This Was SportsCenter: Chris Fowler - Season 1, Ep. 5

25:05Rich Eisen:no it when i first got there it was set up like a um like a nasa mission control setup where there was one you know uh one row of like five six computers and then another one behind it and another one behind it and another one behind it all looking at this bank of televisions that we could all watch sports tv on while we were working on sports center that was it and i'll never forget sitting there again i'm 26 years old and i'm seeing everybody that i just spent all this time in college wanting to be you know colleagues with um and i just seeing them all there and i was totally jarred by the experience and i just remembered thinking to myself i've got to work my ass off here that in the same way that you realize you were like this is big league time now like i realized that there were some serious lead pipe professionals here that i better show that i belong this was sports center is presented by gusto right now everyone is trying to run leaner Tighter budgets, smaller teams, higher expectations.

26:15Rich Eisen:The last thing you have time to waste on is manual payroll or chasing down an HR form. Gusto is how small business owners get time back when every hour counts. Gusto is online payroll and benefit software built for small businesses. It's all-in-one, remote-friendly, and incredibly easy to use. So you can pay, hire, onboard, and support your team from anywhere. Automatic payroll tax filing, simple direct deposits, health benefits, commuter benefits, workers' comp, 401k, you name it, Gusto makes it simple and has options for nearly every budget. And it's all built to save you time with built-in automated tools for offer letters, onboarding docs, direct deposit, and more.

26:53Rich Eisen:Plus, you get unlimited payroll runs for one monthly price. No hidden fees, no surprises. Try Gusto today at gusto.com slash twsc and get three months free when you run your first payroll. That's three months of free payroll at gusto.com slash twsc one more time gusto.com slash twsc yeah and and you are not around like i don't think i met you until like an espies two years after i arrived because you were in a totally different you were already gone from sports centers rotation like so how long were you on in the sports center rotation just like a year or two years to be so disappointed that i couldn't right that i don't recall this the years and all that kind of stuff he knows that he did i think one of my last sports centers was with him and he remembers that I don't remember that or one of his last ones because we we we uh did overlap in that he is by far the strongest MVP candidate in the National League the MVP candidates from both leagues right now relaxed mingling in Pittsburgh for some of the pomp and circumstance of the all-star fest that's right tonight the big all-star gala or is it gala whatever I want to get Chris Meyer's opinion on that we'll send you right now to a preview Pittsburgh.

28:00No, it would have been around 89, 90, 91, into the early 90s, and I sort of moved out of the nutmeg state, as I like to call it. I prefer Constitution State. I like the nutmeg state for Connecticut. About 94. But I did, Rich, I did every sports center imaginable. I was the utility guy on the schedule. Chris Fowler along with Chris Myers. We hope you're in the mood for scores and highlights and information. We are. Some interesting comments from Mike Tyson and also from fighters, not behind bars, Holyfield, Holmes, and Foreman. But first, the fight to break par at Pebble Beach, day one. You know, you would wait for that monthly email schedule from a woman called Julie, no last name.

28:44Julie. It's Julie Paradise. It's okay. It's all right. I thought she was in charge of it. She was in charge. I'm not blaming her for my assignments, but you would wait for that email to come out, and then it would be like your grades are posted on the wall. Yeah, I remember that. You go up, did I pass? What do I got this month? Yeah, who am I on SportsCenter with? What hour SportsCenters do I have? Were they responsive to my suggestions slash bitching and moaning? Was there any alteration made since last month?

29:13Rich Eisen:Right, and it would come out sometimes the day the month started. So you're like, I want to plan out March, and it's like February 28th, and you're like, when's that schedule? I don't even know how if you had like a family, how you could coordinate schedules. The thing would hit and it would be, and I would do, and I'm proud of this actually, because it shows that you can work sleep deprived and we're crazy schedules. I did within a week, one of the six o 'clock sports centers, I think it was 1130, before they went to 11, it was 1130. I did a 2.30 a.m., the overnight show. And I did a weekend morning sports center because eventually I did Sunday Sports Day when Robin Roberts sort of moved out of that.

29:59And I worked with Dick Schaap and Frank DeFord and Lupica. They were in New York. I was in Bristol. It was kind of like a two-headed monster show. Sports reporters. Right. And they kind of blended with them. But I would do two ways with Schaap, which was a thrill. I mean, to be able to overlap some of these true, like, OG TV giants was a cool thing. I mean, not on SportsCenter, but, like, Jim McKay, Jack Whitaker covering thoroughbred racing. I get to work with them. And guys like, you know, Schaap was just so cool to be able to think that I work with the Schaap. And so I did that in one week, which is pretty cool.

30:35I mean, not ideal. Different producers, different, you know, co-anchors, different types of shows. Right. Right. So you just adapt to it. But I did that for a few years where outside of football season and basketball season, kind of to fill in the other dates that I was required to work, I would do all these various shows and, and, uh, you know, and it is a good learning experience, but, but it was also, uh, I was sort of like biding my time.

