Mitch King | WUW 520 - Washed Up Walkons

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Throwing it back to the mid twothousands with this one. Today, Mitch
King joins the show, obviously oneof the best Hawkeye d linemen in the
Farrens era. Well, we getto learn a little bit more about what
Mitch does now in the business world. Talk memories in the Black and Gold,
memories from the NFL, all theway back in Hillcrest, and a
lot more. Lots of good piecesin here about mindset and how to be

(00:21):
successful in the life. Let's havea day. Let's go another episode of

(00:52):
the wash Up walk On's podcast.We have a guest. We've tracked on
somebody else so that you guys don'thave to listen to just our voices.
It's uh, it is the actualwash Up walk On, not just the
friendship podcast. Tonight. Our guestis a former first team All Big Ten,
first team, second team third teamAll American depending on which publication you
ask back then. And Uh,one of the guys that when we were

(01:17):
coming up, this guy played andwe were in middle school, I thought
was one of the toughest sons ofbitches that I'd ever seen on the football
field. It's Mitch King joining theshow tonight. Mitch We're happy to have
you. Yeah, I've been watchingfrom afar, guys. Thanks for the
invite, dude. I'm so excitedto have you on, Excited to learn
a little bit more about you.Excited to be reppin' the Mitch King Agency

(01:41):
on the on the show. Iknow you are. I appreciate it.
So I don't know how. Idon't know how that came out. Oh
that's right. I cold emailed youtoo, didn't I you did? You
didn't like yo. I listened tothe show a little bit. I'd love
to maybe throw some ads around onthe on the podcast, and I was
like, hey, yeah, shootyou to my guys. Guy sent me
back. He's like, hey,put to put a read together for Mitch.
Now we're rolling. Now Mitch Kingcan be heard all over the Washing

(02:04):
walkons. There you go. Now, that's that's a different world for me
from what I was doing and shakinga moving like that. But now it
works. Tell me about it.What's uh? So you're slinging insurance now?
Is that that? That's the adultjob your Yeah? So when I
got done playing football, I investedin real estate, so I owned and
operated. I still own a propertymanagement company. So we manage. We

(02:30):
owned portion, but we managed abouttwenty six hundred rental units and HOI units
in the Courtora. Who Yeah.So we had my wife and I.
We had about forty employees. Westill have about forty employees. I just
do nothing of the day to day. She was running it, and I

(02:50):
stepped out of the day to dayin January of twenty three. So I
was like, hey, I'm kindof just a people person. I don't
really do much of the day today a what the hell is gonna move
my needle? So I believe anyways, long story short, without talking all
about me, but I believe inthe podcast is about you, you can

(03:10):
talk so much about it. Theproperty management gave me the foundation to do
you know, a maintenance a maintenancecompany, a cleaning company, a pest
control company. H now an insurancecompany. And I can run parallel with
helping some of my clients that wedo property management for, but also some
of the people that I've met throughoutthe years. So okay, it was
a good transition. Allows a lotof freedom so that I can bounce between

(03:34):
companies. So you've so all theones you just mentioned, You've kind of
got your hand in all of that. Yeah, wow, and so and
then they all all the businesses youknow, you can work, you can
hire each other for all the differentstuff. Yeah, that's that's kind of
the concept of it, right.So real estate got me into it.
So and then earlier in the yearsI was doing it, I was like,

(03:54):
why am I hiring a cleaning companywhen I can you know, all
that money walks out the door whenI could have it inside. Why am
I hiring a maintenance crew when Ican have that money in house? You
know, like it just started makingsense to vertically integrate. So it's funny
Grant and I were just having thatconversation when you jumped into the call about

(04:15):
stuff we're doing over here. That'sawesome, man. You so you strike
me as the guy then that youdidn't want to just relax, you know,
you got I heard real estate makespeople rich, So like rich guy
Mitch didn't want to just sit down, go to the Bahamas, live half
half time in Mexico, half timein Iowa and just chill. You just
want to run all the companies.That's no. I was actually just having

(04:39):
a conversation at a dinner that Iwas at a minute ago. I don't
think I could sit idle. Iwould I'd end up divorced, a drunk,
probably something not good. I obviouslyI'm in a happy marriage. I
don't even drink that much, sobut something would go wrong if I just
sat around and did nothing something.Yeah, your kids, I do.

(05:00):
I have two little boys. Imean that I got a little girl.
I know that that that keeps youbusy. How old is your daughter?
She's only eighteen months old. Dude, Boys and girls are like polar opposites.
It is absolute bonkers. My bestfriend has two girls and they come
over and my boys are swinging fromchandeliers and chewing holes in the dry wall,

(05:20):
and these girls are sitting there forthree hours coloring. And I'm like,
what now, are you sure thatis a gender difference or is that
just a Mitch king genetic difference thatmy wife shays that same thing. But
I guarantee you it's gender. Iwas I thought I was going to be
cursed with little girls, you know, but now I'm absolutely cursed with little
boys. They're just little little girlso far. It is awesome. Man.

(05:43):
Oh yeah, I bet it's uh. I mean, I'm sure,
and I'm sure the little boys aretoo. But I've I've heard about I've
heard of that. It's a it'sa little different. I mean, you
you had, you had two ofyou, and so you know, you
had you had to know what youwere getting into there. I never thought,
like, I know, I'm anaggressive individual, like when push come
to shove, I'm pretty aggressive.But these little boys are at a different

(06:08):
level from six forty five in themorning. They're they're punching, they're throwing,
they're gritting their teeth, they're wrestling, they're getting you know, I
put them up in uh this lastwas it spring? I was Alex Knelis
runs a little youth wrestling program atat Big Game, and we put the
boys in there and every time theycome home now they're in wrestling stances and

(06:29):
they're wrestling and they're pinning each other. It's yeah, playing d line against
whatever old line up across front.Oh yeah, oh you're reading out of
the house. Just give them anarea where they can just go crazy,
because my parents did that. Likewe had an unfinished basement growing up,
and it's like this is just goingto be where they destroy the house.
There's not going to care out ofsight, out of mind. Yeah.

(06:50):
So my wife and I, rightduring COVID bought a house and we put
an addition on the house. Butdownstairs, the gentleman that I bought the
house from, he had a woodshop and it was probably nineteen and a
half feet by thirty two feet long. And now it's now it's we finished
it out and now it's just awrestling room. So we have a large

(07:12):
wrestling mat in there. We've gotbean bags, we've got a jungle gym.
It's just that's we shut the doorand the chaos is in there and
just hey, come back when it'stime to go to sleep. Yeah,
right, bleeding or something's broke,yeah, unless someone's dying. Yeah,
just yeah, that's all. Didyou wrestle? I didn't. I swam.

(07:35):
I swam. Okay, well that'sthe first twist of the podcast.
Here, tell me about that.My mom said, listen, if you
wrestle, you're you're disowned. You'reon your own. So yeah, so,
I, my sister, my brother, and I were all state qualifiers
swimming swimmers in high school. Igave it up when I tore my shoulder
in my junior year and that wasmy last year's swimming his junior year.

