Super Bowl Highs and Heatbreaks with Larry Fitzgerald

DAVID GREENE, HOST: From WHYY and PRX, this is Sports in America. And what you’re gonna be hearing today is the type of show we plan to bring you every week from here on out. We’re gonna get started talking for a little bit about all the things you need to know about sports this week.

Are you a fan like me? If you are, I promise you’re going to feel seen. If you’re a non-fan, well, it is our job to make you feel right at home, at least to make you feel prepared to sound smart as hell when someone wants to start talking to you suddenly about sports. And this week, sports means the Super Bowl. So after that, we’re going to dive deep into a conversation all about the moments and relationships that shape a career in sports. And today we’re gonna be talking to one of the best wide receivers to ever play in the NFL, but to never win a Super Bowl and that is Larry Fitzgerald. But first, let’s get to this week. I am joined by two of the most fantastic people who speak about sports often, Madeline Hill and Charlotte Wilder. They host the athletics Sports Gossip show. They are both NFL fans, and one of them is very happy this week. Charlotte, I think that’s you, right?

CHARLOTTE WILDER: Well, yes, David, thank you for reminding me how happy I am about my Patriots playing in the Super Bowl

DG: Do you need to be reminded? (Laughs)

CW: Well, every once in a while, I’ll be walking around, and I’m like, “Oh my God, they’re in the Super Bowl again.” And it’s a beautiful moment.

DG: It doesn’t feel real?

CW: No.

DG: You did, and we’re gonna, I do wanna play this video that you recorded of yourself right after the Pats beat the Broncos and moved on.

CHARLOTTE WILDER IN A VIDEO: I can’t believe it! The New England Patriots, ladies and gentlemen, are going back to the Super Bowl! You told me at the beginning of the season, I can’t believe this. This is so crazy, I really can’t believe, oh look at Vrabel. Look at Mike! (Crying) Am I actually getting emotional?

CW: Poor Madeline had to film me at the Wildcard Game.

MADELINE HILL: I did, I did, and I loved every minute of it.

CW: Well, you’re too kind, truly.

DG: Do you? You’re a Bills fan, right, Madeline?

MH: I am, I am like I say on the show, I’m a lifelong Bill’s fan as of this season. I say I have a group of fans called Bill’s Madfia, not Bill’s Mafia.

DG: Bill’s Madfia?

MH: Yes. Bill’s Madfia.

DG: What is the difference?

MH: As in Madeline.

DG: Oh, as in Madeline, okay, yeah, they’re your crew.

MH: They’re my crew. They’re my crew. They’re a crew of maybe our listeners who also are Bill’s fans. Yeah, I went to the University of Georgia, and I feel like energetically going to Georgia and constantly being disappointed right at the end, as of a few years ago. Now Georgia is good. But there was a long period where they were not very good at playing football, and so we were constantly disappointed as fans, and that is very similar to the experience I feel as a Buffalo Bills fan.

CW: I would say you just missed rooting for bad Georgia teams. You’re such a masochist sports-wise. When you were raised in that, you were like, I need another team that’s just not going to do it.

MH: Yes, that’s true.

DG: So this video Charlotte, what are we hearing? Like you sound like this was one of the most, the most wonderful moments of your entire life. Is that exaggerating?

CW: Well, you know, I did love getting married, but it, no I’m just kidding! (Laughs).

DG: (Laughs) I’m sure your partner loves hearing that, yeah.

CW: Yeah, well, he’s used to it. He’s a New York fan, so that shows you how strong our relationship really is.

DG: Jesus. Yeah. That’s almost as much as like a Bill’s fan and Pat’s fan doing a podcast together, but yeah.

MH: True.

CW: I would like, I like to think that we have really healthy relationships all around.

MH: We do.

CW: But yeah, I think part of it is I was just not expecting this at all of the season for the Patriots to be good.

DG: Right.

CW: For Drake May to have the kind of season that he’s had for the team. We talk all the time on the show about vibes. The vibes with the Patriots have just felt so good, and football is such a team sport. And I think we talk a lot on the show about how people kind of forget that at the end of the day, sports are companies, and the companies that are successful are the ones with a good culture where people have bought into the mission, where they feel supported by management, which coach Mike Vrabel has done an amazing job. And so to see that, and it feels like it’s kind of saged the building of some of the weirdness of the way things ended with Tom Brady and the way Bill Belichick kind of ran the team into the ground. And it was just, I think we probably should have had to suffer for more than five years, but I’m happy to be back.

DG: We all, we all, I think, kind of think that you should have suffered for longer than five years.

CW: Yes.

DG: But it’s interesting you’re saying that because it is a reminder that sports is business, and as much as it pains me to say this, and I, you know, I love an organization, the Steelers, that I think have, over decades has done a pretty good job of running their business. You’re saying that this speaks to the Patriots as a business. They figured out a way to find success again, not long after you lost a future Hall of Fame coach and a future Hall of Fame quarterback.

CW: Yeah. Yeah. And it, you know, our show, we focus a lot on PR and also environments that people find themselves in.

DG: Yeah, Madeline, I wonder, I mean, this is the moment, and this is where I’m sure even non-fans can relate to a very human experience. Like you and I sit here with teams, not in the Super Bowl. We are feeling a range of emotions: jealousy, resentment, bewilderment. I don’t know, what is it? You had to film your friend celebrating going to a Super Bowl, which is a place that the Bills have never really found much success.

MH: No, it’s like being dangled a present in front of your face, and you can’t reach it to unbox it. (Laughing) It is a very painful feeling. Personally, it is a painful feeling, of course, as a lifelong Bill’s fan. But I will say, for the success of our show, it’s better that the Patriots are in the Super Bowl, I think.

DG: Oh, interesting.