31:04Rich Eisen:Yeah. Like, what are you doing here? Right. Like, what is your goal? Like, what is, what, how do, how does management view me in terms of a role here. And in that schedule that would come out at any time, it would sometimes be a week in advance of the month, which was glorious, or the last possible second. And I would scour it to know when am I working, what hours am I working, what shows am I working, and with whom am I working. That schedule is how Stuart and I learned we were a team. Hi again, SportsCenter about to flow. Your official team. rich eisen in the house with stewart stack because we would just open the schedule and i'd be like okay 2 a.m show 2 a.m show 2 a.m show 2 a.m show in straight line like not like a day off in between just flat out i'm a 2 a.m sports center anchor and then i'd be like who am i doing a clock pacific time 11 o 'clock pacific that's correct 2 a.m eastern yes and i would i would then scroll down to see who am I doing the show with?

32:05Rich Eisen:And it would be Stuart having the same 2 a.m. line across. And at some point, we just turned to each other and we're like, are we a team? We've got very high standards. Stringly. Because no one sat us down. But no one put you together because, you know, this Eisen guy and this Scott guy, this would be a great Miami Vice, like, let's put them together. Yeah. It was just, you had no other, like, home earlier in the evening, right? so you guys became joined. If I, you know, the unintended consequence of doing this show, if it's at any point in time, I could learn who decided Stuart and I are together.

32:45Rich Eisen:I would love to know. I, to this day, do not know who was the executive to go, this is fun, this is like two guys, you know, with different sensibilities and different upbringings and different ideas being mashed together, and it's working. We begin with two snaps up and two good teams. I feel like this is the opening of the Addams Family instead of SportsCenter. Either the Addams Family or in living color, men on SportsCenter. Oh, we got that straight away. To this day, I have no idea who did it. All I know is that it was on the schedule. Or did they do it? Was it intentional? It had to have been at some point that they had to be like, it's you and Stuart.

33:20These two guys are really good together. I guess. But I don't know if they would have known that ahead of time.

33:24Rich Eisen:We would look at it one time. I don't know when it was. It's just as a memory of mine that Stuart looked at me in a commercial break, goes, Hey, man, are we your team? because we keep doing this show together that actually happened and and the schedule is the one that would inform us nobody would call us into an office and say you and stewart are a team you are you're congratulations i had no team ever happened i envy that they say that part of the sports center thing which made it challenging was i was not teamed with anybody as a utility guy you're going to come in yeah so i but i did get to work with berman i did get to work with keith I got to work with Lee.

33:59Dan. Dan. Or not really. A little bit less. So I think maybe he was kind of, he had, I did shows with him, but it was never like a regular thing. I might have filled in one night or something.

34:09Rich Eisen:So was there, like, who did you do SportsCenter with the most? There had to be somebody, you know? I mean, like Bill Patrick. Okay. Carolyn Burns. I remember. Well, good evening, everybody, and welcome to this edition of SportsCenter. I'm Carolyn Burns along with Chris Fowler. And you know what, Chris? It's the first time in 33 years that it has been a cosmopolitan World Series. Finally, it gets underway. Yeah, the longest layoff between the playoffs and the World Series ever. And afterwards, the Giants said that might have affected him a little bit flat. You had to wonder. Of course, it had to do something with the way Dave Stewart was pitching, too.

34:40There were sort of different folks that would kind of get gravitated in the overnight. But it was interesting because you didn't really have a chance to develop real chemistry or a sense of rhythm or what this person is like. you're just together i mean there was a i'll tell one story please i don't know if i should name oh come on who it was you're this is your 40 for you chris everyone knows you're

35:06Rich Eisen:although is jennifer your wife screaming at home right now no like saying don't say no but okay it was carolyn burns i'll just say she and she by the way after this episode went on and have had a really nice career and did other things but uh no i didn't know her well and so we're sitting there and caroline i'm sorry to tell you if this is embarrassing but she had kind of a panic attack which happens you know and and we've all had wasn't the only person that that at all many it happened to many people i'm sure i felt those emotions but it didn't manifest she really couldn't she she took her stack of scripts and shoved them yes my way so now i had my stack and her stack right before we went on it literally counting down and i just kind of went gonna be good gonna be fine just push the stack back over and we she started and when once she got some air in the lungs and we got through the show yeah but those kinds of things that had wow you just don't know sure the vibe of who you're working with i was gonna go maybe she was nervous because she was working with me who's this kid right and that that was that could have been the reason why she He was hyperventilating.

36:19But no, so that was – but then you were with Berman. The next night you could be with Berman and had some very memorable sports centers. Yeah. Where it's sitting next to him. And you said you watched Oberman work. And that was eye-opening and humbling in a way. To watch Berman work, completely different MO, obviously. Two of them met on the famed Pac-A floor of the Baston Gadden. Michael Jordan and the Red Hot Chicago Bulls winners of seven in a row strode into Boston to meet the Celtics. and a man called Bird, Larry Bird. This just in. Both put on a big-time show. Why are we not surprised? What do you got for me on that?

36:53Chaos just whirls into the sea. He comes in there and is always, like, just in the nick of time.