(07:58):
Interesting, So I don't know whywas mama not a fan of wrestling.
My mom's leak. Who knows thata clip? Yeah, she just she
can't. I mean, she can'teven watch my nephew's pitch a you know,
a thirteen baseball game. She didn'thave to deal with what you got

(08:18):
going on down in the wrestling roomnow, correct. Yeah, that's funny.
So I don't know how much youknow or listening to the show.
We did have another guy, uh, Drake Kolick. I don't know if
you've ever met him. He's fromYeah, he's from Eastern Iowa. He's
from Muscatine, so that says alot about him, you know, and

(08:39):
he's sort of like he just doublethat and that's Drake. He kind of
stepped away because he got a littlefrustrated with some stuff last season. But
he was like big, tough guy, meathead. But also swam in high
school. Okay, it was like, uh he was on the oh no,
I'm gonna butcher it, uh relay. His team was the state champs

(09:03):
in the in like a sprint relay, like a sprint medley. Yeah,
yes, yeah, And he wasthe freestyle guy and he would just pull
the whole pool with his lats andhe would just is that what you slam?
Short? Yeah? I was justI was a sprinter. I told
my coach, I said, lesthe said, at the beginning of the
year. Every year, Hey,everybody's gonna swim the five hundred, doesn't

(09:24):
matter if you're good or bad.I said, I'll fall start. Don't
ever put me in that event.So that's a long way. Oh,
you swim like I don't even knowthirty minutes. I don't even remember the
time played. No, it's probablycloser to like eight. Yeah, probably
that's funny. Did you like it? Did you like swimming? It was

(09:46):
honestly probably my best sport athletically.What else did you play? I tried
baseball. I struck out every timeI swam. I played football, I
ran track, and then baseball theuh and was the goal always I'm doing

(10:07):
this in college? Like is thiswas that the dream? Yeah? So
my brother is four years older thanme, and that like so I looked
up to him. He was,you know, the whole idol thing.
And he went and played football atWarburg and he was a two time All
American first team All American up thereand I you know, at fourteen,
he I don't know if you guysever been up to Waverley, but he'd
go take me up there, getme into Joe's Nighthawk. At fourteen,

(10:30):
I just loved the love the atmosphere. So I thought I was gonna go
to Warburg. Yeah, and thenI was Stay called, And then that
was a shocker. I was stayedoffered you first, Yeah, I was
State was my first offer. Andis a McCartney. McCartney, Yeah,
let me get a salesman jump.He's a sweetheart of a man. Yeah,

(10:54):
he is like this McCartney's a godude. He was. He's a
legend. I'm gonna guess before youtell the next part of the story that's
somewhere along the line, like YsMorgan popped up at your high school one
day and then you were like anIowahaw guy or somehow. That's how the
story goes. So he So Igot a letter. See, I don't

(11:16):
know exact time I got a letter, and I was going back forth.
I didn't commit right away to Iowa. And I was at the YMCA lifting
with my buddy Marcos as the guywith the two girls, and he looked
at me one day he just ranand he's like, listen, if you're
not a hawkey, we're no longerfucking friends. Straight face, straight as
face? Is that? And Iwas like at eighteen, like seventeen eighteen

(11:37):
years old, sixteen seventeen years old? However, is it fair enough that
was what made your decision? Yeah? Yeah, basically it was. I
mean also, a couple of weeksbefore I was in uh, the linebacker's
room in Iowa State and they werewatching film and all this stuff, and
they were like, promise me theworld, and that's just not me.

(11:58):
Like, hey, don't promise methe world. Tell me it's gonna be
hard. Tell me I'm gonna haveto work for it, Like you know,
don't tell me that I'm gonna walkin. I'm gonna start playing as
a true freshman. I saw throughthe smoke. You would hate. You
would hate what they tell the kidsnowadays. I know. I know,
Oh dude, everybody's a starter dayone one and for you and and yeah

(12:20):
it will pay you two billion.Yeah, something that's gonna be coming back
to. I think we might geta small chunk of change on that that's
not small gentlemen. Well, it'sit. I've heard some things around like
star ratings and playing time, likecount enough for like an RB sandwich or
something like Kevin and I might makeenough to go to McDonald's twice. Yeah,

(12:43):
exactly, Yeah, I mean weyeah, chi, Yeah, we're
going to talk about that the nexttime. We don't have a guest cap
because that thing is deep. That'sthat goes far deeper than just a rabbit
hole the thing. Yeah, yeah, And I'm not to inverseed in it,
like I don't. I haven't readso much into it. But here's

(13:03):
the thing. When I graduated college, it was inevitable that paying players was
going to be a thing at somepoint. Yeah. And to have the
n C double a ship the bedso bad on how is mind blowing to
me? You had ten years tofigure this out. That's their problems.
They fought ntil the very end untilthen they just lose everything. Yeah.

(13:28):
I really don't. Yeah, withwith this, with this going down,
the whole report from the this pastweekend of like, okay, well now
we're just paying the play like wetalked to uh can have we talked to
Searles a month ago or whatever?And he's been saying, how it's it's
inevitable, like we're going to they'regoing to pay the players. It's gonna
be a salary cap ish like it'sgonna someone's gonna figure it out. It's

(13:50):
just like, does is the nC double A DoD they? Is that
office just empty? Now? Theythey don't have anything to do. I'm
not sure what they do well.I mean, they're not gonna be doing
much more because they're paying out abunch of this money. It's coming from
the NC Double A and then likesixty percent from the NCAA and forty percent
from the school. Do you seewhat they The reason they settled it with

(14:13):
the two point eight is because ifthey didn't, they were potentially going to
be liable for like twenty Yeah,they had a lot of more ability.
And shit, you got more thana Chick fil a sandwich. If that
was the kid, we we mighthave. Uh. Okay, back to
you. So you're you're seven.When did you do you remember when you
committed? Yeah, I was seventeenmy junior year. No shit, a

(14:37):
sixteen at sixteen, right right aftermy junior year in high school. So
you had a full season left andyou had an Iowa and and Iowa stayed
offer. Yeah, and I had, and then I basically quit recruiting.
So Kansas State was calling Wisconsin,Nebraska, all them things, and I
just was like, hey, guys, I'm I'm good. You shut it.

(14:58):
You shut it down back when Nebraskadidn't suck. Yeah, yeah,
that's true. This would have beenin two thousand and two, three,
Yeah, and social media wasn't athing back then, so I didn't.
I wasn't, you know, englfedin the kissing ass the whole time of
who Mitch King was or who hewasn't. So I just, hey,

(15:18):
I've got a great two offers.I can't go wrong, you know,
in my head, so well youcould have, but yeah, yeah,
that's that's It's a yeah. Youdon't hear that story very often anymore.
I think Aaron Gray, I don'tknow how much you know about the d

(15:39):
line room right now. With AaronGraves on the team, I think his
recruiting story is similar. Freshman year, He's I think he got offered freshman
year by Iowa and Iowa State,and the minute Iowa offered he's like,
I'm I'm committing to Iowa and Inobody else contacts me like don't, which
is crazy because he was a heended up. You know, he would

(16:00):
have been a five star had hekept like going to the camps and all
the shit that they do, andhe would have had fifteen twenty Division one
offers. And like, for akid in high school nowadays, to just
forego that is a really wild concept, to be honest, It's just really
not something you see. So yeah, and I don't. What baffles me