MH: I think from a narrative perspective, we’ve been talking since the beginning of this season about how strong the vibes are with the Patriot, as Charlotte mentioned. And so for us, I think it’s better for the show that we were right with our prediction that the vibes are strong enough that they could potentially go all the way to the Super Bowl and said very early on, I think even before the playoffs started, that I think the Patriots could go all the way, even though I love the Bills. I knew selfishly for the show, it made more sense to have the Patriots in it, I think, from a narrative perspective.

CW: And I think too that there’s something, yeah, I guess validating about, we do this show, we talk about off-the-field stories, impacting on the field’s stories. I was in sports media, traditional sports media, for 10 years before starting to do this. This is really the first show I’ve been a part of where I felt like, oh, this is fully me. Like, I’m not putting on a mask and talking about sports the way that men in executive positions think that I should be talking about sports. It’s like. I’m talking about sports the way I talked to, you know, my best friend, Madeline, about sports. Like, this is just like, this is very real. And I think that our, on the field, our perceptions of what we see just in body language between players, or you hear a speech, or you see Mike Vrabel offer hugs when they all come off the field. It’s very validating to say, like, sure, you can analyze the stats. You can talk about whether they should have gone for two, but at the end of day, these are people. And it’s really cool, I think, to feel like our read on a situation based on very human elements that you could call gossip is actually as valid in terms of predicting outcomes as running the numbers.

DG: Yes. Say more about that because vibes, you know, it’s not just a word to you both. I mean, as you were just saying, you really feel like vibes in the sports world can mean success or failure, and vibes are also such a relatable thing that we, you know, we can think about in our own lives and our own successes and failures. So I mean, what is it about the Seahawks? What is it about the Patriots? What is it about their vibes that makes it unsurprising that this is the matchup that we have?

MH: Yeah. Well, I think to take a step back, something we started doing at the beginning of the season was we did weekly vibes-based predictions for NFL games, and very quickly we realized we were getting above 500 in terms of accuracy with our predictions solely based on the vibes of the team. And I think the through line and the thing we realized was that these off-the-field storylines, and to Charlotte’s point, body language, whether a coach is giving a high fives to all the players after a game, really did have an impact on on-the-field performance. It just felt like there wasn’t a space really besides our show, I think in traditional sports media, where people were giving validation to the vibes as a way to predict an outcome of a game. And so I think going into the Super Bowl, I won’t speak for your Patriots; you can speak for their vibes. But I think the Seahawks also have similarly good vibes. There’s really good vibes between the players. You can see after every play, they’re celebrating. Their fan base in Seattle. I mean, just watching those games.

DG: Wild. They are wild people.

MH: Yeah, unbelievable. It is so loud, and it feels like those fans do not stop cheering until the game is over. And I think that that really has an impact on one of the main reasons why they’re in the Super Bowl.

CW: And I also think with the quarterback like Sam Darnold, who’s been discounted again and again and again, he was with the Vikings, the Vikings decided they didn’t want to keep them in favor of their young guy JJ McCarthy. Sam D’Arnold has turned out to be an incredibly effective passer, and you know this is coming from a guy who is sort of stuck with the Jets, where he got mono, you know, like the vibes are not good, and I think that part of what the Seahawks and the Patriots have in common… Well, no, scratch that. I think with Sam Darnold being underestimated, that can be a very powerful thing to fuel you. Also, Cooper Kupp, one of their wide receivers, has been in the league for a long time. They’ve talked about how he’s been a leader that players like Jaxon Smith-Nijigba have been able to learn from. It’s just like they have the markings of a good organization, and I, as a Pats fan, I am scared of them.

DG: Yeah, I think you should be, but I mean that you’re right, the vibes on both sides, they really do feel special. I guess I wonder what should we be telling people to look for in this game when it comes to vibes, and I mean, you talk about like a head coach, like high-fiving players when they come off the field, like what sort of things do you measure?

CW: I’m going to let Madeline speak to the specifics, but it just occurred to me that if anyone listening is having trouble identifying with what we’re talking about, it’s kind of like when you go to a wedding, and you can tell whether this is a good idea or not.

DG: (Laughs) We all know that! Yes! Yes!

CW: And you can tell how people feel about it on either side of the aisle. You just get a feeling. If you watch enough sports, you get the wedding spidey sense.

DG: Yes, you’re totally right.

MH: No, that’s a great analogy, you know? No, but I do think some things to look out for besides the high-fiving is something that we noticed at the Patriots playoff game. Who are they playing?

CW: The Chargers.

MH: The Chargers, that we attended in person. One thing we noticed was that every single play, the players on the sidelines for the Patriots were cheering on and high-fiving their teammates in the same way that I remember I used to roll my eyes when I played volleyball as a kid. When my coach would say, “Every play, you’ve got to cheer everyone on. High five everyone when you get off the court.” It kind of is annoying, but I do think it helps a lot with vibes and momentum. So I would say that, I think you can also tell a lot by, like, the eye movement of the quarterback, which sounds really specific, but something we talked about early this season was how Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelsey didn’t seem to have good eye contact on the field together. Obviously, they did not end up making it in the playoffs, and I think a lot of that had to do with just sort of off vibes, you could say, with how they were kind of looking at each other, giving glances to each other. So I certainly think that’s another way. And then also how the wives and girlfriends of the players interact with each other. The Patriots, in particular, their quarterback, Drake Maye, and his wife, Anne Michael Maye, post a lot of content, baking content. I’m sure you might’ve seen the Bakemas content she did.

DG: Oh yeah, she did.

MH: But all the WAGS hang out together. They play mahjong together. And I think when there’s cohesion within the personal lives of these athletes, you can see that there’s better vibes on the field with those players.

DG: You have to tell for people who don’t know what WAGS means because I love the, I love the term in sports.

MH: Yeah, WAGS means wives and girlfriends of professional sports players, I guess you could say.

CW: Yes, and then there’s also HABS, husbands and boyfriends, which is as women’s sports, more and more people are watching. It’s important that you know, WAGS, HABS. Or WAGS WAGS. You know, it depends.