37:00Rich Eisen:By the way, that's all I've heard in this series for years, that you can count down 30 seconds to go and he's still talking to people behind the camera. What's up? How you been? And then you whirl in. And he sits right down. Which by the way, being late was, I had dreams about that. Like recurring nightmares. I don't remember my dreams. Yeah, yeah. I just don't. But I remember this dream that kept happening where I was late for a sports center. I still have them, by the way. God bless you. I swear to God. You still have that dream? I swear to God, I am trying to get from one building to the next.

37:39Rich Eisen:And I'm late for that sports center. I have those dreams. I swear to you. I'm told that's just a metaphor for anything you don't feel you're ready for, prepare for. So I, I'm like losing track of time. I'm in that bathroom that gets featured in some of the sports center commercial. We put our makeup on that upstairs bathroom. Yeah. It was like one staircase away from the actual studio. So that was the last minute kind of thing. I didn't know what I'm doing. Cause you were doing your own makeup. Yes. We did our own makeup. Back in that. Yes. And I didn't know what I was doing. Kept it simple, but you know, yes.

38:11So my recurring dream was I was stumbling around trying to get – and the show's already in the air and I turn up and I'm late. Well, Berman knew how to walk that line and that tightrope. And he got there at the last minute. But then scripts, more or less a pile but kind of not. Yeah. Shot sheets. Wire copy. AP wire stories about like the Mariners-Red Sox games over here. so he could, like, when it came time to talk over the score panel, would, like, pull up a thing and, like, get something out of that. Yeah. It was chaos on the desk. And I remember thinking, how can he do the kind of brilliant sports center he's doing out of that chaos?

38:55Michael Chang defeats Stefan Edberg. 6-1, 3-6, 4-6, 6-4, 6-2. And, oh, by the way, he's the first American to win in 34 years the men's title. Tony Trabert, of course, did that back in 1955. Michael Chang,$291 ,000 plus richer. We all have our own methods, I guess is my point, but I was just mesmerized by his ability to bring order from that chaos.

39:21Rich Eisen:In advance of recording a version of this show live at the Super Bowl with him in San Francisco, I had the ESPN people look up when I did sports centers with him because he would frequently just parachute back in for one week's worth of sports centers when I was there from 96 to 03. And I just remember doing a couple of sports centers with him and it was in 2001 and they cut a couple of the clips and watching it back, I could just, it refreshed my memory of how I was just out of body when the show started, even though it's five years into my sports center tenure had to have been close to four figures of shows under my belt at that point in time right and just out of body that he's the one i'm now doing this show with the guy yeah who i had spent in college watching the most doing everything and now it's me in that chair and him just starting the hi hello as we would always script it you know like hi welcome to sports center and i just he was just riffing and i didn't know when to get in how to react i was just watching it back now as a grown-ass 56 year old man i did i did or are you okay and i was it just it hit me i'm like i'm like i am i am watching uh you know somebody in their early 30s early on in a career just blown away like i was out of it you know and here i am watching it back and i'm like i i don't blame me for like you could see i didn't know how to get in i was trying to follow up on it you know i made a burman nickname joke that i didn't know if it landed or not the lone goal scored by vladimir this is or sog this is your search I don't know.

41:19Rich Eisen:I'm just, John, Vladimir is a big fan of him. I'm trying to do something here. That's risky. You had the cojones. I know. My most memorable sports center was with Chris. And easily, not just because I was with him, but because it was a very unusual sports center where we had to report on Hank Gathers' collapse on a basketball court for Loyola Marymount. No way. It was on the day that happened. Yeah, the day that happened. Tonight in Los Angeles, a story that transcends all merriment that is usually the world of sports. Hank Gathers, senior from Loyola Marymount, the 11th leading all-time scorer in NCAA history, led the NCAA in scoring last year, led the NCAA in rebounding last year, collapsed during the first half of his LMU's WCC quarterfinal game in Los Angeles against Portland.

42:07At 6.55 West Coast time, he was pronounced dead at Daniel Freeman Marina Hospital, about an hour and 20 minutes after his collapse. And it was, you know, he's out here in L.A. playing the conference tournament. Sure. And I had been doing the hoop wraps, and I had been out to do a feature. Paul Westhead was a coach at the time. Bo Kimble, Hank Gathers, both, you know, Hank was a future NBA guy. And he had had this heart problem, and he was taking medication for it. And the feature was about this whole thing and this team, which didn't play defense up and down the court, let the team score. Paul Westhead style.

42:46and it had come up that Hank was struggling to play at his regular level with the medication he was on and wished he would be less of that, a less heavy dose. So I, I, and I had just, this is maybe a month before I felt like maybe within a month of, of, of his death. And so this happens. I was just there doing SportsCenter, and I find myself speaking firsthand about the interview I'd done and my impressions of him and the team. And there's Chris and I doing the SportsCenter. You had a chance to get to know him a little bit. You went out to Los Angeles recently. He's a different guy, wasn't he?

