at a fucking country club was like, we gotta mark
nine eleven. We didn't heat pin a gun passed. That is,
there's so many people to fire in this situation, Like
we're talking about this a couple of weeks ago on
the show, but like who do you fire? Here? Are
(44:49):
we firing the fired? Everybody above the kitchen is out
of here? Are we firing? Are we firing the weed
man who brought this fucking weed to the chef to
make them have this? Like everybody that's to fucking god man,
they gotta go. That's the podcast. It's Uncle Rod Story Corner.
(45:11):
I hang my head in Shane, Virginia. I hang my
head in Shane, Virginia. It's crazy to think they even
did that ship. Indeed, do you know how seriously I
mean they take down a living, real serious here in
New York. But like you know, d C nine eleven
is a is a seriously solemn ass thing. I can't
even believe somebody would do that ship. That's crazy, Rod.
(45:32):
Thank you as always. We'll get with you next week.
We're gonna do another Rod's Relationship fail. Oh yeah, I'm
talking about holiday work parties that have gone south. If
you gotta work, Mary, Chris mass Rich out to Roy's jump,
if your boss allows you to have a party, but
to say, y'all know we'll suck this up. This this
(45:52):
is another reasoner Roy to take the party from our ass,
Like just yeah, we don't have no damn party. I'm
gonna come to each to your house individually and we're
gonna celebrate. Welcome to the Grinches. Job say, job for
holiday parties is one on one, like an evaluate like working.
(46:14):
Don't give us an evaluation coming there and layout scam
of a week time. Let's get back to guests. We're
talking tennis with Michael Costo. I've always heard like, if
you're a tennis professional, like you're a tennants pro, like
(46:35):
you know, at least in the movies, it seems like
a lot of older women who are very lonely trying
to sleep with you. I'm not to ask you about
yourself out, Costa, but I'm just saying, you know, like,
have you seen tennis groupie game? Yeah? Different when you're
attendants pro because you get like, you know what I'm saying,
like millionaire white groupies, which is crazy. I'm not saying
it's aside of hustle. I'm just saying that if you
got the right tournament and you about three weeks out,
(46:57):
you can tendis. I'm not trying to call you out.
I'm asking question was not in the prep dot, cost
The best questions are never in the prep doc, right, Uh,
excellent question is an excellent question. Um, you might be
mistaking like teaching pro at a country club for a
(47:18):
playing professional. Right now, My friends that are at the
country club's teaching rich wives who are bored and they
sign up. Yes, yes, it happens. Yes, there's a reason.
It's the cliche. Um. The closest that happens in the
in the tournaments that I was playing was um. You
(47:42):
would sometimes get to a tournament and you could request housing.
You could say, Hey, I don't have the money for hotel.
Are there any families that would put me up? Um?
And you know this is tennis. These are nice houses, uh,
And so sometimes you get put up. Sometimes there's not
a lot of people in the house. Sometimes you lose
(48:04):
and maybe the you know, the mom, maybe she serving drinks.
I've heard of that happening to UM. But that's as
far as I'll take it. Really, what you're telling me
is that I have to tell a rod that he
needs to be a tennis a tennis pro and maybe
lose a couple of matches. It might work out for him.
I can see him work in that path. But I
like this, sir, I like this. I like to thank you.
(48:25):
How how does a career like this? And like, like,
is there a day like in football you are waived
and eventually no one else will sign you or invite
you back. In tennis, if everything isn't open and you
just have to win the qualifying tournament to get a
(48:48):
chance to get a chance for the bigger tournament at
walk us through that last month of playing tennis. Is
it a decision to just not get in any more
tournaments I'm tired of losing, or this is improfitable and
I'm out of cash. Walk us through the end of it,
through the end of a tennis career flour for the
average you know, tennis pro. Yeah, it's an excellent question
(49:09):
because it's not like most of us get to play
our last match on Arthur ash Stadium in front of
twenty nine thousand people on ESPN. It's this really uneventful, objective, financial, emotional.
You're kind of like I remember I got Basically what
(49:30):
happened with me was I got offered the assistant coaching
position at University of Michigan, and I just said, that's it.
I'm taking that job. I'm going from one job to
the next. And I had about four thousand dollars left also,
so that certainly helped the decision. Um, but were you
married at the time. No, I wasn't. I was living
(49:52):
with my parents and I was twenty four and uh,
you know, my last year on with with tennis as
I was all this downtime that you have waiting. I
used to write jokes and in notebooks, and essentially those
those notebooks are what turned into my first end up
comedy set. But you know, most, I guess, even in
(50:16):
minor league baseball, there is a last day or last
at bat. But in tennis, much like golf, it's you
kind of just slowly fade away. Mm hmmm. So no,
like you don't play on the underground tennis death circuit
until you know you just can't for tennis, thank you.
(50:39):
I'm saying, lots of explosions that moves at the end
of matches, so that would be sick. That's it. That'd
be a good video game, right, But yeah, there isn't
you know. And this is tennis. It's it's a pretty
affluent sport. Most players when they're done playing, they probably
got some other stuff lined up. You know. It's not
(51:02):
it's not as dramatic or sad as to some of
the other sports where like, holy sh it, I've been
the defensive lineman my whole life. I'm now injured bringing Yeah, yeah, exactly.
It's not in your racket turning your balls. What what
are some interesting scams that you've seen run at various businesses.
(51:24):
I don't imagine you two have been much of a
scammer yourself, because you went from coaching straight into stand
up comedy. You know, comedy itself is a scammy business. Television.
I played a comedy club in the Midwest, still in business,
so I will refrain their name. Small, intimate, wonderful venue.
(51:45):
I was there Saturday. I see this giant U haul
pull up and the entire staff is taking the chairs
and the tables from the showroom and loading them into
the U haul, and the U haul has parked in
the back with the flashers on. So I go in
there and I'm going, what's up, And they're going, we're
(52:06):
getting our fire inspection and we need to be at
this number. But you know, we see four times that
obviously in the showroom. So they periodically rent a U
haul and put all the stuff in a a U
haul on the corner with the flashers on and wait
for the fire commissioner to leave. And I was like,
(52:26):
that is something that is some intelligence. And they supposedly
they pay. Supposedly they pay the commissioner. So he says
to them, I'm coming in now. So then they got
two hours to go rent the truck and do this
whole thing. Good business, that's good, that's good business. When
you're in with the commissioner. I don't care. That's good business.
That that's that's the way you should do it. That's
the way it works. I'm sorry. I respect them, I
(52:48):
respect him. I'm not necessarily saying Cody and most most,
but I'm just saying it's that's pretty damn closed you're
in with the commissioner. I love it like business until
there's a fucking fire route. Well, I mean, you know,
price of doing business. What are you both talking about?
What are you talking? I want my bonus? Pack them
in God damn it. I don't give a ship. Put
(53:09):
fifty chairs in there. See that's what happened. Both of
YouTube are famous to do things for causes and to
look at the money and just be like, oh it's cool. Me.
I'm still the mother coming fire, burning place out, somebody
trying to pee ons. I want the jokes. I want
to cash. After the break, we'll bring it home with
the homie Michael Costra and wrap up a little bit
of tennis talk. It's a job, fair, job fair round
(53:39):
and third headed for Home. Now I want to talk
about the two podcasts that you are working on, Costra.
But first, j G, what was your question. I was
just gonna say, today impacts tomorrow. What are you doing
today to make your world, your spear, your neighborhood, your
area a better place? Oh? Man, I hate this question.