(16:26):
is like, listen, you cango to Georgia Alabama. You know,
everybody goes to different schools for eachother reason, but they leave their home
state. And if you are regardlessif you're a first team All American or
a first round draft pick, ifyou're a good player in your home state,

(16:48):
the opportunities once football is done isendless. Yeah, do you walk
in a room you're if you havea good reputation to precede yourself, you
can your resume speaks for yourself.You go into job interviews, as you
meet people whatever, Like when youleave the state that you grew up in
and play for whatever other school thatis, you forego that opportunity when you're
done playing football for that advantage,and that's I don't know how people miss

(17:12):
that. Yeah, it's a longgame that I don't think anybody really thinks
about. Yeah, I mean everybody'sgoing to the NFL after three years.
Yeah, yeah, it's weird.I mean, Kevin's not from Iowa.
But even to some extent, Ihave experienced some of that with the reception
of our show and stuff. Inever thought or had any plan to have

(17:37):
the fan base even know who Iwas. Naturally, I'm a loud mouth,
cocky I mean, like that ismy personality, but I basically knew
that. Like, hey, onceI'm become the long snapper and I'm not
the linebacker anymore because I played linebackeras well, and I know you did.
I'm curious to hear about the transitionto d line as well. But

(18:00):
like hometown Marshalltown, Like now I'mstill an hour away in Des Moines,
Like I still feel what you're kindof alluding to their even you know,
eight years after our career, whichis it's true, like you can kind
of get that name, image,likeness poll for as long as you want
to. Yeah, yeah, Iwent to a networking thing. You know,

(18:25):
you guys have probably done it thenetworking thing with the football team,
and they kind of that roundtable thing. I've got my current job. That's
how you got your current job,not how, but it's why because I
had no idea that my industry existed. And then like half the guys that
they brought back through med sales,I'm like, I should probably look into
this. But yeah, yeah,And the thing is what I mean,

(18:45):
they I think they do better nowthan maybe when I was in school,
and maybe I was just too eotisticalto know about it. But like,
they need to teach you how tonetwork. Yeah, they need to teach
all these kids how to do thenetworking class and actually do the follow up.
Hey, Mitch, it was greatto meet you yesterday. Let's grab
coffee next month. I'd like topick your brain whatever that is. Like,

(19:07):
they need to teach these girls andguys in college how to network,
because that is the skill that youtake away from being an athlete, and
that's that you can put a money, like you can put a value to
that too easy easy, Like youyou walk out of college and if you
use your network like you're automatically atthe top of the resume piles, just

(19:30):
you know, you still got aninterview. Well, you still got to
have the skills and personality traits atwhatever company that you're looking for. But
just being right there at the topof the pile just you know you're probably
going to get an interview is huge. Yeah. Also using who you know,
Hey, you know one of myone of my good friends and everything

(19:52):
like that. Has I'm doing aninterview in a couple of weeks about on
a radio for a radio gig,and a girlfriend of mine's like, hey,
I used to work for this radio, this radio in Chicago and this
radio and this radio in Saint Louis. If you need to know anybody and
go through a cold warm up orwhatever. Just the networking that you can
have to better your skills and everythingwith it is huge. It's just yeah,

(20:18):
it's uh, there's a statistic outthere, and I don't know the
exact statistic, but you know,online applications to jobs are everything these days,
right, But every job posts onlinegets thousands and thousands of applications that
most of these companies, especially smallcompanies, are taking like word of mouth
and you know, like from peoplethey know. It's like, hey,

(20:42):
I can get you set up withso and so and this is a good
kid. I think he'd be goodat your company. And then boom,
that's easily gets you through the frontdoor. Right. Yeah, Hey,
I didn't know guy Grant. Helives in Chicago. He wants you know,
he's looking for jobs. He appliedfor your job. Just make you
have an eye out for his resume. Boom boom exactly, and we plan

(21:03):
on getting granted job. As forhis association with us at some point here,
very highly sought after or the formerproducers from washing to balk Uh,
he's still working through his office rightnow. Yeah, he's got a lot
of clover producer coaching trees. Verybig dude. It's some say, some
liking it to that that Hayden Frytree. Yeah, gets out there.

(21:30):
So at seventeen, you commit tothe Hawks, but not as a d
lineman. You're uh, you're atwo hundred and fifteen and twenty pound linebacker.
Sexy guys, sexy, you shouldhave seen it. Yeah, I
think my first day walking in toan official way in. So the official
way in is obviously right before camp. Yeah, first day of camp or

(21:52):
first day summer is not official yet. I think official. I was like
two twenty three was my first wayin lean. Last time. Yeah,
yeah, first time, last timeI ever saw that number. Haven't been
two twenty three cents. Huh No, I'm like a yo, yo,
we could probably I'll tell you you'renot. You're not like a test sky
fraper. No, I'm six twosix two three. By the way,

(22:17):
Yeah, I got corrected the combinefor that. You're not same. So
when I was six foot on theroster the whole time, I'm five to
ten on a good day. Bullshit, man, they didn't give me a
centimeter. They didn't, no,not a one. What killed me was
my short arms. I'm like tRex. That's tough. I mean that

(22:37):
had to be tough playing D linewith short arms. I mean I sacrificed.
I blame my dad for two things, and they're both being short,
not high twise, so short armsand yeah, uh I but you got
let you have leverage, right,So I think I think on a D
line it's all about violent hands.If you can hit someone, stunham,

(23:00):
get off the block, direct them, you know, control that man,
It's all about your violent hands.I don't I don't necessarily think it's long
arms. It does. I'm notsaying it doesn't help. But number one
is having violent hands. I'm surethere's somebody that would argue with you,
and I know that. There's thefirst person that comes to the mind when

(23:22):
I think of long arms is AnthonyNelson. Anthony Nelson was so stupid long
Do you guys ever see Have youguys ever met Broderick Binns? Oh?
Yeah, we know was on thecoaching stuff. His arms are long long.
He couldn't I might butcher this,but he couldn't do hand cleans because
the bar when he bent his kneesto snatch his arms took the bar below

(23:45):
his knees and he couldn't snatch itup his wild Yeah, or he was
hanged cleaning like one hundred and thirtyfive pounds he had to do. I
think he had to change out ofhis technique. Doyle did at all.
I was, you know, butyou were just an observer? Yes,

(24:06):
did you? Were you a hanklingerbig hankling? Yeah? Yeah, yeah,
I don't. I think the mostI got was like three sixty three
seventy five something like that. Prettygood, Yeah, pretty sure. I
was more explosive than strong. Ithink. So you're six' two.
You come in at two twenty threeand you said you were You said you
were like kind of like lean sexymachine then. But I mean I got

(24:30):
the picture pulled up right here.I mean even when you got a little
thicker, still looking pretty good.That flow, Mitch. Come on now,
dude, dude, why where bringit back? I can't you know,
I would love to. I hadmy boys grow the hair out just
because I miss it. But no, yeah, that hair was something else

(24:52):
back in the nil guys that wouldhave brought so much money, dude,
you head and shoulders, local barbershop, like every the lawn in town.
For the holy smokes. You couldhave been doing commercials all day.
And I'm serious too, you knowlisten, that's hey and now I'm old
and Washington who team would have beendragging in the most nil money back in