43:36Tremendous guy, very likable guy, wanted to be a sportscaster, is very involved in internships and student television, radio programs, and Loyola Marymount, extremely popular with his teammates. And I'll tell you, when I spoke with him last month, he was very concerned about his medication. Doctors had him on heavy doses of medication after that first collapse in December, and he was very sluggish. He couldn't play basketball, and that troubled him more than anything. Chris Myers was out here in L.A. reporting on it. So we had a lot of Chris's, and it was an out-of-body experience. It was because it was forget the prompter wasn't wasn't like a regular sports that we were covering this and Chris was doing great reporting and I Was Chris was talking to me about What I knew of the story was able to convince the doctors to slowly back away on the amount of medication He was taking and as the medication was taken off It became more and more effective on the basketball core and became more and more the old Hank that his teammates Remember all of them to a man said it wasn't the same Hank after his first collapse and after the amount of medication he was taking.

44:33But apparently the medication after being removed was not enough to stop the second collapse on the court. That ended up being the SportsCenter episode that was submitted on the Emmy reel and it won an Emmy. No kidding. The SportsCenter won an Emmy. I think I was told this. I don't know. That process I know nothing about. But I think, yes, that's what they told me. And I got a statue. But yeah, that was an incredibly memorable thing. And to have, to be able to sit there with the great Chris Berman and be able to offer something and be able to speak off the cuff about this story, which was suddenly the only story that mattered that night, was pretty cool.

45:14Dude, I did not know that. In a tragic circumstance.

45:18Rich Eisen:Of course I know that, but at least you're, for a fan sitting at home, mourning immediately in the shock of it all, for you able to try and make some sort of sense knowing what you're talking about. No, it's the outlier shows. I mean, maybe this isn't true for you, but it's the outlier shows that you remember more, the things that were dramatic. It wasn't, hey, what a great Celtics-Laker game. The highlight was wonderful that night. It's the other things that happened. I was a huge Formula One fan. uh and back in the day the glory days the early f1 days of the mclaren team you know erin senna land prost and those guys and and um i was doing the the morning sports center on a weekend um you know they the f1 races are on on sundays and he crashed in the race in italy and and to have to come on there and report that um because the race was going on basically when the show was going on right and you know and and um to report that he had crashed into the wall and then he was being taken to the hospital and then the show was long enough that i i did have to go back and report that the worst news possible the news from italy this morning is indeed tragic three-time world driving champion aerton senna has now been confirmed dead by officials at the hospital following a violent collision during the san marino grand prix this morning senna dying of massive head injuries he suffered suffered multiple skull fractures a full-speed collision with the wall and he was one of the more like i don't know if heroics the word but i one of the most admired sports people for me at the time and so he the fact that he had had died in a crash was that that i'll never forget that i still get chills about it that that's an unusual show but those are the ones i tend to remember the ones that were unusual sure and obviously you know again in in in this show um this pod series that we're you know appreciate you taking part in here obviously the pop culture um touchstones that sports center um created um and also um embodied as a as an entity along with the the anchors who did it and the producers behind the scenes and all that um is one thing but the journalistic aspect of that show on top of it i mean it was basically sometimes a news magazine and at times were serious breaking news that you had to take part in you know yeah no that was the that was the aberration but those are the ones I just kind of remember because a Aaron Senna was was something to me that meant a lot to me and to be the one that probably more than anyone else because who else was on the air reporting live stuff on a Sunday morning um that he had died um you know I still think about that this was Sports Center is presented by Gusto.

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48:49Rich Eisen:Plus, don't pay a cent until you run your first payroll and get direct access to certified HR experts to help support you through any tough HR situation. There's a reason Gusto is ranked number one on G2's highest satisfaction products list for 2026 and trusted by over 400 ,000 small businesses. Try Gusto today at gusto.com slash TWSC and get three months free when you run your first payroll. That's three months of free payroll at gusto.com slash TWSC. One more time, gusto.com slash TWSC. So you started doing college game day around the country and that took you off SportsCenter. When was the last time you did a SportsCenter?

49:33Tariqo knows the answer. I should text him. I don't remember, actually. It would have been about 93, 94. I don't know what his first year was at the company, but he overlapped a little bit.

49:43Rich Eisen:Well, Tariko might answer, but he's probably calling a game right now. You know? Yeah, he's somewhere between the NBA. Santa Clara and Cortina. Exactly, I know. It's amazing what he has done with his career and obviously what you've done with yours. What you're doing now, what you're doing now, is this what you envisioned, what you wanted to do? when you first started? I mean, not specifically the sports I'm doing, but documenting live sports. Yes. And if you're lucky enough, championship moments in those sports. So my two favorite sports happened to be college football and tennis. Unlikely combo.

50:24And it wasn't an accident. I mean, I sort of navigated that way. And as we got more and more tennis, bigger and bigger events, I was able to convince them that that was worth them putting me on. Yeah. Taking me off other things that were considered more higher profile, like college basketball, et cetera. Right. In the spring, right? So, but yeah, I always wanted to do, it was the sound of a crowd through a radio that my grandmother had in her backyard in Rockford, Illinois, listening to Cubs games on the radio and scoring every game in a book that got me interested in this in the first place, of getting dropped off my grandparents' house, listening to games, watching the first Super Bowls.