(54:00):
Who else has asked you this question? The philanthropy question
was that that? Also, I can see there's good in
those eyes. You have kind eyes. So I'm wondering, what
are you doing to make the world a better place,
or even if it's just your neighborhood or your sphere
of influence? Yeah, I mean the reason I hate this
(54:23):
question is I never feel that I'm doing enough. I
have decided that raising a daughter than you're doing more
than enough. You're raising to So I tried. I tried
very hard. We need to do anything else, like just
keep off the pole. I guess, so, I guess, So, okay,
(54:46):
it's all right. Uh. You know in my neighborhood there's
some trash pick up Costa. Costa bought one of those
things that picks up the trash. Yeah, you know that
goes around my neighbor My neighbors laugh, at me because
I put the mask and the gloves on and I
go pick it up. I'm still contused why I visit
(55:09):
other cities around the world and no one has the
trash like New York City. But um, but that'll be
my answer. But I'll also take your question as a
as a slight nudge for me to to reconsider ways
I can do more. Let me let me say one
thing to that costume. And this is something that I
think a lot of people don't know about what we
(55:30):
do with the Daily Show. But you know a lot
of what we pitch at the show comes from the correspondence.
So we are in a lot of ways the arbiters
of where the camera gets pointed and what issue gets
you know, I am not And I found this out
when I went back to Birmingham during George Floyd to
(55:51):
help clean up after you know some you know riding
and you know folks tearing up ship. But I will
probably never have the availa ability to be the person
that's the boots on the ground to lead the charge
about the thing. But what I can do is to
be the support system to bring attention to the issue
or bring money to the issue, which then helps to
solve the issue. So for me, it's always been about
(56:16):
trying my best to make sure that I'm trying to
create conversations around issues that a lot of people don't
give a funk about. Because the Daily Show, just by volume,
we get to cover more ship than any of the
show because we're on four nights a week, so we
you know, we just have more run way. So I
would I would say you care a lot more than you.
(56:38):
Probably hear something about Costa j G. And he's probably
not giving himself credit for it. He just straight up
took on the role of water dude at the show.
This motherfucker. Like the way I'm like always like, oh,
let me find another race story. Costas like, Hey, the
waters fucked up. You gotta fix the fucking so heat
(57:00):
time and time again. Has you know, spearhaited so many
stories that are about the environment, And when you look
at what's going down right now in Jackson there, you
best believe that that type of ship has already been pitched.
Mother motherfucker. You're looking at it there it is. Oh yeah,
I mean I I yeah. The more I've dug into
(57:22):
water quality, we call ourselves USA or Number one motherfucker. Jacksonville, Mississippi,
would have had a boilier water the last three months.
I mean, Flinn still isn't figured out. It's like, wait,
we don't we don't have our we don't have clean
drinking water for our citizens. So oh and you want
(57:44):
them to be more politically active or more registered to vote,
they can't. They would have drinking water. So yeah, Roy,
thank you, thank you for thank you for mentioning that.
But that when we're in the ship, we don't even
really it's what we're doing in the worth and just
how unique and how powerful it is in the moment.
(58:04):
And also J. G. Costas the person when we were
looking at the red algae and green algae plumes that
are polluting um the water systems in Florida. Yeah, Costa
wanted to get on a boat and ride through the
algae so we could see the fucking close, which we did,
and we both almost went fucking blind because it's in
(58:27):
the air, like whatever toxin is in that water that
it's in you, it's in the air's fucking with your eyes,
all types of shoot. But you know, it was a
good story. Free tripped Miami. Okay, I'm curious about something
totally different. Who put your head on this tennis ball? What?
What coop in my head? What ball? Oh? The logo
this tennis ball. As it relates to your podcast, I'm
(58:50):
looking at a picture that has your head on that.
It was a graphic designer. Friend, But you're not happy
with that. You can have whatever you want, but tell
us about the podcast. Thank you there. I have my
own personal podcast called Tennis Anyone with Michael Costa, and
(59:13):
we talked tennis, we talk everything, but uh, and then
I also have to promote a wonderful podcast I was
a part of called Choosing Sides f one with Sports Illustrated,
where I don't know anything about Formula one racing but
um with a journalist named Lily Herman. I was presented
every team and every driver and at the end of
(59:35):
the season, I pick my team and my driver and
I learned so much about Formula one and it's available
wherever you listen to podcasts. But really really fun. That's
a crazy sport that makes me think a Ricky Bobby.
Now in the movie. In the movie, there's a Formula
one racer. Thank you. You know you're Ricky Bobby, Ricky
(59:59):
Bubb Yes, I've enjoyed watching F one the last couple
of years. I'll be lying if I said the Netflix
series F one Drive to Survive did not. It helped
me understand the stakes and the strategy of the sport
(01:00:20):
in a way that video games did not. For the
most part, I learned sports by playing the video game
version of it, and then that gets me interested in
the real life version of it. Like I've reversed engineering
my way to soccer with that. With that, like that's
that's just how otherwise I was never going to learn
about that. Nascar is a little bit more simplistic in circle, circle, circle,
(01:00:44):
and there's strategy to it, but it's not to the degree, uh,
you know, a Formula one. So with this podcast, I
think what's dope about it is that you're able. What
you represent in that is the person who doesn't necessarily understand,
you know, I don't know, and I didn't know anything
about at one. I didn't. They told me not to
watch Drive to Survive. And what I what I learned
(01:01:05):
in the podcast is it's always interesting to learn this stuff.
Formula one was very against Drive to Survive. They were
really reluctant at first. They liked their fan base. They
didn't want new people. It is a wealthy, old white
dude sport and and they were convinced to give this
(01:01:26):
a shot. And man, has it exploded the sport grown
the sport and uh punch, A bunch of people are
watching the sport that never did before. That's only good
for their business. Yeah, well, we thank you so much
for coming on. Brother. I don't want to hold you up.
I know you got a two year old somewhere in
that house that you have to tend to that. I'm
sure somewhere somewhere, I mean just just so you see,
(01:01:53):
like like I'm recording, but there there's like a bouncy house, right. Yeah, well,
thank you so much for coming over there. Um, I
love you and I'll see you back in the office
at some point. Man. Thanks roy You're the man. That's
the show. Royce John fare as a product of I
(01:02:14):
Heart Media, Comedy Central and South Park and Princeton Productions.
We did it. Um. I did think of one more
person for a thousand dollars that I am. I hank
I would want to talk to m Michelle Obama. Obama's
(01:02:37):
win every time Michelle Obama number I think because I
think women women. You said he got the husband number.
J G. Absolutely, you could save me a thousand dollars.
All the time you asked me, I told you you
could see me a thousand dollars. I don't know Obama
(01:02:58):
both the thousand dollars? Are you pad a thousand dollars?
We're about to say you to see somebody who's gonna
invite you to a barbecue, because I feel like at
the end of talking to Michelle Obama, she'd give me
my money back. She was like, Hey, that I just
wanted to. I feel like that's the one, all right.
Next week, Rod's Relationship Fair returns the dangers of work parties.
(01:03:24):
Don't you go to these work parties you get the drinking.
You know later somebody gonna get the m sex. So
give us a call reach out to the show, Royce
job Fair at gmail dot com. If you got want
to add to the show, that's it. We'll do it
again next week. This has been a Comedy Central podcast.
You're listening to Comedy Central. You're not gonna like this one.
J G. Why I know you and I know you're
not gonna like this one. No, you assumed these things.
How do you know? What is it now? Hiring Queen
Elizabeth the second is dead in the country. If England
(00:23):
needs somebody to take the throne, please submit your applications.
W W, it's so wrong. That's not how that works.
The old queen passed away, uh due to complications from
being nineties. Look, I told you that told you stop
(00:53):
making me laugh and stuff like that. King Charles the
Third takes the throne. Good for him, You know, I
don't know what, But who would be the American equivalent
of like a monarch, like somebody we all respect, but
they ain't really got no like legal power, like like
she's not like the Prime Minister, super respected and influence. No,
(01:17):
I'm not saying, but the same legacy like quenel I'm
just saying, just someone who walks around like they in charge,
but they really got a lot of legal leverage. But
that well she does. Now wait a minute, she did
ensued or sent a cease and desist letter to one
of our over yest so yes, she does quean, yeah, yeah, over.