DG: WAGS, WAGS, HABS, HABS, yeah, I mean, it can be, yeah, all encompassing these terms and important. Can you just say a little more about kind of your show and you mentioned like coming from traditional sports journalism. I now look at the two of you as sports journalists, but who are really seeking a connection with a much bigger audience. Like what is, think about it, reflect on a week like this heading to the Super Bowl, and sort of what that means?

CW: Well, thank you, David. That means a lot. I think when I was in traditional sports media, something that I noticed was, like, none of my friends and family really listened to the shows I did because they didn’t know who I was talking about. And it felt like we were just leaving a huge swath of potential fans on the table. When I started working in sports, I didn’t know anything about sports. Like, I didn’t know who Kevin Durant was 10 years ago. And then I just sort of was like drinking from a fire hose, and I figured it out. And I realized how many conversations, especially male-dominated spaces, I’ve been cut out from. So on our show, we really try to qualify who people are so that people feel included. And it’s like, you can learn the characters, and once you know the characters of a story, the story becomes that much more interesting.

DG: I love that.

MH: Yeah, and I think another thing we do on our show is try to use sports as a way to explain other issues. A recent episode we did, we did a deep dive on Tom Brady’s Instagram presence. He’s been in the news lately for things he’s been sharing on his Instagram story. And we did a full deep dive on his Instagram strategy, what it meant for his retirement through the lens of a sociological study, so to speak, with, and we rooted it in a theoretical framework. I did my master’s in sociology. And so we did this really intense deep dive into the type of content he was sharing, what the significance of it was within his career, within his personal life, within the broader sports world at large. And so I think that’s something we try to do as well, is try to use sports as a way to explain other things that are going on in the world that have some sort of sports connection to them.

CW: Yeah

DG: All right, coming up next, Charlotte Wilder and Madeline Hill, and I are gonna talk a little bit about their planned trip to the Super Bowl, which is happening, and then we’re gonna get to our conversation with one of the best wide receivers in the history of the game, Larry Fitzgerald. That’s coming up next on Sports in America.

All right, welcome back to Sports in America. I am here with Charlotte Wilder and Madeline Hill from The Athletic’s Sports Gossip show. We are getting ready for Super Bowl 60 together, and, like, we’re seriously getting ready for Super Bowl 60\. You both are going, right?

MH: Yes!

DG: Is this your first?

MH: This is my first Super Bowl, but Charlotte is a veteran.

CW: This is my seventh, which is kind of crazy. (Laughs)

DG: Were you planning to go before you knew the Pats would be in it? Like, this is just…

MH: Yeah, this is just divine. That’s what I’m saying. This is so much better for our show that the Patriots are in the Super Bowl. It was like, again, it was a gift from the football gods for us.

DG: Yeah. You know, I wonder, I mean, you both are going, this event is amazing. You as, you know, journalists can decide to go to a Super Bowl to cover it. I mean, I’m not saying like tickets are freely available and anyone can go anytime. But I wonder about the experience for players because you know I think about Drake Maye, the Pats quarterback, and Sam Darnold, the Seahawks quarterback, and all these other players, maybe many of whom haven’t been on this big stage. It’s like, particularly someone like Drake Maye. Young. The Pats, you all are kind of playing on house money. Like you weren’t supposed to be here. You can convince yourself like we have, you know, a decade or more with Drake Maye, we’ll be back, but do you ever know you’ll be back and it’s like the pressure on these players to get so close and then if you lose, you might never get that chance for a Lombardi again that has to be weighing on them.

CW: Something that a lot of players talk about is how shocking it is when you’re actually there. And even something as simple as like the halftime show, which is longer than a traditional halftime break. They talk about the importance of like, physically what you have to do to stay active during that time, what you have to eat, how you have mentally stay locked in, how hard it can be. Like, I don’t think you know until you go there, but I also think you can’t really be a professional football player without assuming you’ll be back. You have to have a competitive mindset that is so insanely intense in levels that like civilians can’t understand to be able to do this.

MH: I think another thing, too, that’s interesting, besides just the game and preparing for the game, is the week leading up to the Super Bowl. You know, the work for these players starts, I believe, Monday morning. I remember seeing a photo. I think that it’s like a media photo, and it’s all the Patriots players lined up, and they’re in their matching sweatsuits. And the look on some of these players’ faces is just like, “Oh, my goodness. What have I gotten myself into for this week?” I mean, it is like a full event, a week-long event. There’s interviews. There’s a lot of events that some players are required to go to. I mean, there’s a a lot happening. So I think it’s more than even just how they feel going into the game, but it’s everything else leading up to it as well.

CW: And you’re in a random hotel ballroom for team meetings. You’re going to practice in a place you’ve maybe never practiced before. Like it’s a really, it’s I think very disorienting experience. And I think often that’s why people say that teams that have Super Bowl experience do have a leg up, just because they know how to manage the weirdness of the whole thing.

DG: Yeah, and you’re right, it’s such a different game, so hard because of everything else around it, the meetings, the press, the media, the everything, to focus on the actual football, but so much at stake for both of these teams and both rosters.

CW: Which, sorry, as we’re talking about this, I feel like maybe the Patriots have a leg up here because Mike Vrabel as a leader is so good at keeping the main thing the main thing. And he is very good at being no-nonsense and locking out noise and getting his players to do the same. So I sort of feel like, given the noise around the Super Bowl, the Patriots might actually, vibes-wise, have the edge.

DG: You are definitely scared of the Seahawks and looking for reasons to feel confident. You are definitely scared (Laughs)

CW: (Laughs) Sorry that Mike Vrabel’s won three Super Bowls.

DG: There is that. Charlotte Wilder and Madeline Hill from the sports gossip show from The Athletic hope you both will come back. This was really fun. Thanks for getting us ready for the Super Bowl week.

MH: Thank you so much for having us.

CW: A pleasure, David. Thanks.