51:09I have memories. Some of the first things I watched were the first Super Bowls with a bowl of M &Ms on the table. My brother and I, my parents were not into sports, didn't have any, they were never on in our house, the Olympics maybe.

51:25But learning from her the joy of sports and the sound of a cheering crowd out of a TV or a radio, that's what drew me to it like this is they're joyful they're really joyful for the same reason at the same time in a group of people what that's how cool and that that was what it was so you don't get that really in a studio environment you get it from documenting live sports and that's what I always kind of wanted to do and it took a while to sort of get there um game day was a like a beautiful detour um well also being live there yeah that was in front of a live audience so It almost felt like you were, once the show went on the road, like you were documenting a live event.

52:09We were the event, but it was capturing in front of a live crowd the energy of a game, kind of.

52:17Rich Eisen:When did you know that show had hit? When did you know College Game Day was becoming as iconic as anything that ESPN has put together? It was a slow burn. I mean, the first few years I did it, we're in the studio, again, you know, not leading into big games. The numbers weren't very good. I think they were going to keep the show around, but I'm not sure they were super convinced that anything would come of it. When we got in the road, Rich, I mean, 1993 in November, the Florida State-Notre Dame one versus two game, we finally convinced them to do it, take it on the road in the regular season. We are just across the street from Notre Dame Stadium at the Ed Joyce Center, live for a special college game day and surrounded by all kinds of memorabilia, a reminder of the great tradition of this Notre Dame program.

53:04And today's game, just the latest chapter in that great history. They said it was going to cost$50 ,000 to do it, which was apparently a lot of money to them. It's laughable now. Right. In 1993. But, yeah, so that was kind of like a huge lightning bolt moment. We knew that, hey, this is really what we need to do. We need to get this show on a campus, showcase what's great about college football. That was a moment, an event that cut across the sports landscape, that one versus two games, South versus North, Holtz versus Bowden, all the ingredients. Sure. Chris Bowler along with the coach, Lee Corso, the pony, Craig James, and about 2 ,000 Irish and Seminole fans.

53:46They have been yelling. They are revved up. These guys are definitely revved up. Only in college football can you have a regular season event of this magnitude because other sports settle things with the playoff, and it's much more special, of course, to have it on a college campus. We didn't know what we were doing. We dropped the set in the Hall of Fame, indoors, and put like a rope around it and wore lavalier mics, which gave us little chance to be heard over the crowd if they made any noise. I like a blocked punt by Florida State.

54:15Rich Eisen:I'll take Florida State. 31-30! Yay! Hey! Hey! Hey! I think Notre Dame 31-30! So the fans were inside? Inside. When was the first time that people just started showing up on their own because you were there and it's like, okay. Yeah, that day they kind of showed up. Let me see the trophies. What the hell was going on over there? No one knew what we were doing. Right. They just showed up because that was where the pep rally was in the same building the night before, which we covered. And then the Saturday morning, people would wander around. And this was November, so probably staying out of the cold.

54:55And then before they went into the game. No, in 94, 95, we started to take it on the road more and more. And then it became something that, okay, now this is, this is, now we're now in a different weight class.

55:08Rich Eisen:I was wondering, like, was there a campus or a moment where you and whoever else was doing the show with you with regularity at the time looked out during a commercial break over your shoulder going, holy shit, that's a lot of people that are here and that you know the next week they now want to top it, that you now got in the zeitgeist of the campus where the fans were like, oh, so they showed up like that? Wait till we show up like this. That was fun. That was a fun era because they did want to top. They wanted to break the record. It was like nobody ever had a true head count, But they wanted to break the record.

55:49Right. No, it hit me in Lincoln, Nebraska. You can tell the alarm clock went off mighty early all over the state of Nebraska. They say great teams have to rise to the occasion. Both of these teams have had to rise pretty early. They've been up since 6 o 'clock in the morning for this early kickoff. Some of them have been up most of the night. There was an October game near Halloween. Nebraska beat Colorado, which is my alma mater, and ripped the goalposts down. Okay. and took them out the stadium and walked them through the crowd. This was like a post-game show we had done. So we did the morning show, but then the post-game show, when the stadium would let out, we'd be in the same spot.

56:28And that would be even more energy. Of course. When the home team won. Yes. So I see a goalpost with like a jagged metal end, like being brought through this crowd of like Cornhusker fans. and I'm thinking like, we better get, we better get this thing away. Somebody's going to get killed. Sure. So we, we let them bring it and they laid it on the desk. Get out of here. They put the goalposts across the desk, like a trophy. You know, it was like a, like a tusk of a woolly mammoth that they had slain. Right. And they dropped the bar on it and, and had a, they were going crazy, you know? And so we realized, like, okay, this energy of this sport, which I think is the best-suited sport for an on-site pregame show.