(02:05):
My name is Roy. This is my job, fair little
raspy this week. I apologize in advance. Don't adjust your
listening devices. Uh why ended up in a strip club
of tea, pain and things? Got a little lot of
hands next, and I felt it. I felt it because
(02:28):
I don't want your fucking mom guilt on me right now.
This is so third about every eighteen months, I lose
my voice just like clockwork, just inexplicably, my voice just goes.
I'm taking a personal week, Good luck to you. And
when that happens, Jacqueline goes into mom mode and your
(02:52):
voice is your instrument. And I don't understand why you
would allow that man to take you to an establishment
like that, knowing that you had gigs to do. You
had to do Stephen Kovid, you had to do and
promote confess Let your movie, so many other things. The
Emmies were coming up. There you are in Honolulu in
(03:13):
a strip club, screaming at the top of my lines.
You're damn right, I was. How did that work out? Though?
Just just don't ask me. I have made better decisions
in my life, Roy. There is nothing wrong with having
fun However, you have to protect your instruments, and your
(03:37):
voice is your instruments. Jacqueline. Yes, when the Strip Club
Genie appears script, you cannot say no no. That's what
tep and t paint. He was doing shows in Honolulu,
and I was in Hollolulu doing shows, and he came
by my my spot after his show. Hey man, what
(03:57):
you're doing in that? Hey man? What was on? And
the strip Club Genie took me. I have words club
in Hawaii. It wasn't bad. It doesn't sound bad. A
little weird. So tennis, What do we know about tennis
(04:17):
other than it's expensive to play? Oh, the outfits are cute.
Arthur Ashes from Virginia. Yeah, that's what I know. I
like the fact that the young brother that's been killing
killing in at the US Open, he's from the d
n V. I know that much. And I know that
he uh. I know he Milly rocked the other day
when he beat that dude like a mug. He was
(04:39):
all on the court Millie Rock and I support that
all day. I don't know, but I know one thing.
There's a member of the staff who went to the
US Open and didn't invite anybody else but I believe
that that is unfair. I'm not gonna let you do
that to her. She she did invite people. You just
happened not to be on the team. Who went, Who
went to the US South Tennis girl is a good
(05:00):
as time. Let me let me just just as an aside,
if you're a fan of food and atmosphere. The only
thing I can compare the US Open to it like
it's tennis with a fucking tailgate broke. There's just food
and activities, and you could go to the US Open
and literally not see a match. You can just be
(05:22):
walking around outside the stadium and if you go in
the early rounds, it's like thirty fucking tennis matches happen
and just pick one and you can go in center
court where you have a ticket. But it was I
haven't gone in years. I think I went like four
or five years ago, and it was a legitimately good time.
(05:42):
It really was, you know, and you know, our guest today,
Michael Costa, who's also a Daily Show correspondent, went to
the US Open with Trevor Noah because you know, Trevor
gets the box seats and apparently my fucker's think I
don't like baseballs, you know, tennis, the U them and
turn on the US Open and see my boss and
(06:03):
my my fucking coworker just in theate giggling and just
eating elephant. Isn't looking old types a little but pastries.
It is weird with like, you know, you see your
boss on I don't know, throwing out a picture of
the baseball game, and you kind of said there like
maybe he just thinks I like soccer. I don't know, so, yeah,
you're right, it is weird. It's strange. So yeah, tennis,
(06:24):
let's let's talk. No no no no no no no
no no no, you can't say that because you are
actually promoting a movie. So you can go to the
tennis match anyway, Mr the best Blacks getting personal today.
I didn't know that tennis would be the topic of
a Divide us like this. The game of love. It
brings things out of people, you know what I mean?
Love one love? Okay, I like that little research here
(06:46):
from down South Georgia. Girl. It's not an un lucrative business,
but god damn, everybody's in your pocket. Yeah. The top
tennis coaches usually received ten percent of their players prize money. Okay,
and then you have an instructor, you gotta pay. You
got all the traveling tennis coaches you gotta pay. You
(07:07):
got trainers, you gotta pay. That's that's that's not a lot.
The average tennis pro in America only makes about thirty
five thou dollars a year. And that's not so they're
high married. That's that sounds that sounds like that sounds
like a little grimy in there for real. If they
only make them like that, it's a lot of people.
And that's not a lot. But people that that do that,
(07:30):
that's that's that's sleeping out your car money type stuff.
It's different than minor league baseball. But when they do
the when they do the numbers on minor league baseball,
the hours spent at the field versus what you paid,
it's less. It's literally less than minimum wage. So, you know,
if you want to have a chance of making some
real prize money, you've got to you know, you gotta
pay your dues. Master racket technician, what is that? Master
(07:54):
racket technician. Yeah, they fixed the strings on the racket,
don't they. Yeah, And all so matches athletes with the
best racket for their type of play, and it focuses
on every detail of the racket, from the string material
to the tension, to make sure that the racket is
customized and just right a year m Lastly, before we
(08:18):
get into the CMO here, thank you again Ron to
hear some of the ways that tennis players get played.
And this is why I think that tennis isn't seen
as as immediate of a path out of the hood.
We're gonna get the pay out of a fucking tennis tournament.
You do this once or twice a year, it's not
a bad lick dog. So let's look at the breakdowns
real quick. Um bonuses of course, or into every player's sponsorship.
(08:43):
You signed with Nike, and if you win as many tournaments,
we're gonna get you a little more money. Exhibition fees,
endorsement deals, sponsorships, apparents fees which always do Roger one
million in appearance fees just to show up to smaller
tournaments like this, Momber. You're just it's not even an
official tournament, it ain't sanctioned by nothing. You're playing and
(09:05):
one street ball tennis. If the money is right, how
tennis players get paid. This is a breakdown from the
teen you was open If you get eliminated in the
first round, you get fifty eight thousand dollars. Second round,
hunted thousand, third round, hunted sixty thout, full round to eighty, quarterfinal,
(09:25):
half of milk Simbos, nine hundred, runner up one point
nine if you win. If you won the US Open,
you got three point eight million dollars. Now what's a
decent Now keep in mind you're paying for your own travel,
you're paying for other and and Michael Costle is gonna
break down why fifty eight thousand dollars for the first
round really ain't as good as we think. It is
(09:46):
half to taxes and ten percent to your fucking coach
and your tennis pro and the motherfucker that's stringing up
the strings on your racket. I guess he gotta get
a little pinch to everybody getting a fucking pinch. It's
time most outstand employee of the week. Now, as you
were talking earlier, third, we got to give props to
this brother, Francis Tiafo. He was the first American since Andy.
(10:09):
This is this is when you know they're getting deep
into them tennis statistics. He's the first American since Andy
Roddick in two thousand four to make it to the
like not even the last American to win. They was
just like, did you know an American hedn't even got
this goddamn fall in twenty years? Holy Ship this year
Rhonda's Moonlight and giving them no steps. It was dope
(10:32):
to see him play. But the thing that I liked
about watching Tifo in the US Open was that he
played with emotion, And I really did appreciate that because
he didn't mute himself and the wool I almost be button.