(25:17):
the day. You think any ofyour teammates that you play with, and
not just the good, not justthe good guys, like the guys who
are charismatic enough to like go andlike actually have a brand, like a
personal brand and make funny commercials orstuff like that. Drew Tait would have
been huge back then. Chad Greenway, Abdual Hodge. They could have tag

(25:37):
teamed a lot of you know,sponsorships and all that stuff. Sean Green.
Sean Green was very skilled, buthe wasn't very outgoing or charismatic.
So I think that would there wouldhave been a cap to that, just
because because there's a there's a limiteron it, Like if you're just elite
on the field, but then youget off off the field and like you're

(26:00):
trying to do a commercial or anadvertisement, and then you're up there like
I like football, I play forthe Hawkeyes. Me big, be big,
I tackle running back. Yeah,then you're not gonna work like companies
aren't like or it will work onetime and then no one else is going

(26:22):
to see that and be like,oh, we'd love him to do something
for our brand. Yeah, youknow, like great guy, but I
just can't. Can't can't do thethe entertainment side of it. I feel
like that wouldn't have been a problemfor you. This is the vibe.
No, No, I'm three sheets, I'm crazy all the time. So

(26:44):
no, that wouldn't have been anissue. But I'm trying to think.
I mean, there was some reallyskilled players back when I played, But
I'm trying to think of people thatcould both have a beer with a farmer.
You know, did you play withMatt Roth? I did my freshman
year. I played with Matt Roth. He graduated after the LSU game bowl
game, and then that was mytrue freshman year, so I only played

(27:06):
with him one time. Yeah,so he's someone who's been long requested on
the show. Really and obviously he'skind of got a reputation that precedes him.
Uh. He he might have beengood on some on some interesting n
I L opportunities. Yeah, Mattwas the sneaky smart kid, right really?

(27:29):
Oh, I think yeah, heknew how to let on. He
knew I mean, don't get mewrong. I'm sure he has CTE today,
but sure, who doesn't. Ithink he's I think he's one of
those sneaky smart guys, Like heknew how to work people, the angles
and all that stuff. I thinkthat a lot of it was a gimmick.
That's yeah, I'm probably totally wrongon that, but wow, maybe

(27:53):
right, Yeah, half the battleeither Yeah, either way, he's got
you question it. So you're two. Was the plan to play linebacker?
Yeah? Yeah, so I camein and there was that dual there middle
linebacker, and he was you know, he was that duel at that point
already. So I was battling fora backup position with Mike Clinkenberg. But

(28:18):
I came in, by the way, at a great time. What's that
you came in at? Some wouldsay the peak of football? I mean
it was like an unbelievable Kevin andI we joined a class. Uh that
was that was we were the worstrecruiting class in KF's ten ure. Yeah,
we joined a team that had justgone four and eight the previous year.

(28:41):
I think your first year was eitheryeah, yeah, and we walked
up. We decided to pay ourway for that team. You joined a
team that had just come off thetwo thousand and two and then the two
thousand and three season, and youryour true freshman year was two thousand and
four. Correct. At the YAHthe LSU game catch you guys were fucking
rolling. Well, the crazy thingwas, you look back on it,

(29:03):
all the top three running backs werehurt. We are down to Sam Brownlee,
which I love Sam Brownlee. JeffI used to tell us the story
all the time. Yeah, itwas all the defense. The defense was
the best defense, in my opinion, one of the better ones ever in
Iowa football history, even up therewith uh, well up there, but
like, how do you think theycan they you guys, well, I

(29:26):
guess you wouldn't have been quite playingon that defense yet. But yeah,
compared to like these last couple ofyears with like Jack Campbell, Cooper guys
like that, there's always going tobe the pieces that that can you can
take it out and interchange or saythis guy's better than that. I think
just from top to bottom in thatthere wasn't a weakness like the D line.

(29:47):
I mean, you can go throughthat D line was just nasty.
And then you've got Chad Greenway,you got Abdua Hodge in the second you
know, second level, and thenyou've got you've got four year starters at
cornerbacks. I mean, I wouldsay our dbs on in that team would
have been not as strong as theselater years. Right, Bob still on
the leaving he left a three Ithink to go to the Cools, so

(30:12):
he didn't get to play with Bobat in India. I did, yeah,
Indy, so they they I wasplaying two ways when I got to
Indianapolis. One on D line andI was playing full back because they used
to still have the same, truetrue full back. And I remember in
camp I did an arrow route,right flat route, whatever you want to

(30:33):
call it, and the ball allI heard was just a train just trained
behind me. He's screaming. Ithink he was doing it on purpose because
he was coming downhill and he heruns past me and he goes go hawks
and he just blew like he blewlike it felt like something blew on your
ear. He could have just laidme out. I'd have been done.

(30:55):
I'd have probably died. Yeah,the old Hawkeye connection was what saved your
life. Yeah, without a question, dude, I got scared just listening
to you tell how that happened.Oh, I mean you're totally exposed right
your one yard deep. I meanyou look back and they could I mean
everything's exposed. I'd have died.I just saw Cliff of Bob on like
two days ago on Twitter. Idon't think anyone has ever or will ever

(31:19):
hit like him again. I yeah, he wouldn't be allowed to play today.
Now if you guys ever met him, we want to get him on
the podcast so bad. I've Ithink he only came and talked to us
one time during our our senior year. He came back during camp and talked
to the team. But yeah,he's a very soft spoken guy. The

(31:40):
first time I met him, hewas wearing a wife beater around the the
in the weight room or whatever,and I was on a recruiting trip and
he walks up to me. Iwas getting introduced, and from his outside
of his shoulder to his ear justcontinued to drop. I was like flying
from shoulder, Yes, I think, but I mean he was. I

(32:01):
mean, you guys saw pictures.Bob was absolutely shredded and his traps were.
Yeah, when you talk about whenthey say, you know, the
term built different, I think Ithink that it was created because of Bob.
Yeah, built different. And hewas only five eight tops, but

(32:22):
he just but he just absolutely murderedpeople. God, that's mostly mental,
I too, I think. So, I think you have to have the
mentality to be like, hey,there's no holds bards, there's no regard
to me getting hurt or you know. So he didn't. Yeah, the
way he played it just he didn'tcare. He just and probably it probably

(32:43):
shorted his career a few years,but definitely did. Damn it was exciting
to watch him when he was sohe he was the one back when I
was playing in the NFL if youwent on IR, so I blamed Bob
for ruining my career. By theway, you when you were in the
NFL, you go on IR,you're done for the whole year. It

(33:04):
doesn't matter if you were you couldn'tplay for three weeks or all year,
whatever you had. So like Bob, the first quarter of the Houston game,
we both made the team, andBob tore his bicep, and they're
like, hey, we just gotdone with the Super Bowl run. We're
going to go back again this year. So we're going to keep Bob on
the active roster the whole year.And then it just so you can only

(33:29):
have fifty three guys on the activeroster, but you're going on dress forty
eight for forty safety. So theybut it was everybody. Then Reggie Wayne
went down for three weeks, AustinKley went down for three weeks, and
it just they kept him on.And now in the NFL, you can
go IR for seven weeks or sevendays or whatever the hell it is,
five or six weeks. I meanit is, yeah, And I mean