DG: All right. It was fun talking to them, and I do really hope they come back. So the point that Charlotte made there about you can’t really be an elite NFL player without believing that this won’t be your only Super Bowl. You have to think that you’re going to get back onto this stage at some point. That totally makes sense, but it’s not always the case, and it is a reality that a lot of NFL players need to face. So, as we get ready for Super Bowl 60, let’s travel back in time together to Super Bowl 43.

[MUSIC]

LARRY FITZGERALD: Everything is literally just swirling through your head when you’re in those moments.

BROADCASTER: Raymond James Stadium in Tampa.

LF: All the good things that could have happened and the bad things that can happen

BROADCASTER: The buildup is over, and away we go in Super Bowl 43.

LF: It’s one of those moments you kind of dream of when you’re in the backyard with your dad, throwing passes and catching balls and tapping your toes.

BROADCASTER: Cardinals in the Super Bowl for the first time ever.

LF: And you could see the people in the stands, they were on the edge of their seat. So that even added to the suspense.

BROADCASTER: Pittsburgh seeking an unprecedented sixth Super Bowl title.

LF: I remember going in as an overwhelming underdog to the Pittsburgh Steelers.

BROADCASTER: When the number one defense plays in the Super Bowl, the result is normally terrific, and that’s the case here, the Steelers number one-ranked defense

LF: And the whole stadium is black and gold, literally. It was a 75-25 Steelers crowd, and we have to have that in the bunker mentality, and there’s nobody there who’s gonna be pulling for us, so we had nothing to lose in that game.

[THEME MUSIC]

DG: So this is Larry Fitzgerald there; he played his entire 17-season career with the same team, the Arizona Cardinals. He made the Pro Bowl a bunch of times, 11 times, I mean, that’s ridiculous. His last season was in 2020, but the moment that lives with him came over a decade prior to that, and that was February 1st, 2009.

[CHEERING]

LF: That experience for me was something that I’ll always remember.

BROADCASTER: Tampa, Florida Super Bowl 43\. Al Michaels and John Madden with you. What a game twists and turns.

DG: So, Fitzgerald, I mean, he is considered one of the greatest receivers ever in the NFL. He is second behind Jerry Rice on the NFL’s all-time receiving yards and receptions list. He’s expected to be a first ballot Hall of Famer. That’s just a no-brainer, but this game, this game turned out to be his only shot at a Super Bowl ring.

[MUSIC]

LF: Just the pageantry, just the magnitude, and to finally be able to play in one and earn the right to get into that game.

DG: It’s a matchup between star quarterbacks, Ben Roethlisberger of the Steelers and Kurt Warner of the Cardinals.

BROADCASTER: This is what the NFL is. This is a heavyweight championship fight.

DG: A heavyweight championship fight, yes. And I will tell you, I had my favorite fighter in the ring. As you might have gathered by now on this show, the Pittsburgh Steelers are my team. I bleed black and gold. Yes, I wave a terrible towel at Steelers bars every Sunday. I am that guy. So yeah, I remember this game like it was yesterday. The Steelers were ahead most of the game, aided by that insane, incredible play in the final moments of the first half. The Cardinals are on the one-yard line. It’s looking like they’re gonna score. Quarterback Kurt Warner has the ball.

[CHEERING]

BROADCASTER: Here they come, he gets it away, and it’s picked off at the goal line. James Harrison to run it back. Harrison is going to go all the way. It’s a 100-yard interception return.

DG: Yet James Harrison rumbled the length of the field. I can still see it. I’ve watched this replay like hundreds of times. So the Steelers from there keep the lead most of the game, but the Cardinals, with just a few minutes left in the fourth quarter, have a chance to take the lead.

LF: They would play two-man, it’s where two safeties are deep in the middle of the back, and they have like their sides of the field, and the defenders underneath try to keep it from going into the middle field, so we knew if I was able to win inside, there were some big plays to be had.

BROADCASTER: It’s 7-10.

LF: It’s something that we worked on hundreds and hundreds of times. I was able to get free, and Kurt just hit me in stride.

BROADCASTER: Fitzgerald in the Steelr territory.

LF: The middle of the field was wide open when I caught the pass.

BROADCASTER: 30, 20, 10, Arizona has the lead!

LF: I remember first kind of crossing the goal line and then kind of taking the B line right. And I remember seeing Anquan, my boy and fellow receiver, kind of there to celebrate with me.

BROADCASTER: With 2:37 to play, the Cardinal lead is three.

LF: And I remember kind of jumping into his arms and then a bunch of the guys came, and it was a great moment, one that I won’t forget.

BROADCASTER: This would be the biggest comeback in Super Bowl history.

LF: Just the pure adulation that you have when you’re in those moments. So it was cool, man. It was really, really cool.

DG: Larry Fitzgerald grew up in Minnesota, and as a teenager, he was actually a ball boy for the Vikings. He’s also got some serious Pittsburgh roots because he played two years at the University of Pittsburgh, the Panthers, before he was drafted third overall by the Arizona Cardinals in 2004\. So, yeah, it’s kind of ironic that his biggest career moment came during a game against the Pittsburgh Steelers.

BROADCASTER: There’s no one that does it better than Larry Fitzgerald to go up and get the ball at the highest point, and a defender cannot go as high as he can go.

DG: I want to ask you about your style of play and what you achieve on the field.

BROADCASTER: His hands just go up, and he just plucks the ball out of the air. Very, very strong hand.

DG: That touchdown in the Super Bowl, I mean, you broke through Ryan Clark and Hall of Famer Troy Palamalu.

BROADCASTER: You see the big hole in the middle? But the safeties work to the outside, Fitzgerald in that hole, and he runs right through the defense.

DG: Does that even register that like I am literally speeding past two great safeties on one of the best defenses in years in the NFL? I mean, it’s extraordinary.