He was like, Nah, yes, I've beating a doll. This's
my funer's number two in the world. Listen to me
throwing out tennis names like I watched the Ship every
(10:53):
week he beat the dude who's bad and the motherfucker
and then did the salt may sprinkle on his As
I support anybody bringing flavor to mainstream sports, you might
as well have done the crip walk like Serena did
so many years ago when she beat somebody. That was
amazing to watch. So I enjoyed when when when folks
(11:15):
come up there and you know, let let them know
a little bit, let him know that the rest of
us is watching too. I dig that I haven't seen
it yet, but I can't wait. You like his story,
you tell me whether this is fair a file. It's
very difficult sometimes for us to just be allowed to
just sit back and enjoy an athlete being a good
ass athlete and being new dominant and being refreshing. How
(11:40):
soon is too soon to tell the struggle stories about
the athlete because he's his star is now, so you
kind of got to know everything now. But do you
have to? Because it be the way that they bring
it up, you know what I'm saying. You know what
I mean, Like when they started talking about the struggle,
like while he's playing in the match, and as we oh, no,
(12:00):
he came from nothing. His daddy was a janitor and
they ate a mop every day? Is in this family
they ate a mop with they had mop selens kind
of thinking this guy's situation. You gotta tell that story
right now because because I mean, we talked to Costa
(12:23):
and you know how much of a struggles. There's no
bad boys, there's no there. You know, they don't they
don't get the harassed rookies to carry their stuff. They're
their own rookies. They carry their own equipment. They pay
their own stuff. You gotta tell this guy's story now
in hopes that there's somebody out of this willing to
give this brother money to continue doing this very expensive sport. Okay,
So then middle Ground, let the white tennis professionals call
(12:45):
the match, and then when it's time to tell the
story and go into the news package about him during
one of the time outs, you're calling a black person
and let them struggle, announcing like you have play by play,
you have color trama table, and you have struggle. You
have struggled person now now and with that ball, it
(13:05):
is now forty tiafo to serve after this spreaper real quick,
we have Jacqueline, and Jacqueline tell us about the struggle
of this room. Well, his name is Frances and his
father used to work at a tennis center and he
had really bad equipment, and those white kids used to
tease him when he had that bad equipment. But he said,
(13:25):
I don't care, I'm gonna go out there and beat you,
and that's what he did. Thanks, Jaqueline, sound like that.
It was a head. Not for me, It was a
total head. Was overcoming and coming to and truly be
in the American dream and getting out that U bus
(13:46):
open and whipping ass and making sure that people know
your name henceforth and forever, going into three Francis Tifos
Most Outstanding Employee of the Week, brought to you by
Sackles and State Community College. So worse than first time, Jacqueline.
What if I do the whole show like this nice
(14:07):
and deep voice to protect the fact that I have
a little bit of rasp today, then I'm going to
have to answer a bunch of emails from women who
will be like, Okay, that's kind of sexy. Do that?
That would be a hit podcast. Just sex sounds like
(14:28):
not sex, but okay, just the sounds like when you're
faking it in a movie. Okay, Jack will be the
world's first girl. Oh my god, your hair like just
just welcome home would be the name of the podcast.
And just when you come home as a woman, you
put it on and then it's just me and you.
Damn you look like you had alone day. Baby. We
(14:51):
have guests, Roy, we have guests. Jacqu w be the
world first audio intimacy coordinator. This this person that we
have today, his careers spreads multiple genres, like I would
say he's checked a lot of boxes. Professional athletics, check,
professional entertainment, check, college, all of that, working in the
(15:16):
regular world check. He is a good friend of mine
and I we um. We share a hallway together over
there the Daily Show. But before that we random l
a joke streets together. J G. Who do we have
on the line. We welcome comedian and Daily Show correspondent
Michael Costa to the show. While Michael is best known
(15:37):
for his work and comedy, we were surprised to learn
that he is also, like you, said, a former professional athlete.
The Michigan native enjoyed a successful college tennis career before
going pro and eventually coaching. His coaching gig allowed him
time to try his hand and stand up comedy. And
(15:58):
I guess they say the rest is history. Welcome, Thank you. Wow.
I thought this is already more researched than I anticipated.
You had a mean year when you're in tennis, man,
I think you reached all of eight sixty four. We
have clips of that year with you were killing it
at eight sixty three two and uh well no, and
(16:21):
this you know, this is the for those the that
are unaware. Eight and sixty four was my highest a
t P Association of Tennis Professional World rankings. Okay, that's
the highest, that's the best I ever got. Okay, that's me.
I mean it's still to this day of the signature
(16:43):
on my email, it is. It is what I am
most proud of. But it is like, you know, maybe
it's just because I love in sport. Unlike in comedy Roy,
there is no subjectivity. There is no oh I'm eight
sixty four, but I actually am number one. I actually
(17:06):
am a Grand Slam champion sport. You are your number.
That is it? Okay, So then let's let's start there
for the worst and first part of this conversation. Now,
being a college athlete. We spoke with Candice Parker Um
a while back and she was talking about her time
at Tennessee and how when you're a student athlete there
(17:27):
is no time to deliver pizza, there is no time
to work retails. So were you pretty much from your
childhood on, were you always in athletics and just you
just were never the kid that worked at the drive through?
Like what were some of those first Michael Costa pay
stuffs or did none of that happened until the world
with tennis. Yeah, it's a good question. And you know,
(17:49):
Candice is right, it actually doesn't matter what collegiate sport
you play. If it's a varsity sport, they got you,
They got your schedule, they have your was on lockdown,
they feed you at feeding times. Um. So when my
when my bell like cling cling, tennis, people eat now pinging.
(18:16):
I know I made it sound like we're a bunch
of Gerbils, but you kind of are. You kind of are,
and you're representing. You're representing that the team in the
jersey that you're wearing. And for me, it was University
of Illinois. But um, to answer your question, when John Costa,
my father realized that college might be free for me,
(18:39):
he said, he said, he said, you can spend your
summers working on your serve in your forehand. Um. So
I didn't have to do those drive through jobs. I
didn't have to, you know, man, my my sitting. Yeah,
they did everything. It was nice, except in the back
(19:00):
of my head, I kept thinking I better get a scholarship, uh,
which which thankfully I thankfully I did. But you know,
I mean, truly my job became to get very good
at tennis. So that's that's what I focused on. To
me Tennis is an interesting sport in that you know
what's your fault, Like there is no teammate to blame. Okay,
(19:26):
there's no the coach called the wrong place, like your coach.
Your tennis coach may call the wrong strategy for the match. Well,
you want to play against the net, but ultimately you
had to hit that ball. Pitch coach, you can hit
that ball. You didn't know you didn't you. It's on you,
third coach fault. It's not my fault. I don't know
(19:53):
how it works. There's the reason his name is third
and not first. I'm just I'm just messing obviously, But Roy,
what does that remind It reminds me of comedy, of
stand up comedy, like I can you know Friday Light Show.
(20:16):
I was in Kansas City. It didn't go well. You know,
I walked off the stage. I was ready to bitch
about the server. I was ready to bitch about the
Czech spot. I was ready to bitch about the group
up front. That was complaint, that was loud. At the
end of the day, it's like, yo, it's you. You're
out there, man, do your job and um So tennis
(20:36):
is very similar to me to stand up comedy in
the sense that the responsibility falls on your shoulders. So
let's get into the world of professional tennis. You're out,
you're on the A TP Tour, and you're doing your thing,
and you're winning matches and you're losing matches, and you're
trying to figure your way through this particular world. What
are their hurdles as a young because like, is it
(20:59):
are they called rookies? Like what is the beginning level?
Because it seems like tennis is just it's beautiful in
the sense that you know, anybody can kind of sign
up for an open qualifying low level professional tournament. So
in theory, if you you can win your way into
(21:22):
the US Open um Now technicality, I was probably playing
the majority of my matches on the i t F,
which is the International Tennis Federation Circuit, which is like
the double A, single A sometimes triple A version of
what you're watching on TV right now, the U S Open.
(21:44):
So I was in the Bull Durham minor leagues. But
the biggest, one of the biggest turtles, not a sexy
answer is money, yourself funding. It's like golf, I don't
have a team, I don't have I'm not playing for
the you know, Toledo mud Hens. I'm playing for Michael
(22:07):
Costa and so what my one of the greatest gifts
my dad gave me was he didn't give me money.
He said, I will help you create a business plan
where you sell shares of your potential earnings two investors,
and we basically created Michael Costa Tan Company and people.