(33:51):
that's if they would have had thatback then, who knows. So there
was a trickle down effect and eventuallyMitch gets the call O Kay, yeah,
what's that like? Yeah, eventuallyyou get numb. And that's why
I I shouldn't say quit trying.That's why I retired or quit or whatever.
The business aspect of it for mewas ruined everything. Yeah. I

(34:14):
I won't name names, but therewas a guy that I played with in
New Orleans and he was on theback end of his career. And do
you remember the the bounty gate.Yeah, so that I was part of
that team and they got all introuble and saw that stuff. But the
decordinator why the story was all aboutlike statistics for your playing time, So

(34:39):
like how how active are you onevery play? How productive are you on
every play? How like is ita tackle, is it a breakup,
is it a whatever it is?And so I was when I got cut
for the Saints, I asked SeanPayton, I said, hey, like,
why are you cutting me? Andnot? So and so because I

(35:00):
was averaging about twenty six to twentyeight plays a game, which is for
a white guy, you know,rotational. I love it. My nickname
was white Boy mitch Man or WhiteLightning. I loved it. You white
Lightning, I love it. Yeah, you know, I was at I
was a rotational player. I washappy with it. But when I got

(35:22):
cut, I said, hey,why are you cutting me? And not
so and so? And they're like, because you walk out the door,
we don't know you another dollar,so and so walks out the door.
We still owed four million dollars.And at that point I was just I
was just kind of tired of it. I'll skate over over the football.
Yeah this guy justified gatting this guyover this guy and yeah, yeah,

(35:43):
it's all chess, right, it'sa it's a chess game. And I
don't blame him. I don't blamehim now that I'm I own a business
and I look at structural moves andstrategic moves. I get it. It's
a business. But it just suckswhen you're twenty three years old and you're
working your tail off and you yeah, on to a dollars and cents.
It's yeah, it's the one thingthat we've been told over and over from

(36:06):
guys who didn't get to uh didn'thave to experience that, but didn't but
also didn't get to experience that Yeah, it's just everyone's like, yeah,
it's just so there's just this addedelement of like it doesn't eat. It
absolutely starts to feel like a workplacelike it's and that's it kills it for
a lot of people because it's like, Okay, this is that the this

(36:28):
is not like truly about passion andjust having fun anymore. Yeah, nobody,
I mean, honestly, I don'twant to say nobody, but a
lot of people. You'd lose,you get blown out, you you'd have
a winning, winning, less seasonor whatever, and as soon as they
walk in the locker room, itwas like nothing ever happened. It wasn't
check yeah, yeah, check cashed, yeah, check cash. And in

(36:54):
some cases it's hard to blame peopletoo, Like if you're healthy and the
check cash is, it's like,I mean, I get it. Oh
yeah, I don't. I don't. I don't fault anybody. I don't.
Man, oh man, And youwere in the league for what uh
you kind of four years? Close? Yeah. It took me a long
time not to be bitter, SoI did. I didn't watch IEWA football

(37:14):
for a while, I didn't goto games. I didn't like football period
for a long time, just bitter, just bitter at myself better at the
situation. But then now that Ihave boys, I mean we got season
tickets and we go to everything,and you didn't even wow, really you
were you were that kind of youwere angry at the sport. Huh yeah?
Yeah? How'd you get over that? Let go of my ego?

(37:37):
Like, who, who the fuckare you? Mitch? Like right,
like nobody owes you anything? Getover it. I was upset, like
I didn't get drafted, right,I was how my mentality. I was
like big tim defensive Lineman of theYear, first Team All American dah da
da da, and you don't getdrafted, and then I get hurt right
out of the gate. So Iwas on ir or my rookie year.

(37:58):
So I just tanked me a littlebit more. And then you know,
my when I got cut from theColts, there was another There was a
rookie d lineman there. I meanhe was if you created a player,
that's who you created, six footfour and a half, three hundred and
five pounds, eight percent body fat, just sexy and that's and then they

(38:21):
cut me, right, so yougot this chubby little guy walking around.
Yeah, so explosive, explosive andchubby. Yeah. Yeah, that's from
swimming by the way four years andyou were on like you spent time with
like five teams. I think Isaw in your Yeah, I claim three

(38:43):
because the other two were a coupleof calls. I had a couple of
coffee. Yeah. Yeah. Somy first year in Tennessee, I was
on IR blew my back out squatting, had to have a dissectomy. That
was tough, and then I gotcut. After that, you went to
Indy. That was when Pat Angergot drafted. Was that year. So

(39:05):
we played together out there, playedthere most of the year, got cut.
I got picked up by the Ramsfor I think like eight and a
half days, and then the Saintspicked me up. I played there for
two years. You and Pat giveme a lot of the same vibes.
Pat and I've got a lot ofthe same juices. I think you guys
are you? Are you guys friends? Yeah? We talk all the time.

(39:30):
Is he because he doesn't Oh no, he sells mortgages, doesn't he?
He's a business I think his newtitle is in he's in business development
at a bank. But yeah,I don't know. I couldn't tell you
what, I'm gonna have to givehim shit about that one. Yeah,
business development. He golfs, Hegolfs, goes a happy hour, and
his kids baseball games. That's yeah, there's no way he's developing businesses.

(39:50):
He's he's too dumb for that.Uh. And and if you're listening to
this and you know him, justlike clip it and send it to him
and then he'll get back to meabout it. Oh yeah, speaking of
of of you and Pat, thereis a little memento passed along in the
Iowa football locker room that legend saysthat you started little little lion type deal.

(40:12):
The heart of the lion is thatit was that. Is it true
that you're the one that started that? Dude, I've been hitting the head
quite a bit. I don't knowif I exactly started it, but it
was a round. Yeah, wellwe think that it was. Your number
was the first one that was carvedinto it. Oh yeah, yeah,
yeah, who gave that to me? Okay, now I know exactly what
you're talking about. I don't know. Yes, that was the first person

(40:37):
that was given to and then Igave it to Pat, and I think
I don't remember who he gave itto afterwards, It's it's made its way
through a pretty pretty significant list ofhawkkeys since Yeah, was Carl Klube?
I mean maybe I don't know.Yeah, I think yeah, Clube might

(40:57):
have been on there. Uh uh, let's see. I think is it
still going Brett van Slowton maybe?Well, that's that's the That's the hiccup
in the story is we're kind ofuncertain what happened to it and who has
it and if it is still goingbecause I think during COVID it must something
might have stopped. I don't doyou know the Josie gave it to.

(41:19):
I forget who Josie gave it to. They made it all the way to
Jewel had it during our time fromI think during our time James Morris had
it, probably right, James hadit, Yeah, then did was it
slow or was it Mark? Andthen Josie got it. Mark eventually had
it and then Josie. Uh.And I forget who Josie gave it to.

(41:44):
I don't. We will have toget an update on that, but
it is, yeah, I thinkUh, I don't think Josie does.
I don't think Josie does. Joeand if he if he If he did,
he probably lost it because Josie's heain't good with that stuff. Uh,
except for earning stuff like that.He's pretty good at earning awards.