LF: I really don’t think about it like that. I mean, we did a great job of scheming up and trying to find the things that they weren’t great at, right? I think in the first half we tried to force the run game, and you know, when Casey Hampton’s on the field and Brett Kiesel and Aaron Smith, LaMarr Woodley, and you’re not gonna blow these guys off the ball. Like this is not what’s gonna happen. They’re from the AFC North. One thing they’re gonna do, they’re going to stop the run, and I think we came in thinking we could do that. We completely changed our game plan in the second half. We’re trying to spread them out and make it a passing game and, you know, try to tire their big guys out. And I think they had a great game plan for us early on, what they were doing and trying to attack us and to limit us to explosive plays. It’s a cat-and-mouse game, just trying to catch them, and something that you can exploit. And we were able to do that in the 2nd half; they were able in the 1st half, but they made the plays when it was most important, and when the chips were on the table, they were able to execute, and we weren’t. That was just the name of the game. Right before the end of the half, we’re in position to score a touchdown. At worst, we kick a field goal. At like, at worst, right? That was the worst-case scenario. And we have a 99-yard interception by a 300-pound man.

BROADCASTER: You know that you have to protect against James Harrison because he’s such a great pass wrestler on that plate.

BROADCASTER: It’s the longest play in Super Bowl history is a one-hundred-yard interception return.

[CHEERING]

DG: There was a guy who should not have been able to rumble 100 yards.

LF: There’s no chance that he, of all people, should have been over the score. That’s the gut punch of all gut punches to know that you couldn’t do something more. All intents and purposes, we cost our team that game with that untimely possession.

DG: We should say you still had a chance to win after you made that incredible 64-yard touchdown catch in the fourth quarter, the one we’ve been talking about. And I, I mean, I can still visualize every moment from this game. And after you scored in the fourth quarter, in those final minutes, I thought that you had the game, the Cardinals had this.

LF: And I thought that was my moment, you know, only to have it snatched away.

DG: Yeah, two minutes, 37 seconds left in the fourth quarter. You’d think Fitzgerald and the Cardinals might have this thing wrapped up, but…

BROADCAST: This is a Super Bowl. Ben Roethlisberger says all bets off!

DG: Then came the other play that, I mean, really robbed you of the Super Bowl ring. 35 seconds left.

BROADCASTER: And it is caught for a touchdown by Holmes! Incredible.

[MUSIC]

DG: Ben Roethlisberger, Big Ben, connects with Santonio Holmes for a touchdown, making it 27- 23 with the extra point. And I mean, I remember the anxiety just waiting as the officials were reviewing that Holmes catch to see if he was in, and did the toe tap to make it a touchdown.

REFEREE: After review, the receiver controlled the football, came down on both toes, inbounds, touchdown…

[CHEERING]

LF: And I remember being on the sideline watching, you know, Ben throw that pass to Santonio and me sitting there envisioning how happy you were watching that on TV or in person or wherever you were celebrating, you know, and just knowing that I was in a lot of despair and heartbreak just so, but it makes me feel good that you were happy though. That’s most important.

DG: (Laughs) I’m not relishing my happiness right now. It’s sort of surreal to be talking to you, having lived through that moment in very different ways.

BROADCASTER: Santonio Holmes nine catches and the game winner.

DG: What about after the game? I mean, what are the sort of first images, memories you have, conversations?

LF: Man, it was, it’s like pure heartbreak, you know, it, it is a feeling of despair and hurt that is really hard to even express, even 10 plus years, You work so very hard to put yourself in that position and you know there is no guarantee and there is a high probability that you will never get back to that position, so you are dealing with the immediate hurt, pain, disappointment of the current moment and then the reality that just you’ll probably never be in this position again. Like that, even kind of like piles on to just, you know, just the agony that you’re feeling, right? And then, you got to go out and kind of try to put on a good face for the family that’s there in town. And it’s a lot, it’s a lot. I’ve never seen that many grown men crying at the same time. You know, it was just, you got a hundred people in that locker room that are just completely just devastated. You know you got 100 people in the opposite locker room who are as happy as anybody can be. So you couldn’t have two different experiences that differ from each other.

DG: Larry Fitzgerald had some of the best hands I’ve ever seen. You watch old highlights. He didn’t just haul in a pass from an impossibly wide radius. He erased really good defensive players with his elite body positioning. He was basically unguardable. I mean, it didn’t seem fair.

When I think of a Larry Fitzgerald catch, it’s like balls in the air, you’re throwing it up, and he’s just gonna get there. He’s gonna come down with it somehow. It’s just going to happen. I mean, is there a catch in your career that stands out in that way where you think back and you’re like, that was my style of catch? That’s what I bring that no one else can.

[MUSIC]

LF: You know, all my best catchers are in practice, actually, you know, they’re locked away, locked away.

DG: (Laughs) We don’t get to see it, okay.

LF: Nobody gets a chance to see, but in a game, I’m going to catch an Oakland where I caught it up against my helmet, you know, trying to hold a defender off. You know, I felt like I was really in awesome control with a couple of defenders around me. I made a couple one-hand catches throughout the years that showed a lot of focus. I think that’s the biggest thing is, I tried to make the most difficult catch to the routine. I practiced them tirelessly every single day to make it routine. And so, you know, if you saw me make a tough catch, it was something I probably had done hundreds of times to prepare myself for that moment, to make sure it was, I wouldn’t say easy, but easier.

DG: Is it practicing, like, the timing? So when we see you like leap up and literally grab, it’s like you’ve gone over the timing in a play like that to just get it right. Like, what are the mechanics that make what you do possible?