(22:32):
People bought shares of me for five thousand dollars and
we raised a hundred and seventy five dollars and I
played on that and once that was done, guess what
I switched to com yourself? You yah, yeah, in nine myself.
(22:54):
That's pretty fire man. You're you're you're a trailblazer, sy Leach.
You didn't have to get only fans of working to
pull appreciate that. But you also, you know, think about, like,
what a great gift from my dad. It wasn't money,
it was it was entrepreneurial spirit. It was believing in yourself.
It was also calling his friends that had money. But um,
(23:14):
you know, what a great what a great uh, what
a great parenting move. That's that's something serious. It's one
thing to call uh I got kid, It's one thing
to call your friends to get them to buy like
girls Scout cookies or whatever dow hikies that they're selling
for the basketball team. It's a whole another thing to
call somebody and make a serious investment. Say I want
you to put your money behind my child, who I
(23:35):
believe in, who can to actually do something. You know,
that's that's pretty dope. Dollars. Will give you one per
cent of his earnings, yeah whatever over X amount of years,
which means they'll get the tin k back over the damn.
It was more like I still have the business plan.
But it was like they got thirty They got the
(23:59):
first two years, and it went down after that, and
long story short, they all got about half their money back.
But Michael Costa and Tennis, you know, from from a
from a venture capitalistic standpoint, I was a failed company.
But um, but I'm to this day extraordinarily Yeah. Well,
(24:21):
and I just was so appreciative they gave me the
opportunity to travel the world and to compete, to compete
at a sport that I that I was good at
and loved. So in stand up, if I'm working a
city in the early days, bro, if I was somewhere
more than two days. I went to a temp service
and I got a day job while I was in
(24:42):
that city. So when you're touring for tennis, could you like,
because the tournament could be two weeks long, right, if
you're if you're going far into that tournament, what is
the day to day you just training and practicing, like
there's just no time to get any type of because
it seems like the type of job where you can't
(25:02):
get aside hustle. You know, you're when when you're playing
in these tournaments that I was playing, the tournaments are
only one week long, but the ones that I was
playing it, you know, the major tournaments are two weeks long.
But dude, your job is to sleep. You sleep. Don't
underestimate sleep. Sleep. Professional athletes sleep. That is your healing time.
(25:22):
That is your downtime. You sleep, you eat, and you train.
That is quick break. When we come back to home
in the right a k A right for short, maybe
we talk a little tennis with him, see if he's
done a little bit of tennis, and then I want
to get into the world of tennis groupies with Michael Costa,
a little scam action, John Fair, We'll be back job
(25:48):
Fair talking tennis the homian Michael Costa is standing by,
and you'll get back to Costa and talk a little
bit about the world of tennis groupies, and we'll probably
talk to him a little bit third about the shadiness
and comedy club since he does stand up now and
you know, scam gonna do what scam gonna do? Uh
real quick before we um take the show off the rails.
(26:11):
J G. Did you not that Sackleson State Community College
now has a faceless tuition policy. That's right, if you
are less than an eight, sack Wilson State is still
willing to invite you to end person classes. As we
already know, Sackleson State Community College the only community college
for good looking people. The distraction of ugliness is a
(26:38):
scourge on our educational system. But with the new faceless
semester at Sackleson State, if you are an ugly person,
you can still attend in class. If you agree to
face the wall, you get the same correct in the
same education, the same lectures. All we asked that you
do at Sackleson State is point your desk at the
wall to not distract the more intelligent scott Us Saxon
(27:01):
State Community college. You can get a four point Oh,
but not if you're a four visiting online sex state
dot com where the graduation rate. Who ship? God damn. Yeah,
that's the chemical that released in your brain. You see
an ugly person just shuts down its ship. Damn ship.
(27:22):
We turn it over now briefly to a brother who
was the author of the New York Times bestseller How
to Make Love to Your Woman on a Public Bus
and Not Misschell Stop, sold over three million copies. Hard
(27:43):
back is Mama named in Murado. We call him ride
a short ride. We're talking tennis today. He was talking
a little bit about all the US opening that brother
a couple of weeks ago was running things. Francis Tiful
m black Man, first generation immigrant from Sierra leon Rod.
(28:08):
Do you like it when they have the struggle story
about the athlete while the athlete is still being great
or does that feel a little out of pocket to you? Yeah?
I don't. I don't like that. It's uh, it's very annoying.
It's what it's It's like my top two like two
things that really bothered me in sports is these super
(28:29):
struggle stories that are like totally irrelevant to what they're
being great at and when like the announcers are like
coming up with these weird stats to make some ship
more interesting. You know, they're like, this is the first player.
He just became the first player to hit eleven consecutive
free throws in black Sox And what are you talking
about by the left foot? For me, the issue with
(28:57):
the struggle story, I think it holds war to what
third said earlier, makes perfect sense. You have there are
people watching who have to know that no matter what
situation they're in now they can overcome it. But can
we do it at the end of the match. Can
we do at the end of the tournament? Can we
do it before like before the game starts, but like
when they're in the game, actively playing the game constantly.
(29:21):
And just a reminder that gentleman you're watching used to
sleep in a fucking trash can at McDonald's and he
would eat whatever whatever food came down that trash can
at McDonald's. And his family came from Sierra Leone and
they survived on that middle bread in the big mag
that nobody likes they which is eating big mcmiddle bread.
(29:42):
And now you see him here at the tournamentful to
serve it's disrespectful, man. I just find it real disrespectful.
Like they don't tell you about they only do that
with people of color, like they I'll tell you about
the white selling that tennants who moms is in a
mental acitlement, the peel problem. Now talk about that ship
that's so fast, but they always quick to take this,
(30:06):
Oh this black person, you better believe, buddy, this is
even more amazing because yeah, both their parents died from
AIDS and had drug problems, and they were homeless till
last night and all that ship. But then on the
opposite side of that coin, that means that we people
of color and so on and so forth, we need
(30:28):
to take control of our own narratives. The only thing
you're gonna know about me is what I tell you
and what I put out there. So I just can't
do that for the turn. You can't do that during
the tennis like all those people. Everybody like that's that's
public information, so to speak. But like, I just don't
like it. You can only if you start doing that
with white people. Tell me about this white lady's brother
(30:51):
who fucking is in prison for manslaughter because he killed
his girlfriend and a drunk driving accident when he was sixteen,
talk about they never tell the stories of the Eastern
European players. Like that's why I agree with Like if
you are if you are black and you are from
the UK, you are from America, or you are from
somewhere in Africa, they find the hardest luck. Your family
(31:13):
used to sleep on straw and date elephants type story
to tell by you on the screen. But don't let
them be from like Poland and Romania or one of
those Eastern European countries where they have some horrible ship happened.
They just skip over all of that ship. It's the
subtle it's the subtle racism of lowered expectations. And somebody
(31:33):
is white enough on my heart background, nobody cares because
they they're white, so they're expected to be great, so
that's not something to overcome. But if you're black and
you got a parking ticket, they're gonna talk about that
ship forever. I agree that racism is there. I agree
that all the things are there. However, if that's not
(31:54):
the story he wants told, and we don't know what
story he wants told, or whomever, of course, go to
ESPN and tell them this is my story. Let me
tell you my story the way I want you to
share my narrative. That is not how journalism works. Those
people they were laughing, they were they were laughing. Your faith.
You're coming in, You're coming there and be like, this
(32:15):
is a story that Look, I love the fact that
you guys talked about my broke as background. But I
went to college and I had a scholarship. Yeah, here's
whats gonna happen. So we're gonna run the story we
already got. You're just going out there and keep playing
tendants saying though, and let me give you an example.
And this is some ship y'all can actually google about me.