57:16It's been tried, obviously, every other sport now. But we thought, this is pretty cool. And then it was Virginia Tech, Frank Beamer, you know, figuring out this is an infomercial for our program. They may have broken our college game day attendance record set last year at Kansas State. Frank Beamer has one caution. Pace yourself. Save it for tonight at 6 o 'clock to kickoff. This is an opportunity that we're not going to let go. We're going to get every student out there for the pregame show, and we're going to fill up Lane Stadium, and we're going to make it obvious that Virginia Tech was the coolest place to be on a Saturday morning.

57:56And the smart coaches sort of figured out how to use this and not be inconvenienced by the pain in the ass that it was to have a show, you know taking up your your parking lot or your quad you know at the time it was it was so new and it was a nuisance these colleges didn't really want to play ball that's the way the combine was

58:15Rich Eisen:for nfl network at the start yeah yeah it's just like what are you doing here what are we doing here until they realize more and more players and more and more athletes are going to start running the 40 because they can be running on so so behold exposure is kind of good as it turns out As Berman would say, this just did. Yes, correct. And so, you know, so coaches began to utilize your platform and the cameras that your show was bringing as a way to say, look at what we've built here as a program. Win-win. I would think, right? Yeah, no, and it got that way. And it was fun. And I think that at that point, there was a real momentum.

58:51We were on this show on the road every week with the show. Right. Beginning about 96, that's the year Herb Street came on this show. Kirk was there. His first year was 96. And so it definitely mushroomed from there. And then, you know, I think the the challenge became how do you, if not top it, make sure every week is unique and it's not just a bunch of screaming kids who are hung over or sleep deprived. But we try to capture like what's cool about LSU, Oregon, Ohio State. You know, we we we wanted to make sure it looked and felt different depending on where we were.

59:28Rich Eisen:Well, I mean, it's become as iconic a show as there is, including, you know, the show that this pod's all about with SportsCenter. Would you want to do another SportsCenter again? Yeah, it's an interesting question. You know, I mean, I'm up for anything, but like, you know, do I have to read a teleprompter? Because I haven't read one since I left. I don't use a teleprompter for anything. So the hardest thing is like, is, I think you could pick it up. I probably, I probably could. I think you'd be able to pick it up. Okay, to the ballparks now. Now a June night with an October feel to it. Big hype.

59:58First place Cincinnati, winners of six straight. Second place Atlanta, riding a seven-game streak. It could be the beginning of a beautiful pennant race for you Casablanca fans. If you write it yourself, it's easier to use that.

1:00:10Rich Eisen:I mean, just to go back one more time. You know what I mean? Just go back one more time. But they have a SportsCenter version now where it's a casual show and they're like sitting on a couch. Sure. I mean, it's different versions of it. Obviously, you know, what Scott's doing now is as close to the old school. as there is or right or any of the you know the overnight shows or the 2 a.m shows like that there it's still it's still you know similar the just doing it the one time i did it last august yeah was just well for me it's different because it had been 20 something years and i'd you know you've had 40 continuous years i'm like the glorious run though you i'm like a grover cleveland here i'm in my second uh administration felt like when you were doing it right i mean that you were That was something amazing.

1:00:52It was. There's nothing like it. That's what you wanted to do. And that's why I don't want to sound at all ungrateful because I'm not. But it wasn't the ultimate thing for me. It was sort of like a huge step up. Yes. A serious challenge. Yes. A lot of fun. Like I said, I worked with a lot of different people. At night's end, we were down to just eight in the NCAA tournament. We're going to start in the West region, the hardest region to figure out. You know, two months ago, Temple was about six light years away from being a team capable of making the Final Four. I never had the continuity that you would get from being a regular guy doing it.

1:01:26But I also, I knew that I wanted to be part of live shows, live sports broadcast.

1:01:32Rich Eisen:I'm with you. Because, again, the show that I did the most would never be done anymore. Ever. Again. Think about it. The 2 a.m. show I would do with Stewart then became the 1 a.m. show. Right. Because they wanted to get it on earlier. And could you imagine in this day and age where everything is now an alert on your phone or in the palm of your hand and that's how you're learning about it? Could you imagine that ESPN would have a news and information show like SportsCenter and run it back ancient over and over and over again? Rich and I coming right back. If you take the Mavs first quarter and the Raptors fourth quarter, two different games, you have 20 combined points.

1:02:15Rich Eisen:Oh, it continues in the NBA. And we learn how some Patriot fans need lessons in both manners and grammar. Stewart got more than nothing when we come right back. For nine straight hours the next morning as news is breaking, like that would never happen again. That would never happen again. The ESPN would never run a show at 11 in the morning Eastern time that was recorded at 2 in the morning and talk about what sports is going on right now. Things break so much now. They just would never. It's just not the same way. The fact that it re-aired, because I did those overnight shows where you used to, once the show finished, it was already really late, like wee hours.