LF: I mean, I know what route I’m running. I know when I’m getting the ball in terms of the coverages because the coverage kind of determines where the football is gonna go. And so I understood, you know, okay, it’s cover two, I’m running the big end at 20 yards, and I need to catch this ball two yards inside the numbers. I need to make sure I inside stem them, you know, reset them, keep leverage on the safe. You know, like all these things are goin’ through my mind and I know if that’s the look, that’s I’m the first read, so. I have a general idea. Now, if the safety’s driving down on it a little bit earlier, I know that ball could be back shoulder to me. And so, like, you’re anticipating where the throw can be and what the quarterback’s thinking when you’re running it. And so you have a little bit of insight on, you know, where it could possibly be, and then you just let your natural and physical gifts take over once the ball is in the air. You know, you aren’t worrying about, “Oh, am I gonna jump off the left foot? Am I gonna drop off the right foot? Or am I going to catch it, you know, with my pinkies together? Or am I gonna catch it with my thumbs together?” You’re not thinking about all those things. You just, it’s reactionary. And you just attack it, you see it, and then you catch it, and you try to make somebody miss and get up the field. You can do it a thousand times, but every single time you get in the game, it could be different. But, you know, having a little bit of situational awareness and just confidence can help you pull off a lot of cool things.

BROADCASTER 1: And the blitz of Rutherford picked up nicely, has time to fire one deep Fitzgerald, open!

BROADCASTER 2: A diving catch for a touchdown! Are you kidding me?

DG: I want to ask you about your college days.

ANNOUNCER 1: There he is, folks. That’s the guy.

ANNOUNCER 2: That is a true freshman.

DG: As a Pitt fan myself, I just want you to know what you meant to that program.

ANNOUNCER: Look at this, folks. That is a fantastic football catch. That’s Jerry Rice reincarnate.

DG: To have the best player in college football at the time playing for Pitt, I mean, meant so much, I think, to the university, to the fan base, to the city. Did you feel that weight coming to a program that probably wasn’t going to win the biggest Bowl game, but loves its football and loved you?

LF: Yeah, you know, I loved my experiences at Pitt. It was, it was amazing. The city of Pittsburgh is really unique. It’s such a, it’s a big city, but it has like a real grittiness to it. A blue-collar, hardworking people, not a lot of flashiness. And our team kind of took on that mantra, being tough and gritty. And you know it really kind of toughened me up. It made me a much better player, much more diligent. Hard-working player because that’s kind of what Western Pennsylvania people are all about. You know, you look at the history, I don’t have to tell you about the history, but steel workers working 15-hour shifts and cooking their meals on hot pipes during a five-minute break, and one of Andrew Carnegie’s big steel plants. These people are a hard, tough people, man. They don’t like guys showing off and hot dogging. They like people to be respectful and their athletes to be down-to-earth and approachable. And I got all of that from Pittsburgh, and I got a chance to watch like Jerome Bettis. He’s one of my great mentors, and it’s how he’s always done it. Graduated from Notre Dame just recently this year. You know, he’s just showing a commitment to being a lifetime good person, right? And I’ve got a chance to watch him for two years. Learned a lot from him, and it was great, man. My college experience is one I’ll never forget.

[MUSIC]

DG: You know, I have a terrible towel signed by Bettis. I lost my mom in that Super Bowl year, and I went to the White Hous,e and he signed the terrible towel to my mom, and he is that nice guy. I mean, he’s that nice guys you’re describing, a nice guy for life.

LF: Yeah, I mean, I ain’t no bussy from Adam, right? And, you know, I was in my freshman year when I lost my mom. It was kind of well known that my mom was battling and fighting for her life with her breast cancer. And I remember I was coming in the building, he was leaving, and he said, “Hey, youngster, I’m Jerome.” I said, “Yeah, obviously, I know who you are.” He was like, “Man, I heard about your mother. Hey, I got a suite at Heinz Field. I know it’s getting late in the season. It’s like October. If your mom’s in town and she wants to come and it’s cold and I know she’s going through some things and she wants to sit in my suite for the games, you know, just let me know.” And I remember, you know, for the next three games, and it was like really, really cold, and obviously we couldn’t afford the suites and stuff. He let my mom and some family members sit up in the box, you know, and put food in it, and you know, just over the top, very kind. And I was really moved by guys who do things like that because there was nothing that I could give him at that point. I didn’t have anything to give. All I could give him was a thank you, right? And it wasn’t like I seeked him out. He was looking for me to tell me that. And that’s a guy I wanna be like, I wanna emulate the way he carries himself, the way he plays, the way he treats people. All of those things were really, really great lessons for me at 18, 19, 20 years old to learn. And now he’s one of my closest friends. We spend a lot of time together, and I thank God for that relationship.

DG: Wow, that’s amazing.

LF: Yeah, it was really nice of him.

DG: Coming up, we will continue our conversation with Larry Fitzgerald.

Welcome back to Sports in America. After Larry Fitzgerald’s mom died of cancer while he was in college, he says there were some moments with her in her final years that he wished he could do over.

So you lost her between your freshman and sophomore year, right?

LF: Yeah, I was in the second week of spring football practice when she passed away in April. So yeah, I missed the rest of spring ball and just came back, got back into classes, and tried to find some semblance of normalcy, which took me a while. You losing your mom, you’re reeling for a while, trying to find your new norm, is not easy.

DG: You wrote about this. It’s a really, I mean, it’s an incredibly moving article in The Athletic, and talking about some regrets that you felt. You wrote, “I was a 20-year-old young man with short-sighted vision, focused more on myself and less on those around me.” And you talked about wanting to have been there more for your mom when she was ill. Like what sort of bothered you and what you wish you had done more of?