So when I do podcasts, right, there is a difference
(32:40):
and the way the episode description of the podcast is
written when I mentioned getting arrested versus not mentioned and
getting arrested if I straight up, if I straight up
don't bring up getting arrested in a conversation, they go,
tell me how you're gotting a stand up? We know
the truth, you gotta said. I thought I was going
(33:01):
to prison. I did comedy to deal with depression until
I got sentenced, and then I got probation, and I
kept doing comedy the rest of my life. That's the truth.
But in certain conversations you can feel that ship. I
can't explain it, but you can feel it, and it's
like it's very much. So tell me about your struggle
and about everything, and sometimes and this is like, you know,
(33:24):
I'm talking five ten years ago type ship where I
would mention the arrest right and will be eloquent and
explain why and what's happened, and I am remorseful, and
then we would talk for another fifty minutes about other
ship in my life. But then it would be boiled down.
In the news article of the podcast description, Roy Wood Jr.
Talk about I'm going to prison and doing comics. That's
(33:48):
not all that I am. That's not so I just
I would just straight up not talk about it. I
just straight up would not bring it up. And I
get what j G Is saying, like, in certain instances,
to manipulate the people that you're talking about, Rod, who
literally are only gonna write what you say and only
gonna put out what you say, you just gotta straight
up not tell them ship. And if you already know
(34:08):
that about me, then motherfucker just write it. Because that
was the thing that was really they used to really
be fucked up, is j G. They wouldn't they wouldn't
know that part of my story because they've done the
research and then they would what they want me to
say it to them for they by it. So I'm
not going to verify what do you need to verify for?
I talked about getting arrested, oh three on Star Search
(34:29):
motherfucking us twenty years where they go get it. So
so in those interviews where I feel them fishing for struggle,
let's call it struggle fishing, Rod, struggle fishing, that's the term.
Talk about your damn talk about talk about what you've
overcome and struggle your comedy, understand your early days in comedy,
(34:53):
the struggle, right, and just be like, yeahs hard on
the road, let in my car, yes, yes, but what else?
What else? Struggle? Yeah? Man, everybody struggled. But I'm here
and I'm thankful. So I give what you're saying, but
thank you for that, Rod, because I just I think
(35:13):
there is a place to know where someone is overcoming.
But I'm just not sure if in the middle of
while the matches in progress, That's all I'm saying now,
while it's in prior or we bring in a struggle
comment you add a third person to the blue Rod.
This is what I propose. You add a struggle commentator,
but you let it be a brother, because a brother
delivers struggle on the upbeat, So it doesn't sound it's
(35:36):
painful to bring Tracy Mortgage in his hustle man struggle
for welcome back. We're in the third set. Tiafa was
down six too, and he's been through a lot. Uh
to tell a little bit more about his story, it's
go to struggle commentator, Tracy Morgan. Tracy, what can you
(35:56):
tell us about Francis Tiafa? Well, yes, daddy was the
janitor's a genital me snapping the motherfucker tennis and said
that's how you earned that fucking tennis. You can nothing
earn tennants sweeping around tennis. Have you seen Tracy Morgan
voice is the face you can't We bring right on
(36:23):
this program every week to give you topics to break
the ice for co workers. You can't stand co workers
in the opposite race. Rod will let you go ahead
and break it down for folks this week. A man
for your black co workers. A huge conversation raging right
now uh rapper Shad Moss, better known as bowsers Weuser's
(36:45):
better known also as Little bow Wow. He is currently
getting ready to set up on the Millennium Tour once
again and in the Gang Show, and this time features
a one thousand dollar a Little bow Wow v IP
backstage package where if you give bow Wow a thousand dollars,
(37:09):
he will give you a tour of the facilities where
they're performing, and he will let you hang out in
his quote unquote private club for about thirty to forty
five minutes, and you also get a personalized backpack and
a picture RHN to find me Chris Brown's pressure. So
why are people complaining about this? Well? You know, well
(37:33):
the well, the joke is, you know, why would anybody
pay a thousand dollars to meet and greet with bow Wow?
Because that's the same price Chris Brown has a picture
in like ten fifteen minute package four thousand dollars, and
it's just like, okay, that's Chris Brown, but this is
bow Wow. He should be willing to take twenty five
(37:53):
dollars to hang a Trihanna's ex boyfriend. He don't even
get Chris Brown like that is yeah, yeah, okay, thank
you down South charge. Yeah, but but Chris Brown is
only charging a thousand let's see, but you don't get
to hang and be around. So bow Wow is the
better value. You get a lot more. But the problem
(38:14):
is for people is that it's about wow. It's paying
a thousand dollars to hang out with Chris Brown. First
is spaying of thousand dollars to hang out with a
little bow But what if w is your Chris Brown,
then you should be. You do not need to be
in the cut. You don't, you're dangerous, dangerous society and
(38:36):
yourself die hard. You know what, no funk that. I'm
not gonna let y'all attack like this, this man said himself.
That's that's self checked. I know you don't play a
lot of basketball, but he's literally throwing the ball off
the backboard and catching it and trying to shoot a basket.
This is so you're telling me that paying a thousand
(38:58):
dollars to go backstage and hang out with Chris Rock
is the same as staying of thousand dollars to spend
two extra hours pass Chris Rock. We Willie and Tyler.
You're not gonna disrespect Willie Tyland me telling me a
(39:22):
thousand dollars Willie Tyler Lester is the same as a
thousand dollars crist disrespecting Willie Tyler, not disrespected. I respect
my hustle, I respect the talent. I'm just saying. If
you're telling me they are in the same world, then
I'll drop this old thing. If you're telling me Chris
Rock is equal to Willie Doyland, left dropping. I'll tell
(39:43):
you about what to raise the price to ten thousand
if you would tell me on the record that Willie
Tall and Lester is exactly the same Jimmy Walking. Some
ships say somebody else what I'm saying. The market decides right,
(40:08):
and the market has decided that. Some people have decided
that bow Wow is worth one thousand fucking dollars, which
is a lot of fucking What would you wait in
line for? Is there anyone you would wait in line for? Me? Personally?
Not a soul. I wouldn't wait in line to meet
Jesus fucking Christ. Okay, what about your third? First, for all,
(40:31):
I'm paying the g Second of all, I better be
seeing Chan Grier like or somebody like that. Guys that
I can't and she's the only person I can think of,
because that way I could. I got to justify the
G with my wife, so like that's the other problem.
I got to justify both of y'all. Want to meet
wait for Barack. I'll leave it at Barack. I paid.
(40:54):
I paid a G for Barack. Would you wait three hours?
Thousand dollars to me? Um? This goes back to a
question from way many episodes before Rod and I said
that I can't remember what it was, but I said,
I really want to meet Andre three thousand, but I
would look big Boy because I know big Boy would
actually show up, and three thousand maybe said I would wait.
(41:19):
I don't know if I pay a G, but I
would wait three hours to me, like like if somebody
told me standing right here and in three hours, Samuel O.
Jackson will be here and we'll have a conversation with you.
I probably the state, but Jacqueline, Oh, I would only
wait in line for food. Thousand dollars for a meal.
(41:44):
Depends on what it is now, like that Salt Bay
restaurant or Gordon Ramsey. If it's an experience, I will
pay the money for it. I will wait in line
for it. Is that white table cloth I'm going to
miss star chef. Yes, all that stuff, I'm all in
(42:06):
on that. All right, right, let's flip it up for
the people real quick. For your white co workers, we
got a motherfucking doozy right now. Uh. A country club
in Manassas, Virginia. Shout Out was forced to release an
apology for a special nine eleven themed food menu to
(42:33):
mark the twenty first anniversary of Nah. Well, I'm glad
you asked that, Ralph, because I got the list right here,
my man. Would you like some Flight ninety three redirect
that is hot crab dep with krostini You can't say
(42:57):
first responder? Yeah for the first responded flatbird jack, that's
not an experience. What about nine eleven orysters, the freedom
floundered fried? Uh yeah, they look like yeah, they said that.