1:02:52You'd have to stay and do the alternate close. Right. Because the show would lead, it would be used again and again and again. Sometimes it would just lead into itself. Yeah, right. The show would repeat. It would cycle in, yeah. But it would be also other things, including the body shaping show, which was co-hosted by my now wife. That's correct. Jennifer Dempster. So we didn't even know each other then, but I had to stop and do one of her many jobs. It was the longest-running fitness show in the history of ESPN. They ran it forever. The body shaping. Yeah, body shaping. Oh, yeah. Forever made a lot of money.

1:03:27Rich Eisen:With my blanket on her name, Austin, right? What was her name? Well, Denise Austin. Denise Austin. She was another – they had a fitness block. Yes, they did. But body shaping had its own cast, and there was kind of the core cast, which Jennifer was a part of. And then a few other people kind of came and went. But, yeah, so that's it for SportsCenter. Stay tuned for body shaping. And then you'd have to do like three scores at the end of the show. Yes. Because it wasn't a long segment because then it would be ridiculous to continue to do it again and again. And then you would – the next – stay tuned for, you know, Galad.

1:04:01Whatever was coming up next. That was the swarthy-looking dude, right? Yes. He was doing it, right? It was the Israeli, I believe. That's right. Jake, body by Jake. Jake Stonefield. And then Gilad's sister, I think, maybe they did a fitness show. Yeah. Like a military theme. I remember that. With fatigue. On an aircraft carrier or something.

1:04:20Rich Eisen:Then sometimes it was World's Strongest Man. Yes, there was a lot of stuff. A lot of stuff, yeah. I used to joke, like, you know, the high school show that I did was, like, sandwiched in between, like, monster truck maybe or celebrity skeet shooting. That was a real show. Celebrity skeet shooting? It was a real show. I mean, I don't know how long lived it was, but I remember it being wedged. Because SSA would run. Like James Garner was taking some shots or something, like Bob Conrad? I think they weren't. Gabe Kaplan? They weren't that. The celebrities were not of that caliber, I don't think. Here's Telly Savala shooting skeet.

1:04:59It was not like Battle of the Network. Gabriel Kaplan, captain of NBC. Look at that shot. He hits the bullseye. Bobby Benton. no i mean this was not howard doing battle of the network so these were i but but yeah no in that show would would run like after school yeah weekend mornings we just get slotted all over the place but it definitely fall in between shows like that yeah so damn i gotta get you back you should get just do one more sports center i don't know if you do you have the ability to make it like a binding offer i'm not making a binding commitment i no i mean it's an interesting idea

1:05:36Rich Eisen:you know you know what i mean because i i want to get some of the old school back together you know i would love to i'd love to figure that out but do a new school type show oh no just do it like again when i did it back in august same music same graphics just a lot of highlights yeah you know it's not too far from what it is right now just different music same different graphics yeah just getting you all back on one more sports center i just want what if you did it one what if we get to rico to do it if you get him back i don't know i mean like three-headed monster no those kinds of things were fun to me i i at this point like i i outside of the normal football tennis kind of thing right the only thing i'll say yes to is something that sounds it was i i host the u.s open for polo it's a home game down in florida so i i sure don't didn't know much about polo but i but dude i did like you did it all yeah x games winter x games i you know i i I did a lot of different things.

1:06:32And so I was never too proud to take on some kind of crazy ideas. We have a lot more still to come on down the stretch. Right after this break, we'll show you a secretariat. Where is he now? Well, the old guy can't really get it up anymore. So those high-priced stud fees are all gone. He finds himself keeping company with a bunch of cows in New Jersey.

1:06:50Rich Eisen:Yeah, why not? Well, again, I'll share this just as we wrap up here. that you know uh i used i don't know if i've ever told you this so screw it i'll say it here i used you to rico and um uh robin roberts when i was trying to stay on stay with the espn okay i was having a dinner with the executive mark shapiro whose name gets mentioned every now and then around here on this show um and because he he only wanted me to do sports centers which is how i wound up getting handed a cardboard box at the end of the day because it was too late trying figure other parts out at least in his mind or the rest of management uh i said basically like look at what you know i used your example tariko's example and and robin roberts example about what look at what they've done for the company writ large for disney not just espn for the whole disney concept um this is early uh aughts and look at what they've done if would you go back in time and and tell them they can't be the voice of college football now or what tariko was doing at the time clearly he was gone from sports center at that point and robin roberts was becoming you know oh yeah you know the massive crossover exactly i mean the grand game of robin you know i and so i'm i said what would you go back in time and tell them they have to do sports center for the rest of their careers and he looked at me he said yeah and that's when i knew that i was i probably wasn't going to be sticking with espn anymore that if i'm going to be made an example of i still need to stand my ground i need to figure out what i want to do and play around with the other toys in the disney chest and you know interestingly enough here i am in in 26 you know doing doing that but we made a smart choice but i tried i tried i said what about you because you were doing what what what you should be doing which is you know taking in what espn could offer killing it doing that building your own brand and doing some other things that you wanted to do and and become a voice in a sport or other things outside of sports center that are very valuable for the company but also rewarding for you personally and professionally you know they really wanted you to live in bristol though that was a big thing i mean right well one of the tim brando who was the original host of college game day right for the first year and he and i I overlapped and he obviously is still involved in college football and college sports, but he, we, I think he thinks of himself, but he might've been the Kurt flood old free agent baseball reference who, who, who got out and convinced them to sort of, he could still work for the company, but he didn't want to live in Bristol.