LF: Well, you know, I was just very selfish at that age. You know, I was only focused on what I was trying to accomplish, and I was more of an out of sight, out of mind person. You know, if I was in front of you talking to you, you would have my full attention, but as soon as I kind of went on to the next thing, it was that. And mom at the bowl game, my freshman year, told me she was disappointed in the way I was kind of conducting myself. I wasn’t handling, you know, my success very well. And you would think most people would just say, “Yeah, mom, I gotta be better. I know I’ve fallen short, and I’m gonna do better,” right? That’s what most people will think. And I went the complete opposite way and is like, “Look, I’m a grown man, I think that I know what I’m doing,” and in a very selfish manner, knowing what she was going through at that time, I chose to go a different path. I mean, I didn’t even speak to her again after that time in January, right? So I went all of February, all of March. And she passed away in April without, you know, having a conversation with her again, cause I was just too stubborn and egotistical. So it was a lot of regret that I was going through after she passed away, and, you know, you have a lot of time of self-reflection that you, you know, you got to look inside yourself and decide who do you want to be? Do you want to be that person? Are you comfortable being that [EXPLETIVE] that you displayed that you were? And then I was like, no, that’s not what I want to be. That’s not who I am. I’m gonna move forward now, and I’m gonna live my life in a way that I know my mom would be proud of me. That’s kind of how my mindset changed. So I took a really, really negative, depressing time and tried to flip it into something that could be a great learning experience.

DG: Well, that’s really powerful. There’s something about a mother-son relationship that not many days go by when I’m not thinking about her somehow. And it can be guilt, it can be regret, it can be anger, it can be joy. I mean, it’s just always there.

LF: Yeah, for sure.

DG: I wanna ask you about you getting your degree years after you left Pitt because it sounds like that was a promise that you had made to your mom.

LF: Mhm.

DG: That’s really inspiring. Why was that important to you to keep that promise and get that diploma?

LF: Well, I mean, it was something that she always harped about was education. Always, she, first question she asked when I talked to her in college. “How are you doing in school? Classes okay? Are you taking advantage of the other academic support staff that, you know, that we talked to during recruiting? I really want you to make the honor roll,” like it was always about education, because I think she realized that education is the one thing that nobody can take from you. Right. I was one step, one hit away from never being able to play again. Somebody hit me on my knee or break my neck, doing something on the football field. You know, I could always still get a job if I was educating myself. And so, you know, I left midway through my sophomore year. She told me long before that, “I don’t care when you go, you can go after your freshman year, after your junior year, senior year. I want you to finish. I want to graduate.” I know it’s something that is important to me, and I wanted to make sure I honored that. And it even came to you from a step before that. My grandfather, God rest his soul, he was, you know, a doctor in Chicago, and he was a campaign manager for Harold Washington. He was the first African-American mayor in the city of Chicago. Remember my grandfather having a little event at his house, and I was probably like in the league five or six years and said, “Larry, come over here. I want to introduce you to some of my buddies.” You know, I come over, and I think he’s gonna go, “This is my grandson, All-Pro wide receiver for the Arizona Cardinals.” No, he goes, “I want you to introduce my grandson. The only one that does not have his college degree.” So it was always very important as a family to make sure we educate ourselves. Voting, making sure that you’re reaching back and helping people in your community that look like you, you know, like those things are all really important in our households.

DG: Larry Fitzgerald may well be the greatest to never win a Super Bowl, but even if it weighed on him, he never let it define him. Instead, he used a legendary career to build a deep relationship with the Arizona community that welcomed him home as a hero.

You have been described by some as maybe the best wide receiver to ever play in the NFL. I don’t disagree with that at all. You stayed in one city your entire career, you brought so much joy to a fan base, and helped that franchise grow. Like you’ve done all the things. Does not having a Super Bowl ring matter that much with a stellar career that you’ve had? Like, what is the difference between having that ring or not?

LF: Well, I mean, obviously, David, I would have loved to win a championship. Does it keep me up at night? Am I hurting and depressed about it right now? No, there’s nothing I can do. I’m one of those people that kind of, it is what it is, this happened. I had the opportunity, I didn’t capitalize on it. Now I kind of have to move forward. But it definitely would have changed, I guess, the perception of my career. I mean, you look at great athletes in team sports who haven’t been able to win a championship. They are kind of in a different category. You know, you look at Charles Barkley or Karl Malone or, you know, guys who have been phenomenal, just no disputing the fact that they are the very best, the tip of the spear, what they were able to accomplish, what they was never able to win it. And so you’re put in a different category, and you just understand that’s kind of part of your journey, one that, you know, even if you complain or are upset about it, it’s not gonna change. So I’m more so just deal with it. And, you know, I take solace in the fact that, you know, as an organization, when I got to Arizona, the Cardinals weren’t that respected. We were not looked at as an organization that had a lot of success or was well run or any of those types of things. And in four short years, we were able to completely transform the way people looked at us and actually respected us. That was great to be a part of that transformation in a very short period of time.

DG: Are there ever, I know you say it doesn’t keep you up at night, are there what-ifs? What if I had had Tom Brady or Aaron Rodgers as my quarterback for a decade? Like maybe we would have had another shot or two to, to win a Super Bowl. Like, do those kinds of things go through your mind?

LF: No, not really. Not really. I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t change the things that I’ve done in Arizona for anything. You know, because realistically, I was able to stay in the same place you mentioned earlier for 17 years. And what that’s done is allow me to really kind of become a part of the fabric of the community in Arizona. So, like, Super Bowl Host Committee would never have happened if I was bouncing around playing in city to city, because nobody would have valued my thoughts or my relationships had I been all over the place, right? I wouldn’t be able to have three restaurants in town. I wouldn’t be minority owner of the Phoenix Suns. I wouldn be able have the relationships that I have with Make-A-Wish, which is headquartered in Arizona, or Boys and Girls Club, Big Brothers, Big Sisters, or Zion Institute, all of these wonderful organizations I’ve been able to align with, and really I feel like do my work in the community if I’ve have been able have an indelible impact on the people that are coming behind me, right? And that’s much bigger in terms of going to Green Bay or going to New England and winning a championship in the long run. So I think it helped me kind of refocus what’s truly important in life, is being a pillar in your community as opposed to winning a championship, where you’re just kind of on the team more important. And, you know, it’s easy for me to say that cause I never won a championship, but I like what the last 20 years have been for me in Arizona.

