That's right guys back to back episodes this weekend for you! In this episode, I talk with former rower Arshay Cooper! Now if you're unaware of his story, Cooper grew up on the West Side of Chicago during the '90s and became a member of the first all-Black high school crew team in the history of the sport, which became the inspiration for his fantastic book, A Most Beautiful Thing, which has since been turned into a documentary. After his rowing career, Cooper went on to work for AmeriCorps and WWE as a chef before eventually establishing a rowing program in New York and helping expand the sport to lower income communities. In this episode, myself and Arshay discuss his upbringing and how he was introduced to rowing (1:15), the role models that inspired him to keep going and the misconceptions around some gang members (4:30),  his initial reactions to his coaches (13:40), bonding with his teammates (18:09), adjusting to the culture shock (21:35), and so much more! I hope you guys enjoy the interview and always remember love yourz!

On this episode, I discuss my takeaways from the Thursday night game between the Houston Texans and the Kansas City Chiefs, and I make my Week 1 picks for this weekend's slate of NFL games. Hopefully this gets posted in time and I hope you guys have an awesome weekend! Thanks for listening!

Well it’s finally here! The inaugural episode of The Black and Blue Pod has finally arrived and the first guest is sports writer Roland Lazenby, who has written over four dozen sports books on icons such as Colts quarterback Johnny Unitas, Lakers legends such as Kobe Bryant and Jerry West, global icon Michael Jordan and his legendary Chicago Bull teams, and many more. In this episode, we discuss the creative process behind his lengthy biographies on Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant (1:19), what it was like to be in the locker rooms during the 1980s NBA(5:30), I ask him his thoughts on the structure of the modern game (8:58), the groundbreaking Detroit “Bad Boys” Pistons teams in the late 80s (18:45), Tex Winter’s attempts to get both Michael and Kobe to buy into the triangle offense (36:05), how professional leagues and amateur athletics are attempting to play amid the COVID-19 pandemic (42:55) and we finally wrap up with a special segment called Off the Dome (65:00). Hope you guys enjoy the episode!