(42:04):
That's a that's a cool thing.Do you remember anything about that? It's
like, what what the story wason it? I think it was given
to me and I can't I could, dude, I couldn't tell you for
hitting people in the head the hardestor something like that. Yeah, something,
do you worry? Do you worryabout CT? Oh, there's if
I got tested, like my braindissected and stuff. I'm sure I have

(42:24):
CT, But do you worry aboutit? Are you worried about like drooling
in your pot of cereal in theone morning when you wake up or I
haven't forgotten anything. I do droolalready, but that doesn't that doesn't stop
me from me Probably you were probablydrooling when you were playing. So No,

(42:45):
here's the thing I tell people.Ask me, well, I let
my sons play football, right,And I think I correlated to this question
is I've benefited more from football thanI ever will be taken away from me.
YEA, so fast forward twenty years. Yes, I have to be
putting a home or put down ourback. It is what it is.
So I've lived fifty some years agreat life from football, Mitch ol Yeller

(43:08):
King, leaving instructions for your sons. Just just dig a whole lot back,
a few poison pellets in my soupand we're good. Bury me under
the wrestling room, Yeah, wegot we gotta pond out back. Just
throw me in there with some weights. Yeah. So that's a good point

(43:29):
though, like to look at itas okay, take away football and now
we's you know what is what ismy life hard? Mitch King? Without
football? Yeah? Yeah, Ijoke about it all the time. If
I would have went to Iowa andnot played football, there's no way I
would have graduated college. Absolutely distractionsor just didn't care. All my friends

(43:51):
went there to the university. Solike, you know, Mitch, we're
going to Dollar you call the sportscolumn. We're going to fac at two
o'clock in the afternoon where you knowthe sand volleyball down the street. Come
on, and I'm like, I'mgoing to learning center until midnight, you
know, or ten night, tenpm the learning center of Learning Center.
Yeah, that makes you want apike. Oh, we got I don't

(44:15):
know if you guys were there yet. We used to be able to sign
in twice and it would double clockus, so I I'd sign in and
then fifteen minutes later, I'd goto the bathroom and I'd sign it again,
so that whole time I was inturn one hour into two hours or
two hours into four. Wow.Yeah, I don't know if they fixed
that bug or that information just nevermade its way to us. I think
they I think they caught on theson of a bit. We got a

(44:37):
good six months out of it.For sure. We could have used that
man, because those eight hours everyweek freshman year, woh, you'd wake
up at what five five point thirtyto go to workout, and then you'd
go class all morning, and thenyou've got spring ball, and then you
after springball you have to go tolearning center, so you're up from five

(44:58):
to ten o'clock every night or later. You guys didn't even have you got
me, we're like over ten yearsaway from it. Our freshman year was
twenty orteven years ago now. ButI don't know if I've ever had a
harder year, calendar year in mylife. Freshman year, Oh, I
almost quit. I'm literally almost quit. Yeah, seriously, like you from

(45:22):
that thing, the schedule, theworkload, and I think it's all been
downhill since then. You mean easier, Oh yeah, for sure. Yeah.
Yeah, you're just talking to yourlife, keV, or just in
general. Man. I remember,like you know, taking classes, trying
to adjust to being an adult,being responsible for yourself, and the workload

(45:47):
of football classes, study hours,all that bullshit, signing in for the
eighteen things you have to do everysingle day. I think that was the
hardest year of my life. Yeah, I think it's interesting. Mitcha.
You you say you wouldn't have graduatedcollege all those University of Iowa that's not

(46:07):
in Iowa. Yeah, I wouldhave gone some I would have had to
gone somewhere else. You could nameten guys right now, me and Kevin
could name probably thirty guys right nowthat still didn't get it. They didn't
get it through their head. Theydidn't They got distracted like those things,
those things got them in some wayor other. So what was it about?

(46:30):
What was it about those things?Or who were you being accountable to
or who did you feel responsible tothat that kept you like, fuck,
I hate this, but I haveto do it. Like, I'm not
going to let those things derail me. Yeah. So, I mean,
I I work hard and I playhard, but my mentality is that like
when I walk I've had this mentalitywhen I was when I when I walk

(46:52):
into a room, I want myreputation to truly percede myself. Right,
somebody knows that I work hard,that will never give up that. You
know what I say it, Imean it. I'm gonna if I tell
you I'm gonna be there, I'mgonna be there. You tell me to
be on at seven, I'll beon it or six fifty eight. Like
I'm just that's my reputation and it'snot gonna falter. So I think,

(47:13):
long windedly to answer your question,it was never gonna. I was never
gonna let anything derail me. Iwas never gonna do that. What I
think what sets people apart is isthat they truly don't have something that matters.
They may be skilled at football,but football doesn't matter to them.
The life lessons they learn from footballdoesn't matter to them personally, right,

(47:36):
so they allow things to get intheir way. Football meant and the life
lessons I was learning in real timemeant everything drinking or whatever didn't matter as
much to that, so that itwas never gonna be an option for me.
It's the first time I've heard thatdescribed in a way that I actually
relate with, because sometimes that's hardto answer, Like you look at one

(47:59):
guy versus another, and you're like, what went wrong here versus here?
And because otherwise it looks like twovery similar, you know, eighteen year
old kids, and uh, yeah, that makes sense. Having I think
I just valued what the coaches couldgive you as a player and as a
young man so much. And Irespected so much the guys who had made

(48:22):
it to senior year and we're goingto graduate, and how people looked at
them. I think that was huge. Yeah, And the idea of being,
uh I guess who I am now, Like, oh, you you
went and you played five years frywith football. You like you did it,
you accomplished it. That was thatwas such a thing for me that

(48:42):
like it was never not going tohappen. So I yeah, yeah,
if I ask you, you don'tneed to tell me. But if I
ask you, could you think ofthree things that you were told or learned
for playing football at the University ofIowa that you would teach your daughter or
your sons thirty yeah, three hundred, like three would be like I could
fall asleep saying three. Yeah.That's a huge part of it too.

(49:06):
Now that I'm good, it's goingto turn supposed to be there. That's
where KAF starts every fall camp withthis is first rule is you we're supposed
to be We're you're supposed to bethere. Yeah, that's that. I
just I wish I say this alltime in my in my life and being
around you know, kids and allthat stuff, nieces and nephews. I
I wish the good coaches did it. I wish the all the middle of

(49:31):
the road coaches would tell you thelife lesson you just learned from that action.
Hey, you relate to practice today? Did you run? Yes?
But you're gonna either lose a jobor you're gonna do this later in life
if you're consistently late. I've youknow, Hey, you've funneled the ball
twelve times, right. I there'salways going to be an excuse. But

(49:53):
your teammates are going to foolk atyou as unaccountable, so they're not going
to bring you in. They're notgoing to bring you in on work.
They're not going to bring you inon projects, and you've got to look
and teach every life lesson. SoI wish the good coaches did, right,
I can tell you who they are. I just wish in most athletics
that big twenty to eighty percent ofthe coaches would teach that because you learn

(50:17):
more, in my opinion, aboutfrom sports than life. Ever, that's
interesting because I think when they Ithink when you don't tell tell a player
or an athlete why there was aconsequence or what lesson you're learning in a
certain situation, it leaves their mindup to a lot of their own interpretation

(50:38):
of that. Uh oh, hebeing hard on me, he doesn't like
me, He's being a dick.I'm getting singled out. You know,
I'm not getting fair treatment. Wetalked a lot about, you know,
there's a lot of that stuff thatwent on with the with the Doyle stuff
in twenty twenty. Again, foranybody listening, I recognized that there was