DG: It’s so funny you bring that up because I mean, it feels like sports in general are going much more towards you bounce from city to city. I mean, and yeah, especially the NBA, but I mean the NFL too. I did you have conversations with your agent over the years where your agent was like, you know, you could go somewhere else, like we’re getting phone calls, and you could go, you know, let’s get you a ring in another on another team?

LF: Yeah, you know what? I never really entertained it. There was opportunities, you know, Philadelphia Eagles or New England Patriots. There’s a couple other ones later on, but I never wanted to explore those options. I was very happy where I was. Even going through the ups and downs, it was devastating not having more opportunities to play in the playoffs. But like, I mentioned earlier, the trade-offs were really good. I was able to raise my kids in the same place, in the same schools, every single year. I would be able to be very consistent in terms of my participation in their lives, and really had like a well-rounded experience throughout my entire professional career because I was able to stay in the same location. I was to be someone who’s dependable and reliable. And that meant a great deal to me. That meant a many great deal me. Yeah, it would have been nice to play with Aaron Rodgers or Tom Brady, for sure. I mean, you’re talking two of the greatest to ever do it in the game, right? But would I have been productive there? Would I have had the same impact? Who knows, you never know. I had a coach by the name of Tom Moore coach me for five years, and he used to always tell me the grass is not always greener on the other side. It’s usually greenish next to the septic tank, you know? So sometimes you got to go through a little [EXPLETIVE] for personal growth. And so, it’s true. I mean, I think, when you go through adverse situations, and you go through trials and tribulations, it builds, it calluses you. It makes you realize how difficult things have been. And I think that helps you not only for your professional career, but it helps you as you transition to whatever else you’re doing in life as well.

[MUSIC]

DG: When we spoke in 2022, Fitzgerald was thriving in his role on the Super Bowl host committee, getting ready for the big game to be played at the Cardinals’ home stadium in Glendale, Arizona. He leaned into being an ambassador for the region, excited by how much, like the Olympics, the World Cup, a Super Bowl would bring attention and economic growth to his home state.

LF: I feel like I’m in a position now, post-career, that I really can help people. You know, you look at the role that I have at the Super Bowl Host Committee, right? Like, really shed light on everything that we’re doing really well. And that might bring, you know, another three, four, five, six thousand people that come out and visit our state, like Arizona will be a great place to live. And that will be great to do that or work with my foundation to improve technology in underserved schools, right, or, you know, improve my business acumen or work on more affordable housing in the state of Arizona projects that we’re working on. So there’s a lot of different ways that I think you can be influential and helpful. And at the end of the day, like that’s where I want to really focus my attention on improvement of my state and the people around me.

DG: It sounds like the host committee role goes beyond the Super Bowl. It’s kind of like using a moment like this to catalyze things and kind of do whatever you possibly can to use the energy to help the community in all sorts of ways? It is not just about the Super Bowl.

LF: Yeah, I mean, the Super Bowl is the title wave that we’re all riding on, right? It’s 200 million people, 300 million people watching the game. And no other time outside of the Olympics, are you able to get that type of attention on your city, and so why wouldn’t you want to capitalize on showing everything that’s amazing about our state? You know, the great education, two wonderful state universities, all four sporting events, our rich heritage in our Native American communities. You know, it’s like a lot of wonderful things in the state, and then, you know, to be in the position that I am, like it’s, you know, we have to do a great job of showcasing it.

DG: Larry, it’s been an absolute pleasure. Thank you so much. It was great meeting you.

LF: Thank you. Good to meet you as well. Have a great day.

DG: Next time on Sports in America.

[THEME MUSIC]

ALYSA LIU: I love a good twist, you know what I mean? I love suspense, and it was very dramatic, and I felt like I was in a movie.

DG: The Winter Olympics are upon us, and as we look forward to the games in Milan, we sit down with world champion figure skater Alysa Liu, who has the potential to be the first American woman to medal in figure skating in more than 20 years. Can you believe that? But her journey to the international stage has been anything but easy.

AL: There were so many days where I would show up to the rink, and while warming up, I would just start uncontrollably crying.

DG: Like so many other star athletes, Alyssa essentially sacrificed her childhood to compete. It drove her to quit and forced her to reconsider everything about her life.

AL: I decided I would never compromise so much of myself to do something that I didn’t want to do. I would never do that again.

DG: We’re going to hear all about how Alysa found her way back to the ice. And we also want to hear from you, maybe your favorite Olympic underdog stories, maybe the best place to grab an espresso in Milan. Maybe that time you went off the wrong ski jump. Whatever it is, how about you drop us a line? You can write us at sportsinamerica@whyy.org, that’s sportsinamerica@whyy.org. dot org. Thanks, everybody. We’ll see you next time for more Sports in America.

[MUSIC]

DG: This is Sports in America. I’m your host, David Greene.

Our executive producers are Joan Isabella and Tom Garhsler.

Our senior producer is Michael Olcott. Our producer is Michaela Winberg, and our associate producer is Bibiana Correa.

Our engineer is Mike Villers. Our talent booker is Britt Kahn. Our tile artwork was created by Bea Walling.

Sports in America is a production of WHYY in Philadelphia and is distributed by PRX. Some of our interviews were originally created by Religion of Sports, with special thanks to Adam Schlossman. You can find Sports in America on Apple podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, the iHeartRadio app, you know, wherever you get your podcasts.

Oh, and just one quick reminder, new podcast episodes of the show drop every Thursday now. So Thursday is when you can expect the feed to update. Thanks so much for listening to Sports in America.

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Executive Producer: Tom Grahsler
Senior Producer: Michael Olcott
Producer: Michaela Winberg
Associate Producer: Bibiana Correa
Talent Booker: Britt Kahn
Engineer: Mike Villers
Tile Art: Bea Walling

Sports in America is a production of WHYY, distributed by PRX, and part of the NPR podcast network.

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