1:09:28He wanted to live in Port, Louisiana. I just wanted to live in New York. I just, I couldn't meet you. I couldn't stay there anymore. I couldn't someone I was seeing at the time she lived in Boston. So it was either, or, but ended up wanting to live in New York. And I just, they finally relented. I could continue to work at ESPN, but not live in metropolitan Bristol. Right. And that was pretty controversial. It was hard to get that, your wish that way.

1:09:57Rich Eisen:Trust me, I noticed that. And at the end of the day, you know, Mark did offer me a job in New York for the, I was hosting the original cold pizza. Yeah. And I just was, it just didn't strike me as something that I wanted to do. so I said no to that and I got a cardboard box unlike you saying no to the the Los Angeles job you know and and and being allowed to stay it's just different times different different um you know management priorities or whatever but it's still the same story which is way more advanced in your career I mean I think you knew I mean maybe you didn't know but you you you had you you know I I was either naive or I had the hubris to say no to them a couple times by the way not After that, you get more confident.

1:10:42You realize, okay, I can do this. I think that I still feel that way. If things didn't – if we couldn't see eye to eye and it was – I'll just tell you. I mean it was close to not happening, the deal I'm in right now. Then I'm at peace. I'm okay. Now that would have been foolish as a kid to do something. It would have got me let go from ESPN. but I didn't think I didn't didn't even occur to me right that was that was I was risking that

1:11:12Rich Eisen:so you kind of knew maybe you didn't well I would I didn't think it was gonna wind up with a cardboard box no I didn't certainly 10 days just to bring this whole thing full circle since we're talking about an hour you know it was 10 days before Susie and I got married yeah I mean it was it was a wild time but thankfully you know and again that's another reason why doing that sports center in August was kind of cathartic for me that I got to do it again when I thought I would never do it again ever and that's of my own choice which is why you should do it again because it's your choice i got a cardboard box we did it what i have a cardboard box by the way they just they just sent me cardboard boxes from from bristol like about four or five months ago of your stuff of shit that you left i left they finally i hadn't had a desk i hadn't had a phone yeah i haven't had a company email in i mean many many many years yeah and they i guess at some point when they're moving these boxes out of out of the basement or shutting this part down yeah they said enough's enough like there's mini helmets stuffed animals from colleges jerseys with my name on them uh the kicking shoe of northwestern's kicker from the 1995 rose bowl team dude and i'm balanzizi who who signed his kicking shoe and it was on my desk somewhere in up now it gets sent me and a box from ESPN.

1:12:35So I finally got my cardboard boxes. There are two of them. But about 15 years after I had an office there.

1:12:41Rich Eisen:Take your stuff out of here already, Fowler. Maybe let's you and I do one. Sure. Now you're just saying that. Well, I don't want to. I don't. It's a great idea. Let's work on it. Let's think of it. Let's work on it. We'll work on it. Sure. Because you know what I think of you. But thank you for doing this. No, it's fine, man. This is excellent memory lane stuff. I am not a reflective person. I don't take this opportunity, but I had a great time, and you're the only one I would sit down and do this. I appreciate that. That means a lot to me, man, because, you know, people should know about back in the day now and know what they're seeing now at people like yourself who were there, you know, in the very early days of getting something like this done.

1:13:25Rich Eisen:And I appreciate you sharing everything, because I imagine you do look back, and just to wrap this whole thing up, about what SportsCenter meant to you. Oh, yeah. And how it all does sort of, I know you had a show before it and did a bunch of other things, but I had a magazine high school show. Okay. And I had some feel. No, no, I obviously, I mean, to be a part of that, I mean, the roster is staggering. Yeah. The number of people who came through and did it and then they blew up because of it or they moved on and went on to other things. No, I'm immensely proud of it. I mean, it was scary. It was fulfilling in the best way.

1:14:12I think all those things that you do because they're challenging and they're fulfilling and they require something of you you weren't sure you had. And also really it's about the people too. Honestly, you mentioned some of the anchors, some of the producers, some of the other people who became dear friends, people who ran prompter for me, people who were production assistants on the show, ended up knowing them for a long time. And I really think that the collaborative part of this business is really the priceless part of it. So you think you're just sitting out there with one other person, you know what goes into that.

1:14:43And, yeah, that's the fact that I got to sit there with Olbermann, with Berman, with Dan, with you, you know, with Tirico, and on and on. It was pretty cool.

1:14:54Rich Eisen:Oh, man, I appreciate you sharing. and good luck in your 50th or your fifth decade. Yeah. I'm glad that we, at least doing this show, established that your math was off. This is your 40th year, man. Yeah, I guess I would say in 38th and it was a habit. It was 40 years ago in the spring of 2026. Yeah, man. Awesome. Thanks for being here. My pleasure. Chris Fowler in the latest edition of This Was SportsCenter.

1:15:26Thank you.