(43:18):
With chipotlemolate, you get sick pentic gun pie. The remembered
teeny and the most egregious thing on this list is
a creamy crab in corn with bacon chowder called twenty
nine seventies seven chowder. For those of you who don't
know two thousand seventy seven. It's the official fatality count
(43:43):
of the attacks of book And if you don't know
which one of those things sounds the most delicious. They
do have a never forget sampler. I'm not bullshit. The
only thing that would have made it more egregious is
if all of these food items were likely dusted with
(44:06):
confection and sugar. Like this is insane, man Like, whozy?
This sounds like an idea from a comedy sketch that
you tell another comedian, you know, because when comedians talk
to each other, there's absolutely nothing off the table, And
that's what this sounds like. This sounds like a joke
(44:27):
between a couple of comedians of the group chat, and
somebody turned it into a real A fucking restaurant manager
at a fucking country club was like, we gotta mark
nine eleven. We didn't heat pin a gun passed. That is,
there's so many people to fire in this situation, Like
we're talking about this a couple of weeks ago on
the show, but like who do you fire? Here? Are
(44:49):
we firing the fired? Everybody above the kitchen is out
of here? Are we firing? Are we firing the weed
man who brought this fucking weed to the chef to
make them have this? Like everybody that's to fucking god man,
they gotta go. That's the podcast. It's Uncle Rod Story Corner.
(45:11):
I hang my head in Shane, Virginia. I hang my
head in Shane, Virginia. It's crazy to think they even
did that ship. Indeed, do you know how seriously I
mean they take down a living, real serious here in
New York. But like you know, d C nine eleven
is a is a seriously solemn ass thing. I can't
even believe somebody would do that ship. That's crazy, Rod.
(45:32):
Thank you as always. We'll get with you next week.
We're gonna do another Rod's Relationship fail. Oh yeah, I'm
talking about holiday work parties that have gone south. If
you gotta work, Mary, Chris mass Rich out to Roy's jump,
if your boss allows you to have a party, but
to say, y'all know we'll suck this up. This this
(45:52):
is another reasoner Roy to take the party from our ass,
Like just yeah, we don't have no damn party. I'm
gonna come to each to your house individually and we're
gonna celebrate. Welcome to the Grinches. Job say, job for
holiday parties is one on one, like an evaluate like working.
(46:14):
Don't give us an evaluation coming there and layout scam
of a week time. Let's get back to guests. We're
talking tennis with Michael Costo. I've always heard like, if
you're a tennis professional, like you're a tennants pro, like
(46:35):
you know, at least in the movies, it seems like
a lot of older women who are very lonely trying
to sleep with you. I'm not to ask you about
yourself out, Costa, but I'm just saying, you know, like,
have you seen tennis groupie game? Yeah? Different when you're
attendants pro because you get like, you know what I'm saying,
like millionaire white groupies, which is crazy. I'm not saying
it's aside of hustle. I'm just saying that if you
got the right tournament and you about three weeks out,
(46:57):
you can tendis. I'm not trying to call you out.
I'm asking question was not in the prep dot, cost
The best questions are never in the prep doc, right, Uh,
excellent question is an excellent question. Um, you might be
mistaking like teaching pro at a country club for a
(47:18):
playing professional. Right now, My friends that are at the
country club's teaching rich wives who are bored and they
sign up. Yes, yes, it happens. Yes, there's a reason.
It's the cliche. Um. The closest that happens in the
in the tournaments that I was playing was um. You
(47:42):
would sometimes get to a tournament and you could request housing.
You could say, Hey, I don't have the money for hotel.
Are there any families that would put me up? Um?
And you know this is tennis. These are nice houses, uh,
And so sometimes you get put up. Sometimes there's not
a lot of people in the house. Sometimes you lose
(48:04):
and maybe the you know, the mom, maybe she serving drinks.
I've heard of that happening to UM. But that's as
far as I'll take it. Really, what you're telling me
is that I have to tell a rod that he
needs to be a tennis a tennis pro and maybe
lose a couple of matches. It might work out for him.
I can see him work in that path. But I
like this, sir, I like this. I like to thank you.
(48:25):
How how does a career like this? And like, like,
is there a day like in football you are waived
and eventually no one else will sign you or invite
you back. In tennis, if everything isn't open and you
just have to win the qualifying tournament to get a
(48:48):
chance to get a chance for the bigger tournament at
walk us through that last month of playing tennis. Is
it a decision to just not get in any more
tournaments I'm tired of losing, or this is improfitable and
I'm out of cash. Walk us through the end of it,
through the end of a tennis career flour for the
average you know, tennis pro. Yeah, it's an excellent question
(49:09):
because it's not like most of us get to play
our last match on Arthur ash Stadium in front of
twenty nine thousand people on ESPN. It's this really uneventful, objective, financial, emotional.
You're kind of like I remember I got Basically what
(49:30):
happened with me was I got offered the assistant coaching
position at University of Michigan, and I just said, that's it.
I'm taking that job. I'm going from one job to
the next. And I had about four thousand dollars left also,
so that certainly helped the decision. Um, but were you
married at the time. No, I wasn't. I was living
(49:52):
with my parents and I was twenty four and uh,
you know, my last year on with with tennis as
I was all this downtime that you have waiting. I
used to write jokes and in notebooks, and essentially those
those notebooks are what turned into my first end up
comedy set. But you know, most, I guess, even in
(50:16):
minor league baseball, there is a last day or last
at bat. But in tennis, much like golf, it's you
kind of just slowly fade away. Mm hmmm. So no,
like you don't play on the underground tennis death circuit
until you know you just can't for tennis, thank you.
(50:39):
I'm saying, lots of explosions that moves at the end
of matches, so that would be sick. That's it. That'd
be a good video game, right, But yeah, there isn't
you know. And this is tennis. It's it's a pretty
affluent sport. Most players when they're done playing, they probably
got some other stuff lined up. You know. It's not
(51:02):
it's not as dramatic or sad as to some of
the other sports where like, holy sh it, I've been
the defensive lineman my whole life. I'm now injured bringing Yeah, yeah, exactly.
It's not in your racket turning your balls. What what
are some interesting scams that you've seen run at various businesses.
(51:24):
I don't imagine you two have been much of a
scammer yourself, because you went from coaching straight into stand
up comedy. You know, comedy itself is a scammy business. Television.
I played a comedy club in the Midwest, still in business,
so I will refrain their name. Small, intimate, wonderful venue.
(51:45):
I was there Saturday. I see this giant U haul
pull up and the entire staff is taking the chairs
and the tables from the showroom and loading them into
the U haul, and the U haul has parked in
the back with the flashers on. So I go in
there and I'm going, what's up, And they're going, we're
(52:06):
getting our fire inspection and we need to be at
this number. But you know, we see four times that
obviously in the showroom. So they periodically rent a U
haul and put all the stuff in a a U
haul on the corner with the flashers on and wait
for the fire commissioner to leave. And I was like,
(52:26):
that is something that is some intelligence. And they supposedly
they pay. Supposedly they pay the commissioner. So he says
to them, I'm coming in now. So then they got
two hours to go rent the truck and do this
whole thing. Good business, that's good, that's good business. When
you're in with the commissioner. I don't care. That's good business.
That that's that's the way you should do it. That's
the way it works. I'm sorry. I respect them, I
(52:48):
respect him. I'm not necessarily saying Cody and most most,
but I'm just saying it's that's pretty damn closed you're
in with the commissioner. I love it like business until
there's a fucking fire route. Well, I mean, you know,
price of doing business. What are you both talking about?
What are you talking? I want my bonus? Pack them
in God damn it. I don't give a ship. Put
(53:09):
fifty chairs in there. See that's what happened. Both of
YouTube are famous to do things for causes and to
look at the money and just be like, oh it's cool. Me.