(50:59):
other stuff that was legitimate too,But there was a lot of that from
a lot of our teammates on andthey just thought that they were getting unfair
treatment or they were getting singled outfor you know, there was just a
personal dislike there was there was apersonal vendetta against them, and I don't

(51:19):
listen. I will never be aperson to tell you how you feel about
a situation. So like, Ican't speak for them and what they received
or what they felt, that's notmy position. But what I would tell
them if they were my friend ormy son is what did you learn from
this? Good, bad, andugly? What did you learn from this
situation? Right now? So let'steach how you're going to get better in
life, whether you're a husband,a friend, you know, or a

(51:43):
businessman or a coworker, Like,what did we learn? Don't just self
loathe from it, learn from yeah, because if you don't, then it's
just it's just worthless. It's yeah, it's a waste of time. Yeah,
you said you almost quit, likeyou legitimately sat there in the LC
like thinking, fuck, I gottatalk to coach. I'm gonna tell them

(52:04):
I'm hanging it up. So thatspring is when I switched to D line.
Okay, so after the freshman season, correct, So that was really
that was after springball through that wastough. You went through the season.
Your first season's a blur, right, Hey, this is what I'm here
for. Bloom. Then after theseason, you get into the winter program

(52:24):
and all this stuff, and itbecomes dark super early. And then you
get right into springball and you're wakingup as a true freshman at five am,
coming home to the dorms at tenpm. And then spring hit and
I switched to D line, andI was super depressed about it. And

(52:46):
then all of a sudden, theweather got nice and I coming home from
class at one point thirty, gonnawalk out of the door at two o'clock
to go to springball meetings, andthere's a sand volleyball with thirty people,
twenty girls in bikinis and this,that and the third and I'm and I've
got eight hours left in my dayright now. I was, and this

(53:07):
is not what college is supposed tobe like. So, yeah, I
had a rough time that spring switchingfrom D line. The schedule and the
grind caught a hold of me.Yeah, there was a lot of negative
thoughts. I had to get throughit. Yeah, just just kind of
grit your teeth and get through it. Or is there my brother? I
called my brother. I was like, do what am I doing? What?

(53:28):
Because he played d Line. Hewas, like I said, he
was a two time All American atWarburg D Line. Hey, what like,
what do I do? Blah blah. And he just reminded me like
we got a tattoo on our chestor I do anyways, And it was
a quote he gave me my beforeI went to college, and it was
you give what you give for whatyou don't give is lost forever. This

(53:51):
day will never come again, right, And I take that into every situation,
like, hey, you you're theonly person that can say I gave
it my all. You have toput your head on your pillow at night,
you have to tell your wife andkids that you worked your tail off
to earn the mortgage that day orwhatever it may be. You're the only
one that can say, could Ihave worked harder? And that's the mentality
that I try to walk into.And that's what he reminded me, is

(54:14):
like, hey, we've been apussy sometimes sometimes that's all that's really all
it comes down to. Right,It's just like cowboy, the fuck up.
It's not that hard. You canget you can do this. There's
a lot of people that have beenthrough a lot tougher ship in their lives.
We that a question. With thatquestion, it's tough when you walk
by that Sam volleyball court though,did you you guys weren't at Hillcrest?

(54:37):
Were you was built by then?No, we were in the process a
third to last uh freshman class togo through. I think I love them.
I think Hillcrest was the ship.Dude, Oh some of the I
got so many memories from Hillcrest.It's just oh yeah, I get like

(55:00):
some of my fondest memories were absolutelyabsolutely yes, yes, and we don't
have to do I know, memoriesare yeah, just imagination. Drake and
I. I was roommates with Drake, the guy that I talked about,
and we considered like staying another year. You had the option to state like
once you left the dorms, youhad to you couldn't come back, but

(55:22):
if you stayed in the dorms foryour sophomore year, you could continue to
live there. And two years Istayed. Yeah. Yeah, So Drake
and I legitimately were like, shouldwe do another year in Hillcrest like we
thought, we thought about it.Yeah, I bet the sophomore running back
and Hillcrest would be even better.Telling you, man, we had one

(55:44):
of the handicap rooms. I shouldn'tsay this probably on this podcast. We
had one of the handicap rooms thathad the shower and sitter in the room.
What. Yeah, we had anen suite in our room. It
was the So you don't know aboutpaying in the sink then, oh yeah,
yeah, so you still pete inthe sink even though you had my
first year, that was my secondyear and we had the anybody who's ever

(56:07):
been to Hillcrest nos you just gotto Yeah. I can't remember who it
was. I can't remember who itwas, but he woke up, he
was on my team. He wokeup in the middle of the night and
some girl was squatting down on topof his sink. Obviously he didn't live
with the girl in the door untunately. Yeah, I've broke in started peeing
in that situation as well too.Yeah, that's uh, it's funny how

(56:31):
the stories are all the same.Yeah. Did you guys ever fill the
trash cans up and lean him againstthe doors because they open in filled the
trash can with water, knock onsome door and never did that? Never
did that? We did that everyday, every day, every day.
Oh yeah, yeah, well,they always teammates are just random people.

(56:52):
I mean, everybody in the hallwaysthat we knew, they weren't always teammates.
Yeah, that's awesome. Man.We used to steal bananas from the
steal We used to take the bananasfrom the treatment center or whatever, the
food center and let him rot onour windowsill, and then we'd open our

(57:13):
dorm doors and we'd throw it againstother people's doors, so they'd be rotten
bananas smashed against all of them.It's incredible. Yeah, that's incredible.
When you when did it finally startto feel like you transition to d line
and like, do you remember lookingfor you? Yeah? Do you remember

(57:37):
a moment when you're like maybe Ibelong, Like maybe I can get this
done. My freshman year, thefirst game I started was against Nick Mangold.
I mean, if you guys knowthe name he used the first round,
he's gonna be a first ballot Hallof Famer. He just oh,
he tossed me every way but theright way, and that was your welcome

(57:57):
to college football moment. Yeah,it was awful and by but by the
end of that season my freshman year, we went up to Wisconsin for Barry
Alvarez his last game, and Iwas the Big Ten Player of the Week
that week, and it just itwas awesome. Every time I put my
hands on a guy, I couldtell where the ball was going just by
his you know, his body languageand his tilting is pressured getting off the

(58:21):
ball. We were making plays andwe beat him. It was like the
first time I've heard jump around.It was just awesome. And that was
like, Hey, I think Ibelong on this stage, right, I
think I could make it work.So is that one of your fonder memories?
Like what? It was like astorybook? The what the It was
like a two thirty or three thirtygame going into dusk, started missing and

(58:44):
then they started playing jump around.I'm on the fifty yard line, jumping
around, pumping the crowd up.It was that was that to win the
Big Ten Championship? That game?Was that the Big Ten Championship? No,
the next week was that? Andthat would in two thousand and five?
Oh four, right, yes,five five five, five thousand and

(59:04):
five. Yeah, man, Soand then you played and then he played,
Uh, you played all four Youplayed four years and by the time
you were a senior, obviously youreally had you like, You're like,
okay, if I understand what I'mdoing though, and to the extent of
like I'm a first team All American. Yeah, I mean was that like
in the was that like a goalor did that just you just kind of

(59:28):
nose down, head down, andthen all of a sudden you look up
and senior year, like, I'vemade a lot of progress here. This
is where I'm at. My freshmanyear, I made Freshman All American.
And when that hit, I justremember thinking, hey, now, let's
Chad Greenway came up to me andI was sitting in my locker and he
goes and he had just made firstteam All American. Right, so I

(59:51):
was freshman All American. I'm downhere and he's the first team All American
and he and he basically said,hey, don't get don't get a fucking
ego, and hey, come talkto me when you're a first team All
American, not a freshman All American. Yes, he was kind of a
dick about it. I love Chad, but it got me. It lit
a fire in my ass that Iwasn't going to be content just by having

(01:00:13):
a little bit of a success myfirst year. I love that We had
chat on too on the pod andhe's awesome. Oh he's yeah, he's
a great man. And we needhis daughter. We need his daughter.
I think we'll get all their daughters. All of them are going to be
five star athletes. We need it, we need them all. We need
all in the black and gold.His daughters scored like forty eight thousand points

(01:00:35):
and she's going into just her junioryear at high school. Yeah, crazy,
Grant pop in here. We don'twant to take up too much of
this man. Signed. This iswhen I let Grant finally speak. Uh,
he answered, He asked a coupleof questions and then I'm excited to
hear it. Yeah. Oh so. Uh So, when I looked up
Mitch King football on YouTube, uh, there's a video that had a speech

(01:00:59):
of your is in it from thetwo thousand and nine Outback Bowl. I'm
curious, like the contexts that you'retalking about, like Hawkeye pride and stuff.
What was this speech improvised one ordid you know you're gonna give it?
What's kind of like the backstory tothis? So, I mean you
guys obviously no Farens. He's like, Hey, we're a team. Track
suit guy, or you're you know, we're dressed up for team meetings.

(01:01:21):
We had you go to a bowlgame in the first day you have,
whether both teams come together, it'slike for that. But Outback Bull sponsored
it, out Back Steakhout sponsored it. Just the media day with both teams,
blah blah. So we're wearing theHawkeye track suit, we're sitting down,
and then South Carolina walks in andit was it looked like they pulled
one hundred and twenty dudes off thestreet. And I'm not saying in any

(01:01:44):
just none of them matched, noneof them looked like a team. It
was literally, hey, let's goto the mall, pick up one hundred
and twenty dudes and bring him toa luncheon. It was just not professional
in my opinion. And then,you know, Bull Week, you run
into the guys and your as whatever, and then I just I don't That's

(01:02:05):
where it all started. That wasthe backstory of it. And I was
proud to be a Hawkey. I'mlike, listen, we're representing you guys.
Blah blah blah blah. That wasBut to answer your other question,
that was not improvised, Gary Dolphingot me all shook up and hot to
bother right before I got on there, and then I just kind of took
a turn. Gary Dolphin, awesomeguy with podcast a few times. He's

(01:02:25):
looking for a partner, and hesaid he wants a defensive player from the
kf era. Can we throw yourname? I think Mitch threw his name
in the in the hat on Twitter? Did you? I don't know if
I can say this. Hopefully don'tget me fired before I'm hired. I
got a second round interview next weekfor it. Well, good luck who

(01:02:51):
you're interviewing against. Any other namesout there that you want to leak?
I know, No, I'm notgonna leak anybody. I know at least
put another guy Ford percent certain.Yeah, we won't with that, We
wont. You can put them inthe chat just for our eyes and then
we can we can ask him ina second here. Yeh, Well,

(01:03:14):
we don't want to. I'm I'mI'm if I got that. I'm pretty
excited, Like I haven't had somethingto filled a passion cup like this could
be for me for a long time, so I'm really excited for that.
That would be sick. Uh,yeah, that would be and that would
be one heck of a gig.That would be something it'll be interesting to
hear as just a consumer of theproduct, Gary with somebody else, So

(01:03:37):
it's it's gonna be yeah. Sothis next round, we're doing a simulated
broadcast, so we're gonna sit infront of a TV with pull up on
the games from last year and kindof just go back and forth in front
of a TV. So that's cool, man, I've got to get the
game. Do you get to doa little homework or are they going to
give you a random game? Idon't know yet. They said they probably
will let me know the game,so they haven't ye. Well, yeah,

(01:04:01):
we appreciate you coming on and talkingto us. You know, I
appreciate it. I've been a fanfrom Afar, my wife. My wife
goes. So they think you're washedup? What's the name? Why are
you washed up? I am washedup, that's for damn sure. We've
had some very very not washed uppeople on this podcast, so we are
the ones that are washed up.Although we try to stay athletic around here,

(01:04:29):
but yeah, we try to bringthe good job. I know you
you know you're doing the social mediaso coaching and all that stuff. Yeah.
So for me, Kevin, likeyou said, does med sales and
Grant just does all this for freeand just we work them to the bone.
For me, this is we'll callit almost fifty percent of like really,

(01:04:53):
yeah, how I make money?So awesome, it's really cool.
We never had the idea that itwould even understand or have when we started
this. It was like we werejust pissed that we didn't play anymore,
and we wanted to talk to eachother once a week, uh and about
Iowa football. And we were like, hey, maybe fans would listen to

(01:05:15):
this because we kind of know alot about Iowa football. And they did
listen to it, and it gotbig enough to the point where it's like,
you know, then you have guyslike you who own businesses who want
to run sponsorships or ads, andpeople want merchandise and all this other stuff.
So enough to the point where peoplestarted getting upset at some of the
things. We say, yeah,yeah, we get we ruffle feathers now

(01:05:39):
and again on the online so andnow we that was I mean, this
September, it'll be six years thatwe've been doing. So, yeah,
you've carved out a niche for yourself. Guys, I think, I mean,
I think it's going well. Ithink what kind of business it is.

(01:06:00):
I'm just a fan, but yeah, you should be always, always
trying to increase the business side ofthings. But uh, it only happens
because people like you answer their messagesand say, yeah, sure, I'll
come talk to you for an hour, So we appreciate you obliging them.
Yeah, no, guys, Iappreciate it. You got me, you
know, got me all excited again. Should I get to talk about how

(01:06:21):
I way you talk about Hillcrest?That'll get you excited any day. I
bet Hillcress gets bought up in myfriend group once a month, maybe once
every other month in a conversation ofjust something. So yeah, yeah,
Well for everybody listening out there,I hope you guys enjoyed it. We

(01:06:43):
will be back again next week,hopefully with another guest. I got to
keep finding guests for the summer herein the dry season before the season rolls
round. I hope you enjoyed Mitch. We'll talk to you guys next time.
Till then, peace. Gentlemen,Hey, thanks for listening to the
show. If you want more,you can check us out on Twitter,
Facebook, Instagram and YouTube by searchingWashed Up walk Ons, and if you're
interested in supporting the show, headover to patreon dot com slash washed Up

(01:07:06):
walk Ons, where you can findbonus podcasts, merchandise, and other cool
perks. Best part, half ofyour subscription benefits the kids at UI Children's
Hospital. We'll see you next time. Hawks buy a million

All Episodes

Mitch King | WUW 520

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

1. Stuff You Missed in History Class

2. Dateline NBC

3. Crime Junkie

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Mitch King | WUW 520