I'm still the mother coming fire, burning place out, somebody
trying to pee ons. I want the jokes. I want
to cash. After the break, we'll bring it home with
the homie Michael Costra and wrap up a little bit
of tennis talk. It's a job, fair, job fair round
(53:39):
and third headed for Home. Now I want to talk
about the two podcasts that you are working on, Costra.
But first, j G, what was your question. I was
just gonna say, today impacts tomorrow. What are you doing
today to make your world, your spear, your neighborhood, your
area a better place? Oh? Man, I hate this question.
(54:00):
Who else has asked you this question? The philanthropy question
was that that? Also, I can see there's good in
those eyes. You have kind eyes. So I'm wondering, what
are you doing to make the world a better place,
or even if it's just your neighborhood or your sphere
of influence? Yeah, I mean the reason I hate this
(54:23):
question is I never feel that I'm doing enough. I
have decided that raising a daughter than you're doing more
than enough. You're raising to So I tried. I tried
very hard. We need to do anything else, like just
keep off the pole. I guess, so, I guess, So, okay,
(54:46):
it's all right. Uh. You know in my neighborhood there's
some trash pick up Costa. Costa bought one of those
things that picks up the trash. Yeah, you know that
goes around my neighbor My neighbors laugh, at me because
I put the mask and the gloves on and I
go pick it up. I'm still contused why I visit
(55:09):
other cities around the world and no one has the
trash like New York City. But um, but that'll be
my answer. But I'll also take your question as a
as a slight nudge for me to to reconsider ways
I can do more. Let me let me say one
thing to that costume. And this is something that I
think a lot of people don't know about what we
(55:30):
do with the Daily Show. But you know a lot
of what we pitch at the show comes from the correspondence.
So we are in a lot of ways the arbiters
of where the camera gets pointed and what issue gets
you know, I am not And I found this out
when I went back to Birmingham during George Floyd to
(55:51):
help clean up after you know some you know riding
and you know folks tearing up ship. But I will
probably never have the availa ability to be the person
that's the boots on the ground to lead the charge
about the thing. But what I can do is to
be the support system to bring attention to the issue
or bring money to the issue, which then helps to
solve the issue. So for me, it's always been about
(56:16):
trying my best to make sure that I'm trying to
create conversations around issues that a lot of people don't
give a funk about. Because the Daily Show, just by volume,
we get to cover more ship than any of the
show because we're on four nights a week, so we
you know, we just have more run way. So I
would I would say you care a lot more than you.
(56:38):
Probably hear something about Costa j G. And he's probably
not giving himself credit for it. He just straight up
took on the role of water dude at the show.
This motherfucker. Like the way I'm like always like, oh,
let me find another race story. Costas like, Hey, the
waters fucked up. You gotta fix the fucking so heat
(57:00):
time and time again. Has you know, spearhaited so many
stories that are about the environment, And when you look
at what's going down right now in Jackson there, you
best believe that that type of ship has already been pitched.
Mother motherfucker. You're looking at it there it is. Oh yeah,
I mean I I yeah. The more I've dug into
(57:22):
water quality, we call ourselves USA or Number one motherfucker. Jacksonville, Mississippi,
would have had a boilier water the last three months.
I mean, Flinn still isn't figured out. It's like, wait,
we don't we don't have our we don't have clean
drinking water for our citizens. So oh and you want
(57:44):
them to be more politically active or more registered to vote,
they can't. They would have drinking water. So yeah, Roy,
thank you, thank you for thank you for mentioning that.
But that when we're in the ship, we don't even
really it's what we're doing in the worth and just
how unique and how powerful it is in the moment.
(58:04):
And also J. G. Costas the person when we were
looking at the red algae and green algae plumes that
are polluting um the water systems in Florida. Yeah, Costa
wanted to get on a boat and ride through the
algae so we could see the fucking close, which we did,
and we both almost went fucking blind because it's in
(58:27):
the air, like whatever toxin is in that water that
it's in you, it's in the air's fucking with your eyes,
all types of shoot. But you know, it was a
good story. Free tripped Miami. Okay, I'm curious about something
totally different. Who put your head on this tennis ball? What?
What coop in my head? What ball? Oh? The logo
this tennis ball. As it relates to your podcast, I'm
(58:50):
looking at a picture that has your head on that.
It was a graphic designer. Friend, But you're not happy
with that. You can have whatever you want, but tell
us about the podcast. Thank you there. I have my
own personal podcast called Tennis Anyone with Michael Costa, and
(59:13):
we talked tennis, we talk everything, but uh, and then
I also have to promote a wonderful podcast I was
a part of called Choosing Sides f one with Sports Illustrated,
where I don't know anything about Formula one racing but
um with a journalist named Lily Herman. I was presented
every team and every driver and at the end of
(59:35):
the season, I pick my team and my driver and
I learned so much about Formula one and it's available
wherever you listen to podcasts. But really really fun. That's
a crazy sport that makes me think a Ricky Bobby.
Now in the movie. In the movie, there's a Formula
one racer. Thank you. You know you're Ricky Bobby, Ricky
(59:59):
Bubb Yes, I've enjoyed watching F one the last couple
of years. I'll be lying if I said the Netflix
series F one Drive to Survive did not. It helped
me understand the stakes and the strategy of the sport
(01:00:20):
in a way that video games did not. For the
most part, I learned sports by playing the video game
version of it, and then that gets me interested in
the real life version of it. Like I've reversed engineering
my way to soccer with that. With that, like that's
that's just how otherwise I was never going to learn
about that. Nascar is a little bit more simplistic in circle, circle, circle,
(01:00:44):
and there's strategy to it, but it's not to the degree, uh,
you know, a Formula one. So with this podcast, I
think what's dope about it is that you're able. What
you represent in that is the person who doesn't necessarily understand,
you know, I don't know, and I didn't know anything
about at one. I didn't. They told me not to
watch Drive to Survive. And what I what I learned
(01:01:05):
in the podcast is it's always interesting to learn this stuff.
Formula one was very against Drive to Survive. They were
really reluctant at first. They liked their fan base. They
didn't want new people. It is a wealthy, old white
dude sport and and they were convinced to give this
(01:01:26):
a shot. And man, has it exploded the sport grown
the sport and uh punch, A bunch of people are
watching the sport that never did before. That's only good
for their business. Yeah, well, we thank you so much
for coming on. Brother. I don't want to hold you up.
I know you got a two year old somewhere in
that house that you have to tend to that. I'm
sure somewhere somewhere, I mean just just so you see,
(01:01:53):
like like I'm recording, but there there's like a bouncy house, right. Yeah, well,
thank you so much for coming over there. Um, I
love you and I'll see you back in the office
at some point. Man. Thanks roy You're the man. That's
the show. Royce John fare as a product of I
(01:02:14):
Heart Media, Comedy Central and South Park and Princeton Productions.
We did it. Um. I did think of one more
person for a thousand dollars that I am. I hank
I would want to talk to m Michelle Obama. Obama's
(01:02:37):
win every time Michelle Obama number I think because I
think women women. You said he got the husband number.
J G. Absolutely, you could save me a thousand dollars.
All the time you asked me, I told you you
could see me a thousand dollars. I don't know Obama
(01:02:58):
both the thousand dollars? Are you pad a thousand dollars?
We're about to say you to see somebody who's gonna
invite you to a barbecue, because I feel like at
the end of talking to Michelle Obama, she'd give me
my money back. She was like, Hey, that I just
wanted to. I feel like that's the one, all right.
Next week, Rod's Relationship Fair returns the dangers of work parties.
(01:03:24):
Don't you go to these work parties you get the drinking.
You know later somebody gonna get the m sex. So
give us a call reach out to the show, Royce
job Fair at gmail dot com. If you got want
to add to the show, that's it. We'll do it
again next week. This has been a Comedy Central podcast.
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